Tips for a good dialogue

It will help both yourself and your partner if you work together collaboratively on this task.

1. Turn taking: Be prepared to ask your partner for his or her opinion rather than simply stating your own. Respect the turns in the conversation: don´t speak for too long – let your partner do his/her turn. Be positive, helpful and supportive with your partner. 
Remember: balanced dialogues! If one person speaks a lot and the other doesn’t speak much, that will be bad for both people, so avoid it. If someone is quiet, do something! Invite him or her to speak, e.g. You’re very quiet (smile) What do you think about all this? / What would you do? / Do you like the idea?

2. Listen 'actively' to what your partner says, responding to comments he or she makes. Use little signals to show that that you are following: 
"Oh, I see./ That´s right./Yes, I understand./ Oh, yes, I love that. / That's annoying. / Sure."
"I see/know what you mean."
"Really? That´s interesting."
"What do you mean by .......?"  "So, what you are saying is that ........?" (to clarify the information, when you don´t understand an idea)

3. If you don't understand someone's English, relax and try to notice the words that are most clearly pronounced or stressed. You can also ask them to repeat, or, even better, you can ask specific questions to get a specific word you need to reconstruct their message (communicate!) – in this way you wouldn’t make the person repeat it all, just the part you really need to understand to continue. Use your knowledge of the world and your info about the activity to do so.

4. For more functional expressions for interaction in a dialogue (for expressing opinion, agreeing and disagreeing, making a suggestion etc), click to download a LIST OF USEFUL PHRASES FOR INTERACTION

5. Try to bring the discussion to a consensus (though it´s not always possible) . Or you can try to summarize by repeating the main points briefly:
So, we'll be getting some clothes for Peter, then. We'll meet next Friday afternoon to go shopping and you will call Mary to ask her if she wants to share expenses with us. Is that right?
So, there are more sides to this topic than I could think of! It's been an interesting discussion!

6. Practice timing yourselves (in small groups or in pairs) to get the feeling of how long developing all the suggested ideas takes.

7. More things:
Useful language for organizing events, helping people and pros and cons of options
Beginning a dialogue

Communicative strategies: Asking for words

Tips for a good monologue

GATHERING USEFUL LANGUAGE:

1. Read or watch some materials on a similar topic before you start. Gather Useful Language ( words, expressions, whole sentences, ideas) on the topic. Use texts+ audios+ videos from the current course book + previous coursebooks/ notebooks +class blog etc. 

2. Brainstorm on the grammar you want to use, to make your range richer: e.g. different verbal tenses, modal verbs, adjectives (also -ing/-ed adjs.), conditionals, I wish+regrets, phrasal verbs etc.

* later, we can organize the topics in a list: you can also find topic labels on the right toolbar of this blog 

PREPARATION:

1. DON´T WRITE DOWN the complete text of your mon. You have to learn to develop a topic just from an OUTLINE (notes: main ideas and key words). This exercise will also teach you to learn to speak freely, not just read aloud. For example, you can use two sheets of paper: one for your OUTLINE and another for USEFUL LANGUAGE. 

2.  If you use audios as models, LISTEN AND REPEAT TO (bits from) AUDIOS which you can include in your mon. 

3.  Practice/ practise  the mon. several times: by reading aloud your notes or listen and repeat to the model audio. 

4. Record and listen to yourself at home 
-  record yourself doing the monologue samples from the Exam Practice handouts: respect the timing: 4-6 min. and the 3 points to talk about

ORGANIZATION:

1. Structure your talk around an INTRODUCTION, MAIN BODY AND CONCLUSION.

2. SIGNPOST YOUR TALK to help the audience or the examiners follow your train of thought, but be careful not to abuse the signposting formulas! They help you organize your talk, but a good monologue needs ¨substance¨, not lots of formulas and no meaning! 

SIGNPOSTING LANGUAGE EXAMPLES: Let me tell you something about/ I´d like to talk  about…/ I’m going to speak/talk about… To begin with.../ So, let’s start with…/ Let me start by (saying that.../ telling you about...) Now, let´s go on with… Finally I’ll tell you something about… There are 3 things I´d like to tell you about/ we have to take into account/ to consider: First(ly)…Second(ly)…Third(ly)…Finally... It´s also important that.../ Another( idea) is to... Last but not least... Now, moving on.../ And now something about.../Now let´s look at... To conclude/ In conclusion... To sum up… As you can see.../ As we (all) know.../As I said before... For instance/ For example... I´ll / Let me give you an example (from my personal life)... Rhetorical questions: So, what does this mean? / What do we learn from this?

3. You can also use discourse markers: by the way, actually, anyway, basically, in other words, on the one hand/ on the other hand, as I was saying, I mean  etc ( see Grammar Bank Unit 3B: English File Advanced)

DELIVERY:
1. Remember to speak clearly and not too fast - the examiners or the audience have to follow and understand the talk easily, without straining their ears. Pronounce clearly, don´t mumble!

2. Sometimes you need to simplify some thoughts/ ideas/ long and complicated sentences for the sake of delivering the message clearly. Remember that in an exam, in most cases, less is more.

3. Don´t try to translate 100% of what you can say in your mother tongue- rather think about how to express the ideas in English with the vocabulary/ grammar that you know and you can use confidently. Be careful with word-for-word translations!

Speaking file: how to record yourself

Steps to follow to record yourself doing a monologue:

1. Prepare an OUTLINE of the mon. ( ideas, key words, useful language, don´t write the whole text)

2. At home, once you feel you’ve improved in the process of putting together your text, AFTER you’ve been listening to model audios, reading out loud (from your notes) or listening and repeating (just to train and improve your fluency and accuracy), once you have created your OUTLINE and have practiced/practised creating your spoken text, try recording yourself * and listening to yourself.

* To record yourself at home you can use vocaroo.

1. Click to record /ricórd/.

2. Click “Allow”.

3. It’s recording! (if you computer micro is set to being able to record your voice as you speak to it!).

4. Click to stop when you want to stop.

5a. Click on Listen to listen to yourself.

5b. Click on Retry if you want to trash that recording and start again.

5c. Click here to save (it’s just below the two previous tabs). And now a box of Sharing options appears: in tiny script you’ll see “Download as mp3”. Download it to your computer. You need to have a folder ready in your computer. (What about the http address you can see?. It works for a few months. Then the audios are deleted. You can also delete it once you download the mp3 file by clicking “Delete now”)

3. Listen to yourself :

·       Are you using enough useful language (vocabulary and grammar)?

·       Are you speaking clearly enough?

·       Is your talk easy to follow? Are you using (but not exaggerating with) signaling expressions?

·       Can you spot any grammar, vocabulary or pronunciation mistakes?

4. When you are ready share your monologue in class.

5. Example: A MONOLOGUE ABOUT TECHNOLOGY: after listening to a MODEL AUDIO

-  Listen to Joel talking about technology when he was a kid and nowadays (parts 1 and 2). Part 3 here.

-  Listen again, stop after each sentence and repeat, just to practise/practice pronunciation and fluency .
-  Prepare an OUTLINE for a similar monologue (adapt to your situation)

-  Record yourself while you are giving a similar talk where you compare the technology you are using today to that you were using when you were a kid.  

Book reviews by students (2): non-fiction

Book review: How to be Danish                                                             by Julian (course 15-16)

“How To Be Danish”, first published in 2012, is written by Patrick Kingsley, a journalist and foreign correspondent for The Guardian. The book is in fact a series of interconnected essays, focusing both on the tremendous changes that Denmark as a country and the Danes as a society have undergone in a mere two decades and a half – which is, from a historical perspective, a very short period of time – and the challenges that lie ahead. The author looks into almost each and every aspect of Danish life, amongst others the international – and somewhat unexpected – huge success of the TV series The Killing which was followed in its home country by an amazingly consistent 40% of the population. Denmark’s “extraordinary culinary revival” is also extensively covered, as it is Copenhagen’s “Noma”, which has been rated as the best restaurant in the world for several years in a row. He also writes in detail, with understandable appreciation, about the breath and width of the Danish social services network, encompassing childcare, healthcare and education, which are all completely free, including university education and most of its living costs, and the very peculiar “folke” schools, open to everyone regardless of age and life experience, which focus on Humanities. This was certainly my favourite part of the book, as reality in Denmark, today, seems to prove that it is possible to devise and operate, successfully, such a generous social benefits system. “Students aren’t seen as a burden on the state, but as people whose skills will one day support it,” writes the author. “They’re future participants in Danish life, and they’re treated as such.” However, Kingsley is not oblivious to the many current and foreseeable challenges Denmark faces: on the one hand, demographic issues– an increase in the number of pensioners coupled with a decrease of tax collection; on the other hand, integration issues – it is challenging not only for recently arrived immigrants, but also for second generation ones to fit the “Danish norm”. Although the scope of the book is not vast but small, Kingsley succeeds in portraying the quality and complexity of life in Denmark with a fresh perspective and a reporter’s sharp insight. It is an easy, enlightening and highly recommended read.