Development Of Oral Skills Research Articles

Tournament-Style Debate as a Natural Resources Education Technique

ABSTRACT Curricula in the natural resource professions are placing increased emphasis on course work dealing with the larger phil­osophical and value-related questions surrounding resource management. This development presents a challenge to instruc­tors, particularly in terms of encouraging active student involve­ment in such courses. The use of tournament debate format provides one useful means for fostering such involvement while also aiding in the development of oral communication skills. The authors' experience with the use of debate suggests that certain modifications to traditional debate format aid in its suc­cessful classroom use. A FORMIDABLE BARRIER to learning is created whenever a student views a course as merely a requirement with little intrinsic appeal or direct applicability to his or her future. Many students of the natural resource man­agement professions often view classes in policy and other related management and social sciences as irksome. They enthusiastically take on, however, field-oriented techni­cal courses such as dendrology, ornithology, or range plants. Classes that deal with larger philosophical ques­tions such as, Why manage a given parcel of land to achieve a particular end?, seem to many students as ab­stract and far removed from the daily activities of land management and hence of little interest. Yet a student's ability to analytically deal with these why questions is as crucial as the natural resource profession's struggle to redefine a niche in today's rapidly changing world (Gregg, 1992). The emergence of these why questions has resulted in greater emphasis in resource management curricula on topics such as policy, ethics, and the relationship of land management to the larger society and global ecosystem (Gilbert et aI., 1993). The problem remains, however, of how to teach these subjects while holding students' at­tention and stimulating interest. Natural resource edu­cators often find that many natural resource students are more comfortable and active in classes that grapple with questions of how to accomplish some goal rather than those concerned with why the goal exists at all. The how questions tend to be concrete, and students easily see their application to daily decisions. The why questions are more abstract and their specific relevance is less easily grasped.

Disarming the Hunter: Improving Administrative Writing in the Classroom

The teaching of writing within academic disciplines, known as writing across the curriculum (WAC), has gained momentum in traditional undergraduate programs. A recent teleconference featured WAC programs at UCLA, Clemson, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Prince George's Community College, Spelman College, and Robert Morris College (Issues, 1991). The call for incorporating writing skills within existing coursework has come from a variety of disciplines as well; specifically, in political science, Goodman and Lanser addressed this issue in 1987. They pointed out that writing is inseparable from the practice of political science (1987, 61), an observation that may be even more pertinent to those students who enter graduate -programs in public administration. This article, while concentrating on writing within public administration graduate programs, speaks to issues that concern all teachers whose students intend careers in public service. Agreement among those who teach and those who practice public administration seems to be clear: writing skills are important. The National Association of Schools of Public Administration and Affairs has included in its accreditation standards the expectation that MPA programs will graduate students who can write clearly. However, former presidential management interns revealed in a survey that, although they ranked communication skills as the most important component of their public administration education, they rated their programs as poor or very poor in providing written and oral skill development (Dennis 1984). Competent writing skills are not the exclusive concern of public administration education. In the natural sciences (Woodford 1967), concern for competent writing has been expressed. Private sector executives have complained about the lack of writing ability among recent graduates from business schools (Speck 1990). Management education has been criticized as emphasizing technical and quantitative skills over such

Prochievement Testing of Speaking

Today's language teacher emphasizes, among other things, the development of students' oral skills. Therefore, many teachers are seeking or innovating ways to test the speaking skill while (1) overcoming perennial problems such as the lack of time and the subjectivity of grading, and (2) finding effective ways of making achievement testing more proficiency oriented. The author presents a practical oral testing model which she researched, developed, implemented, disseminated, piloted, and refined in a variety of middle school, secondary, and university settings in Texas over the past six years.The author presents an outline of the principal considerations involved in establishing an oral testing program and covers a range of options under each heading. Major concerns discussed include: fitting speaking tests into the syllabus and course grade, linking teaching and testing approaches (with sample formats), testing interactive and individual performance, new versus old material, and impromptu versus prepared performance. Also covered are: sample size, scoring at various levels (with sample scales), partnering procedures, the role of tapes, scheduling, planning (with sample guide), and predicted outcomes.

Oral Form Discrimination in Normal 5- to 8-Year-Old Children: An Adjunct to an Eating Assessment

Presented here are two studies on the development of oral stereognostic skills as measured by an oral form discrimination task The first study describes stereognostic skills of children 5, 6, 7, and 8 years old; the second addresses the question of whether oral stereognostic abilities are correlated with oral-motor (chewing) skills (see pp. 211–223 of this issue). A total of 86 children participated in the first study. Fifty pairs of small, standardized plastic forms were administered to each child With vision occluded, the child identified each pair of forms as either “the same” or “different” The number of errors was computed for each age group. A significant age effect ( p < .004) was noted, with younger children (5 and 6 years) having more difficulty in correctly identifying forms of similar size than older children (7 and 8 years). No sex differences were found for any of the stereognostic skills measured A practice effect was seen only in 8-year-old children: They made significantly fewer errors ( p < .033) on the second than on the first half of the test. When 10 pairs of test items were presented a second time, the children were 73% consistent in their responses. It is concluded that specific aspects of oral stereognostic skills mature in children between 5 and 8 years of age. These measures will form part of an eating assessment that until now has focused only on the oral-motor aspects of eating development.

Literary Texts in the Classroom; A Discourse

methodology. In this country, literary readings have always been considered part of a human*istic education and have never really disappeared from the foreign language curriculum. They are still widely used in language classes, especially at the intermediate and advanced levels, and the discussion of literary texts is often part of the same syllabus as communication-oriented exercises for the development of oral skills. The two activities are, however, methodologically at odds with one another. For while communication exercises activate two-

The development of oral expression skills at first year university level

The development of oral expression skills at first year university level

The Development of Oral Skills for the Presentation of Technical Information

L'entrainement a l'expression orale s'impose comme une necessite pour les professeurs de disciplines techniques

An inquiry approach to science and language teaching

AbstractThe purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of an inquiry approach to science and language teaching to further develop classification and oral communication skills of bilingual Mexican American third graders. A random sample consisting of 64 subjects was selected for experimental and control groups from a population of 120 bilingual Mexican American third graders. The Solomon Four‐Group experimental design was employed. Pre‐ and posttesting was performed by use of the Goldstein‐Sheerer Object Sorting Test, (GSOST) and the Test of Oral Communication Skills, (TOCS). The experimental group participated in a sequential series of science lessons which required manipulation of objects, exploration, peer interaction, and teacher‐pupil interaction. The children made observations and comparisons of familiar objects and then grouped them on the basis of perceived and inferred attributes. Children worked individually and in small groups. Analysis of variance procedures was used on the posttest scores to determine if there was a significant improvement in classification and oral communication skills in the experimental group. The results on the posttest scores indicated a significant improvement at the 0.01 level for the experimental group in both classification and oral communication skills. It was concluded that participation in the science inquiry lessons facilitated the development of classification and oral communication skills of bilingual children.

The Reading Program and Oral Practice

The aim of the reading program at the secondary school level should be the further development of basic oral and reading skills in the study of good literature. 1 Although it is essential to read for accurate comprehension, teachers should avoid excessive grammatical analysis, word study, or translation. Teachers can make reading more purposeful by assigning provocative questions to students before their preparation of a reading passage. This procedure can lead to a sense of anticipation which encourages students to read more carefully. It is often wise to prepare students in class for reading a passage at home. Synonyms, antonyms, definitions, diagrams, and gestures can prepare the student for a more profitable and pleasurable reading assignment. Word study should be done only to help the student to understand, not as a goal in itself. The student might also be encouraged to listen to any available recording of the assigned passage as part of his preparation. He should, as well, prepare a list of new vocabulary items and mark the parts he finds difficult. Teachers should then give the student an opportunity to ask for clarification of difficulties, and through questioning assure themselves that the student has understood the assigned passage. Where available, visual aids to the comprehension of reading should be used : pictures, films, television, slides, films trips, projectuals.

The Reading Program and Oral Practice

The aim of the reading program at the secondary school level should be the further development of basic oral and reading skills in the study of good literature. 1 Although it is essential to read f...

Interaction Analysis in the Foreign Language Classroom

T HE last few years have seen considerable changes in the teaching of foreign languages both in England and the United States. With the development of a wide variety of new and interesting teaching materials, particularly visual ones, and an increasing tendency to base teaching on real situations, such as shopping, family life, travel and leisure, foreign language teachers have begun to devote much more of their lessons to the development of oral skills than was previously the case. It is not unusual to find classes of comparative beginners able to sustain simple conversations without strain, and many teachers deliberately build up to a situation where interaction for 10, 15, 20 minutes or longer will be entirely in the foreign language. Many teachers postpone any form of writing or reading in the early stages, and even those who introduce their classes to these skills from

The American Scene: The Development of Oral Skills

The American Scene: The Development of Oral Skills

The influence of selected home background variables on the development of oral communication skills in children.

One hundred forty-three preadolescent subjects and their parents took part in a study to determine the effects of certain home background variables on the development of speech and language skills. The children were evaluated on 40 speech and language measures by classroom teachers and by speech specialists. Findings indicated that (a) the children of permissive mothers achieved higher scores in language maturity; (b) parental demands were strongly related to general speaking ability as assessed by teachers; and (c) greater use of techniques of speech training in the home led to higher scores in general speaking ability as assessed by teachers.