Two Useful English Teaching Tips to Help Motivate Your EFL Language Learners to Speak in Class

Tired of Dialogues?
While we’ve been discussing some additional, unique ways of motivating your English as a foreign language or other foreign language learners to engage in oral discourse or speaking activities, here are two more ways you can use to deviate from the all-too-common “dialogues” so prevalent in today’s English and foreign language classes.

1. Give a Profile
Most people like to talk about themselves, fortunately or unfortunately – depending on the situation. You can then take advantage of this natural tendency to motivate your learners to speak in class, talking about themselves, their family, their friends or some other personal aspect which they’re willing to share. From a simple profile to a more extensive narrative, the field is open for their speaking practice. Just be sure to set time, language use or other constraints that may be necessary.

2. The “How to…”
Each of us as unique individuals has a distinct set of knowledge and skills. Another way to motivate our English language learners to speak is by encouraging them to explain how to do something that they may have a unique knowledge of or skill in doing. Can one of your learners paint, play chess or poker well, write computer programs or consistently win playing computer games? How about ride a horse, camel or elephant? Maybe fix cars or motorcycles, catch fish or train animals. Whatever special skill they might have, encourage them to talk about it just like the late radio and television actor Jack Webb (pictured above) used to do.

Allow Them to Choose

Using one of these formats, you can likely always get your English or foreign language learners to speak in class, provided you allow them to choose the format they prefer, you give them accurate, detailed guidelines on what is or is not acceptable for each format, and you allow them a reasonable amount of time to prepare. If possible, include some time to do a quick scan or review of their presentation before they present their material to help fine tune the work. This will bolster their confidence and help to minimize their fears of making serious mistakes in front of the other learners – their peers. Most learners are much more afraid of being “laughed at” or “mocked” by their peers than they are of you, the English teacher.

Try allowing oral discourse or speaking practice in your English or foreign language classes using a variety of different formats like these or others you may have in mind. By doing so you’ll probably have far fewer problems with getting your English language learners motivated to speak with more fluency in class.


Prof. Larry M. Lynch is an EFL Teacher Trainer, Intellectual Development Specialist, author and speaker. He has written ESP, foreign language learning, English language teaching texts and hundreds of articles used in more than 80 countries. Get your FREE E-books,"If you Want to Teach English Abroad, Here's What You Need to Know" or "7 Techniques to Motivate Your English Language Learners and Make Your Classes More Dynamic" by requesting the title you want at: lynchlarrym@gmail.com

Motivate Your English Language Learners Using Comedy, Anecdotes and Stories

Add These Suggestions to Your “Bag of Tricks”
Inherently, most people really do like to talk. That includes your English language learners too, although sometimes you have to literally pry the speech from their frozen lips by any means necessary. Have you tried using comedy, anecdotes, stories and fairy tales to lure them into speaking activities? If not, consider adding these five suggestions to your English or foreign language teaching “bag of tricks”.

1. Tell an Anecdote
Everyone has a personal store of humorous stories, happenings or anecdotes that they’re willing to tell. With learners and teachers alike, many of these might even originate in the EFL classroom. Family, friends, romantic interludes and vacation travels can also account for a number of these.

2. Tell a Story
In many countries there is a tradition of passing down stories, fables and history through a series of verbal sessions by “Griots”, or village story-tellers. Your learners may well a few of these they’re willing to share before the class. Why not open up this option to them? There’s no problem either, with using a few small, well-chosen props to aid in the story telling exercise.

3. Narrate a Fable
It’s not only children who love stories, fairy tales and fables. Whether the origin is European, African, Latin American or Asian, your learners can try their hand at relating a well-known, or not so well-known, story or fable they know. If it originates from a local culture, it could be quite interesting for you too and is an excellent way to help to delve more deeply into the local or national culture.

4. Re-Tell a Fairy Tale
The most popular fairy tales, in practically any country, are often ones you heard or learned as a child. Allow your English language learners to try their hand at telling or re-telling these fairy tales in English using their own words, idioms, expressions and language skills to do so. They needn’t stick to the “original” version either. A change of endings, modified characters and plot twists are most welcome, thank you very much.

5. Tell a Joke
Who doesn’t enjoy humor? Everyone knows a few good jokes or a joker or two who can give you a few good jokes to tell. Go onto the internet for a slew of these. Check out your local library for collections of riddles, jokes and humorous stories that might be used to stimulate speaking practice in English class. Did you hear the one about …

So if you haven’t tried using comedy, anecdotes, stories and fairy tales to lure your English language learners and reluctant students into speaking activities consider adding these five suggestions to your English or foreign language teaching “bag of tricks”. Remember, if you have any further questions, comments or assistance, just e-mail me. I’ll be happy to help.


Prof. Larry M. Lynch is an EFL Teacher Trainer, Intellectual Development Specialist, author and speaker. He has written ESP, foreign language learning, English language teaching texts and hundreds of articles used in more than 80 countries. Get your FREE E-books,"If you Want to Teach English Abroad, Here's What You Need to Know" or "7 Techniques to Motivate Your English Language Learners and Make Your Classes More Dynamic" by requesting the title you want at: lynchlarrym@gmail.com

Four Terrific Ways to Motivate Your English Language Learners to Speak in Class

Getting English Language Learners to Speak in Class

If the attitude of your English language learners is anything at all like mine, you need to provide some stimulation or motivation to get them to speak or give any extended oral discourse in English in class. Fear of peer criticism or fear of “making stupid mistakes” along with a decided lack of extensive speaking practice in English are three key factors which contribute to English learners’ reluctance to speak aloud in class. The same holds true with any other foreign language which the students might be learning. To help with this, I often assign or allow learners to prepare oral discourses using a number of different formats. This way, learners can get additional speaking practice using a format they feel more comfortable with.

Here Are Four Useful Speaking Practice Formats
The ten most useful formats I’ve found to aid in motivating my EFL learners to speak in English class are the following:

1. Reciting Poetry
Learners of English or any other foreign language just love poetry in many of its forms. Even Rap is a rhyming, poetic form of sorts. Though you might not have a taste for the late Tupac Shakur (pictured above) you should be able to find something useful. Your learners can be of help with this too. Give them a selection of poets, rap artists, literary works from which to choose or allow them to come up with something on their own and it’s a sure hit.

2. Reading Aloud
Any prose text from an encyclopedia listing to an article excerpt could prove to be useful for reading aloud. A short passage from any favorite story, novel, article or other written form of authentic English will do just fine, especially if pre-selected by the learner. Remember, these need not be lengthy. An oral discourse or reading lasting not more than two to three minutes is more than enough to make a start.

3. Giving a Narrative
A speech excerpt, a newspaper piece, wholly or in part, an essay or review given as a narrative is frequently a good choice made by the learners. An oral discourse of as little as two or three minutes will often suffice for extensive English speaking practice. Treading should be done though, with gestures and expressiveness to highlight, emphasize and lend focus to key parts of the narrative.

4. Performing a Soliloquy
With access to a play, or a screen play from Shakespeare’s “To be or not to be, that is the question…” to contemporary works, even dialogue from popular movies will often spark interest in the learners to “perform” a speaking activity in front of the class. Scenes from the “Dirty Harry” film series are perennial favorites. But lots of other film scenes and many other film genres get equal time too.

A true plethora of ways exist to help motivate your English language learners to speak with more frequency and fluency in class. These four will get you started. We’ll be examining some additional options for motivating English or other foreign language learners to speak as we continue in this theme in upcoming articles.


Prof. Larry M. Lynch is an EFL Teacher Trainer, Intellectual Development Specialist, author and speaker. He has written ESP, foreign language learning, English language teaching texts and hundreds of articles used in more than 80 countries. Get your FREE E-books,"If you Want to Teach English Abroad, Here's What You Need to Know" or "7 Techniques to Motivate Your English Language Learners and Make Your Classes More Dynamic" by requesting the title you want at: lynchlarrym@gmail.com

Using Insightful Poetry in English as a Foreign Language Classes

The Poem Analyzed and Explained

In the post entitled, “A Perfect English Writing Lesson”, we looked at writing exercises which promoted production of authentic language in English as a foreign language (EFL) learners. An alternate writing exercise consisting of writing a poem about the city, region or country where the learner lives was also broached. The following poem was an example.


“The Feria de Cali”

Waves of December heat
are here to meet and greet
those “Gringos” who dare
our Feria to share,
while dancing to a Salsa beat.

Parades of slender, bronzed beauties abound,
as classic antique cars are found

In ten days the Feria ends
with sugar cane sweet tastes
and aguardiente-filled friends

You’ll sadly leave less heavy
than a pink and green ’57 Chevy.


Admittedly, Shakespeare it’s not, but the poetry writing process worked for the learners.
This poem is actually more insightful that it first appears though. It is based on featured activities of the annual Cali Festival held in Cali, Colombia.


Stanza Types

The stanzas shift between three verse grouping types.

Couplet – two lines that rhyme one after the other, as in this excerpt:

“Parades of slender, bronzed beauties abound,
as classic antique cars are found“

Tercet – three lines that can rhyme in different ways as in this excerpt:

“In ten days the Feria ends
with sugar cane sweet tastes
and aguardiente-filled friends”


The first stanza (poem paragraph) has a mixed rhyming pattern of AABBA where the first and second lines rhyme, the third and fourth lines rhyme and the last (fifth) line rhymes with the first and second lines.

The Cali Festival is held for ten days, from December 22nd to January 2nd. “Gringos” refers to the predominance of North American visitors to Colombia with Cali generally being referred to as the “Capital of Salsa music”. Beauty pageants are held throughout most of Colombia’s 32 departments prior to the November crowning of “Miss Colombia”. Beauty Queens then reign over a variety of events for the ensuing year. Miss Valle del Cauca presides over the festivities during Cali’s Festival and those of other towns in this department.

The region around Cali is known for its sugar cane fields. The juice from sugar cane is used to produce a clear, rum distillate called “aguardiente” or “hard water”. It takes notoriously little of this strong liquor to intoxicate even the sturdiest of souls. Finally, due to the free-flowing food and liquor most people pack on not less than a few “unwanted” pounds during the festival season.

If you’d like to brush up just a bit on your poetry writing skills, please see the two additional articles, “How to Evoke Imagery, Emotions and Ideas in Writing Poetry That Captures Your Readers Imagination2 and “How to Write Poems That Capture the Heart and Imagination of Your Readers” to help get you and your English language learners started.


Prof. Larry M. Lynch is an English language teaching and learning expert author and university professor in Cali, Colombia. For more information on entering into or advancing in the fascinating field of ELT send for his no-cost pdf Ebook, “If You Want to Teach English Abroad, Here’s What You Need to Know”, send an e-mail with "free ELT Ebook" in the subject line. For comments, questions, requests, to receive more information or to be added to his free TESOL articles and teaching materials mailing list, e-mail: lynchlarrym@gmail.com

A “Perfect” English Writing Lesson

Reading, Writing, Listening, Speaking

If your English as a Foreign Language learners are anything like mine, then many of them don’t like to write in English. But since we wish to empower our foreign language learners with all four of the basic language skills, writing needs to be included in our class lessons. So, how can writing be introduced in such a way as to inspire interest and facility to our EFL classes - that is the question.

One approach that has worked for me is to have my EFL learners write a “travel” piece about the city, region or foreign country we are living in. This exercise is usually called something like, “A Perfect Day in Bogota”. For a longer written piece or an assignment, you could use, “Three Perfect Days in Barcelona” or “A Perfect Week in Quito” or wherever it is that you live.

Generally, learners love to brag about their city. By allowing them to boast about their favorite activities and places in the city, you can not only get them to write with enthusiasm, but glean some insight into their personal likes and preferences. I’ve even gotten more than a few “hot tips” on unique places or events that eventually panned out into some of my own haunts.


Procedure at a Glance

The learners write a description of their favorite local hotels, restaurants or places to eat, interesting sites to visit, unique slants on local festivals, holidays and other events. Preferred night clubs or discos, and types of music along with days and times to go, help to round out the writing.

Instead of insisting on a particular “format” or style, I’ve found it useful to allow a variety of expression in this area. Learners can use “bullet points”, narratives, essays or advert-style formats and writing. Depending on the level of the learners, I may precede the writing lesson with a class on order of adjectives, paragraph structure, the basic five-paragraph essay or a brief study and analysis of travel ads and travel articles or columns from an English language newspaper.


To Be or Not To Be

For a different type of approach, your English language learners could write a poem about their city, region or country. Often these prove to be both insightful and humorous.

Consider this slightly “tongue-in-cheek” example:


“The Feria de Cali”

Waves of December heat
are here to meet and greet
those “Gringos” who dare
our Feria to share,
while dancing to a Salsa beat.

Parades of slender, bronzed beauties abound,
as classic antique cars are found

In ten days the Feria ends
with sugar cane sweet tastes
and aguardiente-filled friends

You’ll sadly leave less heavy
than a pink and green ’57 Chevy.


Okay, so Shakespeare it’s not, but the poetry writing process worked for the learners.

The next time you’d like to “squeeze in” a bit more writing into your English class, try a variation of these ideas. You may be more than pleasantly surprised at the attitude of the learners and what they ultimately produce. Don’t forget to read aloud and post the more interesting examples. If you give the writing as an out-of-class assignment, your learners can include photos, graphics and perhaps “realia” in their writing as well.


Prof. Larry M. Lynch is an English language teaching and learning expert author and university professor in Cali, Colombia. For more information on entering into or advancing in the fascinating field of ELT send for his no-cost pdf Ebook, “If You Want to Teach English Abroad, Here’s What You Need to Know”, send an e-mail with "free ELT Ebook" in the subject line. For comments, questions, requests, to receive more information or to be added to his free TESOL articles and teaching materials mailing list, e-mail: lynchlarrym@gmail.com