Introduction
In recent years Odisha has become a hub of technical educational institutions. The focus in these institutions is the development of technical skills. However, it has also been observed that mere technical expertise does not ensure employability. Good communication skills are required to succeed in the profession. Hence, an attempt is being made to impart communication skills to technical students. The participation of students in English language classroom, however, is not very encouraging. There are various reasons for this, like low confidence level, stage fear, improper exposure to the target language, low enthusiasm level, and less practice of language skills etc. Moreover, most of the English language classrooms in this state are teacher-centered and the participation of the students in the classroom is very low. Reading text books and listening to lectures do not make learning meaningful. To overcome these difficulties, teachers can introduce various activity-based language learning like, Role plays, group discussions, simulations, language games and dramas etc. in the language classrooms. This study will examine the effectiveness of using one of the language learning activities like Role play as a tool to promote language development. There are many types of instructional techniques. The focus of this study is to understand to what extent role-plays help in promoting language development.
Role Play as a language learning activity
Role play is a very useful technique in learning communication skills, because it gives the learner an opportunity to practice communicating in different social contexts and in different social roles. Role play provides students an amicable atmosphere to learn the speaking skills in...
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...some suggestions for the language teachers. The teachers of English at engineering colleges should encourage the students towards learning speaking skill and explain its usefulness. They should use the effective techniques for developing their speaking skill. Role play is one of the most effective techniques that is cost free and easy to conduct in regular classroom. Teachers should make arrangements in the classroom for the role play performances.
References
Ladousse, G.P. (1987). Role play. Oxford University Press, USA.
Larsen- Freeman, D. (2000). Techniques and Principles in Language Teaching. Oxford University Press, USA
Robinson, P.G. (1981). Role playing and Class Participation. English Language Teaching Journal, 35(4), 384-86
Blatner, Adam.(1995). Drama in Education as Mental Hygiene: A Child Psychiatrist’s Perspective. Youth Theatre Journal, 9, 92-96.
The scripted role-play assisted me in building my confidence in talking to patients. It helped me practice on my communications skills. Also, it gave me a general idea of what type of patients that I may encounter in practice. This exercise helped me in a way that I can reflect on my actions. It help me identify the areas I need to improve on such as: my posture during assessment with the client, body language, and avoiding words that was being said repeatedly for example the word “uhhm”.
The word play cannot be easily defined because it always depends on the contexts and the contexts also vary. There are different forms of play such as fantasy play, free flow play, constructive play, imaginative play, role play, socio-dramatic play, structured play, pretend play and heuristic play. These forms of play are categorised as “Play as learning”, and “Play as Practice” (Macintyre 2001:6). Moyles (2005), states that it is quite adverse that the phrase play has numerous meanings, and this makes parents to be wary of it. Meckley (2002) in his framework suggests that all different types of play involves varieties of activities and behaviours which results in diverse developmental and learning outcomes. Research suggest that the means to spoken language development in children’s brain is hearing language consistently because it is as a result of this that they would be able to speak (Brotherson,2005).There are evidences that toddlers who experienced talking with their mothers when they were infants have advanced vocabularies and a firm foundation for future communication. Snow (1997) claims that children who are deprived of language experiences at age four encounter a breach which barely expands over the school years. Claxton (1984) defined play as a method and approach which offer learning culture in which children’s fundamental learning needs can be met. He argued that these needs include the chance to communicate, question, interact with others and be part of a wider social experience in which flexibility, lenience and self –discipline are crucial. Moreover, different typ...
It involves rather complex and high concepts for children to understand; its complexity requires children to set the scene, make it understandable to others, use appropriate interaction with each character and provide methods of problem solving (Wood and Attfield, 2005). The work of Smilansky (1990) demonstrates the complexities in socio-dramatic play, these are: organisation, planning, integrating, reasoning and collaborating. Singer and Singer (1990) also claim that children develop areas of learning, such as: deeper language; divergent thought; self-entertainment; emotional expressiveness and self-awareness. Drummond and Pollard (1998) believe that the main area of learning whilst playing a role requires children to have enough intellectual knowledge about the appropriate behaviour of the role, which is being taken on; therefore children have to control themselves and learn new approaches to concepts. Children also use metacommunicative and metacognitive skills as they go in and out of play, according to Sawyer (2003), in order to clarify reality and pretend play. When children organise this type of play, they may recall what has happened previously, in terms of characters and plot. They must negotiate and communicate with each other in order to sort out the play frames and characters (Singer and Singer,
The greatest advantage of using radio in the classroom is that large number of learners can assemble around one receiver. Besides, it is an easily accessible and affordable tool in India even at schools in rural areas. Apart from this, the broad casts may be recorded and played in the classroom or the periods of English can be adjusted with the
5). One of the most popular centers in our classrooms is the Dramatic Play Center. When parents and other individuals visit our classroom, they sometimes fail to see the importance of this center and mainly see a play area with a kitchen for the children. The Dramatic Play Center has so much valuable instruction embedded within the center. The Dramatic Play Center helps children learn to socialize, imagine, explore, as well as use words, write, and extend their vocabulary to new words and topics embedded in the endless possibilities of themes in this center (Ihmeideh, 2015, p.
In role-playing, the students represent the experiences known as the characters. According to Zenobia (2012), role-playing is an effective strategy for gaining competency and develop reasoning. Educators should have embraced role playing because it is an innovative approach to teaching and can meet student’s needs. Moreover, role-playing can help the learners to increase their communication skills with patients and facilitate cultural awareness. The only barrier to this instructional strategy is stage fright. On the other hand, one positive to role-playing is it offers instant feedback to the
A major proportion of class time is taken up by teachers talking in front of the classroom(Nunan & Bailey, 2009). No matter what teaching strategies or methods a teacher uses, it is necessary to give directions, explain activities and check students’ understanding (Richards & Schimdt, 1985). This clearly emphasizes the importance of teacher talk in language classrooms. Walsh (2011) claimed that teacher talk is more important in language classroom than any other classroom since in this context the language being used by teacher is not only the means of acquiring new knowledge; it is also the goal of the study.
The use of drama and play techniques in therapeutic situations has always intrigued me. The opportunity to experience a drama therapy course was too much for me to miss. Although my daughter is in the drama therapy program, I was not prepared for the weekend workshop. According to the course title the subject would be about how to create a playful connection with the therapist. I assumed that I would learn how to use play and specific techniques in a therapeutic setting. Although I was exposed to some play techniques, the course lacked a foundation for therapists who are not already grounded in the creative arts. Lacking even a minimal theoretical background left me wondering what, as a marriage and family therapist I could ethically use in my practice.
The fact that the child begins to do theater does not mean that he will become an actor. Children, in children's theater, do not do theater or learn theater. They play to create, invent and learn to participate and collaborate with the group . The children's theater classes are therapeutic and socializing. Group work, psychomotor exercises and physical contact between classmates are the basis of dramatic education. The theater is an inexhaustible field of fun and education at the same time . To the smallest, the theater should not be restricted to the representation of a show. Children's theater is not about promoting and creating stars, but it must be seen as an experience that is acquired through the game
Long, M, H. & Doughty, C, J. ( Eds.).(2009). The Handbook of Language Teaching. Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
Regarding the immense significance of speaking to the learners, teachers have tried to employ unusual techniques and teaching procedures to assist learners master this skill, one of which is task-based language teaching (TBLT). Various investigators stress the significance of task-based approaches over communicative instruction in which teachers and learners feel freer to discover their own practices to exploit communicative effectiveness (Gass& Crookes, 1993; cited in Skehan, 1996). Task-based L2 performance is an attractive subject in itself and requires more experiential examination, but as tasks are extensively employed in language teaching methods and also language examination, knowing more about their efficacy could have convenient worth (Tavakoli& Foster, 2008).
In most institutions of learning today, the classes are made up of students from different ethnic backgrounds. These have different traditions and also speak different languages. In a typical classroom, the majority of the students will speak the same language. The teacher must then employ strategies which will accommodate all the students in the class. This will ensure that every learner gets the best quality of education. This will enable them to be better prepared for career and expressing themselves. In this paper, strategies to assist learners of the English language in their literal development for third grade learners. In the paper, three strategies that can be used by the teacher will be discussed. New strategies and research that will help the English language learners to gain in depth mastery of the language will also be discussed. Due to the widespread learning of the English language in most schools, addressing issues of the language learners is of vital importance. Teachers should have the understanding that cultures are what give someone identity and therefore no student should leave their culture for another. Instead, there should be the blending of different cultures so that students can appreciate and learn from each other.
To facilitate or participate in any classroom activities requires the use of oral language. Talk is significantly important because "language that is heard must be understood before the language that is read can be decoded and understood" (McCandlish, 2012, pg. 9). Specifically, Halliday (1975) categorised language into seven different functions each with its own purpose, allowing students to comprehend that language like writing has different genres and can be formal or informal, depending on the audience, context or purpose.
English language has been rated as one of the most important international languages nowadays. It has been found at primary levels around the world. Teaching English as a foreign language is not an easy task and need a lot of hard work, especially for young learners. However, starting earlier is not the solution for producing better English speakers. EFL teachers of young learners have to follow some strategies and techniques to understand and teach young learners better. YL Students who aged 5-12 can not spend two or three hours sitting on chairs and listening to teachers lectures as adults do. They lose interest more quickly and less able to keep motivated on tasks for long time because these students have short attention spans and are easily distracted. YL Students will be usually learning very basic material but a skillful teacher has to design creative lessons that get students attention and participation during the class, such as moving around and speaking with one another. Interacting with each other improves their communication skills and even building confidence in using the language. In addition, young learners are generally very enthusiastic at this level about songs and games. In order to encourage everyone to participate, it is important to include your sessions with different types of songs and active games to make the lessons relaxed and fun. The teacher should be able to create different activities to encourage and activate students that everyone can enjoy learning in.
This article is based around the 5 elements for effective oral language instruction; they are useful information that teaches about the development of oral language in a classroom. These five components focus on these concepts to: 1. Develop listening & speaking skills, which are instructions to develop students ability to listen and speak well. From this children develop conversational skills which will influence how they interact with others; this will also increase their vocabulary, and also help develop strategies. An example that a teacher could use is "questioning technique" where they give the student time to think of their answer. 2. Teach a Variety of spoken texts, which teaches about 7 functions of oral language. For the student to be able develop understanding they have to be taught the different types of oral languages. 3. Create a language learning environment, this teaches about 3 elements of importance in a supportive classroom suitable for learners where they will feel safe and nurtured. Students will have their own way of learning, so as a teacher it is important to value students and their style of learning. This may be physically, culturally and also so that communication is happening at all times in the classroom environment. 4. Teach and extend vocabulary and concep...