The British Academy

How writing can help your speaking (aimed at intermediate / advanced level students)

In the natural process of learning a language, speaking usually precedes writing. Indeed, at The British Academy our method is based on getting students speaking knowing that writing will follow.

Everyone knows that in order to become a better speaker of a foreign language one must practice speaking it. “The more you speak, the better a speaker you become” is true, but I’m sure we all know people who talk a lot and don’t really communicate very much. What is often overlooked is that the quality of the message plays an important but often neglected part in the process of language acquisition. By quality I’m not referring to the grammatical correctness of the message but to its meaning.

Most of us who have acquired a second language are aware of a strategy that we use semi-consciously when speaking in the new language in which we ease the difficulty of expressing a particular idea or concept by articulating the closest approximation to it that will allow us to maintain the flow of our speech. In other words, we sacrifice some of the message for the sake of a fluent transmission of the message. We find ourselves making compromises at times by articulating a somewhat simplified version of our intended message and presenting it as though it were the message itself because most conversations demand immediate adequate replies. The problem is that many of us begin to accept our “compromises” as our actual intended messages. We allow ourselves these weak, poorly articulated messages particularly in the second and third languages that we speak.

As “compromised” messages in a target language become habitual, we grow accustomed to a lower quality of communication than we are actually capable of. We get by, but we live with the vague awareness that what we say does not really represent what we mean and who we are.

How is it possible to avoid this lapse into “compromised” messages and instead concentrate on improving the quality of the message in English? First of all the importance of quality communication needs to be recognized. We think of “quality communication” as the transmission of important, stimulating ideas and concepts in precise and powerful language. Intermediate and above students who have followed a conversation based course have already acquired most of the techniques of superficial conversation and often feel that they have reached a “plateau”. They feel they are no longer improving their conversational abilities at the rate that they did in the earlier stages of their study. Just doing a lot of speaking, using the patterns and techniques that they already know, has probably ceased to give them the feeling that they are learning.

At this stage in a student’s development writing has been found to be able to play a great role in a student’s progress toward learning quality conversation. The act of writing is necessary at this stage to improve speaking. Writing can temporarily “freeze” the message during the process of its transmission so that the writer is able to refine it and “sculpt” it until it reflects the intended meaning of the writer with a degree of precision far greater than that of the initial, more spontaneous utterance. In fact, most writers are aware that they often “discover” the intended meanings of their discourse in the process of composing.

Speaking does not offer the same kind of exploration, discovery, and precise articulation that writing does for a number of reasons. Often, the social context of a conversation works against quality communication. The focus of a conversation frequently shifts so there is little chance of exploring ideas in any depth or with any degree of precision. In many conversational situations, people tend to avoid talking about their differences of opinion instead of exploring them. However, when people are encouraged to develop their opinions in a systematic manner in writing, they are able to present a reasonable and interesting position. Often speakers in conversation feel that it is more important to convey an impression of confidence and self-assurance than to express important thoughts in their complexity with grace and precision.

Quality conversation is an art, one that can be learned through writing. Of the various modes of discourse, we find that narration and argumentation can be most helpful to the student who wants to improve the quality of her or his conversation. Everyone has stories to tell, opinions to share, and comments about life to make, but few people actually take the time or have the occasion to articulate their ideas effectively.

A very effective exercise that you can do at home to help improve the quality of your English is called “free writing”. It involves writing about a personal experiences, opinions, comments about life, stories, creating scenes, write about “turning points” in your lives, but not worrying about punctuation, grammar, spelling, sentence structure, looking up words, what time it is, erasing, etc. This frees you to let the creative ideas flow from your head to your hands and on to the paper. Before beginning think about the experience for a few minutes to have some ideas, then simply write continuously for 20 to 30 minutes. When finished, read your paper out loud (not worrying about mistakes at the stage). Think about what other people might say in response to your piece of writing – and how you would defend or explain further your ideas. Then give what you’ve written to your teacher to correct (a good teacher won’t mind the fact that they hadn’t asked you to do it as homework!). When you get the corrected version back try writing it again, correcting your mistakes, adding some higher level vocabulary, grammar and expressions, any further ideas you’ve had etc. and again give it to your teacher to correct asking your teacher to change any parts that don’t sound so natural, or if he/she can think of some higher level vocabulary that could have been used. Then finally what remains is for you to do is have a discussion with someone in English about your experience and try to make use of all the higher level vocabulary, structures etc that you’ve been using in your writing and indeed continue to use those structures, vocabulary etc in other conversations that you have in the future.

As a result of these writing-to-speaking exercises, our students are able to increase their active vocabulary rapidly, learning the words and constructions they need to express their own particular view and experiences. Instead of simplifying strive to say precisely what you mean.

Jeanette Sawyer Rodrigues – The British Academy