Monday, November 28, 2011

Need Practice? Try An English Speaking Course Online

By Mark Spolsky


The internet has completely revolutionized the future of learning like never before. Many courses and programs are now diverting from traditional, classroom methods of delivery to semi or completely online modules. As English continues to gain global importance as the worldwide recognized lingua franca, communicative competence in English is extremely important for business, travel, professional and academic purposes. Out of the four linguistic skills, speaking is the only linguistic skill that requires practice with a native or near native speaker for improvement. The rest of the skills, reading, writing, and to a considerable extent listening, can all be learnt and practiced without actual interaction with a native speaker. Thankfully, a wide variety of English speaking course online allow non-native English learners to practice with native speakers.

How Online English Courses Work

English courses use online technology in conjunction with the world wide web. The global community is small and the internet facilitates communication between countries and communities like never before. Learning English with native English speakers can be effective and easy regardless of where the student and teacher actually live. There are lots of English native instructors that offer private lessons in English and conversation classes using Skype as well as webcams for live conversations with non-native English learners. There are also companies and schools that actually employ native speakers to teach conversation classes, using advanced software and classroom whiteboards. These companies may be private language schools, career schools and even universities recognize.

The Benefits

Because oral skills usually can't be properly honed without consistent practice with a fluent native speaker, having a native speaking instructor is important. The majority of English learners simply do not have the opportunity to practice with English speakers, so extensive oral fluency practice is impossible. The majority of students must make do with minimal oral interaction with native speakers by speaking to tourists, using English abroad, with visiting professors or foreigners. The solution to this is schedule conversation with an online teacher.

Students can also learn and practice proper pronunciation, syllabification and practice variations of English, especially if exposed to different dialects and variations of English. An online conversation class can also help students learn idioms, cultural customs and expressions that cannot be learnt from textbooks.

What Online Courses Includes

An English speaking course online can be very relaxed and informal or serious and academic. Courses will be centered around discussion of various themes and students will be expected to express opinions and share ideas. Regardless of the type of course, the instructor is expected to adhere to techniques which improve oral fluency; this usually means that student talk times is generally high and teacher talk time is rather low. Students are also expected to interact with each other, making courses fun and motivational. The role of the instructor is reduced to that of facilitator instead of teacher. Still, students should not assume that courses are unstructured; students are generally given a course outline which covers conversational themes and topics that will be developed during the course. Although not a grammar course, the instructor should also review significant grammar points and correct mistakes when required.

How to Enroll in Online English Courses

A quick internet search will pull up a whole list of many different private and public English speaking courses online.




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