Dong Hwa Journal of Humanistic Studies,No.

4
July 2002,pp.401-418
College of Humanities and Social Sciences
National Dong Hwa University Dong Hwa Journal of Humanistic Studies.No.4

Preparing EFL Learners for Oral Presentations Preparing EFL Learners for Oral Presentations

Jane King * Background

Abstract Oral presentations, if properly guided and organized, provide a

learning experience and teach life long skills that will be beneficial to
The communicative approach to English teaching has been very
ESL/EFL students in all school subjects, and later in their careers (Meloni
popular in many EFL college conversation classes. Having students give
& Thompson, 1980). In addition, with the availability of technology both
oral presentations in front of the class is one of learner-centered activities
at school and home, student-made oral presentations with video cameras,
that has been widely included in teachers’ lesson plans to improve students’
slide projectors, PowerPoint, VCD/DVD and other visual aids could be
oral proficiency. However, students’ oral presentation problems
much more exciting and interesting than traditional ones. Among the
sometimes defeat the purpose of developing language skills. Thus, the
purpose of this paper is first to discuss the appropriateness of this activity many advantages of oral presentations are: bridging the gap between

in EFL educational and cultural contexts. Second, oral presentation language study and language use; using the four language skills in a

problems such as speech anxiety, group boredom and the lack of naturally integrated way; helping students to collect, inquire, organize and

presentation skills are discussed. Third, the teacher’s role in teaching the construct information; enhancing team work; helping students become
pre-requisite skills and as facilitator in guiding students through the active and autonomous learners.
process is defined. Finally, a step-by-step procedure of how to prepare Even though oral presentations have been considered a
students for successful oral presentations is presented. learner-centered activity in the communicative approach that develops
communicative competence. Ellis (1996) questions the appropriateness of
Keywords: oral presentation, speech anxiety, the communicative the communicative approach in different cultural contexts and the social
approach, public speaking principals underlying this approach. He argues that the cultural conflicts
resulting from the adaptation of a mainly Western approach for an Asian
context where both students and teachers had to cope with pressure of
examinations and curricular demands. “Unfamiliar activities having a
communicative or process orientation were not highly valued by students
from traditional backgrounds...a gap between the current level of
* Instructor, Language Center, Soochow University

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performance and the intended learning experience results in a breakdown this learner-centered activity appropriate in an Asian context?
of language production and frustration for learners” (Ellis, 1996:214). The need for establishing a comfortable and low-threat learning
Asian students usually perform more successfully in terms of grammatical environment, from the perspective of second language acquisition, has
competence than in pragmatic and discourse competence. They feel long been emphasized and recognized. The less anxious and more
frustrated when they have to use complex academic skills in expressing relaxed the learner, the better language acquisition proceeds (Krashen,
their ideas in actual performance. Thus, communicative approach needs to 1982). However, the delivery of an oral presentation can be a source of
be “both culturally attuned and culturally accepted in order to make it more extreme anxiety. It seems as though making oral presentations
suitable for Asian conditions. It is suggested that ’mediating’ can serve as a contradicts the principles of language teaching--lowering students’ anxiety
useful tool in this process” (Ellis, 1996). levels results in better language acquisition. Anxiety causes performance
In EFL settings, classroom teachers (Cothran 1995; Altschuler, 1996) to deteriorate and actually affects novice speaker’s self-esteem. Oral
raise the question of whether the adoption of a learner-centered approach presentations can be a face-threatening activity, particularly for some Asian
will be appropriate in a context that is still basically teacher-centered. students.
Speaking in public sometimes actually undermined students’ confidence
Coping with Speech Anxiety
and is ineffective in developing students’ oral proficiency because students
were put on the spot. Speech anxiety, group boredom and limited presentation skills are the
Katchen (1991) offers an alternative by using the video camera to major problems that lead to students’ oral presentation failures. Mulac
improve speaking and performance skills because under stressful situations, and Sherman (1974) give us a clear behavioral assessment of speech
most students just try to get through the ordeal, but not improve their anxiety which “includes a quivering or tense voice, lack of volume,
speaking skills. However, live presentations work much better than video nonfluencies, heavy breathing, lack of eye contact or extraneous eye
presentations that usually detach the audience from the presenter and rob movement, rigidity or tension, fidgeting or motionless arms and hands.
students of experience they badly need. They are better for rehearsal and Every one can easily identify with sweaty palms, accelerated heart rate,
review purposes. Teachers wonder how many students can benefit from and memory loss.” Teachers can easily detect these anxiety-related
such experience because it takes up a quite amount of class time with a behaviors symptoms from students standing in front of the class. In order
large size of class. How will this activity promote the students’ to help students effectively cope with their fear of oral presentations, it is
presentation skills or communicative skills? Do teachers spend too much essential for them to acknowledge that speech fright or speech anxiety is
time teaching presentations or performances rather than language skills? Is perfectly normal. Having an open discussion of speech anxiety and the

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treatments will make students feel that they are not alone. rapport with the audience by making eye contact and only referring to the
Fortunately, we can borrow some insights and strategies from note cards occasionally.
psychotherapy and speech communication literature to help students
Teaching Presentation Skills
overcome public speaking anxieties and reduce nervousness. Tips and
advice provided by these literatures on conquering speech anxiety will When oral presentations are assigned in class, the teacher will get
certainly better prepare students for presentations. either complete silence or grumbles from students who find it frustrating
and intimidating. Lack of experience is usually the main producer of
Avoiding Group Boredom
student stress and nervousness. Experience builds confidence, which is
Group boredom usually results from listening to memorized speeches. vital to effective oral presentations.
A total dependence on memorization is the pattern followed by most EFL Some prerequisite skills are important in building students confidence
presenters who usually have trouble adapting information to spoken for oral presentations. Otherwise, students will feel that the teacher has just
English for the audience. The audience feels bored when they have to listen dumped them into the sea to struggle for survival. If students’ past English
to a tedious reading or word-for-word memorized speech from a presenter learning experiences have been basically teacher-controlled and
who reads rapidly and monotonously, losing command of their voice, tone, test-oriented, they may feel frustrated and overwhelmed. Passive resistance
and pacing. Reciting from passages copied down from references makes and grumbling are common signs manifested by students who do not
the presentation sound canned, machine-like and dull. Instead of using a appreciate and are even hostile to this project. They used to work on
conversational tone and communicative English, they have long pauses memorizing detailed grammatical rules, vocabulary out of contexts and
while fiddling with their notes. The reading of written English, with isolated phrases or expressions by which their test grades are based on. It is
complex sentences and low frequency words, further impedes the a great challenge for teachers to free students from their detail-oriented
audience’s listening comprehension. When the audience cannot follow learning strategies that have been widely used in grade schools. Some of
the presentation, their attention drifts and they lose interest. This makes the these prerequisite skills include how to organize the main ideas and
speaker feel less confident. develop a logical, coherent outline. Without a clear introduction and
Thus, the teacher should constantly remind students of the importance conclusion, the presentation will often leave the audience confused.
of using communicative English in their presentations and keeping the There is also a need for developing the student’s ability to grasp the
audience in mind when they prepare. They may use note cards as general understanding of the material they read or listen to. Learning to
reminders of what they are going to say. It is much easier to establish produce a well-organized and coherent outline can be very helpful to

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learners since an outline can give audiences a clear and concise overview but also holding Q & A sessions, providing feedback on the sequencing of
of the key points of the talk. ideas, and evaluating their performance. Step-by-step procedures of how to
Finally, helping students to conquer the fear of making grammatical prepare students for successful oral presentations are as follows:
or pronunciation errors is another effective way to clarify the purpose of
Step 1: Handing Out Guidelines
oral presentation. Inform the learners that they will not be graded by the
mistakes they make. Hand out the grading criteria to all learners while Since oral presentations involve many skills, a carefully planned and
assigning this activity. constructed guideline will help develop students’ receptiveness to oral
presentations. Listing instructional objectives and explaining reasons for
The Teacher’s Role
this activity can increase student participation and may result in a
Working with students on oral presentations is a challenging job for heightening of satisfaction and achievement.
teachers because it not only involves training in other disciplines such as a.Hand out assignment forms (Appendix A) to organize students and help
speech communication and public speaking, but also demands more of them distribute jobs among themselves.
teachers in terms of time and effort in lesson planning and teaching b.Stress the time limit of presentations. If it is a twenty-five minute
strategies. On the student’s part, the student-centered activity asks students presentation, it will probably be thirty-five minutes in class, allowing for
to be responsible for their own learning. When a teacher moves from the pauses, operating machines, and receiving questions from students.
traditional role of teacher as an authoritative expert to the new role of The teacher may need another five minutes of class time to have students
facilitator of learning, students may feel uncomfortable. They need to be fill out peer evaluation forms.
psychologically prepared for autonomy and responsibility. The teacher c.Grading criteria clearly states the teacher’s expectations for
needs to help students create a supportive learning atmosphere, develop presentations.
interaction skills, and cooperative learning skills and apply
Step 2: Grouping and Scheduling Student Presentations
computer/technology in enhancing teachers’ facilitative skills should be
emphasized (King, 2001). In short, the teacher is the guide, organizer, It is challenging to plan presentations for a large EFL class. Group
consultant, resource person, and supporter. projects with 4-5 students in one group will save class time, develop
The teacher’s role in oral presentations involves not only preparing cooperative learning skills and reduce anxiety. In order to have a
detailed guidelines, organizing groups, helping students to select topics, dynamic group, with a feeling of cohesiveness and togetherness, even
guiding their research and helping them learn the use of various visual aids, though learners have diverse learning styles, the teacher needs to be
familiar with a variety of cooperative group techniques.

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a.Groups of 4-5 students in a class of 50 work best1 and scheduling two travel and tourist spots, and newspaper articles. Teachers could help
groups every other week throughout the semester is a good plan. students choose topics by:
b.Have students choose their own partners, since it is much easier for a.Informing students where the resources are --English newspapers,
students to work out their own schedules for getting together outside magazines, websites, questionnaires, surveys, interviews, library, radio
class. If the teacher groups students from different departments together, programs, English teaching institutes, travel brochures, etc.
there can be time conflicts among them. b.Showing topics chosen by students in previous classes and discuss the
c.Students choose one student as their group coordinator, responsible for strengths and weaknesses of them. Use some previous students’
evenly distributing the assignments among members. videotapes as demos to teach good presentation skills and show some
poor skills.
Step 3: Choosing Topics and Gathering Information
Step 4: Handling Technical Problems
Projects provide opportunities to study interesting topics in detail.
Learners are free to choose any topic they prefer in three categories: It is important for students to know in advance how to handle the
event-oriented; student-initiated; and in-depth topic studies, in order to equipment themselves. Usually, students concentrate all their energies on
enhance their self-expression and creativity. Low-level students are not performance and forget to check machines in advance and assume
required to choose a topic that necessitates research, although they are everything will happen as they plan or expect. Often they expect the
encouraged to do so. It is interesting to see the variety of topics presented teacher to fix their technical problems at the last minute. A discussion
by students. Some students enjoy making skits of fairy tales. The about the equal importance of both the rehearsal and the performance will
reason for that may be their limited English proficiency, maturity and prevent students from technical surprises and panic on the day of the
interest. Some advanced students’ topics deal more with issues pertinent presentation. However, wasted class time in fixing facility machinery can
to university students or current events. adversely affect the presentation, and even be a cause of failure at worst or
Topics presented by students in the past were categorized as follows: the need for presenters to represent their material on another day.
performing arts, culture and customs, fairy tales and short stories, current There are many advantages in using visual aids during the
issues, sports, holidays, American culture, the student’s field of presentation. Visual aids can create a powerful effect, help keep students’
specialization, hobbies, scripts from TV shows, entertainment and shows, attention, and illustrate main ideas. The basic rule is to use visual aids to
support the presentation, not to dominate it. However, the disadvantage of
1
The oral presentation activity was developed for sophomore listening and speaking lab classes at
overusing visual aids is that the attention of the audience will be divided
Soochow University, Taiwan. It is a one-year required course for all majors. Usually, a class of
forty-five students will have a mixture of students from five or more departments.

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and students may stand aside and have visual aids take their place. h.Have time count for reviewing video clips and wind them to the correct
Teachers could prepare students in the following ways: spot.
a.Show supporting materials students can use, such as posters, videotapes,
Step 5: Holding Q& A Sessions
props, artwork, costumes...etc.
b.Tell students what facilities are available in the language lab and the These short sessions are like quality control that is necessary and
school such as data viewer, VCR/DVD, tape recorder, PowerPoint, and helpful in ensuring effective presentations. Teachers can spot possible
slide projector, etc. Tell the possible problems that they may have with difficulties students might encounter and prevent the problems.
their equipment. For example, for outdoor V8 shooting, students need to a.Check with the group about what they are going to do a week before their
be aware of sound effects. presentation.
c.Students should know how to handle the equipment themselves and make b.Encourage students to contact the teacher if they run into any problems;
sure everything is working a week before the presentation. They need to for example,students may have difficulties pronouncing words.
come to the class early to set up the equipment and become familiar with
Step 6: Preparing Peer and Teacher Evaluation Forms
it.
d.Prepare a microphone for learners in advance to make sure good voice The peer evaluation form (Appendix B) provides the presenters with
quality, so the teacher does not need to ask shy presenters to project their feedback from other students. Students will not only evaluate their peers,
voice in a big room. but also learn each group’s strong and weak points from presentations. The
e.Ask students to keep eye contact when using transparencies or teacher evaluation form (Appendix C) should be given to students while
PowerPoint. If possible, control the lighting by not turning off the lights assigning the work. It can be used as a guideline for students to prepare
completely and always leave a light on in the back of the room, so the their presentations. In this way, students are informed in advance of the
audience can still remain eye contact with the presenter. criteria by which their presentations will be evaluated. It is helpful for
f.Also remind students to refer to the image or texts on the projector. Allow students to know the teacher’s expectations and grading criteria. Individual
time for the audience to read longer texts, otherwise there is no point accountability and grades based on the average of the team’s individual
putting them on. scores can help to avoid pitfalls such as the “free-rider effect” and the
g.Make sure writings and illustrations are big enough to be seen from the “sucker effect”.
back of the room. Maybe give them an idea of font sizes for various Conclusion
distances.
Even though there are some arguments about the appropriateness and

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constraints of oral presentations in an EFL learning environment as

mentioned earlier, however, with structured planning and organization, oral
Works cited
presentations can be a beneficial and enjoyable activity for learners. Both
teachers and students can expect a break away from textbooks. Each week, Altschuler, L. Avoiding the stage effect: Ineffective and effective
students come to class with great anticipation and excitement. It is a conversation class activities. Proceedings of ROC TEFL Oral Skills
rewarding experience for low achieving students who have either given up Conference, Taiwan: National Changhua University, 1996, 353-363.
on English or were intimated by past English learning experiences. The Cothran, D. A case study of Chinese students’ and teachers’ attitudes at
introduction of oral presentations to EFL classrooms provides a rewarding Tunghai University in Taiwan. Paper presented at the 12th R.O.C.
and stimulating experience both for teachers in developing facilitating TEFL Conference, Tunghai University, 1995.
skills and for students in training themselves to have confident Ellis, G. How culturally appropriate is the communicative approach? ELT
presentations in public. Journal, 50(3), 1996,213-218.
Katchen, J.E. Using the video camera to improve speaking and
performance skills. Paper presented at the 8th R.O.C. TEFL Conference,
Taipei,1991.
King, J. Enhancing English teachers’ facilitative skills. Soochow Journal of
Foreign Language and Literature, 16. Taipei: Soochow University,2001.
Krashen, S.and Dulay, H., & Burt, M. Language two. New York: Oxford
University Press,1982.
Meloni,C. and Thompson, S. Oral reports in the intermediate ESL
classroom. TESOL Quarterly, 14 (4), 1980, 503-510.
Mulac, A., & Sherman, R.A. Behavioral assessment of speech anxiety.
Quarterly Journal of Speech, 60, 1974, 302-310.

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Appendix C
Appendix A
Assignment Form Teacher Evaluation Form
Group#:_________________Presentation Date:______________
Group#____Date____Topic____________________________________
Topic:__________________________________________________
Preparation
Summary of Content:
___came to the class early to set up equipment
Resources:__
___made sure all equipment in working condition
Group Coordinator:_______________________________________
___turned in assignment sheet
Group Members:
Organization
Name Role Assignment Individual Grade
___clear introduction
1________________________________________________________ ___logical development
2_________________________________________________________ ___strong conclusion
3_________________________________________________________ ___typed and clear outline
4_________________________________________________________ Content
5 ___variety of resources
___amount of research conducted
Appendix B
___originality
Student Evaluation Form ___read English resources
Presentation
Topic______________________________________________________
___held audience’s attention
What did you like best about this presentation?
___spoke without reading word for word
__________________________________________________________
___eye contact
What are some ways to improve this presentation?
___time control
__________________________________________________________
___volume of voice
Did you learn anything new? What skills or advice could you use in the
___effectiveness of visual aids
future?
Oral skills
__________________________________________________________

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___adapted the information for the audience (communicative English)

___clarity and fluency
___provided discussion questions
___involved the audience in activities
Overall Group Rating_____________
Teacher comments__________________________________________

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