Small Talks: Daily Speaking Practice for Vocabulary and Grammar Mastery

A short daily routine from a Japanese middle school. At the start of each lesson, pupils talk in pairs on a simple topic for a fixed time - 40 seconds for beginners, up to two minutes for stronger classes - using the vocabulary or grammar from the previous lesson.

The article gives the procedure, lists of topics for weaker and stronger classes, and the small conversational phrases that keep a conversation going: showing interest, asking a follow-up question, changing the topic.

1. Choose a topic linked to the last lesson - my favourite food, a sport I can play.
2. Put up the target words or structure, and for weaker classes a model conversation.
3. Teach a few conversation phrases such as "Really? Why?" and "How about you?"
4. Set the timer and let pairs talk until it stops. Walk round and listen, but do not interrupt.
5. Run a second round with a new partner, perhaps reporting what the first partner said.
6. Finish with two or three examples you heard, correcting only mistakes in the target language.

It fits inside a 40-minute period with room to spare, needs nothing but a watch, and turns the review that usually happens as questions to the class into talk by every pupil at once.

Start with the model conversation on the board for Grade 6 and 7 classes, and take it away after a week. In an O/L class the second round - reporting what a partner said - is useful practice in reported speech.