Group oral presentations are a staple of many ESL classes. While students get a lot of speaking and listening practice during these projects because they are working in and outside of class with partners to prepare their presentations, it dawned on me last semester that these assignments, paradoxically, do not necessarily require them to speak in order to gather the information they present.  Most of the information my students have presented in the past was something they could find by browsing the Web—data about their country’s economy, current news stories, interesting facts about famous historical figures, etc.  While this may be helpful for their reading skills, I wanted the students in my high-intermediate IEP speaking & listening class to actually use their speaking skills to gather the information they would need for their presentation.

Hence, our “Learning the Ropes” project.  I challenged my students to get out into the surrounding community to find out information that could only be unearthed by having a conversation in English with a local “expert.” Continue reading →