Tips for Teachers

Assessment Criteria for the Speaking Components

Flyers Speaking
Understanding the Tasks — Answers and Discussion

Look at the discussion of these points about the Flyers Speaking component. What are the skills and strategies your students need to have for this part of the test?

1. Why are the tasks in the Speaking test organised in this way?

Most of the test is based on visual prompts, which give a focus to the activities and reflect the type of task that children often carry out in the classroom. After the initial greetings, the first task is fairly structured, as candidates need only to make simple statements about their picture. The following task again is quite tightly structured, but in this task candidates need to form questions as well as answer them. However, Part 3 allows the candidate more freedom to decide what they are going to say and to choose the language they are going to use, although there is still a visual prompt to guide them. By this stage of the test, they should have relaxed and be feeling more confident. The final part of the test involves no visual prompts, with candidates answering personal questions.

2. What is the examiner's role? How can this help candidates?

The examiner interacts with candidates throughout the test. They will encourage the candidates if necessary, offering a prompt or asking the question in a different way if a child seems lost or hasn't understood.

In Part 1, the examiner speaks about their picture first, and so gives candidates an example of the type of language they need to use, as well as directing them towards the differences between the two pictures. The examiner gives their statements one by one, so the candidate can respond to each one in turn. The examiner may use questions to direct the candidate's attention to the relevant part of their picture, and other back-up questions may be used if a child has difficulty understanding. The child may also look at the examiner's picture if he/she has difficulty in identifying the difference between the two pictures.

In Part 2, the examiner again begins by asking the questions, which gives candidates a prompt and helps to remind them of the question forms they will need to produce. It should also help to build up students' confidence. The examiner doesn't ask their questions in the same order as the information is given on the candidate's Information Exchange page. This is so that candidates have to demonstrate that they have understood the question by giving the appropriate answer. It's important to remember this when your students are practising this type of activity in class. The examiner then instructs the candidate to ask questions based on the prompts on the candidate's information page.

The examiner begins Part 3 by telling the candidate the name of the story and by describing the first picture, which again is designed to give a model of the language that candidates might use and sets the scene, perhaps prompting any lexis that students will need. The examiner may ask further prompt questions if they are needed.

The examiner asks questions about the candidate, (e.g. 'Who is your best friend at school?') in Part 4. Topic areas will be taken from the topic list in the handbook. The examiner will ask four questions and one more open invitation to speak, such as 'Tell me about your house.'

3. What language skills do candidates need for Part 2 of the test?

Part 2 involves asking and answering questions about two people, objects or a situation. Initially, candidates only need to answer questions, so they need to recognise question forms which relate to the prompt words on their card; for example, in the sample paper shown here, the question related to the prompt 'Teacher's name' could be 'What's Daisy's teacher's name?' Candidates don't need to use full sentences in their answers.

In the second stage of the activity, candidates need to produce these questions; their questions don't need to be formed in the same way as the examiner's. It's more important that candidates communicate their questions effectively than that they produce completely accurate questions. They don't need to write the answers they are given. Students need lots of practice of this type of pairwork in the classroom, both asking and answering questions and forming questions based on prompts, in order to prepare them for this type of task.

4. What advice would you give your students about Part 3? What can you do in the classroom to prepare them for this task?

In this part, candidates have to tell a story based on the pictures they're shown. Make sure your students know there is no fixed answer and that they can decide on the content for themselves. They don't have to describe everything they can see; if they can say one thing about each picture, this will be considered a satisfactory response.

Again, communicative ability is more important than grammatical accuracy, although candidates who can complete tasks using extended language and not just separate words are more likely to receive higher scores. It doesn't matter what tense the candidate tells the story in (present or past), and narrative language such as time words like 'after that' is not required, but if a candidate can use this, they will be given credit for it.

Use picture sequences in your classroom in a variety of ways. You can build up students' skills by beginning with pictures to match to sentences which describe them, or make the activity more challenging by only giving one picture to each student in a group and not letting them see each other's pictures while they try to put them into order.

Encourage your students to say as much as they can about a picture by playing games where each team or pair adds another word or sentence to describe a picture; for example, you could say, 'There's a boy.' Team 1 says, 'The boy's playing the drums.' Team 2 adds 'The boy's playing his drums and it's very noisy', and so on.

5. How can you prepare your students for Part 4?

The last task, Part 4, is the most open as the examiner asks open-ended personal questions about the candidate, which she or he answers. These questions include 'wh' questions (Who, When, What, Where, How, etc.). Candidates don't have to use full sentences in their answers, but they will be given credit if they do so. No 'Why?' questions are asked.

By getting lots of practice talking about themselves and their families, students will feel more confident and build up a vocabulary base to prepare them for this part of the test. Using topics which relate to your students' interests and lives will also help them; for example, their schools and what they study, the music or TV programmes they enjoy, sports they play, and so on.

It's also important to give them practice talking to other adults in English, so that they are not overwhelmed by being alone with the examiner. Swap classes with another teacher, or try to invite other English-speakers into your classroom whenever you get the chance. These could even be other, older students whose English is at a higher level. If there are English clubs in your town, you could encourage your students to join, or take them to tourist offices or other places where employees speak English.

Teachers can show students the whole Flyers test from the YLE Speaking Test video to show them what they have to do in the Speaking test. The YLE Speaking Test video pack can be ordered from Cambridge ESOL Publications.