English Oral Communication Skills Techniques

General.
• Students should acquire a C2 (CEFR) level of English in both productive and receptive oral language skills: listening, spoken interaction and spoken production.
• Students should develop theoretical and practical knowledge of the oral communication skills needed to participate effectively in a variety of everyday, academic and professional contexts.

Specific.
• Learning about the differences between spoken and written English.
• Learning about the importance of non-verbal communication in oral interaction.
• Acquiring skills to participate in informal conversations successfully.
• Developing interviewing skills.
• Acquiring language, listening and personal skills to participate in discussions and negotiations.
• Developing notetaking skills for academic purposes.
• Developing communication skills to participate in formal debates.
• Learning how to elaborate, organize and present content efficiently in academic presentations.
• Learning how to succeed in a job interview.
• Learning how to craft and give a successful elevator pitch.

Instrumental.
Students should develop the necessary skills to effectively use a variety of learning, communication, collaboration and presentation tech tools.

Interpersonal.
Students should develop personal, negotiation and collaboration skills for effective oral interaction in academic, everyday life and professional situations.

INTRODUCTION
• Spoken language vs written language. The practical importance of oral skills. Key elements of effective public speaking. Aspects of non-verbal communication: body language and voice.


BLOCK 1. ORAL SKILLS FOR EVERYDAY PURPOSES
• Informal conversations. The structure of conversations. Turn-taking. Backchannels. Small talk. Storytelling. The importance of humour.
• Interviewing skills. Types of questions: yes-no, open, and follow-up. Best strategies to succeed in your interviews.
• Discussion skills. Individual and group attitudes for effective discussions. Active listening skills. Language for expressing opinions, agreement and disagreement, etc.

BLOCK 2. ORAL ACADEMIC SKILLS
• Notetaking skills. Preparing for notetaking. Some techniques to optimize your notetaking: active listening, shorthand writing, mental maps, etc.
• Participating in debates. Debate structure and participants. Brainstorming and research: arguments and evidence. Constructing arguments. Debating language. Introducing and concluding a debate.
• Preparing academic presentations. Selecting focus points/key ideas. Choosing the right supporting evidence. Using metadiscourse. Integrating graphs and tables. Using audiovisual aids efficiently.

BLOCK 3. ORAL SKILLS IN PROFESSIONAL CONTEXTS
• Promoting your product. Persuasion: definition and persuasion strategies. The elevator pitch: definition, structure and language.
• The job interview. Responding to the Tell me about yourself prompt in a job interview: general recommendations. Describing your educational and professional backgrounds. Effective language in job interviews.

There will be no set textbook for this module. Reference materials will consist in selected articles, videos and websites on the specific topics of the programme that will be regularly shared with the students through the LMS (Moodle) or the Teams tool.

CB1, CB2, CB3, CB4, CB5, CG1, CG3, CG6, CG7, CG9, CE1, (see Memoria de Verificación do Grao en Lingua e Literatura Inglesas at http://www.usc.es/export9/sites/webinstitucional/gl/servizos/sxopra/mem…).

The module will consist in a combination of presentations of various topics by the lecturer with all sorts of practical activities, individual and group activities, face-to-face and/or online.

The so-called expository lessons will often consist in a general introduction to one of the topics in the syllabus followed by related practical activities, such as watching and analyzing/discussing a relevant video. Some of the interactive lessons will consist in workshops, collaborative activities in small groups followed by a general appraisal and discussion, individual or group presentations on a given topic, debates, etc., all of which are aimed at training and consolidating the acquisition of various oral skills.

First chance
Continuous assessment (100%) of a wide range of activities done both in class and online: individual and group presentations, participation in discussions, role-playing games and other speaking activities, listening activities, tests and exams, etc. Class participation, which will be monitored and used to refine the student’s final grade, is key to pass the subject, especially since most of the assessable activities will take place during the classes or in relation to the content taught or practiced during the lessons.

Those students for whom attendance has been officially waived must follow closely and participate in the activities in the virtual course (individual and group work, tests, assignments, etc.) and follow the lecturer’s instructions regarding participation in the tasks associated with these activities. Moreover, they may be asked to submit specific assignments to complete their grade throughout the course period and, if necessary, to take a face-to-face oral test at the end of the term. Very important: students intending to apply for an exemption of class attendance must contact the lecturers at the very beginning of the term, even if they still do not have any official confirmation of the exemption by the relevant university authorities, to discuss any special arrangements.

Students experiencing timetable conflict with other subjects must contact lecturers at the beginning of the term to make special arrangements. Please note that a minimum and proportional amount of class attendance and participation (around 50%) will be mandatory and you may be asked to submit some extra work throughout the semester (to be discussed with your lecturers).

Second chance.
Whenever possible, students will be able to (re)submit work that they had not done or in which they had not achieved a pass grade during the regular course period with a view to improving their continuous assessment grade. These submissions must be made before the official date of the second chance (see official exam calendar). In addition, if deemed appropriate, the lecturers may summon the student to an extraordinary oral test to complete their grade.
Students to whom class attendance has been officially waived: same method as at the first opportunity.

Exchange students will be assessed according to the same criteria used for local students (see above).

Important note. Cheating, plagiarism or any other form of misconduct during the realization of an assessment test or exercise will be handled according to art. 16 of the USC’s "Normativa de avaliación do rendemento académico dos estudantes e de revisión de cualificacións".

Depending on your current English level, you will have to devote more or less time to this subject, to attain the expected level of English by the end of the course (see aims above). As a rule of thumb, you will have to devote between 4-5 hours per week of your out-of-class time to revise the week’s class content and do various activities, be that preparatory work for the following week (reading, watching videos, etc.), practical exercises, quizzes, final project, etc. You should also allow time, between 1 and 2 hours, for reinforcement tasks such as speaking in English and viewing and listening to materials (see next section) that you deem necessary outside of the course syllabus.

• Student’s active participation in all the course activities is key to the fulfilment of the course objectives and a major component of the student’s assessment.
• Students must learn how to use Moodle and MSTeams to attend a lesson, participate in tutorials, collaborative tasks and assessment activities, as well as to submit their work. There are numerous video tutorials on how to use these tools in case you need help.
• Collaborative activities will be a constant in this course. It is important that you show an open, positive and honest attitude towards your classmates. Always provide constructive feedback, be ready to welcome their criticism and use it to improve your and the group’s work.
• Make a note of all the interesting points that you may hear or observe during the course, be that your instructor’s lessons and advice or a classmate’s comment, suggestions, etc. If you don’t keep a note, you won’t be able to come back to it when you need it. For this purpose, you may use a paper notebook or a virtual one, such as Microsoft Onenote.
• You should actively seek to participate in activities where you may practice your English oral skills out of class, be that tandem exchanges with international students, listening to the radio (download BBC iPlayer app or similar) or to podcasts (download Google Podcasts app or similar), watching documentaries or films (Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc.), etc.