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You are here: Home > Education > Support for Schools, Governors & Staff > School Improvement and Performance Service > Support and Development Teams > Secondary Strategy > English Word Zone > General Resources & Information > Speaking and Listening
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Speaking and Listening

Why speaking and listening is important
The importance of speaking and listening skills can't be emphasised enough. Talk is a rehearsal for writing; it is an outcome in its own right (especially in KS4, where it is orally assessed); and it allows students to extend and develop their Thinking Skills.
  • Exploratory talk is an effective way of using language to think and is one of the building blocks of literacy
  • Discussion is fundamental to an interactive approach to teaching and learning and leads to improved learning
  • At Key Stage 3, where pupils encounter a wide range of subjects with distinctive ways of representing and organising information and ideas, speaking and listening play an increasingly important role in learning
  • Effective discussion in English can lead to significant gains in pupils’ ability to recall, understand and respond to aesthetic elements in literature
  • Real discussion is more likely to take place when there is an authentic task, a reason to communicate, and where pupils have negotiated a set of ground rules
  • Although teachers believe they give prominence to discussion, observational research does not support this
  • Pupils may have plenty of opportunities for talk but teachers are often unsure what and how to teach speaking and listening skills.
For more details on Speaking and listening see the links below

further information

Contact: English / Literacy Team
Tel: 0116 305 6605
or 0116 305 6337
Email: literacy@leics.gov.uk
Last Updated:
11 October 2006
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