Wordplay Speaking

A common theme found in EFL classes in Vietnam is that students learn a lot of language but very little of what they learn is relevant in their everyday lives. One only has to spend a few minutes on any language center’s YouTube channel to see kids reciting complex public speaking presentations like this. Anyone paying attention can see two things right away. First, the vocabulary used is far too advanced for a child that age, meaning they don’t really understand what they are saying. Second, if the student is interrupted for any reason, they typically need to start over from the beginning, meaning the whole entire presentation or conversation is memorized. If you ask the students questions out of order, they won’t be able to have a real conversation. To overcome these common issues, Teacher Keith developed Wordplay’s Everyday English speaking course.

This course covers eight relevant topics and conversations needed to survive day to day tasks. While it begins with a script, once the script is memorized, students are taught to replace the key vocabulary in the conversation with vocabulary that is more specific to their unique situations. There needs to be some element of memorization as key information needs to be mastered to survive, but we then ask and answer the questions out of order to help students more deeply comprehend and more effectively communicate. At the end of this course students will be able to communicate fluently in English about topics and issues that come up every single day.