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Oral exam: Conscious language use

Short description

This course provides the students with knowledge about the production and reception of oral presentations as well as skills in preparing and making presentations.

Teacher's motivation

Many students are unconscious oral language users, which may cause problems at an oral exam. Teachers responsible for a module with an oral exam may help students become more conscious oral language users by asking them to produce oral examples and listen to each other.

Description of the activity

The objective of this 60-minute activity is that all students practice at being both senders and receivers of short oral presentations. In theory, most students know what characterises a good oral presentation, but many find it difficult to translate the theory into practice. When students make short presentations for each other they learn that 1) making a presentation is challenging for most people, and therefore there is nothing wrong with them if they are not in full control of the oral format, 2) listening is strenuous, and senders must therefore make an effort to express themselves clearly, and 3) they may harvest good ideas for their own oral presentations by listening to other presentations.

  • Students team up in pairs and discuss what characterises the good communicator. Each pair formulate three characteristics (two minutes).
  • The teacher lists the characteristics on a blackboard/whiteboard (seven minutes). See the appendix ‘For the teacher’s preparation’ in the right-hand side.
  • The students prepare individually a two-minute presentation of their assignment (20 minutes). See appendix ‘Prepare a presentation, instruction for students’. The presentation may for instance contain argumentation in favour of their choice of topic for their assignment or an account of the topic of the assignment.  Preparation must take place in class, not from home.  The point is that all students must try to act as both sender and receiver of a presentation. 
  • The students present and give feedback in groups of three: Two-minute presentations, two minutes of feedback from each group member (four minutes) and feedback on the feedback; the feedback receiver should state which parts of the feedback were particularly useful (one minute).  The groups themselves are responsible for strict timekeeping (seven minutes per group member, 21 minutes in total). 
  • Feedback in the group is provided on the basis of the following three compulsory questions. 

    1. What did I like best and why?    
    2. What didn’t I understand and why?    
    3. What would I have liked to hear more about and why?    
     
  • The arguments relating to feedback may be harvested from the group’s joint list of the characteristics of the good oral communicator. It is essential that the feedback is given in a spirit of collaboration focusing on collecting good examples.  The students will not be graded in this exercise; they should only learn – not least by giving feedback – what works well and not so well in oral language use.
  • Pause for thought (two minutes). Each student contemplates examples from the group work which they may share with the class.  Exchange of ideas and examples for oral examination, focusing on helpful things to do.

Outcome of the activity

Students who have been at the receiving end of other students’ academic presentations will have discovered how demanding it is to be listening. In other words, they develop an understanding of the situation of the examiner and co-examiner and become aware how important it is to have a clear focus, to meta-communicate, to repeat important points, to speak at a slow pace, to keep eye contact, etc. In this activity they exchange examples of how to achieve these qualities. Students who have tried to prepare and give an academic presentation and to receive feedback become aware of their own strengths and oral development potentials.

Worth considering

Some students stay away from class if they know in advance that they will have to give a presentation. Some students may give the reason that they have not completed the assignment and therefore cannot yet speak about it. This objection against the exercise must be rejected on the grounds that it is possible to speak about an incomplete assignment, and that this is an exercise and not an exam. In this context it is important to remain focused on the positive aspects of the situation. From the activity, the students should take home ideas of how to prepare and give an oral presentation. If the focus is on mistakes, which should be avoided, the activity may lead to increased fear of exams as the oral exam has then become difficult in a new sense.


Basic information

  • Faculty: Arts       
  • Degree Programme: Education science          
  • Course: Project with oral defence    
  • Study level: Sixth semester        
  • Course size: Approx. 70      
  • Teaching method: Lecture/small class teaching      
  • Extent: Activity      
  • Primary type of activity: Practice      
  • Applied technology:  -      
  • How the case was conducted: Campus teaching    

The example of practice was written by Helle Hvass, a former employee at Aarhus University.