My Secret Weapon for ESL Oral English Exams
It’s that wonderful time of the year. Students franticly rummage through their notes while I waltz into the classroom without a care in the world because I. Don’t. Have. To. Teach.
That’s right.
Exam day.
The only problem is, being poorly prepared for giving exams is just as bad as being poorly prepared for a normal class. . . . Except it’s worse because an unstructured exam can explode into chaos ten times faster than an regular day.
I want to tell you about a technique that has SAVED me during oral English exams. Oral exams can be, in most ways, trickier than a written exam to deliver.
The most basic, traditional oral exam is simply a conversation. Two or more students have to work together to present a conversation about a specific topic. You can give the students a list of all the topics discussed that semester, and allow each group to choose for themselves.
I’ve found, however, that you will end up with 16 of your 18 groups all haven chosen the same topic. Which one? You guessed it. The easiest one. Not only does this wreak havoc on your sanity (listening to the same conversation 16 times in a row will do that to you), but your students also really won’t be benefitting from the exam. Most textbooks have the same basic topics, so students probably have done a conversation about ordering food at a restaurant a thousand times.
It’s also far too easy for one group to pass around their conversation, and there you go. Now you have 16 groups with EXACTLY the same conversation, and now you know at least 30 of your students are flat-out cheating.
The solution for this problem is to give each group a different topic. Once I discovered that, little ignorant me walked around assigning topics. Now, I don’t know what the word for “mutiny” is in Chinese, but I’m pretty sure my students were saying it. Each time I have tried this, it’s gone HORRIBLY WRONG. Students felt the entire process was unfair. They would compare their topic to other groups, and complain that theirs was harder. Those groups that got topics they deemed “too hard” had either a bad attitude or would get discouraged and want to quit before the exam started. Those with “easy” topics would brag to the other students or not work as hard to prepare because they got an “easy” one.
The solution? Dice. Or rather, a die. I found a pair of giant dice at a Dollar Tree once, and knew I needed to use them for something. Little did I know they would become one of the most treasured tools in my arsenal.
How it works:
Assign an exam topic that you’ve covered in class to each number on the die. For example, 1= Shopping, 2= Restaurant, 3= Technology, 4= Friendship, 5= Music, 6= Movies. Then, walk around the room, letting each team roll the die. Whatever number comes up is now their exam topic. I recommend writing the numbers and their corresponding topics on the board so everyone can easily see and remember. This is when the magic happens. Instead of being angry or too proud, students (for the most part) just accept their topic! And, I have a secret (shhh). They think it’s actually kind of fun. And you, English Teacher of the Year, just made an exam kind of fun! The whole class dynamic changes. If students get a hard topic, they just accept it, because it’s fate. They rolled the die. They got that topic. If students get an easy topic, instead of feeling proud, they feel relieved. Somehow the nervousness of rolling the die makes them appreciate the topic.
Now, what if this is for a final exam, and you have a lot more than six topics you want to cover? In this case, I choose twelve possible topics, even if I have more than that in the book. (You could go up to eighteen or twenty-four or however many you like, though.) With twelve topics, I just assign two topics to each number on the die, and the students get to choose. With this method, if they roll a 1, they have the choice between Shopping or Health. Rolling a two is now Restaurant or Pets, and so on. I’ve found this to be the best method, because there is still the fairness of getting a topic chosen by fate mixed with the students actually being able to make a choice.
Tips:
Be sure to write the topics and their corresponding numbers on the board so you don’t spend all your time answering “What was my topic again?”
Have a cheat sheet prepared with all your student’s name written down. When they roll the die, write down the number they got. Students will definitely try to “change” their topic, hoping you won’t remember what topic they actually rolled.
DO NOT LET THEM ROLL AGAIN. The moment you let them roll the die again, everything unravels and the cries of “mutiny!” begin again. Once one team rolls again, then every team will want to. Not only will you spend the entire class time rolling the die, but also it defeats the whole purpose of having students present different topics.
When you buy your die, pick up a couple of extra ones. They will get lost, dirty, thrown out an open window. (Seriously, anything is possible.)
So grab your dice, go out, and ENJOY your exam days!