Using language to communicate is influenced by affective, social, and cognitive factors. The class atmosphere and esprit de corps and the individual student's social position in the group become crucial variables in determining the success or failure of any given conversational activity in the class. Teachers should be aware of the social forces at play in the classroom and be sensitive to cultivating a productive and congenial atmosphere. Too, they should be ever mindful of the students' need for participation in group and social interaction in the second language. The preparations for and the inclusion of stimulating conversational activities in the class format will be the teacher's major contribution to the oral fluency that the students attain in class.
Teachers should pay careful attention to the lines of communication and take advantage of these as the students begin to get involved in communicative activities. On this positive basis, other productive conversational groups can be built. As the course continues, teachers should attempt to develop a helpful working relationship between and among all the students in class.
One way to build a cohesive group in class is to let students help each other during the conversation activities. Too, student input should be encouraged. Any ideas for types of activities or for content of discussions should be considered and used if at all appropriate.
Speaking, i.e., making sounds, in order to acquire competence is not, of course, a social activity and need not involve other people. Mechanical drills in which the students practice the sounds of the language and/or the structures of the language may very well be undertaken in isolation or in choral group repetition in the classroom or in the laboratory. Students may also read aloud at home or in the class, or they may do a pattern drill individually in the class. However, in neither case is the purpose a communicative one.
Speaking to send a message ultimately requires a listener. Therefore, all speaking activities at the performance level imply at least one listener. These communicative interchanges may involve the teacher, other students, and/or a native speaker who has agreed to work with the students. Ideally, the students will have all of these opportunities to converse, especially with their classmates. This author recommends most highly conversational practice in groups of three or possibly four students. Each student should have the opportunity to communicate at least once in every class meeting. One way to accomplish this goal is to let the members of the class talk to each other as many times per week as time allows and as the students themselves can do productively. (This is not to imply that conversation groups should be organized every day. There are other types of conversation activities and other language skills that must also be included in the class activities. The question of how much time the students can spend in beneficial activity of this type depends to a large degree upon the students themselves, the atmosphere of the class, and the ingenuity of the teacher in arriving at stimulating topics.)
Teachers should be mindful of the varying degrees of socialization and maturity levels in the class when they pursue these various types of social interchanges in the second language. As mentioned previously in connection with individual differences, it behooves teachers to be flexible and to permit the students a certain amount of leeway as to the areas and types of activities in which they choose to participate and make their maximum contributions.