Using Public Exam Questions in Fishbowl Debate to Engage Exam-Oriented Students in Communicative Language Teaching

Abstract

This article introduces the use of public exam questions in fishbowl debate to engage highly exam-oriented secondary students with communicative language teaching (CLT). The practice aims to address the issue that many teachers of English as a second language (ESL)/English as a foreign language (EFL) in Asian contexts either teach to the test or implement CLT without catering for the students’ pragmatic needs to pass external assessment. A series of activities was implemented in a secondary school in Hong Kong to promote positive washback from the public exam. The author’s experience and reflections informed by ongoing dialogue with the stakeholders in the school and data collected from student focus group interviews suggest that the fishbowl debate encouraged students to use English for authentic and meaningful purposes, while appreciating its relevance to the writing exam. An important pedagogical implication is for teachers to balance CLT and exam preparation and help students to reach both their mastery and performance goals.

Engaging Exam-Oriented Students in Communicative Language Teaching by ‘Packaging’ Learning English Through Songs as Exam Practice

“…In an action research project, the author immersed himself in an elite, English-medium school in Hong Kong for a period of six weeks on a day-to-day basis to try out a series of CLT activities (Yung, 2020a(Yung, , 2020c. One of the activities was to promote literature among senior secondary students.…”

“…Alternatively, other songs can be selected to engage students with less sensitive topics (see, e.g., Lems, 2018). On the pragmatic side, teachers may strengthen the relevance of the tasks to the public exam by using a song that has appeared in the past exam (Yung, 2020c). In this case, after the exam practice task, teachers may analyse the exam report with the students and suggest how they can better prepare for the public exam.…”

Barriers to Using LMS-Edmodo on Speaking Tasks: Students' Perception

“…The use of debate significantly improves the critical thinking and speaking skills of the students [30]. Besides, the fishbowl debate assisted students in using English for authentic and meaningful purposes while at the same time appreciating its relevance to the examination [31]. If debates are adequately practised, students will have confidence in academic, social, and professional users of the English language, so that it can improve their English as well as their presentation skills [32].…”