The Effects of Using Speaking Templates on Developing Oral Fluency of Intermediate Students

Abstract

Among the vast array of techniques that help enhance the L2 oral fluency of students is the use of speaking templates. Much as this technique has been quite commonly practised, its relevance and effectiveness take more than experience and observation to determine. This study investigated the impact of using templates on improving oral fluency. To arrive at a conclusion, a quasi-experiment was designed with a control group (N=24) and an experimental group (N=24); they both took a pre-test and a post-test, but only the experimental group received training with speaking templates in a 6-week period. The data collected were processed to garner numerical statistics of Speech Rate, Mean Length of Runs and Average Length of Pauses, the three measures of oral fluency. The test scores of the two groups were then compared by t-tests and one-way ANOVA tests on SPSS to measure the differences in three components of oral fluency between the experimental group and the control group. The findings suggested that the students from the experimental group did not reap equal benefits from speaking templates.