One recurrent problem teachers try to solve revolves around strategies that help teach speaking in a large classroom. With the growing tendency toward developing communicative competence, verbal proficiency or speaking skill is usually regarded as essential skill in language education and it has gained lots of attention from both teachers’ and learners’ side. It is widely said that today’s world requires that the goal of teaching verbal skill should be focused on improving speaking skill because, in that way, learners can express themselves confidently. Speaking is "the process of building and sharing meaning" through the use of verbal and non-verbal symbols.

Although I try to combine speaking activities with the technology in class, it sometimes does not work very well. When I try making my students speak in class some students become passive and some become demotivated. Therefore, I reckon that teachers should use various strategies and activities considering students' level and skills such as picture description, finding differences, picture narration, storytelling, simulations, interviews, reporting and so on.

Building a welcoming and safe environment makes students feel more confident and relax, it is very important to do that if we expect to make the most out of our speaking classes! Teachers should try to trigger students’ interest through topics they might be interested in or that are relevant in their daily lives.

Warm up activities break the ice and make students talk more, a round of random questions or a bingo activity are not only fun but interesting.

As speaking is an important skill I use a different range of ideas and tools to support enhancing this skill. I also try to integrate different skills. As for integrating the skills, I ask students to watch videos on YouTube and ask them to send voice notes as commentary on the WhatsApp class group on what they listened.  As for other tools I use for speaking I use Imo, Live, and Google hangout. The three tools are mobile applications. The tools nearly work the same way, still I orient my students to them. Students can also use Microsoft teams as it is easy to use.  What works best as an activity is listening to something then commenting as it integrates the skills of listening and speaking and it supports critical thinking.   

 The process of embedding technology with the class is useful for motivating the students. Creating in-class activities that enable students to be engaged in discussions with their classmates is relevant. I hold discussion inside the classroom every class. It is in the warmup, during the lesson pre-reading discussion and post-reading discussion. I use technology out of the classroom to enhance speaking outside the classroom. It is part of my plan to support my students and enhance their skills.

I normally play videos like Ted Talks in my class and ask my students to pen down their own opinions about the ideas being communicated. Holding a discussion session after the video proves to be highly effective for enhancing their speaking skills and confidence.

In my oral communication classes, the focus is on helping students develop interpersonal skills, including communication skills and behaviors. The ultimate goal is to train students to engage in conversations and communicate effectively with others in-person, online or on the phone. To do so, students need to receive training in verbal communication, nonverbal communication, and paralanguage. Therefore, the focus of speaking classes is on accuracy, fluency and ways to fulfil the desired functions. 

The average class size is 55 students, which is not always easy to manage. To teach speaking/oral communication and ensure a greater participation of students in large classes, I use different activities. First, students are always encouraged to turn their written assignments and field projects reports into presentations that they share with their classmates, using different presentation software. Students use dictionary apps to look for the correct translation and pronunciation of words. They are always excited to discover differences between varieties. One more activity that I use with my students is Public Speaking. I always ask them to prepare a five-minute speech and deliver it in front of their classmates. It is amazing to see how some introverted students manage to overcome their fears and develop the right skills to deliver their speeches and impress their audience. Finally, interview simulation practices, using role-playing to practice typical questions and answers. Students play different roles, engage in formal conversations, and practice different ways to highlight their skills and defend their views.  

Give them rubrics to assess or self-assess?
Do both. It is not easy to monitor the whole learning-teaching process let alone assess Ss. Well, I might split the whole class into groups and then make the learning station. 

Turning assignments into presentations is very useful because students get an opportunity to speak while the rest of the students are "taught" something by their classmates.  Such practices empower the student to take charge of their own learning. 

Public speaking is also a skill that will be useful for them in the future so it is very good that they get to practice early on.  Speaking is not taught alone in the majority of the countries, rather it is embedded with listening.

Public speaking activity 

Each student will select a topic of his interest and will research on that topic before the day of the activity.  Other students will be informed about the topic so that they also read about it and get ready for discussions.  The one who is going to stand in front of the students and hold the public speaking activity delivers the topic just like a lesson, while other students inside the class are sitting in a U shape and will be engaged in creating meaningful discussions that will help them practice the most of the speaking skill. 

Most of us teach speaking without realizing as we integrate the listening skill with the speaking skill. We sometimes, integrate speaking with reading when we hold pre-reading activities and post reading activities. The idea is that when we integrate the skills we do not concentrate on a certain skill. In addition, we do not see whether all students participate and whether their participation is equal. 

Tools to enhance speaking skills:

 YouGlish: http://youglish.com

Merriam-Webster: https://www.merriam-webster.com

 Google Translate: https://translate.google.com

 FORVO: https://forvo.com

Voice of American Pronunciation Guide: http://pronounce.voanews.com

The Color Vowel Chart: https://americanenglish.state.gov/resources/color-vowel-chart

 American English resources:  https://americanenglish.state.gov/resources/dialogs-everyday-use

 https://americanenglish.state.gov/resources/everyday-conversations-learning-american-english

 Skype https://www.skype.com/en

 Google Hangouts https://hangouts.google.com

  WhatsApp https://www.whatsapp.com

Some other useful web resources that help enhance speaking: 

Explore these websites so you can become more familiar with them and decide if they would work in your teaching context. Think about how they can commence or support a speaking activity. 

• Breaking News English http://www.breakingnewsenglish.com/

• Quizlet https://quizlet.com/

• Google Suite for education https://www.google.com/edu/products/productivity-tools/

• Google Maps https://www.google.com/maps

• Google Earth https://www.google.com/earth/