Languages for intercultural communication and education

Initiating topics
For a conversation to begin, one participant must initiate a topic by
making an ‘opening move’. There are various ways of initiating conversa-
tions, some of which are more likely to be transactional in nature, others
which are more likely to be interactional, although, at times, as we have
seen, the boundaries between these two can be blurred. See Table 3.1 and
Table 3.2.
A good way of practising opening moves is by playing the game
‘Hidden Sentences’, which can be found in
Keep Talking
(Klippel, 1984). In
this activity, the class is divided into two teams, and each nominates a
speaker. Each speaker is then given a ‘hidden sentence’ which he or she
Culture and Conversational English
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Table 3.1
The language of opening moves
Opening moves
Examples
seek attention
Hey Joe! Hi there!
offer goods/services
Would you like some . . . ?
demand goods/services
Could I trouble you for . . . ?
offer fact
That reminds me of . . .
offer opinion
Your dress looks lovely.
demand fact
Who’s that letter from?
Is that letter from Bertie?
demand opinion
What do you think of . . . ?
Isn’t that terrible?
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must work into the conversation, within a given time, in such a natural way
that the opposing team cannot identify it. Sentences might be something
like ‘I sometimes think of becoming a vegetarian’ or ‘A friend sent me a
postcard from there’. The class then identifies a topic that the nominated
speakers will begin to discuss (e.g. ‘The Economic Crisis’). The object of the
game is for the speakers to manage the conversation so that their own
sentence can be embedded into it in as seamless a way as possible. In order
to do this, they must open a series of moves which will lead them onto their
own topic area. This is a good activity to record, and then discuss in class
how moves might have been opened and how performances could be
improved. With regular practice, learners’ skill in opening conversations
can be significantly improved.
It has been frequently observed that second-language learners are often
not particularly good at giving conversational support. In particular, they
do not ‘back-channel’ the kind of support that encourages a speaker to
continue the conversation. The kind of language that is involved in sup-
porting your conversational partner is seen in Table 3.2.
The activity described below raises awareness of the importance of
giving conversational support through back-channelling. The role-play
invites learners to compare self-assessed and peer-assessed ratings of the
level of support given during a conversation. The learner can additionally
decide how interested or bored he or she wishes to appear to be.
Supporting talk
(1)
Participant roles
: two friends or acquaintances.
(2)
Conversational focus
: to practise supporting moves when someone else
is storytelling.
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Intercultural Approaches to ELT