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carried out for certain informal monologues such as casually delivered speech.
By concerning to the types of speaking performance, the teachers are expected to create effective classroom activities especially in teaching and
learning process of speaking. Determining the type of speaking activities should be based on the students’ needs, level and competence. This effort should be done
to generate appropriate speaking classroom activities that can assist the students in learning speaking optimally.
7. Language Features in Speaking
The knowledge of language elements in speaking must be had by teachers in constructing teaching and learning process of speaking. As the reference for
the teachers, Harmer 2001: 269 points out four language elements in speaking. Those are described as follows:
a. Connected speech In term of connected speech, the speakers of English need to be able to
produce the individual phonemes and use fluent connected speech. In connected speech, sounds are modified assimilation, omitted elision, added
linking or weakened through contractions and stress patterning. b. Expressive devices
Native speaker of English use devices in speaking such as pitch, stress, volume, speed, and other physical and non-verbal. These devices are used to
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communicate meanings by showing extra-expression of emotion and intensity when they speak. As the foreign learners in learning English as the target
language, it is better for the students to use these supra segmental features create effective communications.
c. Lexis and grammar The teacher should provide inputs such as a variety of phrases for different
functions which involve students in the speaking context. As the result, they can produce at various stages of an interaction.
d. Negotiation Language This element of speaking creates an effective speaking which benefits from the
negotiators of the language used to obtain clarification and to show the structure of what the speakers are saying.
Through the elements or features of speaking, the students’ performance in speaking can be assessed based on indicators that represent each element as
stated in the standard of competence and the basic competencies in learning English as the foreign language.
8. Classroom Speaking Activities
There are many kinds of communicative activities that can be implemented in the teaching and learning process of speaking. The teacher should
select those activities based on the students’ needs and ability to carry out
