[intro music]
>> NEIL: It's quite common to find people
haven't heard of oracy, so we're really talking
about the development of the skills of using
spoken language to get things done in every
situation. It was invented to try and give
spoken language skills the same importance
as written language skills, literacy, and
the development of mathematical skills, numeracy.
>> LUKE: We say our school's mission is to
create compassionate citizens. What we mean
by that is that the children develop to be
intelligent and striving, but also are kind.
They develop oracy and dialogue skills, and
they also have playful, enquiring minds.
>> LYN: I was working with children at the
time when computers were introduced into classrooms,
and we only had one computer in the whole
school. So children had to work in a group,
otherwise they wouldn't have got a go on the
computer. And it was evident that they had
no ways to discuss their ideas with one another,
and we did some talk lessons with the children
and this made a huge difference to how well
they would do both with the computers, and
throughout the rest of the school day. So
it was so convincing, and I've been doing
that ever since.
>> NEIL: You really want young people to appreciate
that when you're communicating, say, with
someone for the first time, you have to take
account of what they know and they don't know,
that you shouldn't use vocabulary they won't
understand. That, on the other hand, if you're
talking in a technical setting with other
people, you could use that vocabulary. So
those are the sort of things that students
learn in their own language, and can be used
in English as well. Children from some backgrounds
especially will come to school without really
knowing how to use language for learning,
and this really can set them back. And we
now know that language and development of
thinking are much more closely related than
used to be before, so that's another general
reason why I think oracy is really important.
>> STUDENT: I think dialogues are important,
because if you don't have dialogue then no
one might really understand us.
>> STUDENT: First man on the moon, the communication
is moved between the rocket and the computers.
If we couldn't communicate, then we wouldn't
know what was happening on board the ship
and what to do.
[music]
