Poster Presentation
The Use of “Look & Speak” Dialogues
in ESP Contexts
Mutahar Al-Murtadha
Kanazawa Institute of Technology
This study investigates ESP students’ views on “Look & Speak” dialogues employed toencourage communication in ESP classes. The dialogues provide students with the necessarycontent information, vocabulary, and sentence structure. Students practiced these dialogues
over the course of one semester. A survey was then distributed to obtain their views on
the effect of these “Look & Speak” dialogues on improving students’ speaking fluency,
pronunciation, and motivation. The dialogues also helped students understand the reading
texts and use the language to communicate.

Introduction
This study focuses on student perception of controlled ‘look & speak’ dialogues
created by the author to help students understand the content of reading texts
and speak about it in an ESP context at a Science and Engineering university inJapan. These ‘look and speak’ dialogues encourage conversation (Al-Murtadha,2012; Alexander, 2008; Littlewood & Baohua, 2011; Wood, 2002) because they
provide students with expressions and hints that can keep the conversation going(Al-Murtadha, 2012).
ESP students tend to focus on receptive skills (de la Fuente, 2002; Webb,2005) through memorizing the vocabulary and content without practicing
speaking. They try to depend on memorization rather than communication(Al-Murtadha, 2012). From the author’s classroom observations, it was noticed
that his university ESP students tend to favor receptive learning. There are many
speaking activities that can be used to help students move from memorization tocommunication. Guided, controlled, and free activities, can be used depending
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on the students’ proficiency levels, interests, and needs. This study seeks tounderstand how “look & speak”’ dialogues are perceived by Japanese ESPstudents.

Methods
The study was conducted at a Science, Technology, and Engineering university.
Participants were students enrolled in 11 required English classes. Students
practiced (in pairs) dialogues created by the author throughout one semester. At
the end of the semester, a short survey was administered to investigate students’views on the effectiveness of the dialogues.

Results
Students’ views on the effect of the dialogues on students’ comprehension skills
as well as other language skills were investigated. Concerning the effect of thedialogues on the content, 78% of the students thought that the dialogues helped
them with the content, 17 neither agreed nor disagreed, and 5% disagreed. 81%of the students thought that the dialogues contributed positively to improving
their reading skills, 14% neither agreed nor disagreed, and 5% disagreed. When
asked whether the dialogues improved pronunciation, 66% of the students
thought that the dialogues improved their pronunciation, 28% neither agreed
nor disagreed, and 6% disagreed. Regarding speaking, 75% of the students
agreed, 21% neither agreed nor disagreed, and 4% disagreed. The last part ofthe survey investigated students’ motivation after practicing these conversations.
72% of the students thought that they enjoyed the dialogues, 23% neither
agreed nor disagreed, and 5% disagreed. When asked whether they thought thedialogues motivated students to speak English, 63% of them agreed, 31% neither
agreed nor disagreed, and 6% disagreed.

ConclusionThe majority of students believed that these “look & speak” dialogues wereeffective. The study recommends creating and using “look & speak” dialogues
in ESP classes to give students the chance to talk about the content. These kinds
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The Use of “Look & Speak” Dialogues, OnCUE Journal, 7(2), pages 103-105

of dialogues are particularly useful for ESP students with low proficiency levels.

References
Al-Murtadha, M. (2012). Which reading tasks help non-English majors
understand academic English readings? In R. Chartrand, S. Crofts, & G.
Brooks (Eds.), The 2012 Pan-SIG Conference Proceedings, 1-12. Hiroshima,
Japan: JALT.
Alexander, R. J. (2008). Towards dialogic teaching: Rethinking classroom talk(4th ed.). York, England: Dialogos.
de la Fuente, M. (2002). Negotiation and oral acquisition of L2 vocabulary.
Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 24(1), 81-112.
Littlewood, W., & Baohua Y. (2011). First language and target language in theforeign language classroom. Language Teaching, 44(1), 64-77
Webb, S. (2005). Receptive and productive vocabulary learning. Studies inSecond Language Acquisition, 27(1), 33-52.
Wood, D. (2002). Formulaic language in acquisition and production:Applications for teaching. TESL Canada Journal, 20(1), 1-15.

Author’s bio
Mutahar Al-Murtadha, a Fulbright alumnus, is currently teaching English at
Kanazawa Institute of Technology, Ishikawa, Japan. He did his master’s degree inTESOL at Saint Michael’s College. He has taught English in Yemen, USA, andJapan, and has presented and published in conferences in USA, Japan, Korea, andMalaysia. murtadha77@yahoo.com
Received: October 1, 2013
Accepted: February 18, 2014

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