Accuracy vs fluency

In most ESL classrooms, students spend a lot of time speaking and writing. It is important to make a distinction between speaking and writing activities which help to reinforce students’ knowledge of grammar and vocabulary, and those which help students to develop their speaking and writing skills.

accuracy _________________________________________________________ fluency

Drilling, copying and controlled practice provide intensive oral or written practice of specific grammatical structures or items of vocabulary. The focus is on ‘language reinforcement,’ or learning how to use this ‘target language’ accurately. Controlled oral practice tasks come in a wide variety of formats. Some of the most common include pair work information exchanges and whole class mingle activities where students are given a series of questions to ask each other.

Controlled written practice tasks include fill-in-the-blanks, jumbled sentences, correcting mistakes, discrimination exercises, and sentence completion tasks. The most useful tasks focus on the aspect of the target language which students are likely to find most challenging.

1. Write in, at or on in each gap.

a) He went to the supermarket ________ Saturday.

b) My sister’s birthday is ________ September.

c) I usually get up ________ 7.30am.

2. Put the words in the right order.

a) always / he / at / seven o’clock / gets up

b) in the morning / never / hungry / am / I

c) for / late / sometimes / she / class / is

3. Correct the mistakes.

a) She don’t like playing tennis.

b) He have two brothers and one sister.

c) They lives in the north of England.

4. Choose the correct option.

a) My brother is very good at saying / telling jokes.

b) We arrived at the airport late and we lost / missed the plane.

c) I love the shoes you’re wearing / carrying.

(English File Elementary, Clive Oxenden, Christina Latham-Koenig with Paul Seligson, OUP.)

Controlled practice tasks provide useful practice of grammar and vocabulary. However, no amount of controlled practice is going to enable students to speak or write fluently.