Tips for good oracy

Let’s start off with 5 general tips for oracy. These are mostly context independent, and apply in all kinds of situations in which you may want to, or be expected to, speak well.

1. Use an appropriate register, including using standard English in more formal settings.

‘Register’ is just the general term for the style of language that you use. One of the keys to good oracy is being able to vary your register. You almost certainly don’t speak the same way to your friends that you would speak to your granny or your headteacher or the King. That’s how it should be. That doesn’t mean the way you speak to your granny or your headteacher is the right way, not that the way you speak to your friends is the wrong way — far from it. But you need to understand the appropriate register for the context in which you’re speaking. And if the context is even somewhat formal — as it generally will be in the school, if you’re not talking to your friends — then you should try to use Standard English. That’s what some people wrongly call “correct English”, and it means avoiding slang terms or non-standard grammar (e.g. “I’m going toilet”). This kind of language is perfectly fine when you’re in an informal context, like speaking to your friends, but sounds out of place in more formal contexts, and conveys to other people that you can only speak one way, rather than being skilled and flexible with your spoken language. Being able to vary your register based on the context should be your first goal for good oracy.

2. Speak fluently, avoiding non-fluency features

Your second goal, once you’ve got the register right, should be to speak as fluently as you can. This means avoiding non-fluency features like fillers (“um”, “er”, “like”, etc), false-starts and corrections (e.g. “I was going class going to class when…”), while articulating your words clearly (e.g. trying to pronounce the different sounds that make up each word). This second part is pretty easy to do — you just have to want to do it. Avoiding non-fluency features is trickier, though, especially if you’re nervous — and nobody besides people who speak for a living, like radio DJs, avoids them altogether. But if you want to be a good orator (someone with good oracy skills), then you need to be as conscious as possible of these kinds of linguistic features, especially if you’re doing any kind of public speaking. If you know that you tend to say “like” a lot, then pay attention to your speech and work to cut it out. Again, it’s totally fine to have fillers like this in a spontaneous chat with your friends, but you don’t want your class presentations or your Cambridge University interview to be full of them, so work on cutting them out as best you can.

3. Try to be precise but concise — be an efficient communicator

When people are nervous they tend to either say too much or too little. They either waffle away, filling the awkward pauses with unnecessary noise, or they cut themselves short, creating awkward pauses for others to fill. Being a good communicator — both in writing and in speech — means conveying your intended meaning clearly in just the right number of words, and no more. To do this well, you will need a sufficiently wide vocabulary to convey subtle and sophisticated meanings concisely. You will also need to be able to choose your words carefully as you speak. This will only come with practise and with a desire to speak in this efficient way. Whether you’re answering a question in class, delivering a speech in an assembly or answering a question in an interview, you should want to say as much as you need to say, but no more and no less. This is what it means to be an efficient communicator.

4. Be aware of your body language

As well as controlling, as best you can, the words that come out of your mouth, to be a really effective speaker — in any context — you need to be aware of your body language too. You may be saying all of the right things, but if your body language conveys that your are bored or anxious or desperate to get away, then the people you are speaking to may be more aware of that than they are of what you’re saying. Being a confident speaker means not only sounding confident but looking confident too. This is not easy, especially if you’re not confident, but as with fluency and efficiency, practise will help, as will a self-conscious attempt to control this aspect of your oracy. Start by being aware of your body language, correcting as best you can, and over time it will become habitual.

5. Listen while you speak and while others speak to you

The final tip here is about being aware of your audience. This could be the other members of your group in a small group discussion, or it could be the whole school hall when you’re delivering a speech, or it could just be one other person in a regular conversation. But no matter who your audience is, you need to listen to them. You can’t offer good contributions to a discussion — with one person or many people — unless you really listen to what everyone is saying. It is very easy for discussions to turn into people taking it in turns to say what they want to say, while never really hearing what anyone else is saying. This is rarely a productive conversation. And even if you’re not in a discussion — if you’re delivering a presentation or a speech, for example — you still need to keep an ear out for the audience. Are they laughing in the right places? Are they muttering to themselves? Are they enjoying what you’re saying or are they cross or bored? You can generally get a sense of this if you listen to the audience, and then you can make adjustments to your content, your tone or your body language accordingly.