On 24th March, 20 of our S5 students were invited to participate in an S5 Joint-school Oral Practice with Wah Yan College (Kowloon). It was a valuable opportunity for our students to improve their speaking skills and get prepared for the HKDSE in the upcoming school year.
Some of our participants shared their takeaways from the experience:
5S (02) Chan Wan Sin Reesa
I found the experience of participating in the Joint-school Oral Practice challenging and rewarding. The opportunity of practising my speaking skills with peers from another school was invaluable in helping me improve my confidence.
Throughout the practice session, I was able to receive constructive feedback from my peers and the teacher, which allowed me to identify areas which I needed to work on. Some of the feedback highlighted my tendency to speak softly, which kept me from scoring fully in that area. The examiner said all I needed to do was to talk more loudly in order to excel in Pronunciation and Delivery. Additionally, I learned how to move on to the next bullet point after spending adequate time on one point. Cutting in was difficult, but fortunately, I was able to remind my teammates to move on to the next question. The feedback from my examiner was excellent and helpful to develop my communication skills, enabling me to learn how to interact more effectively.
I also gained valuable insights by watching my peers’ group discussion. It was interesting to see the different styles and techniques used by students from WYC, and how they engaged with their teammates. This will help me to incorporate some great techniques into my own discussion next time.
I am grateful to have this opportunity and would highly recommend my schoolmates to join similar activities whenever opportunities allow. Not only can it enhance students’ speaking skills, but it can also help them prepare for their DSE and gain valuable experience in delivering presentations.
5A (02) CHAN LOK LOK HARSHA
It was a great experience to practice my speaking skills (group discussion) with students at WYK College. We usually do not have a lot of chances to practice speaking with the students outside of our class. So it was a matchless opportunity to practice with other students outside the school.
It was a valuable learning experience for me since I received constructive feedback from the teachers and students from WYK, which indeed enhanced my skills on speaking. Speaking to strangers was always a tough thing for me to do. I’m really thankful that the students and teacher in WYK were very nice to me and I loved how the whole discussion between the other students and was like friends chatting with each other.
Thank you WYK for providing such a cozy environment for us to get a taste of what the DSE speaking exam would be like.
5R (20) Lee Sam Eduards Juen Song
I was really grateful for this opportunity to have a mock speaking exam opportunity with people of different backgrounds and skill levels. Since we cannot predict who we will be paired with during the actual DSE English speaking examinations, it is important to be comfortable speaking with people we are unfamiliar with. Having this opportunity to work alongside people from a different school, who did group discussion activities in a different way than I was used to, was an invaluable experience and allowed me to notice weaknesses in my communication strategies that I had not noticed before, and have a chance to improve myself!
5R (05) Lau Yung
I was quite nervous at the beginning of the practice. When I first started talking, my face turned completely crimson. But the passion and confidence of other candidates in the discussion help me become more confident. I learnt quite a lot in this practice. For example, I learnt how to start my speech and how to respond to others. The most valuable thing that I learnt was how to elaborate on and see things differently. It also helped me to build confidence , develop critical thinking skills and learn how to respectfully disagree with others while still maintaining a productive conversation. Overall, I really enjoyed participating in this oral practice and looked forward to having another chance.
5R (22) Leung Hong Shek Isaac
2This oral practice activity with WYC truly widened my horizons. I came to realise that many students were better than me. Their tone, organisation and ideas were different compared to mine. I was glad that I also found out my shortcomings in organisation and interaction. I did not quite know what to do when other candidates had talked about my ideas. I also lacked adequate interaction with other candidates such as elaborating on the previous candidate’s points. Moreover, replying to other candidates was also a challenge. After this practice, I now know what I should focus more on now.
This activity created a very realistic DSE exam atmosphere since I was having the discussion with people from another school, something that I could not have experienced in school. Although I was under quite some pressure at that time, it was a great experience to help my become more psychologically prepared when the DSE comes. To conclude, this activity has given me good nutrients to improve my English speaking in my future oral exams or practice.