Introduction .

Introduction

  Teaching a foreign language is not an easy task. Tunisian teachers of English Second Language, ESL, learners may find themselves in front of several obstacles that can hinder the effective learning of English. An example of these difficulties is related to one of the four Language skills that learners of English are supposed to acquire and to master, that is Speaking. The nature and the specificity of this important skill pose a “problem” for Teachers as well as for Learners themselves. This can be summarized in the following questions:

• Why, when and how should we teach / learn Speaking?
•  How to motivate students to speak, taking into consideration the almost total unwillingness to speak in an ELT classroom?
• If teachers are to care  more about how to motivate their students to speak, does this mean turning a deaf ear to the errors that can be done by students when speaking?

      This little work will investigate these issues. An introductory part will give an idea about Speaking, its definition, its importance in the light of the Communicative Language Teaching approach. Then this memoir will, mainly, focus on Motivation as a key tool for teachers to deal with learners' unwillingness to speak in an ELT classroom. The stress will be put, mostly on when and how to motivate these students; how, I, as a teacher of English manage to motivate my students to use their English language fluently. This objective of encouraging pupils to speak fluently, on the other hand, may mean to ''neglect'' the correctness of the speech produced. This will be discussed by the end: is it to totally favor the fluency of speech at the expense of its accuracy?