Arab Educational Information Network

This paper aims first at introducing a brief theoretical background about conversations in general, approaches to conversation teaching, and how conversation should be taught. It also sheds some lights on controlled, semi-controlled and free conversation. Finally, it offers some suggestions for ESL teachers which would make teaching conversation more influential. The hypothesis "Teaching conversation for 2nd stage students develops their communicative skills" is the main concern of this paper. It aims at investigating the students' points of view concerning conversation class and whether or not it develops their communicative competence. It is noteworthy that students' view is observed via a questionnaire which consists of 12 items. The items are distributed on different scales and are applied to 40 students from the Faculty of Arts. In the last section of this paper, questionnaire items have been analysed. It turns out that the students seem to enjoy a good extent of freedom in conversation class. They also provide a set of suggestions that are essential to improve conversation lecture. (Published Abstract)