A skills is the capacity or ability to do some works, related to physical and manual work.

There 7 language skills

which are divided in two goups:
Productive and interactive skills: speaking, writing, spoken interaction, written interaction
Receptive skills: listening, reading, audio visual reception.

PRODUCTIVE SKILLS

They are the ability to pass, tell or say oral and written information. They involve producing to language, rather
than responding it.

SPEAKING: consists in using speech to communicate meanings to other people. When we speak we
usually: pronounce words, tell stories, ask for and give information, etc.
o Subskills: grammar aspects, vocabulary and functions of the language; register to speak; linkers to
connect the information, body language; different types of texts; oral fluency; interactive
strategies to keep the attention of person who is hearing you.
o Factors to communicate our message successfully: fluency (to avoid that the listener will be bored
because we speak very slowly, for example); accuracy (use appropriate grammar, vocabulary and
sounds); appropriacy (when you use the appropriate words in a context).
o Levels of common European framework: A1 (can produce simple phrases about people or places);
A2 (can give a simple description about people, daily routines, likes, dislikes,).
o First cycle: can say words or short sentences in controlled contexts; can describe themselves
saying what they can do or like.
o Second cycle: can say short sentences in controlled contexts; can describe themselves saying what
they do or where they live.
o Third cycle: can say sentences of three or more words in controlled contexts; can represent a
dialogue.
o Activity:
Names and animals: All the pupils should make a circle, and one by one they should say their
name and a name of an animal than start with the same letter of their name. Also, they can do
gestures or sounds of the animal that help to memorize this name. The next classmate says the
name of the previous pupil, the animal and does an imitation and introduces himself. And so on,
until the whole group finish.
Describe the scene: The students have to describe all they see in the picture. They can say the
name of animals and objects, their colours, where they are, what they are doing
Tongue twisters: The pupils have to search tongue twisters on internet. Then, they have to
memorize them. In the class, they should present it and the teacher corrects the pronunciation
and intonation.
She sells sea shells on the sea shores

WRITING: consists in the messages production and reception.

In written production (writing) activities the language user as a writer produces a written text which is
received by a readership of one or more readers. Its a productive skill, it means it involves producing
language rather than receiving it.
o To write we need something to communicate and someone to communicate it.
o We can write to complete questionnaires, to write newspapers, notes or business letters,
o Common European framework says that there are three illustrative scales: overall written
production; creative writing; reports and essays (it doesnt apply in Primary).
o First cycle: can describe a picture using words.
o Second cycle: can write short texts about themselves and their experiences.
o Third cycle: can write simple sentences using simple connectors.
 o Activity: see a picture, read and complete phrases about it; write a description about themselves.
All about me robot, its a simple activity where the student must see the picture, read and
complete the sentences.
Self portrait, the student must write a description about themselves as complete as they can
Your favourite season, in this activity the pupil should write a description about their favourite
season, telling what kinds of things they like in that season.

Interactive skills are the ability to share oral and written information with other

SPOKEN INTERACTION: consists in a negotiation to can interact with other person. The language user is
listener and speaker.
o During interaction there are two strategies: reception and production strategies. But there are
other kind of strategies: cognitive or discourse strategies (repetition, adapt to different contexts)
or collaborative or cooperation strategies (people work together).
o These strategies help us to: keeping interaction respecting the turn to speak; identifying problems
and propose solutions; talk about our point of view; solving conflicts.
o Common European framework says that there are the following illustrative scales: total spoken
interaction; understanding a native speaker; conversation; informal discussion (with friends);
formal discussion and meetings*; cooperation to achieve something; transactions to obtain goods,
products and services, giving and receiving information; interviews.
*There arent in Primary.

o First cycle: can give basic information about him.

o Second cycle: can ask and give addresses.
o Third cycle: can ask and gibe information about prices.
o Activity: Guess who? ; interview.
Guess who?: Each player has a sheet with 24 images from different people. They have to choose
one and guess their partners character. They have to ask yes or no questions to eliminate
candidates, such as "Does this person wear glasses?"
At a restaurant: They have to imagine that they are in a restaurant. Each player has a different
role: there are a waiter and two customers. They have to hold a typical conversation at a
restaurant.
Interview: The students have to choose an English native speaker and try to hold a conversation,
using the questions they know previously, but they can read them. Examples: What is your name?
How old are you? Where are you from?

WRITTEN INTERACTION: consists in activities relate to correspondence by letters, e-mails. Fax, contracts,
communiqus, participating in computer conferences,

o First cycle: can describe pictures with words or simple phrases.

o Second cycle: can use words and simple phrases attending to orthography mistakes and with a
correct order of the words.
o Third cycle: can make sentences using linkers such as but/ and.
o Activity: writing emails with children of others countries; sending secret letters to classmates
describing themselves to the receptor can guess who have written this letter.
Emails exchange: There are some websites like www.etwinning.net where you can contact
with schools from other countries and exchange emails with them.
Letters exchange; The sstudents send secret letters to classmates, describing themselves
and typing the name of the student who the letter is addressed. Then they insert the cards
in a box and students must take their letters they receive and try to find out who wrote
the letter and add detail to their description.
RECEPTIVE SKILLS
They involve responding to language, rather than producing it.

LISTENING (aural reception): consists in the understanding of the spoken language giving meaningful to
the sounds. For this, we have to attend (pay attention) to context, language and our knowing of the world.

o Difference between spoken language and written language: spoken language generally is less
planned and less structured than written language. When we speak, we dont have time to
organize our thoughts, so we have to use simple structured messages. In this way, the listener
could listen our. However, when we write we can use a more complex text because we have more
time to organize and structure our thoughts.
o The common European Framework: says about overall listening comprehension, understanding
conversation between native speakers, listening audio media recordings, listening a merber of a
live audience, Listening to announcements and instructions (A1: Can understand instructions
addressed carefully and slowly, simple directions,)
o Activity:
First cycle: Simon says. The game of "Simon says" is that the teacher says one action that students
need to do. It can only be done when the teacher says: "Simon says".
Second cycle: Bingo. Game of "bingo" we want to work the difference between seventeen and
seventy, thirteen and thirty, fifteen and fifty, etc.
Third cycle: Where is the ball? The game "Where's the ball?" we will work prepositions of place.
We will give the students a picture of a house where there are some balls drawn. The teacher will
tell them where the ball is and what colour it is, and the students will paint the ball of that colour

READING (visual reception): consists in responding to text understanding the language at word level,
sentence level or whole text level. For this, we need understand the relationship between words in a
sentence (coherence) and the relationship between sentences (cohesion) using our knowledge of the
language.
We also need to connect the message of the text to our knowledge of world.
o Subskills: reading to look for specific information (Scanning, leer para encontrar la informacin
referente a una pregunta concreta); Reading for detail; Deducing meaning from context
Understanding text structure; Reading for gist (Skimming, leer para conseguir una idea general
del texto);Inferring (is get the authors idea); Predicting (This text is about.)
o The common European Framework: say about: Overall reading comprehension Reading
correspondence (A1: can understand short and simple messages on postcards)., Reading for
orientation, Reading for information and argument, Reading instructions

o Activity: 2 cycle (read a text about a personal description and answer questions about it); 3 cycle
(looking at different pictures with people and relating to with their correct descriptions).

AUDIO VISUAL: consists in understanding the information what we receive through channels
simultaneously (listening and visual). It is an important educational resource, because it increase the
explanations of the teacher, can produce emotional impacts on students and they introduce students to
audiovisual, important technology in modern culture.
o Common European Framework: this skill is not available for A1 level, but its very important to
apply a lot of technological resources following our educational system, so its a very useful skill to
develop the digital competence.
o Digital competence involves: responsible use of TICS, to be conscious that TICS help we to learn
English and get information through internet and technological resources.
o Resources: digital board, television, laptop, projector, internet,
o Applications: blogs, skype, digital books, web pages, forums, moodle,
o Activity: 1 cycle (pocoy cartoons); 2 cycle (videos of youtube where children have to look at
and repeat phrases in loud voice).