The term "Oral English" is commonly used in China and is a huge demand of English students everywhere. What exactly does the term mean, and are there alternative more appropriate titles you could give to describe the same activity?
Another thought... considering 'Oral English' in the context of other language skills.
We don't call listening 'Aural English', do we? Or reading skills 'Optical English' or 'Visual English'? What would writing be? Manual English? In some ways, referring to speaking as Oral English is just as inaccurate.
If oral English is a common term in China, then it would not be so hard to envisionage a learner saying quite innocently something like 'I want to improve my oral skills.' Yeah, you don't want to say that to a native speaker. There will either be an awkward silence or the person will be trying to suppress laughter.
I would say 'spoken English.' To me, 'oral English' sounds awkward. It's a more formal, clinical term which I don't think collocates very well with 'English.'
You can have an 'oral exam' or give an 'oral presentation' so that is probably where the term originates from, but 'spoken English' sounds much better.
'Oral' is a strange word, isn't it? It's kind of anatomical. Oral hygiene at the dentist, for example. Medication taken orally. That sort of thing. 'Oral English' sounds like a practitioner is administering a dose of English by means of a soluble capsule.
The only time we tend to use 'oral' in the context of language learning is an 'oral test' or 'oral exam'. Otherwise, 'Oral English' sounds a bit odd. 'Spoken English' would seem to be a more natural expression.
Shawn, as native speakers I think we all agree that 'Oral English' is a NOT a normal thing to say. It sounds odd to us. The usual expression is 'spoken English'. 'Spoken English' makes us think about communication through speaking, whereas 'oral' makes us think of our mouths.
'Oral' is an anatomical term referring to the mouth. When we hear the word 'Oral' we think of toothbrushes and mouthwash, and medication like capsules, tablets and cough syrup. And yes, it also makes us think of oral sex. I'm a well brought-up girl, so when I first made my comment on this thread I was very polite and I refrained from lowering the tone by mentioning this. But I'm afraid it's true - say the word 'oral' to the majority of English-speaking adults and the first thing that comes into their mind is probably a scene from a porno movie, not an English conversation class. Even the ones who won't admit it.
