Speaking leads to success -Practice, practice, practice. Remember how you learned your native language as a child. Fluency didn't come from reading books or studying grammar, thinking about the correct grammar structures before you spoke i.e. present simple or present continuous. It came simply from speaking a lot, listening and imitating what you heard (as is the case with all children). Speaking is the most important thing when learning a second language. Being a diligent but shy and silent student may help you to learn maths, chemistry or physics, but unfortunately it will hold you back when you are learning a new language. You will learn fastest through speaking and listening a lot. This will actively help you to practice pronunciation and grammar structures as you learn new vocabulary with your partner. It will also help activate your subconscious

"word treasure" and helps convert your word treasure from passive to active. The more speaking you do, the more active your English becomes, This means you acquire more vocabulary, recognize and correct more grammar mistakes, improve your pronunciation and most importantly your confidence. While speaking is the most important skill. Listening skills are also highly important. With a good ear you can pick up many words passively once you hear them in context. You should try to use these words yourself later in the conversation to make them active. Good listening skills help in the acquisition of any language. A good teacher will have many ways to encourage you to speak in the classroom. You can further maximize your learning experience and time by following the steps below so that you can make a greater contribution and get more out of a lesson.

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1. Yes +, No + : Remember to elaborate
Remember always to give your answer plus something extra. Don't just say 'yes' or 'no'; say more. Although there are times in the real world when a simple answer will be expected, the classroom is your chance to practice saying as much as possible. For every question, give the basic answer, and then try to say something more about the subject. Make sure it is interesting, because this will help to stimulate further discussion. Remember, learning English is all about using English.

They ask you	Don't just say	Remember: Answer plus extra
Are you from Germany	Yes	Yes I am. I am from Stuttgart. It's where I grew up and I still love the place.	Yes. But I've been travelling now for six months. I miss my family and friends a lot.
What do you most like about your job	The money is good	Well, for a start the money is good and I get a strong sense of achievement	It gives me the freedom I need to develop my own creative input.

2. Ask open-ended questions
A close-ended question is one where the answer can be either a simple 'yes' or 'no'. For example, "Do you like ice-cream?" "Have you had a good day?" The problem with these questions, obviously, is that they encourage a simple answer - they do not encourage much of a conversation. Continue with these kinds of questions for too long, and the discussion will very quickly become dull.
To avoid this, try to ask open-ended questions. These are ones where the answers must be more elaborate, and not just a simple 'yes' or 'no'. For example, "What is your favourite desert?" "What have you enjoyed about your day?" To these, your listener cannot answer 'yes' or 'no'. Instead, they must say something like, "Well, I absolutely love chocolate ice-cream" "I really enjoyed my English lesson".

3. Ask follow-up questions
To follow up means to ask for more information. A follow-up question is simply a question which follows the answer to an earlier question.
For example,

Open-ended Question	So, what do you do for a living?
Answer plus extra	I'm a business person. I've been working for a telecommunications' company for the last five years.
Follow-ups	That's fantastic. What do you do exactly?

Good follow-up questions are extremely important in conversation. There is nothing worse than telling someone something interesting, only to receive a bored, "Oh, that's nice…. So, let me tell you all about me". This is also true in English class.
Follow-up questions are a good way to show your conversation partner that you're interested in them. This will then stimulate the discussion, which will give you more listening practice, more to talk about, and more interesting lessons.

4. Keep the ball rolling
Imagine that you are playing a soccer game. The first thing you must do to play soccer is kick the ball, and then you must keep the ball rolling. This idiom "to keep the ball rolling" means to keep something going e.g a conversation. By remembering to ask open-ended questions, by giving elaborate answers, and by asking interesting follow-up questions, you will easily reach this target.
In the classroom, your teacher might allocate five or more minutes towards a discussion because he or she knows you are able to think of enough interesting things to cover during this time. This is your time. Make the most of it by keeping the ball rolling.

5. Keep it natural, interesting and challenging
In the classroom students often ask routine questions. They're the ones you've asked a hundred times since you started learning English, like "What's your favourite…?". Instead, why not,try to think of new and stimulating questions for your partner to answer. This will encourage you to think more about what you're saying - thus helping you with your speaking - and it will provide your colleagues with a greater listening challenge. You should also encourage them to do their part to keep it interesting and challenging.

6. Body building versus Language acquisition
If you want to get fit or build muscle, You must train and exercise to achieve your desired goal. This is also true in an English lesson. If you want to improve your English, you should practice, practice, practice maximise speaking time and improve your listening skills.
If you don't want to lose it, use it!
When you go into the class, your teacher will encourage you to talk as much as possible, when you try your best to speak, you are practicing English in the best possible way.

7. Go beyond your comfort zone
Your comfort zone is that place where you feel comfortable about your English. Again, we can come back to the fitness analogy: In order to get fitter or gain more muscle, you must constantly push yourself to your outer limits. If you're running every day at the same pace and only break a light sweat, you will do little to improve your fitness. It is through exceeding yourself that you can see the greatest results. It is the same with English. You might have a level of conversation that you feel comfortable with. It will be a level at which you will make relatively few mistakes. You should however push yourself. English class is a time when you can make mistakes. Where mistakes are good.You can learn from your mistakes and advance Instead of saying what you can say, try to say more. You will make a few more mistakes, but you will learn from them and you will push yourself towards a higher level in English.