Oral English Communication Strategies Employed by First-Year Medical Students, University of Baghdad

This present study reports on an investigation into the oral communication strategies (henceforth OCSs) used by College English students (or non-English major students) in Iraq. These students are a large group who are studying in English and need to use OCSs to facilitate their communication because they do not have sufficient exposure to English in daily life. All of the subjects are first-year bachelor students from Medicine field. The data were collected by mean of questionnaire. The results indicate that students of first year employed the following strategies: Approximation, circumlocution, word coinage, mime, literal translation, language switch, and appeal for assistance. While they do not employ avoidance strategies like: topic avoidance and message abandonment. Other finding which is that females use more strategies then males, females use seven strategies out of nine namely: approximation, word coinage, circumlocution, literal translation, language switch, appeal for assistance, and mime. While males use only six strategies out of nine namely: approximation, word coinage, circumlocution, literal translation, language switch, and appeal for assistance. These findings suggested that OCSs help students overcome difficulties in oral English communication. By enhancing students’ strategic competence, their communicative competence could be improved. The results of this study could be great help in the teaching of English to Iraqi EFL learners by making them aware of CSs already in their repertoire and by encouraging them to use OCSs more frequently.