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Wed 7 Dec, 2016 10:50 am
In one of the articles entitled "Teaching speaking", I have come across such a sentence: There are three main reasons for getting students to speak in the classroom". The phrase "get sb to do sth" sounds a bit informal to me. If I said, for example, "There are three main reasons for encouraging students to speak in the classroom", would the meaning be the same?
@Nat093,
The meanings are different. The first sentence implies prompting; the second sentence implies motivating.
@InfraBlue,
So , instead of "getting students to speak", I may say "prompting students to speak"? Are there any other options?
Getting someone to do something not necessarily imply prompting; the verb is famously loose in its meaning. It can mean persuading, requesting, motivating, instructing, ordering. The essential point is that it has a successful outcome (the students actually do speak).
@contrex,
So maybe I shouldn't change anything and take the sentence as it is. I just thought that it was very informal.
@contrex,
Quote:Getting someone to do something not necessarily imply prompting
Thanks again Con for alleviating my uncertainty. I was sure my age was overcoming my abilities at The Language
@Nat093,
Nat093 wrote:
So maybe I shouldn't change anything and take the sentence as it is. I just thought that it was very informal.
Slightly informal. The standards of formality are relaxing these days. It is useful to be able to recognise levels of formality and write according to the level required.
@contrex,
Could you give me some prompt on how to make the sentence "There are three main reasons for getting students to speak" slightly more formal? Obviously, I need to replace "get sb to do sth" with another form. Maybe "There are three main reasons to have students speak in the classroom?"
To make it more formal, I would just replace "getting" with "inducing".
@contrex,
I will make a speech, so the language should not be too formal either. "Induce" sound very formal.
'Get' is only slightly informal, and 'induce' is only slightly formal.
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