[musica]

Show and Tell is a great activity to do with your class and I think it would work with any age group. It has lots of names but it is a time when students can bring something from home to share with their classmates. This could really promote speaking in front of classrmates.
Some years I have the students hide their object and give hints, such as colour etc. as to what they have brought. The class gets 3 guesses,(how many guesses is up to the teacher), then the students shows what he/she has brought and talks about it to the class. This is good for speaking and for listening skills.
Then we have 'Questions or Comments'
The class can ask questions about the object of make a comment relevant to the presentation. The presenter has the power to choose who can ask the question or make a comment, they love this. It is up to the teacher to specify how many questions will be asked.
This is a non threatening way to get students to speak and communicate with each other.
I usually have a list that we work down to ensure everyone gets a turn sharing, and we have about 5 sharing on each day.

[kpan217]

Agreed! It's really great for older students too, to ask them to bring in photographs of a vacation or something special. My students have always been very enthusiastic about describing the pictures to each other. Because they're shy about speaking in front of everyone, I'd just go around to the groups, and they loved showing me pictures of their kids, vacations to different parts of the country (for which I needed them to describe distance/location, scenery, travel companions, activities, etc), weddings, schoolmates, and so on. Show and tell, whether for pictures, music, objects, or whatever is a real conversation starter, because people love talking about things they care about.

[musica]

Yes and their self consciousness dissolves as they are initiating the discussion and are empowered by asking questions and choosing who can respond. Great for self esteem.