An instructional module designed to help prepare college-level teaching assistants (TAs) for their duties in second language instruction is presented. The module focuses on the teaching of oral language skills in a beginning or intermediate language course. The first section examines features of spoken language, including the range of uses of spoken language, the concepts of communicative competence and communicative efficiency, distinctions between transactional and interactional talk, formulas in spoken language, and typical spoken language episodes. The second section describes specific approaches and classroom techniques for building language learners' speaking skills, including teaching spoken language for communication, finding a balance between control and spontaneity, outlining a curriculum, using class activities to bridge the gap between language knowledge and language use, and activities teaching both. Questions for classroom discussion are dispersed throughout the text. Contains 30 references. (MSE)