THE ROLE OF PHRASEOLOGICAL COMPETENCE IN FOSTERING PRODUCTIVE SPEAKING SKILLS AMONG EFL LEARNERS

Abstract

This article examines the role of phraseological competence in developing productive speaking skills among English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. Drawing on corpus linguistics, cognitive linguistics, and communicative language teaching frameworks, the study argues that mastery of fixed and semi-fixed multi-word units — including idioms, collocations, lexical chunks, and formulaic sequences — is central to achieving oral fluency and communicative accuracy. The paper reviews existing theoretical models and empirical research, identifies key pedagogical implications, and proposes evidence-based instructional strategies for integrating phraseological awareness into EFL speaking curricula. Findings suggest that systematic exposure to and explicit instruction in phraseological units significantly enhances learners' spoken output in terms of fluency, naturalness, and pragmatic appropriateness.