Training to present scientific papers in English

This article describes a course in English taught under severe institutional constraints. Its objective is to help students to cope with the demands of presenting conference papers. Previous research has shown that preparing an oral presentation from almost exclusively written sources increases phonological nativisation phenomena, and that reliance on a fully-written text makes the speaker's intonation and rhythm barely accessible to the listener. We were asked to organize an 18-hour course over a 4-month teen to train the students. The solution was to turn to a blended learning system. A five-step approach, repeated twice, is followed, each step relying on theoretical hypotheses which will be described. Only case studies are available and will be presented. The results validate our hypotheses. The way students proceed does lead to a more appropriate intonation pattern. However the presentations, though perfectly understandable, still carry clear traces of phonological nativisation and confirm previous research results.