Although speaking is the most significant skill among language skills, as it gives the ability for communicating effectively using the target language, EFL students' oral language development has been neglected in the EFL classes. This study aims at investigating the difficulties the primary school students encounter in speaking EFL in the Egyptian context. Further, exploring the factors that cause those difficulties and finding out solutions that may help ease them are study's objectives. The study takes the form of case study on three governmental language schools. The study sample was chosen purposively. For collecting the needed data, two questionnaires were conducted by the researcher for obtaining data from both grade six students and EFL teachers/supervisors. The obtained data was analyzed quantitatively, following descriptive analytical methodology. From the study findings, it was found that the most common speaking difficulties encountered by the Egyptian primary school students are inappropriate sentence formation and mispronunciation. Further, those difficulties are increased by number of factors. According to the study findings, those factors can be summarized in psychological factors; such as shyness and anxiety, and technical factors; such as issues with the speaking activities included in the EFL curriculum, using learners' first language in the EFL classes and teachers' attitude towards teaching EFL speaking skills. In addition, the study found out that using CLT, emotional intelligence and EFL teachers' CPD can ease those difficulties that the EFL students encounter in speaking EFL in the Egyptian context. From all the study results and findings, the study recommends that teachers need more training on the updated ELT methods, and provide their students with enough time and opportunities for practicing speaking EFL. Moreover, curriculum developers should reconsider the included speaking activities and speaking skill should be included in the final examinations.

Keywords : Speaking Skills, Speaking Difficulties, CTL, Oral Language Development