Teachers of English as a foreign language (EFL) encourage students to take a more active role in the oral activities in the classroom through different strategies. This study examines the use of picture descriptions as a strategy to develop and enhance communication skills among the eighth-grade students attending a private English school in Chile. To that end, action research (AR) was attempted with the use of quantitative and qualitative methods to determine whether the use of picture descriptions can improve the students' oral skills in English as a foreign language. The findings of the study suggest that the students' communication skills increased as result of integrating picture descriptions in classroom activities, which in turn enhanced the students' overall participation.