An investigation common methods of teaching english speaking skill to 10th graders in tayninh province from perception to performance

31 4.1.1 What kinds of English speaking teaching methods are being used for grade 10 at high schools in Tay Ninh province?. 31 4.1.2 Do those methods help to achieve the curriculum objec

NGUYEN THI MY PHUONG

AN INVESTIGATION INTO COMMON METHODS OF TEACHING ENGLISH SPEAKING SKILL TO 10TH GRADERS IN TAYNINH PROVINCE: FROM PERCEPTION TO PERFORMANCE

Major: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL)

Code: 60140111

Submitted by Supervisor: TRAN BA TIEN, Ph.D

VINH, AUGUST 2017

This thesis has not been submitted for any degree in any other tertiary institution

Vinh City, August 2017

NGUYEN THI MY PHUONG

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teaching and learning a language: listening, speaking, reading and writing, but out

of the four skills, it can be said that speaking is considered as the most important skill to be mastered Many researches have been done on speaking up to the present time, however, methods of teaching speaking skills have actually not been systematically evaluated Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate whether the current speaking teaching methods being applied by English teachers

in speaking classes were appropriate and met the objectives of teaching speaking for grade 10 defined by the Ministry of Education and Training As a result, three common methods such as Grammar-Translation method, Audio-lingual method and Communicative Language Teaching are applied in teaching speaking skills for grade 10 by teachers According to the data collected, most of tenth-grade students could meet the objectives defined by the Ministry of Education and Training for grade 10 Teachers might make use of some suitable techniques of Audio-lingual method while Communicative Language Teaching was suggested being applied as the main method Further, the research pointed out the possible solutions to solve some difficulties in the process of teaching speaking skills

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accomplished

Firstly, I would like to express my very great appreciation to my supervisor, Mr Tran Ba Tien, for his valuable and constructive suggestions I really appreciated his kindness, patient guidance, and insightful comments that have guided me through obstacles and barriers during along period of time to complete my paper

Secondly, I am grateful to thirty two high schools in Tay Ninh province, English teaching staff and the tenth-grade students taking part in the research Your cooperation, assistance, and contributions have been vital for my thesis

Thirdly, I am thankful to my classmates and friends in giving good advice, feedback and in providing resources I would like to offer my special thanks to my dearest classmates who read and guided my writing through its complexity Besides this, I am thankful to all lecturers who have made comments and suggestions to improve my dissertation

Last but not least, I am greatly indebted my family for their sacrifice in order to offer me opportunity to the pursuit of my higher education You are not only my pride but also my strength It is worth naming the kindness of my soul mate in giving me big encouragement, patience, and help

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii

LIST OF TABLES viii

Chapter 1 1

INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Background to the study 1

1.1.1 General background 1

1.1.2 Problems in Tay Ninh high schools 2

1.2 Statement of purpose 2

1.3 Research questions 3

1.4 Significance of the study 3

1.5 The scope and limitation of the study 3

1.6 Overview of thesis chapters 3

Chapter 2 4

LITERATURE REVIEW 4

2.1 Teaching speaking skills 4

2.1.1 What is spoken English? 4

2.1.2 The nature of speaking 5

2.1.3 Sub-skills influencing spoken proficiency 6

2.1.4 Stages of teaching speaking 7

2.1.5 Principles of teaching speaking skills 9

2.1.6 The common English speaking teaching methods 10

2.2 Evaluation of teaching 16

2.2.1 Definition of evaluation and its significance in language teaching 16

2.2.2 Principles of teaching evaluation 18

2.2.3 Rubrics and their importance in teaching practice 19

2.2.4 Bloom’s Taxonomy 21

2.3 Researches on evaluation of English speaking teaching methods 21

Chapter 3 22

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3.2.2 Questionnaire participants 22

3.2.3 Interview participants 22

Table 3.1: Interview participants’ background 23

3.2.4 Oral test participants 23

3.3 Methods of data collection 23

3.4 Data collection instruments 24

3.4.1 Classroom observations 24

3.4.2 Questionnaire for teachers 25

3.4.3 Teacher interviews 25

3.4.4 Oral tests for students 26

3.5 Data collection procedures 27

3.6 Analytical framework 30

Chapter 4 31

DATA REPORT, ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSIONS 31

4.1 Results 31

4.1.1 What kinds of English speaking teaching methods are being used for grade 10 at high schools in Tay Ninh province? 31

4.1.2 Do those methods help to achieve the curriculum objectives of teaching English speaking for grade 10 in high schools defined by the MOET? 35

4.1.3 How should English speaking be taught at high schools in Tay Ninh province in order to meet the objectives of teaching English speaking for grade 10 in high schools defined by the MOET? 44

4.1.3.1 The difficulties that teachers have encountered in teaching English speaking at high schools in Tay Ninh province 44

in teaching English speaking at high schools in Tay Ninh province 44

4.1.3.2 The ways to teach English speaking at high schools in Tay Ninh province in order to meet the objectives of teaching English speaking for grade 10 in high schools defined by the MOET 45

4.2 Discussion 45

4.2.1 Methods of teaching English speaking skills being used at high schools in

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Tay Ninh province 46

4.2.2 The appropriateness of those teaching methods with the objectives of teaching English speaking for grade 10 in high schools defined by the MOET 48

4.2.3 The difficulties in teaching speaking and solutions 53

4.2.4 Concluding remarks 57

Chapter 5 58

CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS 58

5.1 Summary of main findings 58

5.1.1 Research Question 1: What kinds of English speaking teaching methods are being used for tenth-grade graders at high schools in Tay Ninh province? 58

5.1.2 Research Question 2: Do those methods help to achieve the curriculum objectives of teaching English speaking for tenth-grade graders in high schools defined by the MOET? 58

5.1.3 Research Question 3: How should English speaking be taught at high schools in Tay Ninh province in order to meet the objectives of teaching English speaking for tenth-grade graders in high schools defined by the MOET? 59

5.2 Implications 59

5.2.1 Teachers 59

5.2.2 Students 61

5.2.3 The school managers, the DOET and the MOET 61

5.3 Suggestions for further researches 62

REFERENCES 63

APPENDICES 67

APPENDIX 1: THE OBJECTIVES OF TEACHING ENGLISH SPEAKING FOR GRADE 10 IN HIGH SCHOOLS DEFINED BY THE MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING 67

APPENDIX 2 69

APPENDIX 3: QUESTIONAIRE FOR TEACHERS 71

APPENDIX 4: INTERVIEW FOR TEACHERS 73

APPENDIX 5: THE CONTENT OF SPEAKING TESTS FOR TENTH- GRADE STUDENTS 78

APPENDIX 6: PHIẾU ĐÁNH GIÁ KỸ NĂNG NÓI CỦA HỌC SINH 82

speaking for grade 10 defined by the MOET……….42

Figure 4.2: The teachers’ responses towards the question whether the current

methods of teaching English speaking meet the objectives of teaching English speaking for grade 10 defined by the MOET……… ……… 43

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LIST OF TABLES Table 2.1: The distinction between the key terms evaluation, assessment,

measurement and test (Kerri-Lee Krause, Sandra Bochner, and Sue Duchesne,

2003, p.405) 17

Table 3.1: Interview participants’ background 23

Table 3.2: Levels of 40 students for oral tests 23

Table 3.3: Classes of 40 students for oral tests 23

Table 3.4: Data collection procedure 28

Table 4.1: The speaking activities in speaking lessons 32

Table 4.2: Students’ level of fluency at the end of grade 10 36

Table 4.3: Students’ vocabulary at the end of grade10 37

Table 4.4: Students’ grammar at the end of grade 10 38

Table 4.5: Students’ pronunciation at the end of grade 10 40

Table 4.6: Students’ level of interaction with listeners at the end of grade 10 41

Table 4.7: The difficulties that teachers have encountered in teaching English speaking at high school in Tay Ninh province 44

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ABBREVIATIONS

GTM Grammar-Translation Method ALM: Audio-lingual Method

CLT Communicative Language Teaching MOET Ministry of Education and Training DOET Department of Education and Training

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Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the study 1.1.1 General background

Nowadays, English is no doubt a universal language in all aspects of life, from work to entertainment In Asia, where there are such languages which still play a considerable role in daily life as Chinese, Japanese, or Korean, English still remains a dominant tool of international communication Particularly, in Southeast Asia, it is used as an indisputable lingua franca for regional cooperation in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations organization (Nobuyuki, n.d.) Even in Vietnam, it consolidates its superior status in the national industrialization, modernization, and global integration (Dang & Nguyen, n.d.)

Lately, the importance of English has been increasingly underlined not only in but also outside schools In truth, it is a compulsory subject right from junior high school (Baldauf, 2007) In addition, the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) plans to begin teaching it as a compulsory subject to third graders from 2010 (“Teaching English to Primary School Students: Nothing Prepared,” 2008) In the working environment, it also takes a dominant position as an Order dated on August

15, 1994, and signed by the Prime Minister confirmed that government officials would

be required to study foreign languages, mainly and favorably English (Do, 2006) Therefore, teachers of English especially in high schools need to provide students with the medium of instruction to acquire knowledge of science, modern technology, and cultures worldwide; so as that they can easily integrate into the world community (MOET, 2009) In fact, all of those can not be done without sufficient English knowledge and skills Ur (1996, p 120) emphasizes that “of all the four skills, speaking seems the most important With the aim of helping teachers and students achieve the objectives, many methods of teaching speaking skill have been applied Depending on different teaching situations each method in reality has both advantages and disadvantages Therefore, I conducted the research in order to fully exploit the benefits of the methods and find out if the current methods of teaching English speaking can help teachers and students meet the objectives defined by the MOET

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1.1.2 Problems in Tay Ninh high schools

1.1.2.1 The students’ issues

English is a compulsory subject in Tay Ninh high schools Students have to study English to complete their seven-year English program set by the MOET Most

of high school students tend to ignore English listening and speaking, however, to focus on grammar and vocabulary instead (Kim Lien, 2006) In reality, their English speaking skill is generally of low level in comparison with the objectives set by the MOET Therefore, the methods of teaching English speaking play an extremely important role in motivating students and improving students’ speaking skill especially for tenth-grader students who have just entered high schools and have got

a lot of influences from teachers’ teaching methods

1.1.2.2 The teachers’ issues

At the beginning of the 2016-2017 school year, the English staff at Tay Ninh high schools consist of 155 teachers whose ages are from twenty-four to fifty-five, including 83 teachers with C1 level of English proficiency Most of them actually graduated from the University of Pedagogy or the University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Ho Chi Minh City with the formal training in English teaching Each English teacher often takes up three periods a week for one class and the average number of teaching periods is from seventeen to twenty per week In spite of being busy, most of them are willing to make use of different methods especially in teaching speaking skill However, the teachers are sometimes confused if the current methods can help students to meet the requirement As a specialist as well as an English high school teacher, the researcher finds it extremely necessary to carry out the research to

help students achieve the needs defined by the MOET

1.2 Statement of purpose

This study is carried out to meet the following aims:

 To investigate some common English speaking teaching methods being used

to teach tenth-grade graders at high schools in Tay Ninh province;

 To find out if those current methods can help students to achieve the curriculum objectives of teaching English speaking for tenth-grade graders at high schools in Tay Ninh province defined by the MOET;

3 How should English speaking be taught at high schools in Tay Ninh province

in order to meet the objectives of teaching English speaking for tenth-grade graders

in high schools defined by the MOET?

1.4 Significance of the study

In spite of this study being only small-scale research, it nevertheless has its own significance It is expected that the findings in this research will be useful for the teachers to know the effectiveness of their current methods and make some improvements to help students achieve the requirements

1.5 The scope and limitation of the study

The study is individually conducted in seven months from November 2016 to May 2017 with no financial assistance The study focuses only on grade 10 at high schools in Tay Ninh province, thus the generalization and recommendations will be limited to other grades at high schools in Tay Ninh province

1.6 Overview of thesis chapters

The thesis is divided into five chapters:

Chapter one: Introduction, presents the background, the statement of purpose, the research questions, the significance, the scope and limitation, and the overview Chapter two: Literature Review, presents various concepts relevant to the topic

of the research and summarizes what has been done and has not yet been done

Chapter three: Research Methodology, states the research site, participants and sampling, methods, instruments, procedure of data collection and the analytical framework

Chapter four: reports and analyzes the collected data

Chapter five: draws conclusions and presents some implications to related subjects

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Chapter 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

The previous chapter grounds the problem examined in this study This chapter aims to review the literature relevant to the topic of the present study and then to shape a theoretical framework which the study would be based on to find out the answers for the research questions The first two sections address two important points: teaching speaking skills (2.1) and evaluation of teaching (2.2) The final section deals with research on investigation into English speaking teaching methods (2.3)

2.1 Teaching speaking skills 2.1.1 What is spoken English?

Figure 2.1: Units of spoken language (Van Lier, 1995, p 15)

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Figure 2.1 shows the model suggested by Van Lier (1995) in order to clarify spoken English in term of its particular elements More specifically, the model was divided into three columns The left column points out four original areas of linguistic analysis, consisting of discourse, syntax, morphology and phonology The center column lists the units of spoken language such as text, utterance, clause, phrase, word, morpheme, phoneme and distinctive feature The right column describes the ways to convey meanings in spoken English via the supra-segmental phonemes, including rhythm, stress, and intonation In respect of characteristics, spoken English is received

in auditory way; as a result, the spoken message is temporary and its reception by the student is usually immediate (Van Lier, 1995) In order to help students improve their speaking skills, it is really essential for teachers to fully understand those above interrelated components

2.1.2 The nature of speaking

According to Chastain (1988), speaking can be defined as the using of both background and linguistic knowledge in order to create an oral message which is meaningful for the intended audience The forms and meanings of speaking are determined by the speaking context which consists of the participants themselves, their collective experiences, the physical environment, and the speaking purposes Those who want to speak a language need to have several primary conditions including having adequate vocabulary, having mastery of syntax and knowing how to articulate sounds in comprehensive manner (Nunan, 1999) Unlike reading or writing, speaking takes place in real time That is, the speaker needs to response at once without editing and revising what he wants to say, as he is writing Speaking is completely different from writing which we say loudly (Arnold, 2003)

In regard to speaking nature, Hymes introduced the concept of communicative competence in 1967 Among various definitions of communicative competence, the description of Richards, Platt, and Weber (1985) is a typical one They described communicative competence as the ability that people were able not only to apply the grammar rules of a language so as to form grammatically correct sentences but also to know when and where to use these sentences to whom In other words, those who have communicative competence can interpret and enact suitable social behaviors as well as have the active involvement in the production of English (Canale and Swain, 1980;

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Celce-Murcia et al., 1995; Hymes, 1972)

Communicative competence generally requires the speakers more than linguistic competence In the 1970s, the research on communicative competence indicated how communicative competence and linguistic competence differed from each other (Paulston, 1974) More details, it is the difference between knowledge that is about language forms and knowledge that makes a person able to communicate functionally and interactively Communicative competence includes not only linguistic competence (knowledge of grammar and vocabulary) but three other components (Canale and Swain, 1980; Canale, 1983, Swain, 1984 cited in Xu Li- sheng, 2000) They are the ability to utter an applicable thing in a particular social context (sociolinguistic competence); the ability to begin, continue, and finish a conversation consistently and coherently (discourse competence) and the ability to communicate in an effective way and solve problems resulted from communication breakdowns (strategic competence) From mentioned things, communicative competence determines on speaking proficiency (Scarcella, 1992) In other words, communicative competence is a fundamental requirement for those who want to have effective communication with others of different backgrounds and cultures Communicative competence is closely related to the nature of speaking; for that reason, teachers should pay attention to communicative competence during the process of teaching speaking skills to language learners

2.1.3 Sub-skills influencing spoken proficiency

The macro skill of speaking is a combination of smaller sub-skills (McCarthy and O’Keeffe, 2004; Dornyei and Thurrell, 1994; McCarthy, 1998; Richards, 1994; Hedge, 2004) More specifically, Bailey and Lance Savage (1994) point out five components that are generally recognized in analyses of the speech process: fluency, vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation and interaction A firm mastery of all mentioned sub-skills is necessary for full English speaking competency

To begin with, Nunan (2003) explains that speakers who get fluency are able to use English in a quick and confident manner with a few hesitations or unnatural pauses, false starts, and words searchers Speaking English fluently has such a great influence

in our life that people cannot ignore it As important as accuracy, according to Nunan (2003), accuracy is the extent to which students’ speech meets what people actually say

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when they use English Moreover, Harmer (2001) affirms that accuracy involves the correct use of language with respect to grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation More specifically, concerning grammar, the correct use of language regarding to word form and word order at the sentence level needs to be concentrated In term of vocabulary, accuracy is the appropriate choice of words used to express meaning as well as lexical range Likewise, accuracy in pronunciation can be thought of as the production of speech sounds in the way that is easily understandable to most listeners

And last, but by no means least, interaction is evaluated through immediate, appropriate and informative responses Together with being able to anticipate and then produce the expected patterns of specific discourse situations, speakers must control separate constituents such as turn-taking, rephrasing, providing feedback, or redirecting (Burns and Joyce, 1997) As a whole, five components mentioned above all would be used in order to build the speaking criteria for students, teachers and examiners to evaluate students’ speaking skills via questionnaire, interviews and oral tests However, producing the appropriate and meaningful messages should be mainly focused rather than grammatical accuracy (Kitao & Kitao,1996)

2.1.4 Stages of teaching speaking

It has been said that a speaking lesson can bridge for learners the gap between the classroom and the world outside So as to build this special bridge, the teachers need to focus on the following major stages

2.1.4.1 Pre-speaking (presentation stage)

Aiming to supply the students with clear information about the language they are learning, teachers must present them both the meanings of the language and how to use it As a result, they can see the connection between forms and functions, which is really useful for them to know how to choose the right patterns to express their ideas and feelings (Nunan, 1999) However, in this introduction stage, it is extremely dangerous to spend so much time presenting that the students cannot get enough time

to practice the language themselves (Byrne,1986)

One of effective ways to present a new language use is in contexts (Harmer, 1991), which can be shown through texts and activities Dialogue and passage are two specific types of texts In term of advantages, dialogues supply students with not only models of spoken language which are necessary for them to build uptheiroral ability

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but a framework of showing how speakers interact (Byrne, 1986) Besides, Byrne (1986) supports that new language uses should not be pre-taught in the dialogue and translated for intermediate or advanced learners so that they are able to acquire the strategies of guessing the meanings in the context Various kinds of related oral practice especially discussion of ideas in the passage should also be taken into account Together with texts, activities are needful in presenting a new language use Byrne (1986) divides activities into structured and unstructured ones In particular, with structured activities, students are given a systematic introduction to an item of language

to make its meaning clear In his view, this technique should be accepted as a quick effective way of conveying the item meaning and is useful for some quick pre-teaching because it can elucidate a point in a text which the context has failed to make clear (Byrne, 1986) Furthermore, through unstructured activities, the students can communicate by using the language they have already known Basing on the students’ performance, the teachers have the ability of deciding what new language to be taught

to those students On the other hand, unstructured activities are more suitable at post- elementary, intermediate, and advanced levels, where students know quite enough of language to communicate (Byrne, 1986)

2.1.4.2 While-speaking (practice stage)

Accuracy is considered as the goal of while-speaking stage In order to increase the amount of students practice, pair work, group work and class work are effective choices especially in the case of large class (Harmer, 1991) To begin with, pair work encourages the cooperation among students which is really vital for the classroom atmosphere and for the motivation it gives to learning with others (Harmer, 1991) More importantly, pair work provides students with the maximum amount of significant practice and get them acquainted with working independently as a first steps

to production stage (Byrne,1986)

On the other hand, it is group work by which students are able to express a variety

of language functions (Long, Adams, Mc Lean and Castanos, 1976) Many activities of cooperative learning are adequate preparation for real interaction, and they have built-

in mechanisms to solve some common communication problems in English classroom (Arnold, 2003) Group work promotes students’ responsibility, independence as well as learning motivation and contributes to a feeling of cooperation and warmth in class

2.1.4.3 Post-speaking (production stage)

According to Byrne (1986), all activities at the post-speaking stage are aimed at oral fluency which is promoted by two main factors Firstly, students have to work on their own in different ways such as working individually, working in pairs and working

in groups Talking about the benefits of group work, Broughton et al (1980) states that

it is really an active tool especially at the stage of freer production because of automatically less teacher control and more pupils – centeredness in any work done in groups Secondly, students need to be provided with the activities which are appropriate to the level of the students and can involve the students Following speaking experiences, it is really necessary to give students opportunities to reflect upon their performance; accordingly, their speaking can be gradually improved

2.1.5 Principles of teaching speaking skills

Brown (1994) points out some following principles of teaching speaking which teachers should keep in mind when organizing speaking activities To start with, the teaching content needs to be practical and usable in real-life situations and concentrates

on speaking with the language students have Moreover, teachers might provide students with suitable feedback and correction but do not disturb their flow of communication In addition, both interactive fluency and accuracy should be addressed, especially striving for communication Further, communication strategies such as asking for clarification, paraphrasing, using gestures and initiating should be encouraged Lastly, it is really useful for the teachers to know each student’s personality and then to encourage the quieter one to take more risks, which can be done due to teachers’ participation in the activities but at appropriate level If teachers

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seriously follow these principles, achieving success in teaching speaking skills is not a difficult problem

2.1.6 The common English speaking teaching methods

Being a complex social and cultural phenomenon, teaching is not as easy to carry out as it appears (Elizabeth, 2007) For this reason, together with always keeping in mind the subject aims and objectives, student needs and interests, and the appropriate environmental situations for students, the teacher is required to amend the teaching methods and clearly understand their nature, principles, advantages and disadvantages Besides, each of the different teaching methods has contributed new elements and has attempted to deal with some issues of language teaching and learning However, deriving in different historical context as well as stressing different social and educational needs, they have different theoretical consideration According to Bailey (2006), among a variety of teaching methods, there are three ones that have dominated

in language teaching especially in teaching speaking They are the Translation method, the Audio-lingual method and Communicative Language Teaching The typical features and principles of each method would be reviewed in this part, focusing specifically on how the method treats the speaking skills

Grammar-2.1.6.1 The Grammar-Translation method

The Grammar - Translation method has been used by many language teachers for years This method is known as the offspring of German scholarship since it was first used in the teaching of classical languages, Latin and Greek (Chastain, 1988) The GTM has the purpose of helping students be able to read the literature of a particular culture through learning grammar rules and vocabulary of the target language

According to Richards and Rodgers (2001), the GTM has some following key characteristics:

Reading and writing are mainly focused while speaking and listening seem to be ignored

(a) Vocabulary is chosen by basing solely on the reading texts and taught in the way of presenting their translation equivalents via bilingual word lists, dictionary study and memorization

(b) Sentence is the basic unit of teaching and language practice Teachers and students spend a lot of time translating sentences into and out of English

2.1.6.2 The Audio-lingual method

The Audio-lingual method, in which learning how to use the language to communicate is the purpose of language learning, became widespread in the 1950s and 1960s especially in the United States (Larsen-Freeman, 2000) So as to achieve this goal, speaking skills are taught by virtue of extensive repetition and a variety of

elaborate drills In fact, the ALM was resulted from behaviorism, which has survived

and still had the dramatic influence on language teaching and learning nowadays

Behaviorism is a psychological school of thought which rose to dominance during the first half of the twentieth century According to Onions (1973), behaviorism is simply

defined in the dictionary as “a theory and method of psychological investigation based

on the objective study of behavior” This school was developed by some typical researchers such as Pavlov, Skinner, Thorndlike, Watson, and Hull with a lot of

valuable studies Behaviorism started with the study of Pavlov – a Russian

physiologist, who carried out the experiments on dogs and then discovered the classical conditioning process He proved that behaviors could be learned by means of conditioned association and the association between environmental stimulus and a

naturally occurring stimulus in the learning process Later, with Psychology as the Behaviorist Views It in 1913 and Behaviorism in 1924, Watson, an American

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psychologist, gave the basic principles of this new school of thought as well as defined

behaviorism Behaviorism at that time had a deep impact on psychology and education

and went on dominating for the next fifty years with the appearance of operant conditioning of Skinner, which demonstrated the effect of punishment and

reinforcement on behavior Generally, behaviorism has contributed a lot to the finding

of effective ways for human teaching and learning

Basing on the theory of behaviorism, Richards and Rodgers (1986) affirm that in

the ALM foreign language learning is basically a process of mechanical habit formation Giving correct responses is concentrated on rather than making mistakes to form good habits The opportunities of making mistakes are actually minimized through memorizing dialogues and performing pattern drills Richards and Rodgers (1986) also emphasize that if something is repeated more often, students’ habits and learning will

be stronger and greater

In addition, Larsen-Freeman (2000) explains that new vocabulary and structural patterns are presented through dialogs in the ALM The teacher presents a good model

to students in the first stage and then asks them to practice a lot by using drills such as single-substitution, multi-substitution, transformation, and question- answer drills More specifically, at the beginning of the lesson the teacher introduces to students a new dialogue, demonstrates and repeats that dialogue meanwhile the students listen carefully, and then the students repeat a line several times Next, the teacher says one person’s line and the students say the other person’s lines After that, the teacher and students switch their roles More difficultly, the class can be divided in half; each half plays roles and later changes their roles until there is no hesitation at all Observably, the students work so hard that they are able to respond automatically Also, it should be carefully noted that the habit of using students’ mother tongue is thought to interfere with the students’ attempts to master the target language Therefore, the target language is used in the classroom not the students’ native language (Richards &Rodgers, 1986) Furthermore, making errors is needful to be avoided and corrected at once because errors themselves might cause the formation of bad habits In the ALM, the teacher obviously is the authority who directs and controls students’ language behaviors

In details, there are some following typical techniques (Larsen-Freeman, 2000)

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(a) Backward build-up (expansion) drill: Teacher separates a sentence into some smaller parts and then asks students to repeat each part beginning at the end of the sentence and expanding backwards the sentence, adding each part in sequence

(b) Repetition drill: Students are asked to repeat what the teacher models as rapidly and exactly as possible

(c) Chain drill: Students are required to ask and answer each other in turn

(d) Single-slot substitution drill: Teacher presents a line in the dialog After that, teacher gives a word or a phrase as a cue that students, when repeating the line, must replace into the sentence in the correct line

(e) Multiple-slot substitution drill: This drill is nearly the same as single-slot substitution drill except that there are multiple cues to be substituted into the line (f) Transformation drill: Students are expected to transform the given sentences into other structures

(g) Question-and-answer drill: Students can ask and answer questions quickly (h) Complete the dialog: Students fill in the missing words to complete the dialog (i) To sum things up, Prator and Celce-Murcia (1979) point out the features of Audio- lingual method as bellows:

(j) Phrase memorization, mimicry and over-learning are relied on

(k) Sentences and structures are learned by repetition

(l) Little attention is paid to the explanation of grammar

(m) New words are learned in the context

(n) Students are encouraged to speak only the target language

(o) Proper pronunciation is necessary

(p) Accurate responses are reinforced

(q) Meaning and content are considered not as important as proper manipulation

of the language

Apparently, the theory of the ALM proposes that frequent repetition and correction need to be involved in language lessons to form good habits for students Structures and dialogues are practiced until students are able to produce utterances fluently and automatically While this method focuses on oral skills, producing speech

is tightly controlled in order to reinforce correct habit formation of linguistic rules (Lazaraton, 2001) Teachers indicate spoken errors at once, in hopes of preventing

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students from forming bad habits (Bailey, 2006) Besides, most of the interaction in the classroom is between the teacher and students and is directed by the teacher (Larsen-Freeman, 2000) Consequently, it has been thought that teaching speaking requires no more than engineering the repeated oral production of structures but concentrates on the development of grammatical and phonological accuracy combined with fluency (Bygate,2001)

On the other hand, the ALM has a big problem that students are not able to readily transfer the habits they have mastered in the classroom to communicative use outside it (Larsen-Freeman, 2000) In spite of providing potentially good tools for Second Language Acquisition, the lack of concentration on meaning and fluency of the ALM detracted from its success Additionally, the results observed from classroom practice were disappointing in some way, which emphasizes that repetition, over-learning, and avoidance of errors were not the best way to learn a second language (Brown, 2000) Moreover, Lightbown and Spada (1999) point out the fact that students have no reason to think about repetition void of meaning; as a consequence, they do often not understand what they are repeating In truth, the pattern memorization does not lead to fluent and effective communication in real-life situations (Ellis, 1990) Further, Ellis (1990) affirms that the ALM quickly lost its popularity in the United States, partly resulting from the strong theoretical arguments that were advanced against it For those analyzed reasons, teacher needs to have an appropriate regulation

in using the ALM and its techniques, to thoroughly exploit the benefits and to avoid the shortcomings at the same time

2.1.6.3 The Communicative Language Teaching

In order to meet the increasing need for good skills of communicating in English, Communicative Language Teaching appeared in the late 1960s According to Richards (2006), CLT can actually be understood as a set of principles about the language teaching goals, the ways that teachers teach a language for students, the activities that best facilitate language learning, and the roles of teachers as well as of learners in the classroom With this teaching method, students can learn how to follow the social and cultural rules and express themselves appropriately in each communicative circumstance Being able to communicate actually requires not only linguistic competence but communicative competence – knowing when and how to say what to

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whom (Hymes, 1971) Since its origination, CLT has been the main source of influence

on world-wide language teaching practice and raised a lot of relevant and useful issues today

Followings are the distinctive characteristics of CLT

(a) Everything is done with communicative purpose (Larsen Freeman,2000) (b) Information gap, choice and feedback are three common features of communicative activities including games, role plays, songs and problem-solving tasks (Johnson and Morrow, 1981) Information gap tasks are activities in which students are required to use English to convey information known to them but not to their classmates (Bailey, 2006) Students have their own choice to choose what to say and how to say in communicating (Larsen-Freeman, 2000) Feedback provides students with knowledge of how successful their performance has been (Larsen-Freeman,2000)

(c) Authentic materials are used (Larsen-Freeman,2000)

(d) Students carry out communicative activities in small groups (Larsen-Freeman, 2000) Accuracy is often downplayed; students’ ability to convey their message is emphasized (Hammerly, 1991) In order not to interrupt students’ flow of communication, teachers should note the errors during fluency-based activities and return to them later with an accuracy-based activity since errors are seen as a natural outcome of the development of communication skills (Larsen-Freeman, 2000)

(e) It is necessary for the teacher to use English as much as possible not only during communicative activities, but for explaining the activities to the students or in assigning homework (Larsen-Freeman,2000)

(f) To be the key to the improvement of students’ English speaking abilities (Shumin, 1997), classroom interactions are the processes by which the partners in a conversation can reach agreement (Lynch, 1996) It is when the whole class can be engaged in conversation not only between teacher and students but also between student and student in a way which actually helps the students to learn (Bygate, 1987) because interaction is actually co-production (Allbright and Bailey, 1991) The teacher might present some part of the lesson and then sets up situations that prompt communication between and among the students in various configurations: pairs, triads, small groups and whole group (Larsen-Freeman, 2000) Doughty and Pica (1986) emphasize that working in groups makes it easier for learners to interact than working

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with the teacher

Unlike the ALM, CLT focuses on the semantic content of language learning Students are asked to take part in a number of suitable activities with different tasks so that they can improve their communicative competence In order to choose the appropriate activities, teachers need to base on how well they engage students in meaningful and authentic language use rather than merely mechanical practice of language patterns (Richards and Rogers, 1986)

Talking about applying CLT in Vietnam, Canh (1999) holds a view that it is necessary to question the appropriateness and relevancy of CLT developed in another part of the world to Vietnamese pedagogical contexts Likewise, Ellis (1996, pp 213-218) highlights that for the CLT to be made appropriate with Asian conditions, it needs

to be “both culturally attuned and culturally accepted” through a useful tool -

“mediating” “In this way the nature of what eventually takes place in the classroom involves the teacher’s ability to both filter the method to make it appropriate to the local cultural norms, and to re-define the teacher-student relationship in keeping with the cultural norms embedded in the method itself” (Ellis, 1996, pp 213-218)

From what has been analyzed in the section, it can be concluded that each teaching method has its own benefits and shortcomings Remarkably, teachers need to carefully take the teaching contexts into consideration so that they can have effective choices of suitable teaching methods and principles For the survey carried out in Tay Ninh province, the researcher uses the mentioned different features as the indicators of the three methods in classroom observations, questionnaire, and interviews to indentify what kinds of English speaking teaching methods are being used

2.2 Evaluation of teaching

2.2.1 Definition of evaluation and its significance in language teaching

The term evaluation has been defined in a variety of ways Generally, Lynch (1996) affirms evaluation is considered as the systematic attempt to put information

together so as to make judgments or decision Further, Kerri-Lee Krause, Sandra

Bochner, and Sue Duchesne (2003) modify in education evaluation is related to

making judgments about the relative or absolute worth of entities as varied as an essay,

a dance performance, a class project, a curriculum, a new teaching method or a

state-wide school system Evaluation actually requires not only description but judgments

Assessment Gathering, interpreting, recording and communicating

information about student achievement Evaluation Making judgment about relative or absolute worth

Measurement Testing student performance using numerical values in the

evaluations can be classified into two categories - formative and summative (Scriven,

1967) Regarding formative evaluation in teaching, evaluation activities are done to supply teachers with the information that they can use to improve their teaching The information seems to be private, confidential and rich in detail; therefore, teachers can get clear insights on nature of teaching for personal use On the other hand, summative evaluation in teaching gathers information to make personnel decisions without intending to provide rich and detailed data for improvement of teaching (Scriven, 1967) These two kinds of evaluations can be powerful tools for informing decisions about teachers’ professional development opportunities if they are combined together (Nolan and Hoover, 2005) Evaluative information has two kinds of forms including qualitative and quantitative As such, those kinds of information can be collected by

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many different methods

In reality, evaluation plays a very important role in the process of improving the

quality of teaching and learning Teachers might know their strengths and weaknesses; accordingly, they are able to remedy the current teaching situation and modify their teaching for the benefits of students’ learning

2.2.2 Principles of teaching evaluation

According to Hall and Fitzgerald (1994), it is really necessary for any evaluation scheme to provide valid and reliable information on the quality of an individual’s teaching performance, basing on the type and purpose of the teaching, the background of the students, the resources available, and the nature of the course

Hall and Fitzgerald (1994) also point out some following typical principles of teaching evaluation:

(a) Improving teaching should be the main purpose of any teaching evaluation scheme

(b) Student feedback must be considered as a substantial, primary element in teaching evaluation schemes

(c) In the case of evaluating teaching for assessment purposes, student feedback needs to be combined with the evidences from other suitable sources such as peer review, individual reflection, and expert observation

(d) A representative sample of an individual’s teaching activities should be covered in order to collect the teaching evaluation data

(e) It is important to recognize the differences between the information collected from formative and summative evaluations in case the results of teaching evaluations are to be integrated into decision-making related to career progression In other words, information obtained for the exclusive purpose of improving teaching, and often collected before that teaching is complete, might be incompatible to take into consideration when making judgments

(f) Those who use the results of teaching evaluations for decision-making related

to career progression should be skilful in interpreting and drawing together the different sources of information

(g) There should be different evaluation instruments for different audiences In addition, it is necessary for each evaluation instrument to only include items for which

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that audience is capable of giving informed responses

(h) Evaluation instruments should be designed on the basis of recognized good practice, teaching and learning theory and accepted research findings

(i) Questions relating to an individual’s performance and questions covering the contributions of others teaching or involved in the course need to be clearly separated

(j) The procedures of administration of an evaluation should be adequate and standardized; accordingly, the validity of the information obtained would be protected (k) Clear guidelines and evaluation purposes should be fully provided for the evaluated

(l) Clear rules governing the confidentiality of evaluation information and reports must be included in evaluation schemes

(m) It is vital to always get ready for regular review of the evaluation schemes and of the institution’s evaluation procedures

2.2.3 Rubrics and their importance in teaching practice

According to Szpyrka and Smith (1995), rubrics are defined as sets of criteria or scoring guides which describe performance or understanding levels Via rubrics, students might know clearly about what will be assessed, standards that need to be met and information about where students are in relation to where they need to be In term

of classification, rubrics can be divided into holistic and analytic With a holistic rubric, the teacher is required to score the whole process or the whole product in stead

of judging the component parts separately (Nitko, 2001) Meanwhile, an analytic rubric requires the teacher to score each separate parts of the product or performance first, and after that to sum the individual scores to obtain a total score (Moskal, 2000; Nitko, 2001) Before designing a specific rubric, the teacher must make a decision if the performance or product will be scored holistically or analytically (Airasian, 2000 and 2001)

Followings are primary steps in the process of designing scoring rubrics for classroom use (Airasian, 2000 and 2001; Mertler, 2001; Montgomery, 2001;Nitko, 2001; Tombari and Borich, 1999)

Step 1: Review all the learning objectives that need addressing by the task

Step 2: Determine the detailed observable attributes which the students need and

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do not need to show in their performance

Step 3: Brainstorm the features that describe each attribute and then find out the ways to describe different levels of performance for each observable attribute identified

in step 2

Step 4a: In the case of holistic rubrics, write painstakingly careful and accurate narrative descriptions for excellent work and poor work merging each attribute into the description and then describe the highest and lowest levels of performance together with the descriptors for all attributes

Step 4b: In the case of analytic rubrics, write painstakingly careful and accurate narrative descriptions for excellent work and poor work for each individual attribute and then describe the highest and lowest levels of performance using the descriptors for each attribute separately

Step 5a: In the case of holistic rubrics, complete the rubric by describing other levels on the continuum ranging from excellent to poor work for the collective attributes and write descriptions for all intermediate levels of performance

Step 5b: In the case of analytic rubrics, complete the rubric by describing other levels on the continuum ranging from excellent to poor work for each attribute and write descriptions for all intermediate levels of performance for each attribute separately

Step 6: Collect samples of student work that illustrate each level

Step 7: Revise the rubric if necessary

In teaching practice, rubrics can be seen as the important bridge connecting evaluation and teaching, by which teachers are able to picture the specific teaching quality and since then teach students more effectively Rubrics might make teachers’ work more consistent as well as easier and the evaluation will be more scientific, clear and persuasive Besides, using rubrics might reduce the time for teachers to score and explain the results to students and their parents Thanks to rubrics, students can also recognize the expectations of teachers and schools, and have more motivation in learning Students might even base on the rubrics to self- evaluate; as a result, they are more independent and responsible for their own learning Additionally, using rubrics helps students develop and better their communicative skills through discussing with parents, teachers, and friends Apart from teachers and students, students’ parents can

In order to evaluate the students’ abilities, various tools have been able to be used

In term of cognitive field, Benjamin Bloom announced his famous study – a classification of learning objectives within education in 1956 This professor of Chicago University identified six different levels of critical thinking skills, ranging

from easy to difficult, simple to complex They were knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation With the aim of fitting the more

outcome-focused modern education objectives, Bloom’s Taxonomy was revised by Anderson and Krathwohl forty-five years later They changed the names of the levels from nouns to active verbs and reversed the order of the highest two levels at the same

time The new order is remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating and creating

According to Garavalia, Hummel, Wiley and Huitt (1999), most of the tests made

by teachers aim at the lower levels of the taxonomy meanwhile research has shown that the higher levels of the taxonomy students handle the more students can remember With the knowledge of different levels of thinking, the teachers can design the better tests, which can be used to measure students’ abilities and classify kinds of students as well Consequently, the English learning assessment is more objective, accurate and effective

2.3 Researches on evaluation of English speaking teaching methods

Up to now there have been many researches on teaching speaking skills These researches all emphasize the importance of speaking skills in teaching and learning a language especially for communication However, the number of researches on evaluation of English speaking teaching methods seems to be limited That is the reason why the researcher needs to carry out this study in order to help related objects deal with the urgent problem of teaching and leaning speaking skills in high schools

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Chapter 3 METHODOLOGY

3.1 Research site

The study is carried out at thirty two high schools in Tay Ninh province There were 245te nth -gra de classes with the total number of 10.046 students at 3 2 high schools in Tay Ninh province in the school-year 2016 – 2017 The teaching staff has

167 English high school teachers, with 83 teachers with C1 level of English proficiency With twenty years of operation or lower, 32 high schools in Tay Ninh province have made a lot of efforts and obtained certain achievements in teaching and learning However, half of high schools in Tay Ninh province do not have enough conditions to equip efficiently all authentic materials and facilities

3.2 Participants and sampling

95 teachers in charge of grade 10, the manager of the English board and 40 students from 4 different high schools were chosen as the sample of this study Having just entered high schools, the tenth graders were not accustomed to learning at high school; hence, the methods of teaching speaking might have a deep influence on their speaking learning

3.2.1 Classroom observation participants

For classroom observations, the researcher visited 4 classes of 4 different teachers from 4 different high schools who were in charge of grade 10

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Table 3.1: Interview participants’ background

Teachers Qualification Years of teaching

experience

Name of High School

Hoang Le Kha high school

3.2.4 Oral test participants

40 tenth-grade students from 4 different high schools in Tay Ninh province were chosen randomly for the oral tests thanks to Microsoft Office Excel

Table 3.2: Levels of 40 students for oral tests

Students’ marks at the end of the school-year

Excellent Good Fairly

good Average Unsatisfactory

Quang Trung

Nguyễn Trãi

Number of students

3.3 Methods of data collection

All methods have both strengths and weaknesses Hence, in order to deeply exploit the strengths and minimize the weaknesses, the researcher used a mixed method with various kinds of data sources in this study According to Stake (1995, cited in McDonough and McDonough, 1997), all evaluation studies belong to the kind of case

Also, in order to ensure the reality of students’ speaking performance results, the oral tests were carried out and then would be used to compare with what the researcher observed and what the teachers self-evaluated in questionnaire as well as interviews Additionally, document review was used for gathering data of the objectives of teaching English speaking for grade 10 in high schools defined by the MOET from a wide range of documents, mainly consisting of the textbook - English 10, the Teacher’s Book for English 10 published in 2009, the Guide of Carrying out Standard Knowledge and Skills for English in High School published in 2009 as well as the Syllabus for English in High School published in 2009 The data from document review would be used to compare and contrast with the results got from questionnaire and interviews As

a result, the study issues would be investigated

In fact, both quantitative and qualitative research was chosen for displaying statistical relationships and interpreting understandings Therefore, the study could provide an all-sided picture of the appropriateness of English speaking teaching methods being used for grade 10 in Tay Ninh province with the objectives of teaching English speaking for grade 10 in high schools defined by the MOET Then it would point out some causes and offer several suggestions, aiming at helping teachers improve their English speaking teaching for grade 10 in Tay Ninh province

3.4 Data collection instruments 3.4.1 Classroom observations

3.4.1.1 Rationale for using classroom observations

Observation is actually used in the study because it is the technique most satisfying to investigate because it brings forth to the “sweetest” of data (Tuson, 1995,

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p 16) Besides, observation allows the researcher to collect the detailed information about particular groups in natural settings which is deeper and richer than the data from survey work The researcher uses the observation checklist with the specific indicators

of the English speaking teaching methods so as to identify what kinds of English speaking teaching methods being used for grade 10 at Tay Ninh high schools

3.4.1.2 Description of the classroom observation checklist

The classroom observation checklist (see Appendix 2 for details) contains three major parts with 20 observed items to identify what kinds of English speaking teaching methods were being used for grade 10 at Tay Ninh high schools These items were actually the main characteristics of the Audio-lingual method and Communicative Language Teaching

3.4.2 Questionnaire for teachers

3.4.2.1 Rationale for using questionnaire

It is easy for the researcher to administer and can reduce participants’ fear and embarrassment, resulting in the reliability of the responses at the same time Accordingly, questionnaire was considered as an effective data collection instrument in this study The questionnaire for teachers was designed to identify what English speaking teaching methods being used for grade 10 at high schools in Tay Ninh province Because of DOET’s great authority in the formal conference, teachers would

be more responsible for finishing all questions in the questionnaire

3.4.2.2 Description of the questionnaire

The questionnaire (see Appendix 3 for details) contained 21 questions The contents of the questions were about the English speaking teaching methods being used for grade 10 at high schools in Tay Ninh province

3.4.3 Teacher interviews

3.4.3.1 Rationale for using interviews

Interview was another data gathering instrument employed in this study The advantage of this instrument was that it provided access to the process-oriented data which was unobtainable via other instruments (Cohen and Olshtain, 1993) It was also thought that it might help overcome such potential pitfalls as the researcher’s incorrect inferences about the causes of the observed behaviors (Gerloff cited in Robinson, 1991) The researcher could actually find it “easier to understand and capture the

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opinions of others” (Patton, 1990, p 21) It was additionally “open, flexible and suitable for situations in which the researcher and interviewees already have extensive knowledge of the subject under investigation” (Patton, 1990, p 283)

Considering the above-mentioned advantages, the researcher decided to interview four teachers in charge of grade 10 and the manager of the English staff so as to investigate what English speaking teaching methods being used for grade 10 at high schools in Tay Ninh province Also, those interviews would help the researcher know whether the English speaking teaching methods found met the objectives of teaching English speaking for grade 10 at Tay Ninh high schools Some causes and possible solutions according to the point views of the teachers would additionally be identified

3.4.3.2 Description of the interviews

The interviews (see Appendix 4 for details) contained 41 questions with three specific parts The contents of the questions were about the difficulties that the teachers were facing in teaching English speaking at high schools (from question 1 to question 14), the English speaking teaching methods being used for grade 10 at high school (from question 15 to question 35), evaluation of those methods and some suggestions for the situation (from question 36 to question 41)

3.4.4 Oral tests for students

3.4.4.1 Rationale for using oral tests

Together with questionnaire and interviews, oral tests were employed to evaluate the reliability of students’ speaking performance after they finished grade 10 Taking advantage of oral tests, students had opportunities to demonstrate their knowledge as well as their speaking skills As a result, students’ speaking abilities would be exactly revealed

3.4.4.2 Rubrics for evaluating students’ speaking ability at the end of grade 10

Basing on the general objectives of teaching speaking for grade 10 defined by the MOET that students can ask, answer, present the contents related to the topics in the curriculum and carry out some major communicative functions (MOET, 2009), the researcher concretized them into specific objectives These specific objectives are

in term of level of fluency, vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation and interaction For each mentioned aspect of speaking skills, rubrics for student speaking assessment were built thanks to Bloom’s Taxonomy More details, six different levels of critical

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thinking skills, ranging from easy to difficult, simple to complex consist of

remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating and creating Further,

students could “know” about a topic or subject at different levels; therefore, the researcher built the rubrics with five different levels, including unsatisfactory, satisfactory, fairly good, good and excellent As a result, the researcher was able to design the appropriate tests, which could be used to measure students’ abilities and classify levels of students as well The English speaking learning assessment thus is more objective, accurate and effective

3.4.4.3 Description of the oral tests

The oral tests were designed due to the objectives of teaching speaking skills for grade 10 in high schools defined by the MOET Accordingly, in order to evaluate students’ speaking performance, the oral tests (see Appendix 5 for details) were divided into 2 parts In the first part, students were asked to present a topic in three minutes In the second part, students were given a situation and then asked to make a conversation with the examiners Altogether, there were 10 cards with 10 topics which students studied during their grade 10 such as daily activities, school life, people’s background, technology, the mass media, nature conversation, entertainment, sports, future plans and famous places The speaking criteria including fluency, vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation and interaction were set (see Appendix 6 for details)

3.5 Data collection procedures

Permission was sought from the school principals as well as the classroom teachers prior to the survey The purpose and the significance of the study were clarified with these principals and teachers to obtain optimum cooperation The process

of data collection followed the stages presented in Table 3.4

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Table 3.4: Data collection procedure

Data collection procedure

s - The researcher asked for permission

from the four teachers and four school principals in charge of grade 10 to observe their classes once, basing on the schedule of those teachers and the curriculum of the school

During the

2nd semester (from March to May)

- 4 classes

of four different teachers from 4 different high schools

in charge of grade 10

questionnaire

March

- 95 English high school teachers in charge of grade 10

- 4 teachers in charge of grade10 and 1 manager

of teaching staff from

4 different high school

- The researcher invited one teacher to

be the examiner for the tests together with the researcher

- 40 copies of 10 cards were sent to students and three minutes were given for them to prepare

- Each student had three minutes to present the required topic Also, students were asked to make conversation with the examiners with given situations

- The examiners needed to base on the speaking criteria which consisted of 5 components (fluency, vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation and interaction) in order to evaluate students’ performance and each students’ mark was the average of the two marks given by the twoexaminers

April 16th to April 21st

- 40 tenth- grade students from 4 different high schools

of teachers at this school Data from interviews were calculated in terms of percentage to represent the respondents’ opinions which were later compared with the oral test results All the data collected from observations, questionnaire, interviews, oral tests and documents of the MOET were also analyzed and synthesized This aimed to see if there was any appropriateness between them and then to point out which methods of teaching English speaking could still be used to help tenth-grade students achieve the requirements of the MOET