Sử dụng dạy học theo dự án để dạy kỹ năng nói tiếng Anh cho sinh viên năm thứ nhất chuyên ngành du lịch trường Cao đẳng Công nghiệp Sao Đỏ

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES POST – GRADUATE STUDIES DEPARTMENT ---***--- NGUYỄN THỊ NGỌC HOA MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS USING PROJECT WORK TO TEACH

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES POST – GRADUATE STUDIES DEPARTMENT

-*** -

NGUYỄN THỊ NGỌC HOA

MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

USING PROJECT WORK TO TEACH ENGLISH SPEAKING SKILL FOR FIRST YEAR TOURISM – MAJORED STUDENTS

AT SAO DO COLLEGE OF INDUSTRY

Supervisor: Từ Thị Minh Thúy, M.A

HẢI PHÒNG – NĂM 2010

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES POST – GRADUATE STUDIES DEPARTMENT

-*** -

NGUYỄN THỊ NGỌC HOA

MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

USING PROJECT WORK TO TEACH ENGLISH SPEAKING SKILL

FOR FIRST YEAR TOURISM – MAJORED STUDENTS

AT SAO DO COLLEGE OF INDUSTRY

Supervisor: Từ Thị Minh Thúy, M.A

HẢI PHÒNG – NĂM 2010

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TABLE OF CONTENT

Part I: introduction ………

1.1 Rationale of the study ………… ……… 1

1.2 Aims of the study……… 2

1.3 Research questions ……… 2

1.4 Scope of the study ……… 3

1.5 Design of the study ……… ……… 3

PART II: DEVELOPMENT Chapter 1: Literature review ………

1.1 Theoretical background of speaking skill 1.1 1 The nature of speaking skill 4

1.1.2 What is the main objective of teaching speaking ? 4

1.1 3 The role of speaking skill in teaching and learning language 5

1.1.4 Relating factors in English language speaking ……… 5

1.1 5 Characteristics of a successful speaking lesson 7

1.1.6 Principles of teaching speaking 8

1.2 Theoretical of Project work

1 2.1 Definition of project work 8

1.2.2 History of project work ……… 9

1.2.3 Characteristics of project work 9

1.2.4 Aims of project work ……… 10

1.2.5 Principles of project work 10

1.2.6 How is project work conducted? ……… 11

1.2.6.1 Planning ………

1.2.6.2 Performing

1.2.6.3 Feedback

1.2.7 Evaluation of project work ……… 11

Chapter 2: data collection and analysis……….………

2.1 Description of the setting 2.1.1 Description of the school ……… 13

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2.1.2 Description of the programme 14

2.1.3 Description of the course ……… 14

2.2 Methodology and data collection ………

2.2.1 Participants ……… 15

2.2.2 Materials ……… 15

2.2.3 Methods ………

Questionnaires ………

Pre – tesst and post – tests ………

Class Observations ………

17 2.2.4 Procedures ……… 19

Chapter 3: results …………

3.1 Presentation of the data ……… 20

3.2 Analysis, interpretation of the data and discussion ……… 27

Chapter 4: pedagogical implications 4.1 Suggestions other techniques to promote students to speak English … 4.1.1 Giving more praise and encouragement 34 4.1.2 Error Correction 34 4.2 Recommendation other activities to teach speaking skill 4.2.1 Using songs ……… 35

4.2.2 Games ……… 35

4.2.3 Role-play ……… 36

REFERENCES

Appendices

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List of the tables

Table 1: Students’ attitude towards language skills 20 Table 2: The students’ difficulties in learning English speaking 20 Table 3: Students’ result in the pre-test oral examination 21 Table 4: Statistic from teacher evaluation in the pre-test examination 22 Table 5: Students’ result in the post-test examination 22 Table 6: Statistic from teacher evaluation in the post-test examination 23 Table 7: Factors motivating students in speaking lesson-using project

work

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Table 8: Students’ opinion to projects performed in the first year 25 Table 9: Project work improves students’ English speaking competence 25 Table 10: Result of class room observation 26

PART 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale of the study

English has become more and more popular all over the world It is the international language of diplomacy, trade, business, education, aviation etc There are more and more people studying it as second language beside their mother tongue The motivation of studying English is to get a better work, to have more chance to travel abroad or simply to get information from the Internet, to read foreign newspapers and magazines or to assess knowledge in the world For this reason, English has been taught everywhere in Viet Nam: in schools, universities etc and it has been a compulsory subject

Like other languages, the final purpose of studying English is the ability to communicate with foreigners or native speakers However, in Viet Nam as well as other countries where people speak English as a foreign language, how to speak English well has

been still a big problem According to Bygate,Martin (1987), speaking, speaking is a

productive skill in the oral mode It, like the other skills, is more complicated than it seems

at first and involves more than just pronouncing words People can be very good at grammar, vocabulary but they are very shy when speaking language, especially to foreigners

As a teacher of English, I realize that one of the biggest problems of our students when learning English is speaking skill From observation, I can see during the period of speaking, students usually perform activities conducted by teachers Teacher usually plays the role of controller and the class is usually teacher-centered Students always follow the teacher’s instructions Students cannot promote their imagination, their creation, and do not have chance to show their ability of organization Sometimes, speaking lessons are boring and the class atmosphere is quiet, which must have been interesting and pleasant I think that not only me but other teachers find it embarrassing when teaching speaking skill

To solve this problem and with an attempt to improve students’ speaking skill, I use project work in teaching English especially teaching speaking skill

Project work, factually, is the requirements of teacher to students to prepare the lesson prior to the class Project work functions as a bridge between using English in class and using English in real life situations outside of class (Fried-Booth, 1997) It does this by

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placing learners in situations that require authentic use of language in order to communicate (e.g., being part of a team or interviewing others) When learners work in pairs or in teams, they find they need skills to plan, organize, negotiate, make their points, and arrive at a consensus about issues such as what tasks to perform, who will be responsible for each task, and how information will be researched and presented Within the group work integral to projects, individuals' strengths and preferred ways of learning (e.g., by reading, writing, listening, or speaking) strengthen the work of the team as a whole Therefore, when the students are asked to prepare things prior to the lesson, the lesson will attract them more and it will gain success

Moreover, students at Sao Do College, where I am teaching have a low proficiency

of speaking Preparing the lesson prior to the class can bring them confidence, activeness and other benefits For example; if I ask students to find information and make a presentation about a famous place in Viet Nam, they have to take responsibility for their work, find information, make sure for its performance and the next day in class, everything goes smoothly and be efficient Therefore, project work has been chosen as one effective method in teaching speaking English

1 2 Aims of the study

This study was carried out with four aims:

- To investigate students’ difficulties in learning speaking English

- Investigate the difference between the communication activities performance of students when using traditional approach and that when using project work

- To investigate factors motivating students in speaking lesson using project work

- To investigate how project work improved students’ English speaking competence

1 3 Research questions

The research is carried out to find the answer to the following research questions:

1 What are students’ difficulties in learning speaking English?

2 Does the communication activities performance of students before using project work significantly differ from that when using project work?

3 What factors motivate students in speaking lesson using project work?

4 How does project work improve students’ English speaking competence?

1.4 Scope of the study

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The study is concerned with the use of project work to teach speaking skill It is not applied to all students at Sao Do College of industry It is only carried out with students who are in the first year of tourism major at this college in order to find out a suitable way

to teach speaking skill effectively and students can gain improvement

1.5 Design of the study

A part from acknowledgement, table of contents and appendices, this study is divided into three part

Part I: “Introduction” presents the rationale, aims, research questions, scope of study and its design

Part II: Development

Chapter 1: Literature Review mentions some concepts relating to the content of the study: characteristics of communicative competence, communicative language teaching, speaking skill and areas of project work and the role of project work in language competence and speaking skill

Chapter 2: Data collection and analysis consists of two parts The first part gives description of research setting in which an overview of school, teachers and students, programme and course is shown The second part of this chapter is methodology and data collection gives brief introduction of participants, materials and methods

Chapter 3 Results This chapter composes two parts: Presentation of the data is the first part; analysis, interpretation of the data and discussion is the second part

Chapter 4 Pedagogical implications This chapter shows suggestions of techniques and activities for teacher in teaching speaking skill

Part III : Conclusion This part summarizes the main ideas of the study and give future direction

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PART II DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1 LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Theoretical background of speaking skill

1.1 1 The nature of speaking skill

Speaking is a process of exchanging information between speakers and listeners and speaking occurs in almost relations in almost everywhere in everyday life Pattison (1987) states that in a conversation, there existing at least two participants : speaker(s) and listener(s) When the speakers start the message, the listeners decode and responds to the message in turns

To be more specific, Hayriye Kayi University of Nevada (Nevada,USA) assumes that speaking is "the process of building and sharing meaning through the use of verbal and non-verbal symbols, in a variety of contexts" and speaking is a productive skill which requires a lot of back-up factors like knowledge, confidence, self esteem and enthusiasm Speaking a second language, particularly, brings about its own prerequisites: exposure, consolidation, motivation as well as acknowledgment Whether we realize it or not, these determinant factors can be made to exist in a supportive learning environment of an English as a Second Language (ESL) classroom

If you ask a question: Which one of the four language skills is the "Odd-One-Out"? Which one of these is different from the other three? The answer is speaking The other three you can do alone, on your own, without anyone else You can listen to the radio alone You can read a book alone You can write a letter alone However, you can not really speak alone

When understanding the nature of speaking skill, learners and teachers will recognize the role of speaking skill and the main objectives of studying and teaching speaking skill

1.1.2 What is the main objective of teaching speaking?

The most important reason for teaching speaking is to develop oral fluency , that is, the ability to express oneself intelligibly, reasonably accurately and without undue hesitation To meet this objective, learners will have to be brought from the stage where they merely imitate a model or respond to cues to the point where they can use the language to express their own ideas and feelings (processes that must to a large extent be in simultaneous operation)

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1.1 3 The role of speaking skill in teaching and learning language

In teaching theory, language has four macro skills: Listening, speaking, reading and writing These four skills are in interactive and supportive relation Of all the four skills, speaking is in the central position, as it is fundamental to human communication A society

is really existing when people communicate Speaking skills simply do not refer to the way

in which we communicate with another person It encompasses many other things - the way in which we respond to the person we are speaking, body gestures including the facial ones, pitch and tone of our voice and a lot of other things And the importance of speaking skills is not just limited to the management world, since effective speaking skills are now required in each and every aspect of our life According to Nambiar (1985), speaking when compared with writing, is the essential form of language and writing is ranked second after

it and derived from it

In language teaching and learning, speaking plays an important part The ability to communicate in a second language clearly and efficiently contributes to the success of the learner in school and later in their life Bygate (1987) also claims that our learners need to have ability to speak confidently in basic transactions Especially, speaking is regarded as the first step to confirm who knows or does not know a language It is indicated that people who know a language are referred to as “speaker” of that language as if speaking included all other kinds of knowing Consequently, a lot of foreign languages learners are primarily interested in learning to speak

Therefore; recognizing the importance of speaking skill in language teaching and learning, teacher should pay attention to teaching speaking skill Teacher should provide environment where students have real-life communication, authentic activities and meaningful task that promote oral language For good language speaking teaching and learning, both learners and teachers have to know relating factors in English language speaking; that means they should know what does English language speaking involve? These factors are listed in the next part

1.1.4 Relating factors to English language speaking

Learning to speak a foreign language requires more than knowing language features, its grammatical and semantic rules" Learners must also acquire knowledge of how native speakers use the language in socially constructed interactions, which involves many factors

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Hymes (1971) assumes that L2 learners need to know not only the knowledge but also the culturally acceptable ways of interacting with others in different situations and relationships His theory of communicative competence (1971) consists of the interaction

of grammatical, psycholinguistic, sociolinguistic and probabilistic language components Based on this framework, we will portray tine abilities underlying speaking proficiency

Lexis and grammar, the use of a number of common lexical, especially to perform

certain language functions such as agreeing, disagreeing, expressing surprise, approval, etc

Connected speech: i.e common phenomenon in spoken interactions in which so are

modified (assimilation), omitted (elision), added (linking r) or weak (through contractions and stress patterning) Effective speakers thus need to be not only producing individual phonemes (as I would have gone) but also to connected speech (I'd've gone)

Expressive devices: native speakers of English change pitch and stress of paretic

parts of utterances, or vary volume and speed to convey meanings beyond words, especially in face-to-face communication Students need to recognize deploy some of such features and if they are to be Effie -communicators

Compensating language: effective speaking benefits from the language of

negotiation that we use to seek clarification and to show the structure of what we are saying

Language processing: effective speakers need to be able to process language in

their own heads and put it into coherent order so that it comes out in forms that are not only comprehensible but also convey the meaning that are intended One of the main reasons for including speaking activities in language lessons is to help students develop habits of rapid language processing in English

Interacting with others: most speaking involves interaction with one or more

participants This means that effective speaking involves a good deal of listening and understanding of how the other participants are feeling and a knowledge of how linguistically to take turns or allow others to do so

Real item information processing: the ability to process the information others tell

us the moment we get it The longer it takes, the less efficient we are

Sociolinguistic knowledge: knowledge of language alone does not adequately

prepare learners for effective and appropriate use of the target language Learners must

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have competence which involves knowing what is expected socially and culturally by users

of the target language Understanding the sociolinguistic side of language helps learners

know what comments are appropriate, know how to ask questions during interaction, and

know how to respond nonverbally according to the purpose of the talk

All relating factors to English speaking skill above provide students with basic

knowledge used in studying speaking; Teachers base on them to determine which

knowledge to teach and which method to apply to improve students’ speaking competence

which start with a successful speaking lesson in class

1.1 5 Characteristics of a successful speaking lesson

In a speaking period, it requires everyone to involve, to communicate in order to

exchange information The core feature of speaking class is the dynamic environment

where students do more rather than listen and get information A speaking lesson is

effective when the atmosphere is opened, comfortable Learners must feel safe and

accepted They need to understand both the risks and rewards of seeking new knowledge

and understanding The classroom must provide involvement, interaction, and

socialization The second factor that makes a lesson successful is that learners must be

given frequent opportunities to face new information and experiences in the search for

meaning However, students are encouraged to do more than just receive information It is

better when students face new challenges using their past experience without the

dominance of a teacher/giver of information Finally, though there have interpersonal

relations between learners in a speaking lesson, the students have to discover and perceive

knowledge themselves

1.1.6 Principles of teaching speaking

Teaching language skills in general and teaching speaking in particular requires

principles that all teachers have to follow for their teaching to be successful and effective:

Output and input: when students produce a piece of language, feedback

from their interlocutor will act as input based on that they modify their output Such input

can come from the teacher as feedback or prompters

Texts: texts offer students a model to follow, especially when they are working on

specific functions of language like agreeing, apologizing, refusing, and so on Texts can

also act as stimuli as a lot of language production grows out of texts that we see or hear A

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controversial reading passage may be the springboard for a discussion (Listening to a tape

in which speakers tell a story or opinion may provide necessary I stimuli for students to respond based on their own experience

Reception as part of production: in many situations, production can only continue

in combination with the practice of receptive skills Thus conversation between two people

is a blend of listening and speaking; comprehension of what is said is necessary for what the participant says next

Production enables reception: when students try to speak in certain situations or

within certain genres, they are better attuned to understanding other people speaking in the same context In this case, oral production works in a way that helps students with their listening comprehension

1.2 Theoretical background of Project work

In the trend of teaching and learning English to communicative language teaching approach, all teachers try to provide students with opportunities to explore the language use oral communication Teachers use techniques, activities to enhance students to speak and communicate with others people using target language Teachers are also enthusiastic

to apply new method to teaching and one of these effective method is project work

1 2.1 Definition of project work

According to Diana Fried – Booth (1986) and Diana Fried – Booth (1997), project work is a method which involves students in an authentic learning experience with language used for genuine communication purpose It is student – centered and it results is

a tangible end – product Project work focuses on completing a task

Project work normally involves many resources - time, people and materials - and learners practice a range of skills and language systems

The term “project” is used to describe a framework for teacher-student cooperation that is based on the individual and social needs of the persons involved, as well as the requirements of the society in which they live The main aim was to bridge the gap between “learning for school” and “learning for life” Education should provide relevant knowledge and applicable skills for the students, and enable them to participate as responsible members of a modern democratic society

1 2.2 History of project work

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Root of project work can be seen in the concept of the “work school” that was developed by Pavel Petrovic Blonskij and Anton Semenoic Markarendo during the twenties Their main criticism focused on the curriculum and the methodology that were applied in schools at that time To them schools did not seem to meet the needs of young people or the demands of the society They stressed the necessity of cooperative action at school in order to improve the responsibility for social relationships and to provide training

of social skills to students

In the 1960s the above-mentioned approaches were rediscovered Mainly schools in France, Great Britain, Germany and the United States experimented with project work, which was then seen as a valuable means not only to promote the learning of relevant knowledge and skills but also to increase mutual respect and understanding in the environment of schools

These experiments were very much influenced by the works of education specialists like Ivan Illich and Paolo Freire, who accused schools of contributing to the alienation of the individual instead of enabling students to become self-assured and self-determined adults

With such a long period of developing, project work has been in favor of using by teachers due to its positive nature which is drawn in detail by characteristics below

1.2.3 Characteristics of project work

Wray, Allison.(1998) shows that project work focuses on content learning, world subject matter, and topics of interest to learners; so it bridges the gap between school learning and learning out of school Unlike other traditional methods which is teacher-centered, project work possesses the characteristics of student-centeredness Using project work, teacher only acts the role as the facilitator and controller Students take the main responsibility to devise activities, carry out and develop the project, perform the final product in front of the class and it is the students who give evaluation to each project One

real-of the most outstanding characteristics real-of project work is that it emphasizes on cooperation, which leads to different modes of interaction adopted by students during the work; supports cooperation rather than competition between students Students not only gain language knowledge but also practise ability of organizing and form good personality

In order to have a complete project, students themselves have to find information from

1 2 4 Aims of project work

Project Work is a learning experience which aims to provide students with the opportunity to synthesize knowledge from various areas of learning, and critically and creatively apply it to real life situations This process, which enhances students’ knowledge and enables them to acquire skills like collaboration, communication and independent learning, prepares them for lifelong learning and the challenges ahead and the main aim was to bridge the gap between “learning for school” and “learning for life” Another important aim of project work is the development of management skills This means in particular that students learn to plan the project in a cooperative way Negotiations take place in student groups to find out which one of the different proposals mentioned by the group members seems to lead to the most satisfying results and emphasis is put on the persuasive power of ideas and arguments Besides planning the management of project needs, the distribution of tasks and responsibilities among the group members must also take place Finally, information has to be collected, tested and summarized, which again supports the improvement of management skills

1 2 5 Principles of project work

When using project work to teach language skill, it is compulsory for teacher to follow the principles of building on previous work that means there is closely connection between the current task and old knowledge Moreover, project work must ensure the integration of speaking, listening, reading, and writing skills; During the period of carrying out project, there must have incorporation collaborative teamwork, problem solving, negotiating and other interpersonal skills Though one of the most outstanding characteristics of project work is that it emphasizes on cooperation, it doesn’t mean that no one is responsible for the work On the contrary, project work requires learners to engage in independent work and

be sure for completion One difficult but useful principle of project is it challenges learners

to use English in new and different contexts outside the class; only by this way, students can master their speaking competence quickly Project work also engages learners in

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acquiring new information that is important to them which leads to clear outcomes Finally, project incorporates self-evaluation, peer evaluation, and teacher evaluation

1 2 6 How is project work conducted?

A project usually goes through three stages: Planning, Performing and Feedback:

1.2.6.1 Planning: The students, guided by the teacher, discuss and make a decision on the

theme and content of their project They will make a detailed plan, including the objectives and procedures Each member’s task and duty is made clear They also predict their specific language needs All the ideas for interviews, visits and surveys are discussed

1.2.6.2 Performing: Carrying out the project is the most important part The students now

come out of the classroom to perform whatever tasks they have planned, e.g., having interviews, making recordings, conducting surveys and gathering materials It is at this stage that the students will fully show their talent and develop their abilities It is also an important stage for them to develop their language abilities and integrate the four skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing

1.2.6.3 Feedback: The feedback session includes reviewing, discussions and a final

presentation given by students in different ways of chart, booklet, PowerPoint or an oral presentation This is not only a process of project work reporting, but also a process of peer learning, reviewing and evaluation Comments from peers and the teacher are of great value in helping students improve their project work and build confidence, which will stimulate and further on their follow-up activities and more project work

1.2 7 Evaluation of project work

Learners can evaluate themselves and each other through role plays, learner interviews, and writing activities They can become familiar with completing evaluation forms related to general class activities, and they can write about their learning

learner-to-in weekly journals where they reflect on what they learned, how they felt about their learning, and what they need to continue to work on in the future They can even identify what should be evaluated and suggest how to do it

Assessment can be done by teachers, peers, or oneself Teachers can observe the skills and knowledge that learners use and the ways they use language during the project Learners can reflect on their own work by expressing how they feel about their work and progress, and what skills and knowledge they are gaining

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Assessment can also be done through small-group discussion with guided questions such as what did your classmates do very well in the project? Was there anything that needed improvement? What? Why? The ability to identify or label the learning that is taking place builds life-long learning skills Questionnaires, checklists, or essays can help learners do this by inviting them to reflect critically on the skills and knowledge they are gaining

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CHAPTER 2 DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS 2.1 Description of the setting

2.1.1 Description of the school

Sao Do College of industry locates at Chi Linh district, Hai Duong province Founded in

1969, it used to be vocational school for workers of mining In 2005, it became college of Industry There are 13 departments with about 10 thousands students of various majors from techniques to economic, tourism and foreign language The teaching staff consists

of 500 teachers Many of them are young so we are hoping for further development in the future

Teachers of English are in tourism and foreign language faculty of this college All

of 15 English teachers have degree of university and half of them are studying master level One forth of them is in the age of above 45 Two third of young teachers were students at university of foreign languages – Ha Noi national university or at Ha Noi university and the rest graduated from other universities in the country; so they have experience and knowledge in teaching In recent years, teaching English follows the approach “learner-centered” and focuses on communicative competence In that case, English teachers at our college try to apply new methods to teach English especially speaking skill to help students have better communicative competence after graduation

Students in the first year of tourism major at our college are mainly from 18 to 21 years old Like other students here, they come from locations in Hai Duong province and from other districts in surrounding areas Most of them studied at schools in urban areas and their purpose of learning English is examine-orientation; thus, they did not pay attention to speaking skill Though their grammatical competence is quite good, their communicative competence is in low level Expressing their ideas in oral form or speaking English or discussing before crowded to them is a very difficult problem Many of students always ask me how to improve speaking skill or communicative competence or how to communicate with foreigners confidently-a compulsory requirement to a professional tour guide To solve that problem, I mainly used activities, techniques that promote students’ speaking skill Using Project work in teaching speaking skill, to my teaching experience, is really useful and efficient

As mentioned above, teachers of English at our college try their best to teach speaking skill effectively as they know that the final goal of learning English is to

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communicate However, it is difficult because students lack of vocabulary and background knowledge Besides, methods of teaching are not suitable and types of activity are not interesting; so they do not attract students In a speaking lesson, students usually do exercises or tasks in the books or syllabus It is the teacher who devises activities and controls students For that reason, students are sometimes passive; they cannot promote their creation Some formal types of exercise for speaking skill are: work in pair, ask and answer to get information or work in-group, describe a famous place that you like Most of these tasks are done in class, students are rarely required to prepare at home prior to the lesson Students’ presentation is usually simple with not much useful and interesting information; their performance is not skillful Teachers really have not found suitable way

to teach and students, in fact, have no motivation and passion to study speaking skill In case of having motivation, students usually feel bored because they get a little improvement

2.1.2 Description of the programme

The syllabus used for teaching in our college is in-house materials All the lessons are about tourism theme such as beauty spots, historical places, festivals with the purpose

to provide students with necessary information, which is useful to them in their career later There are 16 lessons and each lesson composes five parts: reading, speaking, listening, writing and language focus Like the other three parts, speaking period goes through three steps: pre-speaking in which teacher raises easy questions for students to answer to get familiar with the main part and teacher mention new vocabulary The second part is while- speaking This part contains tasks or exercises that students are required to complete The last part comes with the name post - speaking This part usually has exercises of synthesizing information in the lesson and then student gives presentation individually The syllabus itself consists of 16 lessons with various topics relating tourism All the topics are interesting; however to get efficiency for speaking skill, there need to have a more interesting types of activities and a more dynamic method of teaching and learning To improve condition, I have applied project work to teach speaking skill that I think is a great way to promote learner autonomy

2.1.3 Description of the course

The course that I choose to study started on September, 2009 and will last in three years (2011) There are sixty students and divided into two classes Like other courses, the

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students of this course have to study English in two and a half school year In the first term

of the first year, students studied 90 periods of basic English From the second term, students study English for tourism and the first ESP syllabus is for one hundred and twenty periods All the lessons in this syllabus are about destination of tourism ; from beauty landscape to historical places such as Ha Long, Sapa, Con Son; from festivals to national parks In the next years, ESP syllabuses focus on English for hotels and restaurants and other relating subjects The objective of this course is to train professional tour guides with high proficiency in English in order to serve in tourism industry

2.2 Methodology and data collection

2.2.1 Participants

This study was carried out among two classes of first year tourism major in tourism and foreign language faculty – Sao Do college of industry in the school year 2009-2010 There were sixty students at the age from 18 to 21 They are forty-five female and fifteen male These students had at least 3 years of learning English at high schools where the extensive vocabulary and grammatical structures are the main focus During the first term

at Sao Do College of Industry, they finished 90 periods of General English which focuses

on developing 4 skills: listening, speaking, writing, and reading Thus, they are supposed to have an intermediate level of proficiency in English, they have sound knowledge of Grammar, and to some extent are able to speak in English Most of them want to learn English firstly for a future job, and secondly for better understanding of the foreign tourists

When doing this study, students were encouraged to express their ideas and opinions directly which made the result of the study have high accuracy and helped to assess the method correctly

2.2.2 Materials

Richard and Rodger cited in Nunan (1991) view materials as detail specification of content and guidance to teacher Teaching materials composes two types :institutionally prepared materials (published text book) and in-house materials In-house materials as Richard (2001) is his or her own prepared materials Materials that has been used in teaching in our class and in this study are some kinds of project There are some kinds of projects that have been used in teaching language in our class The first kind is media and the outcome of which are newspapers or magazines of students themselves The second type may be about culture Students do a project about holidays, festivals, pagodas,

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temples…and the outcome may be a complete power point including images and presentation of a tourist destination; or the outcome may be a guide book for tourists To help students get familiar with the work of planning a trip, project of planning trips is shown Students have to investigate tourists destinations and explore information so that at the end of the project, students can organize a complete tour Hotel project is also useful for student Students are responsible for making a hotel staff portrait gallery which reveal a full description of each hotel staff’s work For a clearer view, the study mentions in detail two projects

Planning a trip ( Appendix 4)

The objectives of this project are to aware students of work and duty of planning a trip and helps students have the ability to organize a trip for tourists The reason for choosing this project is that Planning and organizing a trip is an important work of a tour guide; Students having skill of organizing a trip will find it easier in their work later

To do this project, the teacher has to require students to determine destination of rips and their routine; from that students collect and classify information To make a tour, students have to lists things to do for a trip, e.g means of transportation, types of accommodation, booking tickets, types of service to provide to tourists, stopover, entrance ticket to tourist side…., set routine on the map to find necessary information, Select ways

of gathering information: through internet, newspapers, magazines or interview direct people

The teacher has to organizes students to work in group of five Point one leader, one secretary The leader allocates duty to other members of the group The secretary keeps and classifies information The group has to drawn a tourist map for themselves, which shows the routine of the trip Students can use various color for different points Moreover, students can use symbols to illustrate tourist destination, e.g temple, museum, church , locations etc After completing project, students use Map, color pen, ruler, PowerPoint to perform their presentation in form of a discussion Students make questions for members in their group and they themselves answer to reveal information Students point at the map and pretend to be a tour guide This tour guide will provide information about the trip and the destination For further information, other students in class will raise questions and replies will be made by members of group

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Hotel Staff portrait gallery

The objectives of this project is to aware students of works, position and duty of each person in a hotel The project has been chosen for the reason that in a hotel, there are many jobs that students or new trainees can not recognize and this could provide a starting point for discussion who the staff is

To do this project, the teacher has to require students to gather information about name, work and duty of staff in hotel Moreover, students need select pictures or photographs from newspapers, magazines or people from real life to illustrate then arrange information in the easiest way to understand

Equipments need for this project are broadsheet, pencils and charts The project successes or not depends much on the preparation of students It is the students duty to collect information and pictures relating staff in hotel by interviewing them about their work Although students are the author of the final products, the teacher has to organize students Students make group of four or five, point out a leader who controls the whole group and then use various ways to conduct the project The final product is shown in paper or on PowerPoint During the presentation, each student of the group takes the responsibility to present name, work, and position of some staffs When giving information, students pointing at the pictures to illustrate Finally, the leader of the group combines these parts by giving tree-diagram for these staff and make conclusion for the presentation After the presentation, other students in the class give questions about things they care and they do not know or are not sure At this time, the leader points any member

of the group to reply the questions The teacher can also participate in this process to make the presentation clearer

The questionnaires for the students

The reason for choosing questionnaires is that it gives exact data and its results are objective

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The questionnaire was adapted from the questionnaire designed by Rajit Kumar

(1996) in Research Methodology It was conducted in Vietnamese

The questionnaire was designed with 2 main parts

Part 1 was to get students’ information about their gender, age, place of birth, the duration they have learnt English

Part 2 was designed to elicit students’ opinions on English speaking and their opinions on project work used in English speaking learning The part includes 6 questions,

5 of which are closed questions, one is open-ended question

The purpose of the questionnaires is to investigate students’ attitude to English speaking and their comments on project work and their expectations on the textbooks as well as the teachers

The first questionnaire investigates students’ opinion to the importance of language skill Questionnaire 2 examines students’ difficulties in learning speaking English Questionnaire 3 investigate factors motivating students in English speaking lesson using project work The fourth questionnaire investigate students’ opinion performed in the first year Questionnaire 5 examine how project work improved students’ English speaking competence and the last questionnaire aims to collect other ideas from learners

Pre-tests and post-tests

The teacher conducted an oral examination using questions and situations designed

by staff in the faculty and ten aspects of evaluation (listed in appendix 2) After the exam, the teacher gave students score and stored them for later computation, analysis and comparison with the scores of the students in the post-test examination

After the pre-test oral examination, the teacher began to use project work in teaching speaking skill The duration of time for each lesson was ninety minutes with ten minutes break The teacher taught twice a week After two months of applying the new method in teaching, the teacher conducted another oral examination using other questions and situations but use the same ten aspects of evaluation as above to give students scores

Then the teacher started to gather all of the data and computerize the scores obtained from the pre and post-test oral examination

Observation

The observation was carried out in the first and second semester of the school year

2009-2010, the class performance was observed in two classes in Tourism and Foreign Language

The teacher, then started to apply project work to teach speaking skill The intervention occurred in two months

During the first 7 weeks, the classroom performance was observed by the teacher The detailed notes were kept and interpreted, and then the conclusions were drawn out

In addition, during the time after the class, the teacher usually had talks with students to investigate their opinion about the new method

The last week, the teacher distributed questionnaires to the students Students had

15 minutes to complete; then the teacher collected questionnaires and analyzed them

After two months, the teacher conducted another oral examination and this was considered the post-test The scores of students in the post-test will be computerized and compared with those of the pre-test After interpreting the data, discussion and conclusion will be given

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CHAPTER 3 RESULTS 3.1 Presentation of the data

Table 1: Students’ attitude towards language skills

The most important skill Number of

g Lack of English speaking environment 50 83.3%

h Poor sociolinguistic knowledge 45 75%

i Teacher discourages students 12 20%

j Your classmates usually use mother tongue and

mind communicating in English

47 78.3%

Students had to face many difficulties and some of them are listed in table 2 To 50/60 students (83.3%), lack of English speaking environment was the most difficult; the next difficulties were poor lexical resources (81.7%) and the habit of using mother tongue in