skkn USING GROUP WORK TO ENHANCE STUDENTS’ PARTICIPATION IN SPEAKING ACTIVITIES

SỞ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO ĐỒNG NAITRƯỜNG THPT TAN PHU BÁO CÁO SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM AN EVALUATION: USING GROUP WORK TO ENHANCE STUDENTS’ PARTICIPATION IN SPEAKING ACTIVITIES Tác giả: DO DU

I THÔNG TIN CHUNG VỀ CÁ NHÂN

1 Họ và tên: Đỗ Duy Dương

2 Ngày tháng năm sinh: 01-1-1973

8 Nhiệm vụ được giao: Dạy môn Tiếng Anh lớp 10.

9 Đơn vị công tác: Trường THPT Tân Phú

- Học vị (hoặc trình độ chuyên môn, nghiệp vụ) cao nhất: Cử nhân

- Chuyên ngành đào tạo: Cử nhân Tiếng Anh sư phạm

- Lĩnh vực chuyên môn có kinh nghiệm: Sư phạm tiếng anh

- Số năm có kinh nghiệm: 14 năm

- Các sáng kiến kinh nghiệm đã có trong 5 năm gần đây:

*Một số kỹ thuật đọc hiểu giúp học sinh phát triển kỹ năng đọc trong trường phổ thông.

SỞ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO ĐỒNG NAI

TRƯỜNG THPT TAN PHU

BÁO CÁO SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM

AN EVALUATION:

USING GROUP WORK TO ENHANCE STUDENTS’ PARTICIPATION

IN SPEAKING ACTIVITIES

Tác giả: DO DUY DUONG

Nghề nghiệp: Giáo viên

Chức vụ:

Ngày 10 tháng 02 năm 2017

1 Tên sáng kiến: Using Group Work to enhance students’ participation in speaking activities.

4 Nơi công tác: Trường THPT TAN PHU

5 Đơn vị áp dụng sáng kiến: Lớp 10 thuộc Trường THPT

6 Giải pháp:

I INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale for the innovation

Speaking has always been regarded as the most critical element in the communicationprocess (Boonkit, 2010) As Nunan (1991) has proved it, success in communication ismeasured basing on the ability to conduct a conversation in the target language This ability,

in this sense, refers to the speaking skill Furthermore, speaking can function as a bridge toassist other skills (Ur, 1996) Speaking is said to be able to facilitate learners to become moreproficient readers, more efficient listeners and more accurate writers Given its significance inthe language teaching and learning, it is advised that speaking be given priority in thelanguage classroom

Important as it is, the teaching of speaking skill at many Vietnamese high schools in generaland particularly at Tan Phu high school seems to receive insufficient attention and isimplemented not effectively enough Reasons are varied First, the majority of English tests atVietnamese high school are currently grammar-oriented Teachers and students are largelyconcerned about the academic results rather than the actual practice and knowledge.Therefore, lessons, or more specifically language lessons often focus on the theory,grammatical rules and structures to serve the purpose of taking exams Communicative skillssuch as listening or speaking are sometime neglected by teachers and students also have littlemotivation to study such skills as they do not have practical purposes Second, thearrangement of language classes in many Vietnamese high schools is unsuitable andunfavorable to conduct speaking activities High school students have to study in largeclasses with number of learners ranging from 30 to 35 ones In other theoretical subjects, thisnumber of students is acceptable; however, for the subject that requires lots of interaction likeEnglish, such large number of students is really an obstacle for teachers if they want toenhance communication in their classroom Therefore, speaking lessons are conducted in

such a way that students listen to teachers’ presentation or lecture and only speak when theyare invited This leads to students’ lack of activeness in speaking activities The large number

of students also means the few chances of students to speak out as they have to take turn tospeak in class In addition, no real-life contexts are created in speaking lesson for students topractice; thus, most students are at a loss in using the target language to express their ideas ineven the simplest situations in speaking All reasons and problems considered, the teachingand learning of speaking skill at Tan Phu high school is considered to be ineffective asstudents gain very little after each course Realizing these situations, an innovation on theeffects of implementing group work in speaking lessons at Tan Phu high school has beencarried out with the hope that this technique will help teachers and students overcome theobstacles in teaching and learning speaking skill

2 Context of the innovation

The innovation took place at Tan Phu high school, which is situated in the remote area ofDong Nai province, Vietnam As most other high schools in Vietnam, English is acompulsory subject in the curriculum approved by Ministry of Education and Training(MOET) Students in Vietnam are supposed to study English over their three years at highschool Students often have three class hours per week The teaching of English subject mustfollow the syllabus and the course book released by MOET Teachers have to make sure thatall content in the course book is covered so that students can have sufficient knowledge totake the final examination for the subject As for the teaching approach or techniques, it isoptional for teachers to adopt the approach that they think is the most effective to students.Therefore, with the innovation of applying group work to teaching speaking skills to students,

it is teachers’ right to choose any teaching method to implement, provided that the content ofthe lessons in the course book is not skipped

Students at Tan Phu high school mostly come from the rural areas, where the chances to meetand talk to foreigners are rare As already mentioned, speaking skill is often neglected duringthe teaching of a foreign language at high school as speaking is not tested in the final

examination In addition, the few chances of communicating with foreigners of students hereresult in a variety of problems in teaching speaking to students Although students in Vietnamstart learning English from grade 3, which means when they enter high school, they havealmost 7 years of learning the language, the ability to use the language in communication isrestricted Students often learn by heart the grammar structure to do the written tests, but areincapable of using those structures in expressing their ideas orally Furthermore, they alsohave little motivation in learning speaking skill as the chances for practicing is few Theapplication of group work in teaching speaking is expected to find solutions to theseproblems

3 Aims and objectives of the innovation

The innovation on using group work activities to enhance students’ speaking skill in thecontext of Tan Phu high school has been carried out with the aim to investigate the benefitsstudents can gain from the application of group work in speaking lessons, together withfinding out the most appropriate way to conduct the activities The innovation, thus, aimed toanswer the two following questions:

- What benefit would students at grade 10 in Tan Phu high school gain from group work

activities?

- What is the most appropriate way to carry out group work activities in speaking class at

Tan Phu high school?

II THE RESEARCH

1 The research participants

The participants in this research were 28 students of grade 10 A12 at Tan Phu high school.Students of grade 10A12 was selected as they are in their first year at high school; thus, ifgroup work proves to be an useful method of learning, it is promised that students will form ahabit of using group work in their learning over the next three years at high school Inaddition, when applying the new method in teaching, the freshmen would adopt the new

technique more easily than those who have already form their learning style during someprevious years at high school Students at grade 10 at Tan Phu high school are supposed to be

of pre-intermediate level as they have had some years of learning English at primary andsecondary school

2 The research procedure

The research was carried out in 12 weeks from the 5th of September to the 25th of November(School year 2016 – 2017) Students were divided into 7 groups, each of which consisted of 4members As suggested by I-Jung (2004) and Le (2008), the most appropriate number ofmembers in a group should be from three to five That number can ensure the opportunity foreach member to participate in group work and interact with each other In addition, a largenumber of people in the group may reduce the chances of members to express and contributetheir ideas (Le, 2008)

The first and the second week were spent to introduce students with the emphasis on thechanges in the English lessons Students did not use to have a separate lesson for learningspeaking skills but speaking if often embedded with other skills Therefore, the practice used

to be very limited Within this research, one class hour for each unit was spent on learningspeaking skills; the other four class hours were spent on reading, listening, writing andlanguage focus

The group work activities were introduced to students from week 3 of the innovation untilweek 11 As I-Jung (2004) proposed, there are three most popular grouping strategies namelyrandom grouping, which is often based on the seating arrangement; student-selectedgrouping, in which students can choose their own partners; and instructor-selected grouping,

in which groups are allocated due to the appointment of the teachers basing on students’language level, habit and preference The grouping strategies of this research also followedthose proposed by I-Jung (2004) in which each strategy was applied for every two weeks.Week 12 of the research was spent for the evaluation of the speaking activities

It is necessary to emphasize that all the content of the speaking lessons were taken from thecourse book The only innovative element of the study was the change in the teachingmethod Instead of whole-class discussion or teacher-oriented approach, students weredivided into groups and all speaking activities or discussion took place within the groupwork For example, unit 2 in week 3 was about a memorable people’s background using pasttense and present simple Students were divided into 7 groups of 4 It was a random grouping;thus, students sitting at the same table worked together They were supposed to work in group

to brainstorm ideas about what questions they could ask when they wanted to know aboutsomebody’s background, including ideas about : date of birth , place of birth , home, parents ,brother(s), sister(s), primary school, secondary school, favourite subject(s) experience ….After the given time, one representative gave their presentation in front of the class Often inone group, a group leader was appointed by the teacher to control the group discussion andmake sure every member in the group contributed their ideas and raised their voice Thegroup work activities took place in a similar way during the other 9 weeks

3 The research methodology

A qualitative study was conducted As suggested by Patton (2002), a qualitative approach canhelp the researcher to gather rich and detailed data from various social phenomena, cases andevent that cannot be obtained from a quantitative one Hinchey (2008) shared a similarviewpoint when advising that qualitative studies emphasize more on the on-going processrather than the product with the aims to investigating deeper information and meaning ofsocial issues With regard to this research, the aims of the research was to find out the benefit

of the actual process of implementing group work activities to teach speaking skill and findout the best way to apply group work in speaking lessons; therefore, the focus on the on-going process was emphasized more than on the final product All things considered,adopting a qualitative study is the most appropriate choice to implement this research

4 The research methods

The research aimed at two purposes, which were examining the benefits of group workactivities on students’ speaking skills and exploring the best way to implement the groupwork Thus, three data collection methods were conducted to gather information for theresearch, namely questionnaire, observation and interview

- Questionnaire: Questionnaire was selected as the first data collection method, which

aimed to gather information about students’ views on the use of group work activities.Questionnaire was chosen as students when answering the questionnaire were supposed tohave less pressure than in the direct interview; the analysis of questionnaire was also said to

be unbiased (Gillham, 2000; as cited in Le, 2008) As the questionnaire was collected withanonymous information, which meant students were asked not to write their names on thepaper, students were believed to feel free to express their opinion In Vietnamese societywhere face-saving culture is popular, students do not have the habit of criticizing, especiallycriticizing their teachers and peers Therefore, it is quite popular for Vietnamese researcherswhen collecting data from interviews to receive positive comments and praise and very littleconstructive feedback The use of questionnaire, to a certain extent, could ensure thereliability of the data In addition, in order to collect data from all the participants, usingquestionnaires was a feasible method Data was not only plentiful but also manageable Thecontent of the questionnaire mainly covered some aspects related to students’ viewpoints ongroup working, such as their attitudes towards the activities, their self-report of theparticipation in the activities and their interaction with other members during the group work.Questionnaire was written in English with the simplest language and expression During thetime students did the questionnaire, the teacher was supposed to be present to provide support

or give explanation if necessary Sample of the Questionnaire can be found in Appendix A

- Observation: If the questionnaire aimed to gather information from students, the

observation was a data collection tool that provided information from teachers’ perspective.Observation was said to supply the researchers with an abundant source of information and

feedback directly (Hilmi& Lu, 2010) According to Hilmi& Lu (2010), through observation,observers can have deep understanding of how their subject matter is conducted, whatteaching techniques are implemented and how the actual process of a lesson takes place in theclassroom The observation in this research was conducted by the researcher, who was alsothe teacher of the speaking class As the teacher had to deliver the lessons together withobserving, an observation sheet was designed with detailed criteria to observe and evaluate.The teacher had to take note of the class setting basing on the given criteria (See appendix B).Similar to the content of the questionnaire, the observation also focused on three aspects ofthe lessons, which were students’ participation and interaction in group work, their attitudestowards the group work activities and the quality of the group work activity implementation.Observation was conducted in each lesson Data was coded basing on the given criteria,analyzed and compared to findings from questionnaires

- Interview: Interviews served as the last source of data for this research If questionnaires

were distributed to each individual who participated in the research, interviews were made ingroups Students worked in groups and discussed the given interview questions The groupleader spoke on behalf of the group members and presented their ideas Sensitive questionsthat may not receive the frank answers from students were avoided in the interview such aswhether students liked the group work or not, how they felt about the group work activities –interesting or boring, how they participated in the group work – actively or passively as withsuch questions, it was likely that only positive answers were demonstrated The interviewmainly focused on eliciting students’ evaluation on the group work activities such as whatbenefits they gained from group work, what difficulties they faced while working in groupswith other members and finally what they expected the group work activities to be conducted

As students’ language level was limited, Vietnamese language was used in the interviews.Students using their mother language felt more confident and comfortable to express their

viewpoints In addition, using Vietnamese could avoid the ambiguity and confusion ofstudents when expressing ideas.

The use of three different research methods to collect data helped the researcher gather agreat deal of information for the research All the three methods aimed at answering the tworesearch questions of what effects group work activities had on students’ speaking skills andwhat the best ways to implement group work activities to students at grade 10 at Tan Phuhigh school The data obtained from the data sources were analyzed and triangulated, whichprovided the researcher with the most complete findings for the research

III DATA ANALYSIS

1 Students’ participation and interaction in group work activities

The first aspect of the research involved findings about students’ participation in the groupwork activities and their interaction with other group member during the lessons It wasfound out from the observation that students’ overall involvement in group work was good;however, the extent to which students participated and interacted in the lesson varied fromweek to week It was observed that during three first weeks, some students participatedpassively or kept quiet during the lessons Students also had the tendency to use too muchVietnamese during their discussion However, from week 4 on, possibly after students gotmore accustomed to working in groups, the number of passive students reduced Studentsshowed more involvement and enthusiasm working together It was noticeable that duringweek 5 and 9 when students were allowed to choose their own partners to work with, theywere more enthusiastic and active in group working With regard to the interaction, similarly

to some first weeks, students also demonstrated limited interaction However, it was noticedthat in groups where the group leader worked effectively in controlling and actively invitingtheir partners to speak, the interaction was much improved Furthermore, the teacher alsostayed close to each group and reminded the quiet students to raise their voice, which couldalso enhance the interaction Observation also showed that the lack of participation and

interaction was often found in students of low language level or students with introvertpersonality It was also found out that the interaction also varied according to the groupingtechniques From week 3 to 9, when students were randomly selected (often students sitting

in the same table) and students self-selected partners to work with, the interaction was better

On the contrary, in week 10 and 11 when group partners were assigned by the teacher, theinteraction was not as good This was probably because when students worked with thepartners that they knew well or they liked, they would interact more with each other thanwhen working with those they did not know well Participation and interaction, accordingly,depended largely on the grouping technique and students’ language level, together with thecontrol of a group leader or the teacher

With regard to the findings from questionnaire and interview about students’ participationand interaction, from questions 3 to 8 in the questionnaire would reflect this When askedhow often students spoke in group, 20 out of 28 students said that they sometimes or veryoften spoke; 8 out of 28 said they rarely spoke; and how they participated in group work, 18out of 28 said they participated actively, 4 chose the neutral option and 6 said they werepassive and how other members in their group interact with each other, 24 out of 28 said theyall interacted with other ,4 said some interacted and when asked what benefits you could gainfrom group work activities 18 out of 28 said they were encouraged to express ideas orreduced anxiety while speaking , 10 said they raised confidence, especialy in eight questionmost of them preferred to choosing their own partners to work with The results from thequestionnaire were also equivalent to the finding from the observation In the questionnaire,not all students gave reasons for their choice Those who explained said that their limitedparticipation or interaction was due to the lack of confident in their English speaking abilityand their lack of interest in the speaking topics Reasons for this were also found out in theinterview when students claimed the difficulties in doing the group work Students said thatsome topics in the speaking lessons were unfamiliar or unattractive to them; thus they did not

show interest in speaking and consequently did not participate actively For unfamiliar topics,some students were lacking in necessary vocabulary to express their ideas In addition,sometimes students were assigned to work with other partners who were superior in languagelevel to them; thus, they did not have chances and also lack of confident to raise their ideas.Students also explained for their frequent use of Vietnamese language, which was becausethey were not immediate used to using English to speak all the time; and they were alsofound using Vietnamese gave them the comfort and confidence Therefore, they often usedVietnamese to brainstorm ideas first and then trying to find ways to express these ideas inEnglish

In short, findings from three data sources showed that students’ participation and interaction

in the group work activities were fairly good and experienced an improvement after time.Group work, accordingly, can be said to help improve students’ participation and interaction

in speaking lessons However, the participation and interaction varied from week to weekbasing on different factors such as grouping techniques, speaking topics, students’ languagelevel, the control of group work activities from group leaders or teachers and partly onstudents’ personality

2 Students’ attitudes towards the group work activities

The second aspect of this research was findings about students’ attitudes towards the use ofgroup work in teaching speaking

It was found out from the class observation that students had the tendency to show theirinterest and enthusiasm in speaking activities towards the end of the innovation The level ofinterest of students was also not equal after each week and might vary according to differentfactors For example, in week 9 of the innovation, the topic of the speaking was abouttechnology, which was considered a difficult and unappealing topic In the speaking lesson ofweek 11, the group work was organized following the teacher’s assigning group members.Thus, the level of interest of students in the lesson as well as in the group activities was quite

low However, in week 8, when students were assigned to talk about education, they hadmore ideas, vocabulary and also interest in such familiar topics In this week, they were alsoallowed to choose their own partners; thus, it was observed that they showed high level ofinterest Week 6 also experienced students’ high level of enthusiasm and enjoyment whentheir group activity was the role-play They acted in different role to organize a party for thewhole class This group work activity brought much interest and involvement to students Results from the questionnaires also reflected students’ attitudes towards the use of groupwork When students were asked whether they liked the group work activities or not, 24 out

of 28 students said yes, while 4 others said no Students who said yes explained that theyfound the activities interesting and funny They also felt encouraged and more confidentwhen working with their classmates They had careful preparation with classmates beforethey had to speak in front of the whole class, which gave them more confidence Otherstudents explained that they enjoyed the interaction among group members For previouslessons, they used to sit in one place and listen to teachers and other outstanding students tospeak; they had few chances to raise their voices and felt scared of making mistakes inspeaking aloud Similar reasons were given in the interview when students compared theteaching using group work activities with the traditional teaching Students also claimed thatmany of them did not have a chance to raise their voice even once in the traditional teachingstyle using whole-class discussion, especially those who had low language level They wereafraid to make mistakes in speaking and being made jokes of by other classmates.Furthermore, they did not have enough time to come up with ideas and vocabulary to answerteachers’ questions before the other students of better level raised their answers With groupwork, opportunities were spared equally to all members If they did not come up with ideas todiscuss, listening to other raising their ideas first also gave them suggestions to follow up Forthe other 4 students who said that they did not like the group work activities, they explainedthat they found grouping took too much time Students in the groups did not act seriously, but