IMPROVING THE STUDENTS SPEAKING SKILLS AT TRIEU THI TRINH HIGH SCHOOL

However, most of the students at Trieu Thi Trinh high school find it quite difficult to improve their speaking ability.. All of the reasons above, I carried out this study to examine if

1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background of the study

Nowadays in Vietnam, more and more people have to use English in nearly every field of their life, so the importance of learning and using English as an international language continues to increase Speaking, therefore, is considered one

of the most important skills to be mastered by the students in order to communicate English fluently In every classroom, the teacher tries all his best to improve the students’ speaking skill

However, most of the students at Trieu Thi Trinh high school find it quite difficult to improve their speaking ability It is shown that, the students have little time and few chance to practice speaking English, as the old saying “Practice makes perfect” Byrne, D (1980: 121) also states some problems that may prohibit the students to develop their speaking skill, which are inhibition, lack of ideas, low participation and students’ preference to use their mother language Because of these, all Vietnamese language teachers are encouraged to find out the most useful ways to solve these problems

Among several strategies used to improve students' proficiency such as visual aids, CALL (Computer Assisted Language Learning), drama, role-play, and so on, games are another useful strategy to promote students' language proficiency (Richard - Amato, 1996) However, up till now, not many studies were carried out about this issue and it seems that applying games into English speaking classes has not reached the success as expected

All of the reasons above, I carried out this study to examine if using games can help the students improve their speaking ability It was expected that the results of this study would confirm the effectiveness of games on speaking skill for all language teachers at Trieu Thi Trinh high school who were still suspicious about the real effect of using games And after this study, there would be more teachers

choosing games as a good aids for teaching speaking

1.2 The school and classroom culture

At Trieu Thi Trinh high school and many other high schools in general, English is a compulsory subject in the curriculum with the purpose to equip the students with the basic knowledge about grammar and vocabulary However, the students' speaking ability is still at a very low level They can hardly communicate with the others in English They lack chance to have real-life use of the target language Therefore, there are many obstacles in teaching and learning English in general, in teaching speaking in particular Being aware of the importance of English in communication, our school has invested to improve the quality of

teaching and learning four skills of English, especially focused speaking skill The teaching and learning conditions are therefore improved with good furniture and communicative approach is also applied into English classes Some language teachers in the school also had chance for further study to get more knowledge and experience in teaching However, with too many problems they have to face in teaching process, the complement of the new methods into their classes have not reached the success until now One of those problems that not only our school, but also most of other schools in Vietnam have is large class size In a limited time with too large numbers of students, English teachers find it very difficult to control and organize the class The chance for all the students in a class to practice speaking is thus, not possible

Besides that, the fact shows that the grammar-translation approach is still dominant in most of the language classes in our school The teachers mainly focus

on teaching grammar and vocabulary for the students In class, the students often listen and copy the teachers’ lectures into the notebooks, learn by heart these notes, and write down what they remember in the tests All these made the students in our school become more and more passive when learning English and they do not know how to learn by themselves for further knowledge In speaking lessons, these students feel uncomfortable and reluctant to join in communicating in English

As a teacher, I find that the students’ motivation in speaking class is not really high Most of them are found to be passive and unwilling to speak English In speaking lessons, they are often in silence, some look outside the class, and some even feel asleep Some of them can hardly make any sentence of English, even in the simple English grammar structures For all reasons, using English for communication is still one of the most serious issues of the language teachers in our school

1.3 The study and its rationale

As stated above, most language teachers at Trieu Thi Trinh high school clearly know the important role of speaking ability in their course Although, the students feel bored and stressed in learning speaking, the teachers are seen to be difficult to find out a useful way to motivate students to speak in class Especially, It is impossible for all students in one large class to have chance to practice English Because, this is seen as a great challenge for all teachers to solve and face with Besides investing good and modern furniture for supporting learning conditions, the change of the teaching methods in speaking class needs to be solved

1.4 The aims of the study

While teaching a full-time class at TTT high school, I recognized the problems facing my students Although, it was known that there were a lot of challenges, I still

decided to conduct this study in an effort to find out the best way to help the students improve their speaking ability as well as increase their motivation and interest in English speaking class It was also hoped that through games, the students had chance

to learn in a funny and comfortable atmosphere This made them feel more confident and willing to communicate in English with their partners

Through this study, I also wanted to confirm the real value of games with the teachers and the students who were still suspicious about the effects of games With the great hope that, those teachers would not be reluctant in applying games into their language classes

2 LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Games and motivation in Speaking

Games have been shown to have many advantages in learning speaking English According to Richard – Amato (1996), even though games are often associated with fun, we should not lose sight of their pedagogical values, particularly in second language teaching Games are useful because they promote motivation, reduce students' stress, create an enjoyable learning environment and give the students the opportunity for real communication

The main reason why games are considered effective learning tool is that "they spur motivation and students get very absorbed in the competitive aspects of the games; moreover, they try harder at games than in other courses" (Avedon, 1971)

It is said that gaming in its various forms can motivate and interest learners Discussing this, David and Hallowell (1989:3) also claimed “Because games demand and promote a high degree of students’ participation, they motivate to a greater extent than conventional textbooks or worksheets” In a language class, games are an important source to promote motivation, interest and a game is often seen as the first step to get the students’ attention to their learning When students feel fun, their learning can happen almost without anyone noticing Because “Play

is an important part of the learning experience when we enjoy learning, we learn better”, said Rose and Nichol (1999:63)

The second reason why games are often used in language classes is that they reduce the students' stress In language classrooms, there is a high level of stress because students have to face unfamiliar or unknown grammatical structures, words, texts and so forth Therefore, students often feel uncomfortable and insecure in class, which surely affects their learning ability As a result, “Games can lower anxiety, thus making the acquisition of input more likely” (Richard-Amato, 1988:147) It is believed that when students play games, they feel relaxed and have fun, and want to learn more Since students know that they are playing

mistakes and do not try to correct themselves in every single sentence Thus, they learn unconsciously, learn without realizing they are learning

Besides that, studying for a long time often makes students very feel tired and stressed, it is therefore, very essential to create an enjoyable learning environment for them It is easy to recognize that students become more excited and more active while they are playing games This also makes the atmosphere of the class become more cheerful and more enjoyable In the report of Huyen and Nga (2003), students said that they like the relaxed atmosphere, the competitiveness and the motivation that games brought to the classroom In fact, while studying in an enjoyable atmosphere, students are supplied with chances to practice more their speaking skill, and they can show their understanding about what the teacher has just taught them quickly and easily

In short, the advantages of games in language learning are countless When a game is applied, it does not show one advantage separately but some of these

advantages at the same time

2.2 METHODOLOGY

2.2.1 The participants

The participants of this study consist of 45 students (grade -10B1) at Trieu Thi Trinh high school Their ages range from 15 to 16 years old including 23 females and 22 males Most of these students come from many different rural areas in Nong Cong district where English is taught as a compulsory subject in the curriculum Thus, they do not have good conditions and chance to improve English, especially four skills Before entering our school, most of these students already studied at least

4 years (from grade 6 to grade 9) as one of the compulsory subjects at secondary school Therefore, they all have already obtained basic knowledge of English including basic structures and common vocabulary Their English level is in general not high and limited because their scores of English when entering our school are very low This is a large class with different abilities, motivation as well as interest Therefore, it is seen as a good sample for this study

2.2.2 Data collection instruments

To meet the aims of the study, three different instruments used for data collection were classroom observation, questionnaire and students’ interview

The classroom was observed carefully from the beginning to the end of the

study by recording into two observation sheets (Appendix 1) which were specially

designed for evaluation

In addition, two questionnaires were designed for students to investigate the students’ attitudes towards speaking lessons before and after using games One survey questionnaire was given to the students at the beginning of the innovation and one another was distributed after the sixth week of the study

At last, I interviewed four students selected randomly in the class to know their real feelings towards games

2.2.3 The research procedure

This table below was brief outline of the procedure to conduct the study

Week (from 15

February to 15 April)

Activities

Week 1 - The “traditional way” was used to teach students The

teacher asked students to do the oral tasks as usually

Week 2 - Applying Information-gap game: “Getting to know each

other” into the speaking lesson

- Topic: Questions and answers about personal characteristics

Week 3 - Guessing game called “Hiding and finding” was applied

in the warm-up activity of the lesson

- Topic: Asking questions and making suggestions

Week 4 - Using Information-gap game: “Habits and Hobbies”

- Topic: Talking about hobbies

Week 5 - Using matching game: “The seven families”

- Topic: Asking and talking about personal information

Week 6 - Using role-play game: “Rock and Boat”

- Topic: Asking for directions

Week 7 - Applying information-gap game: “Casanova’s Diary”

- Topic: Asking and talking about future or past events

Week 8 - Collecting and analyzing data Comparing with data

collected from the first week

- Discussing and giving conclusions of the innovation Firstly, It was really necessary for the teacher to have small discussions with her students to find their most common problems in English speaking learning Also, the teachers told the students the essential role of communicative ability in modern society nowadays as well as told them serious results if they did not try to solve the problems they were facing in speaking class

After that, the teacher explained clearly with the students in her class the purpose of this study as well as introduced to them about game activities and the role of games in helping them improve speaking skill Through this, the author hoped that the students understood the reasons why she used games in speaking lessons to get their high agreements and supports during the study

In the first week of the study, the students were taught in traditional way, without using games The teacher observed them carefully and took notes what

was happening in the speaking lessons by using Observation Sheet 1 which aimed

to get more information about the students’ interests, participation as well as motivation to oral activities before the study Additionally, the teacher used

Observation Sheet 2 in order to observe overall class atmosphere.

After the first week, a questionnaire was distributed to all students in the class to fill in to get their attitudes and ideas about their speaking lessons without change To help the students in class could understand all the questions well and answer them, the teacher translated the questions into Vietnamese to give them The students were encouraged to answer truly what they thought because they were told about the aim

of this survey questionnaire as well as the innovation before

From the second week to the fifth week, oral activities with games were applied into speaking lessons During these lessons, the teacher continually observed twice the students’ behaviors and attitudes towards the speaking lessons with game activities The teacher used note-taking technique to write down main comments on what were happening during the speaking lessons

One more observation was conducted after two months of the research This observation focused on the classroom atmosphere, the students’ participation to the lesson and the changes compared with the first observation

Continually, a survey questionnaire including 7 questions was distributed to the participants right after they finished the study and they were asked to fill in the questionnaire individually to check their attitudes towards language games and their speaking lessons with game activities In this one, the students were also told the purpose of the survey questionnaire and were encouraged to answer them

honestly To make sure that the students could understand all the questions, and did not misunderstand about what they chose, the teacher helped them to explain more each of the questions if necessary

Finally, the teacher interviewed some students who were selected randomly to know more about their feelings and reactions about the speaking lessons with games and in order to identify the answers collected from the questionnaire

3 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

3.1 FINDINGS

This section included the results collected from class observation, the survey questionnaire and students’ interview before and after the study The first part of this section was the data analysis of the first observation and questionnaire before applying games The second one was the results from two other observations and survey questionnaire as well as the students’ interviewing after applying game activities into speaking lessons

3.1.1 Data analysis before change

a Data collected from Observation sheet 1 and Observation sheet 2

The data collected from Observation Sheets 1 provided the information about students’ on-task and off-task behavior and observation sheet 2 provided the

information about overall class motivation in the speaking lessons The details of the data collected were presented below:

Table 1: Results from students’ on-task/off-task (Observation sheet 1)

First time

(R: Raw; P: Percent)

It was seen that only a small number of students nearly 30.2% who involved in the activities of the lesson While the students off-task accounted for 69.3% These numbers indicated the fact that there were amount of the students who were not involved in the speaking lessons They did not participate in the activities in class

It could be caused by the teacher’s teaching method used in the class which had something wrong The lessons could be boring or too difficult for the students to

understand Due to these, the students’ motivation and participation in speaking lessons were lower

Besides these statistics, the teacher saw and felt a passive atmosphere at the beginning of the lessons She could observe the students’ anxious and confused faces when being called to answer There were a few students who were willing and able to answer the teacher’ questions At the end of the lessons, the students showed their tiredness and exhaustion, and they were unwilling to go on with other

subjects This was shown well in the Observation Sheet 2 through following table:

Overall class observation (first week)

1 Involvement 1

2 Concentration 2

3 Enjoyment 2

4 Persistent attention 2

5 Activity level 3

6 Interesting 2

7 Challenging 2

8 Appropriateness 3

Total 17

Table 2: Results of overall class motivation

The results showed that the class was not motivated as a whole The students in class seemed to be less involved and participated in the activities of the lessons Their motivation was in general very low

b Data collected from survey questionnaire

The questionnaire distributed to 40 students right after the first week of the innovation were returned enough (100%) The answers of the students paralleled with the results collected from analyzing two Observation sheets The results of 6 questions in the questionnaire were briefly described through the following tables:

Table 1: Question 1 (Q1): How do you feel at the beginning of the speaking lesson?

Options Number of choice Percentage (%)

Table 2: Question 2 (Q2): How do you feel during the speaking lessons?

Options Number of choice Percentage (%)

Table 3: Question 3 (Q3): How do you feel when you are called to answer the teacher’s question?

Options Number of choice Percentage (%)

Table 4: Question 4 (Q4): How do you feel about the atmosphere of the speaking class?

Options Number of choice Percentage (%)

Comfortable 7 17.5 %

From the results in the tables above, we could see that a high percentage of the students had negative attitudes and feelings towards the speaking lessons To answer for the Q1, Q2, Q3 and Q4, most of the students (72.5%) agreed that they felt worried, tired and sleepy at the beginning of the speaking lessons, 52.5% felt stressed during the lessons, and 85% felt afraid and nervous when being called to answer Furthermore, instead of having funny speaking activities in the class, they had to learn in a passive atmosphere

Table 5: Question 5 (Q5): What do you think about the level of the activities and tasks in the speaking class?

Options Number of choice Percentage (%)

Table 6: Question 6 (Q6): How do you feel about the way the teacher corrects your mistakes?

Options Number of choice Percentage (%)