The application of group work activities to improve speaking skills for 10th grade students at a bac ninh high school

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ---O0O--- NGUYEN THI TRANG THE APPLICATION OF GROUP WORK ACTIVITE

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

-O0O -

NGUYEN THI TRANG

THE APPLICATION OF GROUP WORK ACTIVITES

TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILLS FOR 10 TH GRADE STUDENTS AT

A BAC NINH HIGH SCHOOL

Sử dụng hoạt động nhóm để cải thiện kĩ năng nói của học sinh lớp 10 tại

trường trung học phổ thông tỉnh Bắc Ninh

M.A MINOR PROGRAM THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 8140231.01

Supervisor: Dr Vu Thi Thanh Nha

Hanoi, 2019

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

-O0O -

NGUYEN THI TRANG

THE APPLICATION OF GROUP WORK ACTIVITES

TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILLS FOR 10 TH GRADE STUDENTS AT

A BAC NINH HIGH SCHOOL

Sử dụng hoạt động nhóm để cải thiện kĩ năng nói của học sinh lớp 10 tại

trường trung học phổ thông tỉnh Bắc Ninh

M.A MINOR PROGRAM THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 8140231.01

Supervisor: Dr Vu Thi Thanh Nha

Hanoi, 2019

DECLARATION

I hereby declare that this thesis represents my own work for the Degree of Master in TESOL at the Faculty of Post-graduate Studies, Hanoi University of Languages and International Studies - Vietnam National University, and that it has not been previously submitted to this University or any other institution in application for admission to a degree, diploma or other qualifications

Bac Ninh, May 29th 2019

Nguyen Thi Trang

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all, I would like to acknowledge the debt of gratitude to my supervisor, Dr.Vu Thi Thanh Nha for her helpful suggestions, invaluable critical feedback and encouragement in the writing of this study Without her guidance and help, this work would not have been completed

My sincere thanks go to all the staff at the Department of Post-graduate Studies, Hanoi University of Languages and International Studies for giving me assistance and the lecturers who conducted the Master's course for providing me with valuable knowledge

I would also like to express my deep sense of gratitude to my dear students, whose participation in and dedication to the research remain invaluable have been acknowledged Without their precious support, the thesis would not have taken shaped

Finally, the support extended to me by the members of my family has been immeasurable I would also like to express my thanks to my parents and my husband for their wholehearted encouragement

Bac Ninh, May 29th 2019

Nguyen Thi Trang

ABSTRACT

The study was carried out with an attempt to investigate the application of group work towards enhancing grade 10 students’ speaking skill The subjects participating in the research were 40 EFL students studying in the same class at a high school in Bac Ninh province To achieve the desired aims of the study, an action research was carried out Survey questionnaires for students and learning logs were used as the major instruments to collect data about students’ challenges in developing their speaking skill and the impacts of group work implementation on students’ speaking ability The results of the study showed that group work has positive influence on the development of students’ speaking skill and has the potential to help students deal with some challenges that they may encounter in

speaking lessons

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

LISTS OF TABLES AND FIGURES vii

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Rationale of the study 1

1.2 Aims of the study 3

1.3 Scope of the study 3

1.4 Organization of the thesis 4

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

2.1 Theoretical background of speaking 5

2.1.1 Definitions of speaking skill 5

2.1.2 Aspects of speaking skill 5

2.1.3 Characteristics of a successful speaking activity 6

2.1.4 Problems with speaking classes 8

2.1.5 Relating categories of oral production 9

2.1.6 The roles of the teacher in different stages of teaching speaking 10

2.2 Group work in speaking lessons 11

2.2.1 Definition of group work 11

2.2.2 Benefits of group work 12

2.2.3 Some problems in using group work 13

2.2.4 Group formation 14

2.2.5 Teacher’s role in carrying out group work 16

2.2.6 Steps of organizing group activities 17

2.3 Previous studies 18

CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY 22

3.1 Participants and context of the study 22

3.2 Reasons to choose action research method 22

3.3 Phases of action research 24

3.4 Weekly schedules and research procedures 26

3.4.1 Weekly schedules 26

3.4.2 Research procedures 29

3.5 Data collection instruments 31

3.5.1 Questionnaires 31

3.5.2 Learning logs 31

CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 34

4.1 Information collected from the survey questionnaires 34

4.1.1 Students’ opinions on the importance of speaking skill 34

4.1.2 Students’ challenges in developing speaking skill 34

4.1.3 Students’ preference of group work in speaking lessons 35

4.1.4 Reasons for students’ preference of group work 36

4.1.5 Students’ opinions on the effectiveness of group work in speaking lessons 37

4.1.6 Students’ opinions on the advantages of group work in speaking lessons 38

4.1.7 Students’ opinions about the impact of group work on their speaking ability 39 4.1.8 Students’ self-evaluation regarding speaking aspects before and after the application of group work 40

4.2 Data collected from students’ learning logs 43

4.2.1 Things students can do 43

4.2.2 Things students learnt 46

4.3 Summary 48

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION 49

5.1 Summary of major findings 49

5.2 Recommendations 50

5.3 Limitations 51

5.4 Recommendations for further research 52

REFERENCES 53 APPENDICES.……… ……….I APPENDIX 1 PRE-ACTION QUESTIONNAIRE I APPENDIX 2 POST-ACTION QUESTIONNAIRE II APPENDIX 3 LEARNING LOG: SPEAKING SKILL IV

LISTS OF TABLES AND FIGURES

TABLES

Table 3.1 The timetable of the action implementation……… ………… 27

Table 4.1 The importance of speaking skill - 34

Table 4.2 Students’ preference of group work - 36

Table 4.3: Reasons for students’ preference of group work - 36

Table 4.4 Students’ opinions on the effectiveness of group work - 37

Table 4.6 Use of new lexical items and grammar structures - 43

Table 4.6 Use of new lexical items and grammar structures - 43

Table 4.7 Students’ report on new lexical items and grammar structures learnt 47

Table 4.8 Types of mistakes and ways to correct - 47

FIGURES Figure 4.2 Students’ opinions on the improvement of speaking ability - 39

Figure 4.3 Students’ self-evaluation of the vocabulary aspect - 40

Figure 4.4 Students’ self-evaluation of grammar aspect - 41

Figure 4.5 Students’ self-evaluation of fluency aspect - 42

Figure 4.6 Students’ self-evaluation of pronunciation aspect - 42

Figure 4.7 Students’ changes in styles of answers - 44

Figure 4.8 Students’ opinions on the level of hesitation - 45

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

This chapter mentions the background and rationale to conduct the study, states the

aims, scope, and organization of the graduation thesis

1.1 Rationale of the study

English has received growing recognition as the preferred foreign language

in Vietnam nowadays (Do, 2006) and is considered an “unquestionable asset” (Shapiro, 1995: 4) for the Vietnamese people due to its role as a key to Vietnam’s regional and global integration under the impact of the so-called open-door policy

or Doi Moi since the last decade of the 20th century (Nguyen, N 2012) This global integration trend has directly led to a spectacular increase in demand for English training (Nguyen, N 2012) in order to facilitate the communication ability, increase interactions and develop international relations between the local enterprises, labours and those from foreign countries Since then, English has become one major subject at schools and continuously receives significant attention of the government, with a number of national projects which aim at promoting the quality of teachers and that of the English teaching and learning process

Among the four English skills (speaking, listening, writing, and reading), speaking has been perceived as the most important one (Flohr & Paesler, 2006) According to Nunan (1993), the importance of speaking skill is obvious as human depend themselves more on speaking rather than writing when interacting with others As defined by Brown (2001), speaking is an interactive process to conduct meaning which involves producing, receiving and processing information Speaking can also be considered as an indicator for students’ success in mastering a language

By speaking students may realize how much language they have mastered ad how they can use it Besides, through students’ speaking, teachers can get feedback from students faster and more exactly Thanks to students speaking activities in class and outside class, the teacher can find out how much students understand the lesson

Hence, she can know what their weak and strong points are in language to have appreciated solutions and plans

It is clear that speaking skill plays a significant role in teaching and learning

a foreign language Therefore, it is necessary that speaking be paid enough attention from those English language learners who aim to master the language This also leads to the need for English teachers to create more opportunities for their students

to practice this oral skill during class time

As a teacher of High School in Bac Ninh for ten years, I has been familiar with the fact that my students of different generations may have rather good understanding of grammar knowledge and good control of in written language; however, encouraging them to speak remains a challenging job as most of them find

it really hard to express themselves in oral language Students often show their passive learning during speaking lessons Many of them feel extremely nervous when being called to present orally in front of their classes, some even cannot say any words when they have to stand up and speak while when I write the questions

or topics for discussion on the board and tell them to write their answers, the majority of them can perform the task though at different levels of success Obviously, their unwillingness and refusal to practice indispensably lead to their poor speaking performance in all speaking lessons, which is supposed to also reduce their confidence and demotivate them to speak Unfortunately, this is not the problem of students in my classes only but is the shared problems of all other English teachers in my school However, little has been done to improve the situation due to a number of constraints

For a number of decades, many researchers have investigated the impacts of group-work on language learning process and reported its various positive effects For speaking, group-work is proved to help reduce anxiety, create interaction among students (Long & Porte, 1985), provide safer language learning environment (Richard & Rodgers, 2001), increase speaking opportunities, encourage learners to

share their opinions, enhance cooperation and negotiation skills and promote learner autonomy (Harmer, 2007) Being aware of the benefits of group work in promoting speaking skill, English teachers in my school, including me, decided to apply it in our speaking lessons with a view to helping our students improve their skills To formally investigate the application of group work and its impacts on students’

speaking skill, I therefore conduct this study, entitled “The application of group

work activities to improve speaking skills for 10 th grade students at a Bac Ninh High School”

1.2 Aims of the study

The study is conducted to investigate how group work activities can be used

to improve high school students’ speaking skill

To achieve the mentioned goal, the two research questions are proposed:

 What are the challenges for grade 10 students in developing their speaking skill?

 How does group work help improve their speaking skill?

1.3 Scope of the study

The researcher intends to start with an overview of the current situations of students’ learning English speaking skill, then analyze the effects of group work activities on students’ speaking and make some recommendations on the effective use of group work to motivate students to practice speaking English more As an action research project, the study was conducted with the researcher’s own students

in her own class with the participation of 40 students The action research framework employed in this study is the framework proposed by Kemmis & McTaggart (2000) with four phases including plan, action, observation and reflection The three major data collection instruments for the study are questionnaires, classroom observation and students’ diary in the form of learning

logs It is hoped that the information collected will be able to fully answer the two research questions Detailed information on the research procedures is presented in chapter 3

1.4 Organization of the thesis

The graduation thesis consists of five chapters, organized as follows:

Chapter I- Introduction This chapter mentions the background and rationale to

conduct the study, states the aims, scope, and organization of the graduation thesis

Chapter II- Literature Review This chapter represents theoretical background

knowledge related to speaking skill, and a brief review of the previous studies on group work and its impacts on students’ speaking ability

Chapter III- Methodology This chapter states the subjects of the study, research

instruments, and data collection procedures employed in this research

Chapter IV- Findings and discussions This chapter analyzes and discusses the

results collected from survey questionnaire, learning logs Besides, the limitations

of the study are introduced

Chapter V- Conclusion This chapter summarizes the main points discussed in the

previous parts, presents the limitations of the thesis and provides some suggestions for further research

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter represents theoretical background knowledge related to speaking skill, and a brief review of the previous studies on group work and its impacts on students’ speaking ability

2.1 Theoretical background of speaking

2.1.1 Definitions of speaking skill

Bygate (1987) defines speaking as oral expression that involves the use of the right sounds in the patterns of rhythm and intonation as well as the word choice and inflections in the right order to convey the right meaning According to the author, it is a means for building social relationships, ranking, a vehicle of professional advancement and of business, also a medium through which much language is learned According to Chaney (1998), speaking is the process of making and sharing meaning by using verbal and non-verbal symbols in different contexts Brown (1994) and Burns and Joyce (1997) defined speaking as an interactive process of making meaning that includes producing, receiving, and processing information Those different authors defined speaking ability in different ways, their definitions all share one feature which is the ability to use a language as a means to achieve some communicative purpose

2.1.2 Aspects of speaking skill

According to Gower (1995), speaking involves accuracy and fluency The

author’s explanation of the two mentioned aspects can be found below

Accuracy

As for Gower (1995), “accuracy” involves “the correct use of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation” (Gower, 1995:99) and suggests teacher make students clear about the importance role of accuracy in their feedback for controlled and guided activities However, teachers should not be too focused on accuracy at the

beginning because this may make students afraid of making mistakes and prevent them from improving their fluency

Fluency

The term “fluency” refers to the ability to keep the conversation going on Gower (1995) Richards (1993) defines fluency as the level of communication proficiency involving the ability to produce oral and written language with ease, the ability to control intonation, vocabulary and grammar; and the ability to make oneself understood in communication Both fluency and accuracy are important elements of communicative approach, therefore, learners’ activities should be designed based on equivalence between fluency and accuracy achievement (Mazouzi, 2013)

The Council of Europe (2017) provides a more detailed description of the qualitative aspects of spoken language use, which includes “vocabulary range”,

“(grammar) accuracy”, “fluency”, “interaction”, “coherence” and “phonology” (The Council of Europe, 2017:156) Also according to this guidebook, in a number of analytic scales for assessing speaking performance, Range, Accuracy, Fluency and Pronunciation are common regards

It is easy to recognize that according to both descriptions, speaking ability is supposed to involve such aspects as vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation and fluency Therefore, in this study, the researcher makes plans to investigate the

impacts of group work on these four common aspects

2.1.3 Characteristics of a successful speaking activity

According to Nunan (1999:39) “success (in speaking) is measured in terms

of the ability to carry out a conversation in the (target) language” A successful speaking activity is therefore supposed to fulfill a number of characteristics that helps students achieve this goal Ur (1996) explains some characteristics of successful speaking activities which include creating as many opportunities for

leaners to speak as possible, distributing fairly even chances for participants, making them feel highly motivated, and assuring that language is of an acceptable level More detailed description of these characteristics is presented below

Learners talk a lot

As much as possible period of time allotted to the activity which is occupied

by learners talk This is obvious, but often most time is taken up with teacher talks

or pauses It can be understood that the learners must be active to talk with their friends as much as possible It is very clear that the learners are busy, but they seldom spent their time to talk with their teacher

Participation is even

Classroom discussion is not dominated by a monitory of talkative participants It means that all learners have a chance to speak, and contributions are fairly evenly distributed The classroom discussion is not dominated by one participant only, but all of participants get a same chance to speak

Motivation is high

Students are eager to speak because they are fascinated by the topic and have something new to say about it, or because they want to make contribution to achieve

an objective task It means that the students have high motivation to speak English

By having a high motivation, the students will feel interested in learning English, especially in speaking

Language is of an acceptable level

Learners express themselves in utterances that are relevant, easily comprehensible to each other, and of an acceptable level of language accuracy It means that they use the components of speaking which are relevant with the acceptable level of language such as, pronunciation, grammar, fluency, and

comprehensible So, the students often try to speaking English correctly in real communication

In practice, however, not many classroom activities satisfy all the above mentioned criteria This requires language teachers to make efforts in finding out and conducting activities that work best in their teaching context

2.1.4 Problems with speaking classes

According to Ur (1996) there are four main problems in speaking, which are presented below

The first problem is called “Inhibition” (Ur, 1996:121) Unlike reading,

writing or listening activities, speaking requires some degree of real-time exposure

to an audience EFL students are often inhibited about trying to say things using a foreign language in the classroom due to their worry about making mistakes or the feeling of shyness for the attention that their speech attracts, the fear of being criticized or losing face in front of the rest of the class Many prefer to be silent rather than being criticized in front of a large number of people (Brown, 2000)

The second problem is “Nothing to say” Ur (1996:121) reported that even not

being inhibited, his students often complained that they could not think of anything to say In reality, they may feel bored or think that the topic surpasses what they know Thus, students often lack confidence about their speaking ability and believe that they

have insufficient language skills to express exactly what they want to express

Also pointed out by Ur (1996), low or uneven participation is another problem

He explained that only one participant can talk at a time if he or she is to be heard; and in large groups, this means each one will have little talking time This problem is compounded by the tendency of some learners to dominate, while other speaks very little Therefore, in English class, timid students are quite happy to sit back and watch

the lesson unfolding instead of participating

Last but not least, “Mother tongue use” (Ur, 1996:121) is also supposed to be

one of problem for speaking classes because students with the same mother tongue normally prefer to use their first language to exchange information and express their thoughts rather than using the target language (Tuan & Mai, 2015) This may result from the lack of topical and language knowledge, as well as motivation (Harmer, 1991) Therefore, most of the students are not disciplined in using the target language

in the learning process even when the task is too easy

Large class size is also an important affecting factor If the classroom is crowded with more than 40 students, it is a fact that the students has fewer chances to practice the language and it is also much more difficult for students to pay enough attention to each of them, to keeping good disciplines, as well as to organize dynamic and creative teaching and learning sessions (Febriyanti, 2011)

To sum up, speaking is believed to be one of the most challenging skills which require learners’ time and effort to make a success Therefore, it is necessary that both teachers and students pay enough attention to the learning and teaching process to help students overcome these obstacles and make progress in their speaking skill

2.1.5 Relating categories of oral production

According to Brown (1994), there are six categories relating to oral production which are:

- Imitative: accounts for very small portion of speaking time in the speaking time when learners are practicing an intonation contour trying to pinpoint a certain vowel sound

- Intensive: includes any speaking performance that is designed to practice some phonological or grammar aspects of language

- Responsive: is short replies to the teacher or student initiated questions or comments These replies are usually sufficient and do not extend into dialogue

- Transactional (dialogue): is carried out for the purpose of conveying or exchanging specific information Conversations, for example, may have more of a negative nature to them than merely responsive speech Such conversation could readily be the part of group work activity as well

- Interpersonal (dialogue): this type of dialogue is often carried out more for the purpose of maintaining social relationship than the transmission of facts and information These conversations are a little trickier for learners because they can involve some or all the following factors: a casual register, colloquial language, emotionally changed language, and slang etc

- Extensive (monologue): Finally, students at intermediate or advanced levels are called on to give extended monologues in the form of oral report, summaries, or perhaps short speeches Here the register is more formal and deliberative

As can be seen, the six categories proposed by Brown (1994) illustrate different forms of speaking practice with different levels of difficulties that can be organized during the speaking lessons Teachers can base on these categories to design the practice activities for their own students to help them step by step improve their speaking skill In this research, the categories that I used with my students were mainly but not limited to responsive, transactional, interpersonal and extensive which

I found suitable for the content planned to teach

2.1.6 The roles of the teacher in different stages of teaching speaking

Byrne (1986) introduced three stages of teaching speaking: the presentation stage, the practice stage and the production one In each stage, the role of the teacher is different

At the presentation stage, the teacher is considered an informant role The teacher introduces something new to be learned and present it in such a way that the meaning of the new language is as clear and memorable as possible The students listen and try to understand It means that the teacher is at the centre of the stage

Therefore, teacher’s time spending should be sensible so that the students get enough time to practice themselves

At the practice stage, it is the students’ role to do most of the talking while teacher’s main task is to devise and provide the maximum amount of practice, which must the same time be both meaningful and memorable The teacher’s role, then, is completely different from that at the presentation one The teacher is like the skillful conductor of an orchestra, giving each of the performers a chance to participate, observing and monitoring their performance to see that it is satisfactory

At the final stage- the production one, the teacher takes on the role of manager and guide Students are given opportunities to use language freely Sometimes students can make mistakes at this stage, but mistakes are unimportant What is more important is that students have chance to use language as they wish,

to try to express their own ideas Moreover, they become aware that they have learnt something useful to them personally, and are encouraged to go on learning It will not be so easy for the teacher to measure students’ performance as it was at the practice stage, nor is there any easy recipe for success So, what is needed is flexibility, tolerance, patience on teacher’s part- and, above all, an understanding of the learners’ difficulties

To sum up, the teacher through speaking lesson should work as an instructor His/ her roles closely relate to the three stages of learning Whatever the teacher is doing in the classroom, his/ her ability to enhance the students’ interest, to create motivation and involve them in what they are doing, will be crucial

2.2 Group work in speaking lessons

2.2.1 Definition of group work

Group work is not a new technique in teaching and has been similarly defined by a number of authors Nolasco and Arthur (1998) states that group work

is a number of people assigned a task together and they will work on it

cooperatively According to Doff (1998), in group work the teacher divides the class into small groups to work together and similar to pair work, all the groups work at the same time

Group sizes can vary from pairs to large groups of students, each group may consist of three members, four or up to six members or sometimes only two like pair work (Doff, 1998) In fact, there are not any fixed rules on the number of group members so this largely depends on teacher’s belief and decision

2.2.2 Benefits of group work

As previously mentioned, group work is proved to bring a number of potential benefits to speaking classes such as providing more opportunities for students to practice, increasing classroom interaction (Long & Porte 1985), enhancing cooperation and promoting learner autonomy (Harmer, 2007).When working in groups, students can exchange, share their knowledge and understanding with other members in their group, thereby improve the effectiveness of lesson acquisition

Group work also requires members to work collaboratively with the rest of the team to create an output, so the mutual understanding also increases Group work is a cooperative activity in which the students work at the same time, sharing ideas and responsibility and independently have their own ideas which contribute to the group work’s success without every minute observation from the teacher and other students Joining groups can also help students develop a host of skills that are increasingly important in the professional world (Caruso & Woolley, 2008; Mannix

& Neale, 2005) Positive group experiences, moreover, have been shown to contribute to student learning, retention and overall college success (Astin, 1997; Tinto, 1998; National Survey of Student Engagement, 2006)

Group work has also been proven to be an effective way of promoting learning motivation, enhancing performance and lessening learners’ language

anxiety (Dumas, 2002); Kahle, 1993; Stahl, 1994) It is an effective way to offer an interactive environment, which is crucial to communicative language learning

Harmer (1999) also presented a number of advantages of group work, which include the possibility to increase the student talking time, enhancing problem solving, teamworking and interpersonal skills This may be explained by the fact that in group work, normally a number of people involved, each with different experience, knowledge, points of view and values, a larger number and variety of ideas can be given Moreover, the exchange of the ideas in the group can act as a stimulus which will encourage individuals to give more ideas, more opinions and therefore contribute more to group work activities Thanks to this, students probably become more active in their learning process

Also according to Harmer (1999), another advantage of group work is that it helps reduce bias This is because the shared responsibility in a group in coming to decisions can encourage individuals to explore seemingly realistic ideas and to challenge accepted ways of doing things Therefore, individual biases and prejudices can be challenged by the group, forcing the individual to recognize them Group pressure can also encourage individuals to accept that change is need

Finally, students’ group work frees the teacher from the usual role of “an expert who always lectures” and allows him/her to walk to each group, to guide, to answer questions from students or to encourage students to work actively (Harmer, 1999)

To sum up, group work has proved to be beneficial to students in helping them improve their speaking skill

2.2.3 Some problems in using group work

Despite a number of benefits, group work also has several disadvantages Haines (1995) claims that “being forced to speak a second language to someone who shares your first language is artificial” (Haines, 1995:57) This partly explains

why one major problem of group work among students of the same first language is

their frequent use of the mother tongue

The amount of noise is also a big challenge which is not always easy for teachers to control Conducting group work is somehow time-consuming as teachers often need more time to organize groups and instruct students on what to do Another problem is the different levels of responsibility of the group members (Harmer, 1999) It is common that among members of a group, some may be highly responsible while some others may be quite passive and even lazy so their contribution and participation in group work may not be equal Moreover, in a mixed-level group, better students are sometimes dominant As consequence, less proficient students often have fewer opportunities to participate According to Harmer (1999), working in group can also cause competitions as some unconsciously perceive the situations as a competition, which probably leads to the generation of a destructive behavior and therefore drains the creative energy of the group

Besides, Harmer (1999) argued that working in group is a relatively slow process compared to working alone due to the fact that students often have to be present at an assigned time and need time to negotiate before coming to an agreement

Although there are some disadvantages of group work, the advantages still outweigh Being aware of the all potential challenges in conducting group work will help teachers anticipate the problems they might encounter to be able to reduce the difficulties and make use of its benefits

2.2.4 Group formation

There are a number of ways to form group work According to Jung (2004), groups can be formed randomly (counting off or by their seat proximity), on the basis of teachers’-selection, or students’ selection Random group assignments

avoid cliques and ensure that students interact with different students throughout the semester Once teachers know their students fairly well, teacher-selected groups can

be useful for pairing weak and strong students, students with common interests or shared learning styles, or characteristics It can be said that teacher can clearly

understand their students’ behavior in class

Random grouping

Random grouping is often used for in-class activities because of its convenience and readiness that is random grouping is a way including collecting and gathering students ignoring any differences among students in terms of their language level, learning style, interests etc The number of students in class varies

up to forty or more, so random grouping helps teacher saves time For the class of different levels, random grouping is supposed to narrow down the gap between the students of different levels

Student-selected grouping

Student selected grouping is another popular way to form groups Many students feel more committed when they are let choose their own partners with whom they feel most comfortable to communicate However, student-selected grouping can result in high level of noise in class because students of such groups tend to exchange a large amount of information both relevant and irrelevant to the lesson content

Teacher-selected grouping

Compared to random grouping and student-selected grouping, selected grouping is a more time-consuming method due to the fact that teachers have match students together to form the best group for each of them basing on their preferences, learning style, level of activeness and other related characteristics However, this kind of grouping is also supposed to be the most effective as it enables peer tutoring that gives students more chances to learn from one another

teacher-Group size

It is suggested that three to five members in one group can be the best for it According to Honeyfield (1991), I-Jung (2004) and Ngoh (1991), a group with four members make group work more interesting as there are a wider range of opinions being expressed, as well as more negotiation required for the group members to reach an agreement In addition, each group member has better chances to express their own ideas in such group size Six should be the maximum number of members

in one group (Honeyfield,1991; I-Jung, 2004) as bigger groups may lead to difficulties in controlling, organizing activities and encouraging contribution from all members

2.2.5 Teacher’s role in carrying out group work

In Communicative Language Teaching, teachers are supposed to take the roles of a guide, an instructor, an organizer, an assessor, a prompter and a participant (Hammer, 1991) When carrying out group work, even though the students are more independent, the teacher still plays an important role in designing, conducting the tasks and analyzing the need

According to Cross (1992), the teacher is the manager of an activity who must plant it, organize it, start it, monitor it, time it and in the end conclude it The teacher in the group work activities is not the free one but the one who is active with assisting, supervising and monitoring the group The teacher is not only there with their students only at the beginning or the end of the learning process but from beginning to the end of the process as they perform a number of roles including

- an activity selector who creates activities that fit the students' skills and abilities, assigns group tasks that allow a fair division of energy as well as set up

"competitions" among groups

- an instructor who is there to ensure that the students will be not misleading

- a performance controller who provides help and assists students to tackle the difficulties they have with the group while the students are working together

- a group evaluator who not only evaluates the whole group work but also the performance of each group member

According to Cross (1992), whether group work is successful or not depends much on how and where the teacher applies these roles

2.2.6 Steps of organizing group activities

Harmer (1999) divides group-work activities into three steps: before activities, during activities, and after activities and suggested that each group work activity should follow these steps More information about each step is presented below

Before activities: In this step, the teacher should make students feel enthusiastic about the activity Students also need to understand what they are going

to do, and when they will have finished the task they are going to get involved in Therefore, the instructions teachers make in this step should be clear enough for students to understand and agree on what the task is

During activities: While students are working, it is time for the teacher to assist them with the knowledge and in tackling difficulties they have with the group Also, he/ she can stand in the front or the side of the class (or at the back or anywhere else in the room), and keep an eye on what is happening, noting who or which group appears to be stuck or disengaged The teacher can then decide to help that group

After activities: When groups stop working together, the teacher needs to organize feedback The teacher can let them discuss what occurred, add his/ her own assessments and make corrections It is important that the teacher not only evaluates the whole group-work but also each member of the group Constructive feedback on the content of student work can greatly enhance the students’ future

motivation and inspire them the willingness to actively participate in the following activities

2.3 Previous studies

So far, a number of researches into the application of group work have been conducted Presented below is the summary of the findings from similar researches which also investigate the application of group work to enhance students speaking skill

Ningtyas Orilina Argawati (2014) conducted a study entitled “improving students’ speaking skill using group discussion” The result of the study shows that there was significant improvement of the students’ speaking test results Group work also helped increase students’ confidence in speaking Siti Nurkasih (2009) also indicated that group-work techniques could create free atmosphere during the learning process, make the classroom situation more alive, help improve both the teaching-learning situation in the classroom and students’ speaking skills Group techniques also made a contribution in increasing students’ motivation and participation

Divya John’s research, carried out in 2017 was a reflective study using a sample activity conducted in the English class for engineering students These students were in an English class where all of them were well aware of the importance of making improvement in their English speaking skill, because this helped them to convey a complete and successful message to communicate Evaluations of both students and the researcher were carried out and analyzed Focusing on the factors analyzed, he came up with guidelines and recommendations for ideal group work and he suggested a 5D procedure which are:

1 Direct: the teacher directs the students how to go about the group work

2 Discuss: the students discuss among themselves

3 Develop: the students develop the content for presentation

4 Deliver: the students deliver the content in front of the class

5 Document: the teacher documents the feedback

The researcher recommended creating meaningful activities, controlling the attitude of the students with careful internal evaluation and observation for speaking, and including a final oral exam The study concluded with the idea that the best way to foster speaking skills is through group work and when done with enough planning and monitoring, group work can inspire students in any class, regardless of age, subject of study, aptitude and attitude

Ibtissem (2013) also admitted the significance of using work group to motivate speaking skill in class In his research, he made effort to explain the importance of establishing a comfortable and friendly environment as an attempt to get learners to use the language appropriately Therefore, the research targets to describe two aspects: group work activities and its benefits in improving learners’ speaking proficiency The relationship between group work activities and students’ speaking output was studied The results revealed that group work is considered to

be the appropriate and quite effective technique for improving learners’ language use and classroom performance, which also affects learners’ oral proficiency

In Vietnam, researches into this topic matter are also common Pham Thanh Mai (2007) did research into group discussion and its impacts on speaking ability of the EFL students in Military Science Academy She formed groups randomly though to increase the reliability of the research, students participated in the research were selected in advance according to some criteria Pre-intervention questionnaires and post-intervention questionnaire were distributed before and after the implementation of group work During the research period, the researcher carefully recorded group work and individual presentations on a weekly basis for a period of two-month study The results of the study show that group discussion has

great impact on speaking ability of the students Most of them found that their speaking ability had been improved after working in group discussion

Another research into the impacts of group work on students’ speaking ability by Le Thuy Duong (2014) also showed that group work has positive influence on students’ speaking ability It provides them more opportunities to speak, helps them reduce anxiety and increase their confidence Thanks to regular peer and group feedback, students step by step improved their fluency and accuracy

in speaking However, there were also some problems that the researcher encountered such as the difficulty level of the group task, the lack of time, effort to control group work, the high level of noise Duong (2014) then made some suggestions such as assigning a group leader, awarding students with good performance and simplifying the task for better group work practice

Do Thi Huyen (2017) also investigated the use of group work to improve first year students’ speaking skills at Hanoi University of Industry The study again confirms the positive impacts of group work on students’ speaking ability, especially on students’ grammar and vocabulary mastery as well as fluency, which was proved by their improvements of scoring and performance In this study, the researcher strictly followed the cycle of action research framework starting with planning, then continuing with acting, observing and reflecting The researcher also proposed clear criteria for assessing pre-test and post-test in terms of pronunciation, grammar, word order, fluency and vocabulary Evaluation based on such criteria can make it clear about the improvement of students’ speaking skills after the purposeful implementation of group work activities

According to the previous studies’ results, the application of group work has significant impacts on enhancing students’ speaking ability as well as promoting their responsibility and motivation Therefore, the practitioner decided to conduct such activity in her class and investigate its influence on her students and basing on

the research results to propose some suggestions on the effective use of group work

in her teaching context

CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY

This chapter presents a review of the methodology of the study It describes

in detail the subjects of the study, the research design, the procedures and the data collection instruments

3.1 Participants and context of the study

The research was conducted at a high school in Bac Ninh for the period of twelve weeks (from August 20th to November 11th 2018)

Participants of the research are 41 students of the 10th grade studying in the same class For those students, English is a compulsory subject and they have English lessons every week, normally the frequency is three periods of forty-five minutes per week

The course book used is the new English text book named “English 10” - Volume 1 by Hoang Van Van and Hoang Thi Xuan Hoa (2018), with the cooperation by David Kaye, published by Pearson Longman Press and Ministry of Education and Training The book consists of five units and two unit reviews Each unit includes eight parts which are Getting started, Language, Reading, Speaking, Listening, Writing, Communication and culture, Looking back and Project In the first semester which lasts for twelve weeks with thirty seven periods, teachers are required to deal with the all units of volume 1 In the text book, speaking is a frequent classroom activity with practices range from more controlled to freer ones More specifically, each unit starts by providing students with necessary language input and getting them to discuss simple matters, and ends with the preparation and completion of a project in which students are supposed to practice speaking in a freer and more complicated way

3.2 Reasons to choose action research method

Dick (2002) defines action research as a natural way of acting and researching at the same time It is a form of self-reflective inquiry that teachers can

use to improve the rationality and justice of their own practices, their understanding

of these practices, and the situations in which these practices are carried out (Carr & Kemmis, 1983) Action research provides teachers a means to investigate their own practice, have an insight into what they and their students actually do and fail to do, develop a deeper understanding of students, and based on that they are more able to decide what works best and what needs improvement in their classrooms (Gay & Airasian, 2003)

Basing on the definition and description of an action research, it can be seen that there are four distinguishing features making action research different from other types of research Firstly, action research is conducted by teachers themselves Conducting an action research helps teachers identify the problems in their teaching practice as well as the problems their students encounter to be able to draw up a plan to solve it, implement and evaluate the effects of their solutions on their students’ learning The second point is that action research is a reproduction cycle, which means after the evaluation, the process can be repeated with the revised plan Thirdly, it is collaborative Teachers conducting an action research have to participate, collaborate, and examine their knowledge and the ways they interpret themselves and their actions They do research in their own teaching context and collect data about how they teach as all the data comes from the class on which the researcher is working They invite students to study their own learning and to comment on their teaching method, curriculum and organization of their learning Last but not least, action research aims at changing things (Nunan, 1992) It means that for teachers, the study conducted aims to change and improve the situation within the class that they are taking care of, and it also affects the students’ output

to some extents

In this study, my purpose is to investigate the challenges that my students face in developing their speaking skills, identify the impacts of group work intervention on enhancing their speaking ability and based on the findings to make

suggestions on how to apply group work effectively in my own teaching context To achieve these aims, action research framework seems to be the most suitable; therefore, I decided to do this research following the steps proposed for an action research

3.3 Phases of action research

So far, a number of action research models have been proposed by various researchers According to Kemmis and Mctaggart (2000), action research has number of cycles, each cycle of an action research often involves the planning of a change, the acting and observation of the process and the consequences of the change, and the reflection on these processes and consequences After a cycle ends, the new cycle begins, following the same steps An illustration of action research's cycles by Kemmis and McTaggart (2000:564) is presented in the following figures

Figure 3.1 Action research spiral (Kemmis & McTaggart, 2000:564)

The figure outlines four steps in action, the transition from one essential phase to another and how the progress can be done through the system It can be clearly seen that in an action research study, the researcher does not stop after

receiving the results from his actions He must evaluate the effectiveness of his actions as well as the limitations of the methods After that, he should modify the plan, make some changes and do it again for better results These stages are inseparable but embedded in action and reflection

Figure 3.2: Action research framework (adapted from Lewin, 1946)

Figure 3.2 presents detailed action research model by Lewin (1946) The four steps in this model are described as follows:

- Diagnosing and plan: the researcher needs to identify the problem by observing the context or collecting information about the problem In addition, researcher also wishes to make a plan himself for the next action including opinion

of new method changing or any amendment for the current context The plan should

be clear enough to be understood and easy enough to be followed

- Implement action strategy: the researcher proposes different ways or methods which can be used to solve the problem After considering the advantages and disadvantages of different solutions, the researcher chooses one course of

actions to apply in the study context The new method applied should be suitable for specific context

- Evaluate action strategy: This is an important stage In this stage, the researcher reviews what she or he has done and makes a conclusion on his own The findings of research study might base on some extents of evaluation stage The researcher analyzes the data to find out the consequences of a taken action, presents the general findings, what can be solved and what remains problematic, from which

he adjusts the plan to act again and another cycle in an action research begins

In this study, the researcher underwent the following action research framework by Kemmis and McTaggart (2000):

 Planning the action

 Implementing the action

 Observing the action

 Reflecting the action

3.4 Weekly schedules and research procedures

This part presents details about the group work topics and activities as well

as the procedures that the researcher followed to conduct this research

3.4.1 Weekly schedules

Due to the time constraint and the fact that there was a strict syllabus to follow, the researcher could only implement activities focusing on the two major parts in the textbook that require more speaking, namely Speaking and Project

The table below shows the topics, requirement, preparation and group activities of all speaking lessons that the researcher had to complete during the twelve weeks of the research It also gives information about the procedures the researcher followed in this period, which mainly involves the preparation process and the group speaking activities

Table 3.1 The timetable of the action implementation

requirement

Preparation Group activity

1 Family Life Expressing

opinions about housework

- Ask and answer about household chores with at least two students in the class

- Report about their friends’ likes and dislikes in groups

- Ask and answer questions

in the class

- Do a survey on family life of different students in the class

- Report the survey results

3 Your Body

and You

Talking about how to get rid of bad habits

- Read the habit list and decide which one is good/ bad, prepare some explanation for their judgments

- Brainstorm the ways to get rid of one bad habit

- Discuss why some habits are good/ bad

- Discuss the do’s and the don’ts in order to kick a bad habit

- Ask and answer questions

in groups

- Get feedback from other group members and teacher

4 Your Body

and You

Project:

Doing a survey on the

importance

of categories

in staying healthy

- Go round the class and ask some

students to rank the order of importance

- Ask and answer questions

in groups

explanation - Get feedback from other

group members and teacher

about TV shows

- Prepare a talk about a TV show

- Present about their ideas

Doing a research on a folk song and Dangdut song

- Collect information about these two kinds of music

- Discuss the similarities and differences of these two kinds of music

- Get feedback from other group members and teacher

8 For a Better

Community

Talking about local community development

- Prepare a talk about three most important activities for community development and reasons why they are important

- Discuss in group and choose the three most important activities

- Prepare group presentation then present

in front of the class

- Listen to other groups’ presentation, discuss and votes for the most

interesting ideas

- Get feedback from other group members and teacher

9 For a Better

Community

Project:

Making a plan to help

a person/ a place in need in the students’

- Find someone/ a place in their community that need help

- Make a report on their problems and think about what

- Make a group presentation in front of the class, listen to other

groups’ contribution to the plans

- Get feedback from other group members and