A study on english language teachers’ reasoning for the strategies they use in teaching speaking skills at van xuan high school, hoai duc, ha noi

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES *************** TRỊNH THỊ NHUNG A STUDY ON ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACH

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

***************

TRỊNH THỊ NHUNG

A STUDY ON ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS’ REASONING FOR THE STRATEGIES THEY USE IN TEACHING SPEAKING SKILLS AT VAN XUAN HIGH

SCHOOL, HOAI DUC, HA NOI

NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ NHỮNG LÝ GIẢI CHO VIỆC SỬ DỤNG CÁC CHIẾN LƯỢC DẠY KỸ NĂNG NÓI CỦA GIÁO VIÊN DẠY TIẾNG ANH

TẠI TRƯỜNG THPT VẠN XUÂN, HOÀI ĐỨC, HÀ NỘI

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

HANOI – 2015

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

***************

TRỊNH THỊ NHUNG

A STUDY ON ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS’ REASONING FOR THE STRATEGIES THEY USE IN TEACHING SPEAKING SKILLS AT VAN XUAN HIGH

SCHOOL, HOAI DUC, HA NOI

NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ NHỮNG LÝ GIẢI CHO VIỆC SỬ DỤNG CÁC CHIẾN LƯỢC DẠY KỸ NĂNG NÓI CỦA GIÁO VIÊN DẠY TIẾNG ANH

TẠI TRƯỜNG THPT VẠN XUÂN, HOÀI ĐỨC, HÀ NỘI

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Supervisor: Nguyễn Văn Độ, Assoc Prof Dr

HANOI – 2015

Hanoi, 2015

Trinh Thi Nhung

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere thanks to my supervisor, Assoc Prof Dr Nguyễn Văn Độ, for his valuable guidance, helpful advice, recommendation, as well as his encouragement during the time I tried to complete this minor thesis Without his supervision, this work would never have been possible

I am also indebted to all the professors of Post-Graduate Department for their encouragement and their valuable lectures while I was taking the M.A course in English Language Teaching Methodology at the University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University (VNU) Their constructive ideas, assistance and advice helped me much during various stages of learning and writing

ABSTRACT This research investigates the strategies applied in teaching speaking skills with the new English textbooks for students at Van Xuan High School in Hoai Duc, and explains the question why they used these strategies

The thesis is divided into 3 main parts: Part A presents the rationale, aims, research questions, scopes, research methods and the design the study Part B includes 4 chapters: Chapter 1 presents definitions of major terms used in this study, including overview on speaking skills, definition of speaking, theories of teaching speaking skills and strategies in teaching speaking skills; Chapter 2 describes the methodology of the thesis Specifically, the data for this research was collected in the forms of class observation, survey questionnaires and interviews The participants of the interview were 6 English teachers and the participants of the survey questionnaires were 270 grade - 11 - students; Chapter 3 analyses and discusses the results from the class observation, survey questionnaires and interviews; Chapter 4 mentions some findings and recommendations Finally, Part

C gives the conclusions of this paper, some limitations and recommendations for further study

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 3.2a: Teacher’s difficulties in teaching English speaking

Table 3.2b: Teacher’s solutions to the problems

Table 3.2c: Teacher’s reasons for using speaking techniques and activities

Table 3.3a: Students’ reasons for learning English

Table 3.3b: Frequency of employed activities

Table 3.3c: Student’s attitude towards teacher’s teaching speaking activities

Table 3.3d: Student’s expectation from teacher

Table 3.3e: Factors affecting Van Xuan students’ participating English lessons Table 3.3f: Student’s achievements from speaking teaching strategies

Figure 3.3.1: Student’s opinions on speaking topic in the textbooks

Figure3.3.2: Frequency of student’s speaking participation

Figure 3.3.3: Student’s opinions about the frequency of teacher’s English speaking Figure 3.3.4: Frequency of student’s English speaking

Figure 3.3.5: Student’s progress after applied speaking teaching strategies

5 IG: Information gap

6 Q&A exchanges: Question and answer exchanges

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES iv

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS v

TABLE OF CONTENTS vi

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale for the Research 1

2 Aims of the Research 2

3 Research Questions 2

4 Scope of the Research 2

5 Research Instruments 2

6 Design of the Research 3

PART B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter 1: Literature review 4

1.1 Overview on speaking skills 4

1.1.1 Speaking skills 4

1.1.2 Theories of teaching speaking skills 5

1.1.2.1 Functions of spoken language 6

1.1.2.2 The role of speaking skills in communication approach 6

1.2 Strategies in teaching speaking skills 7

1.2.1 Brainstorming 7

1.2.2 Debates 7

1.2.3 Discussion 8

1.2.4 Group work 8

1.2.5 Simulations 9

1.2.6 Communicative activities 9

1.3 Factors affecting the outcomes of learning speaking skills 10

1.3.1 Learners’ aptitude 10

1.3.2 Learners’ attitude 11

1.3.3 Learning strategies 11

1.3.4 Psychological factors 12

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 2.1 An overview of the research site 13

2.2 Subjects 14

2.3 Instruments of data collection 15

2.3.1 Observation 15

2.3.2 Interview for teachers 16

2.3.3 Questionnaire for students 16

2.4 Data analysis methods 17

2.5 Research procedure 18

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS 3.1 Results from class observation 19

3.2 Results from teachers’ interview 21

3.3 Results from students’ questionnaire 25

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 4.1 Findings 30

4.1.1 The students and teachers’ difficulties in speaking lessons 30

4.1.2 The teachers’ teaching strategies used in speaking lessons 32

4.1.3 The outcomes from the teachers’ teaching strategies in speaking lessons 32

4.1.4 The students’ expectations towards their teachers 33

4.2 Recommendations 33

4.2.1 A careful plan of the speaking lesson 34

4.2.2 The change in students’ speaking habit and opportunity for students to use English in real life 36

PART C: CONCLUSIONS 1 Summary, major finding and implications on teaching 38

a Summary and major findings 38

b Implications on teaching 38

2 Limitations of the study 39

3 Suggestions for further studies 39

REFERENCES 40 APPENDICES

APPENDIX 1: CLASS OBSERVATION SHEET I APPENDIX 2: INTERVIEW QUESTIONS FOR TEACHERS ……… II APPENDIX 3: SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENTS ……… III APPENDIX 4: CLASS OBSERVATION SHEET VI

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

Turning to the 21st century, the society has witnessed plenty of extensive changes in every walk of life In a constant changing world, with a rapid growth of globalization and spread of information and technology, communication plays a crucial role in many different fields It is undoubted that English has, as an international language, become more and more important all over the world To catch up with this trend of growth, English teaching and learning in Vietnam have been paid more attention In fact, English is a compulsory subject in all curriculums from primary to upper secondary level of education It is clear that listening, speaking, writing and reading are four key skills to English teaching Of them, speaking skill is strongly considered the most important one “Speaking in a second

or foreign language has often been viewed as the most demanding of the four skills.” (Bailey, Kathleen M & Savage, Lance, 1994) People widely choose speaking as the quickest way to convey messages and ideas As a result, it is believed that speaking

is the main ingredient to an individual’s success in working and learning From that point, to get the goal of improving the speaking skill of students in English class, the techniques used are vital indicators of successful achievements The fact that each student has a different way in studying, level of knowledge and capacity of perception considerably challenges teachers Before applying a new method to give out English talking- related lessons, researches are thoroughly investigated and examined Not only do the teachers hope for an effective lecture, but they also take current situations of their school students into account The mutual desire of teachers and students working in a second language used environment is to motivate learners to speak out in any given chance, and subsequently improve speaking skills for students

This research, based on primary and secondary data, investigates the reasons why English teachers choose their strategies for English teaching As an English teacher at a high school, the researcher hopefully takes a chance to develop and

improve herself through conducting this research, regardless of its scope of minor thesis These really decisive factors give the writer motivation to carry out a research: “A study on English teaching teachers’ reasoning for the strategies they use in teaching speaking skill at Van Xuan high school”

2 Aims of the research

The study is aimed at

- identifying the strategies used in English speaking lessons and the outcomes from these strategies

- suggesting some solutions in hoping to improve English speaking for students

3 Research questions

The following questions were made to achieve the aims above:

1 What instructional strategies do teachers at Van Xuan high school use in their teaching speaking skill?

2 Why do they use those strategies according to their self-reports?

4 Scope of the research

The study focuses on strategies applied in teaching English speaking skills for students at Van Xuan High School in Hoai Duc The strategies are investigated

in some particular classes, and the questions are raised to explain why they used these strategies

5 Research instruments

To collect data and information, three outstanding instruments are used:

- The first one is related to class observation in speaking lessons of students in some particular classes

- The second one is interviewing the English teachers of these above classes at Van Xuan high school

- The last one is survey questionnaire for the students of these classes at Van Xuan High School

All comments, remarks, recommendations, assumptions and conclusions provided in the study based on the analysis of the statistics from class observation,

survey questionnaire and interview section conducted with the students from six groups (11D1, 11D2, 11D3, 11D4, 11D5 and 11D6 in 2013 - 2014) and their English teachers at Van Xuan high school

6 Design of the research

There are three main parts in this study, namely Introduction, Development, and Conclusions

Part A: The introduction, begins with the rationale, aims, research questions, scopes, research methods, and the design of the study

Part B: Development, includes the following chapters

Chapter 1: Literature review, presents definition of major terms used in this study, including overview on speaking skills, factors affecting students’ speaking skills, and strategies in teaching speaking skills

Chapter 2: Methodology includes settings, participants, data collection instruments, data collection procedure, data analysis methods

Chapter 3: Data analysis, presents data analysis and discussion

Chapter 4: Findings and recommendations

Part C: Conclusions, includes the summary of the findings, implications, limitations and recommendations for further studies

PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter consists of three sections Section one deals with the overview

on speaking skills which is intended to be discussed in terms of the definition of speaking skill and theories of teaching speaking skills Section two focuses on the definition of strategies in teaching speaking skills and some common strategies in teaching speaking skills The last section is about factors affecting the outcomes of learning speaking skills

1.1 Overview on speaking skills

1.1.1 Speaking skills

We are now living in a globalization world than ever before, and speaking is regarded as an integral part of life There is no doubt that speaking plays an important role in both social and academic field Especially, for the whole learning process, speaking is obviously crucial For that reason, the term “speaking” has drawn much of attention of linguists As a result, there have been various definitions of speaking

One of the most accepted term is offered by Jones, R (1989:86) Speaking in his words is defined as “Speaking is a form of communication, so it is important that what you say conveyed in the most effective way” In addition, Kathleen M Bailey (2005: 2) stated that “speaking is the productive, oral skill” Speaking, as mentioned above, is the way by which speakers say a word to listeners not only to express what is on their mind but also what they need and desire to do Because people spend time communicating with others, speaking meets their daily demand

To a speaking learner, the term “speaking” has been more deeply offered In more academic words, Nguyen and Nguyen (2001) considered speaking quite different from the preceding terms Speaking in their words is focused on two main aspects: accuracy and fluency “Accuracy involves the correct use of vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation” while “Fluency can be thought of as the ability to keep going when speaking spontaneously” Language learner, who is able to fluently

communicate in or out of the class, is necessary to master speaking skills Regardless of grammatical and other mistakes, learner is encouraged to develop their speaking ability across whatever resources they have got To language teachers, they believe in a teaching speaking method that does not put students to have a definitely communicative accuracy and unnecessary to follow conversational teaching methods What language teachers choose to develop students’ speaking ability is to provide them with conversational practice Consequently, to each stage

of language learning, there is difference on the requirements and standards of fluency and accuracy

Bygate (1987) raised a suggestion that “speaking is a skill which deserves attention as much as the literary skills in both native and foreign languages” About the nature of speaking, he also denoted that “in order to be able to speak a foreign language, it is necessary to know a certain amount of grammar and vocabulary Part

of a language course is therefore generally devoted to this objective”

1.1.2 Theories of teaching speaking skills

The reason that oral language is chosen as the most effective means of communication leads all people develop their own forms oral language The ways to promote speaking skills have caught much of attention from the recent studies on communication Therefore, a question is raised to determine how to develop both language competence and language use It is undeniable that learning language, particularly a foreign language is not an easy task but a whole process Teaching, therefore, is firmly important Teaching speaking, together with teaching strategies,

is supposed to help speaking learners use inputs as resources from environment and personal acquisition in learning language to generate output in communication Furthermore, teaching speaking focuses on fluency in which learners’ thoughts are organized in a meaningful and logical order so that the learners have ability to use language confidently and quickly with as few unnatural pauses as possible

1.1.2.1 Functions of spoken language

According to the study of Brown and Yule (1983a: 1-3; 1983b: 11-16), language functions under 2 main aspects including: transferring information considered as transactional function and establishing or maintaining social relationships, or in other words, interactional function The characters of interactional spoken language can be seen as shifts of topic and short turns The accuracy and clarity of information is estimated not to be the initial importance Similarly, facts and views are not normally raised as a question or challenge To transactional spoken language, the norm is its longer turns On account of the goal seen as effective transference of information, interlocutors are actively engaged in the negotiation of meaning From the stating mentioned above, Brown and Yule call interactional language "listener oriented" and transactional language "message oriented"

1.1.2.2 The role of speaking skills in communication approach

Firstly, people may think it is common knowledge that English learners are definitely in a close relation to some things done with oral language Students, who are said to be good at English, will be thought to have ability as an English native speaker

Secondly, for further development of writing and reading skills, oral English play a useful role The above point of views is that Rivers obviously illustrated

“when we read and write, we call upon what we know of the language orally” (1968: 20) He continues to provide some bases on which the reason why reading is related to speaking is explained It is stated that when students are doing some reading, they are also taking advantage of their oral English competence Moreover,

it is likely that students who are not good at English speaking may have a poor ability to read in English Similarly, Rivers’ arguments pointed out in 1968 that writing has the same involvement in oral ability as reading

1.2 Strategies in teaching speaking skills

It is undoubted that strategies play an indispensable role in language learning process The teacher, regarded as the strategies user, are hoped to provide systematic practice and approach for students attending language learning activities That the education ministry has witnessed a movement in policy leads to a change

in teaching strategies and approaches in general The teacher –centered model has turned into student – centered where the teachers play a role as guider and support students with a learning environment in which they are actively engaged in learning activities There are a lot of teaching strategies for English speaking teachers to develop speaking skill of English learners such as: brainstorming, debates, discussions, group work, simulations and communicative activities

1.2.1 Brainstorming

According to the study of Australian researchers (2014), it was expressed that “brainstorming is a large or a small group activity that encourages students to focus on a topic and contribute to the free flow of ideas” In brainstorming teaching strategy, the teacher begins with raising a topic or questions and problems related to the topic Students are required to express their ideas by using relevant and coherent words in a limited time After that, a class discussion is opened, and the teacher plays a role as supervisor and student are allowed to raise their voice without any criticisms

Brainstorming delivers to students speaking opportunities by expressing their own ideas as well as listening to other people Facing a specific speaking topic, students not only use their previously learnt knowledge but also accommodate differences By sharing ideas with other people, it is chance to evaluate and respect language abilities and skills Participating in a brainstorming activity, students shape the habit of making outline before starting to do anything

1.2.2 Debates

The UNSW (2014), based on their observation, debating was defined as

“structured way of exploring the range of views on an issue” In a debate with

structured argumentation, there are two opposing individuals or groups of people who are for and against the ideas to protect their position Debates provide students with engagement in activities helping interaction Before making a debate, students learn how to think critically and strategically in accessing to both defending and opposing ideas To become a survival in a competitive speaking activity, it is a must for learners to have listening and oral skills It is true that debating requires higher level of talk than discussion only

1.2.3 Discussion

There is a claim that “Discussion stimulates communication among students, and it helps to achieve communicative practice With this activity students have an opportunity to develop sharing and co-operative skills” (ÇAKIR, 2006) Unlike a lecture that is mostly controlled by an individual presentation, discussion lets each member actively attend a talk Discussion encourages individual contributions, and the play role is highly appreciated To reach the conclusion of a discussion, opinions

of members need to be shared and solutions are found to tackle to problems Students may develop oral skill through expressing ideas, negotiating and persuading others In addition, students also take a chance to improve their problem-solving and critical thinking skills

1.2.4 Group work

Within the aim of motivating the study among students, group work plays a useful role in class To change that negative learning and teaching situation, a boring speaking lesson with the teacher raising a question and students pointed to answer one by one, group work is suggested in speaking lesson Group work, in other works, cooperative learning, encourages people to participate in doing a task

In fact, working together is more highly appreciated than working independently

In teaching strategies, group work requires students’ participation to work periodically and share the outcome of cooperating process Consequently, the whole class involvement is apparently increased Stimulating activity as group work brings

to the class an efficient and effective working environment in which motivation, the

enthusiasm to learn, confidence to speak and cooperation with others are valued (Jacobs and Ratmanida, 1996: 102)

1.2.5 Simulations

According to Joan Andorfer’s view (2008), simulations encourage language learner Simulations create a scenario in which instruction provided by the teacher Simulations focus on student - centered form that the teacher plays a controlling role This is the reason why Burns & Gentry expressed their views that is is necessary for the teacher to pay attention on role playing or simulation (1998) In more specific words, the student must be encouraged to study, provided with relevant learning material by the teacher

opinion on a debatable topic Before students do this activity, they need to be prepared with necessary language and brainstorm idea With the opinion sharing activity, it is required to use factual information, formulating arguments and justifying one’s opinion The activity involves identifying and articulating a personal preference, feelings and attitude For some topics there even maybe no right or wrong responses Reasoning gap activity and prepared talks are two other valuable communicative activities

1.3 Factors affecting the outcomes of learning speaking skills

There are many factors affecting the outcomes of learning a second language Studies have found that the outcome of a second language acquisition is strongly influenced by aptitude, attitude of learners, learning strategies and psychological factors

a good aptitude in learning, they are able to understand the functions of words in a sentence and use rules of grammar Furthermore, they are likely to determine key words, memorize and use them in a proper and correct way

An outstanding point shedding light on the relation between aptitude and learning a foreign language is that it is not necessary for successful students at the second language acquisition to fill in all components of aptitude Students who have

a strong ability to memorize but an average to the components of aptitude are a clear example of the above stating Some specific tests on measurements of aptitude help the teachers understand that aptitude can be in any individual and determine how much it is in different forms

1.3.2 Attitude of learners

Attitude poses the second factor on the outcome of the process of learning a second language Gardner and Lambert (1972) gave some information that the attitude of learners as a persistence depends much on their learning target to follow The attitude towards second language learning is closely related to leaners’ motivation The motivation regarding to both extrinsic and intrinsic motivation brings to learners a positive attitude than those who work without it The outside factors affect extrinsic motivation whereas intrinsic one is influenced by the inside factors like desire to achieve learning target or enjoyment attained from the learning process To students who consider learning a language a compulsory task, motivation does not go with

1.3.3 Learning strategies

The third influential determinant of language achievement is learning strategies There are a number of language learning strategies defined within a second language education Rubin (1987:22) suggested that language learning strategies “are strategies which contribute to the development of the language system which the learner constructs and affect learning directly” Another term adding information about learning strategies is: “Steps or actions taken by learners

to improve the development of their language skills” (Gass et al 1993: 265) Having the same concern on language learning strategies, O’Malley and Chamot (1990:1) defined it as “the special thoughts or behaviors that individuals use to help them comprehend, learn, or retain new information” Each individual choose the language learning strategies that they work best with For example, some students learn vocabulary by putting it in a specific context and then using it whereas some students choose to look it up many times until they could memorize it Successful students in second language learning are often the students who adopt the learning language strategies that suit them best

1.3.4 Psychological factors

Within language learning, students’ participation is a key determinant of the level of proficiency Howard, Short, and Clark (1996) stated that students who actively participate in class activities promote effective learning However, psychological factors are one of the factors affecting participation of learners in the classroom Wood defined psychological factors as the developmental processes inside the learner The teacher, therefore, is expected to help the learner in terms of psychological problems (1981:92) In reality, to interact with other people and develop speaking skill, learners are said to reach both motivation and speaking opportunities As a result, the learner is suggested to be provided with a learning environment in which they recognize individual value and have a sense of safety towards speaking In addition to this, that learning it is necessary to the learning environment to have clear co-operation between learner and learner as well as teacher and learner

Besides, to learn a foreign language and speaking as well, anxiety plays a negative factor to the language learning process It poses obstacles on the learner to overcome difficulties in learning, especially speaking a foreign language Trait anxiety, state anxiety and situational-specific anxiety made from distinction can be listed in different kinds of anxiety Perhaps aspect of personality can be the best view of anxiety Spielberger (1983) defined anxiety as apprehension happing at a particular moment when there is a respond to a particular situation such as public speaking, examination and class participation

In a nutshell, the outcome of learning a second language depends largely on students’ aptitude, attitude, learning strategies and psychological factors The teacher needs to be aware of the relationship between the factors and the outcome in foreign language acquisition Fully comprehending the factors, suitable teaching strategies are found out to improve speaking skill of English students

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY This chapter provided the general description of how the study has been conducted This chapter included the following sections: an overview of the research site, subjects, methods of data collection

2.1 An overview of the research site

Van Xuan high school, the research site, located in Cat Que commune, Hoai Duc district, the suburb of HaNoi city, is a public school founded in 2002 It is one of three schools in Hoai Duc district The school has 36 classes of three grades 10th,

11th and 12th with approximately 90 teachers of different subjects The students of classes from A1 to A7 of each grade have three English lessons every week For classes from D1 to D6 of each grade, they have one more selective English lesson every week The textbook used for teaching is the new textbooks, Tieng Anh 10, 11,

12 at basic level The English teacher staff at Van Xuan high school are at the age

of from thirty to forty years old who are experienced and enthusiastic in teaching They are eager to enhance the teaching skills and their students’ performance However, they find out that the most challenging skill among four basic skills is speaking skill They always hope to improve the speaking skills for their students The students come from villages in Hoai Duc district They are chosen by passing the tenth grade entrance exam with the score of over 36 points, which is ranked at the medium in comparison with other schools in Hanoi The students have the same years of learning English with the same curriculum and textbook

At Van Xuan high school, English is recognized as a compulsory and necessary subject However, for most of the students here English is always a really difficult subject and they do not often like English lessons Therefore, it is difficult for the teachers of English to teach as well as improve their students' English level Thanks

to the recent economic renovation, most of the students in my school are better aware of the need of learning English However, the majority of students learn English in my school just to pass the national examinations They do not have an obvious communicative need All they need is a sufficiently good knowledge of

grammar and vocabulary of the target language to pass the national grammar-based and norm-referenced examinations Because of testing system, our school's students seem to be in favor of language focus lesson In speaking lessons, they have a lot of difficulties expressing themselves in English and thus they remain inactive in the class

Despite above difficulties, like many other high schools in Vietnam, the teachers of the school have been attempting to apply appropriate methods in order to meet the students' need and equip them with a more communicative competence The teachers tend to adopt more communicative activities

2.2 Subjects

The subjects of the study were composed of 276 participants divided into 2 groups: The first group consisted of 270 grade 11 students from 6 classes, 11D1, 11D2, 11D3, 11D4, 11D5 and 11D6 (2013 – 2014) They were at the same age of seventeen and had the same total year of learning English with the same curriculum from primary school to high school All of them specialized in 3 subjects Math, Literature and English Most of them choose those three subjects to take the university entrance examination Their academic performance in social science subjects was better than ones in natural science subjects They were interested in learning English Each week, they had three English lessons as other classes and one more selective lesson In total, they had four English lessons every week They had been learning English at least for nearly six years

The second group involves six teachers aged from 32 to 39 They have been teaching at school for at least 7 years They are assigned to teach English 11 One has already got her M.A degree and two others are going to Of these six English teachers, with more than seven years’ working experience, five of them graduated from official courses at the University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi The rest teachers finished in-service training programs of the University Most English teachers are young and active They have easier access to CLT (through classes, Internet and books or different courses), so

they are more familiar to it so as to apply it in their teaching On average, every teacher has seventeen periods per week besides a great deal of work (designing tests, marking, controlling form classes, etc., as well as family workloads at home) Especially, half of the members are following courses of English of the 2020 foreign language project

2.3 Instruments of data collection

In the process of doing the study, three instruments were used: observation, questionnaire and interview

2.3.1 Observation

Observation is a fundamental way of finding out the world around us Marshall and Rossman (1989) define observation as "the systematic description of events, behaviors, and artifacts in the social setting chosen for study" (p.79) Observations enable the researcher to describe existing situations using the five senses, providing

a "written photograph" of the situation under study (Erlandson, Harris, Skipper, & Allen, 1993) The collected information can be recorded in some ways to enable the analysis and interpretation latter In addition, the observation can be useful to crosscheck data from the future questionnaire For those reasons, class observation was the first instrument to be carried out in this study The researcher attended different speaking teaching classes of six different teachers to get the general view

of how teachers conduct a speaking lesson The prior purpose was to find out what kind of strategies that were being used in the speaking class by the teachers Furthermore, it was to see whether those strategies work effectively and how was the students’ participation in the lesson To prevent teachers and students from preparing themselves, the exact objectives of class observation were not announced

to them in advance There are three items in the observation sheet

Item I was to make an overview toward the setting of the class

Item II was to explore the teacher’s strategies through the lesson plan, method and procedure

Item III was to see whether those strategies work effectively or not through the students’ activeness in participating in the lessons

2.3.2 Interview for teachers

According to McNamara, interview is particularly useful for getting and understanding the story behind the participants’ experiences (1999) The interviewers also can pursue in depth information around the topic It is the reason why interview was chosen as the second step in data collection procedure for this study The interviews were conducted in forms of personal interview with 6 English teachers whose classes had been observed before In the interview, the Yes/No questions and the WH questions with explanation were both used The teachers were asked about the strategies they used in their speaking class and the rationale behind this choice Because the interviews were for the teachers only who are excellent at English, therefore, English was used during the interview

Six handouts were delivered to six grade 11- English teachers at Van Xuan high school It included 8 questions in total with the aim of finding out their opinions towards the speaking lessons’ design in the textbook, their difficulties in running a speaking lesson and their strategies in teaching English speaking skills

2.3.3 Questionnaire for students

Questionnaire is among the most prominent instruments in research Questionnaires have advantages over some other types of surveys, they are cheap, do not require as much effort from the questioner as verbal or telephone surveys, and often have standardized answers that make it simple to compile data The information can be easily obtained even without the researcher’s presence For those reasons, questionnaire was employed in this research to get students’ point of view

Questionnaire for students included 11 questions, which were in English The questions were written with simple vocabulary, furthermore the subjects are the students who specialize in English, Math and Literature, therefore, it’s easy for students to understand clearly all questions … Handouts were delivered to students, and all of them were collected The questionnaire investigated students’

attitude toward learning speaking in general and toward the teachers’ strategies in specific

2.4 Data analysis methods

When the data collection was accomplished, the data analysis was initiated The methods used in this paper come from both quantitative and qualitative research A brief look at these two kinds of research will be presented as following

Qualitative research

Qualitative research is an umbrella term for an array of attitudes towards and strategies for conducting inquiry that are aimed at discovering how human beings understand, experience, interpret, and produce the social world (Sandelowski 2004, p893) Qualitative researchers aim to gather an in-depth understanding of human behavior and the reasons that govern such behavior The qualitative method

investigates the why and how of decision making, not just what, where, when

Quantitative research

On the other hand, Aliga and Gunderson (2000) define the quantitative research as explaining phenomena by collecting numerical data that are analyzed using

on gathering numerical data and generalizing it across groups of people

Quantitative research deals in numbers, logic and the objective, focusing on logic, numbers, and unchanging static data and detailed, convergent reasoning rather than divergent reasoning

The data of this research was analyzed both quantitatively and qualitatively The results were presented in numbers and percentage and analyzed with the help of quantitative approach For the students’ questionnaires, they were collected and analyzed by means of descriptive statistics After that, they were processed in Excel application and then presented in the forms of tables, charts, or diagrams The qualitative data from classroom observations and interviews were analyzed both descriptively and interpretively and then transcribed to find out the teachers’

strategies in teaching speaking skills, the students’ response, their participation and

to confirm the students’ attitude toward the strategies of teaching speaking skills 2.5 Research procedure

The research was carried out following these steps:

- The researcher attended some speaking classes to get an overview of teaching and learning English speaking at the school

- The researcher got in touch with six teachers teaching English 11

and told them about the purpose of the interview The interview was

carried out the following day

- The researcher made contact with students of six classes 11D1, 11D2, 11D3, 11D4, 11D5 and 11D6 and told them about the purpose of questionnaires Then

270 copies of the questionnaires were delivered to students of the six classes The researcher took back the questionnaires the day after

- The researcher summed up the results from class observation, questionnaires and interviews

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS The main source of data is derived from the results from class observation, the results from the interview and the answers of the questionnaire

3.1 Results from class observation:

The class observation was conducted on some speaking lessons of six classes (11D1, 11D2, 11D3, 11D4, 11D5 and 11D6 in 2013 - 2014) at Van Xuan High School in Hoai Duc district in the suburb of Hanoi The general reality of teaching and learning English in general and speaking lessons in particular was discovered

The setting of the class:

The number of students in each class was ranging from 43 to 46; the classrooms were pretty small with 24 desks, which was difficult for the teachers to organize some activities requiring students’ movement

The teachers’ teaching

The teachers’ lesson plans had clear stages (warm - up, pre - speaking, while - speaking and post - speaking) There was no exact time for each stage in a speaking lesson; however, they spent most of the time for while – stage, which gave students enough time for practicing speaking skill

- Pre-speaking stage (Presentation stage):

The stage prepared students for getting them to think about the topic or situation before they spoke about it Pre-speaking tasks could be: discussion or brainstorming, where students collected all their ideas on the topic; vocabulary preparation, where the teacher pre-taught key vocabulary to aid comprehension; prediction, where students guessed what they might learn about This stage was kept short, about 10 minutes, but gave enough time for students to assimilate to what they were going to speak Warm-up activities might be included

in this stage

In this stage, the teachers’ role was to get students think about what they were going to speak before they spoke

- While-speaking stage (Practice stage):

This stage was the time for students to practice speaking The teachers did not do a lot

of things because students were working on the while tasks individually or in pairs,

in groups When working on the tasks, they might have had some difficulties; therefore, during this stage, the teacher monitored and assisted weaker students with their difficulties in completing while tasks instead Also, the teacher evaluated how well students had completed the tasks and whether they were ready to go to the next stage or not because of the limited time

The activities applied in this stage for the purpose of helping students practice speaking skill were a role play, a game or a discussion Depending on the lesson and the classroom condition, the teachers chose and set up the suitable activities for their students

- Post-speaking stage (Personalization stage):

After students had practiced speaking skill in the while stage, they often did an extension activity in this stage This helped students take the information or whatever they had produced in the previous stage and do something meaningful with it The post task was usually “an information transfer” - a production type of exercise where they responded to what they had just learnt They responded in the way that was related to what they had learnt to their own experience For instance, if they had talked about a world famous football player in the while stage, they might talk or write about their own favorite one

in this follow-up stage Writing was a very appropriate integrating skill for this stage If students had conducted a questionnaire on their friends in the while task, they might write up the results in a short paragraph, for example

The teachers’ method was collaborative work that all the activities were used with students’ cooperation In these periods, English was used most of the time, about

85 percent The teachers used English to teach vocabulary, give instructions in the activities and ask questions Whenever the teachers saw that students were not clear what they said, they explained in Vietnamese They monitored and involved

the students in the lessons so well Because of the limit of time, there was no integration between the topic with the prior or subsequent ones Some lessons were also not finished in time

The use of teaching strategies:

Some activities were in the textbook and some others were re-designed by the teachers For instance, in part B, speaking, of unit 13 (Hobbies), there were three activities However, the teachers re-designed them into four In the activity in task

3, students were delivered handouts with only some key words and their work was to speak based on the handouts As a result, they needed to look at the key words, make up sentences and speak them out One more activity was designed, task 4 In this task, students had to make similar dialogues about their own collections in pairs

or in groups of three students That was the reason why the activities used were very successful in terms of communication, and they were real communicative activities

In general, most of the activities used by the teachers of English at Van Xuan High school were called communicative activities as they gave students both a desire

to communicate with the target language and a purpose which involved them in a varied use of language They had real purposes: to find information, to break down barriers, to talk about oneself, and to learn about the culture The students participated in the activities as real people and took responsibility for their learning

The students’ participation

Students were pretty responsive; they responded to the teacher’s questions and were willing to participate in the activities However, they spoke not loud enough, which made the classroom atmosphere not very ebullient (only in the warm-up activity) The classroom was noisy instead when others usually talked something outside the lesson in Vietnamese

3.2 Result from teacher’s interview

Question 1: What do you think about the speaking lesson in the text book?

The surveyed teachers shared answers to question 1 They all supposed that the English textbook 11 was good but difficult The topics in the text book were said to

be interesting However there was evidence that those topics were also challenging and not really appropriate for high school students

Question 2: How much time do you spend designing a speaking lesson?

The teachers had different opinions to the second question, but they all agreed that the time spent planning a speaking lesson depended on each speaking lesson To motivate students to speak more, English teachers usually used other activities beside the tasks available in the textbook To achieve the best result of a speaking lesson, the activities inside and outside the textbook were varied so as to find which ones were suitable for their students Before applying those activities, it was important to choose the material relevant to the activities in the text book For all the reasons above, it took one hour or even 2 hours for English teacher to design a speaking lesson

Question 3: What difficulties do you encounter most when holding a speaking

lesson?

All the information obtained from question 3 is mentioned in table 3.2a which represents the difficulties the teachers at Van Xuan high school faced in English speaking lessons There is a complaint that a 45 minute-lesson is too short and difficult for teachers and students to solve all the tasks in the textbook and practice English through activities 100% teachers admitted that learners’ reluctance post a great negative impact on the effectiveness of a speaking lesson Students were not willing to raise their voice, which led to a fact that learners unevenly participated in class activities The two huge facts above were facing English speaking teachers at Van Xuan high school 83% teachers revealed that learners’ lack of motivation was

a trouble It was also emphasized that it was complicated to control a large-sized class The class which had different learning abilities of students was not easy to use the same methods and strategies to teach The students’ habit of using mother tongue in English speaking class also set obstacles to teachers

Question no.4: What are your solutions to these difficulties?

Mixed-ability class

Allocate easy questions to the less able and less confident learners and more to difficult ones the more able

Use interesting authentic materials (songs, films with subtitles, games, …)

Show your confidence and experience in teaching in the communicative way

The language used in the classroom must be of the learners’ language level

Table 3.2b: Teacher’s solutions to the problems

Question 5+6:

IG 3 50% Sometimes used because it is a bit difficult for the

less able learners to do

ST 1 17% Sometimes used because it is time consuming to

prepare and practice at class

Q & A

Exchanges

4 67% Always used because learners are familiar with it and

easy to prepare

PD 2 34% Sometimes used because it is interesting but time-

consuming and not very profitable

RP 2 34% Sometimes used because it is a demanding task Games 5 83% Sometimes used because it is interesting but

sometimes time-consuming Interview/

CS

3 50% Often/sometimes used because it makes students

more confident Discussion 3 50% Sometimes/often used because it is a bit difficult for

the less able learners but it is very interesting

PS in

groups

3 50% Often used because it is quite interesting and provide

learners with good opportunities to express their own opinions but sometimes learners lack of vocabulary

of English and social knowledge Table 3.2c: Teacher’s reasons for using speaking techniques and activities

Question 7: What are the outcomes that you achieved?

Because the teachers at Van Xuan high school applied different techniques in teaching speaking skills, they attained various results from their students It is a truth that those techniques have helped students practice speaking effectively so that they can improve their public speaking skill Students not only develop their language skills but also the skills of working as a group member From making use

of given chances to speak in front of the whole class, students become more confident in any speaking situation In addition, working in a group and with the

help of other members, critical thinking is inevitable in the co-operative atmosphere

Question 8: What strategies do you find the most effective? Why?

Most of English questioned teachers at Van Xuan high school agreed that using communicative activities in speaking lesson is the most effective teaching method They admitted that they often vary speaking activities including communicative ones such as role play, games, interview, discussion, pair or group work They reason that those activities help the students to practice speaking effectively and speak out easily One important key is that communicative activities are useful in creating a co-operative atmosphere

3.3 Result from students’ questionnaires

 Students’ reasons for learning English

It is important that students should clarify their motivation before they start studying a subject Therefore, right from the very beginning of student’s questionnaires, students made great effort to answer the question why they learn English From the result of the statistics, the major of students (70%) consider English a compulsory subject to study Only 30% of participants thought they learn English because of their self-interest 60% of students thought that English will help them with better job opportunities in the future while others needed English for entertainment (40%) As an international language, English was said by a half of respondents to improve social culture and language knowledge

 Student’s opinions on speaking topics in the textbooks

The figure 3.3.1 gave information about student’s evaluation to the speaking topics

in the textbooks Over half of students (55%) found those topics suitable to study, and a large number of participants said the topics interest them However, the speaking topics are said to be difficult to follow by 45% students Only a small number of respondents felt bored to those topics In general, from the result, English speaking topics are suitable for students in speaking lessons

 Frequency of student’s speaking participation

Question 3 reflects how frequent students participate in speaking lessons Only 10.1 % of students are willing to take part in speaking activities, and the same number (10.9%) admitted that they never joined in speaking Nearly a half of participants said they sometimes participated in speaking activities while 30% of them were frequent speaking participants From the figure, it is clear that there are few students who are willing to speaking participation

 Student’s opinions on the frequency of teacher’s English speaking

We can see from the Figure 3.3.3 that English was used frequently by the teacher in speaking lessons Most of students revealed that their teachers always speak English Only 25% of participants said English are often used in speaking classes Especially, there is no situation that students are never taught in English

 Student’s preparation time for speaking lesson

In all 270students who are asked if they spent time on preparing a speaking lesson

at home, 78% of them did and 22 % did not As a result, there are a large number of student who had speaking preparation before attending a speaking lesson

 Frequency of student’s English speaking

To find out whether students actively participate in speaking English or not, Figure 4.1.2d illustrated that the level of participation is close to speaking time According

to the figure, only 9% of the students are active participants who talked more than 75% of a speaking lesson It is also the same number of students who have a level

of participation less than 25% To the level from25% to 50% of a speaking lesson, 50% of students reported that they attainted that level of participation About over 50% of a speaking lesson, it made up 32% of respondents From the figure above, students are quite active in English talking time

 Student’ attitudes towards teacher’s employed activities of teaching English speaking

In speaking lessons, various activities are employed to draw student’s learning motivation The table 3.3a and 3.3b demonstrated different techniques and activities

used in Van Xuan high school Despite the fact that those activities are widely applied, the activities are not suitable for all students Information gap raises most

of student’s interest (88.8%) Students also are strongly motivated by games in which they can play their role in speaking activities When teacher uses picture description technique, students have more speaking opportunities as well as vocabulary practice In addition, there are a large number of students who find working in a group an effective way to develop speaking skills In a group or pair work, besides improving speaking skills, students learn how to interact and cooperate with other members For students who are not willing to make speaking mistakes, interview, discussion or stories telling are not their interest

 Student’s opinion about the outside topics and activities used by teacher

It is evidenced form the student’s questionnaire that English teacher at Van Xuan high school tried to provide students with other speaking topics outside the textbook 67% of the questioned students revealed their recognition while the rest of them (33%) did not do so

 Student’s expectation from teacher

The finding of question 10 in the student’s questionnaire aims at the student’s expectation from their teachers When learners make mistakes in speaking class, a major of student said that the teachers should wait until they finish, point out the mistakes and correct not only for only mistake maker but also for the whole class (67%) There is no doubt that correcting mistakes in the learning process is extremely important to student’s improvement, especially speaking skills For that reason, correcting mistakes is considered a vital part in speaking lessons

 Factors affecting Van Xuan students’ participating English lessons

As we can see from the table 3.3e, there are many factors cause difficulties to students’ language learning, especially speaking skills The number of students who always have few speaking opportunities is the smallest percentage (7.8%) Lack of ideas, grammar structures and pronunciation competence is a problem to 9% of the students Being afraid of making mistakes is a factor of difficulty in speaking

(13.1%) 18% of participants say that they have a problem of speaking because they are short of ideas and social knowledge In addition, students who usually face difficulties in speaking tasks express sayings that they are not confident in expression skills (20%) The obstacle that most prevents students from talking is personal shyness to speak in front of the whole class (22%) From the results of the table 4, is is apparent that Van Xuan high school students are evaluated to be rich in vocabularies, grammar structures and good at pronunciation competence Their weakness is lack of confidence, shyness and fear of making mistakes Some statements released to reason for the situation of Van Xuan students are large-sized classes It is difficult for all students to have many speaking opportunities As a result, students are not highly motivated to speak

 Student’s progress after applied speaking teacher strategies

Figure 3.3.5 (question 11) reveals that up to 50% of respondents’ learning situations are relatively changed after being taught by speaking strategies of their English teachers The percentage of the students who are strongly affected is 30% 13% of participants said those speaking teaching strategies have a slight impact on their speaking situation, and 7% never experience any changes in their learning situation

In general, the speaking strategies used by Van Xuan’s English teachers have a positive effect on students’ English speaking situation

 Student’s achievements from speaking teaching strategies

Question 13 asks students achievements they get from speaking lessons in which speaking teaching strategies are used From the table 5, there are many options for students to choose The statistics show that most students attain skill of working in a group (62%) Group work is not only suitable for teacher’s plans but also for student’s working ability Problem solving and confidence in any speaking situations are equally chosen by students (40%) In addition, there are a large number of students responded that they have positive changes in critical thinking, language skills and public speaking

To sum up, it is obvious that speaking teaching strategies has been helpful for student with many kinds of skills Beside language and academic knowledge including grammar structure and vocabularies, many other soft skills have been achieved To language skills, they help students improve their own background knowledge About soft skills like public speaking and problem solving skills, students are confident in any speaking situations

 Student’s suggestions to improve English speaking skills

Do you have any suggestions for the teacher and yourself to improve English speaking skills?

Students have made great effort to seek for answers to the last question in the student’s questionnaire There are some helpful and reasonable solutions given To teacher, they are expected to provide students with more speaking opportunities and talking time for speaking skill Moreover, speaking section should be included in the test, so that students’ speaking ability can be reflected and test can also be motivation for them to pay more attention to speaking About speaking lessons, many students express their agreements that more interesting speaking lessons are hoped to develop students’ communicative efficiency As for students who are learning English as a second language, it is crucial for their improvements that they work harder and spend more time at home practicing speaking

Chapter 4: FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

4.1 FINDINGS:

From the data analysis of class observation, interview and questionnaire for both teachers and students at Van Xuan High School in the previous chapter, the major findings drawn out may be as followed:

● The students and teachers’ difficulties in speaking lessons

● The teachers’ teaching strategies used in speaking lessons

● The outcomes from the teachers’ teaching strategies used in speaking lessons

● The students’ expectations towards their teachers

4.1.1.The students and teachers’ difficulties in speaking lessons

Lack of motivation

Motivation is important for the success of the second language learning and plays an important role in learning any language skills especially speaking Motivation is expressed through students’ diligence and participation in the lessons Nevertheless, not many students at Van Xuan High School were willing to speak in speaking lessons because of the following reasons The first reason was that most of them still concentrated much on grammar to do grammatical exercises because speaking skill has not been used in the exams at school and the university entrance examination The second reason was that quiet students were not paid enough attention by their teachers And after having learned for a period of time these students could not see any progress in their learning so they felt unmotivated Finally, boredom in teaching also made students unmotivated

Only 30% of the participants studied English because they found it interesting 70%

of them considered English as a compulsory subject in the curriculum They had to take written examinations so they did not care about spoken language

Lack of confidence

It can be realized from the statistical results that students’ lack of confidence is another main factor affecting students to get involved in speaking lessons Many students confessed that they felt shy and not willing to speak in speaking lessons