some ways to improve speaking skills of grade 10 students at nguyen huu canh high school

Mã số: ...SOME WAYS TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILLS OF GRADE 10 STUDENTS AT NGUYEN HUU CANH HIGH SCHOOL Người thực hiện: Nguyễn Thị Xuân Mai Lĩnh vực nghiên cứu: Mô hình Đĩa CD DVD Phim

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SOME WAYS TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILLS OF GRADE 10 STUDENTS AT NGUYEN

HUU CANH HIGH SCHOOL

Người thực hiện: Nguyễn Thị Xuân

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SOME WAYS TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILLS OF GRADE 10 STUDENTS AT NGUYEN

HUU CANH HIGH SCHOOL

Người thực hiện: Nguyễn Thị Xuân

Mai Lĩnh vực nghiên cứu:

5 Some ways to improve speaking skills of grade 10 students at 9

Nguyen Huu Canh high school

7 Some illustrations of the ways to help students improve their 15

speaking skills

THÔNG TIN CHUNG VỀ SÁNG KIẾN

1 Tên sáng kiến: Some ways to improve speaking skills of grade 10 students at Nguyen Huu Canh high school

2 Lĩnh vực áp dụng sáng kiến: phương pháp giảng dạy bộ môn

3 Tác giả:

- Họ và tên: Nguyễn Thị Xuân Mai Nam (nữ): Nữ

- Trình độ chuyên môn: thạc sĩ giảng dạy

- Chức vụ, đơn vị công tác: giáo viên trường THPT Nguyễn Hữu Cảnh

- Điện thoại: 0918806338 Email: xuanmai@nhc.edu.vn

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SOME WAYS TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILLS OF GRADE 10 STUDENTS AT NGUYEN HUU CANH HIGH SCHOOL 1

Introduction

In the world of integration, English fluency plays an integral part ofcommunication as well as any other aspects of life Speaking English wellmay help one feel more confident Confidence is the key to every success.Therefore, teaching and learning English should be combined effectively sothat students can get active roles in learning process The more confident theyget, the better they can communicate

The goal of teaching speaking is to improve students’ communicationskills in order that they can express themselves and learn how to use thelanguage Nowadays, many teachers agree that students should learn to speakEnglish by interacting with others Therefore, English teachers should becreative in developing their teaching process to create good atmosphere wherestudents have real-life communication By using this method, teachers helpstudents have the opportunity of communicating with each other in the targetlanguage Moreover, teachers should apply appropriate methods andtechniques of teaching speaking to make the English lessons more exciting forstudents to develop their speaking skills

2 Literature review

Definition of Speaking

Speaking is considered to be one of the four skills that give speakersthe ability to communicate effectively Speaking skills allow the speaker toexpress his ideas in a passionate and convincing manner In addition, speakingskills help to make sure that one will not be misunderstood by those that arelistening

In the opinion of Everson (2009), speaking is the crucial skill oflanguage in the sense that it enables individuals to communicate through theuse of verbal codes or words that are understood by both sender and the

recipient Cohen (1996) stated that speech contains its own skills, structures,and conventions different from written language Learning to speak Englishthrough interaction with each other is not an easy task because it is Shumin’s(2002) contention that students require much more than knowing grammaticaland semantic rules Through interaction, especially in speaking activities,students get chances to develop their own communication and express whatthey gain rather than learning the structures of a language Furthermore, inNunan’s (2011) view, speaking consists of producing systematic verbalutterances to convey meaning Also, according to Kaikala (2012) speaking isboth a factor of language learning and teaching achievement and an importantskill in human interaction In short, there are many of different concepts ofspeaking, i.e speaking as an action, a process and a skill As English isuniversally used as a means of communication, English speaking skills should

be developed along with the other skills in order that these integrated skillswill enhance communication competence

The importance of speaking skill

It is universally accepted that language is a tool for communication.When we communicate with others, we want to express our ideas, and toknow others’ ideas as well Although the four language skills of listening,speaking, reading and writing are all well connected, Zaremba (2006) claimsthat speaking seems to be the most important skill required forcommunication of all the four macro English skills Speaking is “the process

of building and sharing meaning through the use of verbal and non-verbalsymbols, in a variety of contexts” (Chaney & Burk, 1998, p 13) According

to Brown (1994); Burns & Joyce (1997), speaking is an interactive process ofconstructing meaning that involves producing and receiving and processinginformation Its form and meaning are relying on the context where ithappens, including the participants themselves, their combined experiences,the physical environment, and the purposes for speaking In the opinion of

Cohen (1996) speaking contains its own skills, structures, and conventionsdifferent from written language Also, Kaikala (2012) noted that speaking isboth a factor of language learning and teaching achievement and an importantskill in human interaction On the whole, proficiency in speaking skillsprovides learners with many benefits such as becoming a successful, effectivecommunicator We are living in a global community in which languages andcultures mix together Therefore, it is very useful for those that are good atspeaking skills to express themselves.

3 Methodology: Research context

Nguyen Huu Canh high school is the place where I conducted andcollected all the data of the research This school is located in Bien Hoa city.Most of the students come from working - class families; therefore, theyrarely have chances to study English at Foreign Language Centres or extraclasses They only study English at school

Participants

The subjects involved in the research include 40 grade 10 students agedfrom 15 to 16 from Nguyen Huu Canh high school The class chosen for myinvestigation is 10A1 They are my students, so it was convenient for me toask them to complete the questionnaires in class

Research instruments

At the beginning of the school year, in every speaking lesson theclassroom atmosphere tended to be deadly dull Most of my students were soafraid of taking turns speaking English that they did not look at me I tried mybest; however they seemed not to cooperate with me I wondered how I made

my students get involved in my English speaking lessons

In this school year students were asked to do three speaking tests Thefirst test was after Unit 1 to test students on speaking skills The second testwas in the final first term test (there were 4 parts and speaking skills

accounted for 20% of the total) to check whether my students made progress.The third speaking test was in the middle of the second term in order to come

to the conclusion on how much my students made progress

After students did the first speaking test I realized their speaking skillswere not good enough Therefore, my students were asked to complete thefirst questionnaire The aims of this questionnaire were to understand theproblems students had in learning speaking skills After that, I conducted thisresearch to find some ways to help my students improve their speaking skills.Another questionnaire was given to students after I finished my research tofind out more about the results of my application for improving students’speaking skills and how successful I was The time between twoquestionnaires was six months

Furthermore, when I was teaching, I often made observations aboutstudents’ attitudes in class From that I could adjust my ways of teaching tohelp them develop their necessary skills more

4 Some problems grade 10 students have before making the research

By observing students while teaching and analyzing the firstquestionnaire, I realize that my students have some of the following problems:

- The factors make them reluctant to speak English in class: + Fear of

mistakes and derision

+ Low proficiency in English

+ Not being accustomed to speaking in

class + Teacher’s uneven allocation of turns

+ Teacher’s intolerance of silence

- The factors that prevent their speaking English process: + Being unable to find words and structures

+ Being unable to find ideas

5 Some ways to improve speaking skills of grade 10 students at Nguyen Huu Canh high school

From these problems above and the results of question 5 in the firstquestionnaire I always did my best to find some ways so that I can help mystudents improve their speaking skills

No one can deny the fact that most of the foreign language learners try

to learn English because it serves the purpose of international communication.Obviously, perfect communication is not possible for anyone without using alanguage As speaking skills play a dominant role in communication, there aresome key principles that are important for developing speaking skills

Providing good input

Input is something that students receive from teachers Input is whatstudents hear, see and perceive when teachers teach Teachers should providegood input to prepare students with their storage of language information.Teachers can create an environment where there are many sources of input.These sources may include materials from tapes, videos, English TVprograms, other English speakers and teachers can also be the rich sources ofinput In addition, good input requires elements of quality Among good input,comprehensible input is very necessary It is teachers’ input that students canunderstand with great ease owing to its high quality as well as relevance.Comprehensible input helps students acquire language naturally rather thanlearn it consciously (Krashen, 1985), so teachers should be sensitive andskillful in selecting input materials for students and input materials should besuitable for students’ developmental process

Creating interactive process

After providing good input, teachers should provide interactive processfor students to communicate and control their production In interactiveprocess students are motivated as teachers create an atmosphere of attentionand participation; therefore, lessons that help students enrich their vocabulary

and use their knowledge in situations resembling real life become moreinteresting The teachers’ role is not limited as a controller, instead we shouldcommunicate with them In teacher-student communication, the two-wayinteraction such as teacher-student and student-student is set up in whichstudents regulate their speech to achieve the end, e.g communication itself.Apart from being communicator, teachers should also select supportive andmotivating styles in order that learners can develop different language andcommunication skills as well as the ability to search for information.

Tolerance of silence

There are different kinds of levels of students in class; therefore, inspeaking class, there is, usually silence For silence, there are twointerpretations One is the long silence; the other is the short silence The longsilence often refers to the beginners or slow, weak students It takes long timefor them to output their speech According to Baurain (2011) silence means amultifaceted, often determined border between thoughts and speech orbetween thoughts and words Silence might reflect that thoughts cannot bespoken, or truths seem to be inexpressible Sometimes, students are eager tospeak but they do not know how to speak it However, some teachers cannottolerate this silence The speedy expectation of teachers may kill students’enthusiasm and confidence The short silence usually occurs between orwithin activities in the classroom Some teachers do not like this silence andtry to fill in the time by talking too much This talking may affect negativelyboth input and interaction Teachers should be tolerant of silence Reda (2012)suggested that teachers should encourage students to engage more in speakingclass by considering what they like and what they need in order to prepareinteresting material In most situations, teachers are expected to createcomfortable atmosphere

Learning by doing

Learning by doing encourages students to experience the language,which is a process of acquisition leading to high level of proficiency Highlevel of proficiency requires much practice Much practice can boost students’confidence in their own English language abilities Teachers shouldencourage students to speak, to practise, and to use English to communicate inclass and also out of class as much as possible The more they practise, themore progress they make Obviously, learning by doing can also increasemotivation of students as well as desire to learn More importantly, studentscan develop their practical language skills which can be applied in their dailylives

From controlled to automatic

There are two ways to improve students’ oral production One is topractise speaking based on structure This way focuses on mastery ofgrammatical structures rather than on mastery of vocabulary It can makestudents have a sense of control over the language and they can communicate;however, it is more suitable for low- level students The other kind of activitythat promotes speaking is topic or function based This way helps studentshave more opportunities to express their thoughts, ideas, or even arguments.Whether teachers adopt structure focused or function or topic focusedactivities depends on students’ level

There are two kinds of speaking activities One is factual informationexchange; the other is personal idea exchange By factual informationexchange, students can exchange information based on facts, do not have toexpress their own opinion They just need to share information or completethe missing information Such activity is called information-gap exchange.This activity can keep students talking as they have information to say Theother activity expressing their own ideas can be productive or non-productive

If students are interested in the topic or have a lot of things to say, they can

fill the classroom with their talking voices, but the topic is not what they feelinterested in or what they do not have a lot to say, silence will occur.

Therefore, teachers should design activities having a sense of controlfor students and also prepare them for further speaking development in orderthat they can move from controlled activities to automatic production inspeaking

Dealing with students’ errors

In speaking class, most of the students surely make mistakes in theirspeaking practice How teachers deal with students’ mistakes and errors isvery important to individual learner If teachers correct theirs too much or toofrequently, we may kill students’ enthusiasm or willingness to continuespeaking or even destroy the flow of the class If we do not correct at all,some of the mistakes can become unchanging Therefore, we should know thenature of what kinds of mistakes of students so that we can deal with theirmistakes or errors scientifically Deep understanding or error analysis canhelp teachers operate and manage speaking periods better

From the start of every activity, teachers should be clear of the aims and make sure that students can be aware of what teachers expect from them The first port of call when correcting should be students themselves Students can usually correct themselves as they realize they have made a mistake Teachers should give students a chance and time so that they can correct themselves Just by raising eyebrows or repeating the mistake, teachers can help students know what we mean and go back to correct error themselves Students can also correct one another Peer correction creates a positive class atmosphere because students realize teachers are not the only source of error correction and they can also learn a lot from one another In addition, teacherscan get students to work in groups and have them correct each others

Although it is possible, there are some problems with this way and teachers

need to make sure of class as well as monitor them closely while it ishappening.

These principles can be applied in teaching speaking flexibly The mostimportant thing is that teachers can help students practise speaking as much aspossible

6 Implementation

I have been teaching English for 21 years My school is in Bien Hoacity Most of students come from working - class families, so they rarely haveconditions to study English at Foreign Language Centres or extra classes.They only study English at school Among four skills, my students are oftenafraid of speaking skills To make my speaking periods successful I have triedmany ways As I want to help my students follow my lesson easily, I givethem input which refers to what information they must have in the lesson sothat they may reach the objective and how they get this information Myinstructions should be brief, easy to understand and clear so that all studentsknow what they have to do These help attract students’ commitment to thelesson and avoid confusion

After all my students understand what to do, I reduce my speaking time

in class while increasing student speaking time I observe my students whilethey are practising At that time I circulate around classroom to ensure that

my students are on right track and see whether they need my help while theyare working in pairs or groups By this way I want my students have moretime to practise speaking and I can find ways to help slow or weak students

One of the problems that often prevent speaking English process ofstudents is shortage of vocabulary Most of the students do not spend timelearning vocabulary, so their vocabulary is very limited When speaking theyoften get stuck or cannot finish the sentences they want to speak One simpleway is that before teaching speaking I often give students vocabulary that arerelating to the topic Another way is that in pre-speaking stage I use “mind

map” to give students the topic so that they can work in groups to find out asmany words relating to topic as possible By this way I want to help mystudents enrich their vocabulary and they can memorize new words moreeasily.

Some of my students feel very shy to speak because they do not acquirethe target language They do not even interact with other students or keepsilent when they are asked to speak English all the time Therefore I try tocreate a comfortable atmosphere in the classroom where students are notafraid of speaking and enjoy communicating with me I try to let them feelrelaxed and comfortable in English periods There is a close relationshipbetween my students and me as we are enthusiastic about learning andrespectful of one another Both strong and weak students are most motivated

to learn when they feel comfortable and relaxed According to Nunan (2011)teachers should pay attention to many problems in classroom I providemaximum opportunities for students to speak English by providing a richenvironment containing collaborative work, materials and tasks that aresuitable for my students’ levels I try to involve each student in everyspeaking activity by varying speaking activities Some activities that can bedone to promote speaking are: discussions, role play, simulations, interviews,story completion, brainstorming, pair work, group work, etc

Most of students are often worried about making mistakes This makesthem feel unconfident when speaking English, especially some weak students.The teachers should not correct very often the students’ mistakes while theyare speaking (Kayi, 2006) When my students are speaking I don’t interruptthem to correct their mistakes, I take notes in my paper After my studentsfinish speaking I correct mistakes for all class without mentioning whosemistakes By this way every student doesn’t worry about their mistakes, theycan improve themselves from other mistakes

Besides, while teaching I often ask eliciting questions such as “What doyou mean?” “How did you reach that conclusion?” to prompt students tospeak more Also, I often provide helpful feedback like “your presentationwas really great It was a good job” By this way, I can encourage my students

to speak more

7 Some illustrations of the ways to help students improve their speaking skills

In this part, two illustrations are given to make everything more clearly

In Unit 3: People’s background - Lesson B: Speaking

1 Activity 1: “Word square”

Find 9 words about Marie Curie

input I provide for students, the better they can talk about Marie Curie’s background in activity 2.

In Unit 10: Conservation - Lesson B: Speaking

1 Activity 1: Look at the pictures and tell the differences between a

traditional zoo and a new kind of zoo.

In this activity, I would like my students to understand little by littlehow a traditional zoo and new kind of zoo are different by describing twopictures If my students get stuck I can help them by asking some questionssuch as:

+ In traditional zoo where is the tiger kept?

+ In new kind of zoo is the tiger kept in a cage?

By providing my students with good input, I can help my studentsprepare more carefully so that in Activity 2 they can discuss the questionsabout the features of the zoo of the new kind At the end of the lesson inActivity 3 students can share their ideas about which kind of zoo they choosefor animals and explain why they choose it.

In every lesson, I always encourage my students to make progress Ioften give them my compliments such as: “you’re really working hard today”,

“you are very good at that”, “not bad”, “I knew you could do it”, “keepworking on it You’re improving”, “that’s not half bad”, “you outdid yourselftoday”, etc By doing so I can help my students feel relaxed in speakingperiods and they are not afraid of making mistakes

8 Findings and discussions

The analysis was analyzed to get information about the problemsstudents have in learning speaking skills and then I can find the ways to helpthem improve speaking skills

As can be seen in Appendix C - Questionnaire results (page 26) thenumber of students that speak English in English class time is rather small.The reason for that is most of the students feel reluctant to speak English inclass Moreover, in this questionnaire results it can be found that there aremany factors making students reluctant to speaking English such as not beingaccustomed to speaking English in class (90 %), fearing of mistakes andderision (80 %), their low proficiency in English (72,5 %), and teacher’suneven allocation of turns (67,5 %) In addition, being unable to find wordsand structures (92,5 %) and being unable to find ideas (87,5 %) often preventstudents’ speaking English process Even more importantly, thanks to thisquestionnaire I could find what my students want me to do in speaking period

to help them speaking English more Most surprisingly, all of them want me

to give simple and clear instructions (100 %) Furthermore, they’d like me togive them various materials (95 %), create interactive process (92,5 %), pick