Đánh giá sự phù hợp của việc áp dụng phần mềm ‘ learn to speak engl

Universities are also exploitingusing many types of software to help develop students‟ English competence.Therefore, the research is aimed at evaluating the appropriateness of the softwa

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

UNIVERSITY OF BUSINESS AND

TECHNOLOGY

Đánh giá sự phù hợp của việc áp dụng phần mềm „ Learn to Speak English‟ trong việc dạy kĩ năng nói cho sinh viên năm thứ nhất không chuyên Tiếng

Anh của trường Đại Học Kinh Doanh và Công Nghệ Hà Nội

M.A MINOR THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 601410

Hanoi – 2013

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

UNIVERSITY OF BUSINESS AND

TECHNOLOGY

Đánh giá sự phù hợp của việc áp dụng phần mềm „ Learn to Speak English‟ trong việc dạy kĩ năng nói cho sinh viên năm thứ nhất không chuyên Tiếng

Anh của trường Đại Học Kinh Doanh và Công Nghệ Hà Nội

M.A MINOR THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 601410

Supervisor: Đỗ Tuấn Minh, Dr.

Hanoi-2013

I hereby state that I, Phung Thi Ngoc Ha, K20D, being a candidate for the degree ofMaster of Arts (TEFL) accept the requirements of the University relating to theretention and use of Master‟s Thesis deposited in the library

In terms of these conditions, I worked on the Thesis on my own and used thesources of information listed in the references only

Signature Hanoi, October 2013

Phung Thi Ngoc Ha

Firstly and foremost, I would like to express my special words of thanks to my

supervisor, Mr Đỗ Tuấn Minh , Dr for his constant encouragement, precious

advice and especially for his valuable correction throughout this study There is nodoubt that without his help, this thesis would be impossible to be accomplished

I also wish to express my deep gratitude to all teachers from Faculty of PostGraduate Studies giving lectures and advice that are of great help for me tocomplete this study

I am very grateful to all the teachers of English Division III and all of the students

of three classes at Hanoi University of Business and Technology for theirenthusiastic participation in the survey questionnaire and interview Without theirhelp, this thesis would not be able to be completed

My thanks go to many writers whose important ideas and notions are exploited anddeveloped in the study

Finally, I would like to send my deep gratitude to my family and all of my closefriends who are always by my side to take care of and support me in the process ofdoing this thesis

With the development of Information and Technology Communication (ITC),computer- Assisted Instruction (CAI) has been brought into the classroom CAI is akind of instruction that exploits computer software to assist teachers to teachinformation or skills related to a particular topic, and students can interact directlywith lessons programmed into the computer system Universities are also exploitingusing many types of software to help develop students‟ English competence.Therefore, the research is aimed at evaluating the appropriateness of the software,known as “Learn to Speak English” (LTSE) in teaching English speaking skills as asupplementary material at Hanoi University of Business and Technology And thengive some suggestions for adaptation this software to bring the effectiveness onteaching and studying English speaking From the result and discussion of thisstudy, it can be concluded that this LTSE software is suitable as a supportinglearning aid for students to improve their English speaking skills Studentsperceived this courseware as user-friendly and capable for enhancing the learning ofthe subject However, they also hope for further improvements of the courseware

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page PART I: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study……… 1

2 Aims of the study………1

3 Research questions……… 2

4 Significance of the study ……… 2

5 Scope of the study ……… 2

6 Design of the study……….…… 3

PART II: DEVELOPMENT Chapter I: Literature Review……… 5

1 Software in Language Teaching and Learning……….…… …5

1.1 Definition of software……….………… 6

1.2 Roles of teaching and learning software in general English courses.….…… 6

2 Speaking Skill……….………8

2.1 Definition of Speaking……….……….…8

2.2 Characteristics of Speaking……….……… 9

2.3 Teaching and Learning Speaking Skills with Software…….……….10

3 Software Evaluation……… ……… 11

3.1 Reasons for Software Evaluation………11

3.2 Types of Software Evaluation……….……….…… 12

3.3 Software Evaluation Framework ……….……… 13

3.3.1 Presentation and Organization of the Content……… 15

3.3.2 Evaluation of Learning ……… 18

4 Learn To Speak English Deluxe 10 software……….19

4.1 Introduction of Learn To Speak English Deluxe 10 (LTSE) software… 19

4.2 Reasons to Choose Learn to Speak English………20

4.3 Learn To Speak English Deluxe 10‟s content……… 21

Chapter II: Research Methods………25

1 The context………25

1.1 Description of the LTSE course and its objectives at HUBT……….……….25

1.2 Description of the students at HUBT……… 26

1.3 Description of English teachers at HUBT……… 26

2 The Research Methods……….27

2.1 Research methodology ……… 27

2.2 The data collection methods ……… 27

2.3 Data analysis procedure……… ……… 28

Chapter III: Results and Discussion……… 29

1 Results of general information……… 29

2 Results of how students learn LTSE at HUBT……….30

3 Results of the LTSE’s content evaluation……….33

4 Results of presentation and organization of LTSE’s content……….33

4.1 Pedagogical factors………32

4.2 Interface design factor ……… ………34

5 Results of Learning and Preference toward the use of LTSE Software 39

6 Recommendations for Courseware Improvements……….40

7 Summary of Major Findings……… 42

PART III: CONCULSION 1 Conclusion ……… …45

2 Implications of the Findings……… …46

3 Limitations of the Study……….……47

4 Suggestions for Further Research……….………48 REFERENCES

APPENDICES

Appendix 1: LTSE‟s Vocabulary Part

Appendix 2: LTSE‟s Communication Stories

Appendix 3: LTSE‟s Grammatical Point

Appendix 4: LTSE‟s Exercises

Appendix 5: LTSE‟s Conversation Part

Appendix 6: Questionnaire for Students

Appendix 7: Interview Questions for Teachers

Appendix 8: Transcription for the semi-structured group interview with teacher.

Hanoi University of Business and Technology

“Learn to Speak English”

Information and Communication TechnologyComputer- Assisted Instruction

Computer-Assisted Language LearningComputer -Assisted Learning Material

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Results of the LTSE‟s Content Evaluation Table 2: Results of Pedagogical factors of LTSE‟s content Table 3: Results of Interactivity of LTSE‟s content Table 4: Results of Navigation of LTSE‟s content Table 5: Results of Feedback of LTSE‟s content

Table 6: Results of Feedback of LTSE‟s content

Table 7: Results of Learning Evaluation

PART 1: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

For decades, English was taught in classrooms in which the teacher-centeredmethod was applied The teacher gave information, while students gainedknowledge passively However, advanced technology has influenced on theeducational method in classroom in which computer-based technology is mainlyused to reinforce instruction and put the focus on the students in learning process

By incorporating technology in the classroom, the students can be beneficial in anumber of ways: assisting students‟ understanding of concepts, enhancing students‟motivation in exploring, investigating, conjecturing, creating and discoveringprinciples, and making generalization and connections; engaging studentsinvolvement in the learning process and motivating them (Wertherimer, 1990).The advent of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has brought theconcept of Computer- Assisted Instruction (CAI) into the classroom CAI is a kind

of instruction that exploits computer software to assist teachers to teach information

or skills related to a particular topic, and students can interact directly with lessonsprogrammed into the computer system (Roblyer, 2004) There are many types ofsoftware that teachers can use to develop their own teaching software

Studies demonstrate that the Learn To Speak English software can be to helpimprove students‟ achievement in English in general and speaking skills inparticular hence, to eradicate much English anxiety and fear of using computersoftware and speaking English

2 Aims of the study

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the appropriateness of the software, known

as “Learn to Speak English” (LTSE) in teaching speaking skills as a supplementarymaterial at Hanoi University of Business and Technology (HUBT) in order to findout conclusions and suggestions for using LTSE in the future The objective is theevaluation of the software by the students and that of the teachers on its strength andweakness of the software

3 Research questions

All the above aims are carried out by answering the following research questions:

1 How do Ss learn speaking English with LTSE?

2 How do teachers teach speaking with LTSE?

3 To what extent does LTSE meet the needs of teachers and Ss in teaching and learning speaking?

4 Significance of the study

In evaluating the appropriateness of LTSE for 1st year non-English major students

in learning speaking English and suggesting some solutions, it is hoped that theresult of the study will somehow be used as reference to help students to learnspeaking skills better with this software in the next semesters In addition, thefindings of the study will be a great use not only to the researcher but also to theteachers who are teaching LTSE software to students at HUBT Furthermore, thefindings of the thesis will form a foundation toward adapting effectively thesoftware which is currently used for the students at HUBT

5 Scope of the study

Firstly, although HUBT only apply to teach LTSE for students in the first year inorder to improve their English in communication skills (Listening, Speaking,Reading and Writing), it is believed that LTSE can be continuously used as areference resource for students after this course Due to the limitation of time andthe narrow scale, the study only focuses on evaluating the strength and weakness ofLTSE software in teaching English speaking skills for the 1st year non-Englishmajor students at HUBT from the perspectives of students and teachers Then, thisstudy will also give out some suggested solutions generated from the teachers in theinterview for students to overcome those difficulties and improve their speakingskills

Secondly, in software evaluation, there have been a great number of criteria thatshould be taken into consideration such as: the content, the organization andpresentation, the design factors, the pedagogical parameter, and so on In this study,

the researcher focuses on the following criteria: content, presentation and

organization of the content, and students‟ learning

6 Design of the study

There are three main parts in this thesis: introduction, development and conclusion

The introduction provides the rationale, the aims, the scope, the significance, the

research questions and the design of the study

The development consists of three chapters:

Chapter 1 presents a review of literature concentrating on the issues related

to software in language teaching and learning, speaking skills, softwareevaluation It discusses the definition of software, the roles and types ofsoftware evaluation in language teaching and learning, the definition andcharacteristics of speaking, teaching and learning speaking with the help ofsoftware and present major issues in software evaluation including purposesfor software evaluation, types of software evaluation, and softwareevaluation framework Finally is an introduction of LTSE Deluxe 10‟scontent

Chapter 2 focuses on the methodology employed in this thesis including an

overview of current English teaching and learning at HUBT, researchmethodology, an the data collection procedures

Chapter 3 discusses the findings of the study; points out the strengths,

weaknesses of the courseware, and suggests the recommendations for thecourseware improvement

The conclusion provides a brief summary of all the major parts being presented in

the study, the conclusions drawn out and suggestions for further research

PART II: DEVELOPMENT

Chapter I:

Literature Review

1 Software in Language Teaching and Learning

Computers are becoming more and more common, and in an increasingly diversenumber of applications They are used in all aspects of life such as schools,hospitals, military, offices, banks, airplanes and so on Therefore, computer isconsidered as a tool to improve the quality of teaching and learning Sudjana &Rival (2009:137) sated that the use of computer as a teaching media providesseveral advantages:

i) The role of computer will stimulate students‟ motivation in learning process

ii) Color, sound and graphic increase the students‟ impression of realism iii) Students‟ individual responses in learning activities will produce long term memory.

Mc Donough, et al (1994:211) had the same idea that there are several advantages

by using computer as learning media, such as:

i) Computer gives stimulus to the students‟ learning process

ii) Computer provides audio and visual effect which can catch students‟ interest and attention

iii) Computer helps to recall and rebuild the concept of previous material iv) Computer activates students‟ responses

v) Computer triggers interactive learning process, and computer also

provides learning sources which are easy to be modified

However, besides those advantages, Sudjana & Rival (2009:138) also explain several constraints of the use of computer as learning media as follows:

- The program, especially for teaching goal, is still less developed if it is compared with other goal

- The digital software used is usually not flexible to be used in every computer

by comparing with the benefit itself

- Because the role of human user is still strongly demanded, the teacher should have high- technology skill, at least to operate the system and program of the computer itself.

1.1 Definition of software

In Business dictionary, software is defined as organized information in the form ofoperating systems, utilities, programs, and applications that enable computers towork

Software consists of carefully-organized instructions and code written by

programmers in any of various special computer languages Software is divided commonly into two main categories:

(1) System software: controls the basic (and invisible to the user) functions of a

computer and comes usually preinstalled with the machine See also BIOS and OperatingSystem

(2) Application software: handles multitudes of common and specialized tasks a

user wants to perform, such as accounting, communicating, data processing, wordprocessing

1.2 Roles of teaching and learning software in general English courses

Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) means using computer to supportlanguage teaching and learning in some ways The current philosophy of CALL puts

a strong emphasis on student-centered material that allows learners to work bythemselves Therefore, CALL‟s aim is to facilitate language learning by usingtechnology of computer More specifically, Levy (1997) states that CALL is digitalsoftware tool which is designed to develop language learning and it also covers theapplication of the computer in language teaching and learning Moreover, Ihsanudin(2009:8) in his research states that

"CALL is not focused on technology but on language learning The word assisted indicates that technology only facilities the language learning process A more accurate term for using technology in language learning might be language

learning through technology reflecting the true position of language in such activity"

Soe (1998) says that there are three main roles of CALL in interacting withstudents:

Drill and Practice

Computer provides practice to strengthen the learning material, and gives feedbackdirectly from the student's scores In this case, CALL plays a role as complementmedia in teaching-learning language process in classroom Moreover, this is veryuseful when teacher cannot interact with students individually

Tutorial

Computer provides some information; moreover explains some addition concept tostudents through practicing In this case, CALL plays a role as material providerswhich have been adjusted to each student's proficiency individually

Dialogue

In this case, students are more active in interacting with the computer Computerprovides learning material, practice, and some feedback CALL in this role has beentrusted as replacement enclosed traditional method which provides more effective

According to Brown, 1994; Burns & Joyce, 1997, speaking is “an interactive

process of constructing meaning that involves producing and receiving and processing information” Its form and meaning are dependent on the context in

which it occurs, including the participants themselves, their collective experiences,

the physical environment, and the purposes for speaking It is often spontaneous,open-ended, and evolving.

According to Burn & Joyce, 1997, "speaking" is the delivery of language throughthe mouth To speak, we create sounds using many parts of our body, including thelungs, vocal tract, vocal chords, tongue, teeth and lips In the framework of how welearn our first language, language has been divided into different skill areas A childfirst learns to practice language through the skill of listening Later, a child useslanguage by speaking combined with listening Then, when school begins, childrenlearn the skills of reading and writing So speaking is usually the second of the fourlanguage skills that we learn This vocalized form of language usually requires atleast one listener When two or more people speak or talk to each other, theconversation is called a "dialogue" Speech can flow naturally from one person toanother in the form of dialogue It can also be planned and rehearsed, as in thedelivery of a speech or presentation

Speaking can be formal or informal:

Informal speaking is typically used with family and friends, or people you know well.

Formal speaking occurs in business or academic situations, or when meeting people for the first time.

Speaking is probably the language skill that most language learners wish to perfect

as soon as possible

2.2 Characteristics of Speaking

According to Bygate (1987), speaking has the following characteristics:

Firstly, its form and meaning are dependent on the context in which it occurs,including the participants themselves, their collective experiences, the physicalenvironment, and the purposes for speaking It is often spontaneous, open-ended,and evolving

Secondly, the learners must know how to produce specific points of language such

as grammar, pronunciation, or vocabulary, but also they understand when, why, and

in what ways to produce language

Thirdly, speech has its own features, structures, and conventions different fromwritten language.

Lastly, Bygate (1987) considers speaking as an undervalued skill in many ways.The reason is that almost all people can speak, and so take speaking skill too muchfor granted Bygate also highly appreciates speaking skill by stating that speaking isthe medium through which much language is learnt

To sum up, it is undeniable that speaking is the key to communication Byconsidering what good speakers do, what speaking tasks can be used in class, andwhat specific needs learners report, teachers can help learners improve theirspeaking and overall oral competency

2.3 Teaching and Learning Speaking Skills with the Help of Software

According to Harmer (2001) teachers should be aware that teaching speakingclosely relates to receptive skill work when teaching speaking skills Teachers

should pay attention to: Output and input, Texts, Reception and production Output

and input: output is the language the students produce; input is the feedback or

prompters from students‟ interlocutor (teacher) Teachers can modify their

students‟ output Texts: offer students a model to follow, especially when working

on specific functions (agreeing, disagreeing, expressing surprise, approval ), alsoact as stimuli which then help create language production: discussion (fromcontroversial reading passage), response (after listening to a tape about a story or

opinion Reception is a part of production: conversation between two people is a blend of listening and speaking; comprehend what‟s said is necessary for what‟s said next Production enables reception: oral production works in a way that helps

Ss with their listening comprehension as when they try to speak, they better adjust

to understanding other people speaking in the same context

Brown & Nation (1997) think that teachers should give students practice with both fluency and accuracy: teachers should provide students with form-focused and meaning-focused speaking activities that aim at fluency and accuracy development Nunan (2003) believes that teachers had better provide students opportunities to talk(by using group work or pair work and limiting teacher talk), plan tasks involving

negotiation of meaning, design classroom activities involving guidance, practice forboth transactional and interactional speaking.

With the help of using software in English language teaching, Al-Mansour, N.S &Al-Shorman, R.A (2011) state that

“First, using software in English language instruction is a novelty This novelty may

have encouraged the students to deal with the computer enthusiastically, which may have been reflected in better achievement Second, computers depend on programs that are based on individual learning and consider the level and pace of the individual This may enhance learning as the learner may feel that s(he) is in control of the whole learning process Third, using computers allows the students to repeat the same piece of information or drill as many times as necessary for them to understand Moreover, they are able to refer to the learning material any time they want Fourth, using computers in instruction makes the students become less shy of committing mistakes, which encourages them to learn much better and then improve their achievements Fifth, students using the computers might have felt that they were not being watched or judged and, thus, that the work they did was their own private property Therefore, they were relaxed about pooling information and seeking help from other students Finally, computers have many positive characteristics such as speed, accuracy, variability of presentation and flexibility of use and control, which explains why it outdoes other presentation modes such as books.”

3 Software Evaluation

3.1 Reasons for Software Evaluation

According to Haugland (1992), the type of software that brings impacts to student'scomputer experiences and even seems to determine whether they havedevelopmental gains from these experiences Therefore, the software like any otherresources must have a developmental approach to teaching and learning

It is very important to know whether the suitability of particular software couldmeet the student's needs, its contribution to the student's performance andachievement, and it could act as a motivation tool

3.2 Types of Software Evaluation

There are four general types of evaluation of computer assisted learning material(CALM)

Formative evaluation: to help improve the design of the CALM.

Summative evaluation: to help users choose which piece of CALM to use

and for what

Illuminative evaluation: to uncover the important factors latent in a particular

to adjust their CALM Formative evaluation would be realistic and helpful because

it uses students in their normal learning situation and their feedback to developers is

a helpful substitute that gets round this constraint

Summative evaluation

Evaluation of CALM is rather like consumer reports on goods: the manufacturerdesigns and supplies them, and then someone else does tests and produces reports tohelp purchasers decide which to buy This view of evaluation is linked to a viewthat CALM is produced like textbooks and other goods, and that evaluation is notexpected to have any direct effect on the CAL itself by telling the authors how toimprove it It is expected to help consumers in how to use the product: only which

to buy

Illuminative evaluation

"Illuminative evaluation" is the investigator to hang out with the participants(students, teacher, etc) to pick up how they think and feel about the situation, andwhat the important underlying issues are Its importance is as an open-ended methodthat can detect what the important issues are, without which other methods often askthe wrong questions and measure the wrong things Illuminative

evaluation is in effect a systematic focus on discovering the unexpected, usingapproaches inspired by anthropology rather than psychology.

3.3 Software Evaluation Framework

The efficiency of a courseware depends on many issues In order to build up theevaluation instrument the researcher attempted to integrate in a framework anumber of important issues emerged from researches on instructional design andsystem evaluation the past fifteen years, and which should be considered fromevaluators of hypermedia courseware (H.C.)(Georgiadou & Economides, 2000).This framework is connected with both social and practical acceptability of

hypermedia courseware, based on Nielsen's idea that "the overall acceptability of a

computer system is a combination of its social and practical acceptability” The

term social acceptability is related with the social basis of an educational system.The practical acceptability is examined through the evaluation of the following foursectors:

ii) Presentation and organization of the content

iii) Technical support and update processes and finally

iv) Evaluation of learning

All sectors are equally important, as hypermedia courseware has to besimultaneously pedagogically and technically sound Moreover, each sectorincludes a number of criteria that are incorporated in the evaluation instrument,which should be met in a satisfactory level, in order to characterize a piece ofhypermedia courseware of high quality Furthermore, cost- effectiveness should

always be examined when similar products seem to have the same educationalvalues The diagram below presents the sectors included in the framework and thefactors that are associated with them.

Diagram of the Evaluation Framework

Before presenting the evaluation instrument it is necessary to discuss the underlyingtheory of the criteria used for the „presentation and organization of the content‟ andthe „evaluation of learning sectors‟

3.3.1 Presentation and Organization of the Content

The factors associated with this sector are the pedagogical ones that are concerned

with learning and instructional design theories and the interface design factor i)

Pedagogical Factor:

This is a complicated factor as there are different beliefs of how humans learn.However, cognitive theories stress that learning is an active, constructive,cumulative, self-regulated process in which the learner plays a critical role

Moreover, current instructional theory focusing on learner-centred approachesdepends on information access and learning environments that encourage freeinteraction with information The agreement with the principles of an instructionaldesign theory depends heavily on the subject matter In addition, teachers‟ belief is

of great importance, especially in cases when the hypermedia courseware is part ofthe curriculum

Nevertheless, the two core elements that are important in all educational setting are

„motivation‟ and „structure‟, which largely define the instructional natural of aninformation environment A typical way to motivate the learners is to informhim/her what she/he will achieve at the end of the instruction by stating the aimsand objectives

Structured hypermedia consists of sets of nodes, each set accessible from any otherset The node sets can be structured in any number of ways, such as node-link,hierarchical, network, depending on the nature of the processing the designer wants

to elicit from the user The structure of each node set with the various availablewithin each set needs to be conveyed on every screen Another method forstructuring the node sets is to combine related concepts, tie then together in anintroductory block, and then permit access within the set only to concepts containedwithin the set

In hypermedia learning systems, another important element is „learner‟s control‟,which is primary in the design of interactive learning as it allows students to tailorthe learning experience to their own individual needs However, there are dangers insurrendering too much control to the user, as low-ability students may get confusedwhen control depends on a wide range of options The high level of learner controldepends on the learner characteristics (age and cognitive capabilities), content, andthe nature of the learning task

Moreover, the issues of „accommodation of individual differences‟, and

„cooperative learning‟ are highly important in the effectiveness of based learning In most education contexts learners are not the same in terms ofbackground knowledge, motivation, experience, learning styles and cognitive styles

hypermedia-Also evidence suggests that when hypermedia-learning systems are structured toallow as many learners can operate as possible.

ii)Interface Design Factor: Interactivity – Navigation – Feedback:

Interactivity in instruction comprises the nature of the activity performer by thetechnology and the learner, as well as the ability of the technology to adapt theevents of instruction in order to make that interaction more meaningful It isimportant to design as much meaningful interactivity as possible into instructionalsoftware The amount of navigational assistance needed is a function of the size ofthe knowledge base: the types of links the software allows Guidelines for increasedinteractivity were produce from researcher and are used in the instrument asevaluation items in the relevant section

The basic factors that can determine the effectiveness of feedback are the type andfrequency of feedback given and the delay between feedback and instruction.Laurillard (1993) identifies two types of feedback, „intrinsic‟ and „extrinsic‟.Intrinsic feedback is what given as a natural consequence of an action On the otherhand extrinsic feedback does not occur within a situation but as an externalcomment on it: right or wrong In computer-based instruction, however, the intrinsicfeedback relates to navigation and interactivity with the instructional program, andthe extrinsic feedback relates to the feedback on user‟s performance Schimmel(1988) indentifies three types of extrinsic feedback:

a) Confirmation feedback that simply confirms whether a learner‟s answer is correct or incorrect.

b) Correct response feedback that present the correct answer.

c) Explanatory feedback, such as a step-by-step solution to an incorrectly answered question.

Many actions require more extended extrinsic feedback than confirmation feedback.Simple answers such as right or wrong cannot provide any information about howlearners should correct their performance A more helpful form of extrinsicfeedback would give the learner information about hoe to adapt and correct theirperformance, such as correct response and explanation feedback

iii) „Screen design‟ is also an important evaluation factor Different screen

elements should be used to present stimulating information that will motivate and assist

the learners in retaining and recalling the information The psychological limitations toconsider when designing hypermedia learning systems include:

a) Memory load: i.e how many different control icons is it reasonable for learners to remember at any one time?

b) Perception: i.e what colors and fonts provide the best readability?

c) Attention: i.e how can the user‟s attention be drawn to information that is relevant, when there is a lot of different information on the scree.

3.3.2 Evaluation of Learning

The learning outcomes are evaluated through performance tests typically used tojudge the quality and the quantity of learning, which usually have the form of „pre-test‟ used to determine learning outcomes prior to the intervention and „immediate‟and „delayed post-tests‟ to examine learning outcomes after the intervention Thelearning process refers to the usability of a product and should be evaluated byobserving and measuring the end-users attitudes Usability is usually associated withfive parameters (Nielsen, 1990):

a) Easy to learn: Users can quickly get some work done with the system

b) Efficient to use: Once the user has learnt the system, a high level of

productivity is possible

c) Easy to remember: The casual users is able to return to using the system after some period without having to learn everything all over

d) Few errors: Users do not make errors during the use of the system or if they

do so they can easily recover them

e) Pleasant to use: Users are subjectively satisfied by using the system.

4 Learn To Speak English Deluxe 10 software

4.1 Introduction of Learn To Speak English Deluxe 10 (LTSE) software

LTSE is one of learning software in the flagship Learn to Speak™ Deluxe product line, produced by eLanguage, LLC - a Northern California-based developer of

language learning software The company's products were designed by language experts to quickly teach a foreign language, based on a building-block approach Unlike most language software programs, Learn to Speak English teaches the language from the ground up It not only immerses the user in the language, but it provides extensive grammar lessons as well The course is equivalent to a 2-year college course in English Each Lesson contains a vocabulary list, story, dialogue, grammar topic, conversation lab, and exercises Also included are fun games to break the monotony while strengthening and reinforcing learning Speech

recognition technology allows users to test their knowledge and perfect their accentswith immediate feedback from the computer

4.2 Reasons to Choose Learn to Speak English

Not only being priced much lower than other major language learning software,there are but also a few other reasons:

Developed by language learning experts

Learn to Speak English was designed by University language experts, and tested bythousands of students over many years The goal was to get students tocommunicate in their new language as quickly as possible, while also getting a solidstructural foundation in vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation All of these are in

a playful, flexible and engaging way

Successful history of language learning software

Learn to Speak language software has a long history of successful learning - Over 4 million copies have been sold since 1991 Why? Because LTSEgives students more flexible and comprehensive language learning than the averagelanguage program does

language-Unique Flexible Immersion System

With Learn to Speak English, students will get a language experience that is similar

to living in a foreign country and communicating with native speakers Choose to learn just through simulated conversations, or follow a series of carefully structuredlessons to learn vocabulary and pronunciation Perfect their accents with the help ofspeech recognition

Most comprehensive language learning program

LTSE gives students more lessons, more immersive conversations, and more

additional online and offline resources than other major language learning

programs

Learn for your own needs at your own pace

Follow a carefully designed lesson plan or create students‟ own based on the skills

or subjects they want to learn Use customized lesson plans such as travel,business, shopping, or everyday life Even take your software on-the-go: in yourcar, or on your iPod/mp3 player

4.3 Learn To Speak English Deluxe 10’s content

Learn To Speak English consists of forty increasingly advanced lessons From

lesson 1 to lesson 5 is Beginner Course, lesson 6 to lesson 34 is Intermediate

Course and 5 last lessons are Advanced Course.

Each lesson of Beginner Course has 4 main parts: Vocabulary, Communication,

Grammar and Exercises While each lessons of Intermediate Course and Advanced

Course contain 7 main parts They are Vocabulary, Vocabulary Exercises, Story,

Story Exercises, Grammar, Grammar Exercises and Conversation We can see the

structures‟ similarities and differences between Beginner Course and Intermediate

or Advanced Course Firstly, about the similarities, they all consist of Vocabulary, Communication or Story, Grammar and Exercise However, in the Beginner

Course, all vocabulary exercises, Communication or Story exercises, and Grammar

Exercises are put in one part called Exercise, while in the Intermediate and

Advanced Courses, each kind of exercises is separated in one part.

Vocabulary: (See Appendix 1)

In this part, students can listen to and be suggested meanings of each sound of thelanguage spoken by a native speaker that will happen in Communication or Storiespart In keeping with the flexible, self-paced approach, students can train their ears

to these sounds, listen to the words as often as they wish, and master them beforetesting their pronunciation with the computer‟s speech recognition and assessmentmeter that measures how close they are to a native speaker‟s voice

Communication or Stories: (See Appendix 2)

The Communication or Stories section of the program focuses on the realcommunicative situations students may encounter in the host country such as timetelling, days and dates, and basic colors, greetings, farewells, introductions, and

making acquaintances in Beginner Course and wide range of tasks likely to arise in

an extended stay abroad like looking for an apartment, going to the theater, taking a

taxi, opening a bank account, buying groceries, going to the doctor in Intermediate

Course or further broaden contents, including linguistically more challenging topics,

such as making business calls, flirting, expressing frustration, or even watching a

soccer game of Advanced Course In this part, students can of course hear and

practice each sentence or all conversations as much as they like

Grammar: (See Appendix 3)

Each module or chapter is built around a substantial dialog containing not only anarray of topically focused words and phrases for the situation, but also illustratingappropriate grammatical points in an authentic context Students are demonstratedthe formation, example sentences for each grammatical point

Exercises: (See Appendix 4)

There is a wide range of exercises applied in this software For Dialog exercises, they offer 3 common kinds: See It, Say It; Drag and Match, Multiple Choice For

Vocabulary Exercises is See and Say For Grammar ones is Fill in the Blank

Each kind of exercise requires students to interact with computers to help themrevise all things they have got in these above parts

Conversations: (See Appendix 5)

In this part, students will have chance to interact with characters in real-lifescenarios based on the most common travel situations Converse with people in eachscene can help them learn more quickly than any other methods

As they progress through each lesson, they will use their new language skills tointeract in real-life situations It's a captivating, interactive experience that engagesthem and keeps them interested

Other parts

 Language Workshops

Five language workshops help students improve every aspect of theircommunication Start by learning basic words and phrases, then advance toscenario-based conversations Workshops include vocabulary, grammar,pronunciation, conversation, and interactive simulations

 Games & Activities

Interactive, multi-level games such as Go Fish, Hangman, and Crossword Puzzles add fun and excitement to keep students interested and reinforce learning

 Oral & Written Lessons

Proven and effective lesson designs give students the sentence structure, languagerules, and vocabulary foundation they will need These lessons include printableexercises and a comprehensive reference book

 Media Center

Media Center provides students movies to help them learn more about culturestudents are studying Audio lesson tunes their ears to the new language, printexercises and grammar to take on the road and a world of online guides, referencesand other resources

 Progress

There is a chart to show scores of activities that students have completed Beginnerand Advanced lessons give one overall score, while Intermediate lessons provideindividual scores for each objective After checking their scores students can return

to the lesson and practice more to get the higher scores

1.1 Description of the LTSE course and its objectives at HUBT

The study was conducted with 1st year non-English-major students at HanoiUniversity of Business and Technology, where LTSE software started applying in

2012 It uses interactive multimedia software to revolutionize education All Englishcourses offered by HUBT comprise of two components: face-to face classes andcourseware as a supplementary teaching and learning tool with the aim of helpingthe students achieve mastery of knowledge and skills effectively

LTSE is only taught in the first year with 60 periods (55 minutes per period) andstudents learn each unit of LTSE in 2 periods in a week Some of the units areomitted by Faculty of English because of the inappropriateness

LTSE was chosen because it had been believed to meet the course objectives by theEnglish Faculty Because most of students‟ majors were business, finances andeconomics and they are non- English major Therefore, this course ware aimed toprovide them with knowledge relating daily communication In fact, this coursewarefocused mainly on reading, listening and speaking skills, so the teachers had todesign more writing tasks after learning with computers to help the studentsimprove their writing skills The basic reason why LTSE has been used is that thecourseware is attractive, dynamic, interactive and effective, since it combine stilland moving pictures and audio with text graphics Besides, the content and topics inLTSE are closely related to the course objectives

1.2 Description of the students at HUBT

The students at HUBT come from different provinces such as: Ha Noi, Ha Nam,Nam Dinh, Hai Phong, Hai Duong, Thanh Hoa, etc Most of them have studiedEnglish before; however, they are not good at English When they took the entranceexam to this university, they had to take the test in math, physics and chemistry;therefore, they only paid attention to these subjects to pass the exam English wasconsidered to be unimportant; they did not study it thoroughly Their English level

is usually very low and their English levels are very different Some students can bequite good at grammar but not good at speaking

Non-English major students belong to different faculties such as: economics, andcomputer science Their motivation for learning English is not the same Usually,students from economics faculties, and finances faculties are interested and morehard-working in learning English more than students from other faculties

1.3 Description of English teachers at HUBT

There are 210 English teachers at English Faculty I of HUBT Most of themare female Their age is from 22 to 50 Most of them are still very young, someteachers have just only graduated from university, and they do not have muchexperience in teaching However, the boards of administrators always have someworkshops at the beginning and at the end of the school year to find out the thingsachieved and the things not achieved during the previous course, to train teachers inteaching methods (CLT approach is selected for all the teachers to apply in theirteaching) and to give chance for good teachers to share their teaching experience,managing classroom with their colleagues About 60% of the teachers at HUBTused to be students at Vietnam National University, Hanoi University of Languagesand International Studies (HULIS), 24% teachers come from Hanoi University, andthe others are from Hanoi National University of Education or other universities 18teachers have finished their MA courses and there are many teachers are pursuingtheir MA courses

2 The Research Methods

2.1 Research Methodology

According to Johnson (1992: 104), survey research is a suitable method to getperceptions of people or descriptive information of methods/ programs offered inschools as well as to learn about the characteristics of an entire group of interest (apopulation) by examining a subset of that group (sample)” While the aims of thisstudy is to investigate the appropriateness of the LTSE software for the Englishcourse of HUBT students, therefore the researcher decided to choose surveyresearch methodology It is suitable with this study because the researcher justwants to collect the information from the students and teachers in their own currentsituations to find out the appropriateness of the LTSE software in the process oflearning English speaking skills.

2.2 The Data Collection Methods

The interview questions were administered to 5 teachers who are currently teachingEnglish for non-English-major students at HUBT so that they can understand thestudents‟ problems in learning speaking skills with the help of LTSE software.Those lecturers are also selected randomly These teachers are all female teachers,aged from 23 to 45

Sampling

The sample of about 100 non English-major students, aged from 18 to 22, fromthree different classes of different faculties at HUBT are randomly selected to takepart in answering the questionnaires

The sample of 5 teachers who are currently teaching English for non-English-majorstudents at HUBT are also selected randomly to take part in answering the interviewquestions

Data collection instruments and procedure

In this study, data collection instruments are a questionnaire and a semi- structuredinterview A questionnaire having 3 parts of 45 item questions for non English-major students in order to find out the answer to research question 1 and 3 Semi-structured interviews including 5 questions with teachers will be used to collect data

to guarantee the accuracy of the data Their answers will help the researcher withthe information for research question 2 and recommendations for coursewareimprovements

The researcher delivered questionnaire to the students of 3 randomly chosen classes

at HUBT and asked them to fill in at different recesses with the help of researcherfor translation And then, also at recess, an interview of 5 teachers was carried out atteachers‟ room of the university

2.3 Data analysis procedure

Collected data is classified into different categories and then the researcher usedescriptive statistics and qualitative statistics to analyze through tables Finally, theconclusions after data analysis were given out

Chapter III Results and Discussion

There were 89 non-English-major students participating in the study No control orexperimental group was assigned because the study was not mainly concerned aboutimprovements in students‟ performance before and after using the particularsoftware- LTSE All students were delivered a questionnaire, no time limitation ontheir responses

1 Results of general information

Among 89 selected students, there are only 19 male, the others are girls 59% hasbeen learning English for over 7 years, 37% has been learning from 3 to 7 years andonly 4% has learnt English from 1 to 3 years

Most of them (about 82%) thought that English speaking skill is very important, 2%considered that it is important and 16% supposed that English speaking skill is notevery important

In comparing speaking skill to other macro- skills (listening, reading and writingskill), half of them recognized that speaking is as important as other skills, 48%thought that speaking is more important than other skills and only 2% regardedspeaking is less important than other skills

When being asked how much they like speaking skill, 36% said that they like it alot, 33% like it quite a lot, 26% like it so- so and 5% do not like it at all

In contrary, as being asked to self-assess their speaking skills, 50% said that theirspeaking skills are bad, only 4% thought that theirs are very good 23% supposedthey are good or quite good The others realized that they are quite bad or very bad

To sum up, most of the students have been learning English for a long time andthey all thought that English speaking skills are really important, they also likespeaking English However, they still can not master it

2 Results of how students learn LTSE at HUBT

Five questions in part II of the questionnaire were designed to find out the Ss‟opinion and the ways they were learning LTSE at HUBT

The first question was given out to attain Ss opinion of the teacher‟s role in teachingLTSE 62% of the students answered that the role of the teacher in teaching LTSE isnot important, 31% thought that it is important, only 6% regarded it as veryimportant

The answers to question number 2 and 3 showed that about three quarters of thestudents can understand a lot all the instructions and word expressions of LTSEsoftware and can repeat the sentences after listening While only 10% to 20% ofthem have problems in understanding the instructions and word expressions ofLTSE software and repeating the sentences after listening Surprisingly, 0% of themcan not do those things

These percentages from question 1, 2 and 3 indicated that the students could learnwith the software with little help or guide from the teachers

When being asked whether the software was only suitable for the students with consciousness, over half of them (52%) agreed and 25% of them strongly agree.There are only 27% of them disagreed or somewhat disagreed with it No onestrongly disagreed These figures were consistent with the ones of three firstquestions

self-Finally, referred to pair -work, group -work activities in learning with LTSEsoftware Most of them (84%) said that they had never had pair -work, group -workactivities when learning with LTSE software Some of them (16%) sometimes havethese kinds of activities None often or very often has them

In conclusion, most of the students found that the role of the teachers is not reallyimportant in teaching LTSE software This software could raise their self- learning

as well as learning independently They also agreed that there was a lack ofinteractive activities between students