Ways to motivate the first year non english majors at hanoi university of technology in learning english speaking skill

Factors affecting students’ motivation in learning English speaking skill ……… 30-33 3.1.4.. The main purposes of the study are to explore types of motivation possessed by the first year

POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYỄN THỊ PHƯƠNG

WAYS TO MOTIVATE THE FIRST YEAR NON-ENGLISH MAJORS AT HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY IN LEARNING ENGLISH SPEAKING

SKILL

(CÁC CÁCH GÂY HỨNG THÚ CHO SINH VIÊN KHÔNG CHUYÊN TIẾNG ANH NĂM THỨ NHẤT TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC BÁCH KHOA HÀ NỘI HỌC KỸ NĂNG NÓI)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: Methodology Code: 601410

HÀ NỘI – 2011

POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYỄN THỊ PHƯƠNG

WAYS TO MOTIVATE THE FIRST YEAR NON-ENGLISH MAJORS AT HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY IN LEARNING ENGLISH SPEAKING

SKILL

(CÁC CÁCH GÂY HỨNG THÚ CHO SINH VIÊN KHÔNG CHUYÊN TIẾNG ANH NĂM THỨ NHẤT TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC BÁCH KHOA HÀ NỘI HỌC KỸ NĂNG NÓI)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: Methodology Code: 601410

Supervisor: Nguyễn Huyền Minh, M.A

HÀ NỘI – 2011

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ………

ABSTRACT ……….

TABLE OF CONTENTS ………

LISTS OF TABLES AND CHARTS ………

PART I: INTRODUUCTION ………

ii iii iv vii 1 1 Rationale ……… 1-2 2 Aims of the study ……… 2

3 Research questions ……… 2

4 Scope of the study ……… 2

5 Methods of the study ……… 2-3 6 Design of the study ……… 3

PART II: DEVELOPMENT ……… 4

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW ……… 4

1.1 Theoretical background of motivation ……… 4

1.1.1 Definitions of motivation ………. 4

1.1.2 Types of motivation ……… 4-7 1.1.2.1 Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation ……… 4-5 1.1.2.2 Instrumental and integrative orientations ……… 5-6 1.1.2.3 Global, situational and task motivation ……… 7

1.1.3 The importance of motivation in second language learning ……… 7-8 1.1.4 Factors affecting motivation in second language learning……… 8 1.1.4.1 Learners’ factors ……… 9-11

1.1.4.2 Teachers’ factors ……… 11-12

1.1.4.3 The atmosphere in the class ……… 12-13

1.2 Theoretical background of speaking and the teaching of speaking skill 13

1.2.1 What is speaking? 13-14

1.2.2 Phases of teaching speaking ……… 14-15

1.2.3 Key issues in teaching speaking ………. 15-16 1.2.3.1 Reticence and dominance in speaking activities ……… 15-16

1.2.3.2 Multi-level speaking classes students to speak in the target

language………. 16

1.2.4 Speaking motivational activities and techniques to motivate ………… 16 1.2.4.1 Speaking motivational activities ……… 16-19

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY ……… 22

2.1 The current situation of teaching and learning English at HUT………. 22-23

2.2 Subjects of the study ……… 23

2.3 Data instruments ………. 23-24

2.3.1 Questionnaire for students ……… 24

2.3.2 Questionnaire for teachers ………. 24

2.3.3 Interviews ……… 24

2.3.4 Observation ……… 24-25

CHAPTER 3: DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS ……… 26

3.1 Students ……… 26

3.1.1 Types of motivation ……… 26-27

3.1.2 Students’ opinions on learning English speaking skill 27-30

3.1.3 Factors affecting students’ motivation in learning English speaking

skill ……… 30-33

3.1.4 Students’ opinions on what motivates them to speak English………… 33-36

3.2.1 Teachers’ opinions on students’ motivation in learning English

speaking ……… 36-37

3.2.2 Activities and techniques applied by teachers ……… 37-40

3.2.3 The teachers’ attitudes towards students who are unwilling to speak

English and error maker ……… 41-42

CHAPTER 4: FINGDINGS, DISCUSSIONS AND

4.1 Findings and discussions ……… 43-45

4.2 Recommendations ………. 45-48

PART III: CONCLUSION ……… 49-50

APPENDIXES:

APPENDIX B: SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE FOR THE TEACHERS … VII-IX

APPENDIX D: EXTRACT FROM THE MOTIVATION ORIENTATION OF

SUMMARY OF MINOR THESIS

This study is an effort to investigate ways to motivate the first year non-English majors in learning English speaking skill at Ha Noi University of Technology The main purposes of the study are to explore types of motivation possessed by the first year non-English majors at Ha Noi University of Technology, factors affecting students‟ motivation in learning English speaking skill, speaking motivational activities and techniques applied by teachers and students‟ attitudes towards them and then give several recommendations for teachers to encourage students to speak English

The study is composed of three main parts Part I, the introduction, reveals the rationale, aims, research questions, scope, design, methods of the research Part II is divided into three chapters Chapter 1 reviews theoretical background of motivation and speaking Chapter 2 gives the instrumentation, data collection and data analysis Chapter 3 sums up some major findings and discussion, and then presents recommendations to the English teachers Part III, the conclusion, points out what the researcher have done and what she have not done and give some suggestions for further study

PART I INTRODUCTION presents the rationale, aims, research questions, scope, methods

of the research and design of the study.

Firstly, I would like to give the rationale of the study The first reason is that I realized that the role of motivation in the success of second language learning is of great importance Secondly,

a large number of students at this University cannot use English to communicate in real life In addition, there have been a limited number of studies into ways that should be used to motivate learners

The second point I would love to mention is the aim of the study The study is aimed at investigating methods, activities and techniques used by the teachers to motivate the students

in speaking skill and then recommending several activities and techniques to motivate the students to speak English

The third point is about research questions In my study, I used two main research questions: the first question is what are the activities and techniques used by the teachers to motivate students in learning English speaking skill? The second question is what activities and techniques are considered as effective tools in motivating students to speak English?

The next point I would like to mention is the scope of the study The study focuses on ways to motivate students in learning English speaking skill The subjects of the study are 99 first year non-English majors and 14 teachers at Ha Noi University of Technology

Next, I will talk about the methodology of the study This part is composed of participants, research methods and instruments The participants of the study are 99 first year non-English majors at Ha Noi University of Technology who have TOEIC scores below 250, have learnt English for 7 to 9 years, but some have taken when attending the course and 14 teachers who are currently teaching English for non-English majors at Ha Noi University of Technology In this study, I used two research methods: quantitative method (questionnaires for students and teachers) and qualitative method (interviews with students and class observations) The instruments of the study are survey questionnaires with 99 students and 14 teachers, semi-structured interviews with 8 students and observations of 2 classes

Finally, I would like to give a brief description of the design of the study This point has mentioned in the beginning of this summary

PART II DEVELOPMENT consists of four following chapters:

CHAPTER ONE: Literature review presents the concepts relevant to the study: motivation,

speaking and the teaching of speaking skill When talking about motivation, I focused on the following aspects: definitions of motivation, kinds of motivation, the importance of motivation

in second language learning, and factors affecting motivation in second language learning As for speaking and the teaching of speaking, I gave definitions of speaking, the importance of speaking, phases to teaching speaking, key issues in teaching speaking, speaking motivational activities and techniques to encourage students to speak English

 Definitions of motivation

3 There has been a variety of theories of motivation over the course of decades of research; however, in my study, I only mentioned the outlooks of Harmer (1991), Brown (1994), and Dornyei and Otto (1998) Harmer said that “Motivation is some kind of internal drive that encourages somebody to pursue a course of action If we receive a goal and if that goal is sufficiently attractive, we will be strongly motivated to do whatever is necessary to reach that goal.” Brown states: “Motivation is the extent to which you make choice about (a) goals to pursue and (b) the effort you will devote to that pursuit” Dornyei and Otto claim: “Motivation can be defined as the dynamically changing cumulative arousal in a person that initiates, directs, coordinates, amplifies, terminates, and evaluates the cognitive and motor processes whereby initial wishes and desires are selected, prioritized, operationalised and acted out.”

 Types of motivation

There have been many ways to classify motivation; however, in this paper, only Brown‟s and Gardner‟s classification is mentioned Firstly, Brown classifies motivation into three kinds

such as global, situational and task motivation (cited in Brown, 1981) Then Gardner (1985) distinguished integrative and instrumental as two types of motivation/ orientations However, according to Brown (1994: 170), motivation is categorized into intrinsic and extrinsic

motivation

In general, there are several types of motivation In fact, there are three main types of

motivation: intrinsic, extrinsic and global motivation Harmer‟s view led me to such

conclusion Harmer (1983) indicates the relationship between two kinds of motivation such as intrinsic, extrinsic, and other kinds of motivation Harmer states that extrinsic motivation consists of two sub-components: instrumental and integrative motivation He also claims that intrinsic motivation is primarily made up of parts: situational and task motivation

 The importance of motivation in second language learning

There have been many theorists mentioning the role of motivation in foreign language learning and teaching; however, in this paper, I only mention the views of Brown (2007), Reece & Walker (1997), Li (2009), and Wang (2009) Basing on their viewpoints, we can

conclude that the success in second language learning depends on many factors such as learners‟ factors (attitude, aptitude, intelligence, personality, etc), teachers‟ factors, teaching and learning condition, and motivation Among those factors, motivation is considered as a key factor deciding the success or failure of a foreign language learning

 Factors affecting motivation in second language learning

A variety of factors may influence motivation in second language learning, including teaching materials, syllabus, teaching means and methods, teachers, learners themselves and so on Because the purpose of my study is to find out ways to motivate students to speak English, in

this section, I will only focus on the main factors such as teachers, learners and teaching and learning conditions.

- Learners’ factors:

There are various factors affecting foreign language learning such as aptitude, intelligence, personality, learners‟ preferences, learners‟ beliefs and age; however, in this study, only

aptitude (Grass & Selinker, 2008 and Skehan, 1989), attitude (Verma cited from website: http://www0.hku.hk/clear/conference08/doc/handouts/VERMA%20Meenakshi%20H_handout pdf, and Krashen, 1985) , personality and learning style (Lightbown & Spada, 1999, Cornett,

1983, and Grass & Selinker, 2008) will be discussed because the researcher think that these factors have the greatest impact on second language learning

In summary, second language learning in general and motivation in second language learning

in particular are both influenced by many factors; therefore, when teaching a foreign language, teachers must study deeply factors affecting language learning in order to find out appropriate teaching methods, effective motivational strategies as well as activities inspiring learners, and

so on

- Teachers’ factors

According to Dornyei (2001), teachers play a significant role in socializing and shaping the motivation of their students through their personal characteristics, verbal and non–verbal

5 immediacy behaviour, active motivational socializing behaviour, and classroom management practices My study focuses on teachers‟ behaviours, relationship between teachers and students, and teachers‟ enthusiasm The outlooks relating to these factors coming from Dornyei (2001)‟s theory

- The atmosphere in the classroom

Besides the factors mentioned above, learning and teaching conditions in the classroom contribute to the success or failure of second language learning Concerning this aspect, the outlooks of the theorists such as MacIntyre(1999 and Young, 1999 cited in Dornyei, 2001) and Good & Brophy (1994, cited in Dornyei, 2001) have been mentioned

Besides the factors such as teachers and learners, learning and teaching condition is a factor affecting success or failure of the learners Moreover, it can motivate or demotivate students

 Theoretical background of speaking and the teaching of speaking skill

- What is speaking?

It seems that the concept of speaking is quite familiar to everyone; however, not anybody can give an exact definition of speaking In order to clarify this aspect, the researcher gave the views of Bailey (2005), Brown (1994), Burn & Joyce (1997), and Byrne (1986) On the whole, speaking is a communicative process, including the speaker, the listener, in which, the role of the speaker is providing information, and the hearer‟s is receiving information

- Phases to teaching speaking

According to Byrne (1991), there are three phases to promote students‟ speaking ability They

are presentation phase, practice phase, and production phase.

- Some key issues in teaching speaking

In Bailey (2005)‟s Practical English Language Teaching: Speaking as well as problems dealing with teaching speaking are presented quite clearly; however, in my study, I will only

focus on two main issues that are related to my study: Reticence and dominance in

speaking activities, and multi-level speaking classes.

- Some speaking motivational activities and techniques to motivate students to speak

+ Speaking motivational activities: in this paper, the researcher gave some examples of oral

accuracy practice and oral fluency practice activities that can be used for motivating students in speaking lessons such as games, role play, information gap, conduct interviews, picture describing, and problem-solving activities

+ Techniques: According to Dornyei (2001), the objective of techniques is to „generate and

enhance student motivation, as well as maintain ongoing motivated bahaviour and protect it from distracting and/ or competing action tendencies‟ This means that techniques are used to „increase student involvement and to save the action when ongoing monitoring reveals that progress is slowing, halting, or backsliding‟ (cited in Dorneyi: 2001) In this section, I will present several motivational techniques that can be used to increase their students‟ „commitment, effort and

persistence‟ such as increasing the learners’ self-confidence, building

a supportive learning environment, giving students appropriate guidance, making the

curriculum relevant to the students, and varying speaking activities and topics.

In conclusion, this chapter presents the theoretical background knowledge concerning to the study It has discussed the concepts and issues relating to motivation, types of motivation, the importance of motivation and some factors affecting motivation in second language learning

In addition, several aspects relating to speaking has been presented such as definitions of speaking, phases to teaching speaking, key issues in teaching speaking, speaking motivational activities and techniques to motivate students to speak

The following chapters will display the methodology, the findings, discussion and the recommendations under the light of the above discussed theories

CHAPTER TWO: Methodology presents a general view of the current situation of the

learning and teaching the speaking skill, subjects of the study and research instrument