The use of group work activities for improving speaking skills of the first year students at thai nguyen college of mechanics and metallurgy

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONSCMM: College of Mechanics and Metallurgy ESP: English for Special Purposes ESL: English Foreign Language CLT: Communicative Language Teaching M.A : Master Degree LIS

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE

STUDIES

ĐOÀN THỊ MINH THÚY

THE USE OF GROUP WORK ACTIVITIES FOR IMPROVING SPEAKING SKILLS OF THE FIRST YEAR STUDENTS AT THAI NGUYEN COLLEGE OF MECHANICS AND

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE

STUDIES

ĐOÀN THỊ MINH THÚY

THE USE OF GROUP WORK ACTIVITIES FOR IMPROVING SPEAKING SKILLS OF THE FIRST YEAR STUDENTS AT THAI NGUYEN COLLEGE OF MECHANICS AND

SUPERVISOR : VĂN THỊ THANH BÌNH, M.Ed

HA NOI – 2012

1.2.3 The advantages and disadvantages of using group work 7

1.2.5.1 The role of the teacher 91.2.5.2 The role of each student in group work activities 10

1.2.7 How to design group work activities effectively 14

2.2.1.2 Students’ opinions on learning speaking skills in group work 222.2.1.3 Students’ appreciation of the use of group work in the 23speaking class

2.2.1.4 Difficulties the students have had when working in group work 252.2.1.5 Students’ desire for the better group work 26

2.2.2.1 Teachers’ opinions on teaching speaking skill 292.2.2.2 Teachers’ opinions on the use of group work to teaching 29speaking skill

2.2.2.3 How the teachers use group work in their current speaking class 31

2.2.2.4 Difficulties faced by the teachers when applying group work 34

in the speaking class

2.2.2.5 Teachers’ solutions to overcome their difficulties 36

3.1.2.3 Problems concerning classroom conditions 39

APPENDICES

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

CMM: College of Mechanics and Metallurgy

ESP: English for Special Purposes

ESL: English Foreign Language

CLT: Communicative Language Teaching

M.A : Master Degree

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES Charts

Chart 1: Students’ assessment for the teachers’ frequent use of group work

Chart 2: Student’ appreciation of their participation in group work

Chart 3: The frequency of difficulties

Chart 4: Factors causing difficulties

Chart 5 : Ways students wanted teachers to put them in group

Chart 6: Activities students wished teachers to select for group work

Chart 7: Steps students expect teacher to follow in organizing group work

Chart 8: Ways teacher often used to group students

Chart 9: Activities teachers often selected for group work

Chart 10: Steps teacher followed in organizing group work

Chart 11: Things the teachers often do when the students work in groups

Chart 12: Teachers’ solutions to overcome their obstacles

Tables

Table 1: Students’ opinions on the importance of speaking skill

Table 2: Students’ opinions on learning speaking skills in group work

Table 3: Students’ appreciation of group work for the benefit of speaking skillTable 4: Teachers’ opinion on teaching speaking skill

Table 5: Teachers’ opinions on the use of group work to teaching speaking skillTable 6: The ways teachers prepared and the stages teachers used for group work Table 7: Difficulties faced by the teachers when applying group work in the speaking class

PART 1: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale for the study

Today, English has become an international language It is spoken as a secondlanguage and an official language in many countries, and millions of people speakEnglish as a foreign language Besides, English is considered the medium ofcommunication in many fields such as science, technology, aviation, internet,commerce, and so on Therefore learning and teaching English are getting more andmore important to non-native nations of English, Vietnam is not an exception

In Vietnam, English has been used more and more widely, and it has become themost popular foreign language in the country Thus, people have a great concernabout learning English As a result, English is a compulsory subject at schools andcolleges, and the number of ordinary people learning English nowadays is also onthe rise

To keep pace with the demand of English usage in our society, learners'communicative competence as well as learner-centered learning are the prefered ofapproaches to foreign language teaching today However, for a long time, theteaching of English at The College of Mechanics and Mettalurgy (CMM) wasperformed with traditional teaching methods Much attention is paid to grammaticalcompetence whereas other aspects of language learning such as communicativecompetence do not receive enough attention As a result, though their goal oflearning a foreign language is to communicate in that language, many Vietnamesestudents still find it challenging when talking to, not to mention communicatingsuccessfully with English speaking people

As a teacher of English at CMM, I am aware of the importance of helping studentsbecome communicators of English, and one of the most effective ways that I have

to used to enhance my students' speaking ability is to use group work activities inteaching It is my observation that these activities created more chances for students

to communicate with one another in the medium of English Morever, students oftenappeared less anxious when they worked in groups.

For the above reason, the topic of the use of group work activities for improvingspeaking skills of the first year students at CMM was chosen for this thesis in thehope to study whether group work really help students improve their spokenEnglish

2 Aims of the study

The study is aimed at investigating to clarify how group work is used in thespeaking class of the 1st year students at CMM To be specific, the objectives of thestudy are :

- To clarify students’ opinions of the use of group work activities in the speaking class

- To find the factors that influence the teachers in their application of group work in the speaking class of the 1st year students at CMM

- To suggest practical recommendations for the possibility of group work in the speaking class of the 1st year students at CMM

3 Scope of the study

To improve speaking skill of the 1st year students at CMM, the researcher intends toinvestigate the current situation of using group work in the speaking class of the 1styear students at CMM and then making some suggestions for improvement it Thestudy was carried out with the participation of 70 first-year students and 8 teachers

of English

4 Research questions

This study is implemented to find answers to the following research questions:

1 What do the students think of the use of group work activities in the speaking class

of the first year students at CMM?

2 What facilitates and hinders the teachers from using group work in the speaking class at CMM ?

3 What suggestions for improvement should be used to make group work activities successful in speaking class of the first year students at CMM?

5 Methods of the study

In order to examine the situation of the study, this research used questionnaires The datacollected from the questionnaires (both for students and teachers), will be analyzed andgeneralized

6 Design of the study

The study has three main parts as follows:

Part 1: Introduction

This part introduces the rationale, the aims, the scope and the design of the study

Part 2: Development

This part consists of three chapters:

Chapter 1: Literature review

Chapter 2: Research methodology

Chapter 3: Findings and recommendations

Part 3: Conclusion

This part summaries all the major findings and suggestions The limitations of the

study and recommendations for the further studies are also include in this part

PART 2: DEVELOPMENTCHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Speaking skill and teaching speaking skill

1.1.1 Definitions of speaking

There are various definitions of speaking and the popular acceptance comes from

Jones, R (1989:86) who defines speaking as “Speaking is a form of communication,

so it is important that what you say conveyed in the most effective way.” Speaking is

one of the basic skills that must be mastered by students since it is very importantfor them to communicate in the class or outside the class They must practice itespecially in learning teaching in order to be fluent, without an ability to speak, itwould be impossible to have a natural communication among people Brown and

Yule (1989:14) state in their book “Speaking is to express the needs request,

information, service, etc.” The speakers say a word to the listener not only to

express what in their mind but also to express what they need Most people mightspend their everyday life communicating with others Bygate (1987) claims that

"speaking is a skill which deserves attention as much as the literary skills in both native and foreign languages" When students speak in a confident and comfortable

way, they can interact better in real daily situations Because of this, it is necessary

to encourage the development of the students' ability of fluency in spoken English.Developing fluency implies taking risks by using language in a relaxed, friendlyatmosphere-an atmosphere of trust and support Speaking fluently, of course,involves speaking easily and appropriately with others

1.1.2 Teaching and learning speaking skill

People use oral language as their most means of communication-all people havedeveloped a form of oral language Skill and fluency in speaking have dramaticeffects upon life in general The recent emphasis on communication has focusedparticular attention on ways of promoting speaking skills This is a question ofdeveloping not only language competence but also language use Speaking activities

aim, therefore, to develop the confidence, desire, and ability to use the targetlanguage accurately and appropriately and effectively for the purposes ofcommunication as well Teaching speaking is to prepare students to be able to uselanguage How this preparation is done and how successful it is depend on how we

as teachers understand our aims For students, learning to speak a foreign language

is considered to be one of the most difficult aspects of language learning To helpstudents be able to use that foreign language to express themselves intelligibly,reasonably, accurately without too much hesitation, teachers must provide themwith an environment within in which they can communicate freely, and in whichthey can work together independently with only the minimum amount of directionfrom the teachers In the light of what is known about the nature of languagelearning process and given many demands while speaking activities can makelearners, it is important to set attainable objectives and to have realistic expectationabout learners' achievements This requires a certain attitude on the part of theteachers towards the learners' performance, particularly with regard to the classorganization as group work and the use of communicative strategies to teachsimultaneously

1.2 Group work in a speaking lesson

1.2.1 Definitions of group work

Group work has been incorporated into language teaching and learning in most parts

of the world since the emergence of the CLT up work, in a language class, is a operative during which students share aims and responsibilities to complete a taskassigned by the teacher in groups or in pairs

co-According to Sprott (cited in Metcalfe 1959:9), " a group as a number of people

who interact with another one, who are psychological aware of one another and who perceive themselves to be a group" Doff (1988:137) defines group work is a

process that “the teacher divides the class into small groups to work together

(usually four or five students in each group), as in pair work, all the groups work at the same time.”

In spite of the different definitions, it can be said that in group work, all the membershave chances to cooperate with others They learn to negotiate to listen to differentopinions They participate more equally and in most cases they feel free toexperiment and use the language In group work, the focus is not only on the productbut also on the process and the skills which are activated in order to achieve it.

1.2.2 Types of group work

Davis (1993) divides group work into 3 types:

- Informal learning groups

- Formal learning groups

Informal learning groups are temporary clusterings of the students with a single

class session Informal learning groups can be initiated, for example, by askingstudents to turn to partners and spend several minutes discussing a question theteacher has raised The teacher can also form groups of three or five to solve aproblem Informal learning groups can be organized at anytime in a class of any size

to check on students' understanding of the material, to give students an opportunity

to apply what they are learning, or to provide a change of pace Informal learninggroups have a short lifetime ranging from a few minutes to the class period Withinformal learning groups, the tasks are generally created quickly, for example, the

teacher may say "discuss the questions with your partners" and have little

explanation

Formal learning groups are teams established to complete a specific task, such as

perform a lab experiment, write a report, or carry out a project These groups maycomplete their task in a single class session or over several weeks Typically,students work together until the task is finished and their work is graded Formallearning groups can last several days or several weeks They require more planning.They also have greater explanation

Study teams are long-term groups (usually existing during the course of a semester)

with stable membership whose primary responsibility is to provide members with

support, encouragement, and assistance in completing course requirements andassignments Study teams also inform their members about lectures and assignmentswhen someone has missed a session The larger the class the more complex thesubject matter, the more valuable study teams can be.

1.2.3 The advantages and disadvantages of using group work

1.2.3.1 Advantages

Clearly, group work can increase the student talking time, which increases thespeaking skill In other word, group work helps improved communication Thestudents who have little chance to talk to each other now can share ideas, becomeclose in the short time and above all solve the common problem assigned by theteacher

Besides, working in groups helps students to produce greater output Simplybecause of the number of people involved, each with different experience,knowledge, points of view and values, a larger number and variety of ideas can begiven Moreover, the exchange of the ideas in the group can act as a stimulus whichwill encourage individuals to give more ideas, more opinions and thereforecontribute more to group work activities

In addition to this, group work helps to reduce bias The shared responsibility in agroup in coming to decisions can encourage individuals to explore seeminglyrealistic ideas and to challenge accepted ways of doing things Individual biases andprejudices can be challenged by the group, forcing the individual to recognize them.Group pressure can also encourage individuals to accept that change is need

Finally, students’ group work frees the teacher from the usual role of “an expert

who always lectures” and allows him/her to walk to each group, to guide, to answer

questions from students or to encourage students to work actively

(Harmer, 1999:116)

1.2.3.2 Disadvantages

One obvious disadvantage is the noise made by the group who have a big argument

on the problem or by the group who are so excited about working with one another

It is hard for the teacher to control these kinds of groups This can distract the othergroups.

The very bad effect of working in groups is that many passive students or lazystudents let their friends do everything provided that they still have their names inthe group’s result

Working in group can cause competitions Most students working in a group

unconsciously perceive the situations as a competition This generates a destructivebehavior and drains the creative energy of the group For example, we oftenperceive disagreement with our ideas as a put-down The natural reaction is toregain our self-esteem, often by trying to sabotage the ideas of those who disagreedwith us Instead of looking for ways to improve their ideas we chose to destroythem Eager to express our own ideas, we may totally ignore what others suggest.Power-seekers may use ploys such as highlighting flaws in others' arguments,barbed questions and displays of expertise to show their supremacy These types ofbehavior create an atmosphere which is incompatible with effective problemsolving

Another disadvantage is that working in group is a relatively slow process comparedwith working alone It requires individuals to come together at an assigned time,usually for about a long time, and this can cause organizational problems It is reallytime-consuming It is not only time-consuming for the students in group but also forthe teacher The teacher needs more time to organize the group work and control allthe members in the group let alone the unsuitable students in groups which makesthe class in disorder

To conclude, although there are some disadvantages of group work, the advantagesstill outweighs Learning from each other in small groups is much more effectivethan from the teacher alone

(Harmer, 1999:116)

1.2.4 Group-size

Group size is very flexible depending on many aspects such as task type, the timeavailable, the class and how skillful the group members are? How big the groupshould be?

The smaller the group is, the more chance each member has The fewer skills ofmanaging the teacher need to have However, when the group is small, there will be

a lot of small groups in the class This also leads to the lack of time for them to givereport to the class So how many members in each group is enough?

Many authors have suggested that three to five in one group can be the best number.Four-member group is suggested by Honeyfield (1991), I-Jung (2004), Ngoh(1991) Four members in a group might lead to more interesting and challengingtasks, with a wide range of opinions being expressed, and more negotiation requiredfor the group members to reach an agreement Six members in a group should be themaximum number (Honeyfield, 1991; I-Jung, 2004) It can clearly be seen that four

is the optimum size to manage students learning It allows a good range ofexperiences and individual contributions

1.2.5 The role of the teacher and the role of each student in group work

activities

When students work in groups, teachers must assist them These are some of thethings they have to do:

1.2.5.1 The role of the teacher

Select activities carefully: Teachers should ensure that the activities can be done

reasonably well with language and students It means that teachers should decidewhat they are going to pre- teach and let students ask for what they realise theyneed

Work out the instructions for an activity carefully: Presenting the activity to the

class will be a major factor in its success Teachers must keep instructions simple,and use mother tongue if necessary

Present the activity to the class: Teachers can use mother tongue if necessary;

however, try to use English as much as possible because both their explanation andevaluation activities are very real use of language in a classroom situation Teachersshould give plenty of examples and students a "trial run"

Monitor the students' performance: While students are working in groups, teachers

must move around the class and to listen to them in order to find out how thestudents are getting on Teachers can also join groups and work as a member.Teachers should not correct mistakes as a rule, but make a note of them and usethem as the basis of feedback

Provide feedback: There is a set of ways of providing feedback For example,

teachers may ask students to give their ideas first before giving their opinion Amajor kind of feedback is often concerned with language If during monitoring ofthe activities, teachers have detected mistakes, they may choose to point these out tothe class afterwards Alternatively, they may use errors they have noted as the basisfor remedial or further teaching

Keep a record: It is important to keep a record of the activities teachers have done

with the class, together with any comments on the students' performance Teachersshould also note down any ideas for further activities which occur to them ormodifications of existing ones

Donn Byrne (1986:77)

1.2.5.2 The role of each student in group work activities

According to Ruben (1998) students have to implement two kinds of roles in order

to accomplish group goal They are task roles and group building and maintenanceroles

Task roles: When working in groups, students work together to gather information,

make recommendations, solve a problem or complete a specific task Task roles as acontributor, a analyzer, a coordinator, a recorder and a encourager are performed bystudents As a contributor, each student takes part in organizing the group's work,making all group members understand the task, taking the group's questions, or

proposing new ideas or changing way of regarding the group problem goal As ananalyzer, he helps solve the problems, move the group rapidly to the core of theproblem and examine the reasoning behind each contribution to the discussion As acoordinator, he shows or clarifies the relationships among various ideas andsuggestions and tries to pull them together As a recorder, he writes down thegroup's responses, data or collection on a group response sheet or writes down theproduct of discussion As an encourager, he offers support or encouragement togroup members and keeps others' feeling comfortable when working together.

Group building and maintenance roles: These roles require all the members to

assume responsibility for promoting, building and maintaining positive attitudes and

a positive group spirit Maintenance roles are concerned with the feelings ofindividual members and the emotional behavior of the group Each member of thegroup acts as an active listener, a compromiser and a follower As an active listener,the student recognizes the contributions of the others and responds with specificverbal or non - verbal reinforcement For example, he can nod his head, smile or say

" good" or "great idea" As a compromiser, he, together with other members, makesdecisions when a discussion of two prominent positions emerges He also makes attempts

to reconcile disagreement or relieves tension in conflict situations through jesting As afollower, he accepts the ideas of the others in a passive role

Leader roles: Each group should have its own leader If the student is appointed the

leader of the group by the teacher or his friends or he may volunteer, he will serves

as a link between the group and the teacher and among group members It meansthat his function is not to dominate the group but to coordinate the group members'activities

1.2.6 Some common activities for group work

Many ESL teachers agree on that students learn to speak in the second language by

"interacting" Communicative language teaching and collaborative learning servebest for this aim CLT is based on real-life situations that require communication

By using this method in ESL classes, students will have the opportunity of

communicating with each other in the target language ESL teachers should create aclassroom environment where students have real-life communication, authenticactivities, and meaningful tasks that promote oral language This can occur whenstudents collaborate in groups to achieve a goal or to complete a task The list ofsome common activities is given below.

Information gap

In this activity, students are supposed to be working in pairs or in groups One ortwo students have the information that other partners do not have and they willshare information Information gap activity serves purposes such as solving aproblem, collecting information Each partner plays an important role because thetask cannot be completed if the partners do not provide the information the othersneed This activity is effective because everybody has opportunity to talkextensively in the target language

Discussion

This activity is often used in the new textbook In this activity, the students may aim

to arrive, may aim at a conclusion, share ideas about an events, find solutions intheir discussion groups Before the discussion, teachers have to set the purpose ofthe discussion activity In this way discussion points are relevant to this purpose, sothat students do not spend their time chatting with each other about irrelevantthings For efficient group discussions, it is always better not to form large groups,because quiet students may avoid contributing in large groups The group memberscan be either assigned by the teacher or the students may determine it by

themselves, but groups should be rearranged in every discussion activity so thatstudents can work with various people and learn to be open to different ideas It isimportant that whatever the aim of group discussion is, students should beencouraged to ask questions, paraphrase ideas, express support and check forclarification

Students can conduct interviews on selected topics with various people Conductinginterviews with people gives students a chance to practice their speaking ability notonly in class but also outside and helps them become socialized After interviews,each student can present his or her results of the interviews to the class To helpstudents carry out interviews effectively, teachers should provide a rubric tostudents so that they know what type of questions they can ask or what path tofollow

Role- play:

One of the ways of getting students to speak is role-playing Students pretend theyare in various social contexts and have a variety of social roles In role play activity,teacher can give information to the students such as who they are and what theythink or feel

Communication games: These activities are often designed in class According to

Byrne and Rixon (1979), even though games are often associated with fun, teachershould not lose sight of their pedagogical values, particularly in second languageteaching Games are effective because they provide motivation, lower students'stress, and give them the opportunity for real communication Naturally whenplaying games, students are trying to win or to beat other teams for themselves or onthe behalf of their team They are so competitive while playing because they want tohave a turn to play, to score points and to win In the class, students will definitelyparticipate in the speaking activities

Problem solving: Problem-solving activities as well as others are utilized in the

class to facilitate communicative skills The students are often in groups, then theytalk together to find out a solution for a problem or task given The problem solvingactivities stimulate the students to talk and to listen to the others

Drama: Drama is a more formalized form of role-play and simulation, with a

pre-planned story line and script Sometimes small groups may prepare their own shortdramatization of some event, writing the script and rehearsing the scene as a group

But they are time consuming and rarely can form part of a typical schoolcurriculum.

Projects: Mainly for young learners who can greatly benefit from hands-on

approaches to language, certain projects can be rewarding indeed For example, theteacher choose a topic on environment, various small groups could each be doingdifferent things: Group A creats an environmental bulletin board for the rest of theschool; group B develops fact sheets; group C make a threee dimensional display;group D puts out a newsletter for the rest of the school; group E develop a skit, and

so on

Opinion exchange: Opinion exchange is a difficult teachnique for students to deal

with at the beginning levels of proficiency, but by the intermediate level, certaintechniques can effectively include the exchange of various opinions Sometimes,opinions are appropriate; sometimes they are not In opinion exchanges, the teachermust assure all students in the class that, while there may be disagreement on issues,all opinions are to be valued, not scorned, and respected, not ridiculed

1.2.7 How to design group work activities effectively

1.2.7.1 Forming students in groups

According to Byrne in Longman Handbook for Language Teachers, the group sizeshould be worked out in the relation to the total number of students in class.Usually, a group of 3 to 5 is appropriate in speaking lessons Teachers can formgroups themselves, normally on the basis of the mixed class ability (i.e good andweak students together), since as a rule learners do help one another Sometimes,teachers want the students to work together on tasks which have been selected tosuit their abilities It means that teachers form students of more or less equal ability,

so that they will be free to give their attention to those who most need help Byrnealso suggests that each group should have an identifying label (i.e name or number)and set position in the classroom to work in so that when students are asked to work

in groups, they can do so with the minimum fuss and delay Usually group workwill involve some re-arrangement of the classroom furniture When concerning the

allocation of members into groups, Hurd (2000) states that most selection methods

fall into four categories They are:

 Self- selection

 Selective appointment

This table below describes the above grouping methods suggested by him

Description of Students are Students form their Students are Students are

(e.g mark, skill ) particular topic.Advantages of - Easy to Students have their - Students find it - Students find it

- Students find it easy to work - Students can working with other

compatible same interestmembers - Shirking will be

reducedDisadvantages - Students - Students mostly - That students - Selection bias,

of the method have no tend to choose with with bad marks may not break up

choice to their close friends working together in fiends

form their - Students do not a group leads to - Group size isgroup find it fair bad results affected as there

- Can be time- are two few or twoconsuming may nominations

for a particulartopic

Although there are a set of way forming group, it can be reported that there is no

fixed rule to form students in group Teachers had better try different ways at

different occasion in order to find out the most suitable one which helps his students

to work most effectively in such groups

1.2.7.2 Preparing for students to work in group

When working in groups, many students often experience the feeling of havingnothing to say on the subject, which will certainly be an obstacle for communicationprocess and make them feel inhibited or less confident to speak in group work.Therefore, preparing students well for the group work must involve the pre-teaching

of the relevant language Teachers also explain to students why they are doingactivities of this kind One thing important is that teachers should assist theirstudents to generate some ideas through mini discussion or through brainstorming

1.2.7.3 Monitoring group work activities

When discussing monitoring group work, Jaques (1984) says that it is essential thatteachers should monitor the groups but not to hover Sharing the same idea, Cohen(1986) emphasizes on the supportive supervision of the teachers for the students ingroup work activities This type includes the following of the teachers' roles:

- giving feedback

- redirecting group with questions

- encouraging group to solve its own problem

1.2.7.4 Ending group work activities

To sustain students' motivation to involve in the groupwork activities, it isnecessary that teachers should know how to end groupwork effectively Therefore,

after students have finished their task, teachers should ensure that groups'performance is accessed and that the groups know their members are doing whoneeds more assistance in completing the task and lazy students need to know theycannot let others do all the work while they sit silently Giving groups anopportunity to evaluate other groups' performance is also important This createscompetition among groups and each member of the groups tries their best to workeffectively to become the winner.

1.3 Summary

This chapter provided the theoretical background relevant to aspects concerning thetopic of the study Firstly, it presents the general discussion of speaking skill andteaching and learning it Then it gives the theories relating to the groupworkactivities in teaching and learning speaking skill such as definitions of groupwork,advantages and disadvantages of using group work activities, discussion on the roles

of the teachers and students , emphasis on effective groupwork activity design inspeaking lessons

CHAPTER 2: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

2.1 Design and methodology

2.1.1 The setting of the study

The College of Mechanics and Metallurgy (CMM) is a technical college whichtrains skilled workers and practical engineers of engineering and metallurgy for thewhole country It is located in Thai Nguyen - a northern mountainous province.Accordingly, the teaching and learning conditions are not very good The collegedoes not have special rooms for students to learn the foreign languages Theteaching facilities are only textbooks, board, and chalk and cassette There is notany modern equipment for teaching and practising English The reference books arevery poor in the college library In addition, the class size is large of about 70students Consequently, the teaching and learning of English is limited

English is a common and compulsory subject at CMM The students learn totally 11credits in which 8 credits are for General English and 3 for ESP The teachers ofEnglish Language Teaching Division are in charge of setting the syllabus, choosing

teaching materials for the course In here New Headway Elementary written by John

& Liz Soars is chosen to be the main course book for all the students at CMM at theearly stage (General English) For ESP, students learn the in-house materials compiled bythe English teachers of the college

When students enter the college, they are at different levels of English languageproficiency Most of them studied English, some of them learnt French, Chinese orRussian at high school However, students are not divided into different groupsdepending on their levels of language proficiency, because there has never been anofficial examination to classify them Accordingly, all of them take the same course

as the beginners of English language In addition, the limited class time and largeclass size, lack of reference books… are big problems for effective teaching and learning

In class, although speaking skill is not seperately taught, particular emphasis isplaced on speaking and listening The primary goal is to teach communicatecompetence, that is the ability to communicate in English in a like-real situations.The activities in the book are pair work, discussion (mostly appear in any smalllesson of each unit) and whole class activities involving information sharing androle-play to encourage real communication.

Speaking skill at our college is considered to be so important that any student has totake an oral exam at the end of each semester which includes 2 parts (individualresponse and discussion) Discussion part is more emphasized In this way, studentshave the opportunities to personalize the English language they have learnt, makingfull use of their own knowledge and experiences to express their own ideas andopinions

2.1.2 Data collection instrument

The survey questionnaire is one of the most effective instruments for collecting data

in social science Advantages of using questionnaire which Gillham (2000)highlights are: less pressure on respondents, not under pressure of interview biasand analysis of answer is straightforward The researcher used the surveyquestionnaire as the main sources to fulfill its aims Two sets of questionnaires weredesigned to investigate the teachers’ and the students’ opinion about the use ofgroup work in the speaking classes of the 1st year students at CMM Clearinstructions were given when the questionnaire was administered

The first is the questionnaire for students which includes 11 questions written only

in English, was administered to the 70 first year students The questionnaire wasdivided into 5 main parts:

Part 1: Students’ opinion on speaking (Questions 1,2)

Part 2: Students’ opinions on learning speaking skills in group work (Question 3) Part 3: Students’ judgment of the use of group work in their speaking class at

CMM (Questions 4, 5, 6)

- Students’ judgment of teachers’ frequency of the use group work (by percent) (Question 4).

- Students’ judgment of their participation in group work (Question 5)

- Students’ judgment of group work for the benefit of speaking skill.(Question 6)

Part 4: Difficulties students have experienced when working in groups (Questions 7, 8).Part 5: Students’ desires in learning speaking through group work (Questions 9, 10, 11).The second is the questionnaire for the teachers including 14 questions written only in English, was administered to 8 teachers This is divided into 5 parts:

Part 1: Teachers’ opinions on speaking skill (Question 1)

Part 2: Teachers’ opinion on the use of group work to teaching speaking skill

Part 5: The teachers’ solutions to overcome their difficulties (Question 14)

For futher information of the collected statistical data, the researcher read thecompleted surveys and dialogued with each teacher and some specific students toexplain clearly their opinions

2.1.3 The participants

2.1.3.1 The teachers

The teachers asked are all teaching at CMM and all teaching the first year students.There are eight female teachers Their ages are from 24 to 35 years old with at leasttwo years’ experience in teaching English They were mostly trained in Vietnam, atThai Nguyen College of Education, and Hanoi National University, College ofForeign Languages Among them, three have MA from from National University,College of Foreign languages They are all professionally experienced with EFL

2.1.3.2 The students

The study is conducted with the voluntary participation of 70 first-year students.They are all in the same class CDCK49A of the Mechanics Faculty The numbers ofmales and females are not equivalent: 66 males and 4 females All the students are

at the ages from 19 to 24, and come from different provinces in the North andCentral of Vietnam When entering the college, the students are at different levels ofEnglish language proficiency Most of them studied English, some of them learntFrench, Chinese or Russian at high school Nevertheless, students are not dividedinto different groups depending on their levels of language proficiency, becausethere has never been a placement test in the college to classify them So some ofthem are relatively good and active while some remain passive and quiet in thespeaking class

2.2 Preliminary results

In this part, the preliminary results will be presented before the concrete result

2.2.1 Student survey

2.2.1.1 Students’ opinions on speaking skill

a English speaking is compulsory at your college 24%

Table 1: Students’ opinions on the importance of speaking skill

22

while there are only a few students (16%) who want to learn speaking skill just topass the oral test Also from this table, an interesting fact was that 97% of therespondent said that speaking skill was very important to them, none of the studentsanswered that speaking skill was not important.

In short, it can be concluded that speaking skill is very important and necessary toall the first year students at CMM Most of them find it very interesting

2.2.1.2 Students’ opinions on learning speaking skills in group work

How much do you like to pratice Not at all Little Rather Very

speaking skill ?

Table 2: Students’ opinions on learning speaking skills in group work.

Table 2 shows that all the students asked (100%) reported that they had very littlefavor for working individually, 46% of them rather like working in a small group,and 51% really like working in group in the speaking skill And no student said thatthey did not like working on their own From this, it can be understood that most ofthe students see the importance of working in group for the better speaking skill.Additionally, when being asked, majority of them supposed that, among the fourskills, group work was the most appropriate for speaking skill Next came readingskill and writing skill Listening skill ranked last for group work appropriateness

To sum up, the analysis of data in table 2 reveals that most of the students like tolearn English is groups an they think speaking skill is the most appropriate skill forapplying group work

2.2.1.3 Students’ appreciation of the use of group work in the speaking class at CMM

Always Often

Sometimes

Never

Chart1: Students’ assessment for the teachers’ frequent use of group work

As can be seen from chart 1, 29% of the students answered their teachers alwaysused group work in the speaking class at CMM and the rest 71% supposed that theirteachers often apply these activities Some students said that the teachers' frequentuse of group work really encouraged and promoted them to work actively and creatEnglish environment for them to pratice the target language as well

Chart 2: Student’ appreciation of their participation in group work

From chart 2, when working in groups in the speaking class, 50% of the studentsworked with great interest and the number of the students who did not participate ingroup work by chatting with other groups or speaking Vietnamese is so big (20%and 24%) that it must be looked into consideration about the group work amongthese students In addition to that, the number in the table also implies that some

students may have very low proficiency of speaking skill or not enough Englishbackground knowledge to communicate with their partners or may be the topic is nointerest to them etc.

When being asked why some of them kept silent in the speaking lesson, they saidthey did not know what to speak and how to speak The teacher asked them to speakEnglish in group means making them quiet But when the teacher asked them tocontribute their ideas in Vietnamese, they said that they could not think of anything.Another reason why they kept silent is that many students could not understand theEnglish–speaking teachers’ instructions

Table 3: Students’ appreciation of group work for the benefit of speaking skill

all

a Speak more in English

for exchanging ideas

It was obvious that group work had great benefit on students' learning process Allthe students (100%) found group work very beneficial to help them speak more inEnglish, feel more confident and exchange their ideas with their classmates.Regarding the benefit of learning from each other of group work, 71% of thestudents stated that it was rather beneficial but only 29% of them think it is a littlebeneficial Below is what they said

"Working in groups could help me to improve my English, so I become more confident".