Common errors in english speaking lessons of english –major freshmen at thuong mai university

THUONGMAI UNIVERSITY ENGLISH FACULTY ---GRADUATION PAPER Topic: COMMON ERRORS IN ENGLISH SPEAKING LESSONS OF ENGLISH – MAJOR FRESHMEN AT THUONG MAI UNIVERSITY Supervisor: Pham Thi Xuan H

THUONGMAI UNIVERSITY ENGLISH FACULTY

-GRADUATION PAPER

Topic:

COMMON ERRORS IN ENGLISH SPEAKING LESSONS OF ENGLISH –

MAJOR FRESHMEN AT THUONG MAI UNIVERSITY

Supervisor: Pham Thi Xuan Ha (M.A)

Student: Trinh Thi Thuong

Class: K52N3

Student Code: 16D170186

HANOI, 2019

First and foremost, I would like to express my deep gratitude to mysupervisor, Mrs Nguyen Thi Lan Phuong, for her guidance and encouragementduring my study I am very grateful for being accepted as her student This studycould be completed on schedule thank to her value advices and support

Beside, I would also like to express my sincere thanks to all teachers inEnglish faculty of Thuongmai University, especially Mrs Nguyen Thi Xuan Phuongand Mrs Phan Tu Lan spent their time answering my interview questions to help

Nguyen Thi Thanh Hao

Nowadays, speaking is one of the most important skills have when studentslearn English In particular, completing speaking skills will help students havebetter communication skills as well as give students great advantages in the future

Therefore, the research topic: Common errors in English speaking lessons of

English –major freshmen at Thuong Mai University are necessary to improve the

speaking skills of English students of ThuongMai University

This study aims to list the errors that freshmen students often encounter whenpracticing speaking English Data in the study was collected by 20 freshmen ofEnglish department at ThuongMai University Research results show that studentsoften encounter problems with grammar, psychology and learning environmentwhen practicing speaking English In addition, the research also providestechniques, solutions and suggestions for students and teachers, hoping that thosesolutions will help freshman ThuongMai University

TABLE OF CONTENTS

HANOI, 2019 1

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT i

ABSTRACT ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iii

LIST OF DIAGRAM v

LIST OF ABBREVIATION vi

CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY 1

1.1 Rationale 1

1.2 Previous study 2

1.3 Aims of the study 5

1.4 Research subjects 5

1.5 Scope of the study 7

1.6 Research methodology 7

1.7 Organization of the study 8

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 9

2.1 Definitions of speaking 9

2.1.1 Purpose of speaking 9

2.2 Definition of errors 10

2.2.1 Types of speaking errors 10

2.3 Technique 12

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND RESEARCH FINDINGS 13

3.1 General Introduction of English Department of Thuong Mai University .13 3.2 Settings 13

3.3 Participants 13

3.4 Data collection 14

3.5 Situation of speaking English of students at ThuongMai University 14

3.6 The results of questionnaire and data analysis 15

3.7 Main findings and discussion 25

3.7.1 Difficulties in English speaking of students at ThuongMai University 25

3.7.2 The solutions for the difficulties in speaking English of English –major

freshmen at Thuong Mai University 25

CHAPTER 4: RECOMMENDATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS 27

4.1 Recommendations 27

4.1.1 Recommendations for students at ThuongMai University 27

4.1.2 Recommendations for teachers at ThuongMai University 29

4.2 Limitations and suggestions for further researches 30

CONCLUSION 31

LIST OF DIAGRAM

Figure 3.1: The amount of time students learnt English 15

Figure 3.2:English practice time of students 16

Figure 3.3: The importance of speaking English skills in ThuongMai University 17

Figure 3.4: The importance factors of speaking English skills 18

Figure 3.5: Common mistakes when speaking English 19

Figure 3.6: Common pronunciation error when speaking English 20

Figure 3.7: Common pronunciation error when speaking English 21

Figure 3.8: Students opinions about speaking exercises 22

Figure 3.9: Students opinions about speaking exercises 23

Figure 3.10: Students’ solutions to improve their English speaking skill 24

LIST OF ABBREVIATION

EFL: English as a foreign language

DNTU: Dong Nai Technology University

FELTE: Faculty of English Language Teacher EducationULIS: University of Language and International StudiesVNU: Vietnam National University

TMU: Thuongmai University

SL: Source language

TL: Target language

CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY

1.1 Rationale

In modern times, English has been playing a huge role in the development ofthe world English is one of the most widely used languages today Currently,outside the UK, more than 60 countries choose English as the official language, out

of about 7.5 billion people worldwide, up to 1.5 billion of the population speakEnglish, more than 400 million people over the world The whole world speaksEnglish as their first language - according to Wikipedia English is now not only alanguage but also a bridge for community links and social relationships Moreover,

in the age of globalism, "we live today, interdependently Between countries createsglobal language demand and no language qualifies for this well than English(Abousenna, 1995) English is also a key for Vietnamese businesses to cooperatewith foreign businesses more easily In fact, English has become an important assetfor people who looking for a job in business, industry or technology in Vietnam?Most companies and corporations now require employees to be fluent in English,need professional knowledge and foreign language to work with foreign partners.Recognizing the importance of English, Vietnam's education system hasturned English into a compulsory subject from the elementary school years anduniversity Students will learn 4 skills (listening - speaking - reading – writing)

In particular, speaking is the most important skill and also extremely importantwhen communicating in daily life Linguist Khamkhien said: "Speaking is one ofthe most important skills when learning a foreign language, including English It is

a means for learners to communicate with others, achieve certain goals or express,opinions, intentions, hopes and perspectives In general, students of ThuongMaiUniversity in particular still face many difficulties and make many mistakes whenlearning English, especially speaking skills

As a student of English major at ThuongMai University, the writerunderstands the problems of freshmen students when learning and practicingspeaking skills During the learning process, the writer also encountered similarproblems, such as: grammatical errors, poor expression, or even afraid to express

opinions in English Because of these reasons, the writer decided to research thetopic: Common errors in English speaking lessons of English –major freshmen atThuong Mai University This study will identify errors in the English speakingprocess, to help students solve problems and improve their English speaking skills.

As a result, learning will become easier

1.2 Previous study

There are many documents that shown the problems of English speakingskills, including both domestic and foreign For foreign documents, one of the most

striking and detailed study belongs to Shiamaa Torky (2006): The Effectiveness of

a Task- Based Instruction program in Developing the English Language Speaking Skills of Secondary Stage Students This is one of the most scientific and

detailed studies

This study aims to determine the importance of speaking skills Besides, theresearch also shows the necessary skills in practicing speaking skills of secondarystudents Not only that, the research also proposes appropriate strategies to buildand design a curriculum suitable for developing speaking skills for students

The content of the study is very detailed and scientific The study came upwith very specific figures on English speaking status in Egypt, specifically thefollowing:

“1- 88% of teachers do not have adequate knowledge of the speaking skillsnecessary for students Most of them focus on grammar, sentence structure andpronunciation neglect and other important secondary skills such as, organizingcoherent discourse, conversation management, etc

2 - Students are also not encouraged to plan speeches activities included in thestudent's course book, teachers intervened more than once to correct grammar andpronunciation errors Similarly, teachers do not give students any opportunity toself-assess their speaking performance

3- 78% of these high school teachers expressed a need for better teachingstrategies and methods to help increase student and motivation

Willingness to actively participate in speaking tasks and thus improve

their speaking skills ”

Not only that, the study also outlines solutions for students to improvespeaking skills from social interaction tasks, such as: Social interactive tasks: Thesetasks are those involving a relatively detectable degree of role transparency.Examples of these tasks are role-play, drama, scenario, and interviews

a) Task -based role plays:

Role plays fictional to all sorts of tasks where learners imagine themselves in asituation outside; sometimes playing the role of someone other than themselves(Dinapoli, 2000 and Liao, 2001).The most critical element to consider whendesigning role-play tasks is that they should satisfy communicative tasks criteriaespecially the focus on a certain outcome to be achieved at the end of the task Inother words, role play tasks should include a problem solving element (Willis,1996)

(b) Interview tasks:

Interviews can encourage students to share personal information of differentkinds This includes: anecdotes (talking about terrible accidents), personalreminiscences (talking about past regrets of doing or not doing something),attitudes, opinions, preferences (talking about favorite places to go) and personalreactions (what makes you annoyed / stressed / happy and so on) (Martin, 1997).Interviews encourage students to use the necessary question-and-answerstructures With advanced learners, language functions like asking for confirmation(Did you mean that ? Do you really think that ?) hesitating (well, let me see ),contradicting and interrupting (hold on a minute) can be practiced as well (Dinapoli,2000)

This research has brought a lot of positive results First, research has shownthe effectiveness of using direct interaction tasks during speaking practice Theseinteractive tasks can increase students' confidence during practice In addition, theresearch also points out that instructional strategies for students based on practicaltasks will be more effective In addition, the study also provides students with clearinstructions before speaking practice, which helps students to be better prepared andimprove their speaking skills This is consistent with the results of other studies

such as Slade & Gardner (1993), Kubota (1995), House (1996), and Bejarano(1997)

One of the other impressive foreign studies is by Nadeem Khan and Arshard

Ali (2010): Improving the speaking ability in English: The students ’perspective.

This is one of the researches based on student's perspective The study was created

with the goal of helping students see English as a subject, a language category, not

to help students get high scores in exams

The main content of the study clearly stated the view that teachers shouldprovide students with a friendly learning environment, and encourage students toask teachers questions The reason is because student opinions are so importantright now, because today is the media age, student opinions will also help teachers alot

By surveying 40 random students, the study found that both teachers andstudents greatly influenced the development of students' speaking skills.Specifically, about questions that teachers speak English most of the time, 17(42.5%) student said "Yes" "written 23 (57.5%) said" NO "in this connection 18(45%) students replied that they are responsible for the poor speaking ability, while

22 (55%) students said "NO" in this regard Teachers were the main cause of poorspeaking ability 15 (37.5%) students said "YES" but 25 (62.5%) said "NO" in thisrelation 25 (62.5%) students were of the opinion that teachers and students wereequally responsible for the poor speaking ability while 15 (37.5%) did not think so.Finally, the study suggests that students should be motivated regularly, asteachers should not discourage students Teachers should encourage students tolisten to news sites such as BBC or CNN to improve their speaking knowledge, andeven put hot news on the test to increase student thinking

For studies in Vietnam, one of the very detailed analysis documents that the

author has referenced is the study of Truong Tran Minh Nhat (2018): The current

status of speaking English and proposing some self – training activities outside class for technical students at Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City Truong

Tran Minh Nhat's research was created with the goal of analyzing the

English-speaking situation of engineering students, while also proposing some self-trainingactivities outside the classroom.

Regarding the main content, the research shows the reality of English speaking

of students at Ho Chi Minh City University of Industry By surveying 160 students,the majority of students were freshmen, second year and third year students, thestudy showed that students now assess that speaking skills are skills that studentshave a lot of difficulties with The study also pointed out the causes and factorsaffecting students' speaking skills: little vocabulary base, the ability to use grammarflexibly, the training has not been focused and regularly,

With the above figures, the Study has proposed some activities for students tohelp students improve their English speaking level such as: actual communication

in public places, participation English clubs, discussion with friends on speaking forums, etc The study also draws the conclusion that English speakingskills need regular and long-term practice to produce results Good for students.Students also need confidence and patience to communicate a lot to be able toimprove their skills Research also shows that English speaking skills are veryimportant and necessary not only in the learning process but also a great deal in jobinterview and after graduation

English-1.3 Aims of the study

This study contains the following purposes:

- Understand the basic knowledge of speaking

- Find out the situation of learning to speak English at the ThuongMaiUniversity

- Find out the common mistakes in the English speaking process of freshmen

at the ThuongMai University

- Find out the appropriate skills to learn and practice speaking lessons

1.4 Research subjects

In the study, the subjects studied were common grammatical errors made bystudents of the English department of speaking skills at the ThuongMai University.Specifically, students will make the following common mistakes:

- Wrong word order for question

- Countable / Uncountable Mix-ups

- Word Choice

- Wrong Preposition

- Using Inappropriate Language

- Lack of body language

- Lack of confidence

These are all common mistakes that students make during speaking English.But this error all stems from the following causes:

- The first is lack of motivation to study Most students now still focus more

on studying grammar to get high scores on tests Because of that, students are not soimportant in speaking skills, since they do not spend much time practicing speaking.Even in cases where speaking practice is only practiced in class, with theguidance of teachers Therefore, there is no time for practicing outside theclassroom, leading to the fact that the skills are not practiced regularly

- The second reason is that the current students lack vocabulary as well as noeffective practice methods which lead to not knowing how to apply the learnedknowledge into practice Since then students will become bored with English, donot want to practice speaking English anymore

From the above reasons, the study proposes the following solutions to improvestudents' knowledge as well as to help them practice speaking more effectively:First, teachers need to motivate students to invest more time in speaking skills.Because teachers also make a big contribution to student learning, teachers alsoneed to help students learn to speak English more effectively

Secondly, the class needs to organize more group practice activities such aswork group, work in pair, games, presentation These activities will help studentsnot be afraid to speak English, moreover also help students practice speaking moreeffectively

Thirdly, encourage students to use English speaking software Nowadays it is

a technological age, English-speaking software is no longer rare, students candownload English software by themselves to practice Moreover, these software are

also highly flexible, students can practice anytime, anywhere: at school, at thecompany, at home,

1.5 Scope of the study

To conduct this study, the writer randomly sampled 20 students (10 men and

10 women), who were selected within the English department of the ThuongMaiUniversity In this study, a questionnaire consisting of 10 questions was created toevaluate and collect data These data were collected through the assessments of 20students The study was conducted from April 1 to April 26 Through this study, thewriter hopes to identify obstacles to learning and practicing English-speaking skills

of ThuongMai University students, as well as providing solutions to help studentssolve their difficulties

1.6 Research methodology

Data collection tool

The study was conducted within the scope of ThuongMai University, thewriter-selected method is qualitative research method, which is a combination of thefollowing methods: Questionnaire

Questionnaire: The questionnaire will have 10 questions for research

purposes Questions will be prepared in advance and will be answered in onlineform The reason this method is implemented because if follow the online method,

it will gather information faster than the question is written on paper Thequestionnaire is considered as one of the common tools to collect data in research,the questionnaire aims to understand students' attitudes and problems with speakingskills Besides, the questionnaire also shows the difficulties of students withspeaking skills

Data analysis

The accuracy of research is the highest goal, which is why researchers decided

to apply both quantitative and qualitative methods

Quantitative analysis: Researchers use questionnaire to collect data andnumbers, analyze charts and diagrams Depending on the information of each chart,research is conducted and an evaluation of the results is made to accurately rate theerrors made by students

1.7 Organization of the study

The study is divided into the following 4 chapters:

Chapter 1: Overview of the study

This chapter deals with a number of key sections including theoreticalbackground, references to previous studies, research objectives, research subjects,scope of research, research methods and research organization

Chapter 2: Literature review

This chapter will provide a theoretical foundation for speaking skillsincluding: Defining errors, basic errors in communication that students often make

In addition, the chapter will distribute researcher's discussion, offeringdifferent techniques to summarize the database for research results Specifically, thischapter is an in-depth review of the literature in which a theoretical background isrelevant and an evaluation of studies related to common errors

Chapter 3: Research findings

This chapter contains basic information about the context, the object of study,the tools used to collect data and the process of data collection and data analysis,results and discussion, research results is displayed

Chapter 4: Recommendations and suggestions

This chapter includes a summary of the main views and limitations of thestudy and recommendations for further research

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Definitions of speaking

There are many written and spoken definitions given by researchers Forexample, Brown (1994) and Burns & Joyce (1997) stated that: Speaking is aninteractive process of constructing meaning that involves producing and receivingand processing information

The form and meaning of speaking depends on the circumstances, the purpose

of the speaking, the speaking experience, and the participants in the speaking Evenaccording to Burns & Joyce, speaking will have its own skills and conventions,different from writing Speaking also requires the implementer to create specificpoints of the language such as grammar, pronunciation or vocabulary Moreover,speaking also requires the need to know when, why and how to create language,

On the other hand, there are ideas that A speaker's skills and speech habits have animpact on the success of any exchange (Van Duzer, 1997)

Based on the ideas above, a definition of speaking skills can be formed.Speaking is a language production process, done between two or more individualstogether

Speaking is also a process that is carried out to convey, raise opinions andopinions Speaking skills will also have different rules and regulations than writingskills It depends on many factors such as interaction, body language, richvocabulary and accurate pronunciation A good speaker synthesizes this array ofskills and knowledge to succeed in a given speech act

2.1.1 Purpose of speaking

Speaking plays a very important role in everyday life, it helps the speaker toconvey information as well as express the wishes of the speakers, showing thespeaker's persuasive ability Here are the 2 main purposes of speaking

- Notice: this is how speakers use data and information to help listenersunderstand and remember information

- Speech: the main purpose of a speech is to persuade the listener, who needsthe listener to agree with the speaker's opinion

In general, speaking is one of the important skills, it is also essential If thereare too many mistakes in speaking, the speaker cannot be proficient in using words,nor can he even express his purpose and opinions.

2.2 Definition of errors

There are many definitions of errors in Corder (1973) He pointed out thedifference between error and mistake The error will reflect the knowledge gap ofthe language user and the learner will not be able to fix these errors themselves Inaddition, mistake will often occur when learners lose performance, possibly due tofatigue or the learners themselves unable to process information Of course learnerswill know that they themselves are wrong and can correct mistakes themselvesThe simple example is when we compare language learners with nativespeakers Indigenous peoples will not make error but they will have mistake Andlanguage learners will make mistakes in the communication process

Corder (1981) Corder (1981) said that there are two kinds of errors, which are systematic and non- systematic errors Non-system error is an errorrelated to performance due to memory, or to psychological fatigue As for systemerrors that indicate a lack of or linguistic deficiencies, they are also evidence of alearner's ability to learn a new language

In addition, Ellis (1997) also explained that errors reflect the fact that learnerscannot distinguish between true and false The error is also an example that reflectsthe learner's ability in language learning

2.2.1 Types of speaking errors

2.2.1.1 Wrong word order for question

This is a fairly common mistake for learners in general This error will makethe speaker's sentence easily misunderstood This type of error will cause the user'ssentence to turn into an incomplete and very confusing sentence

Example: He played yesterday football

This is the wrong expression and makes the sentence very difficult tounderstand, correction should be: He played football yesterday

2.2.1.2 Countable/Uncountable Mixups

This is a common mistake when students have not distinguished the differenceand the use of countable and uncountable nouns Common mistakes occur withmuch, many, a little and a few, and less and fewer

For example: I have a few money

For example: I don't care for your opinion

This is a wrong sentence, correct correction should be: I don't care about youropinion

2.2.1.5 Using Inappropriate Language

This is a basic error but also very important Learners need to understand thespoken context in order to come up with the right words For example, when goingout to party, it can be comfortable in communication But if you go to meetings ormeet customers and say: Hi! What’s up is definitely not suitable

2.2.1.6 Lack of body language

Body language is one of the most important components in speaking Inspeaking, words are the bridge between the speaker and the listener, body language

is the catalyst to promote that connection Body language can increase interaction in

a conversation, it shows the enthusiasm and attitude of the speaker in thisconversation Proficient use of body language will be a great advantage in speaking

2.2.1.7 Lack of confidence

Lack of confidence is also one of the very important issues Confidence inspeaking will show that the speaker is well prepared before speaking Show that thespeaker is knowledgeable about the subject and is willing to argue if there is a

mixed opinion However, if the speaker is not confident, it is very easy to be passive

in speaking and will be inferior to the opponent

2.3 Technique

To avoid common mistakes, learners need to apply different techniques

First, learners need to have a rich vocabulary, good listening ability andapplying appropriate grammatical structure If the learner does not have afoundation, the training process will be much more difficult Preparing a richvocabulary will help the speaker convey the full meaning of the message and theright content to exchange Because learning a new language is not just aboutlearning grammatical structures, it is also necessary to apply those grammaticalstructures to reality, reasonably and effectively in speaking

The second thing, learners need to have practical experiences, especially need

to communicate in public, meet and talk to foreign tourists or communicate withfriends and colleagues in English It can be said that these will be very usefulclasses for learners as well as improve communication skills for learners