Thiết kế một số hoạt động nói bổ sung cho giáo trình lifelines elementary cho s

Tables Table 1: Patterns of speaking activities teachers often use to teach speaking Table 2: Difficulties students encounter when learning the speaking section Table 3: Students‟ respon

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

- -

ĐOÀN THỊ LÊ

DESIGNING SOME SUPPLEMENTARY SPEAKING ACTIVITIES TO THE COURSE BOOK “LIFELINES ELEMENTARY” FOR THE FIRST YEAR STUDENTS OF VIETNAM VOCATIONAL COLLEGE OF

TECHNIQUE – CRAFT ART

THIẾT KẾ MỘT SỐ HOẠT ĐỘNG NÓI BỔ SUNG CHO GIÁO TRÌNH

“LIFELINES ELEMENTARY” CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ NHẤT TRƯỜNG

CAO ĐẲNG NGHỀ KỸ THUẬT MỸ NGHỆ VIỆT NAM

M.A MINOR THESIS

FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY CODE: 601410

SUPERVISOR: PHAN THI ̣ VÂN QUYÊN, M.A

HA NOI - 2012

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Declaration……… i

Acknowledgement……… ii

Abstract……… iii

Abbreviations……… iv

List of figures, tables and charts……… v

Table of contents……… vi

Part A: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale of the study 3

2 Aims of the study 4

3 Research questions 4

4 Scope of the study 4

5 Research methods 5

6 Design of the study 6

Part B: DEVELOPMENT 7

Chapter 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 7

1.1 Language skills and speaking 7

1.1.1 Language skills 7

1.1.2 Speaking 8

1.1.3 Speaking activities 11

1.2 Evaluation and supplementation of speaking activities and materials 16

1.2.1 Evaluation of the activities and materials 16

1.2.2 Supplementation of activities and materials 17

1.2.2.1 Definition of supplementation 17

1.2.2.2 Forms of supplementation……… 16

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1.3 Previous studies 18

Chapter 2: METHODOLOGY 21

2.1 The research context 21

2.1.1 The English teaching and learning situation at VVC TCA 21

2.1.2 The students at VVC TCA 22

2.1.3 The teachers at VVC TCA 22

2.2.1 An overview of the course book “Lifelines Elementary (Tom Hutchinson, Oxford University Press, 2002) 22

2.2 Research methods 25

2.2.1 Subjects of the study 25

2.2.2 Research methods 26

2.2.3 Data collection instruments 26

2.2.4 Procedure of data collection 27

Chapter 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS 28

3.1 Students‟ background of English learning: 28

3.2 Current situation of English teaching and learning 28

3.3 The evaluation of the speaking activities in the course book by teachers and students 30

3.4 Students‟ needs when learning speaking skills 33

Chapter 4: DESIGNING SOME SUPPLEMENTARY SPEAKING ACTIVITIES TO THE COURSE BOOK “LIFELINES ELEMENTARY” AT VVC TCA 36

4.1 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 1 and unit 2 36

4.2 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 3 38

4.3 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 4 & Extension unit 3 and 4 39

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4.4 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 5 40

4.5 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 6 41

4.6 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 7 41

4.7 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 11 42

4.8 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 12 43

4.9 Supplementary speaking activities for unit 14 44

Part C: CONCLUSION 45

1 Conclusion 45

2 Limitations of the study and suggestions for further study 46

REFERENCES 47 APPENDIX I

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ABBREVIATIONS

VVC TCA Vietnam Vocational College of Technique and Craft – Art

CLT Communicative Language Teaching

GE General English

ESP English for Specific Purposes

MA Master of Art

3 Tables

Table 1: Patterns of speaking activities teachers often use to teach speaking

Table 2: Difficulties students encounter when learning the speaking section

Table 3: Students‟ response to supplementary speaking activities………… 32 Table 4: Students‟ and teachers‟ preference for the types of speaking

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Part A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

Because of the economic development and the social, cultural integration between the countries, English has become a very popular communicative means

in the modern world In Vietnam, English is considered as one of the most vital working tools in most of the career requirements

English language has been taught and learnt widely for a long time in Vietnam However, most of the learners cannot use English naturally and frequently and they have not achieved the high communicative effect in English There exist many reasons for this situation In the high school, English has been taught as the compulsory subject, but learners have not been motivated in using English as the essential means In addition, although learners can be aware of the importance of English, they have not been put the suitable environment to communicate in English The other reason is that the way of the English teaching The Vietnamese teachers of English have been facing many arising difficulties Materials used in teaching are one of the shortcomings constraining the effect of English teaching Most of the teachers followed all of the activities

in the course book without adapting and designing to suit students‟ abilities, levels and needs Although learners spent a lot of time on learning English, their linguistic competence, especially the speaking skill, has not been effective As a result, the appropriate choice of the materials as well as the language activities is very important for learners to improve language skill

The major purpose of teaching and learning English has focused on the development of communicative approach All the speaking activities should be designed with the aim of helping students find out the easy way to practice

2 Aims of the study

The main aims of the study are as the following:

- To review theories of teaching speaking skills, especially speaking activities and supplementary materials

- To evaluate speaking section of the course book “Lifelines Elementary”

- To clarify the reasons why the speaking activities in the course book should be added to suit students‟ levels and needs

- To design some appropriate supplementary speaking activities to the course book “Lifelines Elementary” for the 1st

year students of the Vietnamese Vocational College of Technique – Craft Art

3 Research questions

The following research questions will be stated in the study to get the above objectives:

1 How do teachers and students at VVC TCA evaluate speaking section

of the course book “Lifelines Elementary”?

4 Scope of the study

There are many different features related to speaking activities used to teach speaking skills However, my study is mainly focused on designing some supplementary speaking activities to the course book for the 1st year students based on the analysis of their difficulties and needs in learning speaking in order

to create a more interesting, active speaking environment and thus, improve students‟ speaking skills

5 Research methods

This thesis is carried out using the combination of quantitative and qualitative methods Survey questionnaires, observations, interview are used to collect data for the research

- Questionnaires are delivered to 100 VVC TCA 1st students and 5 teachers to find out the current English teaching and learning situation, their responses as well as their needs in learning speaking and to find out the kinds of the speaking activities which interest students the most

- Personal observation, informal interviews are implemented to increase the reliability of the obtained information from the questionnaires and to provide more subjective information relating to the speaking activities used by teachers

- The data collected are analyzed The findings are critically discussed and then used as the basis and suggestions for designing some supplementary speaking activities

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6 Design of the study

The thesis consists of three main parts:

Part A: INTRODUCTION presents an overview of the study with rationale

aim, scope, research questions and methods of the study

Part B: DEVELOPMENT consists of 4 chapters:

Chapter 1: Theoretical background provides some theoretical background

related to speaking skill and speaking activities as well as the supplementary process of speaking activities

Chapter 2: Methodology focuses on the subjects, research methods, data

collection instruments and procedures of data collection applied in the study

Chapter 3: Data Analysis and Findings

In this chapter, an analysis on the students‟ background of learning English; the evaluation of the speaking activities and needs in learning and teaching speaking skills by students and teachers is also carried out through data analysis and presentation according to research In addition, the findings and discussion are illustrated clearly

Chapter 4: Designing supplementary speaking activities

In this chapter, some helpful samples of supplementary speaking activities are presented due to the speaking section of each unit in the course book

“Lifelines Elementary”

Part C: CONCLUSION presents the concluding summary of main findings and

some recommendations on designing some supplementary speaking activities in the study together with the limitations of the study and suggestions for further research

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Part B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1.1 Language skills and speaking

skill generating more controversy According to Savignon (1991) and Byrne (1991), speaking and writing are considered as the productive skills in which the learners generate language while listening and reading are known as the receptive skills whose purpose is to comprehend or understand what someone might be saying and writing Moreover, Byrne (1991: 8) shows the relationship

of language skills through the following table:

Figure 1: The four – macro skills

Receptive skills

Spoken language

Productive skills

Understanding Speaking Reading Writing Written language

In addition, Ur (1996: 120) states that speaking seems intuitively the most important and whoever can be able to use a language are referred to as

“speakers” of that language It is certain that students are good at speaking skill;

he might feel confident and motivated to use English in classroom and real - life communication without inhibition Moreover, he will be ready for participation

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in every different, flexible situation This thing leads the other skills improved as well The learner who feels interested in speaking means that he will have a high motivation in learning English It will certainly foster his language competence Thus, teachers should provide students the supportive speaking environment to help them have higher willingness in speaking English This depends so much on the way teachers creatively prepare more and more effective speaking activities

in each lesson

Furthermore, language skills are often related to each other in use In learning English as a foreign language, students cannot develop speaking skill if they don‟t improve listening skill To have a good communication, people must understand everything what is spoken Furthermore, a variety of knowledge is illustrated while learners make communication

In short, all the four skills are equally important to the learners It cannot be denied that speaking skill must not be isolated from the others Certainly, learners‟ success in language learning, together with the effectiveness of their English course is evaluated on the basis of how much they feel they have improved in their spoken language proficiency

1.1.2 Speaking

Bygate (1987) says that speaking is considered as a skill, not just knowledge because the speakers not only know how to make utterances and adapt them to each circumstance but also have a skill of making fluent conversations

Moreover, he distinguished the term of “skill” into two basic ways: “motor - perceptive skills” and “interaction skill” He clarifies that the former involves

perceiving, recalling, and articulating in the correct order sounds and structures

of the language and the later is the skill of using both knowledge and motor -

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perceptive skills to achieve communication Furthermore, interaction skills can involve the management of interaction which illustrates the way to make communication smooth and the negotiation of meaning which considers about how utterances are understood explicitly

The researchers‟ view of language teaching approaches and methods has changed Thus, it has affected the way of teaching speaking According to traditional methods, speaking skill usually seems to be taught as repeating after the teacher, memorizing a dialog, or responding to drills, all of which reflect the sentence-based view of proficiency prevailing in the audio - lingual a nd other drill - based or repetition - based methodologies of the 1970s Mackey (1965: 266) pointed out that a good speaker is considered as being good at choosing the right forms; putting them in the correct order, sounding like a native speaker; even producing the right meanings He also gave a list of the

practicing exercises such as “model dialogues, pattern practice, oral drill tables, look - and - say exercises, and oral composition” However, the emergence of

communicative language teaching in the 1980s led to changed views of syllabuses and methodology, which are continuing to influence approaches to teaching speaking skills today Fluency became a goal for speaking courses and this could be developed through the use of information - gap and other tasks that required learners to attempt real communication, despite limited proficiency in English In so doing, learners would develop communication strategies and engage in negotiation of meaning, both of which were considered essential to the development of oral skills as well as focusing on the learner - centered objective

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Furthermore, Brown and Yule (1983) made a useful distinction between the interactional functions and the transactional functions of speaking The former serves to establish and maintain social relations while the latter focuses on the exchange of information

In addition, Bygate (1987) suggests that oral interactions can be characterized

as routines Information routines contain frequently recurring types of information structures, being either expository (e.g.: narration, description, instruction, comparison) or evaluative (e.g.: explanation, justification, prediction, decision) Interaction routines can be either service such as job interview or social such as dinner party

Another distinction when considering the development of speaking skills is between monologue and dialogue According to Richard, he expanded Brown and Yule‟s framework (after Jones (1996) a nd Burns (1998)) and classified the

functions o f speaking as interaction; transaction and performance In his

research, each of these speech activities is quite distinct in terms of form and function and requires different teaching approaches Understanding these aspects of oral language helps the interlocutor be confident speakers of a foreign language They may be helpful for organizing our classrooms, evaluating our learners‟ evaluating our learners‟ performance, especially for developing oral activities in the classroom and real - life communication However, the Vietnamese students‟ abilities of using English as a tool in the real - life situation are not still good It is the fact that many teachers of English have focused on mostly teaching vocabulary and grammar with the main purposes of preparing the students for examinations Although students may have a good knowledge of grammar and a wide range of vocabulary, they cannot communicate in English

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fluently The lessons of practicing speaking skill are neglected in many classrooms These things can explain why most of the Vietnamese students are

not confident in their abilities of speaking English

As a consequence, determining the well - prepared speaking practice is one

of the major challenges confronting both the teachers and the students Therefore, the next part will present a clear understanding of speaking activities

1.1.3 Speaking Activities

Many researchers propose a great number of interaction activities due to topics; information routines; interaction routines; or in terms of behavioral criteria such as whether one person is being asked to draw something, make something or arrange something Therefore, a lot of oral activities are designed due to the theory and characteristics of CLT

LittleWood (1981) suggests the two sets of activities The first type is

“functional communication activities” involving only communication of

information in which the learners identify similarities and differences in a set of pictures, discover missing features in a map or picture, reconstruct story

sequences or problem-solving tasks The second type is “social interaction activities” in which the learners use English as a teaching and learning medium

in order to implement conversation, discussions sessions, dialogues, role plays, stimulation, improvision and debates in classroom context Similarly, Harmer

(1983) makes a distinction between “practice” activities and “communicative” activities in which oral “practice” activities include “oral drills, information gap activities, games, personalization and localization, oral activities” and

“communicative” activities consist of “reaching a consensus, relaying instructions, communicative games, problem - solving, interpersonal exchange,

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story construction, simulation and role play” What‟s more, activities may also

be clarified as activities for accuracy that aim at learners‟ competence in producing right words, phrases or sentences and activities for fluency that aim at learners‟ capacity to maintain the flow of speech with ease and comfort

When designing speaking activities properly, the teacher should be aware of students‟ English proficiency levels With each level, the teacher should consider the different types of syllabus, methods, techniques as well as speaking materials and types of activities at each procedure of language teaching Byrne suggested that the speaking teaching for the elementary level concentrates on accuracy more than fluency This is opposite to the advanced level at which the students satisfy the requirements of daily situations and can communicate facts casually

as well as being able to describe with some detail, linking sentences together smoothly

Classroom speaking activities which develop learners‟ ability to express themselves through speech would therefore seem an important component of a language course Successful speaking activities in class can have a great effect

on improvement of students‟ speaking skills As a result, teachers should try to design and administer activities As is discussed in Ur (1996: 120), we can see four characteristics of a successful activity:

“1 Students talk a lot: As much as possible of the period of time allotted to the activity is in fact occupied by student talk This may seem obvious, but often most time is taken up with teacher talk or pauses

2 Participation is even: Classroom discussion is not dominated by a minority of talkative participants; all get a chance to speak and contributions are fairly evenly distributed

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3 Motivation is high: Students are eager to speak because they are interested

in the topic and have something new to say about it, or because they want to contribute to achieving a task objective

4 Language is of an acceptable level: Students express themselves in utterances that are relevant, easily comprehensible to each other, and of an acceptable level of language accuracy.”

In addition, Ur (1996: 121) describes some problems happening to the students Firstly, they are often inhibited about trying to say something in English in class, but they are often worried about making mistakes, fearful of criticism or losing face, or simply shy of the attention that their speech attracts Secondly, even though they are not inhibited, they cannot think of anything to say or have no motive to express themselves Thirdly, some students have low participation in the speaking practice Furthermore, in classes, the mother tongue often dominates while the target language is simply neglected Knowing these things can help teachers understand and design speaking activities carefully to avoid these problems

It can be seen that all speaking activities can be characterized as more or less interactive The students can easily achieve the goals of speaking skills by the way of practicing from the controlled activities to communication activities The repetition and reading aloud play the important parts of practicing speaking skills and building confidence and automaticity However, these above things are not just enough because they also want to communicate in English naturally The better way to motivate learners communicate each other is putting them in pairs

or small groups For these reasons, it is crucial for teachers to provide more and more interesting speaking activities for students to practice creative uses of the

- life situation Through practicing dialogue, students are able to know how to express ideas in such variously communicative context Teachers prepare some kinds of dialogues, for examples picture sets, model dialogue with keywords, gapped dialogues or mapped dialogues These things can help students avoid being uninterested in closely modeled dialogues

Information - gap

This activity is one of the easiest and most interesting forms of

communicative activity in the speaking class The students can implement by the way in which one person shares information which the others don‟t know in pair

or group work This kind may encourage students‟ thoughts and highly motivate Some similar kinds can be collaboratively used named “Describe and Draw”

Discussion

According to Ur (1996), discussion is the most natural and effective way for

students to talk freely in English by thinking out some problems or situations together through verbal interchange or ideas Teachers can give learners open - ended questions or a list of topics and then ask them discuss in pairs or small groups or talk freely Particularly, in discussion, students can express and share

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ideas or opinions in constructive and cooperative atmosphere without

threatening There are different types of discussion activities such as describing

pictures, picture differences, things in common, solving a problem

Role - play

This activity is really useful to involve the learners into the realistic situation;

but when practicing this speaking type, the teacher should be careful when

giving the suitable role for each participant due to his personalities Byrne (1986)

suggests that the teacher can provide a guideline for role - play practice such as

open - ended dialogues, mapped dialogues, role instructions, and scenarios with

the aim of helping learners fulfill their roles creatively It can be often happened

in pairs It can be greatly effective if the students are confident and cooperative

because they perform comfortably with their capacity, enthusiasm and well -

prepared presentation and instructions

Interview

Students interview each other using questions given by the teacher or made

by them This activity is really useful to practice speaking and listening skills It

is also helpful when giving students chances in working - situational speaking environment Likely, questionnaires and quizzes can be designed relating to a

topic of some kind such as likes and dislikes about food, leisure activities

Students may interview more than one student After that, they are asked to

report the results of what have been learned

Furthermore, for the higher English proficiency level, students can be put in

the other following types of speaking activities:

do very artificially, is give the students practice in real - life English, as it should

be used in English speaking environment The stimulation has the advantage of involving a large number of students at the same time Examples of stimulation are the travel agent, arranging a meet or the job interview

In addition, when implementing these speaking activities, teachers can need the help of visual aids That‟s something visible to students, which the teacher uses for different teaching purposes, especially speaking They may be objects, pieces, pictures, drawings, cards which are various in formats, convenient and effective use in a language class Teachers can use them as useful means in order

to increase persuasive, heighten retention and improve understanding It can make each speaking activity more interesting and lively

In the next part, the understanding of evaluation and supplementation of speaking and materials are described clearly in order to give teachers foundation

to design the appropriate speaking activities in the course book

1.2 Evaluation and supplementation of speaking activities and materials 1.2.1 Evaluation of the activities and materials

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We take up many complex issues surrounding the evaluation of commercial course books because it is not an easy task The different researchers convey different perspectives to the different aspects of a course book In this study, the author mainly focuses on some main checklists to evaluate the speaking activities in a course book Acklam (1994) provides an extensive checklist of questions which can aid in the evaluation of a commercial course book:

“ Activities focus on “centered – learned”?

 Are there enough communicative activities?

 Is there enough speaking and variety of speaking activities?

 Is there enough revision?

 Is there enough controlled - practice of new language?

 Is there a good variety of controlled practice activities?

 Is there enough freer practice of new language?

 Is there a good variety of freer practice activities?”

As mentioned above, the main criterion for evaluating speaking part in a book is whether enough different types of speaking activities are relevant to language input and communicative aims or not When evaluating activities, teachers consider speaking topics, students‟ interest in practicing speaking Teachers will have a good orientation toward adjusting speaking more suitable

1.2.2 Supplementation of activities and materials

1.2.2.1 Definition of supplementation

Most researchers agree that the teachers should prepare their own material derives in part from their dissatisfaction with published material due to their students‟ needs, interests, level and aptitude (Allwright (1981), O‟Neil (1982),

Sheldon (1988), Nunan 1988) “The needs of a specific class of learners can

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never be perfectly met by a single course book, even when the course book has

been carefully designed to cater for the needs of learners in that

context.”(MacGrath, 2002: 80) Likely, Nunan (1991: 209) points out “Any given

course book will be incapable of catering for the diversity of needs which exists

in most language classroom” That‟s why the teacher should prepare more than

the course book Supplementation is mostly necessary in this case It is

understood as a means of “adding something new” with the main purpose of

bridging the gap and deficit between the course book and the course‟ objectives

as well as the students‟ needs Low (1989: 153) determines that “designing

appropriate materials is not a science; it is a strange mixture of imagination,

insight and analytical reasoning and this fact must be recognized when the

materials are assessed” When designing the activities, it must be sure that they

are consistent with the needs and interests of the learners in accordance with the

nature of language and learning

1.2.2.2 Forms of supplementation

It can be seen in McGrath (2002: 82), supplementing a coursebook can be

designed in one of two ways: by utilizing items, such as exercises, texts or

activities, from another published source: a coursebook, a supplementary skills

book, a book of practice exercises or a teacher‟s resource book and by devising

our own material; this may include the exploitation of authentic visual or textual

items

By these suggested ways, teachers can follow them to choose the best

teaching activities to make the great interest of the lesson

1.3 Previous studies

In this part, the author reviews some previous studies on the same topic

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The thesis by Le Thi Huong (2007) was “Designing extra speaking activities based on “English for Tourism” for third year students at Tourism Faculty, CSSH – VNU” With the hope of motivating students to speak more in class, the author analyzed the situational needs and students‟ needs The results of this analysis were the basis for designing some extra speaking activities The author made a great contribution to the teaching and learning ESP at Tourism Faculty, CSSH – VNU

The second thesis namely “Adapting speaking activities based on the course book “International Express” for the first year non-major students at Hanoi University of Industry” was written by Le Thi Ngoc Ha in 2009 In this thesis, the data from questionnaires and notes from class observation helped the author

to investigate the necessity of adapting speaking activities, find how to adapt them and suggest some appropriate speaking activities for the course book in order help the HUI 1st year students have more chances to practice speaking skill and improve their speaking abilities At the end of the thesis, the author presented some adapted speaking activities of some units in the course book to increase the effectiveness of speaking lessons

The title of the next thesis was “Some communicative activities to enhance speaking skill for 1st year students of English Department - University of Language and International Studies” by Nguyen Minh Hanh, 2010 In this researcher, the author reviewed theoretical concepts of language teaching, the nature of spoken language, the types and purposes of communicative activities and the roles of teachers in class in order to find out the most applicable communicative activities based on the teaching and learning situations in her university

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The researchers had the same purposes of adapting or designing more suitable speaking activities for the textbook which were currently used in their university The effect of the mentioned studies made a significant contribution to students‟ speaking skill improvement

In conclusion, this chapter has just presented all the aspects relating to the topic It has provided the theoretical framework for the study on speaking skill and speaking activities Based on this review, a survey research will be carried out and some supplementary speaking activities for the course book “Lifelines Elementary” will be designed and recommended for teaching speaking to the 1st

year students at VVC TCA

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Chapter 2: METHODOLOGY

2.1 The research context

2.1.1 The English teaching and learning situation at VVC TCA

The study is carried out at VVC TCA This college is located in the suburbs

of Hanoi English there is a compulsory subject for the exam Students have to take a 120-period General English course and a 60-period ESP course

The required material for GE is the textbook “Lifelines Elementary” The aim

of this course is to provide students with basic knowledge of grammar, vocabulary in order to help them make simple and daily communication in English However, both the teachers and the students face a great deal of difficulties English is only taught and learnt in classroom Students do not have environment for using and communicating in English outside classroom Most of the students haven‟t been accustomed to self– study Although some students spent much time learning English, the learning effect is not high Despite teachers‟ efforts in adapting the textbook to the students‟ level as well as the time allotment for the course, the result of the study is still unsatisfactory

ESP courses were designed by a group of teachers of English at VVC TCA They all find it difficult to teach ESP effectively due to such reasons as students‟ awareness of the purpose and of the importance of English for their future job, the students‟ lack of vocabularies and strategies in language skills; the teachers‟ and the students‟ lack of specialized knowledge All of these difficulties lead to the fact that the students‟ reading competence, to some extent, remained unimproved

Therefore, teachers should find out effective ways to help students overcome difficulties and have high motivation to learn English

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2.1.2 The students at VVC TCA

There are different faculties at VVC TCA: the Faculty of Information Technology, the Faculty of Accounting, and the Faculty of Craft - Art Generally, students at VVC TCA do not have the same level of English proficiency Most of them have learned English for 7 years at gradeschools; some have only learned English for 3 years while a few have never learned English They do not like learning English Moreover, they do not feel self-confident in communicating in English Students just concentrate on learning grammar of English to pass the paper test of grammar Thus, motivation to

learning English in class is generally low

2.1.3 The teachers at VVC TCA

There are 5 teachers of English at VVC TCA who range from 24 to 30 years

of age They either hold a master degree in English or are studying for that degree All of them have several years of teaching experience

Most of the teachers at this college still employ the traditional methods to teach English They focus more on language knowledge rather than language use Although they are aware of the importance of the communicative approach, they feel constrained to implement communicative language teaching in their classroom Moreover, because of teachers‟ low English proficiency, large classes and poor teaching materials, using CLT is too challenging at VVC TCA responding, making suggestions making travel arrangement, solving problems

2.2.1 An overview of the course book “Lifelines Elementary (Tom Hutchinson, Oxford University Press, 2002)

In this part, the author presents a description of the course book currently used to teach the 1st year students at VVC TCA

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Course books have played an important role in most language programs

Hutchinson and Torres (1994: 315) suggest that “no teaching – learning situation, it seems, is complete until it has relevant textbook” Furthermore, good teaching materials are regarded as “a form of teacher training” (Richards,

2001: 251) As a consequence, our college has used the book “Lifelines Elementary” as the course book since 2008 It was designed to teach English via Communicative Language Teaching method because realistic and meaningful communication should be the goal of classroom activities; communication involves the integration of different language skills Among the different kinds

of language textbooks, this one is highly evaluated due to its great advantages in helping students improve their communicative competence

“Lifelines” is a set of books at the three levels: Elementary, Pre – Intermediate, Intermediate Having the same pattern, each book is made up of 14 units plus 7 Extension parts Each unit has different sections under the different headings relating to its topics Each unit consists of language input (grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation) and skills development (reading and writing, listening and speaking) Due to the scope of the thesis, in this part, the author concentrates on describing the lowest level textbook “Lifelines Elementary” which is currently taught in the college

Firstly, most of the topics in this book are familiar with students such as introduction, people, work and play, likes and dislikes, daily life, places, entertainments, travel, fashion, health However, there are some topics in which students are not interested such as survivors, winners and experiences Each section in the course book is related to its topic Especially, students are provided with a variety of vocabulary about the topic of each unit Moreover, some kinds

Thirdly, language skills are taught cooperatively Reading part often is put together with writing part Both reading and writing tasks not only help students improve reading comprehension but also give them opportunities to revise vocabulary file and language focus in each unit Furthermore, listening and speaking are also integrated in one section Listening skill is often taught before speaking skill because some useful expressions and conversation pieces in listening section are good guides to help students in speaking part Listening tapescript in each unit is the good model of conversation for students to practice speaking

In addition, speaking tasks in each unit are really familiar to students such

as meeting people, shopping, making arrangements, offering and accepting and giving advices However, the presentation of speaking section in all the units of the course book is so similar Some conversation species are presented first by asking students do some exercises such as gap – filling or matching the utterances After that, students are asked to look at tapescripts of that

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conversation and then practice it Each tapescript is a conversation sample for students to reproduce what they have listened before In addition, at the transition stage from practice to production, there are some kinds of speaking activities such as mapped dialogues (e.g.: unit 12, unit 13, extension unit 3 and unit 4), cue words (e.g.: unit 4, unit 6, extension unit 5 and unit 6, unit 7, unit 11) In my opinion, these speaking activities are very useful because at this level, students cannot freely express themselves when making a conversation in English For free communication in this textbook, otherwise, students are only provided with different situations to make conversation based on its model Some types of speaking activities at this stage are dialogues, conversation, role

- play and interview These activities in the course book just give students chance to practice in pair - work under teachers‟ control However, it is the fact that when teaching speaking, students are not likely to use new language for themselves or to say what they want to say but what they are directed to say Thus, it can be seen that speaking activities in this course book are not adequate for the 1st year students at VVC TCA As Cunningsworth (1984: 89) points out:

“no course book will be totally suited to a particular teaching situation The teacher will have to find his own way of using it and adapting it if necessary” Therefore, the researcher finds it important to introduce supplementary activities, especially for speaking section of this course book

2.2 Research Methods

2.2.1 Subjects of the study

Two groups at VVC TCA are chosen to carry out the research The first group includes 100 1st year students and the other consists of 5 teachers of English at Foreign Language Department at VVC TCA The students‟ ages from

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18 – 20 years old, 45% are male and 55% are female They are from the Accounting Department, Craft Art Department and the Information Technology Department Among the teachers, 2 are taking an M.A course and 3 graduated from the University of Languages and International Studies of Vietnam National University and 2 from Open University They all age from 26 to 32 and have at least 3 years teaching experience

2.2.2 Research methods

This thesis is carried out through the mixture of quantitative and qualitative methods The quantitative is employed to help the author focus on the collection and analysis of numerical data and statistics from two survey questionnaires for both teachers and students To complement and understand its findings of quantitative method, qualitative is used to provide valuable information to certain research questions from personal observation and interview

2.2.3 Data collection instruments

There are many different types of data collection instruments such as questionnaire, interview, telephone, observation The instruments used to collect data in this study were survey questionnaires and personal observation

Firstly, two survey questionnaires were designed for both students and teachers

The survey questionnaire for students includes 4 different sections The first section includes the three questions in order to help the author find out students‟ background of learning English The second section consists of 3 different questions about the frequency of using supplementary speaking activities designed by teachers, patterns of speaking activities which teachers use in the classroom and some difficulties in learning the speaking section which students

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encounter The third one has four questions aiming at finding students‟ evaluation of speaking activities in the course book The last one consists of 5 questions about students‟ needs when learning speaking skills

The survey questionnaire for teachers consists of 7 different questions with the aim to know teachers‟ evaluation of the speaking activities in the course book, their difficulties in teaching speaking skills and their needs in designing and using supplementary speaking activities for this course book

Secondly, personal observation and interviews were also used to help the researcher collect more in - depth information about the process of speaking before and after using supplementary speaking activities

2.2.4 Procedure of data collection

- The questionnaires are in English and were distributed directly to 100 students and 5 teachers at VVC TCA They were allowed to ask questions for clarification if necessary and were given help with formulating their ideas in open-ended questions Results were collected after 20 minutes

- All the data collected from survey questionnaires, personal observation,

interviews were analyzed

They provided the basic elements to help the author design the most suitable supplementary speaking activities to the course book

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Chapter 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS

3.1 Students’ background of English learning:

In this section, 3 questions are designed to help the researcher understand

students‟ background of English learning

Chart 1 show that 78% students come from the countryside A few students (6%) come from the mountainous areas and only 16% students are from towns and cities

It can be inferred that students‟

English learning is quite restrictive

They do not have enough chances as

well as time to learn and practice

English They only learn English

from textbooks in class It is likely that students‟ ability of speaking English is not good enough

When asked about their ages and time for learning English, 100% of them are from 18 – 20 years old and have learnt English for 7 years at gradeschools

3.2 Current situation of English teaching and learning

- Question 1 is to find out the frequency of using supplementary speaking activities designed by teachers: It is surprising that only 1% students say that some different speaking tasks outside the course book are always given to them Not many students (16%) indicate that

their teachers often provide them with

more activities in the speaking lesson

while 55% teachers sometimes add

supplementary speaking activities

Chart 1: Students' background of learning English

6%

78%

areas Countrysides Cities/Towns

Chart 2: Frequency of using supplementary speaking activities designed b y teachers

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It can be drawn out that supplementary speaking activities are not often used

in class As interviewed about their current teaching, the teachers explain that they lack time both for preparation and performance Therefore, they often teach all the activities in the coursebook

- Question 2 is to present patterns of speaking activities which teachers often use to teach speaking skills in classroom:

The figures shown in table 1 indicate that pair work (43%) and group work (36) are used more than the whole class work (12%) and individual work (9%) in speaking lessons

Clearly, there are very few speaking activities in which teachers organize students to work individually It seems that pair work and group work have many advantages in giving students far more chances to speak English It can be certain that putting students to work in pairs or groups will increase the students‟ participation in speaking lesson

- Question 3 is to indicate difficulties which students encounter when

learning the speaking section in the course book:

Pair work 43%

Small group work 36%

The whole class work 12%

Individual work 9%

Table 1: Patterns of speaking activities

teachers often use to teach speaking

skills in classroom

You don‟t know how to express yourself and exchange information 82%

You lack background knowledge 35%

The difficulty in learning speaking which all the students have is the lack of language input (100%) They do not have enough vocabulary as well as grammatical structures when talking about any topic Two other reasons which causes difficulties in speaking English are the lack of confidence (87%) and the lack of communicative skills (82%) The lack of background knowledge (35%) constrains students from making communication

The above difficulties reduce students‟ attention in speaking lesson Moreover, when interviewed about this problem, students say that they often have nothing to say or express their ideas, so they often feel shy and worried about making mistakes Some students say they use mother tongue to talk to each other in class It is understandable why students learn speaking English so much, but they cannot use it to communicate Therefore, understanding these obstacles can help teachers find out the more effective ways to teach speaking skills

3.3 The evaluation of the speaking activities in the course book by teachers and students

- Question 1 in section 3 is evaluate the topics of speaking activities in the course book:

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As can be seen in chart 3 above, both students and teachers have the rather

similar opinions about the topics

of speaking activities in the course book 87% students and 80% teachers agree that the speaking topics are familiar However, the lower proportion of students (57%) and teachers (60%) say that they are interested in the topics 36% students find them uninteresting to practice speaking

These results reveal that the topics in the course book are mostly familiar to the daily life Students may feel easy to talk about the topic, but many of them do not feel interested in the speaking topics

- Question 2 in section 3 is to evaluate the types of speaking activities:

We can see in the chart 4 that both teachers and students have the similar

familiar unfamiliar interesting uninteresting

Chart 3: Evaluation about the topics of speaking activities

various only a few interesting uninteresting familiar unfamiliar

Chart 4: Evaluation about the types of speaking activities

Students Teachers

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evaluation about the types of speaking activities More than 80% students and teachers say that the speaking activities are uninteresting and are of a few different types There are very few students (9%) who find it interesting All the teachers (100%) in this research indicate that students are accustomed to practicing the speaking types in the course book while 85% students feel familiar with those activities

It can be concluded that not only students but also teachers seem to find speaking activities given in the course book unattractive Maybe students are not really fond of working with something too familiar to them Their motivation can be reduced in speaking lessons Likewise, both teachers and students state that they often get bored with teaching the same types of activities in each unit Thus, it is necessary that teachers consider designing more various and interesting speaking activities in order to get every student participate in the lessons

- Question 3 in section 3 is to evaluate the level of difficulty of speaking activities:

Chart 5 presents students and teachers‟ evaluation of the level of difficulty of speaking activities 60% teachers reveal that speaking activities are suitable for students‟ abilities while only 40% students think so 31% students feel difficult

in practicing speaking activities The number of difficult activities and easy activities are equal according to the teacher‟ evaluation (20%)

difficult suitable easy

Chart 5: Evaluation about the level of difficulty of speaking

activities

Students Teachers

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It may be estimated that speaking activities in the course book are mostly moderate to all the students Therefore, teachers can maintain the content of speaking activities such as vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation, conversational skills to help students express their ideas in English frequently when they are asked to do oral activities

- Question 4 in section 3 is to evaluate the number of speaking activities:

From chart 6, it can be seen that teacher and students have the same ideas about the number of speaking activities 45% students and 60% teachers indicate that there are too few speaking activities in the course book No teachers think that the course book provides students with too many speaking activities while 24% students do not need anymore because there are too many activities The course book is said to include enough speaking activities by only about one – third of students (31%) and teacher (40%)

These figures mean that the speaking section in each unit hasn‟t still provided students and teachers with enough speaking activities

3.4 Students’ needs when learning speaking skills

Survey questions in section 4 are designed to help teachers find out students‟ needs when they learn speaking skills

When asked if they needed supplementary speaking activities, all of the participants (100%) in this research agree that they want to have more activities