Students and teachers perception of warm up activities at yen phong 2 high school

Based on the fact, the researcher concluded that, the warm-up was effective to the students’ English learning at 10th grade of Yen Phong 2 High School.. Regarding the issue of using warm

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERISITY

SCHOOL OF FOREIGN LAGUAGES

TRINH THI NGOC LAN

STUDENTS’ AND TEACHER’S PERCEPTION OF WARM UP ACTIVITIES

AT YEN PHONG 2 HIGH SCHOOL

M.A THESIS

Field: English Linguistics

Code: 8220201

THAI NGUYEN - 2020

ĐẠI HỌC THÁI NGUYÊN

TRƯỜNG NGOẠI NGỮ

TRỊNH THỊ NGỌC LAN

NHẬN THỨC CỦA GIÁO VIÊN VÀ HỌC SINH VỚI CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG KHỞI ĐỘNG BÀI HỌC TẠI TRƯỜNG THPT YÊN PHONG SỐ 2

LUẬN VĂN THẠC SĨ

Ngành: Ngôn ngữ Anh

Mã số: 8220201 Người hướng dẫn: TS Vũ Kiều Hạnh

THÁI NGUYÊN - 2020

DECLARATION

I hereby declare that no part of the enclosed Master Thesis “USING WARM

- UP ACTIVITIES TO INCREASE STUDENT’S EFFECTIVE ENGLISH LEARNING AT YEN PHONG 2 HIGH SCHOOL” has been copied or reproduced

by me from any other’s work without acknowledgement and that the thesis is originally written by me under strict guidance of my supervisor

Student

Much appreciation is conveyed to all the lecturers and my former teacher, Nguyen Hong Hanh, MA of the School of Foreign Languages - Thai Nguyen University for their valuable teaching and great support during the time I did my graduate course there

I would also like to express my sincere thanks to my colleagues and the students at Yen Phong 2 High School who have actively participated in this research, enthusiastically completed the questionnaires as well as provided me very important information for this research Without their help, this study could not have been successful

My sincere thanks also sent to my classmates in my Graduate Course who took the time and trouble to warn me of the flaws in my thesis and provided me with useful data as the basis for this thesis

Very importantly, my deepest gratitude goes out to my family, who have supported and encouraged me so much to complete my study

Although I have tried my best to complete this thesis, but due to my limited experience and knowledge, this thesis still has certain limitations I hope to receive constructive feedbacks and contributions from teachers, researchers as well as others

ABSTRACT

Learning will be more effective through joyful learning It will not be a successful lesson if the students do not feel interested at the very beginning of a lesson Thus, a teacher should try to start a lesson in a way which keeps his/her students engaged An interesting way of starting a lesson could be using activities called warm-up activities or icebreakers (Robertson & Acklam, 2000) An effective classroom warm-up activity can help teachers in creating a positive and joyful classroom atmosphere Many teachers put too much mechanical activities and they think it is the best way to spend the time in the classroom Few of them put the warm-

up activities in the beginning of the lesson to attract students’ interest in learning

Based on the fact, the researcher concluded that, the warm-up was effective

to the students’ English learning at 10th grade of Yen Phong 2 High School It was also proved by the observation which indicated that students always enjoy, be active, energize, feeling happiness, interactive in the classroom, stay in the class during learning process, and focus on the lesson

Based on the findings, it is advisable that, the English teachers apply or implement the warm-up in their English classes It can improve the students' effective English learning It is also advisable that, the future researchers conduct a similar study to different level of students

TABLE OF CONTENT

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENT iv

ABBREVIATIONS vii

LISTS OF TABLES viii

LIST OF CHARTS AND FIGURES ix

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Background of the study 1

1.2 Rationale of the study 3

1.3 Aims of the study 5

1.4 Research questions 6

1.5 Significance of the study 6

1.6 Scope and limitation 7

1.7 Design of the study 7

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 8

2.1 Literature review 8

2.1.1 Definition of warm-up 8

2.1.2 Goals of warm-up 9

2.1.3 The functions of the warm-up and its effect on students’ learning 10

2.1.4 Principles of Warm-up Activity 15

2.1.5 Drawbacks of warm-up activities 18

2.1.6 The role of the teacher in warm-up activities 19

2.2 Related studies 24

CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 27

3.1 The Context of the Study 27

3.2 Research Methodology 27

3.2.1 Research participants 27

3.2.2 Research Design 28

3.2.3 Data Collection Instruments 28

3.2.4 Data Collection Procedure 30

3.2.5 Data Analysis Method and Procedure 31

3.3 Summary 31

CHAPTER 4 RESULTS, DISCUSSION AND FINDINGS 32

4.1 The Questionnaires 32

4.1.1 The Questionnaire for Students 32

4.1.2 The Questionnaire for Teachers 42

4.2 The Class Observations 50

4.2.1 Class Observation 1 50

4.2.2 Class Observation 2 52

4.2.3 Class Observation 3 53

4.2.4 Class Observation 4 54

4.2.5 Class Observation 5 55

4.2.6 Class Observation 6 56

4.2.7 Class Observation 7 57

4.2.8 Class Observation 8 58

4.2.9 Class Observation 9 59

4.2.10 Class Observation 10 59

4.3 The Interviews 60

CHAPTER 5 CONCLUSION 62

5.1 Summary of research 62

5.2 Limitation of the study 63

5.3 Implications and recommendations 64

REFERENCES 66

APPENDIX 1 SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE I APPENDIX 2 SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE (For Teachers) IV APPENDIX 3 CLASS OBSERVATION VII APPENDIX 4 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS (For Students) IX

ABBREVIATIONS

CLT : Communicative Language Teaching

EF : Education first

EFL : English as a foreign language

ESL : English as a second language

SFL-TNU : School of Foreign Languages - Thai Nguyen University

LISTS OF TABLES

Chart 2.1 Differences between the warm-up and the presentation stage 9

Table 4.1 Students’ perception towards the benefits of warm-up activities 34

Table 4.2 Student’s perception toward the impacts of warm-up activities 39

Table 4.3 Student’s expectation about the use of warm-up activities 42

Table 4.4 Teachers’ perception towards the benefits of warm-up activities 44

Table 4.5 Frequency of giving warm-up session 45

Table 4.6 Frequency of warm-up activities 45

Table 4.7 Difficulties encountered by the teachers 48

Table 4.8 Measures to improve the effectiveness of warm-up activities 50

LIST OF CHARTS AND FIGURES

Figure 2.1 Principles for warm-up activities by VELANDIA (2008) 17

Figure 4.1 Student’s experience in learning English 32

Figure 4.2 Students’ perception towards the importance of warm-up activities 33

Figure 4.3 Students’ preference of class arrangement for warm-up activities 35

Figure 4.4 Students’ preference of activities for warm-up stage 36

Figure 4.5 Frequency of having warm-up activities 36

Figure 4.6 Representation of warm-up activities students do in class 37

Figure 4.7 Representation of student’s participation in warm-up activities 38

Figure 4.8 Representation of student’s satisfaction with warm-up activities 40

Figure 4.9 Difficulties encountered by the students 40

Figure 4.10 Teachers’ experience in teaching English 43

Figure 4.11 Teachers’ perception toward the importance of warm-up activities 43

Figure 4.12 Class arrangement for warm-up activities used by the teachers 46

Figure 4.13 Reasons for delivering warm-up activities 47

Figure 4.14 Teachers’ perception toward students’ participation 49

Figure 4.15 Lesson plan of the first observation 51

Figure 4.16 Lesson plan of the second observation 52

Figure 4.17 Lesson plan of the third observation 53

Figure 4.18 Lesson plan of the fourth observation 54

Figure 4.19 Lesson plan of the fifth observation 55

Figure 4.20 Lesson plan of the sixth observation 56

Figure 4.21 The most favorite warm-up activity 60

Figure 4.22 Students’ reason to like doing warm-up activities 61

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

This chapter presents the research background, rationale, objectives of the study, research questions, significance, scope and limitations, and organization

of the study

1.1 Background of the study

Teaching English as a second or foreign language to young learners has prompted a great deal of academic research and discussion for several reasons One reason is that English has become accepted as an international language during the last few decades, and therefore its importance has been more widely recognized and increasingly included in primary curricula in many countries Vietnam is among the countries where English has been introduced to young learners in basic education The English programme in Vietnamese basic education aims to enable pupils to: i) achieve a reasonable proficiency in listening and speaking English at a reasonable speed, reading simple texts with comprehension and writing about a simple subject or incident; ii) develop their interest in learning English so that they can learn effectively

by themselves; and iii) improve their knowledge and have access to foreign cultures However, it seems that these aims are not being realized In Vietnam, high school years is a critical period for students before they take the national graduation and the entrance examinations to tertiary education, in which English a compulsory component Grammar, reading and vocabulary are the focus of English tests in these exams The results of the National Graduation and Entrance Examinations for high school students in recent years reveal that pupils' performance in English was disappointing One of the reasons for this unsatisfactory performance could be ineffective English learning and teaching methods

Teaching English to students of High School has become a challenging job It seems hard to find many high school students who have strong motivation in learning English Most of them are easily getting bored, especially if the teacher teaches them using the same technique all the time without giving them any refreshing activity such

as warm-up or ice breaking activity In respect of teaching methodologies, for many decades, the Grammar - Translation method has been a dominant teaching method in the English classes in high schools in Vietnam Following this method, EFL classrooms in Vietnamese high schools were generally teacher-centred where pupils worked individually on linguistic forms and structures rather than English communication English grammar rules and sentences structures are normally taught deductively in the learners’ first language Students are required to rote learn these rules prior to translating them into their first language (i.e., Vietnamese) Vietnamese high school students are not given opportunities for interaction and participation in the classroom; and they lack the chance to work collaboratively

Recently Communicative Language Teaching (CLT), which emphasises effective communication of meanings rather than mere linguistic forms (Richards, 2005), was introduced into English classrooms in high schools in the late 1990s in Vietnam Although teachers express positive attitudes toward this method, evidence has indicated that their adaptation and application of this innovative teaching methods is either limited or ineffective According to the 2019 English Proficiency Index compiled by the global education firm Education First (EF), Vietnamese people's proficiency in using English has fallen for the third year in a row to reach the lowest point since 2015 Students still require a language environment conducive for communicative practices to develop their English skills

In respect of the learning method, many passive students are driven to earn points for passing English subjects in exams, not to practice language skills They

do not assume responsibility for their learning as well as retain motivation in learning English at school Therefore, teachers are required to develop more effective instruction to engage as many students as possible in their lessons in addition to keeping the students interested in learning English at school Effective instruction is an instruction that meets students’ needs and characteristics and accommodates students’ learning style (Border and Note in Rejeki, 2009:8)

Learning will be more effective through joyful learning It will not be a successful lesson if the students do not feel interested at the very beginning of a lesson Thus, a teacher should try to start a lesson in a way which keeps his/her students engaged An

interesting way of starting a lesson could be using activities called warm-up activities

or icebreakers (Robertson & Acklam, 2000) An effective classroom warm-up activity can help teachers in creating a positive and joyful classroom atmosphere Many teachers put too much mechanical activities and they think it is the best way to spend the time in the classroom Few of them put the warm-up activities in the beginning of the lesson to attract students’ interest in learning

1.2 Rationale of the study

Many students complain that they feel bored doing same thing again and again from the beginning to end of a class As they do not feel interested in class, they cannot progress much in learning a language Unfortunately, many teachers do not pay attention whether or not students feel interested and motivated to work with the activities they provide in classes It is needed to find out how to keep students’ interest in learning (Jun, 2000) Using warm up activities can be one way to bring variation in class activity and to make the students curious, focus their attention, provide them purpose and motivation (Eragamreddy, 2013)

Nowadays, the Communicative Language Teaching Approach seems to be dominant, and the communicative competence is the goal of language teaching Many great changes have been made in classroom atmosphere: learners play active and positive roles during the class time and learners-centered classroom is reached However, in fact, in Vietnamese high schools, teachers and students still find it difficult to start enjoying the very first moment of a lesson in the target language Actually, it is not easy to get students start participating the beginning activity of the class How to encourage students to enjoy English and actively join learning activities is the worry of many teachers

Recently, the use of warm-up activities has been a topic commonly mentioned

in methodologies; since they are considered as an essential ingredient for an effective period in language learning classroom and play an indispensable part in leading to the success of a lesson Nonetheless, they often receive less attention than they should Teachers spend a lot of time preparing explanations to introduce and practice the target language, and seem do not prepare carefully for the first five-minute activity of each lesson This can cause the boredom in classroom for it cannot involve students and attract them to the next contents of the lesson

With the widely application communicative language teaching where the primary function of language is interaction and communication, and the main aim

is to be able to train students who are communicatively competent, the traditional teaching style no longer takes its dominant place in classroom In other words, in communicative language classroom, students expect to be involved in more activities to develop proficiency in language use The traditional reading-writing teaching form is no longer appropriate with students Instead, they need some practical activities which motivate and inspire them as much as possible Among all of those activities, warm-up activities should be the first element to care about

at the beginning of each lesson The core reason is that to be “the first activity of the lesson, the warm up sets the tone for the next ninety minutes” (Chris Cotter, 2012) This means whether students are motivated to enjoy the rest of the lesson

or not, to some extent, depends on the warm-up activity Thus, the teachers must

be aware of designing and applying these activities to achieve at least the following aims: to introduce a theme, to relax students after a hard day's work, to wake students up after a hard night, to wait for late arrivals, to provide a break in the lesson, to provide humor, to provide oral fluency practice and to finish the lesson on a light note From this point of view, using warm up activities to motivate and engage students is critical

Regarding the issue of using warm-up activities at Yen Phong 2 High School, where the author is a member in the teaching team, it seemed that both teachers and students have not fully understood about the roles as well as the rules of using warm

up in certain classroom environment Among the stages in an English lesson, the warm-up stage is taken too lightly during the lesson plan preparation or is even absent in most of the courses We particularly noticed this fact when we did the class observations during our teaching practice period; we observed in total 10 forty-five-minute periods in which only 2 periods had a warm-up session This situation concerning the warm-up stage is quite understandable due to some reasons

To some extent, the consideration of the warm-up stage in itself is the main reason - since during this session, the teachers do not actually teach something to the students,

and devoting time for this session seems to be unnecessary; this thought mostly leads teachers to think that it has no importance for the course and the students Related to that, teachers are often more concerned with covering the lesson of the day due to time constraint; that is why they want to tackle directly with the lesson right at the beginning of the class This situation also indicates that some teachers lack of ideas on the warm-up activities that can be done in class In addition, some teachers do not think warm up is useful that is needed for learning to be fun They basically use it in the first class of a new course to give the students a chance to be familiar with each other They ignore the other benefits of using a warm up activity

in classroom For example: it can motivate the students to participate in class activities, activate the students’ background knowledge, help the teachers introduce

a new topic in interesting way or help get the students’ attention However, teachers use common techniques such as questioning, reviewing materials from the previous class, chatting with students as warm up activity whereas they can use jokes, songs, funny videos, games, stories or pictures to make the class more interesting Meanwhile, other teachers at Yen Phong 2 High School have tried their best to make their students interested in learning English, and this have led to some significant impacts However, how the students perceive the effects of the warm-up activities and whether the of use warm-up activities improve the effectiveness of English learning and teaching is still in question

Against the above-mentioned background and with the hope to get a profound insight into the roles of warm-up activities perceived by Grade 10 students of Yen Phong 2 High School and to make some recommendations to effectively employ warm up activities in English lessons, the researcher has decided to conduct a study entitled “USING WARM-UP ACTIVITIES TO INCREASE STUDENT’S EFFECTIVE ENGLISH LEARNING AT YEN PHONG 2 HIGH SCHOOL”

1.3 Aims of the study

The research was undertaken to examine the use of warm-up activities in enhancing students’ effective English learning at high schools in general and at Yen Phong 2 High School in particular

The specific objectives of the study are:

1 To determine the students’ perceptions of warm-up activities

2 To determine the teachers’ perceptions of warm-up activities

3 To investigates the difficulties encountered by the teachers and their practices of employing warm-up activities in their lessons

4 To identify the kinds of warm-up activities which enhance students’ effective English learning

5 To provide some recommendations to improve the effectiveness of using warm-up activities in English lessons

1.4 Research questions

The research questions that the study addressed are:

1 What are the perceptions of Grade 10 students in Yen Phong 2 High School towards warm-up activities?

2 What are the perceptions of English teachers in Yen Phong 2 High School towards warm-up activities?

3 What kind of types of warm-up activities which enhance Grade 10 students’ effective English learning?

4 In what ways are warm-up activities used for Grade 10 students at Yen Phong 2 High School?

1.5 Significance of the study

This study provides an overview of the theoretical frameworks and practices

on warm-up activities in teaching and learning English with a case study at Yen Phong 2 High School

For the researcher, this study helps the researcher determine the impacts of using warm-up activities in teaching and learning English in general and at Yen Phong 2 High School in particular

For teachers, this study may bring more insight into the indispensable importance of warm-up stage and the results of this study may enable teachers to determine which kinds of warm-up activities should best fit and how they are adapted to achieve the specific goal of each lesson In addition, this study may help arise some practical ideas for change in teaching methods using warm-up activities

in combination with the application of new pedagogical innovations

For students, this study provides them with relatively clear understanding of the role and benefits of warm-up activities, so they can be willing to actively engage themselves in learning activities introduced in the warm-up stage of an English lesson in order to enhance the effectiveness of their English learning

For further research, this study can be used as a reference for future research related to the investigated topic

1.6 Scope and limitation

Due to limitation of time, knowledge and materials, with the aforementioned aims of the study, the researcher only focused on major aspects of warm-up activities

as perceived by Grade 10 students and teachers at Yen Phong 2 High School in Bac Ninh Province Accordingly, only some kinds of warm-up activities that students like most and the way warm up activities are used for Grade 10 students at Yen Phong 2 High School were discussed Moreover, the study was confined only on 3 of 10 classes in Grade 10 of the school with the participation of 133 students among 1831 students at Yen Phong 2 High School, where there are teachers and students who are implementing the new English syllabuses for Grade 10 It is also noticeable that this study did not attempt to pay specific attention to the impacts of warm-up activities on

a single linguistic skill such as speaking or writing

1.7 Design of the study

This study was organized in five chapters:

Chapter 1 provides the background of the study, the rationale, the aims, the research questions, the significance, the scope and limitation and the organization of the study Chapter 2 provides a review of related literature and related studies for theoretical basis of the study

Chapter 3 presents the methodology used in the study It includes the description of the participants, the data collection instruments, the data collection procedures and the data analysis procedures

Chapter 4 covers an analysis of survey results, and discussion on the qualitative data collected from the interview, class observation and findings drawn out

Chapter 5 presents a summary of major findings, draws the conclusions, recommendations of the study and make suggestions for further studies

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter provides a review of related literature and related studies for theoretical basis of the study

2.1 Literature review

Warm-up sessions actually contribute a lot in the process of learning by its power to engage students, especially in language learning The first part below will actually serve at enlightening this importance of the warm-up stage in language learning since this may be an unfamiliar approach to teaching for some teachers, especially in one that would usually be more traditional than communicative

2.1.1 Definition of warm-up

A warm-up session is viewed as a simple starter, and from this idea, it becomes less valued than the other stages of the course Consequently, during the lesson plan, teachers do not plan any warm-up activity However, this stage needs to

be devoted time and reflection

The definitions below will serve to primarily induce us to think that a

warm-up is far from being a mere starter but is a stage that richly and heavily contributes

in the course

Leblanc (2011) states that warming up is an activity in the beginning of a lesson which has as aim to attract the students’ attention in the class and avoid external distractions Another definition of warm-up is the one given by Rushidi (2013) who defines warming up as an activity that help students to feel relaxed and sets a positive attitude to learning In that sense Flanigan (2011) concludes that warming up activities are very useful in language classes because these activities help learners to practice and improve the four skills (listening, speaking, writing and reading)

Leigner (2015) defines the warm-up stage as “the first activity of the lesson”

In other words, the warm-up stage opens the class session Considering this definition, we can first infer that a warm-up session should be situated at the beginning of the class Therefore, a warmup activity is the first provided by the teacher to the students

According to The Cobuild Learner’s Dictionary, a warm-up is “a preparation that you do just before an event such a race for example, exercising or practicing” Relating this definition to the warm-up stage in teaching, Velandia (2008) states that the warm-up stage “is like a preparation to the other stages”

Other researchers consider that a warm-up activity is a motivating starting point that will lead students to become more animated to work efficiently in language class Also, Lassche (2005) emphasizes that the warm-up stage is “a process of initial orientation to the language learning lesson” That is why, it is important to link the warm-up activity with the lesson because if we start with an exciting and interesting activity that also gives some marks about the lesson to the students, the other steps will be developed easily

Because the warm-up stage we develop here has a close connection with the lesson, it is possible to mix this stage with the presentation stage Therefore, few differences between these two will be shown below stages in a form of a chart

Chart 2.1: Differences between the warm-up and the presentation stage

As mentioned previously, the warm-up

stage is like a preparation to the other

stages Therefore, the warm-up session

can include a preview of the lesson that

will be covered

This stage is considered as the core

of the lesson where the language or new vocabulary items are taught

The warm-up stage is an activity to

identify the knowledge students have

about the topic

The students receive new information and explanation about the topic

2.1.2 Goals of warm-up

Like every stage in a lesson, a warm-up session also has its specific objectives

in learning Firstly, a warm-up stage aims at preparing students’ mind to focus on the study and the actual lesson A warm-up done at the beginning of a physical

training acts the same way as a warm-up done at the beginning of a lesson if we compare these two areas The exercises we do before practicing sport will warm our body and muscles up, and that is in the courses will warm the students’ brain up Students need some time to settle down and be relaxed in the course A warm-up activity will intend to allow the “wheels” in their head to start turning and to integrate little by little the actual course In a nutshell, the warm-up stage intends to bring the students back into classroom mentality Secondly, the warm-up stage also aims at engaging the students in the classroom activities by arousing their interests, attentions, and motivations - three variables that are keys in a good transmission and assimilation of the lesson

2.1.3 The functions of the warm-up and its effect on students’ learning

With the various ideas collected from the different articles and books, we came

up with the following classifications to enlighten the special roles embodied by the warm-up stage

Waking up students

Warm up itself means making a quick preparation about both physical and mental features This requires more energy burnt into the activity; thus, it can wake students up to ask them to join the task Moreover, warm-up activities get students

to begin to think and focus on English

Attention getter

There are many possible reasons why it takes time for students to start a new lesson and to be attentive: thinking of the previous subject matter, talking to classmates, daydreaming due to tiredness, or laziness to continue studying A warm-

up session can help to eradicate these issues

According to Allwright (1984), warm up activities are used to get students’ attention so that to they put aside their distracting thoughts and become ready to focus individually and as groups on class activities (as cited in Velandia, 2008, p.11) By using warm up activities, learners’ attention can be taken and they can be invited to start thinking of lesson topic Warm-up activities help the students stop being distracted and focus their attention on the lesson These kinds of activities

lead the students to effective language learning from the beginning (Velandia, 2008) Arousing and attracting students’ attention by means of a warm up session is then of a great importance in language learning, for attentive students will be totally engaged right from the start of the class

According to Leblanc (2011), warm-up activities will help students to turn off the outside world and focus on the task at hand By the end of the warm-up activity, every student will be ready to learn and being able to focus on their language lesson In any classroom, there always are students who are more reticent and are willing to let others do all the participating By engaging students to take part in a low-risk, warm-up activity, a teacher will reach every student and will help their students achieve their language goals

It is widely agreed that catching students’ attention at the beginning is a global concern for every teacher

Transition between the languages

A warm-up session acts as a bridge between the students’ mother tongue and English Students need time to switch from their native language to English Throughout the warm-up stage, students will try to adapt their mind, especially their ears, little by little to the English language The warm-up stage will be an occasion

to make them start thinking in English and to be used to listening to that foreign language Leblanc (2011) states: “Whether it’s asking and answering simple questions, listening to music or watching a cartoon, warm-up activities tune the students’ ear to English nuances”

Mind comforter toward the English language

Students need something easy to start with in order to avoid any frustration when they are faced with English The warm-up stage is where the introduction

of the language is the easiest Therefore, the students’ mind will feel more comfortable with the contact to the foreign language if the learners do a warm-up activity when starting class Humanistic approach considers each learner as a whole person, thus making him feel good, at ease, and relaxed is necessary for

him to be self-confident With the help of the teacher and the right activity, warm-up sessions will allow students to feel relaxed and comfortable in class Having the students relaxed and start thinking in English is here the key issue for every English teacher Spaventa (1979) said: “The job of the teacher is to work

on the students while the students work on the language.” According to Flanigan (2011) performing warm-up activities in English class will help students be in the right frame of mind to learn Also, proper warm-up activities ensure that students will get the most from their class

Creating a relaxed atmosphere to reduce the affective filter

With regard to Second Language Acquisition (SLA), the affective filter is always a notion to be considered Based on Krashen’s theory of affective filters (1985), Randrianarison (1997) explained the use of the terms “filter” and

“affective” as follows:

- Filter (n): an obstruction to the passage of the input

- Affective (adj.): the factors which determine the strength of the filter are mainly related to the learners’ emotion

Thus, the amount of input received by the students depends on the filter, and the power of this filter depends on the attitudes and emotions of the students The following schemas explain in a simple way the mechanism of the affective filter Some quotations of Krashen (1985) and Dulay (1977) from Randrianarison (1997) are also used to support each schema

- Pleasant attitude and emotion → low affective filter → high amount of acquired input

Krashen (1985): “People acquire second languages only if they obtain comprehensible input and if their affective filters are low enough to allow the input in”

- Bad attitude and emotion → high affective filter → low amount of acquired input

Dulay and Burt (1977): “Learners with low motivation, little self-confidence and high anxiety have high filters and so receive little input and allow even less in”

When these schemas are considered, it can be confirmed that nothing can

be learnt if the students are tense and anxious Yet, these kinds of emotion are most of the time present in students during English classes since English is a foreign language for them For that reason, it is important for teachers to be able to create a good learning atmosphere to have an impact on their affective filters Warm-up activities are suitable for this requirement because it provides stimulus that arouse a good atmosphere in class and a good attitude toward the lesson As a result, students will be able to easily receive information during the course

Topic transition

Kay (1995) emphasizes warm up is “an effective way to help the students begin to think in English and to review previously introduced material.” Warm-up can be an effective mean to introduce a theme or to mark the shift when students have finished learning about one topic before starting on a new topic An activity at the beginning of the lesson activates pre-existing knowledge on a subject, and may even get students to consider some of the ideas, vocabulary, or even grammar contents important to the lesson

García and Martín (2004) mention that one of the objectives of using warm up activity is to activate students’ background knowledge (p.17) Teachers need to understand what students already know about the topic they are going to teach and they need to connect the topic with the students’ present understanding Teachers should start teaching from the point about which students have knowledge or they are familiar with (Cheung, 2001) García and Martín (2004) mention that “from a deductive methodological viewpoint”, we can assume warm-up as a ship that takes the learners for a journey from known to unknown as an attempt to activate their potential and passive vocabulary (p 17) A warm-up activity helps the students trigger their existing knowledge and also drive their mind towards the main activity This is the way students can build a connection between the old and new information (Nemati & Habibi, 2012)

Triggering interest

Interest plays an enormous role since it is necessary for successful language learning One of our lecturers in the English department at university argued that learning takes place when it is related to the need and aspirations, especially the interest of the learners Therefore, students need to be interested if the teacher wants them to be involved during the process of learning Learning languages is not always appealing for students given that they tend to associate it with long lessons, forms and uses …, especially if they are used to be taught through traditional approaches Calling for students’ interest is even difficult if the way the teacher starts class is boring for the students

A good warm-up session has the power to produce this interest in students if the activities are appealing enough for the students As a consequence, the learners will become more curious and involved on the course at the beginning of the class Randrianarison (1997) said: “They will find their lesson more stimulating if some of their tasks are concerned with things that interest them […]”

Instiller of motivation

Among the various variables leading to the success of learning, motivation

is certainly regarded as the most important one Motivation makes up the very basis of a successful learning Motivated students will learn much more effectively and will be pleasurable to teach, whereas, unmotivated students will have some difficulty during the course, and engaging them could be a difficult task for the teacher

As a matter of fact, Raveloharimasy (1996) argued that warm-up activities aim

at motivating learners and achieving the objective of the lesson And according to Dornyei (2001), “the warm-up stage can foster motivation in the students through the activity suggested by the teacher and can also generate positive attitude in students toward learning.” As the warm-up stage is already an occasion to make the students aware of what they will learn during the course, the students will be prepared to learn the lesson ahead and will be motivated because they know that at the end of the course, they will be able to know and use all the necessary information surrounding this topic of the day

Establishing a positive relationship

Learning process is facilitated through building a positive relationship with the students A fun or interesting class largely depends on the teachers as their personality and teaching method motivate the students to raise a positive attitude towards learning (Krishnan & Hoon, 2002) Teachers’ attitude is an important factor

to develop cooperation between students and teacher If teaching style is cooperative, learning condition becomes good (Klippen, 1985) Klippen (1985) mentions that the teacher sets an atmosphere within a class without being aware of

it by choosing certain types of exercises and topics (p 6) The teacher can help the students share their ideas and opinions in less tensed situation by developing rapport with them (Lassche, 2005) Building up a sense of rapport and mutual trust among the teacher and the students is the pre-condition to create a positive atmosphere in classroom (Richards & Bohlke, 2011)

Stimulating class involvement

We can promote students’ participation at the very beginning of the class

by using warm-up With a good activity and technique, students can already be involved during the first minutes of the class and are not only a passive audience This students’ engagement has an advantage to arouse motivation and pride in them because they know that the knowledge the class acquired partly comes from them, therefore they are more enthusiastic to learn Eison (2010) cites Teton Lakota Indians as follows: “Tell me and I’ll listen Show me and I’ll understand Involve me and I’ll learn.”

2.1.4 Principles of Warm-up Activity

There are specific aspects related to warm up activities which can make students’ learning more stimulating They are noted as follows:

- Breaking the monotony of learning: About this one, Dornyei (2001) highlights the importance of the “motivational flow” when talking about the general rhythm and sequence of events in class and suggests starting it with a warmer, which can be a short stimulating game to set the tone

- Making the tasks more interesting: The author claims that humans are able to produce concentrated effort if they want to Generating this interest involves a set of characteristics Most of them can be adaptable; thus, they become challenging for students since they have interesting content, novelty, and intriguing, exotic, fantasy and personal elements; they stimulate competition and humor

- Increasing the involvement of the students: It is important to make students active participants and suggests selecting tasks which require mental or physically involvement of each participant and creating specific rules and personalized assignments for everybody

Referring to most of ideas we developed previously, we can deduce that the impact of a warm-up session on students’ learning partly depends on the warm-up activity that the teacher is presenting to the class Hence, we can infer that the choice of a correct and efficient warm-up activity is essential if the teacher wants this warm-up stage to reach its desired goals Based on the results of Velandia’s research (2008), below are the criteria of a good warm-up activity aiming at helping teachers in their choice

A warm-up activity should:

- Be short: the length of a warm-up activity needs to last around 5 to 10 min

During that time, students will slowly adapt their mind to the English language Moreover, as an English course lasts in average one hour and a half, the warm-up stage should not take too much time because the other stages in which the main lesson is to be treated still take a lot of time

- Go at the beginning of the class: The warm-up activity should come at the

first place when we begin class Therefore, in the teachers’ lesson plan, the

warm-up stage is the first thing teachers should prepare

- Be an interesting and enjoyable activity

- Focus students’ attention and prepare students for a period of concentration

- Help students begin to work

- Be useful to continue the class

- Be related to the topic: the lesson ahead will not be unfamiliar to the students

if the warm-up activity is linked with the topic to be dealt The learners will not face

a sudden shift from one thing to another that is totally different

Figure 2.1 Principles for warm-up activities by VELANDIA (2008)

Robertson and Acklam (2000) also have described the main features of a warm-up activity They include that a warm-up activity needs to be interesting to motivate the students for practicing English It will not be the main part of the lesson as a warm-up activity is a short activity Warm-up can be used to give the students a chance to revise previously studied language Robertson and Acklam (2000) have disagreed with Velandia (2008) that warm up activity has to be related with the lesson topic They mention that it is not necessary that warm-up activity be connected to the lesson as the main purpose of using warm-up activity is making the students ready to work in English (p 8)

Learning English highly depends on pupils’ positive attitude toward the class Consequently, learning must be stimulating and enjoyable through breaking what might cause monotony in this process and strengthening what makes tasks more interesting, as well as what increases students’ involvement The use of warming up activities implies features as the ones previously described in order to get students’ attention, to make them interested in what is going on, to focus on language items and to increase learners’ expectations by consciously arranging the conditions in a way that they put the learner in a more positive or optimistic mood

2.1.5 Drawbacks of warm-up activities

Besides the outweighed advantages that warm-up activities bring about, we must be realistic and assume that there might be some problems

Firstly, warm-up activities in class inevitably result in a noisy and chaotic classroom because several groups of students work at the same time and the teacher has to monitor these groups The teacher may lose control of the class In addition,

it is obvious that in Vietnam’s language teaching context, a classroom often houses around 40 students As a result, the teacher will not be able to equally give help and advice to every student Kumar (1992) mentions that large class size might make interaction and involvement difficult

Secondly, most English teacher may face mixed ability students In a ability group, better learners will consolidate their own understanding of issues at hand when explaining these to slower learners, while slower ones will benefit from peer tutoring by faster learners As a result, all members may not participate equally

mixed-in discussions Warm-up activities cause unbalanced participation among members This may be because some may fall into roles that easily become fossilized; consequently, they turn out to be passive whereas the others might dominate For instance, a higher-level learner may not want to work with a weaker partner and tend to dominate and monopolize most of the time As a consequence, slow learners have the tendency to withdraw and sit still listening to their dominating partners Thirdly, prior passive learning experience is a factor that prevents learners from taking part in warm-up activities They still do not get accustomed to presenting their ideas in front of their class Furthermore, they foci greatly face-losing when using the target language incorrectly or inappropriately In addition, in their mother tongue, learners have a wealth of strategies at their disposal to avoid a difficult or embarrassing situation, to self-correct, or to seek help in case of linguistic trouble That can explain why the students are hesitated to participate in speaking activities Many passive students or lazy students let their friends do everything provided that they still have their names in the group's result (Harmer, 1999)

Lastly, working in group is a relatively slow process compared with 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 really time-consuming It is not only time-consuming for the students in group but also for the teacher The teacher needs more time to organize the group work and control all the members in the group let alone the unsuitable students in groups which makes the class in disorder

It seems that there are as many disadvantages as advantages of these classroom arrangements and one cannot unanimously state which one is better, since each teacher has his/her own likes and dislikes It is his/her individual choice which one should be used during the process of teaching a language

To conclude, although there are some disadvantages of warm-up activities, the advantages still outweigh Learning from each other in small groups is much more effective than from the teacher alone

2.1.6 The role of the teacher in warm-up activities

In Communicative Language Teaching, the teacher has the roles of a facilitator, an instructor, an organizer, an assessor, a prompter and a participant (Hammer, 1991) When carrying out warm-up activities, even though the students are more independent, the teacher still plays an important role in conducting (designing) the tasks, analyzing the need The teacher will be of great help for the students as the group members interacting with each other as well as helping them with the difficulties

According to Cross (1992), the teacher is the manager of an activity who must plant it, organize it, start it, monitor it, time it and in the end conclude it The teacher in the warm-up activities is not the free one but the one who is active with assisting, supervising and monitoring the group The teacher is not only at the beginning or the end of the learning process but from beginning to the end of it The teacher is:

- Activity selector: This is very important because the teacher has to create

activities that fit the students' skills and abilities, assign students tasks that allow a fair division of energy as well as set up "competitions" among groups

- Instructor so that the students will be not misleading

- Performance controller While the students are working in groups, this is

the time for the teacher to help, to assist them with the knowledge and may be tackling the difficulties they have with the group

According to Brown (2001), the teacher should not do the following:

- Don't sit at your desk and grade papers

- Don't leave the room and take a break

- Don't spend an undue amount of time with one group at the expense of others

- Don’t correct students’ errors unless asked to do so

- Don't assume a dominating or disruptive role while monitoring groups Whether groupwork is successful or not, it depends much on how and where the teacher applies these roles

2.1.7 Some activities used during warm-up sessions

From the aforementioned principles and issues, we can deduce that finding the good warm-up activity is not an easy task If teachers want the warm-up to produce its desired effects on the students, they will need to choose those which fulfill most

of these principles Therefore, reflection and selection are required

Learning English must be stimulating and enjoyable through breaking what may cause monotony in the process of learning and strengthening tasks that interest and involve the students According to LEE (1986), “it is now very generally accepted that language teaching not merely can but should be enjoyable […] A language is learnt by using it - and this means using it in situations and communicatively” We have here selected some warm-up activities which English teachers are used to using and which bring a positive effect on students They also fulfill most of the criteria above

Exploiting pictures: Visual aids such as pictures, cartoons, and realia are

really attractive for students The idea the teacher wants the students to have in mind can be easily guessed by students without many efforts Well-designed visual aids bring clear ideas without the necessity to talk a lot Moreover, when students see the visual aids, there are times when they often participate directly without the teacher asking what the thing is Since they see the object concretely, they are able

to give their appreciation and knowledge right away It is also an effective way to attract their attention As an example, if the teacher wants to present a lesson on politics, the visual aids during the warm-up session will be pictures showing the President or politicians the students know well

Singing or listening to songs: Songs are really appreciated by students

because they have fun and are relaxed when they sing Apart from that interest, using songs is efficient in bringing the English language little by little into the classroom It is a good channel to prepare their ears Hasani, Rahmani, and Afsharfard (2014) studied the effect of songs on upper-intermediate Iranian EFL learners The results showed that performance of the students who used songs in their learning materials are much better than the other group who received spoken text Martin (1983) and MC Carthey (1985) pointed out that music can help in acquiring all linguistic skills (Writing, Speaking, Reading, and Listening) Horwitz (1986) claimed that it may be easier for learners to learn skills of language but while learning speaking English they have mental block against it So, teachers must use useful tools for removing this mental block They said that music by decreasing anxiety breaks this mental block However, the song should be short and easy to understand A song that they already know is also better

Short stories: Here, we are not referring to stories like anecdotes, dialogues,

tales, or jokes The content should be interesting for the students, and the words used should not be difficult It should correspond to the level of the students Apart from the real material, such as texts used during the presentation of the lesson, the short story in the warm-up can already be an example to illustrate the lesson Students will already have in mind what the lesson might be

Here is an example of joke we used during the warm-up stage:

“Two friends, Koto and Bema, are talking Koto is relating the dream he did the night before

K: You know what, last night, I dreamt in English

B: How do you know that you dreamt in English?

K: Because I did not understand anything.”

Games and competition: Generally, most of the teachers consider English

games as a waste of time, but there are evidences that they are very useful

Language games could play a fundamental role in developing a positive attitude towards the target language, because pupils have pleasant experiences during the activities Generally speaking, if an activity is enjoyable, it will be memorable; the language involved will stick and the children will have a sense of achievement

Well-chosen games are invaluable as they give students a break and at the same time allow students to practice language skills Games are highly motivating since they are amusing and at the same time challenging Furthermore, they employ meaningful and useful language in real contexts They also encourage and increase cooperation Games are highly motivating because they are amusing and interesting They can be used to give practice in all language skills and be used to practice many types of communication Deesri (2002) stated that games contain factors as rules, completion and fun relaxation which result in improving students' speaking ability

He mentioned that games encourage students to have a friendly competition and real communication

Games and competition promote stimulating classroom atmosphere It directly enhances class participation in students because they are all involved in the task It can also strengthen the relation students - teacher because students need to be guided during the game, and they are also always tempted to ask some clues from the teachers Using games as a teaching tool for teaching new vocabulary and grammar decreases students' stress and fosters communication practice

Moreover, language games can provide pupils with an essential link between their real lives and school, which helps to make them feel more secure and confident about taking part in classroom activities This feeling has a great impact

on learners' participation

However, teacher should be cautious when using games and competition as warm-up activities If a teacher plans a game, it is critical to explain the rationale of the game to the students in the class, no matter what For example, if he or she were

to employ a short, simple hangman or hotseat game, the teacher should swiftly

inform the students that this game will help them with spelling, or get their brains focused on recognizing the shape and structure of new words, and will facilitate their learning of new vocabulary In addition to making sure the students are aware

of the learning benefits of the activity, preparing such an explanation will also help teachers to make sure that they know precisely why they are spending time on the game in the lesson in the first place Such explanations are absolutely vital, because they satisfy the more serious student who can feel pressured by game time, they make sure the weaker student understand that this activity is not a waste of time and also enables all of the students to comprehend that the teacher is playing for an explicit reason, has planned the game to enhance their learning, and is not just wasting time by adding a fun element to the lesson

In short, games can be a very worthwhile teaching element A successful game is successful for it is based on specific time allocation, it has clear relevance to the material, there is appropriateness to all members of the class, and ultimately, the enjoyment of the learners is increased through their actively engaging with the language

Brainstorming: According to the American Heritage Dictionary, brainstorming

is “a method of shared problem solving in which all members of a group spontaneously contribute ideas” It is an occasion for students to activate their prior knowledge Moreover, through brainstorming, the class can collect a lot of ideas, even those which are not expected Therefore, it will expand the knowledge of all

students in class, and the learners are directly involved in the course “Brainstorming helps to connect information from different sources to the topic at hand, opening the large passive vocabulary vault in each student […] The information in a brainstorming session comes from the students, not the teacher Students become aware that they are not blank slates, but come in with valuable information that they can contribute, even teach, to each other.” (LASSCHE, 2005)

Example of brainstorm:

The teacher writes some keywords on the board and students have to guess the connection between them, i.e they have to guess the topic which all of them have in common

Another type of brainstorm, for example to introduce Halloween, could be writing “Halloween” on the board and having the students come up and draw related pictures This activity is very successful with low levels

Exploiting audio-visual aids: Audio-visual aids offer the advantages brought

by both audio and visual aids in one Here, we mean by audio-visual aids the use of videos Not only using videos modernizes the field of teaching, but it also suggests that this revolutionized aspect of communication satisfies the needs of the learners

in real communication Its audio-visual characteristics, such as the possibility to offer a paralinguistic feature - meaning images - puts the videos as being a powerful tool that can be used in language teaching and learning Melvin and Stout (2005) give us an example on what differentiates videos from other media in showing or expressing the language through this following illustration:

The greeting “How are you today?” can be presented in a variety of mediums:

Subtitle: How are you today?

Audio: We hear the phonemic chain, with stress and intonation for the

particular meaning intended

Video: We can observe one individual greeting another and saying “How are

you today?” with gestures appropriate to the culture”

Using videos may prevent monotony in the way of starting class According to Radasimalala (2002), “video will free the teachers from their routine tasks as they provide variations to their way of teaching” It is a widely accepted that routine keeps away our interest and attention whether in our everyday life or in class because the things we see or do are not anymore new to us In that way, using videos will certainly help teachers to arouse the learners’ attention and interest Thus, it is worth examining its strength and its particularity in the context of English language learning and specifically as a warm-up activity in order to recommend its use as a possibility during the warm-up stage of English class

2.2 Related studies

Understanding the importance of warm-up activities and the fact that the use of warm-up activities is not as effective as expectation, some researchers invest in studying

this issue A typical example is Rosalba V (2008) with the study entitled “The Role of Warming Up Activities in Adolescent Students' Involvement during the English Class”

In this research, Rosalba indicated some benefits of using warm up activities and pointed out the ability to promote students' involvement at the very beginning of the class by applying warm ups Nevertheless, this research just focused on students Grade 7 and did not suggest the solutions to apply warm up activities in order to satisfy the demand and encourage the appetite of learning of students This gap in the research of Rosalba; therefore, is an inspiration for other researchers to study and expand the issue

In an experimental study conducted by Estalkhbijari and Khodareza (2012) at a university in Iran, 60 EFL students were grouped as an experimental and a control group in order to investigate the effects of warm up tasks as classroom activities on foreign language written production The experimental group received treatments on warm-up tasks, and the control group received placebo Two paragraphs of 150 words writing tasks were used as pre- and post-test Three experienced teachers graded the student papers The results of the study provided that the experimental group showed better performances in writing The authors drew attention to the role of warm up tasks

as facilitators for student involvement in the class work in the forms of sharing answers, trying to participate, paying attention, giving the answers, encouraging to take part in the lesson, participating as volunteers, working on the exercises, drawing, and writing the exercises (p 197) However, this research cannot be generalized for the same results in other groups of students, particularly high school students in Vietnam, where the English learning and teaching context is relatively different

Hansen and Liu (2005) point to the significance of warm-up activities in another study, which aims to present guiding principles that teachers can utilize in their own planning and student training for effective peer response The authors state that in order to create an environment wherein students feel more comfortable

to engage in negotiation of meaning and provide each other with linguistic content, warm-up activities play supportive roles (p 33) Whether the guiding principle work in Vietnamese high school English learning environment is an interesting question calling for further research

An Exploratory Practice study conducted by Pillai (2013) explores why students have low interest in learning vocabulary and have lack of lexical control when it comes to use in academic and personal growth The participants of the study were a group of 20 students of a postgraduate management program With the aim

of understanding students’ perceptions and needs on vocabulary learning, a questionnaire was first delivered to the participants Following that a test was administered to students, which included finding the word and matching it with the correct meaning Having analyzed the findings, the teacher implemented over a 20 hours of action research-based instruction with aiming to integrate a selected set of vocabulary items which would be useful for the students’ present and future needs After the application of the study, the researcher also conducted informal interviews and used questionnaires to understand students’ perceptions/opinions on the practice

of using games for the teaching of vocabulary A posttest was administered to see how the study was effective on students’ vocabulary use and recognition The results of the study provided improvement for students in terms of words taught, interest in going to class, and interest and involvement in class The study also revealed improvement in involvement of tutor and using different methods/games (p 92) This study adds more insight into the controversial issue whether warm-up activities can be used for vocabulary lessons, but the respondents of this research are quite different to the respondents of the current study

A university graduation paper on “A study on the exploitation of games and activities to warm-up the class at secondary schools in Hanoi” by N.T.T Huong in 1999

at the English Language Department, College of Foreign Language, Vietnam National University - Hanoi was one of the pioneers in studying warm-up activities This study provides an overview at warm-up and some games and activities which can be used to warm-up However, it has not given a deep look at warm-up and its role in specific Follow this study, another university graduation paper from the same institution called “Designing warm-up activities for the new Tieng Anh 10 (set 1)” by P.T.T Ha in

2005 pointed out some types of warm-up activities which are designed in regard to some criteria established in the teaching implications However, with the introduction of the new syllabus, no relevant literature is found on this issue

CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter includes two small parts The first part is the context of the study The second one is the research methodology which consists of the participants, research design, data collection instruments and procedure, and data analysis method and procedure

3.1 The Context of the Study

The study was conducted at Yen Phong 2 High School, which was founded in

2004 and located in Yen Trung Commune, Yen Phong District, Bac Ninh province Every year, the school enrolls around new 600 students At the time of this research, the school had 41 classes in three grades with the total number of students of 1831 students Most of the students came from the nearby villages and town in Yen Phong District Regarding the students’ level of English proficiency, most students started learning English at the early age and have been formally learning English since grade 3 However, the students differ in their level of language proficiency The academic records revealed the majority of them have low proficiency of English

As for the English teachers, the school has 8 English teachers aged from 25 to

45 The youngest finished university last year, so she has nearly one year of teaching experience The oldest one has over 20 years of teaching experience

In terms of language teaching method, the teachers at Yen Phong 2 High School are familiar with the traditional teaching method as they used to teach the old syllabuses, and all of them has been trained Communicative Language Teaching

as well as have attended a number of workshops or seminars about teaching methodology However, when following the new syllabuses, they still feel difficult

to initiate activities and manage the class and time

3.2 Research Methodology

3.2.1 Research participants

In order to gather information for the study, 133 students of Grade 10 from 3 classes (10A3, 10A7, 10A11) at Yen Phong 2 High School were chosen to answer the questionnaire These students, of who 73 are female and 60 are male students, are

those who are learning the new English 10 syllabuses They were getting used to the new way to study in the upper secondary school, while most of them are at the age of

15 when people normally have changes in awareness, personality and mentality Among the English teacher, 07 of them were invited to answer the questionnaire All of the teachers are female and have the teaching experience from 1 to 22 years

20 students who were volunteers from three (03) classes were chosen for the interview after the class observations by the researcher Of these students, there are 60% females and 40% males

3.2.2 Research Design

The study used the descriptive method of research design Descriptive research describes characteristics of a population or phenomenon being studied It is mainly done to gain a better understanding of the topic It is an exploration of the existing certain phenomena

This study is mainly an exploratory study in which a number of 'what' questions need to be answered Since both numerical and non-numerical data are required to answer the questions being addressed and to understand the phenomenon from different angles, a multi-method research strategy combining quantitative and qualitative methods was adopted

One reason for adopting this design is that a mixed strategy could best serve the purpose of the study in answering the research questions Quantitative data, for instance, allow one to code and quantify any discourse acts which take place in the classroom In my view, numerical data help in providing an overall picture of the nature of classroom interaction, especially when comparison is involved Qualitative data, on the other hand, supplement the findings of quantitative research by providing examples from transcripts of learning in action and in obtaining explanations for teachers' behavior in class Thus, both quantitative and qualitative data can be used to supplement and support each other

3.2.3 Data Collection Instruments

Various types of research instrument have been developed over the years to be used in data collection Each instrument is particularly appropriate for certain sources

of data, yielding information of the kind and in the form that could be most effectively used The data sources for this study are varied and were designed to address the range

of research questions The following is a description of each data source

So as to gather more accurate data, both quantitative and qualitative methods were used Quantitative data were gathered through two survey questionnaires administered both to the students and the teachers and qualitative data were collected via class observations and interviews of teachers and students Those methods help the researcher get more in-depth data for analysis

3.2.3.1 The Questionnaires

The questionnaires were adopted since it is one of the most popular instruments in gathering data It is not only easy to prepare and can be given to large groups of subjects at the same time, but also helps the researcher get a great amount

of information within a short period of time The questionnaire is the most suitable method for a large-scale survey, the aim of which is to find out participants’ opinions and perceptions

In order to obtain sufficient data for this study, 133 copies of a semi-structured questionnaire were delivered to 133 students to gather information about students’ perceptions and opinions of warm-up activities in their English lessons to investigate the opportunities for and constraints on employing warm-up activities to enhance their effectiveness in learning English

07 copies of another semi-structured questionnaire were distributed to 7 teachers to collect information about the teacher's perceptions of the practices and difficulties they encounter in their teaching of English skills using warm-up activities and their techniques in dealing with these difficulties

3.2.3.2 Class Observations

The purpose of class observations is to know how the teachers perform warm-up activities to lead students into their lessons, what atmosphere is in the class, what students’ attitudes to the lessons are like, and what interactions of students are during the lessons Thus, class observations are conducted to clarity some information which the questionnaire cannot provide such as students’ real time-on-task and teachers’ instructional strategies as well as students’ responses to classroom tasks