VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIOAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES BÙI THỊ THUỲ DƯƠNG APPLICATION OF TASK-BASED LANGUAGE TEACHING IN TEACHING SPEAKING TO THE 1ST YEAR NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS: AN ACTION RESARCH AT HANOI UNIVERSITY OF BUSINESS AND TECHNOLOGY ÁP DỤNG PHƯƠNG PHÁP DẠY HỌC THEO ĐƯỜNG HƯỚNG GIAO NHIỆM VỤ TRONG VIỆC DẠY KĨ NĂNG NÓI CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ NHẤT KHÔNG CHUYÊN TIẾNG ANH: NGHIÊN CỨU HÀNH ĐỘNG TẠI TRƯỜNG KINH DOANH VÀ CÔNG NGHỆ HÀ NỘI M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 HA NOI, 2015 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIOAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES BÙI THỊ THUỲ DƯƠNG APPLICATION OF TASK-BASED LANGUAGE TEACHING IN TEACHING SPEAKING TO THE 1ST YEAR NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS: AN ACTION RESARCH AT HANOI UNIVERSITY OF BUSINESS AND TECHNOLOGY ÁP DỤNG PHƯƠNG PHÁP DẠY HỌC THEO ĐƯỜNG HƯỚNG GIAO NHIỆM VỤ TRONG VIỆC DẠY KĨ NĂNG NÓI CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ NHẤT KHÔNG CHUYÊN TIẾNG ANH: NGHIÊN CỨU HÀNH ĐỘNG TẠI TRƯỜNG KINH DOANH VÀ CÔNG NGHỆ HÀ NỘI M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Supervisor: Assoc. Nguyễn Văn Độ HA NOI, 2015 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CANDIDATE’S STATEMENT I certify that the minor thesis entitled: “Application of task-based language teaching in teaching speaking to the 1st year non-English major students: An action research at Hanoi University of Business and Technology” is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts is the result of my own work and this thesis has not been submitted for any degree to any other university or tertiary institute. Signature: Date: November 30th, 2015 i LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor, Assoc. Nguyễn Văn Độ, who helped, supported and encouraged me while I conducted this study.
Without his helpful comments, value advice and considerable assistance, this study could not have been completed. I want to thank all lecturers of the Department of Post Graduate, University of language and international studies, Vietnam national University for providing me best conditions to fulfill my study. I also want to express my appreciation to my colleagues and my students at Ha Noi University of Business and Technology for their excellent assistance and cooperation in collecting data for the study. Last but not least, I would especially thank my family, my close friends and my classmates who supported and encouraged me to conduct this study.
ii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT It is the fact that speaking is one of the most important skills. However, the teaching and learning English speaking at Ha Noi University of Business and Technology are still far from satisfactory, which has urged the researcher to carry out the present study. By describing and analyzing the survey questionnaire, pre-test and post-test collected, the researcher managed to find out the reasons for the students‟ weak speaking skill and justify the effectiveness of using task-based language teaching to improve the students' speaking skill. Although the research has revealed some limitations, its findings prove that task-based language teaching improves students‟ speaking skill.
Besides, this study has provided some implications for the teaching of English speaking skill for Vietnamese students. With detailed investigations and valid findings, the researcher believes that this study is a reliable and useful source of reference for language classes in general and for any learners and teachers who share the same concern. iii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF ABREVIATIONS HUBT : Ha Noi University of Business and Technology TBLT : Task-based language teaching TBT : Task-based teaching TBL : Task-based learning ESL : English as a second language EFL : English as a foreign language PPP : Presentation-Practice- Production % : Percentage iv LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF CHARTS, TABLES AND GRAPHS Chart 1: Students‟ attitude towards speaking skill 22 Chart 2: Students‟ interest towards speaking skill 22 Table 1: Students‟ motivations 23 Table 2: Students‟ learning styles 24 Table 3: Students‟ problems in learning speaking skill 25 Table 4: Students‟ comments on their previous teachers‟ teaching 27 methods Table 5: The comparison of the percentage of students who passed the passing grade 29 Graph 1: Students‟ opinions on speaking activities in the textbook 26 Graph 2: The score of students‟ speaking competence 28 Graph 3: Improvement of the students‟ speaking competence 29 v LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLE OF CONTENT CANDIDATE‟S STATEMENT .ii LIST OF ABREVIATIONS. iv LIST OF CHARTS, TABLES AND GRAPHS.
Rationale of the study. Aims and objectives of the study. Scope of the study. Method of the study.
Significance of the Study. Design of the study. 3 PART II: DEVELOPMENT. 4 CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW .1 Speaking in foreign language learning .1 Definition of speaking .3 Components of Speaking.2 Task-Based Language Teaching .1 Definition of TBLT and characteristics of TBLT .2 Definition of a task .3 Components of the task-based teaching Framework.4 Advantages of using task based language teaching .3 Previous studies relating to applying TBLT in teaching speaking skill .2 In Viet Nam.
13 vi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY .1 An overview of action research. Rationale for the use of an action research .2 Description of the context of the research .1 The current situation of teaching and learning English at HUBT .2 The teaching program and material .3 Description of the research .1 Subject of the research .2 Data collection instruments .3 The action procedures .4 Data analysis procedures. 21 CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION .1 Analysis of questionnaire .1 Students‟ attitudes towards speaking skill .2 Students‟ motivations and learning styles .3 Students‟ difficulties in learning speaking skill .4 Students‟ opinions on speaking activities in the textbook .5 Teachers‟ teaching methods in speaking class .2 Analysis of test .3 Analysis of interview .4 Discussion about the research questions .1 What are the possible reasons that lead to students‟ weak speaking skill?31 3.2 To what extent does task-based language teaching improve students‟ speaking skill?. 33 PART III: CONCLUSION.
34 vii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.3 The other researchers. Limitation of the study. Suggestions for further research.IV INTERVIEW QUESTIONS. VII SPEAKING TEST (Post-test) .IX THE ACTION PROCEDURES.
X ENGLISH SPEAKING ABILITY EVALUATION .XI DESCRIPTION OF A SAMPLE TASK-BASED SPEAKING LESSON .XIV TRANSCRIPT OF STUDENTS‟ ANSWERS IN THE INTERVIEW. XV AN OVERVIEW OF THE RESEARCH PROGRAM FOR FIRST YEAR STUDENTS. XVIII TRANSCRIPT OF TASK SAMPLE. XVIII viii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com PART I: INTRODUCTION 1.
Rationale of the study In recent years, English has been considered one of the most important and compulsory subjects for Vietnamese students. "Better English, better careers" was the answer given by many of them when they told about their purpose of learning this language. In addition, due to our country's recent regional and global participation, it is essential for people to communicate by English to keep up with the development of the world. Therefore, speaking plays an important role because without it, communication cannot take place directly among people.
According to Nunan (1991), speaking skill is an essential process for learning English. Performances through speaking are an indicator of success in careers and finally in life. When the researcher works as an English teacher at Ha Noi University of Business and Technology, she has faced two striking problems. First and foremost, students are very weak at English, especially speaking skill.
They always sit quietly and passively in the speaking lesson. Besides, they cannot implement speaking tasks well when teachers require, which makes them fear of English classes. Another issue she has met here is the teaching method. Most of English teachers apply the traditional approaches such as teacher-centered or lecture-oriented in teaching speaking skill.
Therefore, it is one of the main causes leading to students‟ non- involvement and passiveness in the classroom. To deal with this trouble, the researcher has tried to find out a suitable way or an interesting teaching method to improve students‟ speaking skill. In fact, many educators and researchers have made an effort to give effective ways. In addition, through reading the teaching document as well as listening to lectures about English language teaching methods, the researcher is interested in task-based language teaching and supposes that it is an effective approach to solve with this problem.
Nunan (1992) stated that “task learning increases student talks, makes the classroom atmosphere input”. He also pointed out that task-based 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com language approach may play a crucial role in the communicative language classroom: a variety of tasks could be employed depending on students‟ needs, interests, and language proficiency levels. The above mentioned situation has urged the researcher to conduct an action research at Ha Noi University of Business and Technology “Application of task-based language teaching in teaching speaking to the 1st year non-English major students”. Aims and objectives of the study This research aims at applying task-based language teaching to improve the students‟ speaking skill.
To be more specific, the objectives of this study are to: - find out possible explanations for the weak speaking skill of the students - find out the effect of task-based language teaching on students‟ speaking skill 3. Research questions With the above purposes, the research questions are: 1. What are the possible reasons that lead to the students‟ weak speaking skill? 2. To what extent does task-based language teaching improve students‟ speaking skill? 4.
Scope of the study The research was conducted on the 1st year non-English major students at Ha Noi University of Business and Technology. Regarding its scope, the research was only aimed at investigating the causes of students‟ weak speaking skill and measuring the effect of task-based language teaching on the students‟ speaking skill. Besides, she also focuses on communicative tasks in the speaking lesson. Method of the study The method employed in this study is an action research, with the use of a number of instruments, namely tests, questionnaires, and interviews.
Action research has been proved to be the best choice for this study because the study was aimed at improving the students‟ speaking skill within a certain context. The combination of different instruments used in this research would help the researcher to gain reliable data and have a close investigation into the problems that the students were having. 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Significance of the Study The study is hoped to raise teachers‟ awareness, especially the teachers at Ha Noi University of Business and Technology about the application of task-based language teaching as a useful method in their teaching process; inform all teachers of the benefits of task-based language teaching and suggest some effective ways of applying them in teaching English to make the lessons more interesting.
Design of the study The study is intended to consist of three parts: 1. Part I: Introduction shows rationale, purposes, research questions, scope, methods, significance, and design of the study. Part II: Development: will be divided into three chapters: Chapter 1: Literature Review deals with some theoretical background relevant to the study: overview of speaking skill, theories about task-based language teaching and review of previous studies. Chapter 2: Methodology presents action research and also describes the current situation of teaching and learning at HUBT, subjects of the study, data collection instruments and data collection and analysis procedure.
Chapter 3: Data analysis and discussion presents the findings and answers for two research questions. Part III: Conclusion summarizes the study, conclusion of the study, recommendations, limitations of the study and suggestion for further study. 3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.