MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HUE UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES ------------ NGUYEN DAI MINH AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE USE OF COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES IN TEACHING SPEAKING SKILL BY EFL TEACHERS OF GIA HOI HIGH SCHOOL IN HUE CITY MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts, Hue University of Foreign Languages HUE, 2018 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HUE UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES ------------ NGUYEN DAI MINH AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE USE OF COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES IN TEACHING SPEAKING SKILL BY EFL TEACHERS OF GIA HOI HIGH SCHOOL IN HUE CITY MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING CODE: 60. TRAN VAN PHUOC HUE, 2018 BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO ĐẠI HỌC HUẾ TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ -------- NGUYỄN ĐẠI MINH NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ VIỆC SỬ DỤNG CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG GIAO TIẾP TRONG VIỆC DẠY KỸ NĂNG NÓI CỦA CÁC GIÁO VIÊN TIẾNG ANH TẠI TRƯỜNG THPT GIA HỘI, THÀNH PHỐ HUẾ LUẬN VĂN THẠC SĨ LÝ LUẬN VÀ PHƯƠNG PHÁP DẠY HỌC BỘ MÔN TIẾNG ANH MÃ SỐ: 60.11 NGƯỜI HƯỚNG DẪN KHOA HỌC: PGS. TRẦN VĂN PHƯỚC HUẾ, 2018 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I hereby declare that the thesis entitled “An Investigation into the Use of Communicative Activities in Teaching Speaking Skill By EFL Teachers of Gia Hoi High School in Hue City”. The thesis contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due reference or citation is made in the thesis itself.
Hue, 10 th October, 2018 Signature Nguyen Dai Minh i ABSTRACT Communicative Activities (CAs) play a crucial role in enhancing the quality of teaching English. Nevertheless, applying CAs is not popular and still limited in Vietnam, the fact that teachers use traditional method which is not attractive and effective. Therefore, the principal goal of this research is to investigate and identify the teachers‟ perception and reality of using CAs for teaching English speaking skill at Gia Hoi high school in Hue city. Moreover, the study also aims at presenting some suggestions to make using CAs at in teaching English speaking skill more efficient.
The main subject of this thesis was 12 EFL teachers from of Gia Hoi high school in Hue city. In terms of methodology, questionnaire, interview were chosen as the main instruments of the research. All data was analyzed thanks to the qualitative and quantitative method. As a result, it indicates that most of the teachers have a quite good understanding of CAs knowledge and their positive perceptions towards the roles of CAs in and applying it to teaching speaking skill.
Moreover, the findings also illustrate useful strategies for teachers for using CAs in real speaking classes. Furthermore, it can be drawn from the research results that certain difficulties including time constraint, choosing proper materials, different English language proficiency levels among students and other factors which teachers often confront in the application of CAs. Last but not least, some suggestions for teaching speaking skills were thus offered to help teachers utilize CAs in their teaching more effectively. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Apart from my own efforts, the success of this study depends largely on the encouragement and guidelines from many others.
In the process of choosing and writing this study, I was fortunate to receive valuable assistances and supports. In the light of this opportunity, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to those who have been instrumental in the completion of this research paper. First and foremost, I would like to acknowledge my enormous debt to my supervisor, Associate Prof Tran Van Phuoc for his precious guidances, constructive and insightful criticism, helpful suggestions and constant encouragement during the implementation of this thesis. Without his whole-hearted assistance, this work could not have been completed.
Secondly, I would like to convey my sincere thankfulness to lecturers at English Department of Hue University of Foreign Languages for their generous assistances and useful advices, which have enlighten my research work. Thirdly, I am indebted to the English teachers of Gia Hoi high school for their enthusiastic participation in completing the questionnaires and interview. Thanks to their cooperation and contribution, I have collected the necessary and valuable data to serve the purposes of my research Last but not least, I am deeply grateful to my beloved family who created favorable conditions and supported me both spiritually and materially to accomplish this graduation thesis. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER I.
Rationale of the study. Aims of the study. Scope of the study. Subject of the study.
Significance of the study. Organization of the study. Communicative Language Teaching (CLT). Definition of Communicative Language Teaching.
Characteristics of CLT. Principles of CLT. Teacher‟s and Learner‟s Roles in CLT .1 Definition of CAs .2 Characteristics of CAs .3 Types of CAs. Possible CAs to teach Speaking.
The nature of teaching speaking skill. Definition of Speaking Skill. The importance of speaking skill in English teaching and learning. Aspects of the Speaking Skill.
Principles for Teaching Speaking. Shape of a speaking lesson. Difficulties in Teaching Speaking. Characteristics of a successful speaking lesson/ activity.
Teacher‟s Role During A Speaking Lesson. Prior studies related to the study. Research design and approach. The participants of the study.
The procedure of data collection. Reliability and validity .36 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS. Teachers‟ perceptions about applying CAs to teaching speaking skill. Teachers‟ perceptions about the definition of CAs.
Teachers‟ viewpoints on the importance of CAs in teaching speaking skill. Teachers‟ of purposes of using CAs. Teacher‟s opinions on the characteristics of CAs. Teachers‟ preferred types of CAs.
Teachers‟ interest in CAs in the current English textbook. Teachers' application of CAs in a speaking lesson. Teachers‟ sources for designing CAs for speaking lessons. Teachers‟ Feedbacks on the speaking lessons without CAs.
The Reality of using CAs in speaking lessons in Gia Hoi high school. Teachers‟ frequency of CAs application in speaking lessons. Teachers‟ commonly used CAs in the speaking lessons. Teachers‟ observation towards students‟ reactions when participating in CAs in speaking classes.
Teachers‟ ways of giving feedbacks after conducting CAs in speaking lessons. Teachers‟ reaction towards using CAs in speaking lessons. Teachers‟ viewpoints on the advantages of CAs. Teachers opinions on the benefits of some common types of CA for teaching Speaking skill.
Teachers‟ difficulties when conducting CAs in speaking classes. Teachers‟ suggestions to promote the use of CAs in teaching English speaking skill .62 CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS. Implications for teachers. Implications for students.
Implications for the educational administrators. Limitations of study. Suggestions for further research.73 vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS Communicative Activities : CAs CLT : Communicative Language Teaching ESL : English as a Second Language EFL: : English as a Foreign Language T1 : Teacher 1 T2 : Teacher 2 T3 : Teacher 3 T4 : Teacher 4 T5 : Teacher 5 vii LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1: Demographic characteristics of the respondents to the questionnaire for teachers. Teachers‟ Feedbacks on the speaking lessons without CAs.
Teachers‟ viewpoints on the advantages of CAs .3: Teachers‟ suggestions to promote the effectiveness of CAs in speaking lessons .60 viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 4. Teachers‟ perceptions on some definitions of CAs. Teachers‟ perceptions about the significance of CAs in teaching speaking skill. Teachers‟ purposes on using CAs to teach speaking skill.
Teachers‟ opinions on the characteristics of CAs. Teachers‟ favorite types of CAs. Teachers‟ interest in CAs presented in the current English textbook. Teachers' application of CAs in a speaking lesson .Teachers‟ sources for designing CAs for speaking lessons.
Teachers' frequency of CAs application in speaking lessons. Teachers‟ commonly used CAs in the speaking lessons. Teachers‟ observation towards students‟ reactions when participating in CAs in speaking classes. Teachers‟ ways of giving feedbacks after conducting CAs.
Teachers‟ feelings towards using CAs in speaking lessons. Teachers opinions on the benefits of he advantages. Teachers‟ difficulties when conducting CAs in speaking classes .58 ix CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION 1. Rationale of the study As a matter of fact, the trend of global integration is leading to closer relationships among countries, in that context, learning foreign languages plays a crucial role in enabling learners to be aware of cultural diversity and values of the world, and in giving us more chances to expose to better cooperation with international friends to perfect themselves.
In foreign languages, English is widely used as an international language in most countries around the world in different fields such as economy, politics, tourism, electronics, telecommunication, culture, science and technology. English is spoken by at least a quarter of the world‟s population (Harmer, 2002), it means English is really essential for our life. Therefore, learners had better learn English for real communication since they are still high school‟s students. The widespread of English leads to an incredible increase of English learners nowadays, especially learners in Asian countries in general and Vietnam in particular.
Vietnamese learners study English as a preparation for their future jobs that usually require a good communication in English. In high schools, learning English becomes more essential for students since it is one of three compulsory subjects in high-school finals. In fact, the Grammar – Translation method is mainly used to teach high school‟s students. Teachers usually concentrate on grammar rather than skill.
Teaching grammar is only to meet students‟ demand for the examinations. After high-school finals, students are not able to use English that they have learnt for a long time for the purpose of communication. They cannot speak English even in a daily conversation, so how can they use English in a communicative environment to serve their future plans? The reality requires that high school English teachers ought to pay more attention to students‟ listening and speaking skill. It is better for students if teachers apply Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) in classroom.
To achieve the goals of learning English – to be able to communicate with both native and non-native speakers – CAs in English classes are very necessary. Particularly, it seems to be 1 easy for teachers to apply some CAs in speaking lessons which always deal with an important characteristic – learners talk a lot (Brown, 2001). In recent years, there has been a renovation on the focus from learning language‟s forms to acquiring the functional system utilized significantly to fulfill learners‟ communicative purposes. According to David and Rebecca in their book (1997), foreign language is one course in the curriculum where students should be encouraged to talk a great deal in class and to express their ideas, not simply the teachers tell them to say.
In Vietnam, there are quite many obstacles hindering from teaching and learning English effectively for communication, for example, teachers are not competent in English and do not have enough knowledge about the culture of the native speakers. However, there are still existing factors that initiate certain problems around teaching and learning English, which are attributed to both teachers and students. The teaching process is partly affected by teaching methods. It is pointed out that it is the traditional teaching method with which students stay passive in learning and do not have a communication environment, which is the main reason behind the ineffective teaching and learning of English.
Most teachers in high school focus on grammatical rules instead of language use. As a result, students have become afraid of speaking English. There are four skills in English that need to be mastered by learners, they are reading, writing, listening and speaking. According to Harmer (2002), the four skill are divided into two types.
Receptive skill is used to refer to reading and listening, and productive skill is the term for speaking and writing, in which students have to produce language themselves.