VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ĐỖ THỊ TUYẾT THE EFFECTS OF APPLYING LANGUAGE GAMES IN MOTIVATING NON-MAJOR ENGLISH FIRST YEAR STUDENTS IN SPEAKING LESSONS: A STUDY AT A COLLEGE IN BAC NINH PROVINCE Hiệu quả của việc áp dụng trò chơi ngôn ngữ tới việc khuyến khích sinh viên năm thứ nhất không chuyên Anh trong các giờ học nói: Một nghiên cứu tại một trường cao đẳng ở Bắc Ninh M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Major: English Teaching Methodology Code: 8140231.01 Hanoi, 2019 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ĐỖ THỊ TUYẾT THE EFFECTS OF APPLYING LANGUAGE GAMES IN MOTIVATING NON-MAJOR ENGLISH FIRST YEAR STUDENTS IN SPEAKING LESSONS: A STUDY AT A COLLEGE IN BAC NINH PROVINCE Hiệu quả của việc áp dụng trò chơi ngôn ngữ tới việc khuyến khích sinh viên năm thứ nhất không chuyên Anh trong các giờ học nói: Một nghiên cứu tại một trường cao đẳng ở Bắc Ninh M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Major: English Teaching Methodology Code: 8140231. Hoàng Văn Vân Hanoi 2019 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com DECLARATION I, hereby, declare that my thesis entitled: The Effects of Applying Language Games in Motivating Non-major English First Year Students in Speaking Lessons: A Study at a College in Bac Ninh Province is the result of my own work, submitted in the fulfillment for the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. Except where the reference is indicated, no other person‟s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis. This minor thesis or any part of the same has not been submitted for higher degree to any other university or institution.
Signature Đỗ Thị Tuyết i LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My research has been completed with the support of many people. Firstly, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Prof. Hoàng Văn Vân for his enthusiastic and helpful guidance, insightful comments and encouragement without which my thesis would not have been completed. Secondly, I am indebted to all my lectures in Post-graduate Faculty, University of Languages and International Studies for their precious assistance, knowledge and enthusiasm.
Thirdly, I am also grateful to all the participants, students of students in classes Korean 1 and Chinese 1 at Viet Nhat College of Foreign Languages and Technology for their enthusiastic participation and cooperation during the duration of conducting the research. Finally, I would like to express my profound gratitude to my family, especially my parents, who have given me constant support, both spiritual and material, and love during the completion of this research paper. ii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT An English speaking lesson cannot be successful without students‟ active participation and students‟interest in the lessons. Second foreign language learners should be offered the opportunity to get involved in the lessons and fulfill their learning orientations.
The goal of conducting this action research is to enhance students‟ motivation in speaking lessons by using language games. The research, therefore, checks the students‟level of participation and interest in speaking lessons at Viet Nhat College of Foreign Languages and Technology. In addition to this, the thesis tries to find out the factors affecting the students‟ participation and learning motivation. The researcher uses action research to conduct the study whose subjects are fifty two students of students in classes Korean 1 and Chinese 1 at Viet Nhat College of Foreign Languages and Technology.
These fifty two students took part in completing questionnaires reflecting their appreciation of learning speaking English and what factors affects negatively their participation and learning motivation. Class observation, pre-test, post-test and survey questionnaires were employed to find the answer to one research question. The findings of the research revealed that students‟ poor participation and low motivation resulted from both students themselves and their former teacher and that using language games in speaking lessons helped enhance students‟ participation and motivation in terms of both quality and quantity. Lastly, it is hoped that the results of this thesis could benefit for developing teaching and learning English at Viet Nhat College of Foreign Languages and Technology.
iii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLE CONTENTS DECLARATION. iii TABLE CONTENTS. iv LIST OF TABLES. vii LIST OF CHARTS.
vii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION. Rationale of the study. The aims of the study. Significance of the study.
Scope of the study. Methods of the study. Design of the thesis .4 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW. What is speaking.
Definition of speaking. The importance of speaking. Phrases to teach speaking. Characteristics of a successful speaking activity.
Problems with speaking activities. What is motivation .8 iv LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. The role of motivation in Foreign Languages learning. Definition of language games.
The purpose of language games. Types of language games. Language games as a motivator for students to speak. Previous studies related to how to motivate students during speaking lessons.
Description of the context of the research. An overview of Viet Nhat College of Foreign Languages and Technology. The teaching program and materials. Current situation of teaching and learning speaking skills at Viet Nhat College of Foreign Languages and Technology.
What is an action research? …………………………………………………16 3. Rationale for the use of an action research. Description of the research. Subjects of the research.
Data collection instruments. Data analysis procedure .25 CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION. Data collected from preliminary investigation stage- Questionnaire 1. Students‟ attitude towards the speaking skill and the causes of students‟ low motivation in speaking classes.
Data from the intervention stage. Data collected from observation sheet. Data collected from the questionaire 2. Data collected from the tests .37 v LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION.
Recommendations based on the findings. Some suggestions for using games to motivate students in speaking classes 42 5. Limitations and suggestions for further research. XIII APPENDIX 6: ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………XV vi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Students‟ attitude towards speaking skill.26 Table 2: Students‟ motivation, learning styles, anxiety in speaking lessons .27 LIST OF CHARTS Chart 1: Students‟ reasons for learning English.28 Chart 2: Factors that make students involuntary to speak English in the classroom 28 Chart 3 Observation sheet that looks at overall class motivation .30 Chart 4: Students‟ evaluation on how easy the language games are .31 Chart 5: Students‟s evaluation on how appropriate the language games are .31 Chart 6: Students‟ feeling on how much they like the language games .32 Chart 7: Students‟ level of participation in recent speaking lessons .32 Chart 8: Students‟ feeling after playing the games .33 Chart 9: Students‟ level of motivation in recent speaking lessons .33 Chart 10: Students‟ evaluation of the effectiveness of language games .34 Chart 11: Students‟ ideas on the benefits of language games .34 Chart 12: Students‟ desires on what stages language games should be applied .35 Chart 13: Students‟ suggestions on What the teacher should do to make the application of language games more effective .36 Chart 14: Students‟ desires on how often they join the language games.37 vii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION This part states the rationale of the study, the aims, objectives, the scope of the study, and the design of the rest of the thesis.
The research questions are also identified to work as clear guidelines for the whole study. Rationale of the study People around the world communicate through many ways such as body language, verbal language, signals and gestures. Among them, verbal language plays the most important role in communication. For that reason, communication skills in which speaking skill is a big part of learning any language because “of the four skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing), speaking seems intuitively the most important” (Ur, 2000: 120).
It is the fact that students and teachers pay more attention to other 3 skills (writing, reading, and listening) than speaking skill due to the necessary of high school graduation exam. Students usually learn English as a compulsory subject to pass the final tests which mainly include grammar and vocabulary. Therefore, when they continue to study at colleges or universities, learning speaking skill is a big challenge to them. Being an English teacher for 5 years, I find most of my students have problems in speaking lessons.
They easily become speechless in their oral performance or they are reluctant to speak in English although they may be good at other skills. It is not a surprise as “the quality of learning engagement in the classroom does not depend on students‟ cognitive abilities alone, but is also influenced by complex motivational and effective factors.”(Kubanyiova, 2006) As far as we know, in learning a Foreign Language, students will learn more effectively if they learn in a fun, relaxed learning environment and have more opportunities to communicate in the context of the real world. Therefore, the use of language games in Foreign Languages teaching is one of the most effective ways to increase student learning, one of the determinants of success in learning a Foreign Language. At the same time, they help and motivate students to maintain their 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com learning and excitement with learning.
In addition, they help teachers create contexts in which practical language is useful and understandable to learners. Learners want to participate in the game, they have to understand what other people are saying or writing, and they have to say or write things to express their own views or to present information to help others understand. Language games can be used to develop all four skills for students: Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing. However, in schools in Vietnam, the skill that students find the most difficult is speaking skill.
This is the reason why the researcher only mentions the effect of language games on the teaching and learning of English speaking skills in this study. From there the researcher decides to choose the topic: The Effects of Applying Language Games in Motivating Non-major English First Year Students in Speaking Lessons: A Study at a College in Bac Ninh Province. The aims of the study The study aims at improving students‟ motivation in speaking lessons at Viet Nhat College of Foreign Languages and Technology through using language games. To attain this aim, the following objectives need to be accomplished in the research: - revealing factors that discourage students from taking part in speaking lessons and the factors that bring their low motivation in speaking class, and - examining language games applied during speaking classes to enhance the students‟ participation and interest in speaking activities and measuring the effectiveness of language games by using action research.
Research questions With the current situation of teaching and learning of English speaking skills at Viet Nhat College of Foreign Languages and Technology and after studying the principles of applying language games, the researcher would like to have an action research aiming at finding the answer to the following question: How effective are language games in increasing students’ motivation in speaking lessons? 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Significance of the study The study is conducted with the expectation that the findings will help teachers at Viet Nhat college clearly acknowledge the significance of speaking skill and how language games impact on their students‟ speaking so that they spend more time and effort making speaking lessons in classroom more useful. Besides, students can find suitable strategies to improve their speaking skills.