NGHIÊN cứu THỰC TRẠNG VIỆC dạy và học nói TIẾNG ANH đối với SINH VIÊN năm THỨ HAI KHÔNG CHUYÊN TRÌNH độ TIỀN TRUNG cấp TRƯỜNG đại học CÔNG NGHIỆP hà nội

In every English class, teachers would like to develop students’speaking skills by applying the communicative language teaching method known as one of themost effective approaches that h

PART ONE: INTRODUCTION

Since the open-door policy adapted to Vietnam, the need for integrating into the world hasincreased That is why, English teaching and learning have become very important to ourcountry’s modernization and industrialization

However, in some places in Vietnam English teaching has been strongly influenced by thetraditional methods Teachers as well as students paid too much attention to the grammaticalitems In these classes, teachers mainly focused on explaining the grammatical rules andstructures to students who were considered as passive recipients As a result, those students might

be structurally competent but communicatively incompetent That causes a lot of difficulties inusing English in their real-life communication

In addition, the political and economic changes have a great positive impact on theteaching methods of teachers of English in Vietnam They have realized that students can onlyimprove their language competence through communication It is the need for oral competence inEnglish that has turned the teachers’ emphasis from teaching grammar into teachingcommunication Therefore, speaking skills nowadays play a much more important role in modernEnglish than ever before In every English class, teachers would like to develop students’speaking skills by applying the communicative language teaching method known as one of themost effective approaches that help students speak

To meet the demand of students, English teachers in general and English teachers at

Hanoi University of Industry (hereafter HaUI) in particular have been trying to find out the most

suitable and effective method of teaching English Speaking Thus, the Communicative Language

Teaching Approach (hereafter CLT) is applied to teach English Speaking at all levels at this

university Teachers hope with this teaching method, they can help their students both improvetheir English knowledge and use it effectively and fluently in communication This idea is alsosuggested by many linguists and methodologists such as Nunan, 1991 and Das, B.K, 1985

As one teacher of English at this university I realize that although both the teachers andstudents try their best to reach their goals to teach and study English Speaking skills effectively,

up to now the results have been still far from satisfaction Hence, I would like to do somethingwith a hope to improve Speaking skills for our students so that I have carried out the study

entitled “An investigation into the Reality of Teaching and Learning Speaking Skills to the 2 nd

year non-major English students at Pre-Intermediate level of Proficiency at Hanoi University

of Industry ”

II AIMS OF THE STUDY

The main purpose of this study is to research the reality of teaching and learning speakingskills to the 2nd year non-major English students at Pre-Intermediate level of Proficiency at HaUI

in order to find out the problems preventing the students from willingly taking part in speakingactivities at the English class The writer also makes some recommendations for the Englishteachers to consult and apply in their teaching speaking skills with a view to help the studentsimprove their speaking competence

The above aims of the study can be realized by the following research questions:

(i) What is the present situation of teaching and learning English speaking skills at HaUI?(ii) Which problems do the teachers and students have in a speaking lesson?

(iii) What are the techniques to be used to improve speaking skills for the 2nd year major English students at HaUI?

The study focuses on the reality of teaching and learning English speaking to the 2nd yearnon-major students at Pre-Intermediate level of English Proficiency at HaUI Although the author

is well aware that the survey statistics are not fully representative of all the non-major students ofEnglish at many universities in Vietnam, she hopes to propose some of the most popular factsthat occurring in the study

V METHODS OF THE STUDY

In order to achieve the aims mentioned above, the researcher collects information fromthe teachers of English who have been teaching non-major English students at HaUI Firstly,questionnaires are delivered to the teachers so that more information on the reality and problemsthey face and solutions implemented can be collected Then, questionnaires are also given to thestudents to investigate their problems in learning speaking skills The information fromquestionnaires can help to draw a general picture about the reality of teaching and learningspeaking skills at HaUI and suggest some solutions for this situation

VI DESIGN OF THE STUDY

The thesis consists of three parts:

Part one is the INTRODUCTION which presents the rationales, the objectives, themethod and the design of the study It expresses the reason why the author decided to choose thisstudy and the methods for the fulfillment of the study

Part two, DEVELOPMENT, includes three chapters Chapter one deals with a historicaloverview of literature It starts with the theoretical issues on Communicative Language Teaching(CLT), which consist the definition, characteristics, communicative competence, using CLT inteaching speaking, conditions of applying CLT, and the factors affecting CLT application Thenext part discusses about the definition of speaking skill, the characteristics and three stages ofteaching and learning speaking skills as well as the problems of speaking and speaking activities.This chapter also presents the motivation and types of motivation which is considered to be avery important factor in a speaking lesson Chapter two emphasizes the study methodology Themethod of the study is carried out by investigating the teaching staff’s perception ofcommunicative approach and the difficulties they confront with in their teaching process with aquestionnaire distributing to 15 teachers and another one to 110 students Also, in this chapter theauthor would like to provide some information about the findings of the study Chapter threesuggests some recommendations to improve the teaching and learning to speak English

Part three, CONCLUSION, summarizes the thesis with key issues in the study, makessome suggestions for further study

PART TWO: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER ONE: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)

a facilitator of the communication process Materials promote communicative language use; they are task-based and authentic.

Nunan also asserts that in communication process, learners are negotiators and integratorswhereas teachers are facilitators

The definition above, as with any definition of the language teaching method, represents aparticular view of understanding and explaining language acquisition It is socially constructedand must be seen as a product of social, cultural, economic, and political forces

Canale and Swain (1980) expanded on the theoretical basis of CLT for both teaching andtesting In their reaction against an over emphasis on function and a lack of emphasis ongrammatical complexity, they pointed out that externally oriental communication is notnecessarily more essential than other proposes of language such as “self-expression, verbalthinking, problem solving, and creative writing”

- The goal of CLT is to create a realistic context for language acquisition in the classroom todevelop Hymes’ notion of communicative competence

- CTL is also associated with learner-centered and experienced based tasks.

- The focus of CLT is on functional language usage and learners’ ability to express themselves Inother words, for CLT, developing learners’ skills is more important than the content of theteaching and learning ( Johnson, 1982)

- There are three major principles of CLT:

(1) communication principle: emphasizes activities that involve real communication

promote learning

(2) task principle: purposes that activities in which is used for carrying out meaningful

tasks promote learning

(3) meaningfulness principle: claims that language that is meaningful to the learners

supports the learning process (Le Van Canh, 2004)

- In communicative classes, learners communicate with each other and learning tasks arecompleted by means of interaction between learners It is clear that learners’ completing a task isfore-grounded and communicating with each other is back-grounded This may lead toconsiderable use of pair work, group work and mingling activities

- In ESL classes, teachers are facilitators and monitors, usually, without interruption and then toprovide feedback on the success

However, CLT is not a perfect method There still exist critical remarks on CLT like: itsinappropriateness to local contexts and cultures; its negation of rote-learning, memorization,displaying questions, teacher’s talk, etc

In spite of its limitations and shortcomings, no one can negate that CLT allows teachers toincorporate motivating and purposeful communicative activities and principles into theirteaching, which later results in the improvement of their learners’ proficiency

For the seasons mentioned above, CLT has served as the dominant approach to languageteaching since the demise of the Audio-lingual Method

1.1.3 Conditions of Applying CLT

1.1.3.1 Authentic materials

To overcome the typical problem that students can’t transfer what they learn in theclassroom to the outside world and to expose students to natural language in a variety ofsituations, adherents of the Communicative Approach advise the use of authentic language

materials Materials like newspaper articles, books in target language, live radio or televisionbroadcast programs are only suitable for students of high intermediate level of proficiency Forthose with lower proficiency in the target language, simpler authentic materials are realistic andmost desirable Besides, the lower level class can use authentic materials without containing a lot

of complicated language items, but a lot of discussion could be generated

1.1.3.2 Teachers

Teacher’s role is also one of the most important components in applying CLT In CLTclass, teachers are not only facilitators of students’ learning but also advisors of the students’wonderings Sometimes, they can act as a co-communicator to engage in the communicativeactivities along with students Teachers are the initiators of classroom activities but they do notalways interact with the students They give the students chances to express their individuality byhaving them share their ideas and opinions As for Littlewood (1981) this helps learners integratethe target language with their own personality and feel more emotionally secure with it

For the ones who never or rarely attend any language courses on CLT, training orretraining in CLT is always necessary because teachers’ competence decides the success orfailure of applying CLT

1.1.4 Using CLT in Teaching Speaking Skills

When using communicative activities, it is important to make students feel comfortableand confident, feel free to take risks and have opportunities to speak According to Pica, Youngand Doughty (1987), there are two kinds of classroom available to second language learners:

Input has been modified or simplified such as a traditional “teacher-fronted” classroom;and authentic students-to-student interaction is emphasized It provides the learners moreopportunities for speaking since the learners try to achieve mutual understanding and modifytheir language according to the demand of the situation

Objectives for speaking are often given by the particular program in which the teachermust work In some cases, the syllabus will consist of a list of grammar structures to be taught.The teacher needs to be flexible in making best use of what is available for teaching purpose Inother words, the teacher must have some freedom in deciding what objectives to meet, whatcontent to cover, and what activities to use In this case, the teacher can go beyond the more

specific goals and objectives of the particular program to the speaking needs that the studentshave in the “real world”.

There are many speaking activities can be used in classroom such as scrambled sentence,language games, role-plays, problem-solving, discussion, cued story, picture story etc

1.1.5 Factors Affecting CLT Application

It is commonly seem that any choice of an approach of teaching needs favorableconditions for effective application The following sections will deal with the factors often cited

as influential to CLT application These factors are: Learners’ motivation, Learners’ beliefs and attitudes, Learners’ learning styles, Learners’ anxiety and confidence, Teachers’ attitudes and beliefs, Teachers’ qualities and personalities, Language environment, Classroom conditions, Syllabuses and textbooks, Tests and evaluations.

that spoken language is made by using the loosely organized syntax, and non-specific words,

phrases and filters such as oh, well, uhuh etc.

1.2.2 Characteristics of Speaking

As for Bygate M (1987:12), in most speaking the person to whom we are speaking is infront of us and able to put right if we make mistakes He/ She can also generally show agreementand understanding - or incomprehension and disagreement Unlike readers or writers, speakersmay need patience and imagination, too While talking, speakers need to take notice of the otherand allows listeners chance to speak it It means that we take turns to speak Brown (1983) andher colleagues point out that a listener helps speakers improve their performance as a speakerbecause being a listener gives learner models to utilize when acting as a speaker In addition,being a hearer first helps the learner appreciate the difficulties inherent in the task It is clear thatgiving speakers experience in hearer’s role is more helpful than simple practice in task in which aspeaker is having real difficulties in appreciating what a particular task required

Speaking has the following characteristics:

Its form and meaning are dependent on the context in which it occurs, including theparticipants themselves, their collective experiences, the physical environment, and the purposesfor speaking It is often spontaneous, open-ended, and evolving However, speech is not alwaysunpredictable Language functions ( or patterns) that tend to recur in certain discourse situationscan be identified and charted

Speaking requires that learners not only know how to produce specific points of languagesuch as grammar, pronunciation, or vocabulary (“linguistic competence”), but also that theyunderstand when, why, and in what ways to produce language (“sociolinguistic competence”)

Speech has its own skills, structures, and conventions different from written language Agood speaker synthesizes this array of skills and knowledge to succeed in a given speech act

Bygate (1987) considers speaking as an undervalued skill in many ways The reason isthat almost all people can speak, and so take speaking skill too much for granted He also assertsthat speaking skill deserves attention every bit as much as literacy skilled Learners often need to

be able to speak with confidence in order to carry out many of their most basic transactions.Bygate also highly appreciates speaking by stating that speaking is the medium through whichmuch language is learnt

To sum up, it is undeniable that speaking is key to communication By considering whatgood speakers do, what speaking tasks can be used in class, and what specific needs learnersreport, teachers can help learners improve their speaking and overall oral competency.

1.2.3 The Development Approach of Speaking Skill

There are three main phases in the teaching of a speaking lesson Byrne (1991:22-31)points out that there are three phases to develop learners’ oral ability, which are as follows:

- The Presentation Phase ( when you introduce something new to be learned)

In this phase, teachers are centre It means that they work as information provider, sincethey know English, select materials to teach and present the material in such a way that themeaning of the new language is as intelligible and memorable as possible while the learners aremotionless As far as we know, oral materials are written mainly in two forms in every course-book They are dialogues and prose And obviously these two forms must be presented indifferent ways

According to Byrne (1991:22) 10 different steps are used to present a dialogue They arethe following:

1 Establish setting by using pictures At this phase English should be used as much as possible

2 Draw out learners’ experience related to situation

3 Explain some key words

4 Set listening task by asking key information of the dialogue

5 Ask learners listen without looking at the books

6 Allow learners to have a look at their book when necessary for them

7 Ask the learners to listen and repeat

8 Ask learners to pick up difficulties ( good chance for them to speak) and explain difficulties

9 Ask them to practice ( role-play)

10 Ask them to dramatize the dialogue

It is known that this procedure is perfect and logically arranged However, it is dependent

on learner’s competence so some steps can be left out It is quite hard for Vietnamese learners toconduct the step 10 because they are generally shy and time is limited 9 other steps are used topresent a prose Byrne ( 1991:26) suggests that teachers should use the following steps to present

a prose passage

- Introduce the topic by asking to look at the picture or asking them about the related thing.

- Introduce the text New words and structures are given

- Provide relevant practice

- Set the reading task: make questions

- Ask the learners to read the passage in silence and find the answer

- Explain difficulties they still have

- Do silent reading again because the learners need to go on with the step 9

- Get the learners to talk about what they have to learn based on the previous answers

- The Practice Phase (when you allow the learners to work under your direction)

Unlike the presentation phase, this phase learners have to do most of talking Teachersprovide maximum amount of practice Practice is usually in the forms of activities to improvefluency of speaking At this phase, pair work or group work is used

- The Production Phase (when you give learners opportunities to work on their own)

At this phase learners need chances to speak English freely A real chance to speakEnglish takes place when the learner is able to use English naturally for themselves, not for theirteachers Group work plays an important part in making learners practice speaking here

Doing group work, all learners can have chance to participate in talks Time can be savedand learners seem more confident

Byrne ( 1988:2) concludes that in order to improve speaking ability of learners Thesethree phases should be followed orderly But in fact, they might not be applied as expected due totime limitation, types of learners and materials in use

1.3 Problems with Speaking and Speaking Activities

1.3.1 Problems with Speaking

Brown (1994:256) points out the characteristics of spoken language that make speakingskills difficult as follows:

- Clusterings: In order to speak fluently, speakers have to select from their store of language

clusterings, that is groups of words, not word by word

- Reduced forms: Contractions, elisions, reduced vowels, etc create difficulties in teaching and

learning spoken English If learners do not learn colloquial contractions, they can develop thekind of speaking that is stilted, bookish

- Colloquial language: Colloquialism appears both in monologues and dialogues If learners are

only exposed to standard English and/or “textbook” language, they sometimes find it hard tounderstand and produce words, idioms and phrases of colloquial language

- Stress, rthym and intonation: Learners of English often find it difficult to pronounce English

words, to stress the right syllables, to follow the stress-times rhythm and intonation patterns ofspoken English

- Affective factors: Learners learning to speak often encounter the risk of saying out things that

may be wrong, stupid and incomprehensible At those times, they tend to be anxious because they

do not want to be jugded by other learners

- Interaction: The greatest difficulty that learners face in learning to speak originates from the

interactive natural of most communication Engages in process of negotiation of meaning withmany discourse constraints, learners have to do the complex task of choosing what to say, how tosay, when to speak, etc Learners are afected by their interlocutors’ performance

1.3.2 Problems with Speaking Activities

Classroom activities that develop learners’ abilitty to express themselves through speech

is an important component of a language course where CLT is applied However, it is moredifficult to design and administer such activities than to do so for listening, reading or writing.Teachers often come across the problems that Ur (1996:121) lists out:

- Worries: Unlike reading, writing or listening activities speaking requires some degree of

real-time exposure to an audience The student speaker has to face the teacher and other students inclass Learners are often worried about trying to says something in a foreign language in theclassroom because they are worried about making mistakes, afraid of criticism or losing face, orsimply shy of the attention that their speech attracts

- Nothing to say: Teachers often hear learners, even if they are not worried or nervous, complain

that they can not have anything to say They may have no motivate to express themselves beyondthe guilty feeling that they should speak When they say something in class, they feel that theyare forced to say

- Uneven or low participation: Usually, there are many students in one class ( between 25 and 35

students) Only one student can talk at a time in a large group This means that each one haveonly very little time for talking This problem is compounded by the tendency of some learners to

dominate the group, while others speak very little or not at all In some cases some studentshaven’t got any chance, intentionally and unintentionally, to speak for a long time.

- Mother-tongue use: When all, or a number of the learners share the same mother tongue, they

may tend to use it frequently This happens because the native language is easier to use andbecause they feel unnatural to speak to one another in a foreign language and become learnersfeel less “exposed” if they are speaking the language they master If they are talking in a smallgroup, it can be quite difficult to get some classes, particularly the less disciplined or motivatedones, to keep to the target language

- Teacher domination: Teaching in a crowded class, many teachers tend to spend much time

explaining words, phrases and grammar structures in details for fear that otherwise the studentscan not understand and fail in their tests During explanation, teachers find it is easier and lesstime consuming to the use of the mother tongue Another important thing is that the teachersseem more interested in individual work ( between teacher and one student or the whole group, orone student and another student or the whole group) They fear that other kinds of studentgrouping (pair work and group work) may cause noise or discipline problems

1.4 Motivation

Overcoming the above-mentioned problems to create a successful speaking activity wherelearners talk a lot, participation is even, motivation is high certainly requires a lot of teachers’efforts in designing and carrying out speaking activities

1.4.1 Definition of Motivation

Motivation plays very important role in teaching and learning as “positive attitudes andmotivation are related to success in second language teaching” (Gardner, 1985) And he alsoemphasized that motivation is “a key consideration in determining the preparedness of learners tocommunicate” (Gardner, 1985:10)

Motivation refers to the combination of effort plus desire to achieve the goal of learningthe language plus favourable attitudes towards learning the language It means that if learnersneed to speak the second language in a wide range of social situations or to fulfill professionalambitions, they will perceive the communicative value of the second language and will therefore

be motivated to acquire proficiency in it

Thus, as Nina Spada (1999:56), motivated learners are those who participate actively inclass express interest in the subject and study hard If teachers can make classroom the placeswhere learners enjoy coming and where the atmosphere is supportive and non-threatening, theycan make a positive contribution to learners’ motivation to learn ( Nina, 1999:55).

1.4.2 Types of Motivation

So as to answer whether the learners are driven by the same kind of motivation Garderand Lambert (1985:10) distinguish between two major types of motivation: integrative andinstrumental, and also the others: resultative and instrinsic

- Instrumental motivation: when learners need English as an instrument to reach a particular goalsuch as getting a job or pay a rise or rewards In this case, therefore, motivation is the refection of

an external need

- Integrative motivation: when learners internally want to integrate him-/herself in to the culture

of target language ( English)

- Result active motivation: known as the cause of achievement It also can be the result oflearning The facts show that learners who experience success in learning may become moremotivated to learn

- Instinsic motivation: plays a vital part in most learners’ success or failure as languagelearners…For them, what happens in the classroom will be of vital importance in determiningtheir attitudes to language and in supplying motivation Instrinsically autonomy and self-actualization whereas extrinsically motivated learners anticipate a reward from outside andbeyond the self such as money, prizes, and grades… Therefore, it seems to be the problem thatlearners with different reasons will be differently motivated to learn the language

In short, motivation plays a vital part in developing language skills It can be consideredboth the cause and the result of language teaching achievement That is, learners who experiencesuccess in learning may become more or in some contexts, less motivated to learn (Ellis,1997:75) The four types of motivation should be seen as complementary rather than as distinctand oppositional Learners can be both interrogatively and instrumentally motivated at one or atthe same time

This chapter has been concerned with establish the theoretical backgrounds related to thetopic of the study It has discussed issues concerning CLT application in teaching, the problemsoccur in speaking activities and the importance of motivation in teaching and learning a language.

CHAPTER TWO: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

In the previous chapter, the theoretical matters related to the topic have been covered.However, in order to see how they work in real teaching and learning, a practical research wascarried out The research underwent the following steps:

1 Designing survey questionnaires

2 Delivering questionnaires to the pilot informants

3 Collecting the completed questionnaires

4 Analyzing collected data

5 Proposing some remarks and comments from the results of the questionnaires andgiving suggestions

In this chapter, only the first four steps will be mentioned The last step will be presented

in the next chapter

2.1 Practical Situation of Teaching and Learning English Speaking Skills at HaUI

2.1.1 Description of the English Course and its Objectives at HaUI

Hanoi University of Industry (HaUI) has been known as one of the leading providers ofskill-based diploma degrees in Vietnam Any students who passed the entrance examination toHaUI must study English as a compulsory subject Students learn this subject during five terms atuniversity However, before students are asked to learn this foreign language they can take part inthe replacement test which divides students into three different levels: A class (Elementary level

of proficiency), B class (Pre-Intermediate level of proficiency) and C class (Intermediate level ofproficiency and students at this level can skip one semester) Each level lasts 120 periods (45minutes per period) equivalent to one semester and students learn from 8 to 12 periods in a week.Hence, depending on the results of the test students will be arranged in a proper class basing ontheir English competence

The English course at HaUI is divided into two stages: The first stage – the stage forGeneral English lasting in four terms This early stage aims at providing students with generalknowledge of vocabulary, phonology, English grammar as well as developing students’integrated four language skills with the focus on speaking skill At this very first stage, the

textbooks Expressions (Intro, I and II) published by Thomson Heinle are used in the first three

terms Each of these textbooks consists of 16 units with a variety of topics such as yourself,

family, entertainment, food, jobs, vacations, health problems, education, etc In fact, these

textbooks do not require learners to have much grammar knowledge because its objective is topractice speaking and listening skills However, in the fourth term students learn the textbook

International Express published in 2004 by Oxford University Press at three levels (Elementary,

Pre-Intermediate, Intermediate) International Express (Pre-Intermediate level of proficiency)

contains 12 units with four skills The topics in this material focus especially on first meetings, work, plans and arrangements, lifestyles, cultures, environment, and transportations This book includes four main parts: Language focus which provides students with grammatical items, Word power which concentrates on vocabulary (pronunciation, stress pattern, meaning, etc), Skills focus and Focus on functions emphasizes four basic skills especially speaking and listening skills By using this textbook, we can improve our students’ communicative competence and our

students can learn the real things from business fields Students are asked to work in pairs, ingroups to practice English in situational contexts At this stage, in each semester students arerequired to complete three progress tests and a final test

The second stage – the stage for English for Specific Purposes – lasts 60 periods At thisstage, our students are provided with the knowledge of terms and structures related to their futureprofession The materials used during this stage vary depending on the majors of the students.These materials collected and designed by teachers at HaUI themselves mainly focus on students’specific vocabulary, reading and translation

2.1.2 Description of the Students at HaUI

Like the students of other colleges and universities, in order to be the students of HaUI,they have to pass a challenging University Entrance Examination Students of HaUI come fromall parts of the country: big cities, provinces, mountainous and remote areas

New students of HaUI do not have the same level of English language proficiency Some

of them have learnt English for 7 years at secondary and high schools Some have only learntEnglish for 3 years and others have never learnt English but French Students from big cities like

Ha Noi, Hai Phong, Nam Dinh seem better However, they are only good at grammar, notspeaking They can do grammatical exercises very quickly but they cannot speak fluently Also,most of them do not feel confident when communicating in English

Moreover, their individual difficulties in attitudes, motivation, studying methods may bethe cause(s) of potential problems arising during the course

2.1.3 Description of the Teachers at HaUI

If students are the most important factor in the learning process, teachers are the mostimportant factor in the teaching process At HaUI, there are more than 100 teachers of Englishlanguage (about 50 of them are permanent staff and the rest are temporary ones) aged from 22 to

45 but only some of them have ever been to English speaking countries like Australia and theUSA HaUI has been a university since 2006; it needs a greater number of English teachers toteach all students coming from different majors Therefore, every year this university hires nearly

50 English teachers from other universities in Hanoi These teachers are still quite young andeven some of them have just graduated from universities so they do not have much teachingexperience but the university doesn’t offer new coming teachers any further training courses toadapt the new teaching environment Besides, in order to improve the quality of teaching andlearning English at this university, the board of administrators divides the major classes intomany small English classes That leads to the lack of classrooms, so that most of non-majorEnglish classes have to study English both in the day time and night time Consequently, manyteachers have classes all day so they feel exhausted and have enough time to neither prepare forthe lessons before class nor get higher education All of the above reasons create the hardship forteachers during the time they teach English at HaUI

2.2 The Study

2.2.1 Participants

In order to server the purposes of the study and, at the same time, to facilitate datacollection and analysis, a sample of 15 teachers who are currently teaching English for allstudents at non-major English Departments at HaUI, and the other sample of 110 2nd yearstudents randomly selected at Faculties of Economics, Engineering, Chemistry, Electronic andComputer Science There are some reasons for the selection:

First of all, the author chooses teachers and 2nd year non-major English students at HaUIbecause she thinks it will be easier for her to invite more teachers and students to participate incompleting the survey questionnaires, and she will have more samples to judge the validity andthe reliability of the research data

As for the teachers, the author invites 15 teachers ages from 24 to 30 belonging to major English group number 2 and they have taught English for at least 2 years They are alldedicated and receptive teachers The selected teachers have not only the knowledge of Englishbut also knowledge of the subject matter Thus, the author believes that from these teachers’experience she will get information about teaching and learning speaking of the second year non-major English students Besides she can take a look at students’ major problems in learningspeaking English, the techniques teachers often use in teaching English speaking as well as theteachers’ recommendations for the improvement of the students’ speaking skills.

non-In addition, the selected students are necessarily in the classes of participating teacherswith the anticipation that the writer can make a comparison between the information given by theteachers and their students Then, there will be a discussion about the gap between them Thestudents under investigation aged from 19 to 25 both males and females are in the second year atthe non-major English Faculties They have at least two terms learning General English Thus,the information collected from the students can be quite reliable

2.2.2 The Setting of the Study

The study was conducted at the non-major English Faculties of Economics, Engineering,Chemistry, Electronic and Computer Science The students at these Faculties have to take a four-year training course in which English is considered a compulsory subject Like many othersubjects, English is taught in a formal setting, namely a classroom The teaching and learning ofEnglish is divided into two main stages - General English and English for Specific Purposes

The resource pool for intake of the 2nd year non-major English students at HaUI is fromtwo major exam groups – group A and D1 in the university entrance exams These studentstaking exams in mathematics, physics and chemistry (group A) or mathematics, literature andEnglish (group D1) so their English competence is in a mixed level Before being divided into asuitable class, the English Faculty requires the students to take part in a placement test then thestudents of the same level of proficiency will be placed in a class However, through informalinterview with some teachers and students they said that the placement test is not effectivebecause it is an optional test so those who do not take the test are placed in A class though theirEnglish competence is not at A level That causes uneven level among students in the Englishclasses This uneven level posed great problems on the one hand for the teachers of English

because they had to find the suitable way to cater for the needs of the entire class and on the otherhand for the students themselves to deal with an English speaking lesson Thus, there is a needfor improving students’ English speaking level in general in order to benefit both the strong andthe weak students To achieve this, practicing speaking in and out class is very important for eachstudent.

2.2.3 The Data Collection Methods

To reach the primary purposes of the study, a survey questionnaire has been chosen asmain method for data collection for this particular research The questionnaires consist of twomain parts with the first one intended to explore the teachers’ and students’ attitudes towardsspeaking skill, the second one dedicated to identify speaking problems and techniques used bythese teachers and students One survey questionnaire with 17 questions is designed for teacherswho are currently teaching or have taught English speaking to get their ideas on the learningreality, problems experienced by their students as well as their recommendations for improvingthe students’ English speaking skills Another survey questionnaire with 19 questions is for the

2nd year non-major English students to identify their opinions on their speaking lessons, the factoraffecting their speaking competence, and to find out their expectations to achieve better speakingskills To make sure that the subjects understand the questions properly, the author asks them toanswer the questions truthfully and trustworthily with the translation from English intoVietnamese

Survey questionnaire is intended to serve as the main source of data because it is

undeniable that questionnaire is valuable tool for researching the attitudes, images, concerns, needs, etc held by a group of interest Hence, it will certainly be valuable for the author in

exploring the subjects’ difficulties in learning speaking skill Moreover, this research tool is alsorelatively more comfortable, time-saving and economical to administer as compared with othersurvey methods like interviewing, telephoning, mailing, videotaping, etc It also makes theanalysis of data easy and simple as all the subjects answer the same questions This method isalso supposed to be of great advantage in the sense that it is easier for the subjects to answer thequestions Besides, the survey questionnaire preserves the subjects’ anonymity so they are morelikely to give unbiased answers

2.2.4 Data Analysis of the Teachers’ and Students’ Survey Questionnaires

This section of the thesis is the treatment of the data collected from the surveyquestionnaires conducted on 15 teachers from English Department and 110 second year non-major English students of Economics, Engineering, Chemistry, Electronic and Computer Science

This part will present the analysis of the data collected from the English teachers and the

2nd year students of non-major English Faculties at HaUI All the statistical data will be shown inthe form of percentages Among 17 questions for the teachers, as to questions 6, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13,

14, 15, 16, 17 and for the students, as to questions 1, 5, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 morethan one choice is acceptable Therefore, the results for the questions are presented in thepercentage of the options chosen

In which, questions 1 and 4 in the students’ survey questionnaires are designed to ask aboutthe students’ purposes of learning English

Questions 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8 (in appendix 1) and 2, 3, 6, 7, 8 (in appendix 2) are about theteachers’ and students’ attitudes towards English subject, the speaking skill, the materials and thestudents’ speaking competence as well as the teaching time for English speaking

Question 6 in the teachers’ survey questionnaires and 9 in the students’ ask about thedifficulties the teachers and students at HaUI face during the teaching and learning process.The speaking activities are mentioned in questions 10, 11, 12, 13 in the teachers’ survey andquestions 12, 13, 14, 15 in the students’ one

The last four questions in the teachers’ survey as well as in the students’ talk about theteachers’ techniques during the teaching time and their students’ responses

Table 1: Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards speaking skill and the role of teaching and

learning speaking skill

(Please refer to questions 1&2 in appendix 1 and questions 2&3 in appendix 2)

As can be seen from the table, the teachers share the same opinion with their students thatlistening is the most difficult skill among four skills 57% of the teachers and 69% of the students

put listening skill ahead of speaking skill Surprisingly, only 29% of the teachers and 23% of thestudents think that speaking skill is the most difficult skill The reasons for this choice maydepend on the recent materials include lots of difficult listening lessons Being aware of this, theteachers as well as the students may spend more time and energy on listening, which certainlyaffects their speaking competence and therefore prevents the improvement of their speakingability Only a small number of teachers (14%) and 8% of the students find it less difficult toteach or learn reading and writing skills

Moreover, when being asked about the importance of speaking skill nearly 70% studentsand half of the teachers (47%) find learning and teaching English speaking skill very essential to

2nd year non-major English students and the same number of teachers with 31% of the studentsbelieves it is essential The same number of teachers and students (6%) state that teaching andlearning speaking is not very essential None of the teachers and students says speaking skills isnot essential at all The reasons for these positive attitudes toward teaching and learning speakingskills derive from their understanding that their country is on the way of the integration so thatthey need to use English to communicate both in the students’ future jobs and in their everydaylife Thus, the teachers wish to help the students enrich their background knowledge, increasetheir vocabulary and grammatical structures, improve their speaking skill and gain theirconfidence when communicating in English

Table 2: Students’ purposes of learning English and their participation in learning to

speak English (Please refer to questions 1&4 in appendix 2)

Table 2 presents the students’ purposes of learning English and their participation inlearning to speak English Most of students at HaUI learn English with different purposes: to get

a good job in the future (57%), to communicate (25%), to pass the exams (14%), to entertain(1%) and to study aboard (0.6%) The others (2.4%) show their own opinions that they learnEnglish in order to have more knowledge about the English language and the cultures and

customs of the English speaking countries Depending on their own specific purposes, they willspend how much of their time learning English as well as participating in an English speakinglesson

Furthermore, among 110 students, only 30% of them state that they like speaking Englishand are willing to speak in an English lesson More than a half of the students (53%) feelunfamiliar with speaking English in class, so they sometimes join class speaking activities.Nearly 20% of the students say they are never willing to speak in class There are some reasonsfor their unwillingness to speak First, they are afraid of losing face in front of their friends Also,they are not accustomed to speaking foreign languages in class Besides, their English learninggoal isn’t to communicate but to pass the exams or to get good jobs in the future Another reasonfor this is their teachers’ poor teaching methods which are not interesting enough to encouragethem willingly take part in the class activities

To sum up, most students have realized the role of learning to speak English Therefore,they mostly learn English for a long-term purpose In spite of knowing that speaking Englishfluently is very difficult, all students hope to improve their speaking skill, which is really anadvantage

Chart 1: Teachers’ attitudes towards Communicative Language Teaching

(Please refer to question 8 in appendix 1)

Teachers' attitudes towards Communicative Language Teaching

C - its final goal is students' communitive competence

D - does not teach grammar

E - is used only for teaching speaking skill, not for other skills

F - focuses on meaningful tasks rather than the language itself

G - gives students opportunities to communicate with each other

As we can see from chart 1 most of the teachers at HaUI have quite good knowledge ofCLT and its features The teachers (24%, 20% and 19% respectively) believe CLT is student-centered, improves students’ communicative competence and provides students opportunities to

communicate The percentage of those who agree that CLT emphasizes fluency over accuracyaccounts for 9% Besides, 11% of the teachers claim that CLT focuses on meaningful tasks ratherthan on the language itself This leads to the fact that when applying the CLT in teachingspeaking the teachers (10%) do not usually teach grammar and 7% do not use CLT for othersskills but speaking skill Having realized the benefits that CLT can bring to English LanguageTeaching, 14 teachers out of 15 have applied CLT into their own teaching and only one of themstill thinks that traditional method is a good way to teach English skills including speaking skill.

In short, though most of the teachers know the great advantages of the CLT, some of them alsoassert that they sometimes find it hard to apply this approach into their teaching and the otherssay that CLT is sometimes not really effective when teaching speaking In other words, theteachers at HaUI encounter many difficulties when teaching speaking skill in the light of CLT

Chart 2: Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards students’ speaking competence

(Please refer to question 3 in appendix 1 and question 6 in appendix 2)

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Really bad Bad Quite good Good Really good

Teachers Students

As we can see from the above chart, although both the teachers and students realizespeaking is a necessary skill for a brighter future, they all do not seem to have optimistic attitudestowards the students’ speaking competence The statistics indicates that the majority of theteachers (60%) recognize their students’ real ability still bad and even half of the studentsthemselves agree with their teachers’ ideas Surprisingly, both the teachers (13%) and thestudents (18%) admit that the students’ communicating competence is really bad Meanwhile,40% of the students think their speaking competence is quite good compared to 27% of theirteachers for that Only 2% of the students are self-confident about their good English speaking

ability whereas no teachers support that idea because they think that none of their students are atgood or really good levels.

It can be concluded that the teachers and students at HaUI deeply understand theimportance of English speaking and it will take the teachers much time and great effort toimprove their students’ speaking skill because of the students’ low level of English proficiency

Table 3: Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards speaking materials and appropriate

time for teaching and learning English speaking

(Please refer to questions 4&5 in appendix 1 and questions 7&8 in appendix 2)

The data about the number of speaking lessons per week the students have at universityshow that the time for teaching and learning English from 8 to 12 periods a week at HaUI atpresent is too much As can be seen from the table, nearly the same number of the teachers (66%)and students (61%) think that 2 to 4 English periods for speaking in a week is enough However,

4 out of 15 teachers and 38 out of 110 students asked claim that more than 4 periods of Englishper week is suitable

There are many reasons why the teachers and students at HaUI do not willingly spend muchtime on speaking skills in classes but one of those reasons comes from the present materials used

in class According to the data in the table above, nearly half of the teachers (47%) and 34% ofthe students admit that the present materials are not only difficult but also boring The topics ofsome lessons such as introduction about yourself, family, food and drink are repeated in differentlevels, which make both the students and teachers find it boring In contrast, they find difficult todeal with some complicated topics like cultures, environment, transportations or health problems

On the other hand, 3 teachers and 54 students state that the current materials difficult but