(SKKN 2022) HOW TO IMPROVE STUDENTS SPEAKING SKILL WHILE TEACHING OTHER SKILLS

I INTRODUCTION The reason why the topic is chosen Speaking is a crucial part of language learning The mastery of speaking skill in English is a priority for many second or foreign language learners Nowadays, many learners even consider the ability to speak the language is the aim of language learning They often evaluate their success in language learning as well as the effectiveness of their English courses on the basic of how well they feel they have improved in the spoken language proficiency Despite its importance, for a long time, teaching speaking has been under valuated Traditional teaching methods have seemed to emphasize the learning of language system (rules of grammar and, lists of vocabulary items ) as a goal in its own right and failed to give learners an ability to gain realistic experiences in actually using the language knowledge gained Moreover, very often when people study a language, they accumulate a lot of 'up-in the head' knowledge, but then find that they can't actually use this language to express what they want to There seems to be some difficulties in moving language from 'up-there' knowledge to actively usable language Without experience in using the language, students may tend to be nervous about trying to say things Nowadays things have been different Today's world requires that the goal of learning speaking English should develop students' communication skill so that students can express themselves and use the target language to state opinions, express their feelings and exchange information Many new teaching methods have been introduced and applied to serve the basic need of English learners Among them, communicative approach and learner - centered approach seem to be the most effective ways to teach oral communication And we should apply these methods in teaching the four skills and focus on designing speaking activities in appropriate stages of English lessons while teaching other skills so that students always have a lot of chances to practice speaking while learning English In Viet Nam, there has been also a reform in teaching English in secondary schools as well as High schools The new series of textbooks presently used in secondary schools and high schools were designed in view of communicative language teaching method The topics of the lessons given in the textbooks are really interesting and based on real - life situations that require communication In spite of many efforts of teachers and others, the results we get from our students are unsatisfactory Students still complain that they find speaking lessons really stressful and thus speaking is a difficult skill to master Many students, after studying English for years, have left school without being able to speak an intelligible sentence Therefore, in this writing I would like to tell you how to improve the students’ speaking skills while teaching English so that we can help students to improve their speaking skills But first of all, I would like to introduce something about the teaching and learning environment of the place where I teach The teaching and learning environment 2.1 Advantages: Like some other regimes, there are some advantages and disadvantages for the teaching and learning of the language in my school First, the students are very eager to learn the language They say that they want to learn English to listen to music, to read books, and especially to communicate with foreigners This is to say that they have intrinsic motivation towards the learning and practicing speaking English Second, it is the objective factors that influence the students' learning motivation The fact that our country has opened trade relations with all countries in the world and implemented the policy of encouraging domestic and private investment and the joining WTO of our country have been an impetus for the students to learn to communicate in English for their jobs in the future In other words, this factor has motivated the students greatly Third, as I have said above, the new series of textbooks were designed to serve communication need of students as well as in view of communicative language teaching method So students really have a lot of chances to practice in real situations Finally, high school students have been provided with necessary language knowledge such as vocabularies, grammatical rules as well as language competences so that they can have the ability to communicate in English in certain situations 2.2 Disadvantages Besides the advantages discussed above, there are plenty of difficulties that affect the learning and teaching of the language in my school To begin with, there are too many students in a class Normally, each class contains more than 40 students In addition, all of the classes are fixed with rows of desks This makes it difficult for teachers to organize communicative tasks and keep control of the class Second, most of the students are not good at the language, especially their communicative competences are poor although they have been exposed to the new curriculum since they were in secondary school Normally most of them don’t know how to talk about the topic given They can’t make up the ideas to express in English because their vocabularies, structures are still limited Furthermore, they often look for a specific word rather than using simple language to describe what is meant, so it takes them a lot of time to be able to speak up a whole sentence Many students find it very difficult to show their ideas in English due to nervousness and lack of confidence in front of the class They feel shy, they are afraid of being laughed at, being lost face with their friends when they have mistakes As a result, the class is tense and passive because students don’t want to say out their thought Then although English is one of the core subjects, which are compulsory in final examinations at certain stages of the school education system, speaking skill is not usually included in their exams so sometimes students just learn English for written exams not for communication as the aim given Grade Number of 11 students 277 Mark and over total rate Under mark total rate 105 172 38% 62% Statistics According to the survey carried out at the beginning of this school year, more than 70 % of the students reported that they are worried about their English They said that they could hardly make a simple conversation in English or express what they thought Importantly, most of them assumed that like writing, speaking is also difficult for them to master II SOLUTIONS Improving students’ speaking skill while teaching speaking itself There are many rules we must remember while teaching speaking so that we can help students improve their speaking skill: 1.1 Firstly, we must make sure that students feel safe and confident while they express themselves Personally I think that, the first thing that teachers have to to help students improve their speaking skill is that they have to help them overcome their feelings of shyness and nervousness when practicing English in their class One of the best ways to solve this problem is to put them in 'safe' situations in class where they are inspired and encouraged to try using the language from their 'store' Organizing communicative activities in pairs, in groups is also an effective way to serve this aim Working in pairs, in groups, students will feel less anxious than when they are 'on show' in front of the whole class together Moreover, pair - works and group - works can help shy students who would never say anything in a whole class activity have the confidence to open their mouths Students can also learn from each other's new ideas so that they will have something to speak in front of the class later Another thing that teacher should remember to help students have confidence in speaking is teacher's positive corrections and feedbacks Making errors is a natural and unavoidable part of the learning process, but how to correct the students’ errors is particularly important You need to provide appropriate feedbacks and corrections, but don't interrupt the flow of communication Take notes while pairs or groups are talking and address problems to the class after the activity without embarrassing the student who made the error We can also write the errors on the board and ask who can correct it Teachers should encourage their students to speak whatever they can and focus on what they have got right, not on what they have got wrong We should also help them to develop positive attitudes towards their friends’ errors and to correct themselves Teachers should try to develop for themselves positive strategies of error corrections When students achieve success in oral communication, they will feel confident, secure and enjoy learning English; they will have confidence to take part in communicative activities later 1.2 Secondly, we must pay attention to warm - up activities Warm - up is also an important part which contributes to the success of a speaking lesson Warm - ups help our learners put aside their daily distractions and focus on English If they haven't used English all day, they may take a little while to shift into it Warm - ups also encourage whole group participation which can build a sense of community within the group and they can help to arouse student' interest in speaking We should vary warm - up activities to attract our students' attention and interest because if they feel good about the lesson from the beginning they'll make a good contribution to it These may be a discussion, a picture describing activities or playing a game, brainstorming, …etc In order to have a good preparation, the teacher does different things to arouse students’ interest, brainstorming, musical warmer, word card, etc Before a new lesson I often motivate the students by chatting to them about the topic of interest, giving them preparation tasks or quick warm-up to get them in the right mood for speaking Brainstorming is one of the simplest, but the most effective kind of motivation because it takes a short time I can write key words on the blackboard and the class is encouraged to think of ideas, words, phrases associated with them Example 1: Speaking in unit 12 - English 10 When I teach speaking in unit 12 - English 10, I may present a picture of a famous singer or musician and asks them the following questions Who is she? Do you like her? If not, who is your favorite singer? What kind of music does she sing? Teacher leads in new lesson Example 2: Speaking - Unit 15 - English 12 Teacher may raise some questions and ask students to discuss in pairs: Do you think that women are as intelligent as men? Do they have equal rights in the family and in the society? Students ask and answer in pairs, then some students present their answer, teacher leads in new lesson Example 3: Speaking - unit - English 12 T asks students to play a guessing game:" Find someone who " Teacher divides the class into groups: Teacher gives some information about some popular and interesting jobs in the society and asks student to guess what job it is Each time they can guess they got one point 1.3 Thirdly, students must be well-prepared and instructed before they practice speaking Another point that makes it difficult for students to practice speaking is that their knowledge of the language is poor and they don't have ideas to talk about the topic; (their language competences, vocabulary and grammar are limited) so in order to help students practice, teachers have to provide them with necessary language input and give students clear instructions Example 1: Task – speaking - unit - English 12 Teachers have to present some verbs used with the collocations given in the task by asking students to the matching A build provide reform apply train raise B Teacher's salary Curriculum and textbook More school Teaching and learning method More highly qualify doctors More equipment and facilities Teachers also have to elicit the meaning of some words or phrase in the task Example 2: Speaking - unit11 - English 10 Before students practice, teachers have to present the form and use of conditional sentences type which is used to express a regret about what you did in the past Example 3: Speaking - unit3 - English 12 Teacher presents some ways of giving and responding to compliments You Giving compliments Responding to compliments really have a beautiful Thank you, Phil That's a nice blouse, Barbara compliment What a beautiful blouse it is! You've got to be kidding! I thought it was terrible How beautiful you are! Thanks, Peter It's nice of you to say so Congratulation You've played so Thank you Your compliment is well today! Your hairstyle is terrific really encouraging! 1.4 Fourthly, Varying communicative activities is also important As I have just presented above, effective methods of teaching indirectly encourage oral interaction and they can provide motivation The direct way to promote oral communication is to provide students with opportunities to participate and to communicate with each other so that students can learn the language from speaking The more opportunities of speaking the language they have, the more fluent they become Actually, various activities in each lesson adds interest to students and can help with making students more dynamic and active In speaking, students will be motivated if teachers provide them with various communicative activities Below are some common speaking activities that I often carry out in my classes to make my speaking lessons more interesting and to motivate my students in practicing English: a) Discussions: In a discussion students may aim to arrive at a conclusion, share ideas about an event, or find solutions in their discussion groups Before the discussion, it is essential that the purpose of the discussion activity is set by the teacher In this way, the discussion points are relevant to this purpose In a discussion teacher can form groups of or students Then each group works on their topic for a given time period, and presents their opinions to the class For efficient group discussions, it is always better not to form large group because quiet students may avoid contributing in large groups Generally speaking, in class or group discussions, whatever the aim is, the students should always be encouraged to ask questions, paraphrase ideas, express support, check for clarification, and so on b) Role - play: One other way of getting students to speak is role - playing Students pretend they are in various social contexts and have a variety of social roles In role - play activities, the teacher gives information to the learners such as who they are and what they think or feel c) Information gaps: In this activity students are supposed to be working in pairs One student will have the information that the other partner does not have and the partner will share their information Information gap activities serve many purposes such as solving a problem or collecting information These activities are effective because everybody has the opportunity to talk extensively in the target language The aim of this activity is to get learners to use the language they are learning to interact in realistic and meaningful ways, usually involving exchanges of information and opinions d) Brainstorming: This helps students produce ideas in a limited time The good characteristics of brainstorming is that the students are not criticized for their ideas so students will be open to sharing new ideas Brainstorming is one of the simplest, but the most effective kind of motivation because it takes a short time Teacher can write key words on the blackboard and the class is encouraged to think of ideas, words, phrases associated with them e) Storytelling: students can briefly summarizes a tale or story they heard from somebody beforehand, or they may create their own stories to tell their classmates Storytelling fosters creative thinking f) Interviews: Students can conduct interviews on selected topics with various people It is a good idea that the teacher provides a rubric to students so that they know what type of questions they can ask or what path to follow, but students should prepare their own interview questions g) Reporting: Before coming to class, students are asked to read a newspaper or magazine and, in class, they report to their friends what they find as the most interesting news Students can also talk about whether they have experienced anything worth telling their friends in their daily lives before class h) Group planning tasks: An example of this is planning a party or an excursion for the whole group In this activity, teachers should allow them a good amount of time to prepare for a presentation in which they attempt to persuade the rest of the class to agree with their arrangements i) Picture Narrating: This activity is based on several sequential pictures Students are asked to tell the story taking place in the sequential pictures by paying attention to the criteria provided by the teacher as a rubric Rubrics can include the vocabulary or structures they need to use while narrating j) Picture Describing: One way to make use of pictures in a speaking activity is to give students just one picture and having them describe what it is in the picture For this activity students can form groups and each group is given a different picture Students discuss the picture with their groups, then a spokesperson for each group describes the picture to the whole class This activity fosters the creativity and imagination of the learners as well as their public speaking skills 1.5 Last but not least, we should also pay attention to these points: The communicative activities listed above can help teachers a lot in promoting their students' speaking skills because they are quite interesting and they give students a reason to speak in different situations and about different topics However, how should teachers run an activity effectively so that they can achieve their aims is also a problem Here I would like to provide you with a basic route - map plan for running a simple EFL activity (English as a Foreign Language) Activity route map Before the lesson: familiarize yourself with the material and the activity; prepare any materials or texts you need In class: Lead - in, preparation for the activity ( this may be helped to raise motivation or interests, or perhaps to focus on language items that might be useful in the activity model the conversation or the talk Typical lead-ins are: show a picture connected to the topic Ask questions/write up or read out a sentence starting a viewpoint Elicit reactions/ask students if they have ever seen/been/or done, etc…/make a strong, controversial statement/ ) Set up the activity: give instructions, make groupings, organize the class, etc… Run the activity: students the activity, maybe in pairs or in groups while teachers monitor and help Close the activity and invite feedbacks from learners Post activity: any appropriate follow - on work Example: Task - speaking - English 10/page 67 This task is a discussion activity * Before the lesson (teacher prepare at home) * In class: To lead in and prepare students for the activity, I may show them the model of the boat and ask them about the different characteristics of each section/present some useful expressions for expressing agreements and disagreements/teacher asks some good students to make an example in front of the class before each group practice * Set up the activity: I would like you to work in groups of or students, deciding the best seat for each person mentioned in task You have minutes to complete the task: * Run the activity: Teacher lets students to carry out the discussion in groups, move around and monitor the class * Close the activity: Teacher asks some groups to perform in front of the class and gives feedbacks * Post - activity: Teacher asks students to present their choice (which seat is the most suitable for them) Good atmosphere in the class and friendly relationship between teachers and students Presenting our opinions and feelings in front of a lot of people in our native language has been a challenge to many people and using another language to convey what we want to say is of course more challenging Therefore if the teacher does not encourage his students and make them feel good about their teacher and their lessons, the class will become tense and dull Interaction can't take place in the class effectively As a teacher in a language class, we should always create a good class atmosphere from the beginning because our students, especially young students, will have no communication if they don’t feel good about their teachers and their English class Teacher's and students' involvement: The main aim of organizing a communicative activity is to get students to speak, then one way to achieve that would be for you to reduce your own contributions Probably the less you speak, the more space it will allow the students It could be useful to aim to say nothing while the activity is underway, and save any contribution for before and after Improving students’ speaking activities while teaching other skills 2.1 Teaching reading, listening and writing As we have mentioned above, speaking is the most important skill to any learners of English or any other languages Therefore, we must help students to make full use of every chance to practice speaking This can be done at different stages of the lessons: Pre-, while- and post- Before students read or listen to a text or write about a certain topic, they should be prepared about what they are going to read in advance by discussing some questions and talking about their own experiences relating to the topic These activities can be carried out in pairs or in groups, or sometimes the teacher asks questions and the students answer The teacher at this time should play the role of an assistant We use different ways to encourage our students to be engage in oral communication and present their ideas We can also apply this when we present new language (vocabulary, structures, etc…) or review what they have learned We can make our students think and pay more attention to our teaching by asking them for their opinions, suggestions, or encouraging them to guess new words, having them contribute what they remember or already know instead of introducing directly the new lesson Some of the communicative tasks we can give our students while teaching listening or reading or writing are: • Discussions about the text • Summarizing texts • Reviewing texts • Using a 'follow-up' speaking task related to the topic Clearly, I can encourage those students to share the knowledge with those members who not and I can help my students make full use of every chance to practice speaking And in fact, telling someone about what we have read, listen is a very natural reaction to a text Speaking activities can be also used as a mean for students to check the answers with each other after they listen or read the text Students may answer the teacher’s questions directly or discuss the questions in pairs In this stage, we can encourage students to talk by asking them to summarize what they have read or listen Students take turns to talk in groups and then they may present the ideas in pairs Telling someone about what we have read is a very natural reaction to a text Some illustrations of using communicative tasks while teaching reading, listening or writing a Pre - reading activity: while teaching reading Unit - English 11: Friendship: Teachers give some ‘English proverbs’ about friendship and asks students to work in groups to explain the meaning of each statement orally After the students have practiced, the teacher will asks them to explain orally in front of the class Then the teacher will asks them the next question: What are the quality of a good friendship? • A friend in need is a friend indeed • Hold a true friend with both your hands • Be a person that your friend can trust • A friend indeed is a person who always walks in while the rest of the world walk out b Pre - listening stages: Unit - English 11 (Listening) Teacher asks students to work in groups Each group will makes three sentences to describe the picture The teacher feedbacks and introduce new lesson c Pre - reading, Unit - English 11 Teacher asks students to describe the picture orally and then tell the whole class which occasion it is? d Post - reading, Unit - English 11 Teacher asks students to talk about their last Tet holiday e Pre - writing - Unit T asks students to talk about different festivals before writing….etc While teaching language focus Teaching grammar sometimes makes students feel passive and bored Mostly, teachers only teach grammar rules and ask students to exercises in a passive way If we observe Traditional Grammar Teaching class in most of the schools, we may find out that nearly every teacher follows a simple way like this: firstly, the teacher lists the grammar rules Then, the students learn by heart all the rules and some exercises Lastly, the teacher gives more written exercises such as blank-filling or translation This is quite similar with what we called 3p theory: presentation, practice and production These three stages convey different purposes Presentation is to present new language in context so that the meaning is clear, to present the new form in a natural spoken or written text so that students can see its use in discourse, to link the new form to what students already know, to check comprehension, to elicit the form from students where possible and exploit their existing knowledge And when students learn English this way, some of them would have good command of English especially in the examinations, but when they open their mouth, they always find that they can’t get a proper word to express themselves or sometimes when the author points out some mistakes in their speech they can hardly believe they had made such silly mistakes Most of the students mention that they are quite sure to have learned the corresponding term but couldn’t help making mistakes when they get to talking That is the question which is going to be focused on today Nowadays most of us realize that to teach grammar lessons effectively so that students can not only remember grammar rules but also apply the language in communication we should resourcefully move as quickly as possible from certain pattern drills to oral interaction because each student really likes talking about his or her own ideas and feelings We should give them a reason to use the structure we teach in conversation Let’s look at some examples: * Target structure: The simple past tense To help students practice the simple past tense, the teacher may ask his students to look at the picture of a famous film star 10 years ago and talk about her: + At that time she was poor She was not famous She lived in a small village in the South She worked as a street vendor then The teacher asks students to practice in groups, taking turns to talk about themselves 10 years ago * Practice stage: Simple present tense Teacher asks students to tell the whole class about their daily activities or tell fairy tales using simple presents to make the story more vivid It’s always very interesting to talk about themselves And the students will be bare in their speaking that simple present is used to express a habit, a routine and in story - telling * Target structure: Relative clauses Practice stages; Teachers divides the class into two groups and asks them to play a guessing game: Find someone who…each group will gives a statement and the other group must guess who he or she is Ex: - He’s a person who works on spaceship - She is a person who works in a hospital - He’s a person who is caught because of shop - lifting or selling drugs * Target structure: if clauses Teacher gives some cues and asks students to work in pairs asking and answering questions using the cues given: Cues; See a pickpocket /get lost in a jungle/ have a lot of money/ Go to Africa/President of a country Ex: A: What would you if you are the President of our country? B: I would issue many policies which are good for the poor A: What about you? C: I would try to make our country richer and richer Above are some examples in which we can use communicative tasks to help students practice English while learning Grammar Giving them as many chances to practice speaking English as possible is the best way to help them improve their speaking skill III CONCLUSION Results: After some years of conducting these solutions, to my expectation, I have gained satisfying results I've found that my students have become more confident and active in speaking lessons Many of them said that they no longer feel their speaking lessons stressful and burdened Most of them admitted that their speaking skill has been improved a lot day by day This is the statistics this year Speaking is an important part of second language learning to any learners The ability to communicate in a second language clearly and efficiently contributes to the success of the learner in school and success later in life Therefore, it is essential that Grade Number 11 students 277 of Mark and over total rate Under mark total rate 184 91 67.2% 32.8% language teachers pay great attention to help students develop their speaking skill rather than leading students to pure memorization Teacher should provide students with a rich environment where meaningful communication takes place while teaching any skill Proposals Above are just a few ideas small experience of myself, certainly will not avoid errors or confusion So I am looking forward to the suggestions of colleagues to my initiative be applied more effectively in the next years I sincerely thank you! THE PRINCIPAL'S CONFIRMATION Thanh Hoa, May 18th 2022 Undertaking not to copy Hoang Thu Huong REFERENCES Littlewood, W.T.(1992) Teaching Oral Communication, Blackwell Publishers, UK Staab, C 1992 Oral language for today’s classroom Markham, ON: Pippin Publishing 3 Brown, G and G Yule 1983 Teaching the Spoken Language Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Brand, S T and Donato, J M, (2001) Storytelling in Emergent Literacy: Fostering Multiple Intelligences, Thomas Learning, USA Applegate, R.B (1975) The language teacher and the rules of speaking TESOL Quarterly, 9(3), 271-281 Richards, J.C & Rogers, T.S (2001) Approaches and methods in language teaching Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Harmer, J (1998) How to teach English Malaysia: Addition Wesley Longman Harmer, J 1984 The Practice of English Language Teaching London: Longman  ... the students? ?? speaking skills while teaching English so that we can help students to improve their speaking skills But first of all, I would like to introduce something about the teaching and... writing, speaking is also difficult for them to master II SOLUTIONS Improving students? ?? speaking skill while teaching speaking itself There are many rules we must remember while teaching speaking. .. be useful to aim to say nothing while the activity is underway, and save any contribution for before and after Improving students? ?? speaking activities while teaching other skills 2.1 Teaching