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DECLARATION VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES ********************* LƢƠNG THỊ HUYỀN AN EXPLORATORY STUDY ON TEACHING[.]
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ********************* LƢƠNG THỊ HUYỀN AN EXPLORATORY STUDY ON TEACHING AND LEARNING SPEAKING ENGLISH AT BINH GIA HIGH SCHOOL - LANG SON: PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS Thực trạng dạy học nói Tiếng Anh trƣờng Trung Học Phổ Thơng Bình Gia - Lạng Sơn: Những khó khăn cách giải M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY CODE: 60140111 Hanoi, 2014 z VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ********************* LƢƠNG THỊ HUYỀN AN EXPLORATORY STUDY ON TEACHING AND LEARNING SPEAKING ENGLISH AT BINH GIA HIGH SCHOOL - LANG SON: PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS Thực trạng dạy học nói Tiếng Anh trƣờng Trung Học Phổ Thơng Bình Gia - Lạng Sơn: Những khó khăn cách giải M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY CODE: 60140111 SUPERVISOR: HOÀNG THỊ XUÂN HOA, Ph.D Hanoi, 2014 z i DECLARATION I certify that the thesis entitled “An exploratory study on teaching and learning speaking English at Binh Gia high school - Lang Son : Problems and solutions ” is the result of my own study and the substance of this research has not been submitted for degree to any other university or institution Hanoi, August 2014 Signature Luong Thi Huyen z ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Hoang Thi Xuan Hoa, PhD for her precious instructions, helpful suggestions, and especially, invaluable critical feedback and correction during the research I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to all of my lecturers at the Faculty of Post-Graduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University Ha Noi, whose support and considerations have enabled me to pursue the course I also wish to acknowledge the great support and precious help with the data collection and analysis of my colleagues and students at Binh Gia High School Without them, I could not have completed my thesis Last but not least, my heartfelt thanks are due to my beloved family members who are always besides me to support and encourage me to fulfill my study z iii ABSTRACT English speaking is an important skill and most used to express opinions, explanations, make arguments in daily life Students need to speak English fluently to get better result in learning English and get a good job in the future This minor thesis aimed at investigating some difficulties that students and teachers at Binh Gia High School have encountered in learning and teaching English speaking skill and suggesting solutions to overcome these difficulties The subjects of the study were 120 students and 12 teachers of English The data of the research was collected from both students‟ and teachers‟ questionnaires, interviews The findings showed that students' difficulties in learning English speaking skill were low level of English proficiency, lack of motivation and using mother tongue problem Teachers' difficulties in teaching English speaking skill were insufficient communicative competence and inappropriate method In addition, other difficulties in learning and teaching English speaking skill of students and teachers were large and multi-level classes, current testing system and lack of class time From these findings, some recommendations were made with the aim to improve the teaching and learning English at Binh Gia High School z iv TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii ABSTRACT iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS vi LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES vii PART A: INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale of the study Aims of the study 3 Method and procedure of the research Scope of the study Organization of the paper PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1.1 Speaking skill 1.1.1 Definition of speaking 1.1.2 Characteristics of speaking 1.1.3 The role of speaking in foreign language teaching 1.2 Teaching and learning speaking skill 1.2.1 Teaching speaking skill 1.2.2 Learning speaking skill 1.2.3 Problems in teaching and learning speaking skill 10 1.3.Using CLT in teaching speaking skill 10 1.4 Summary 12 CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 13 2.1 The context 13 2.1.1 Overview of the English textbook 13 2.1.2 An overview of Binh Gia High School 13 2.1.3 The students at BGHS 14 2.1.4 The teachers at BGHS 14 z v 2.2 Research questions 14 2.3 Participants 15 2.4 Data collection instruments 15 2.4.1 Questionnaire 15 2.4.2 Interview 16 2.5 Data collection procedure 16 2.6 Data analysis 17 2.7 Summary 17 CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS 18 3.1 Data analysis 18 3.1.1 Results of the survey questionnaires 18 3.2 Findings 30 3.2.1 Difficulties from the students 30 3.2.2 Difficulties from the teachers 31 3.2.3 Problems from other factors 33 PART III: CONCLUSION 35 Conclusions 35 Solutions perceived by teachers and students to overcome teachers‟ and students' difficulties 35 2.1 Teachers‟ solutions 35 2.2 Students' solutions 37 Limitations of the study 39 Recommendations for further study 40 REFERENCES 41 APPENDIX I APPENDIX IV APPENDIX VII APPENDIX X APPENDIX XI APPENDIX XII z vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CLT: Communication Language Teaching BGHS: Bình Gia High School %: Percentage z vii LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES Charts Chart 1: Teachers‟ and students‟ opinion about the importance of English speaking skill Chart 2: Teachers‟ and students‟ opinion about the importance of English speaking kill in comparison with other skills Chart 3: Teachers‟ and students‟ opinions about students‟ passion of learning English peaking skill Chart 4: Teachers‟ and students‟ judgment about students‟ speaking competence Tables Table 1: Information about students and teachers participating in the survey Table 2: Teachers‟ years of teaching English and students‟ years of learning English Table 3: Students‟ reasons for learning English speaking skill Table 4: jj Teachers‟ difficulties when teaching speaking skill Table 5: Teachers‟ solutions to improve the speaking lessons Table 6: Teachers‟ suggested solutions to improve the speaking lesson Table 7: Students‟ difficulties when learning English speaking skill z PART A: INTRODUCTION Rationale of the study O‟Malley and Pierce (1996) stated that speaking is an important skill that a learner should acquire It is very important in order to enable students to communicate effectively through oral language because the disability of the students to speak may lead them to be unable to express their ideas even in a simple form of conversation In addition, Burn and Joyce (1997: 54-55) stated that one of the aims of most language programs is to develop spoken language skills and most programs aim to integrate both spoken and written language Learning a language means using it in communication in oral or written form, and being able to express feeling, thoughts, and experiences in various contexts Lade (1964: 51) stated that to know the language is to use it He further stated that students not know a sentence until he can speak it One of the main tasks assigned to foreign language teaching at school is that of training students to be communicatively competent Speaking is "the process of building and sharing meaning through the use of verbal and non-verbal symbols, in a variety of contexts" (Chaney, 1998: 13) In any second language teaching and learning, speaking is always believed to be the most vital skill Learning a target language makes no sense if you cannot communicate in it successfully For many years, teaching speaking has been undervalued and English teachers have continued to teach speaking just as a repetition of drills or memorization of dialogues However, with the rapid progress of globalization, English speaking skill is thought to be the key to one‟s success in his career The goal of teaching speaking should improve students' communicative skills, because, only in that way, students can express themselves and learn how to follow the social and cultural rules appropriate in each communicative circumstance Classroom activities that develop learners‟ ability to express themselves through speech would therefore seem an important component of a language course However, in some places in Vietnam English teaching and learning has been strongly influenced by the traditional methods Teachers as well as students pay much attention to the grammatical items In these classes, teachers mainly focus on explaining the grammatical rules and structures to students who are considered as passive recipients As a result, those students might be structurally competent but communicative incompetent That causes a lot of difficulties in using English in real-life communication z ... mentioned reasons have inspired the writer to conduct a research titled ? ?An exploratory study on teaching and learning speaking English at Binh Gia High School - Lang Son : Problems and solutions. .. learning speaking English at Binh Gia high school - Lang Son : Problems and solutions ” is the result of my own study and the substance of this research has not been submitted for degree to any other... out a conversation in the language For the reasons mentioned above, it z is really vital that language teachers should pay great attention to the teaching of speaking skill 1.2 Teaching and learning