Non english major students anxiety in speaking english a case study at university of information technology, vietnam national university ho chi minh city m a

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY- HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES & HUMANITIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LINGUISTICS & LITERATURE - NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS’ ANXIETY IN SPEAKING ENGLISH: A CASE STUDY AT UNIVERSITY OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY, VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY – HO CHI MINH CITY A minor thesis submitted to the Faculty of English Linguistics & Literature in partial fulfillment of the Master’s degree in TESOL By DUONG THI HIEN Supervised by LE THI THANH, Ph.D HO CHI MINH CITY, AUGUST 2022 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I hereby declare that this thesis entitled “Non-English major students’ anxiety in speaking English: A case study at University of Information Technology, Vietnam National University - Ho Chi Minh City” is my own work This paper has not been submitted for the award of any degree or diploma in any institutions All the work from other authors, which has been used as references in this study, was cited with acknowledgement Ho Chi Minh City, August 2022 DUONG THI HIEN i RETENTION AND USE OF THE THESIS I hereby state that I, Duong Thi Hien, being the candidate for the degree of Master in TESOL, accept the requirements of the University relating to the retention and use of Master’s Thesis Deposited in the Library In terms of conditions, I agree that the original of my thesis deposited in the Library should be accessible for the purpose of study and research in accordance with the normal conditions established by the Library for the care, loan or reproduction of the theses Ho Chi Minh City, August 2022 ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude towards my supervisor, Dr Le Thi Thanh, for her great support and advice during the time I conducted this study Thanks to her valuable academic guidance and constructive feedback, I have overcome the difficulties to finalize my Master’s thesis Secondly, I am indebted to all the lecturers in the Faculty of English Linguistics and Literature for their precious assistance, scholarly knowledge and enthusiasm which have kindled my interest in teaching and research Thirdly, I would like to send my appreciation to all the participants who provided me rich and detailed data, including my colleague - Ms Tran Ngoc and 40 nonEnglish major students from her classes at UIT Without their participation, this study could not achieve its aims I also want to say a big thank-you to my close friends for always being by my side to support me during the Corona pandemic Without their huge encouragement, this thesis would have been far from complete Most importantly, I heartily thank my parents, my older sister and brothers for their support in every single moment of my life Without their unconditional love and trust, I would not have become who I am today I am proud and fortunate to be part of their family iii ABSTRACT Over the past decades, language speaking anxiety has never failed to attract researchers’ attention from all over the world Especially, one of the notable matters is how to bolster students’ willingness to communicate in English without being impeded by apprehension This study aims at exploring potential triggers of English speaking anxiety among non-English major students at University of Information Technology, Vietnam National University – Ho Chi Minh City and the strategies which might be used by them to overcome such problems The qualitative case study employed two main instruments which are sixteen in-class observations and semi-structured interviews with 10 out of 40 students from two General English classes at University of Information Technology The data collection began with a series of observations in class to realize the students’ manifestations of anxiety during speaking sessions Then semi-structured interviews with 10 highly anxious students were administered one after another to detect the causes of speaking anxiety as well as the students’ coping strategies The findings of the study disclosed eight factors provoking non-English major students’ speaking anxiety at University of Information Technology They were classified into two groups including intrinsic factors (lack of communicative competence, lack of self-confidence, low self-esteem, low motivation) and the extrinsic factors (peers, teachers, previous teaching curriculum, limited exposure to English) The main coping strategies reported by the students were learning additional vocabulary and undertaking more speaking practice Based on the findings, pedagogical implications were drawn to help the researcher recognize the sources of this psychological phenomenon and propose several efficient solutions for teachers, administrators and tertiary students to enhance the teaching and learning of English in this context Further research considering factors which are not scrutinized in the current study may contribute to a fuller understanding of speaking anxiety Key words: students’ anxiety, speaking English, factors of anxiety, speaking anxiety iv TABLE OF CONTENTS STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP i RETENTION AND USE OF THE THESIS ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii ABSTRACT iv TABLE OF CONTENTS v LIST OF TABLES ix LIST OF FIGURES x LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS xi CHAPTER INTRODUCTION .1 1.1 Background to the study 1.2 Personal motivation 1.3 Aims of the study 1.4 Research questions 1.5 Significance of the study 1.6 Scope of the study 1.7 Organization of the thesis CHAPTER LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Overview of speaking 2.1.1 Definition of speaking 2.1.2 The importance of speaking in EFL classrooms 2.1.3 Characteristics of a successful speaking activity 2.2 Anxiety 2.2.1 Definition of anxiety v 2.2.2 Anxiety and fear 10 2.2.3 Types of anxiety 11 2.3 Foreign language anxiety 12 2.3.1 Definitions of FLA 12 2.3.2 Debilitating and facilitating effects of FLA 13 2.3.3 Components of FLA 14 2.3.4 Manifestations of FLA 15 2.4 Anxiety and speaking English 16 2.4.1 Speaking anxiety 16 2.4.2 The effects of anxiety on speaking 17 2.5 Potential causes of foreign language speaking anxiety 18 2.5.1 Intrinsic causes 18 2.5.1.1 Lack of communicative competence 18 2.5.1.2 Lack of self-confidence 19 2.5.1.3 Low self-esteem 20 2.5.1.4 Low motivation 20 2.5.2 Extrinsic causes 21 2.5.2.1 Peers .21 2.5.2.2 Teachers .22 2.5.2.3 The previous teaching curriculum .22 2.5.2.4 Limited exposure to English 23 2.6 Students' strategies to reduce speaking anxiety 23 2.7 Previous studies 25 2.8 Conceptual framework 29 CHAPTER METHODOLOGY 30 vi 3.1 Research design 30 3.2 Research site .32 3.3 English courses at UIT .32 3.4 Research participants 33 3.5 Materials 34 3.6 Research instruments 34 3.6.1 Classroom observations 34 3.6.2 Semi-structured interviews 37 3.7 Data collection procedure 39 3.8 Data analysis procedure 40 3.9 Reliability and validity .41 3.10 Ethical considerations 42 CHAPTER FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 43 4.1 Intrinsic factors 43 4.1.1 Lack of communicative competence 43 4.1.2 Lack of self-confidence .45 4.1.3 Low self-esteem 46 4.1.4 Low motivation 47 4.2 Extrinsic factors 48 4.2.1 Fear of friends' attitude 48 4.2.2 Fear of negative feedback from others 51 4.2.3 The previous teaching curriculum 52 4.2.4 Limited exposure to English 52 4.3 Solutions to overcome English speaking anxiety 54 4.4 Summary of main findings .61 vii 4.5 Discussions .62 CHAPTER CONCLUSION 66 5.1 Overview of the study 66 5.2 Pedagogical implications 67 5.3 Limitations of the study 68 5.4 Recommendations for further study 69 REFERENCES 71 APPENDICES 79 APPENDIX A Consent Form Interview - Student participants 79 APPENDIX B Interview questions 81 APPENDIX C Interview transcript sample 82 APPENDIX D Thematic network 92 APPENDIX E Observation Scheme 93 APPENDIX F Textbook: Business Partner A2+ 103 viii LIST OF TABLES Table 3.5 The unit contents in Business Partner A2+ 34 Table 3.6.1a Observation sheet 36 Table 3.6.1b The schedules for classroom observations 37 Table 3.7 The summary of the research procedures 40 ix APPENDIX D THEMATIC NETWORK 92 APPENDIX E OBSERVATION SHEET - DAY Teacher in charge: Ms Tran Ngoc Date: Thursday, March 11th, 2021 (Day 1) Time: 7:30 - 09:45 AM (Class ENG01.M16); 10:00 A.M - 11:30 A.M (Class ENG01.M17) Lesson: Unit 93 APPENDIX E OBSERVATION SHEET - DAY Class: ENG01.M16 No Laugh Blushing Freezing up Distortion of nervously Sweating sound Making Not making Making Using speech unnecessary eye contact grammar fillers (i.e mistakes umm, uhh…) movements Notes (i.e fidgeting body and hands, touching hair/ objects) S1 S2 S5       Speaking        Feeling interior         Lack of ideas          S3 S4     93 preparation Losing face   without  Mispronunciation S6 S7     S8 S9      S10   S11 S12    S13 S14    S15 94   Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds S16   Lack S17   Lack S18   Lack  Lack  Lack S19 S20   95 of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds APPENDIX E OBSERVATION SHEET - DAY Class: ENG01.M17 No Laugh Blushing Freezing up Distortion of nervously sound Going blank (i.e pauses) Making Not making Making Using speech unnecessary eye contact grammar fillers (i.e mistakes umm, uhh…) movements Notes (i.e fidgeting body and hands, touching hair/ objects) S21 S22       Unintelligible        Meaning distortion         Self-pressure       S23 S24    96  pronunciation L1 dominance S25  S26  S27      S28 S29    Lack   Grammar mistakes:  Pronunciation  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack  Lack     S30   S32 S32    S33 S34    97  of ending sounds /s/, /t/, /k/,… wrong tenses/tobe errors of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds S35  Lack S36   Lack S37   Lack S38   Lack  Lack  Lack S39 S40   98 of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending of ending sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds sounds ADDITIONAL CLASS OBSERVATION FIELD NOTES Teacher’s name: Ms Tran Ngoc Class: ENG01.M16 Duration: 135 minutes (7:30 A.M - 09:45 A.M.) Date: Thursday, March 11th, 2021 (Day 1) Attendees: 20 Teacher’s activities Student’s attitudes and The observer’s note behaviors - T introduced herself - Ss listened to T - Many Ss failed to know their majors in English - T asked if Ss had any questions - Some Ss raised their about her and wanted to ask hands to ask questions to know more about their - T had to translate some words students didn’t know in English teacher - T asked Ss to take turn introduce themselves as the T suggested (name, hometown, major, hobbies, career, life motto, etc) future - Ss took turn to stand up - T gave hints for SS to to introduce their names introduce themselves and majors - S1 mispronounced the - S1 was the first student to words Khanh Hoa, T be called to introduce had to correct for him himself He paused many times, himself 99 just in introduced short - Ss made a lot of basic grammar mistakes, sentences: Ah uhm I come lacked ending sounds from Khanh Hoa province… - The other students also faced similar problems, especially S2, S3, S4, S5 - T encouraged Ss to talk more Unit lead-in: T elicited a brief description of the photo and draw students’ attention to the unit title T looked at the quote with the class and checked that they understand the meanings of modest and occupy - T briefly discussed the quote as a - Most Ss looked around - Ss kept silent as they class: Can everyone explain it in and looked at their had no ideas how to simpler words? Do they agree with it? Why? / Why not? textbooks explain the quote in English - T did the warm-up to introduce new lesson - Unit 1: Travelling for work: T put students in small groups and dictated the following questions: + How often you travel? Where to? What for? What you like about travelling? + Give groups 3–5 minutes to discuss - S2 was invited to answer - S2 looked anxious, the questions, then invite brief He didn’t look straight at the teacher and gave short lacked ideas feedback from the class answers 100 - S3 answered with low - S2 didn’t conjugate voice and fillers (uh, ah) the verb in past tense T had to correct for her: “I travelled to Nha Trang last month” - T went through the words in the boxes with students and checked understanding (boat, bus, car, coach, motorcycle, plane, taxi, train) T gave them a minute to tick the items they had used, then got feedback from the class - T went through the questions with students and elicited the meanings of comfort and location - T put Ss in groups and gave them 2– - S4, S5 worked in groups - S3, S4, S5 were minutes to discuss the questions, Then each of them was anxious and had then invited a few students to share invited to answer problems with linguistic their answers with the class Then T - S4 was hesitant in her competence got students to explain what each voice and frequently criterion was and why it was looked at the textbook important for them 101 - T taught new words: “flight, gate, location, lounge, public transportation, - S5 was invited to repeat - S5 mispronounced the “vehicle” T reservation, ridesharing app, stay, new words, he read with word vehicle” asked Ss to listen and repeat, low voice, lacked ending corrected for her then invited some Ss to stand up and sounds repeat - Asked Ss to work in groups: Use adjectives to make sentences about business travel 102 APPENDIX F TEXTBOOK: BUSINESS PARTNER A2+ STUDENT BOOK: UNIT (PAGES: 7-11) 103 104 105