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This study aims at investigating how giving and checking instructions techniques were applied by the fourth year students in their microteaching. To fulfill this objective, both qualitative and quantitative methods with three research instruments including questionnaires, interviews and observations were employed. The participants of the study were 90 fourth year students at the Faculty of English Language Teaching Education, University of Languages and International Study, Vietnam National University. 7 out of 90 participants were randomly selected to be interviewed and then observed in their microteaching. The most significant finding of the study was that there was a paradox between what the student teachers reported and what they actually performed in a microlesson. Added to this, there were some problems in giving and checking instructions techniques applied by the participants in their microteaching. These problems include language use, engaging students’ concentration and checking understanding. The student teachers tended to use lengthy and polite language and they all delivered handouts before instructing students. Also, a minority of them attracted students’ attention. Moreover, instead of employing a particular technique for instructions, the trainee teachers gave a chain of instructions at a time. Finally, without checking to see whether their instructions were fully understood or not, the trainee teachers carried out the activities right away. The paper would be a good reference for those who want to learn about giving and checking instructions techniques. Besides, from the findings proposed in this research, the fourth year students in the following years can draw experience and learn a lesson for themselves to better their giving and checking skill in their microteaching and future teaching.
ABSTRACT This study aims at investigating how giving and checking instructions techniques were applied by the fourth year students in their microteaching. To fulfill this objective, both qualitative and quantitative methods with three research instruments including questionnaires, interviews and observations were employed. The participants of the study were 90 fourth year students at the Faculty of English Language Teaching Education, University of Languages and International Study, Vietnam National University. 7 out of 90 participants were randomly selected to be interviewed and then observed in their microteaching. The most significant finding of the study was that there was a paradox between what the student teachers reported and what they actually performed in a micro-lesson. Added to this, there were some problems in giving and checking instructions techniques applied by the participants in their microteaching. These problems include language use, engaging students’ concentration and checking understanding. The student teachers tended to use lengthy and polite language and they all delivered handouts before instructing students. Also, a minority of them attracted students’ attention. Moreover, instead of employing a particular technique for instructions, the trainee teachers gave a chain of instructions at a time. Finally, without checking to see whether their instructions were fully understood or not, the trainee teachers carried out the activities right away. The paper would be a good reference for those who want to learn about giving and checking instructions techniques. Besides, from the findings proposed in this research, the fourth year students in the following years can draw experience and learn a lesson for themselves to better their giving and checking skill in their microteaching and future teaching. i TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE Acknowledgements Abstract List of figures, tables and abbreviations ii iii vii CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1. Statement of the problem and rationale of the study 2. Aims and research questions of the study 3. Significance of the study 4. Scope of the study 5. An overview of the rest of the paper 1 2 2 2 3 CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW 1. Keys concepts 1.1. Microteaching 1.1.1. Definitions of microteaching 1.1.2. Microteaching cycle 1.1.3. The importance of microteaching 1.1.4. The application of microteaching at FELTE, ULIS 1.2. Classroom management 1.3. Giving and checking instructions 1.3.1. Giving and checking instructions as a part of teacher talk 1.3.2. The importance of instructions 4 4 6 8 9 9 11 11 12 12 13 ii 1.3.3. Types of classroom instructions 1.3.4. Effective giving and checking instructions 1.3.5. Techniques for giving and checking instructions 2. Related studies 2.1. Related studies on mircoteaching 2.2. Related studies on giving and checking instructions 13 17 18 18 19 CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY 1. Participants 2. Data collection instruments 2.1. Questionnaires 2.2. Interview 2.3. Observation 3. Data collection procedure 4. Data analysis methods and procedures 21 22 22 23 24 25 26 CHAPTER IV: RESULTS AND FINDINGS 4.1. Research question 1 4.2. Research question 2 4.3. Research question 3 27 36 40 CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION 1. Major findings of the study 2. Pedagogical implications 3. Limitations of the study 4. Suggestions for further studies 45 46 47 48 iii APPENDICES Appendix A: Questionnaires Appendix B: Guided questions for interview Appendix C: Observation scheme Appendix D: Interview transcript 49 54 56 57 REFERENCES 60 LIST OF TABLES, FIGURES AND ABBREVIATIONS iv LIST OF TABLES PAGES Table 1 Syntactic forms of directives 24 Table 2 Questionnaire content 32 Table 3 Reasons for giving clear instructions in order of importance 40 Table 4 Factors influencing the effectiveness of instructions 42 Table 5 How the fourth year students apply giving and checking instructions techniques 48 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 Diagrammatic Representation of a Micro-teaching Cycle 16 Figure 2 4 th year students’ perception of the importance of giving and checking instructions in a microteaching lesson 39 Figure 3 Difficulty level of giving and checking instructions 41 Figure 4 The most effective technique for giving and checking instructions 43 Figure 5 Language of giving instructions 45 Figure 6 Pre-plan the instructions before teaching 47 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS v VNU Vietnam National University ULIS University of Languages and International Studies FELTE Faculty of English Language Teaching Education ELT English Language Teching L1 First language (Mother tongue) vi CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1. Statement of the problem and rationale for the research In a study involving 60,000 students, Wright, Horn, and Sanders (1997 as cited in Marzano, 2003) found out that the teacher is probably the single most important factor affecting student achievement. Apparently, in order to improve education, bettering the effectiveness of teachers is very much in need. A good teacher should not only have sound knowledge in his/her major but also own some particular teaching skills, one of which is classroom management. In the Faculty of English Language Teaching Education (FELTE), microteaching is a significant activity applied for 4 th year students, which is supposed as the necessary preparation for their practicum. In this activity, students have an opportunity to sharpen and develop specific teaching skills as well as to be trained some vital skills of classroom management. However, having spent hours observing many 4 th year students’ micro teaching, I have identified several problems related to classroom management, one of which is giving and checking instruction techniques. Hence, I have decided to investigate this problem in a research paper titled “The exploitation of giving and checking instruction techniques applied by 4 th year students in their microteaching at FELTE, ULIS, VNU”. 1 2. Aims and objectives of the study The overall aim of this study was to explore how the fourth year students (the student-teachers) exploited giving and checking instructions techniques in their microteaching sessions. To achieve this aim, firstly, the research is expected to find out how the fourth year students perceive giving and checking instructions skill. Secondly, the student teachers’ real application of giving and checking instructions techniques in their microteaching was also investigated. Finally, the researcher hoped to find out the problems the student teachers might have when giving and checking instructions in their micro-lessons. In brief, the study would seek to answer the following questions: (1) What are the fourth year students’ perceptions of giving and checking instructions skills? (2) How do they apply giving and checking instructions techniques in their microteaching? (3) What are some problems these students may have when giving and checking instructions? 3. Significance of the study If the mentioned objectives could be achieved, the study would hopefully provide a closer look at the 4 th year students’ implementation of giving and checking instructions in their microteaching. Once finished, the paper would be a good reference for those who want to learn about giving and checking instructions techniques. From the findings proposed in this research, the fourth year students in the following years can draw experience and learn a lesson for themselves to better giving and checking skill in their microteaching. 4. Scope of the study The scope of the research has been made quite clear in the research title. The researcher wanted to investigate the giving and checking instruction skill of the fourth year students at FELTE, ULIS in their microteaching. The reason was that the 2 researcher was one of these student teachers and it was easier for her to access prospective participants. Besides, giving and checking instructions skill was one of the teaching skills assessed by their university lecturer. 5. An overview of the rest of the paper In order for the readers to follow this paper more easily, the rest of the paper has been divided into four chapters as presented below: • Chapter Two – Literature Review: This chapter provides basic theoretical background to the research problem, helping the readers to better orientate themselves to the contents of the study. • Chapter Three – Methodology: This chapter is responsible for the description of the sampling, participants, instruments used for data collection, and procedure in which the data were collected and analysed. • Chapter Four – Results and Findings: This chapter is devoted to the presentation of the findings of the research with reference to previous studies and relevant theoretical background. • Chapter Five – Conclusion: This chapter summarises the findings of the study, states the limitations and gives some suggestions for further research. In short, this first chapter has justified the reasons for conducting this research paper and simultaneously stated the three research questions as an initial guide for the rest of the paper. Afterwards, the significance, the scope and the organisation of the paper are also provided. 3 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter embraces two main parts. In the very first part, some key concepts related to the research topic are elaborated with the aim of providing a theoretical basis for the study. The key concepts cover: 1) microteaching, 2) classroom management, and 3) giving and checking instructions. In the next section, the researcher provides a brief overview of some related studies. 1. Key concepts 1.1. Microteaching 1.1.1 Definitions of microteaching The history of microteaching goes back to the early and mid 1960's, when Dwight Allen and his colleagues from the Stanford University developed a training program aimed to improve verbal and nonverbal aspects of teachers’ speech and general performance. The Stanford model consisted of a three-step (teach, review and reflect, re-teach) approach by using actual students as an authentic audience. The model was first applied to teaching science, and later on it was introduced to language teaching (Maheshwari, 2011). In the next years, microteaching was seen as a professional development tool applied in education. Therefore, many educationalists have provided a great deal of approaches to microteaching. In 1964, a critical study of microteaching techniques was conducted by Olivero with a view to suggesting improvement in its implementation in colleges of education. The objective of the investigation was to study the opinions of training-college teachers about microteaching in the light of their experience while guiding and observing lessons. The sample consisted of training college teachers teaching different subject methodologies and 20 experienced and effective teachers. 4 [...]... microteaching also leads trainee teachers to focus attention on teacher behaviors, the methods of criticising students’ performance and analysing pupil learning (Sharma & Singh, 20 04) In general, microteaching makes the teacher education program more purposeful, goal oriented and helps to decide common objectives for the program It 8 provides individualized training with more realistic evidence to students,... step, the trainee teacher can receive feedback from the supervisor and peers about his/her performance for some specific improvement The evaluation tool (videotape, etc) gives a rare opportunity for the micro-teacher to view his/her performance objectively This is one of the strong points of the microteaching technique (5) Re-planning session The trainee teacher re-plans his/her lesson incorporating the... number of pupils in a short duration of time According to him, the most important point in microteaching is that the trainee teachers have an opportunity to practice teaching skills in a definable, observable, measurable and controllable environment In the book “Training foreign language teachers: A reflective approach”, Wallace (1991) assumed that microteaching indicates a training context in which a... Critique Session (Fourth step) Figure 1: Diagrammatic Representation of a Micro-teaching Cycle 6 (1) Modeling the Skill: Orienting the trainees in teaching skills is very essential This may be done by stating the psychological base and rationale of the skill and then demonstrate it This step enables trainee teachers to focus their attention on the skill to be practiced (2) Planning a Micro-lesson: This... group should not be formed during or before giving instructions which may distract the students’ concentration 1.3 .4. 4 Breaking the instructions down 15 In order to prevent students from forgetting the first point in the teacher’s instructions by the time the final steps are explained, the teacher should divide instructions into manageable steps (Hughes, 20 04) Because learners have only a short attention... 1991), instructions should be given in segments rather than given all at once Also, the teacher should check if the students understand the instructions (Gower et al., 1995) 1.3 .4. 5 Demonstrating Demonstrating rather than explaining is one of the best ways to have effective instructions suggested by many scholars Lewis and Hill (1985) indicated that demonstration helps “reduce the amount of unnecessary... with each other Specifically, the use of fellow trainees as mock students brought a safe teaching environment which was evaluated as an advantage of helping the teacher trainees feel more confident to perform the lessons However, from the opposite viewpoint, this could be a big disadvantage as it was not challenging enough for the teacher trainees to practice their teaching techniques In addition, the... encountered by pre-service teachers in their practicum Being carried out in 2011 by Dinh Thi Ha Phuong, “Giving and checking instructions skills among 4th year students during their practicum” aims at exploring teacher trainees’ perception of effective instructions and the level of effectiveness with 19 respect to time, speech modification and techniques In this research, although the trainee teachers perceived... between the interviewer and the interviewees, all of the interviews were conducted in Vietnamese so that the interviewees could feel more relaxed and be ready to give their opinions In addition, semi- structured interviews were employed because they would not only create a friendly atmosphere during the interview but also helped the interviewer receive unlimited ideas from their interviewees’ answers... in this chapter: the first part embraces 4th year students’ general understanding about giving and checking instructions The latter part exhibits how 4th year students applied giving and checking instructions skill and their self-assessment on this skill in their micro-lesson The last one reveals some problems of 4th year students in giving and checking instructions 4. 1 Research question 1: What are . 20 04) . In general, microteaching makes the teacher education program more purposeful, goal oriented and helps to decide common objectives for the program. It 8 provides individualized training. Questionnaires Appendix B: Guided questions for interview Appendix C: Observation scheme Appendix D: Interview transcript 49 54 56 57 REFERENCES 60 LIST OF TABLES, FIGURES AND ABBREVIATIONS iv LIST OF TABLES PAGES Table. skills as well as to be trained some vital skills of classroom management. However, having spent hours observing many 4 th year students’ micro teaching, I have identified several problems related