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4 TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION i ABSTRACT ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv LIST OF CHARTS vi PART ONE: INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale of the study Aims and objectives of the study Scope of the study Methodology of the study Research hypothesis Design of the study PART TWO: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Teaching speaking 1.1.1 Concepts of speaking 1.1.2 The role of speaking in foreign language teaching 1.1.3 Factors affecting English speaking ability 1.2 Information gap activities 1.2.1 Concept of information gap activities 1.2.1.1 Concept of information gap 1.2.1.2 Concept of information gap activities 1.2.2 Benefits of information gap activities 1.2.3 Teachers’ roles in information gap activities 1.2.4 Forms of information gap activities 10 1.2.5 Some popular information gap activities 11 CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY 2.1 An action research 13 2 Research questions 13 2.3 The informants 13 The action research procedure 14 5 Description of Data Collection Instruments 16 2.5.1 Questionnaires 16 2.5.2 Observations 17 2.5.3 Tests 17 CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSIONS 18 3.1 Data collected from preliminary investigation stage – Questionnaire 18 3.1.1 Students’ attitude towards speaking skill 18 3.1.2 Factors causing students’ low motivation in speaking English 20 3.2 Intervention 21 3.2.1 The aims of the intervention 21 3.2.2 The intervention of information gap activities 21 3.3 Data collected from the intervention stage 26 3.3.1 Data collected from Observation sheets 26 3.3.2 Data collected from Questionnaire 27 3.3.2 Data collected from the tests 29 3.3.2 Data from pre-test 29 3.3.2 Data from post-test 30 PART THREE: CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION 33 Summary of the study 33 Suggestions for the teachers 33 Limitations and suggestions for further research 35 REFERENCES 36 APPENDICES APPENDIX 1: Questionnaire I APPENDIX 2: Questionnaire III APPENDIX 3: Observation sheet – Overall class motivation IV APPENDIX 4: Data on overall class motivation V APPENDIX 5: Samples of the tests VI PART I INTRODUCTION Rationale of the study It is undeniable that English has been an essential means of communication and more and more Vietnamese students are aware of the importance of English to their study and their future The ability to communicate in English clearly and efficiently contributes to the success of the learners at school and success later in every phase of life Speaking plays an important role because without it, communication cannot take place directly between people However, speaking is generally considered the most difficult to learn among the four skills in English language learning In order to teach the students English speaking so that they become more interested in and maintain their interest in speaking learning The English teachers should provide a rich environment where meaningful communication can take place Communication occurs when there is lack of information between or among a group of people They have to exchange to share the information they have with other people The efficient activities to motivate students in speaking lessons are Information Gap Activities This kind of activity makes students more active in learning process and at the same time makes their learning more meaningful and interesting At Phuong Dong University, non-English major students have to learn English as a compulsory subject At the end of the term, students will be examined on four skills including listening, speaking, reading and writing Speaking is considered as an important skill which accounts for 25% of the total mark in the final test In the final test, students work in pairs to make a conversation about a given situation and then discuss a given topic Most of the students not know how to make a conversation; they are very passive in making a conversation One of the reasons for this situation is that they lack practice in using English in real communication situations These students come from different provinces with different language levels When they were at high school, they got used to Translation Grammar teaching method in which the teachers focused on the rules of grammar structures and practiced the drills to remember those structures They did not have chances to practice speaking skills When entering university, students have awareness of the roles of English to their future They themselves have changed the ways to learn English However, the teachers must find out suitable techniques which create a need for students to use the structures they have learnt to communicate with each other to make a meaningful conversation In my opinion, one effective solution to this problem is using Information Gap Activities to encourage students to use English for communicating The benefits of this technique to my students have aroused my interest and encouraged me to carry out this research “Using Information Gap Activities to motivate students in speaking lesson for the first-year non-English major students at Phuong Dong University” Hopefully, this study will make a small contribution to the implementation of Information Gap Activities in improving speaking skills for students at Phuong Dong University Aim and objective of the study Within a framework of a minor thesis, the study is aimed at using information gap activities to motivate students in speaking lessons for the first-year non-English major students at Phuong Dong University In order to study the subject matter deeply, the writer focuses on: - Describing the importance of Information Gap Activities to motivate students to speak English - Using Information gap Activities to motivate students in speaking lessons - Providing suggestions for English teachers to prepare English speaking lessons at Phuong Dong University Scope of the study Due to the limit of the thesis, the study cannot cover all the speaking activities, but focus on information gap activities to motivate students in speaking lessons The study was conducted on the first-year non-English major students at Phuong Dong University Methodology of the study The method employed in this study is an action research, with the uses of three instruments: observations, questions and pre-tests and post-tests All comments, remarks, recommendations and conclusion are based on the data analysis The combination of different instruments used in this research would help to gain reliable data and a close investigation into the problems that the students were having Research hypothesis Students lack practice in speaking English in real communicating situations is one of the main reasons for the students’ inability to make a meaningful conversation One solution is using information gap activities to motivate students The questions to be dealt with are: What are the causes of the students’ low motivation in English speaking activities? What is the importance of using information gap activities in motivating students in speaking lessons? What suggestions are given for teachers to apply information gap activities at Phuong Dong University? Design of the study The study is intended to consist of three parts as follows: Part I is the introduction which give reasons for choosing the thesis, aims and objects and scope of the study as well as the methodology and research hypothesis of the study Part II is the development which will be divided into three chapters: - Chapter I: LITERATURE REVIEW provides concepts of teaching speaking and the concepts of information gap activities - Chapter II: METHODOLOGY provides the readers with the definitions of the action research, the data collection instruments Detailed information about the research procedure and the participants of the study is also presented - Chapter III: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSIONS analyzes the data collected from the preliminary investigation stage to form the hypothesis of the study An intervention plan is worked out and implemented The data from the intervention stage are collected and analyzed to make an evaluation of the effectiveness of the intervention Part III is the Conclusion which reviews the study, presents the suggestions for the teacher, the limitations of the study and suggestions for further study PART II: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Teaching speaking For many years, teaching speaking has been undervalued and English teacher have continue to teach speaking just as a repetition of drills or memorization of dialogues However, today’s world requires that 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 1.1.1 Concepts of speaking In this section, I will consider what we mean by “speaking” In language teaching, we often talk about four language skills (speaking, listening, reading and writing Speaking can be regarded as the productive, oral skill Speaking consists of producing systematic verbal utterances to convey meaning According to Florez (1999, p.1), speaking is “an interactive process of constructing meaning that involves producing and receiving and processing information” It is often spontaneous, open-ended, and evolving” In order to speak accurately and fluently, students need to improve some areas of knowledge As for Burnkart (1998), students need to recognize that speaking involves three areas of knowledge including mechanics (pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary), functions (transaction and interaction) and social and cultural rules and norms However there areas are quite difficult for beginning learners, and they should be taught gradually Speaking is making use words in an ordinary voice, uttering words, knowing and being able to use language; expressing in words and making speech Therefore, we can infer that speaking is the ability to make use of words or a language to express oneself in an ordinary voice In short, the speaking skill is the ability to perform the linguistics knowledge in actual communication 1.1.2 The role of speaking in foreign language teaching It is known that language has been divided into different skill areas based on the purpose of analysis and instruction In view of language teaching there are mainly four macro-skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing It has been accepted for many years 10 that communication is the proper aim for language teaching That means we learn a language so as to communicate well in that language For that reason, speaking skill plays an important role in foreign language teaching because effective speaking ability helps learners not only to acquire the language better but also to communicate successfully Speaking skill should be taught and practiced in the language classroom The language course truly enables the students to communicate with others in English, so teachers and students should pay more attention to speaking skill However, many English teachers still spend a lot of time on listening, reading and writing and not focus on speaking Therefore, there should be a good balance to practice among four skills in classroom According to Ur (1996:120), speaking seems intuitively the most important of all four skills Speaking is regarded as the first step to confirm who knows or does not know a language Ur (1996) indicates that people who know a language are referred to as “speakers” of that language, as if speaking included all other kinds of knowing; and many if not most foreign language learners are primarily interested in learning to speak Hence, having dealt with the importance of oral skills in language teaching and learning it is essential that language teachers should pay adequate attention to teaching speaking skill The development of communicative skills can take place only if learners have motivation and opportunity to express their own identity and to relate to the people around them That requires the kind of learning atmosphere which gives them a sense of security and value as individuals In turn, this atmosphere depends, to a large extent, on the existence of interpersonal relationships which not create inhibitions, but are supportive and accepting In order to improve students’ speaking ability, for teachers, they should play a positive role in helping students get involved in speaking activities in the classroom Rather than leading students to pure memorization, the teacher can provide a richlanguage environment where students have real communication, authentic materials and meaningful tasks that promote oral language Gradually, students will know how to use their target language correctly and communicatively in everyday conversations 11 1.1.3 Factors affecting English speaking abilities There are many factors that influence the success or failure in learning English speaking However, the two most important factors are motivation, attitude (Gardner and Lambert: 1972) Motivation is seen as “a key consideration in determining the preparedness of learners to communicate, (Gardner, 1985: 10) while Harmer (2001) defines motivation simply as “some kind of internal drive which pushes someone to things in order to achieve something” According to Carol (1962), motivation decides the amount of time a learner will spend on the task of language learning She claims: “The more motivation a learner has, the more time he or she will spend on learning an aspect of a second language” (Carol, 1962) Motivation not only plays an important role in learning, it helps the teacher as well Lite (2002) confirms that “Motivation is the backbone of any classroom When the students are motivated, the teacher can perform his/her job the best.” Teachers are often familiar with two basic types of motivation: extrinsic motivation and intrinsic motivation Harmer (2001) states that extrinsic motivation is caused by such outside factors as the need to pass an exam, the hope of possibility for future travel, etc In contrast, intrinsic motivation is caused by inside factors like the enjoyment of the learning process itself or by a desire to make them feel better It can be concluded that motivation is significant in foreign language learning because when learners set the goal of learning a foreign language, motivation helps them produce effort and have a positive attitude to obtain the goal Therefore, in order to be successful, language learners really need motivation to continue their learning Attitude is the second factor which has an influence on the language learning Gardner and Lambert (1972) defined attitude as the persistence that a learner has to follow an object Language learning attitude has a relationship to motivation Language learners who have extrinsic or intrinsic motivation will have the more positive attitude than those without motivation or who consider language learning a compulsory subject 1.2Information gap activities Teachers are often searching for activities to make their classroom more interactive; language teachers in particular are also looking for activities that they create a need for learners to use the target language Whatever activity the students are involved in, if it is communicative and if it is really promoting language use, the students should have a 12 desire to communicate Information Gap activities are such excellent activities because they are designed so that students have a reason or a purpose for speaking When students have a purpose of speaking, they can center on the content of what is being said, not the language forms that is being used So it can be inferred that these activities make the language classroom experience more meaningful and authentic 1.2.1 Concept of information gap activities 1.2.1.1 Concept of information gap Information gap refers to a situation in communication between two or more people where information is known by only one of those According to Johnson (1979) and Morrow (1981) the major purpose of communication is to bridge an information gap If the speaker and hearer are both in possession of the same information prior to beginning their communication, communication cannot take place Therefore, a communicative methodology will need to create situations in which students share information not previously known by all participants in the communication In Communicative Language Teaching in order to promote real communication between students, there must be an information gap between them and between them and their teacher Without such a gap, the classroom activities will be mechanical and artificial Information gap can take place in three ways: One student has some information and the other student has to find it out, one student has information and tells it to the other student or both students have different information and they tell each other 1.2.1.2Concepts of information gap activities According to Harmer (2002:88) one type of speaking activity is called “information gap”-where two speakers have different parts of information making up a whole Because they have different information, there is a “gap” between them The information gap activity is a kind of structured output activities These are like completing a task, for example obtaining missing information, conveying telephone message and expressing an opinion It sets up practicing on specific items of language Structured output activities lead the students to practice specific features of language and brief sentence, not in extended discourse It can form an effective bridge between instructor modeling and communicative output because they are partly authentic and partly artificial By Information gap activities, the teacher is able to improve the students’ 13 speaking ability because it is an interesting technique to apply in classroom The students become comfortable to say everything The teacher only gives simple explanation about the activity and reviews the vocabulary needed for the activity The students get opportunity to develop their communication competence more freely At the start of an information-gap activity, each pair of students is provided with similar but different information, usually on handouts labeled A and B They exchange information by using relevant language not by looking at each other’s handouts so that by the end of the interexchange they are both in possession of the total amount of information 1.2.2 Benefits of information gap activities There are a lot of benefits to using information gap activities Firstly, information gap activities create students opportunities to speak in target language for an extended period of time The students should transfer the information so that they get the complete information The activities create plenty communication among students Information gap activities allow each student to use the time effectively They not need to sit on their chairs and wait until one-to-one or group-to-group presentation is finished Moreover, the classroom activities are fairly distributed, every student has chance to speak Classroom will not be dominated by talkative students Secondly, these activities force students to communicate in “real” English The material prepared to use in these activities can be motivating and fun for many students Thirdly, Information Gap activities are useful because they are very meaningful An information gap activity focuses on two aspects: attention to information and the necessity of communicative interaction to reach the objective In other words, as Scrivener (1994,p.62) further explains, the aim of an information gap activity is to “get learner to use the language they are learning to interact in realistic and meaningful ways, usually involving exchanges of information” In so doing they will draw available vocabulary, grammar and communication strategies to complete the task All students are involved in the process equally and they are all moving towards a specific purpose Each student has the task of finding out certain information, and therefore must find a way in which to ask for this information Last but not least, Motivation is usually quite high in these activities The content of information gap can be various based on the students’ level and curiosity These activities help the students move from working in a more structured environment into a ... phases: exploring, identifying, planning, collecting data, analyzing/reflecting, hypothesizing, intervening, observing, reporting, writing and presenting In this study, Nunan’s action research model... doing with their language, taking the risks of experimenting what they have learnt Moreover, the lessons can become more practical and interesting to them 18 CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY 2.1 An action research... Action planning: considering alternative courses of action, (3) Taking action: selecting a course of action, (4) Evaluating: studying the consequences of an action, and (5) Specifying learning: identifying