Warm – up activities in teaching and learning English at grade 10A5 in Cai Be high schoo

Warm – up activities in teaching and learning English at grade 10A5 in Cai Be high schoo

I would like to express my deep gratitude to Ms Le Hong Phuong Thao, MA, my supervisor, for her precious advice, insightful comments as well as her considerate assistanceand adequate supervision.

I would also acknowledge my great thankfulness to all my lecturers at Dong Thap University, Ms Nguyen Thi Thuy Hang and Mr Nguyen Anh Nhan, my trainers and my students at grade 10A5 in Cai Be high school, and also send to my boundless gratefulness to

MA Huynh Ngoc Diep, the Head of Cai Be high school, all of teachers and students at Cai

Be high school for their help, encouragement and invaluable support, without which I would have never been able to complete the study of educational reality

Finally, I must express my special gratitude to my beloved family, my closed friends and my classmates, who have given me their best regards, helpful advice as well as precious supports during my study

TABLE OF CONTENT

Page

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS i

TABLE OF CONTENT ii

Part I INTRODUCTION 1

1 Motivation for the study: 1

2 Aim of the research: 1

3 The research question: 1

4 The research method: 1

5 Significance of the research: 2

6 Scope of the research: 2

7 Organization of the study 2

Part II THE CONTENT 4

Chapter One BACKGROUND INFORMATION 4

I 1 Cai Be high school 4

I 2 Teachers staff: 4

I 3 Students: 4

I 4 Warm-up activities 6

I 4 1 Definition of warm-up activities 6

I 4 2 The value of warm-up activities 7

I 4 3 Why do we use warm-up activity? 8

Chapter Two METHODOLOGY 9

II 1 Research question 9

II 2 The researcher 9

II 3 The setting 9

II 4 The subjects 9

II.5 Data collection instrument 9

II 5 1 Questionnaires 10

II 5 2 Observation 11

II 6 Data collection procedure 11

II 6 1 Questionnaires 11

II 6 2 Observation 12

Chapter Three Result and Discussion 13

III 1 Result of interview 13

III 1 1 Students 13

III 1 2 English teachers 16

III 2 Result of observation 19

III 3 Summary 19

Chapter Four Recommendation and Conclusion 20

IV.1 Conclusions 20

IV 1 1 For English teachers 21

IV 1 2 For students 21

IV 1 3 For union local 21

IV 3 Limitations 21

REFERENCES 23

APPENDIX 1 24

APPENDIX 2 25

APPENDIX 3 26

Part I INTRODUCTION

1 Motivation for the study:

Up to now, English which is used very popular in Vietnam is an importantinternational language English is one of the important subjects at High School It has beenused for Final Examinations to evaluate students’ level of knowledge Therefore, whetherstudents are proficient at English or not is very important to them Being proficient atEnglish means student is good at both received skills - reading and listening, and productiveskills - speaking and writing These four skills are integrated in a lesson to improve all theseskills for the students, because one certain skill can be used to improve the others But it isvery hard for people to begin learning English Therefore, it is necessary to have teachingand learning English methods and techniques To make students interested is very importantfor teachers, especially English teachers How must we do that? This is the responsibility ofall of the teachers! Warm – up activities are a way in which we can take interest, but how doEnglish teachers in high schools apply these activities? There are many ways to make goodwarm – up activities at high schools This is a reason why I choose “warm – up activities inteaching and learning English at grade 10A5 in Cai Be high school” to research According

to this research, I myself will get experiences to improve skills and teaching methods

2 Aim of the research:

To make students interested in learning English at high schools

3 The research question:

What are problems in warm – up activities which teachers give for students?

4 The research method:

Interview method

Observation method

5 Significance of the research:

To make good warm – up activities

6 Scope of the research:

Warm – up activities in grade 10A5 at Cai Be high school

7 Organization of the study

Acknowledgment

Table of contents

Part I Introduction

1 Motivation for the study

2 Aim of the research

3 The research question

4 The research method

5 Significance of the research

6 Scope of the research

7 Organization of the study

Part II The content

Chapter One Background Information

I 1 Cai Be high school

I 2 Teachers staff

I 3 Students

I 4 Warm-up activities

I 4 1 Definition of warm-up activities

I 4 2 The value of warm-up activities

I 4 3 Why do we use warm-up activity?

Chapter Two Methodology

II 1 Research question

II 4 The subjects

II 5 Data collection instrument

Chapter Three Result and Discussion

III 1 Result of interview

III 1.1 Students

III 1 2 English teachers

III 2 Result of observation

III 3 Summary

Chapter Four Recommendation and Conclusion

IV 1 Conclusion

IV 2 Recommendation

IV 2 1 With English teachers

IV 2 2 With students

IV 2 3 With union local

IV 3 Limitations

References

Appendices

Part II THE CONTENT

Chapter One BACKGROUND INFORMATION

I 1 Cai Be high school

Cai Be high school was built in 1960s At present, school has 21 learning rooms, alibrary, three laboratory rooms for three subjects (physics, chemistry, and biology), threecomputer rooms (40 computers and one host computer) for teaching and learninginformation technology And there are also many rooms such as a headmasters’ room, twovice-principal’ rooms, one finance room, one teachers’ room, one health care room forschool, and etc Especially, all of learning rooms has computer to apply electronic lessonplan to teach Besides, school also has sports ground, gymnastics ground for students to playsport and learn gymnastics There are many benches and trees in a school yard wherestudents can relax and revise students’ lesson At the present, Cai Be high school also lacksloudspeakers There are only five loudspeakers, six phonographs to provide for teaching andlearning English

Cai Be high school is school at the three zones, Cai Be town, Cai Be district, TienGiang province It is one of four high schools in Cai Be district

In this school year, Cai Be high school has 14 classes in grade 10, 13 classes in grade

11 and 14 classes in grade 12 The number of students at Cai Be high school belongs to

Total students Boys Girls

Figure 1 Figures of students at Cai Be high school

In the first term, about learning capacity and conduct of student at grade 10A5 asfollow from mark-book of senior master:

Learning capacity Good Moderated good Average Weak Bad

Figure 2 Figures learning capacity of students at grade 10A5

Figure 3 Figures conduct of students at grade 10A5

In English, points of students at grade 10A5 following:

Point 8.0 – 10.0 6.5 – 7.9 5.0 – 6.4 4.0 – 4.9 < 4.0

Quantity 3 8 11 13 8

Figure 4 Figures point of students about English at grade 10A5

I 4 Warm-up activities

I 4 1 Definition of warm-up activities

When preparing your lesson, you star by planning the main items you want toinclude: the teaching of a new grammar point, or a grammar exercise, or the reading of atext But once you have prepared the main components of your lesson, and made sure it islearning-rich, varied and interesting, you may find you still need some extra ingredients tomake it into a smooth, integrated unit You may need, for example:

- A quick warm-up for the beginning to get your students into the right mood forlearning;

- An idea for a brief vocabulary review before starting a new text;

- A light filler to provide relief after a period of intense effort and concentration;

- A brief orientation activity to prepare a change of mood or topic;

- A game or amusing item to round off the lesson with a smile

Besides contributing to routine lesson planning, you may find these activities can be

of use in non-routine situations as well: when, for example, you have to fill in for anotherteacher and need some quick, easily-prepared ideas for instant use; or for supplying extracontent for an English club evening or English party; for helping a group of new students toget to know one another; or for keeping students profitably busy when you unexpectedlyhave extra time on your hands

Therefore, to begin the new lesson, we often have warm-up activity, or five-minuteactivity, or playing game What is a warm-up activity? It means an activity which isentertaining and engaging, often challenging and an activity in which the learners play andusually interact with other

I 4 2 The value of warm-up activities

Through warm-up activities, learners practice and internalize vocabulary, grammarand structures Motivation is enhanced, to, by the warm-up activity and the competition Andadded benefit is that the learners’ attention is on the message, not on the language Theyacquire language unconsciously, with their whole attention engaged by the activity in muchthe same way as they acquired their mother tongue

"Activities of a socially infectious nature, where stress is placed on cooperative,rather than the competitive, aspects of some recreation activities, can be used to attractpatients' attention and to sustain their interaction Very simple games played in a small groupmay serve to encourage participation by making the patient feel an integral and necessarypart of the activity." (O'Morrow, The Whys of Recreation Activities for Psychiatric Patients,Therapeutic Recreation Journal, 3rd quarter, 1971)

Warm-ups help your 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-upsalso encourage whole-group participation which can build a sense of community within thegroup For new groups, see the list of ice breakers further down

"Activities help them (individuals with mental & emotional illness) reestablishconstructive self-attitudes and restore self-confidence and a sense of security." (O'Morrow,The Whys of Recreation Activities for Psychiatric Patients, Therapeutic Recreation Journal,3rd quarter, 1971)

There are many advantages of using warm-up activities in the classroom:

1 Warm-up activities are a welcome break from the usual routine of the language class

2 They are motivating and challenging

3 Learning a language requires a great deal of effort Warm-up activities help students to make and sustain the effort of learning

4 Warm-up activities provide language practice in the various skills- speaking, writing, listening and reading

5 They encourage students to interact and communicate

6 They create a meaningful context for language use

I 4 3 Why do we use warm-up activity?

- Language learning is hard word

One must make an effort to understand, to repeat accurately, to adapt and to usenewly understood language in conversation and in written composition Effort is required atevery moment and must be maintained over a long period of time Warm-up activity helpsand encourages many learners to sustain their interest and work

- Experiencing language

Warm-up activity also helps the teacher to create contexts in which the language isuseful and meaningful The learners want take part, and in order to do so must understandwhat others are saying or have written, and they must speak or write in other to express theirown point of view or give information Warm-up activity provides one way of helping thelearners to experience language rather than merely study it

- Repeated use of language items

Many warm-up activities cause as much use of particular language items as moreconventional drill exercise; some warm-up activities do not What mater, however, is thequality of practice

The contribution of drill exercise lies in the concentration on a language form and itsfrequent occurrence during a limit period of time Many warm-up activities similarly providerepeated occurrence and use of a particular language form By making language conveyinformation and opinion, warm-up activities provide the key features of “drill” with theadded opportunity to sense the working of language as living communication

Warm-up activities involve the emotions, and the meaning of the language is thusmore vividly experienced It is, for this reason, probably better absorbed than learning based

on mechanical drills

- Central to learning

If it is accepted that warm-up activities provide intense and meaningful practice oflanguage, then they must be regarded as central to a language teacher’s repertoire and notmerely a way of passing the time

Chapter Two METHODOLOGY

II 1 Research question

What are problems in warm – up activities which teachers give for students?

II 2 The researcher

The study is done by Do Van Hung, a student of class English 2006A, ForeignLanguage Department, Dong Thap University

II 3 The setting

The study took place at Cai Be high school, where I practiced It was done incooperation with the teachers and the students at Cai Be high school The study was carriedout in the eighth term of my semesters The aim is to find out what difficulties the teachersencounter when planning warm – up activities

II 4 The subjects

The subjects of the study are:

Teachers in Cai Be high school

Students in Cai Be high school

Warm – up activities

II.5 Data collection instrument

A number of produces have been used for collecting information such as interviews,observations, record reviews, diaries, material analysis, etc (Nunan, 1992) In this research,two instruments: questionnaires and observation were chosen and employed The usage ofthese instruments will be discussed below

II 5 1 Questionnaires

A questionnaire is defined as “an instrument for the collecting data, usually in writtenform, consisting of open and/or closed questions and other probes requiring a response fromsubjects” (Nunan, 1992, p.231)

Questionnaires are printed form for data collection, which includes questions orstatements to which the subjects are expected to respond, often anomalously Manyresearchers state that questionnaires are commonly used to collect data on phenomena,which are not easily observed, such as attitudes, motivation and self-conceptions, in otherwords, those in social science

The present researcher’s choice of using questionnaires comes from thefollowing reasons Firstly, questionnaires save the researcher’s time They are self-administered and can be given to large groups at the same time It is easy to get theinformation from many people quickly and without the need of the researcher’s presence.Secondly, questionnaires help avoid pressure of interview bias when completing thequestionnaires Furthermore, when anonymity is assured, respondents tend to feel free towhat they answer so that the result will be objective It is because there is no face-to-faceinteraction between subjects and the interviewer Questionnaires in the form of closedquestions or statements, in which the respondent is asked to select an answer from a listprovided by the researcher, provide a great uniformity and standard of responses are easy forstatistical analysis afterwards

In order to answer the research questions, the two questionnaires were applied:

Questionnaires 1 (See Appendix 1) were given to the students to know their attitudeabout warm-up activities and their ideas about warm-up activities The questionnairesincluded 10 items

Questionnaires 2 (See Appendix 2) were given to the teachers to know the shape ofthe warm-up activities they use in high school How do they plan the warm-up activities inteaching periods? The questionnaires consisted of 10 items

II 5 2 Observation

Wajnryb (1992, p.1) said that observation is multi-faceted tool for learning Theexperience of observing comprises more than the time actually spent in the classroom It alsoincludes preparation for the period in the classroom and follow-up from the time spent there,the preparation can include the selection of a focus and the method of data collection In thisstudy, observation is to know the real situation of the warm-up activities, and compare thereality with the result of questionnaires 1 and questionnaires 2

Basic standard for teaching period (See Appendix 3)

1 To begin the new lesson, teacher must make warm-up activities

2 Teacher should often change many forms of warm-up activities

3 Teacher has to control times of teaching period, all of students in grade

4 Student is confident, active, self-motivated and self-conscious when taking part in

warm-up activities

5 Warm-up activities must be various and is used to revise old knowledge and to lead to thenew lesson

6 Warm – up activities must be suitable with ability of students

II 6 Data collection procedure

This sub-section describes the steps that were taken to carry out the results of the study

II 6 1 Questionnaires

+ For students

There were 43 questionnaires 1 delivered to grade 10A5, after giving thequestionnaires and guiding students to do in ten minutes, the questionnaires were collectedback They were done in the ninth week, from 15th March to 20th March

+ For English teachers

In the ninth week, from 15th March to 20th March, questionnaires 2 were given to sixEnglish teachers of the school at the beginning of the week, and they were collected at

II 6 2 Observation

The observation was both in the mooning and in the afternoon because the grade 10 goes to school in the afternoon and some grade 11 goes to school in the mooning During tenweeks, six observations were taken place in four different classes These are 11A8, 10A7 of teacher Nguyen Thi Thuy Hang, 10A4 of teacher Minh Bui Thanh, and 10A9 of teacher Vo Thi Dao

The first observation was on 2nd February, class 11A8, lesson Reading in unit 12: The Asian Games

The second observation was on 3rd February, class 11A8, lesson Speaking and

Listening in unit 12: The Asian Games

The third observation was on 5th February, class 10A7, lesson Writing and Language Focus in unit 12: Music

The fourth observation was on 9th March, class 11A8, lesson Writing in unit 13: Hobbies

The fifth observation was on 13th March, class 10A4, lesson Language Focus in unit 13: Films and Cinema

The sixth observation was on 25th March, class 10A9, lesson Listening in unit 14: TheWorld Cup

Chapter Three Result and Discussion

Chapter Three has mentioned the two data collection instruments in the study:questionnaire and observation Therefore, this chapter will go on with the informationcollected from the two instruments and discuss the results of the study

III 1 Result of interview

III 1 1 Students

How long have you

Although teachers use much kind of warm-up activities, those activities aren’t

various Teachers often use “lucky number game”, so it makes boring for students

How often does

your teacher begin

the new lesson by

games?

During to students, teachers sometimes use warm-up activities in the new lesson In

my opinion, teachers should often begin the new lesson by warm-up activities

Question 6: always often sometimes seldom Doesn’t change

How often does

your teacher

change games?