A SURVEY ON STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS LEARNING SPEAKING SKILLS AT UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES, VNU

LIST OF FIGURES Figure 3.1: Students' general attitudes towards liking or disliking learning English Figure 3.2: Students' general attitudes towards four English skills Figure 3.3: Stu

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Hanoi, 2014

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Supervisor: NGUYỄN ĐỨC HOẠT, PhD

Hanoi, 2014

DECLARATION

I, Tran Minh Son, hereby declare that the thesis entitled: “A survey on students’

attitudes towards learning speaking skills at University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU” is the result of my own research in the fulfillment of the

requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Moreover, this thesis has not been submitted anywhere for any degree

Hanoi, 2014 Author’s signature

Trần Minh Sơn

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my affectionate and deeply-felt gratitude to my

supervisor, NGUYEN DUC HOAT, PhD for his invaluable assistance, inspiration

as well as guidance during the time I tried to accomplish this thesis

I owe my sincere thanks to all the lecturers in Postgraduate Department of University of Languages and International Studies for their precious lectures and ideas

Moreover, I would like to send my thanks to the lecturers and students at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU for their enthusiastic co-operation in this study

Finally, I am also deeply indebted to my family who has supported me vigorously Their great love and encouragement have assisted me in completing this thesis more successfully

ABSTRACT

Speaking is considered one of the most challenging skills which the EFL students at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU are facing Their ability to speak English is generally limited Therefore, the study is conducted with the aim of exploring the students’ attitudes towards learning speaking skills Because the study is a survey, questionnaire and semi-structured interviews are applied as main instruments of the study The participants in the questionnaire consist of 150 first-year non-English major students (both males and females) from six classes, and thirty students in the interviews (12 males and 18 females) selected randomly from the 150 questionnaire respondents The findings from these two instruments have demonstrated that the students of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU have a positive attitude towards learning speaking skills Most of them are aware of the importance of English speaking skills and feel comfortable to learn them However, their teacher’s fast speed of speaking is considered as the least positive factor involved in the students’ attitudes towards learning speaking skills In addition, based on such findings, the researcher has offered suggestions for both lecturers and students to improve the lecturers’ teaching speaking skills and the students’ ability to speak English

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION………

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS………

ABSTRACT………

TABLE OF CONTENTS………

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS………

LIST OF FIGURES………

PART A: INTRODUCTION………

1 Rationale ………

2 Aims of the study ………

3 The research questions………

4 Significance of the study ………

5 Scope of the study ………

6 Methods of the study ………

7 Structure of the study ………

PART B: THE STUDY………

Chapter one: LITERATURE REVIEW………

1.1 Speaking skills and attitudes ………

1.1.1 Speaking skills ………

1.1.2 Attitudes………

1.2 The elements of speaking ………

1.3 The communicative approach in teaching English speaking skills… 1.4 The roles of attitude in language learning ………

1.5 The roles of attitude in learning speaking skills………

1.6 Previous research………

1.7 Summary ………

Chapter two: METHODOLOGY………

2.1 Research questions………

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2.2 The setting………

2.3 The participants………

2.4 The data collection instruments………

2.5 The data collection procedure………

2.6 The data analysis procedure………

2.7 Summary………

Chapter three: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION………

3.1 What are the students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills at USSH, VNU?

3.2 What are the factors influencing the students’ attitudes?

3.3 What are the suggestions for the lectures and the students? ………

3.4 Summary ………

PART C: CONCLUSION………

1 Conclusions………

2 Suggestions for lecturers and students………

2.1 Suggestions for lecturers………

2.2 Suggestions for students………

3 Limitations of the study ………

4 Suggestions for further studies ………

REFERENCES………

APPENDIX 1: Questionnaire (Vietnamese version)………

APPENDIX 2: Questionnaire (English version)………

APPENDIX 3: Transcription For Interview………

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

1 USSH,VNU = University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU

2 CLT = Communicative Language Teaching

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 3.1: Students' general attitudes towards liking or disliking

learning English

Figure 3.2: Students' general attitudes towards four English skills

Figure 3.3: Students' attitudes towards the importance of learning

English speaking skills

Figure 3.4: Students' purposes of learning English speaking skills

Figure 3.5: Students' attitudes towards English speaking lessons

Figure 3.6: Students' frequency of the unwillingness to speak English in

speaking lessons

Figure 3.7: Students' activities in speaking lessons

Figure 3.8: Students’ attitudes towards teachers’ teaching methods of

Figure 3.11: Students' comprehension when the teacher explains the

instruction in English in speaking lessons

Figure 3.12: Students’ expectations of learning speaking skills

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale

In learning English, EFL students at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU regard speaking skills as the most challenging skill to learn They are not ready to stand up to practice English, even work in groups at English speaking lessons Although the researcher is not a lecturer of USSH, VNU, he used

to work as a visiting lecturer of USSH, VNU Therefore, he had an opportunity to know thoroughly about the real situation involved in the university’s English teaching and learning As for most of the students at USSH, VNU, English is not an exam subject in their matriculation exam; therefore, they do not usually pay much attention to it Moreover, their majors are not English, and they have a tendency to

be more interested in their own majors such as History, Orientalism, and Philosophy In English speaking lessons, they do not feel highly enthusiastic about speaking English They possess low proficiency in grammar, vocabulary as well as listening skills, leading to the fact that they are usually unconfident of speaking English and feels difficult to share their thoughts in English In the researcher’s view, it is better for this problem to be enhanced in order to assist students in making progress in learning English speaking skills

For the reasons mentioned above, exploring the students’ attitudes towards learning speaking skills is really essential By investigating the students’ attitudes and the factors impacting on those attitudes, the researcher may discover much more this university’s students’ expectations, from which he can offer suggestions for ways of improving students’ ability to speak English at USSH, VNU

2 Aims of the study

The aims of the study are:

- To investigate EFL students’ attitudes towards learning speaking skills at USSH, VNU

- To find out factors influencing their attitudes in learning to speak English

- To offer suggestions in order for not only USSH,VNU’s lecturers of English to develop their students’ ability to speak English at USSH,VNU but also the students

to improve their attitudes towards learning speaking skills

3 The research questions

The study is conducted in an effort to answer the following research questions:

Question 1: What are the students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking

skills at USSH, VNU?

Question 2: What are the factors influencing the students’ attitudes?

4 Significance of the study

The study provides lecturers of English at the University of Social Sciences and

Humanities –VNU with the findings involved in their students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills The study will assist the lecturers in grasping their students’ expectations of learning to speak English

Furthermore, the research supplies lecturers of English at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities –VNU with suggestions to help them to enhance their students’ speaking ability

5 Scope of the study

The study concentrates on students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities –VNU; however, due to the time limitation, the researcher will only carry out his survey on the first-year non-English major students

6 Methods of the study

To conduct the survey research, the researcher used both qualitative and

quantitative methods Two main data collection instruments are survey questionnaire and interview The survey questionnaire was delivered to students to

collect the data related to the study This was also the main method used in the study Then, the interviews with some students took place to attain more information The form of interview used in the study was the semi-structured interview since it would make the researcher more flexible and give the participants

a degree of control during the interview

The detailed information on methods of the study will be presented in chapter two: Methodology

7 Structure of the study

The study consists of three parts

Part A: INTRODUCTION

This part includes rationale, aims, the research questions, significance, scope,

methods and design of the study

Part B: THE STUDY

This part is composed of three chapters, as follows:

 Chapter 1: Literature review

The chapter presents the previous findings relevant to the study such as the defintions of attitudes and speaking skills, the elements of speaking, the communicative approach in teaching English speaking skills, the roles of attitudes in language learning and speaking skills

 Chapter 2: Methodology

The chapter is involved in the introduction of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities-VNU – the research place, the information of the participants, the data collection instruments consisting of the reasons for choosing the questionnaire and interview and the categories of the twelve questions in the questionnaire Moreover, the data collection procedures and methods of data analysis are also stated carefully

 Chapter 3: Findings and Discussion

After collecting the results from the students of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities-VNU, all the answers to the questions from the questionnaire and interview are analyzed and discussed logically and in depth in this chapter The figures will be presented through tables and graphs

Part C: CONCLUSION

This is the last part of the study, which is expected to summarize the main points

of the study, including the summary of findings Besides, the suggestions are also addressed to help not only teachers to adapt their teaching methodology to enhance their students’ speaking ability but also students to improve their attitudes towards learning speaking skills as well as their English speaking skills

PART B: THE STUDY Chapter one: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Speaking skills and attitudes

1.1.1 Speaking skills

In language teaching and learning, the manner in which a language is used is called skills or language skills, and speaking is one of the four skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing skills (Richards et all, 1992: 205) In teaching and learning a foreign language in general and English in particular, speaking is one of the most essential skills because it is said to be the basic for communication; moreover, speaking skills can be considered a real challenge to learners of English Thornbury (2005) states that there is no synonymy between knowing a language

and being able to speak it Therefore, the statement “He knows English” does not entail the statement “He can speak English” From the researcher’s perspective,

speaking skills should be attached special importance to However, it is essential to consider the typical definitions of speaking skills by many different scholars

According to the traditional view, speaking was a by-product of teaching vocabulary and grammar and was strengthened with tasks on pronunciation However, the modern view considers speaking as a real skill, and the speaking skills can be divided into sub-skills and the purposes of speaking (Thornbury, 2006)

Moreover, when it comes down to speaking skills, Nunan (2003:48) is of the opinion that speaking is the productive oral skill, which is generated by the learner

of a language in speech Speaking is composed of using verbal systematic utterances to express meaning Bailey (2005) also states that speaking is a verbal and productive skill and consists of systematically-produced oral utterances Nonetheless, Burns and Joyce (1997) as well as Brown (1994) have a different view that speaking can be understood as an interactive process of meaning construction that is associated with producing, receiving and processing information

Another term for “speaking” is spoken communication or oral communication It

is more immediate and natural, so speaking is in need of the parties’ simultaneous presence and attentiveness (Rai, 2010)

Thus, it is reasonable to state that speaking is a verbal skill and a process of oral communication A speaker begins to produce oral utterances, which are received by

a hearer, and then are processed so that the hearer can understand what the speaker

is saying

1.1.2 Attitudes

The definition of attitude can be understood as an individual’s judgement towards something, and in general people’s attitudes can be positive or negative in spite of the fact that they can potentially have ambivalent attitudes (both positive and negative attitudes) or claim that they have no attitudes (Baker and Ellece, 2011)

Attitude is composed of three components The first one is the affective component which is involved in our evaluation of and feelings about the object The second one is the cognitive component which is related to our beliefs about the object, and the last one is the behavioral component, which reflects the intentions of

an individual (Fazio, 1986)

Kumaravadivelu (2006) defines attitudes as “one’s evaluative responses to a

person, place, thing or an event” He adds that attitude is complicatedly connected

with the processes and practices of language learning Moreover, Malcolm (cited in Kumaravadivelu, 2006:39) suggests two external forces shaping the learner’s language learning attitudes, namely the environmental force and the pedagogic force The environmental one consist of social, cultural and economic imperatives, and the pedagogic one consisting of the interaction between teachers, students and the learning situation to result in positive and negative attitudes

Thornbury (2006) also presents that an individual’s attitude towards learning a

language is the way he or she feels about, and the individual’s attitude towards

language learning can be positive or negative

To sum up, attitude is to talk about a person’s opinions, feelings and beliefs In

other words, it mentions the way which he or she thinks about, feels about and

behaves towards somebody or something Furthermore, two components of attitude

focused upon in the study are the cognitive component and the affective component

1.2 The elements of speaking

Rai (2010) mentions the voice dynamics, intonation, speech, stress, volume and

accent, which are considered as momentous elements in spoken language

Sufficiently, Harmer (2001) suggests many elements of speaking which belong

to two aspects, namely language features and mental/social processing, when

mentioning the fluency in speaking

Language features consist of connected speech – expressing fluent connected

speech including elision, assimilation, contractions, stress patterning, and linking

“r”; expressive devices to convey meanings such as the pitch, stress, volume, speed,

physical and non-verbal means; lexis and grammar – using a number of common

lexical phrases for different functions, for example agreeing or disagreeing,

expressing approval, surprise, shock and so on; negotiation language used to find

out clarification and to show the structure of our utterance Bygate (1987) also

mentions the term involved in the negotiation, namely “negotiation of meaning”

referring to the skill of communicating ideas obviously

The mental/social processing is involved in the rapid processing skills that are

very necessary Harmer (2001) also presents three elements, namely language

processing, interacting with others and on-the-spot information processing The

language processing is related to “the retrieval of words and phrases from memory

and their assembly into syntactically and propositionally appropriate sequences”

(p.271) The interaction with other people includes listening, an understanding of

other people’s feelings The on-the-spot information processing means that a speaker can process the information another speaker tells him or her as soon as he

or she receives it

To sum up, there are many elements of speaking in the language features and the mental/social processing A speaker should have knowledge of language features, together with the ability to process information and language immediately Language features are composed of four elements necessary for spoken production, namely connected speech, expressive devices, lexis and grammar and negotiation language When the speaker has these language features, the mental/social processing will assist him or her in achieving successful communication goal Processing skills consist of three elements such as language processing, interacting with others and on-the-spot information processing

1.3 The communicative approach in teaching English speaking skills

The communicative approach is also called communicative language teaching Nunan (1989) have an overview of CLT, as follows: in CLT, language is considered

as a system for communication and conveying meaning Activities used in CLT are related to real communication, meaningful tasks Objectives in CLT reflect learners’ needs and they are composed of functional skills and linguistic objectives In CLT classrooms, students act as an interactor and a negotiator, and teachers act as a

facilitator Harmer (2001:84) defines CLT as “the name which was given to a set of beliefs which included not only a re-examination of what aspects of language to teach, but also a shift in emphasis in how to teach” He also adds that CLT

highlights the significance of language functions and the idea that language learning will take care of itself, and CLT includes activities associated with real communication, in which the accuracy is not as important as the achievement of communicative tasks

According to Richards and Rodgers (2001), CLT refers to a various set of principles reflecting a communicative view of language and language learning Below are the principles:

* Students use a language for communication when learning it

* The goal of classroom activities is to communicative authentically and meaningfully

* An important element in communication is fluency

* Four language skills should be integrated in communication

* CLT appreciates learning as a process of creative construction and learns by trial and error

There are five main characteristics emphasizing the current applications of CLT, suggested by Johnson and Johnson (cited in Richards and Rodgers, 2001) Firstly, appropriateness means the use of language must be appropriate to each situation and learners need to use formal as well as informal styles of speaking Secondly, message focus is the characteristic that wants learners to be able to understand and convey messages or real meanings The third characteristic is psycholinguistic processing in which learners are engaged in the use of cognitive processes important in second language acquisition Risk taking is the fourth characteristic which requires learners to make guesses and learn from their mistakes or errors The last one is free practice in which the use of holistic practice, involved in the simultaneous use of different sub-skills, is appreciated

Communicative language teaching uses more interaction-based activities, for instance information gap tasks and role-plays Moreover, two typical organizational features of interaction-based lessons in CLT are group-work and pair-work (Bailey, 2005:19) In other words, group-work and pair-work are two typical ways in which

a teacher can group his or her students in a CLT classroom

One of the approaches can be applied in teaching English speaking skills is communicative language teaching because speaking can be more effective by applying this approach to teach, and it is likely to enhance students’ speaking

achievement According to the article “A Comparison of Learners’ and Teachers’ Attitudes Towards Communicative Language Teaching At Two Universities In Vietnam” by Khoi Mai Ngoc and Noriko Iwashita (2012), not only students but also

teachers have positive attitudes towards communicative language teaching approach Thus, it can be said that CLT is the appropriate approach to apply to teach English speaking skills However, designing various activities for speaking skills in order to assist students in interacting spontaneously can still be the challenge in CLT classroom

1.4 The roles of attitude in language learning

First of all, it is essential to understand of what language leaning is Davies and Pearse (2000) affirm that language learning is a long process of acquiring a language through exposure to the language and its use to communicate and many unavoidable mistakes can occur

Learner’s attitudes in language learning play an important role They are involved in the success which learners have in learning a language (Lightbown and Spada, 1993) Gardner (1985) points out three ways of classifying attitudes The first one is attitudes that have a dimension of specificity or a dimension of generality For instance, it seems to be specific to mention attitudes towards learning English; whereas, attitudes towards learning foreign languages has a general dimension The second one is about attitudes’ relevance to second language achievement In this case, there are attitudes which are more connected with the tasks of learning a second language than other attitudes The last classification is based on educational attitudes or social attitudes Attitudes towards the course, the teacher, and learning a language are typical examples of educational attitudes while social attitudes concentrate on the cultural implications of acquiring a second language Besides, one of the reasons for the importance of attitudes presented by Baker (1992) is that attitudes towards a language seem to be momentous in the restoration, preservation, decay or death of the language Therefore, it is reasonable

to state that the role of attitudes towards a language or language learning is not minor

According to Tsiplakides and Keramida (2010), students possessing positive attitudes towards language learning are less likely to suffer from the anxiety over language learning and more capable of taking part in learning tasks eagerly

Ellis (1994) suggests that learner’s achievement and their attitudes have a relationship with each other in learning a language Attitudes and learners’ second language competency influence mutually If learners gain success, their attitudes towards learning a language will be positive, and the attitudes may be more negative if the success does not come Rebecca L Oxford (edited in Carter and Nunan, 2001:168) also affirms that the learners’ language learning can be reduced and harmed by negative attitudes, but it can be increased by positive ones

Furthermore, Shimizu (cited in Lieb, 2009) believes that if students have negative attitudes towards their teachers, these students’ motivation in the classroom as well as their desire to go on learning the language will be impacted adversely This proves that the role of attitudes is significant, and what’s more, it is essential to inspire or stimulate learners’ long language learning

In brief, the position of attitudes is dominant in language learning Language learning is facilitated by positive attitudes For example, suppose that the learners hesitate to learn a language or they do not possess positive attitudes, any result may not be produced Moreover, language learning is also influenced by learners’ attitudes and motivation Their perceptions are related to their attitudes A learner’s perceptions of the teacher, the class and his or her awareness of future needs impact his or her attitudes towards language learning, too Therefore, not only are attitudes appreciated in language learning but also studying them a lot should be paid attention to, which is because the role of attitudes is essential, and it can create the learners’ success as well as the failure in their language learning

1.5 The roles of attitude in learning speaking skills

The learners’ success in language learning and the effectiveness of their English course are usually evaluated by them through the progress they feel they have made

in their proficiency in speaking (Richards, 2009) Thus, it can be said that the learners’ attitudes towards their progress play an important role in the success in language learning

When mentioning attitudes in speaking, Quyen Thi Thuc Bui and Channarong Intaraprasert (2013) believe that the learners who possess positive attitudes towards English speaking skills are going to be far more involved in speaking activities, and they have a tendency to make use of more ways which assist them in coping with their difficulties during the conversation On the contrary, the learners who have negative attitudes will tend to be unwilling or less willing to take part in speaking activities Thus, it can be inferred that the learners’ attitudes in learning speaking skills still play a vital role, which decides the learners’ desire to learn speaking Besides, Horwitz, Horwitz and Cope (1986) mention the components of foreign language anxiety in their article One of them is communication apprehension, which can be understood as an attitude “characterized by anxiety about or fear of communicating with people” In other words, this attitude occurs when an individual feels nervous and afraid of communicating with other people Therefore, when the learners are anxious to speak English, this will also influence their learning

To sum up, the attitude has a great impact on learning speaking skills Its roles are appreciated, for it is one of the factors that come to a decision about whether the learners can learn speaking skills successfully or not According to Davies and Pearse (2000), that the learners can use English in communication both inside and outside the classroom is really real success in English language learning Thus, it is very necessary to study their attitudes in order to find out ways of improving their positive attitudes towards learning speaking skills

one mentioned attitudes towards English learning in general; its object of study was the first and second year students at university However, the second one mentioned attitudes towards learning to speak English, but its object of study was the 10thgraders at a high school

The researcher’s topic concentrated on students’ attitudes towards learning speaking skills; however, the setting and the object of study were different The setting was at USSH, VNU and the object of study focused on the first-year non-English major students

1.7 Summary

This chapter has presented previous research involved in the following aspects: the defintions of speaking skills and attitudes, the elements of speaking, the communicative approach in teaching English speaking skills, the roles of attitude in language learning, the roles of attitude in learning speaking skills All the theoretical information mentioned above focuses on speaking skills and attitudes, which are used as the basis for the data analysis related to the study on students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, VNU

Chapter two: METHODOLOGY 2.1 Research questions

The study is expected to solve two research questions, as follows:

1 What are the students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills

at USSH, VNU?

2 What are the factors influencing the students’ attitudes?

To carry out this, the researcher decided to choose the survey research because

of its advantages Survey research is suitable for the study with a large population The data in this study were collected through a combination of the questionnaire and interviews, the two typical data collection instruments in the survey research The questionnaire was expected to offer the best description of the students’ attitudes towards learning speaking skills at USSH, VNU through significant statistics However, during the process of completing the questionnaire, the students might circle the choices that were not similar to their thoughts or opinions because they might be afraid to make their teachers sad if their answers had a tendency to criticize their teachers Therefore, the researcher used the interview more to have an opportunity to talk directly with some of the students participating in the questionnaire with the aim of increasing the reliability of the questionnaire, which made the study more reliable

second term (equivalent to level A2) Furthermore, students have to attend two English classes every week

Although students have learned English for nine years, their English in general and their English speaking proficiency are not good This study is expected to find out whether they have positive or negative attitudes towards learning speaking skills and why they have those attitudes, from which the suggestions will be made to enhance the students’ ability to speak English

2.3 The participants

To investigate the students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills, the researcher chose 150 students (both males and females) from six classes FLF1105 1, FLF1105 2, FLF1105 6, FLF1106 10, FLF1106 29, FLF1106 30 The number of students in each class ranged from 20 to 30 people These students come from different parts of Vietnam They reach Hanoi to go to university At USSH, VNU, they have to learn English as a compulsory subject although it is not their major Their majors are History, Orientalism, and Philosophy Moreover, when they are learning English at university, the course-book and the self-study materials are their main learning tools The researcher chose these students as the participants of the study because all of them have been learning English since they were in grade 3

or 4; however, their English is rather weak, especially speaking skills Furthermore, they are not confident of using English to communicate with their partners in English classes Therefore, the researcher would like to have a bird’s eye view of their attitudes towards as well as their expectations of learning English speaking skills so that he can make suggestions about improving the students’ English speaking skills at USSH, VNU

2.4 The data collection instruments

Seeing that the study is a survey used to gain the information of attitudes, conditions or events at a single point in time (Nunan, 1992:140), the researcher decided to use two various instruments, namely survey questionnaire and interview

Firstly, questionnaire is one of the typical instruments in the survey research

This technique is used the most widely in order to gain data from participants; moreover, it is said to be economical and have standardized questions (McMillan and Schumacher, 1993) Richards et all (1992) states that the questionnaire is a group of questions about a topic designed to be answered by participants in a study

It is very important that a questionnaire should be valid, reliable and unambiguous Two types of questions often appearing in a questionnaire are closed questions and open questions With closed questions, the researcher will design the range of possible choices for respondents to be able to choose, whereas with open questions, respondents can decide what they want to say and how they say it

The questionnaire in this study includes 12 questions, which are both closed and open ended The researcher asked the students to give further information to explain their choices below each question Furthermore, all the questions were bilingual in English and Vietnamese in order that the students can understand the questions perfectly and precisely Below are the categories of the twelve questions:

Question 1, 2: students’ general attitudes towards learning English

Questions 3 to 9: students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills Question 10: students’ attitudes towards lecturers’ teaching methods in speaking

classes

Question 11: students’ viewpoints on the factors impacting on their attitudes in

learning English speaking skills

Question 12: students’ possible expectations of learning English speaking skills

Secondly, another instrument is interview McDonough (2001) considers the interview as a basic research technique According to McMillan and Schumacher

(1993), the interview is fundamentally the vocal questionnaire and the distinction between them is that the interview is associated with direct interaction between individuals There are three main types of interviews, namely the unstructured interview, the semi-structured interview and the structured interview The interview designed in this study is the semi-structured interview the reason why the

researcher chose this type of interview is that the semi-structured interview are based on the list of interview questions, but the order of asking these questions can

be changed; therefore, the researcher (as an interviewer) is given a deal of flexibility and the interviewed students (as interviewees) are given a degree of control during the interview Seeing that it is very challenging to interview 150 students and the interview was used to provide more in-depth information to clarify students’ attitudes towards learning speaking skills more, 30 students (12 males and 18

females) from six classes FLF1105 1, FLF1105 2, FLF1105 6, FLF1106 10, FLF1106 29, FLF1106 30 with five students each were selected randomly from the

questionnaire respondents They had to answer two similar questions from the

researcher

2.5 The data collection procedure

The data from the questionnaire and the interview were collected from April,

2014 to late May, 2014 In the first stage, the researcher asked permission to visit five classes and delivered the questionnaire to those classes’ students He explained how to complete the questionnaire before the students answered the questionnaire and assisted students if necessary To ensure their understanding of the questions, the questionnaire was written in Vietnamese and English After that, all the questionnaires were collected

After the questionnaire, the semi-structured interviews with 30 selected students from six classes were conducted The interview was carried out to make the data from the questionnaire clearer, from which the study will be more reliable The interviews lasted three days with ten students each day in the mornings and in the afternoons The duration of each interview was about 3-5 minutes The students had

to answer two similar questions prepared by the researcher In order for the students

to be able to express their opinions easily and clearly, two questions and all their answers were spoken in Vietnamese The interviews took place with the students’

willingness and enthusiasm, and the information from the interviews was taken note

of carefully

2.6 The data analysis procedure

After having collected the information from the questionnaire and the interviews, the researcher started analyzing and discussing it All of the data from the questionnaire were summarized statistically and illustrated in the form of graphs such as bar graphs and pie graphs The result of the interviews was also taken notes

of carefully, and presented in the tables The researcher analyzed and found out the findings from the participants’ responses The data from the questionnaire and the interviews supported each other to find out the real answers to the research questions

2.7 Summary

To sum up, chapter two has mentioned the detailed information involved in how the study was carried out by presenting the setting, the participants, the data collection instruments, the data collection procedure and the data analysis procedure The setting of the study is to succinctly introduce the location of USSH, VNU, its students, an overview of English learning at the university “The participants” mentions the number of students taking part in the study “The data collection instrument” is about two main instruments to collect the data for the study, namely the questionnaire and the interviews The data collection procedure and the data analysis procedure are the two parts which mention the formal order and ways of collecting, analyzing and discussing the data from the questionnaire and the interviews

Chapter three: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

There are 12 questions in the questionnaire and two questions in the interview Below are the results collected from 150 students of USSH, VNU (consisting of 53 males and 97 females) through the questionnaire and 30 students through the interviews The researcher has analyzed, discussed and illustrated each of them in groups in order to answer each research question

3.1 What are the students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills

at USSH, VNU?

This question is considered the most important in this study In the questionnaire, the questions 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 10 were designed to investigate the students’ attitudes towards learning English speaking skills at USSH, VNU To ensure the reliability of the study, the research used the two questions in the interview with 30 students from the questionnaire All are expected to answer the first research question

Below are the results from the questionnaire and interview:

Yes 48.7 %

Normal

37.3 %

No 14%

Figure 3.1: Students' general attitudes towards liking

or disliking learning English

As can be seen from the pie chart, three choices for question 1 “Are you fond of learning English? Why/why not?” are YES (meaning “like”), NO (meaning

“dislike”) and NORMAL (meaning neither like nor dislike) The greatest percentage belongs to the students liking learning English, which constitutes 48.7% The rate of the students neither liking nor disliking learning English is next with 37.3% Most

of them offered the reasons such as “English helps them to be more confident in their life” and “English is very interesting and necessary in the life” Meanwhile,

only 14% of the students are not interested in learning English They stated that English was difficult to understand and their knowledge of English and vocabulary are rather limited Although the number of students fond of learning English and the number of students feeling normal in learning English are not very different, it can

be said that the students have a tendency to support English learning

Reading

23.3%

Speaking 48.7%

Listening 20%

Writing 8%

Figure 3.2: Students' general attitudes towards four English skills

According to figure 3.2, the number of students interested in learning speaking skills predominates (48.7%) They responded that speaking helped them with their future jobs and communication Not only do they find speaking skills interesting and practical, but speaking skills also make them more active Besides, they also like learning English because of a desire to talk with foreigners confidently Whereas, the proportion of the students that like learning writing skills is the lowest (accounting for just 8%) Seemingly, the students are not keen on this skill The others are reading and listening skills It can be seen that the difference in the percentage between these two skills is not very considerable, with 23.3% and 20% respectively The reasons some of the students gave for liking reading skills are that when practicing reading, they do not have to pronounce and write a lot As for listening skills, most of the students who like learning this skill were of the opinion that they loved listening to music, watching films and singing in English and only when can they listen to English they understand information faster

The result of the second question in the questionnaire is rather similar to the

result of the first interview question “Do you like learning speaking skills? Why / why not?” In this question, the majority of students (22 students) replied that they

were really fond of learning speaking skills They gave many reasons for that They said that they were interested in learning to speak English because it helps them to

be more confident of communicating with other people, especially foreigners;

moreover, they wanted to have a better job in the future Besides, they felt speaking lessons very interesting and speaking topics were practical and useful in their life They believed that speaking skills assisted them in improving English vocabulary,

passing speaking exams at university and being easier to learn majors

However, there were still seven students not interested in learning speaking skills They stated that they felt shy when they spoke English wrong The causes resulting in their mistakes were that they were bad at grammar and pronunciation They did not know whether they were speaking right or wrong Furthermore, a lack

of vocabulary made them difficult to verbalize Only one student felt neutral

(neither like nor dislike) in learning speaking skills because the student did not have specific purpose and did not learn English as a major

at speaking and pronunciation and they wanted to improve them

Besides, the students’ attitude of the importance of speaking skills was also

reaffirmed in the second interview question “Do you think speaking skills are important? Why / why not?” All of the students who were asked this question

stated that they appreciated the importance of speaking skills To them, spoken English played an important role not only in their studies but also in their future life

Their explanations for the answer are reasonable They believed that speaking had a great influence on the other skills and when learning speaking skills well enough, they also studied the other skills such reading, listening and writing skills well The second reason they gave was they could have a good opportunity to have a better job and promote their future career

More interestingly, two of them considered English speaking skills as a way of manifesting their competence in English directly Moreover, they had to take an exam at their university, learning English speaking skills also had a considerable part in their studies and examination There was a student highly appreciating speaking skills when being of the opinion that learning English without being able

to speak it was considered failed Thus, it can be seen that their attitudes towards the importance of speaking skills are positive

a to pass the exams at university

b to communicate with foreign people

c to have a good job in the future

d to be confident of joining English clubs as well as other activities organized

by the faculty and university

e to help me to learn the other skills (listening, reading, writing) better

Figure 3.4: Students' purposes of learning English speaking skills

This fourth question is expected to investigate in detail the aims of learning English speaking skills the students in USSH, VNU have had The bar chart reveals that the majority of students are aware that they learn English speaking skills with the aim of getting a good job in the future, which accounts for 62.7% The number

of students learning English speaking skills so as to pass their exams at university and to talk with foreigners makes up 28.7% and 27.3% respectively The percentage

of the students who learn speaking skills to support their other language skills are 21.3%, and only 4% is from the students who learn speaking skills to make them confident of taking part in English clubs and other activities organized by their faculty and university It is interesting to state that most of the students would like

to learn English speaking skills to serve their practical purposes, both in the short term (to succeed in their English speaking exams) and in the long term (to find a good future job)

It can be seen from the chart, the number of students finding speaking lessons fascinating and enjoyable is more than the number of those who do not think

English speaking lessons are interesting 60.7% (18.7% for the choice “very interesting and enjoyable” and 42% for “interesting”) of the students are keen on

English speaking lessons and they feel enjoyable and interested in these lessons They said that they were relaxed and elated when practicing the discussion topics the teacher gave with their partners in English On the contrary, there are 32% of the students who find English speaking lessons not very interesting and 7.3% of the students do not have any interest in English speaking lessons In other words, they are unmotivated students in English speaking lessons They stated that in speaking lessons they were frightened of speaking English because they did not know what and how they would say Moreover, although they had a lot of speaking ideas in Vietnamese, they could not express them in English because of their limit to vocabulary and grammatical structures, which resulted in the fact that they felt tired

in speaking lessons Despite this, it is obvious that the majority of students (60.7% out of 100%) find English speaking lessons interesting and enjoyable

a always b usually c sometimes

d when asked by the teacher