An empirical study on the benefits of video assisted activities to students oral proficiency = nghiên cứu về lợi ích c

VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES DANG THI KIEU GIANG AN EMPIRICAL STUDY ON THE BENEFITS OF VIDEO-ASSISTED ACTIVITIES TO STUDENTS' ORAL PROFICIENCY (NGHIEN CLIU VE LOI ICH CUA CAC HOAT DONG CO SU TRO (;IL P CUA VIDEO VOI VIEC PHAT TRIEN KHA NANG NOI CHO SINII MEN) M.A MINOR PROGRAVLME THESIS Field: English Methodology Code: 601410 Course: kl7 Supervisor: LE \ AN CANH, M.A Hanoi, August 2010 IV LIST OF TABLE "hart 20 fable 21 fable 22 fable 23 fable 25 fables 25 TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale I 1.2 The aims of the study 13 Research questions 1.4 Scope of the study 1.5 Method of the study 1.6 Significant of the study 1.7 Structure of the study IIIAPIER IWO: LITERATURE REVIEW !.l Oral Proficiency !.2 IJcmcnts get involved in oral proficiency !.3 Challenges to students in speaking English as a foreign language !.4 I iciping students to cope with challenges in speaking English !.5 Video-assisted acti\itics 10 !.6 Pedagogy value of video-assisted activities in teaching speaking 11 !.7 Benefits of using video in language teaching 11 I.S Drawbacks of using video in leaching language 14 HAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY 15 fhe context of the study 15 3.1.2 he English Department 15 3.1.3 Students' background and needs 15 3.1.4 Course book and teaching materials for teaching speaking skill 16 Research Methods 16 3.2.1 Participants 16 3.2.2 Instruments 17 3.2.3 Procedures 19 HAPTER IOl R: DATA COLLECTION AND DISCUSSION 20 Data collection and analysis 20 4.1.1 Ihc students' comprehension toward the video-clips 20 VI 4.1.2 The extent to which the video-assisted activities enhance the students^ motivation to practice speaking English 21 4.1.3 The extent to which the students think the video-assisted activities help to develop their oral proficiency 23 4.1.4 The areas of oral proficiency that are most positively affected by video-assisted activities , 25 4.1.5 Some disadvantages of leaming to speak English with the videos 4.2 Discuss of the findings 27 28 4.2.1 To what extent video-assisted activities enhance the students' motivation to practice speaking English? 28 4.2.2 To what extent the students think the video-assisted activities help to develop their jral proficiency? 29 4.2.3 Which areas of oral proficiency arc most positively affected by the video- assisted ictivities? 30 CHAPTER FIVE: CONCLUSION 32 V1 Objectives revised 32 v2 Summary of the results 32 >.3 Pedagogical implications 32 5.3.1 Using video-assisted activities to motivate students to practice speaking 33 5.3.2 Using videos-assisted activities in teaching speaking to help students develop their )ral proficiency especially in terms of intonation and pronunciation 33 5.3.3 Designing appropriate activities with video clips 34 5.3.4 Problem taken into consideration 34 i.4 Limitations of the study and suggestions for further studies 35 iEI ERENCES 36 U»PK\DI( ES CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale In globalization trend, the communication in English has been had an increasingly significant role than ever before The ability to communicate in real life has become the main goal of most learners They invest a considerate amount of time and money in the hope of using English better in all communicative situations The desire to speak English fiucnlly drives students of all areas in Vietnam to make more effort to improve their oral proficiency Many students, besides the time of participating in regular course at colleges or universities, seek further occasions to practice speaking Some meet and converse face to face with foreigners to familiarize themselves with native speakers' sounds while others like self-education with available softwares, or online English teaching programmes to ameliorate their oral proficiency These practical deeds offer students much success; help them be more llexible and confident in using English to contact w ith others Despite the impressive progress made by my own students, their speaking ability was still limited They seemed to be more reticent and reluctant in presenting something in crowd audience This was clearly shown in several English speaking courses as well as the workshops with the presence of many students coming from different areas They were afraid of opening their mouth even to raise questions to the teacher or express their ideas in participating classroom speaking activities Their reticence led the atmosphere of my classroom to be quite unexciting After having small talk with them I have realized the fact that the first-year students had a lot of problems concerning their oral proficiency Especially noteworthy was that the students' leaming condition here was really poor Many students neither had speaking-assistant devices such as softwares, e-books, computers iu)r knew how to exploit the diverse information source trom internet As a teacher, I ha\c always been preoccupied with the question of how to both arouse the students' interest, stimulate ihcm to be ebullient in speaking and help them to develop their oral proficiency more effectively One day, w hilc reading a book tilled "Video in Action" w ith the attractive introduction that activities with videos are of great advantage to language learners in tcnns of motivation and communication (Stempleski and Tomalin, 1990), I thought the video might be a solution In addition, more information is affirmed: leaming with videos could help students develop all aspects of oral proficiency such as pronunciation, intonation, vocabulary, and idiom with use It was much hope that activities with videos could meet my students' needs and this motivated me to conduct an action research on the benefits of video-assisted activities to students' oral proficiency in an attempt to test the impact of these activities on my students' spoken language leaming 1.2 Ihe aims of the study This action research was conducted to investigate the benefits of video-assisted activities to students' oral proficiency The aims of the study are set out as follows: - The extent to which video-assisted activities motivate the students to practice speaking -The extent to which video-assisted activities help the students develop their oral proficiency - The areas of oral proficiency that are most positively affected by video-assisted activities 1.3 Research questions To achieve the purposes of the study, the research questions are put forward: - To w4iat extent the video-assisted activities enhance the students' motivation to practice speaking English? - To what extent the students think the video-assisted activities help to develop their oral jiroficicncy? - Which areas of oral proficiency are most positively affected by the video-assisted activities? L4 Scope of the study In this action research, I intended to investigate the extent to which the video-assisted activities motivate and help my students to develop their oral proficiency as well as find out the areas of oral proficiency that arc most positively affected by these activities The action research are conducted within a periods of five months during the second term of the academic year of 2010 The participants are 79 students of two classes at the same college junior level 1.5 Method of the study Action research has proved to be the best choice for this study since its aim is to improve the students' oral proficiency in a certain context The combination of different instruments: an observation, an informal talk with the student participants, a refiective journal-keeping, and a questionnaire in this research was intended to collect the data for the study 1.6 Signification of the study This study is expected to provide an insight into the effectiveness of video-assisted activities on students' oral proficiency The findings from the study will therefore shed light on the practicality of video-assisted activities in developing students' oral skills in a context where exposure to the target spoken language is very limited 1.7 Structure of the study The study is presented in five chapters; namely, introduction, literature review, methodology, data collection and discussion, and conclusion Chapter one Introduction, introduces the rationale, the aims of the study, research questions, scope of the study, method of the study, signification of the study and structure of the study Chapter two Literature Review, aims at reviewing some concepts as well as the theory involving in oral proficiency, video-assisted activities that w ill be a fimi foundation for the study Chapter three Methodology, consists of two sections The first section presents the context where the action research is pcrfomied A brief description of Ha Tinh University, linglish department with teaching condition, the students, the teachers and the course book arc also outlined The second section describes the research methodology that the description of pailicipants, data collection instruments and procedures are gone into details Chapter four, Data Collection and Discussion, presents and discusses the findings of the study Chapter five Conclusion, summarizes the result of the study Implications and suggestions for teaching speaking using the video-assisted activities are also presented in this chapter CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter reviews the relevant literature on video-assisted language leaming activities Since the focus of this study is the impact of video-assisted activities on students' oral proficiency, a working definition of the term "oral proficiency" is discussed first 2.1 Oral Proficiency According to Canale and Swain (1980), communicative competence is composed of (a) grammatical competence, (b) sociolinguistic competence, (c) discourse competence, and (d) strategic competence Grammatical competence means grammatical accuracy, and sociolinguistic competence refers to the ability to use language appropriately in terms of cultural norms in various communication settings or contexts Discourse competence is the ability to use language coherently and cohesively while strategic competence refers to the ability to deal with linguistic challenges by using the existing language resources One linguistic component which is missing from the above construct regarding oral proficiency is the phonological competence, i.e., pronunciation, intonation, and rhythm as well as the lexical competence, or the appropriate range of vocabulary Applying the above construct of communicative competence to oral proficiency, I, in this study, define oral proficiency as being composed of the following: - ability to use English for oral communication accurately; - ability to speak intelligible English - ability to show cultural sensitivity to the interlocutor - ability to speak English with relatixc confidence and ease - ability to get the meaning across w ith whatever linguistic resources available - ability to show a relatively sizable vocabulary These mdicatoi-s will be used lo measure the mipact of video-assisted activities on students' oral proficiency in this study 2.2 Elements get involved in oral proficiency With regard to speaking, many researchers have provided several definition and explanations of this concept According to Chancy (1998) speaking refers to the process of building and sharing meaning through the use of verbal and non-verbal symbols, in a variety of contexts In Plorez's view (1999) "speaking is an interactive process of constructing meaning that involves producing and receiving and processing information" (p 1, cited in Bailey, 2005) Bailey (1993) divides the oral proficiency into four components; namely, accuracy, fluency, functions and mitigation Accuracy refers to the ability select the correct words and expressions to convey the intended meaning and use the grammatical pattems of English as well I'luency is the capacity to speak fiuidly, confidently, and at a rate consistent with the norms of the relevant native speech community Fluency happens naturally when proficient learners have ability to use vocabulary flexibly to speak smoothly especially for topics which arc easy or familiar (Stain, 1999) Functions (speech acts) in language are nomis or the appropriate ways to accomplish the goals in speaking such as thanking, requesting, apologizing, refusing, warning, complimenting, directing, complaining Mitigation is the various linguistic means of softening a message through pronunciation of words, phrases, clauses, or entire utterances that can make spoken utterances more or less polite The elements of oral proficiency, which have been reviewed above, fit well the indicators of oral proficiency listed in 2.1 at the beginning of the thesis 2.3 Challenges to students in speaking English as a foreign language Speaking in a second language or foreign language has oflen been viewed as the most demanding of the four macro- skills When attempting to speak, "learners must muster their thoughts and encode those ideas in the \ocabulary and syntactic of the target language" (Bailey and Savage, 1993, p.l) Encoding ideas accompanied with affective influences and linguistic considerations is especially difficult even for native speakers, let alone language learners (Haymes, 2009) Oral proficiency is closely relates to vocabular>', phonology, structure, functions and listening comprehension .\ll these arc integrated into the whole, constituting the oral proficiency; as a result, these components should not be considered as parts of the whole Widdowson (1978) states the acquisition of linguistics skill docs not seem to izuarantee the consequent acquisition of communicative abilities in a 35 5.4 Limitations of the study and suggestions for further studies The study looks into the students' perceived benefits of video-assisted activities on students' motivation and their self-evaluated progress in oral proficiency These benefits, especially those on the students' oral proficiency have not been tested through a pretestposttest research design Secondly, participants in this study were small in number This small number of participants, who were not chosen randomly, makes it impossible to generalize the findings Thirdly, the study was conducted and measured by the researcher herself Researcher biases are therefore unavoidable Despite these limitations, the study, which is a small- scale action research project, helps to shed light on the impact of video-assisted activities on students' language leaming in general and in their learning to speak English in particular It encourages, at least, the research herself to continue designing video-assisted activities to supplement the speaking activities in the classroom In the future more research which uses an experimental design should be used if generalizations are intended Without an experimental study, it is hard to gcncrali/c the impact of video-assisted teaching on the students' oral proficiency This is also the researcher's plan for future action 36 References Bailey, K M., and Savage, L (1994) New Ways in Teaching Speaking, in C Richards (ed.) New Way in TESOL Series USA: Teachers of English to S^peakers of Other language, Inc, pp Bailey, K M (2005) Practical English Language Teaching: Speaking New York: The McGraw- Hill Companies, Inc Bymc, D (1991) Teaclnng Oral English Singapore: Longman Singapore Publishers (Pte) Ltd Brown, H, D, (1994) Teaching by Principles- An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy The United States of America: Prentice Hall Regents, Inc Canning-Wilson, C (2000) Practical Aspects of Using Video in the Foreign Language Classroom, The TEST Journal Retrieved 9"^' June 2010 from iteslj.org/Canning-Vidco.html Essberger, M (1998) Developing speaking activities Retrieved 2"^ November 2009 from http://cnulishnauc.com Gainer, G (2005) Silent movies Essential Teacher (14): 49-51 Haymes, J (2009) The dcNclopmcnt of interacti\'e oral proficiency in classroom Develop Teachers Retrieved 2""^ November 2009 from http://el.edu.com Kayi, H (2001): Teaching speaking: activities to promote speaking in a second language USA: University of Nevada Retrie\ed 2""^ November 2009 from http://unr.edu/homepaue hayrick 10 Katchen, J et al (2005) Do-it-yourself video Essential Teacher (X): 40-43 1 Littlcwood, W (1991) Communicative Language Teaching Great Britain: Cambridge Uni\crsity Press 12 Loncrgan, L (1984) Mdeo in Language Teaching Cambridge: Unnersity Press 13 Mill, G.E (2003) Action Research: A Guide for the Teacher Researcher Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill Prentice Hall 37 14 Mumgavel, T (2003) Using video, English Teaching Professional Journal (29): 35-36 Moobin, D (2008) Online video for ELT Retrieved 2"*^November 009 16 Sun, J (2005) Using Movies in the EFL Classroom: English second language Journal of English Second Language, 43 Retrieved October, V\ 2009, from http://csimau.com 17 Steun, M (1999) Developing oral proficiency in the immersion ACIE Newsletter 2(3) Retrieved 2"^ November, 2009 from http://delicious.com 18 Stempleski, S., and Tomalin, B (1990) Video in Action Cambridge: University Press, 19 Williams, B (2004) Using digital video in teaching materials Retrieved 2""^ November, 2009 from http://www.doci.org/ 20 William, J.D (1984) Theory and Methodology: Do we what we are knowing, in K Das (t^d.),.Communicative language teaching Singapore: Singapore Uni\crsity Press, pp 51 -63 http:// www.manything.org/songs/ http://wwAv.podcastallev.com/ http://wwAv.podcastpicklc.com/ http:/'www.eslpod.com/ http://allmovic.com/ http://w\vw.kolumbus.fi/rukkila scripts.htm/ http://ww\v.script-o-rama.com/ http://www.cmpiieonlinc.co.uk luip://www.fi lmfindcr.com/ http: ww w.mo\ic web.com'movie/alltimc.html http: www.filmsite.org/films.html APPENDIX QUESTIONNAIRE Please respond to each statement or question and complete all of them as frankly and correctly as you can Class Sex I Learning to speak English with the video clips helps me Strongly Disagree feel more confident in speaking English learn more about English grammar speak English more correctly improve my pronunciation leam English words better speak English with better intonation know how to use English appropriately in different situations know how to use difYerent grammatical structures for different communicative purposes learn more about English culture and other foreign cultures 10 feel more interested m speaking English even when my English is limited Disagree (2) Not sure (3) Agree (4) Strongly Agree (5) + II Put a tick in the appropriate column Strongly disagree (1) Disagree (2) Not sure ' Agree (4^ (3) Strongl y agree (5) 1, After leaming to speak English with the video clips, I am not afraid of speaking English any more My speaking and listening skills became better after leaming to speak English with the video clips Even with the video clips, I could not make any progress in speaking English I did not understand what people spoke on the video clips I understood English grammar better with the video clips In general after learning to speak English with the video clips, my speaking English was better I am more excited in participating in the speaking activities with video clips prefer leaming to speak English without the video clips , III Write two things you don't like about learning to speak English with the video clips, 1) 2) I\ Write two things that vou tlnd most useful to you after learning to speak English with the video clips 1) 2) V How rate vour speaking skills after learning to speak with the video clips much better " little better not better at all xsorsc M Would you like to continue learning to speak with the video clips', Yes No don't know APPENDIX Week ACTIVITY: LISTEN AND SAY Level: Intermediate Purpose: Pronunciation, Listening, Speaking Sequence type: Educational video Sequence length minutes Activities: 15 minutes Content of a video The video aims at teaching students how to pronounce / d/ and / 9/ In class Tell the students that the teacher is going to play a sequence twice During the first viewing their task is simply to listen and observe what speaker guide and perform two different sound /d / and /G /, Play the sequence without stopping Play the sequence again, pausing at the time of pronouncing for choral repetition Encourage the students to use the same intonation as the speaker Ask the students to work in pairs for pronouncing some w^ords and some sentences containing /6 /and /Q I sound Week ACTIVITY: SOUND SEARCH Level: Intermediate Purpose: Pronunciation Sequence type: Educational video Sequence length: minutes Activity time: 15 minutes Content of a video The video aims at guiding students how to pronounce /d3 /and /3 / In class Tell the students that the teacher is going to play a sequence Ask the students to listen to and observe the way the speaker guide them to pronounce /d3 /and /3 / Play a half of the sequence Ask the students to follow the way the speaker instmcts them to pronounce Let some students make the sound that lies in some words and some sentences Then distribute copies of the transcripts Tell the students that the teacher is going to continue playing the rest of the sequence in which there are several words containing the sound /d3 / or /3 / Ask them to circle all the words with those sounds Play the rest of the sequence The students work in pairs, comparing the answers Play the whole sequence again Pause each time the sound occurs Ask for volunteers to say the w ord that ha\ c the sound /d3 /or 1^ I Week ACTIVITY: RECONSTRUCTION Level: Intermediate Purpose: Discussion, Speaking Sequence type: Cartoon film Sequence length minutes Activity time: 15 minutes Content of a video The video is concerned with a short story having many actions with a clear, visual narrative line In class Explain to the students that the teacher is going to play a sequence in which a particular incident takes place Their task is to observe details, and then describe w hat they have seen in chronological order, listing as many details as possible Play the sequence The students work in groups of four, discuss what they have seen and prepare a list o\' events in the correct order A volunteer from each group reads its list to the class The class votes on which list was the most accurate and detailed Play the sequence again Pause from time to time to allow \'oluntcers to report on w hat they have just observed on the screen ^^^•^ ^- ACTIVITY: THE NEWS '^^^^'' Intermediate ^^''P^^''' Grammar review (question forms) Listening, Speaking Sequence type: Broadcast Sequence length: minutes Activity time: 20 minutes Content of a video This IS a news programmer containing information about the President Barack Obama In class Ask for volunteers to say what they know about the subject treated in the sequence Write their contributions on the board, Tell the students that they probably have a lot of questions about the subject Volunteers ask one or two questions The students work in pairs and write down at least three other questions about the subject Tell the students that the teacher is going to play a sequence in which some of their questions may be answered The questions may be answered directly Their task is to determine what answers, if any, are given to the questions Play the sequence Volunteers read their pairs' questions to the class and report on answers pro\ ided by the video The remaining questions for which no answers have been provided fomi a topic for discussion in groups A volunteer from each group present his/her report Week 8, ACTIVITY: ROLE PLAY Level: Intermediate Purpose: Listening, Speaking Sequence type: Drama Sequence length: minutes Activity time: 20 minutes Content of a video The video involves in two characters with clear dialogue In class Tell the students that the teacher is going to play a sequence tw ice Their task is to study the situation in the video, and they play role the same situation using w hatcver words or other means they wish Play the sequence twice Let the students work in pairs like the characters in the sequence Allow the pairs minutes to rehearse role-playing the situation in the video The pairs take turn performing the situation for the class, using their own words, actions, and gestures Play the sequence again, and compare it with the role plays ^^^•^ 9- ACTIVITY: CONSUMER SURVEY Level: Intermediate ''"''P^^^- Discussion, Viewing comprehension Speaking Sequence type: TV commercial Sequence length: minutes Activity time: 20 minutes Content of a video The video is a short advertisement for shampoo products In class Distribute the questionnaire Tell the students to work in pairs to interview each other and answer the questions Every student should complete the questions - How many hours of television you watch per day? - How many hours per week? - How many commercials you think you see per week? - What types of advertisements make strong impression on you? Why? The students report back to the teacher and compile a consumer profile of the class Tell the students that the teacher is going to play a TV commercial Showing the questions first: - What is the message? - At what target audience is the message convincing? - Are you part of the target audience? - Do you find the message convincing? The students^ task is to think about the questions as they watch the commercial Play the commercial Ask the students to work in groups of four, discuss the questions given Play the commercial again, for the students to confimi or modify their responses to it Week 10 ACTIVITY: SOUND ONLY Level: Intermediate Purpose: Speaking, Listening Sequence type: Music video Sequence length: minutes Activity time: 20 minutes Content of a video The music video involves in a romantic melody with images illustrated In class Tell the students that they are going to hear the sound-tract of a sequence without seeing the pictures Their task is to listen to the words, sound effects, music, etc and predict what they will see in the pictures Show the lists of the questions: - Where does the scene take place? - How many characters are in it? - How are their dresses? - What arc their ages? - What is their relationship? - What are they doing? - What is the content of the melody? Play the sequence with sound only The students work in groups of tour, discussing the questions and giving reasons tor their answers Play the sequence with sound and vision Groups discuss the questions again Week 11 Level: Purpose: Sequence type: ACTIVITY: WHAT IS THE CON\ ERSATION? Intermediate Viewing comprehension Speaking (Functional language) Educational video Sequence length; minutes Activity time: 25 minutes Content of a video The video presents a conversation between two people that guides the students to communicate in some concrete situations (booking the ticket, rending the house, shopping) In class Tell the students that the teacher is going to play a sequence without sound, in which a conversation takes place Their task is to work with a partner and write a dialogue to go with the pictures, and later to act it out in front of the class Play the sequence one and the sound turned down The students work in pairs to play role of two people to speak out the conversation Individual pairs take turns performing the dialogue in front of the class Play the sequence with sound, to compare the original dialogue with the students' versions Ask them to converse again Week 12 ACTIVITY: WHAT IF Level: Intermediate and above Purpose: Cross-culture comparison Discussion, Speaking Sequence type: Documentary film Sequence length: minutes Activity time: 20 minutes -> Content of the video The video is concerned with cultural features of Britain countr>' in general and British weeding in particular In class Tell the students that the teacher is going to play a sequence which takes place in a particular country Show the following questions on the board first - Which country the characters belong to? - What did the characters say? - What did the characters wear? - What did the characters do? Play the sequence Ask the students to work in pairs to discuss and answer the questions above Ask them to imagine how the scene w^ould difTer if it took place in X'ietnam, basing on the questions above to discuss Let some volunteers present their point of view Week 13, ACTIVITY: DISCOVERY Level: Intermediate Purpose: Speaking, Vocabulary development Sequence type: Short cartoon film Sequence length minutes Activity time: 25 minutes Content of the video The film chosen is the cartoon film having five characters with different personality types In class Prepare a list of their names with four adjectives at least to describe the characters in film (Example: Thumper- name of a character: active, intelligent, glib, swift-iongucd ) Tell the students that they are going to watch a sequence of a cartoon film in which ^ach of the characters could be described by some typical adjectives Ask them to watch :he video, then observe the features of five cartoon characters Their first task is find four adjectives at least that correspond to personality of each :haractcr - Let them compare their result with their partners and discuss • Ask three students belonging to groups to go to the board to w rite them • Ask the whole class to check their result and find out the person w ho docs the best • The teachers provide them some adjectives \ The students arc asked to discuss the main activities happening in the scene Let about hrce volunteers report what they have discussed [...]... the top of the list is intonation and pronunciation that were supported wamily by almost of the students 86% of participants appreciated the value of the lessons of intonation they had from these activities, among them, 39% emphasized their unanimity Only 12% of them neither approved nor protested Especially noteworthy are a number of advocators for pronunciation As much as 96% of the students considered... environment is great necessary for language students because it is an important factor that can help students decrease anxiety and develop their oral proficiency 29 Thirdly, many students expressed their interests in the voice of speakers in most of the videos After leaming with the video clips they made more efforts to improve their pronunciation and intonation In addition, they also want to enhance their... at the bottom of the list The next is the grammar and the following is reserved for natural language Vocabulary got much agreement from the students but less tickets than that pronunciation and intonation had Meeting approval of numerous students, intonation and pronunciation come out at the top of the list As mentioned above, the video- assisted activities had a powerful infiuence on the way the students. .. advantage to the students in enhancing their oral proficiency 4.2.3 Which areas of oral proficiency are most positively affected by the videoassisted activities? To answer to this question, several areas of oral proficiency such as culture, grammar, natural language, vocabulary, intonation and pronunciation were taken into consideration It was found that component of culture that receiving the lowest... things the most useful to them after leaming to speak with the videos, two-thirds of the students mentioned in areas of intonation and pronunciation They insisted on practical lessons that the videos guided them to pronounce, stress as well as positive infiuence of these acti\ ities on their intonation 27 These benefits were also repeated in refiective joumals that they absolutely believed the speakers'... activities to the participants in term of motivation and aspects of oral proficiency such as words, intonation, pronunciation, the use of natural language Part two consisting of 8 statements mainly focus on the improvement of the students after learning lo speak with the video clips and their preference between the activities with videos or without videos The questions in the part one and part two were designed... based on the authentic video clips that have been considered to be of great advantage to language leamers What follows is a discussion of the benefits and drawbacks of video- assisted activities 2.7 Benefits of using videos in language teaching There arc two kinds of videos: educational videos and authentic \idco materials Both of them are valuable teaching aids for language speaking According to Shcmian... summarizes the students" responses to the statement uh.ch are reflective their comprehension on the language use in the video chps From the chan it can be seen that only 7" of the students endorsed the statement (/ did not understand ^^hal people spoke on the video clip.s) on rating scale of 4 Luckily, nobody showed their strong agreement to this There were 23% of them having no clear opinion m their responses... sounds strange but correct I believe my pronunciation will be much better if I have more chance to listen to and observe them" (Ngoc, kl6B) The results assert that pronunciation and intonation are the most beneficial areas of oral proficiency the video- assisted activities brought the students 4.1.5 Some disadvantages of learning to speak English with the video clips An open question in part 4 of the survey... affected by video- assisted activities To figure out the areas of oral proficiency which are the most beneficial to the students when learning with the videos, some of aspects of oral proficiency such as grammar, intonation, pronunciation, words, culture, the use of natural language were taken into consideration The results were collected as below Table 5 1 2 3 4 5 1(41) improve my pronunciation 0% 0% ... my students' needs and this motivated me to conduct an action research on the benefits of video- assisted activities to students' oral proficiency in an attempt to test the impact of these activities. .. Signification of the study This study is expected to provide an insight into the effectiveness of video- assisted activities on students' oral proficiency The findings from the study will therefore... appropriate to the students' language proficiency as well as finding out the benefits of the v ideo -assisted activities to the participants in term of motivation and aspects of oral proficiency