Dealing with reticence in english speaking activities of non english majored students at university of science, vietnam national university hanoi

Employing such research instruments as questionnaires, researcher’s classroom observation and students’ reflection, the study reveals that these students had low current level of reticen

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES

-o0o -

NGUY N VŨ XUÂN LAN

DEALING WITH RETICENCE IN ENGLISH SPEAKING ACTIVITIES OF NON-ENGLISH-MAJORED STUDENTS

AT UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE, VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HANOI

KH C PH C TÌNH TR NG KHÔNG NHI T TÌNH THAM GIA CÁC

HO T Đ NG NÓI MÔN TI NG ANH C A SINH VIÊN KHÔNG

CHUYÊN TRƯ NG Đ I H C T NHIÊN,

Đ I H C QU C GIA HÀ N I

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code : 60140111

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES

-o0o -

NGUY N VŨ XUÂN LAN

DEALING WITH RETICENCE IN ENGLISH SPEAKING ACTIVITIES OF NON-ENGLISH-MAJORED STUDENTS

AT UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE, VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HANOI

KH C PH C TÌNH TR NG KHÔNG NHI T TÌNH THAM GIA CÁC

HO T Đ NG NÓI MÔN TI NG ANH C A SINH VIÊN KHÔNG

CHUYÊN TRƯ NG Đ I H C T NHIÊN,

Đ I H C QU C GIA HÀ N I

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code : 60140111

upervisor r Ho ng Th Xu n Ho

DECLARATION

I hereby certify that this research entitled “Dealing with reticence in English

speaking activities of non-English-majored students at University of Science, Vietnam National University, Hanoi” was conducted and then submitted in partial

fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts (M.A) This paper was original and has not been submitted for any degrees at any other universities or institutions

Hanoi , 2016

Ngu n V Xu n L n

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all, I would like to express my deepest appreciation to Dr Hoang Thi Xuan Hoa for her expert guidance, encouragement and patience during my completion of this MA thesis Her important suggestions greatly contributed to the final improvements of this paper

Special thanks should also be sent to colleagues and my students at Hanoi University of Science, without whom the data procedures could not have ever been completed

Finally, I take this opportunity to record my sincere gratitude to my family, for their incessant support, without which I would not be able to overcome personal difficulties to complete this paper on schedule

Reticence has been a common problem in EFL classrooms, which seriously damages students’ studying process as well as restricts academic improvement of the whole class This paper reports an action research undertaken in an English

course for 24 second-year non-English majors in a university in Hanoi, Vietnam

Employing such research instruments as questionnaires, researcher’s classroom observation and students’ reflection, the study reveals that these students had low current level of reticence which was presumably caused by some certain factors With the aim of decreasing students’ reticence in speaking activities, various measurements including brainstorming strategies training, communication strategies training and motivational feedback were applied Data collected after the research project proved the positive influence of these measurements on students’ willingness to participate in speaking activities in class

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Declaration i

Acknowledgements ii

Abstract iii

Table of contents iv

Abbreviations vi

List of tables and figures viii

PART A INTRODUCTION 1 Problem statement and rationale of the study 1

2 Aims and objectives of the study 3

3 Research questions 3

4 Scope of the study 3

5 Methods of the study 4

6 Design of the study 4

PART B DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1 LITERATURE REVIEW 1 Speaking skills 5

2 Reticence 6

2.1 Definitions of reticence 6

2.2 Reticence in classroom 7

2.3 Causes of reticence in EFL classroom 8

2.4 Foreign Language Class Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) 19

2.5 Possible solutions for reticence in EFL class 19

3 Related studies 15

CHAPTER 2 METHODOLOGY 1 Background of the study 17

1.1 Description of the English course and textbook 17

1.2 Participants 17

2 Action research 18

2.1 Rationale for action research 18

2.2 Action research model 20

3 Research instruments 21

3.1 Questionnaire 21

3.2 Classroom observation 22

3.3 Reflective report 22

4 Research procedure 23

4.1 Research steps 23

4.2 Data analysis 24

4.3 Procedure of the intervention 24

CHAPTER 3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 1 Research question 1 29

2 Research question 2 35

PART C CONCLUSIONS 1 Summary of the major findings of the research 43

2 Teaching implication 45

3 Limitations of the study 46

4 Suggestion for the next cycle 47

REFERENCES 48 APPENDICES I

ABBREVIATIONS List of abbreviations

EFL: English as a foreign language

FLCAS: Foreign Language Class Anxiety Scale

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

List of tables

Table 1 Comparison between traditional research and action research 19 Table 2 Timeline of intervention phase 25 Table 3 Excerpt from table of score for students’ activeness in pair work and group work 38

List of figures

Figure 1 Waters-Adams’s action research model (2006) 20 Figure 2 Average score of each categories of FLCAS 35 Figure 3 Class’s average score of activeness in group and pair speaking activities in each period 38

PART A INTRODUCTION

This part, which is an introduction to the thesis, helps to provide the background as well as the context for the present study The section includes the statement of the problem and rationale for the study, research questions, aims and

objectives, significance, scope of the study and an overview of the rest of the paper

1 Problem statement and rationale of the study

According to researchers in foreign language teaching, speaking skill is believed to be a significant component of any language teaching curriculum The ability to speak/ communicate in English is one of the initial aims of learning and using a foreign language (Tsui, 1992; Ellis, 1988)

The importance of speaking skill can be seen in two aspects: in social and in academic context Firstly, being able to communicate, which also reflexes the speaker’s self-expression, personality, reasons and thoughts in a variety of social and working situations, is surely the goal of almost every L2 learners (Luoma, 2004) Secondly, there is an undeniable connection between students' classroom participation and their academic achievement Students who participate actively in class, in other words, more willing to speak out in class, are proved to have higher academic achievement than that of those who are passive in class Krupa-Kwiatkowski (1998), in her study, claims that "interaction involves participation, personal engagement, and the taking of initiative in some way, activities that in turn are hypothesized to trigger cognitive processes conducive to language learning" (p 133) This also implies that whether students can perform well in foreign language partly relies on their behavior and activeness in class The more they are enthusiastic in speaking lessons, the more likely that they will learn effectively Consequently, the role of the ability to speak, as well as the perception of ability to speak, should not be underestimated by either teacher or pupil

In real teaching situation, however, a great number of students show low level of in-class participation They are normally not willing to speak English or to join in speaking activities with classmates; even when they know the answers, they

hesitate to speak up It is assumed that when people speak in a second or foreign language, they become more apprehensive and tense and thus more unwilling to participate in conversation (Horwitz et al., 1986) Researches carried out with interviews, observations, journals and survey revealed that a large proportion of L2 learners have the tendency to stay passive and reticent in foreign language classrooms, which hinders their academic achievement Encouraging students to talk in a language classroom, therefore, is a problem that most language teachers face (Tsui, 1996) With the importance of speaking as mentioned above, there is a pressing need for English as Foreign Language (EFL) teachers to help reticent students develop the skills and confidence needed to take an active role in oral classroom lessons Thus, researchers have been paying increasing attention to the growing importance of oral proficiency in L2 learning situations (Chen, 2003; Flowerdew et al., 2000; Jackson, 2002, 2003; MacIntyre et al., 2001; Tong, 2010) Most of these studies focus on the factors accounting for this phenomenon

As an EFL teacher in Vietnam, the researcher has experienced many difficult groups of students who have low proficiency in speaking but refuse to collaborate in class In Asian culture context, this has been shown more clearly than ever The majority of Vietnamese students have 3 to 12 years studying English from primary school to high school; nevertheless, English subject is usually test-oriented, hence focuses mainly on grammar and reading while speaking is generally neglected Students have very few chances for oral practice, which lead to the deficiency on speaking skill and also the habit of speaking in foreign language As a consequence, students bring that passive habit along when entering university, creating highly inactive atmosphere when it comes to speaking activities It has become common that a student graduating from university with 2 years of learning English cannot hold a simple conversation with foreigners In the advent of globalization, an increasing number of companies require certain English level or certification from their employees; meanwhile, the number of university and college graduates who are incapable of using English has always been alarming This prevents them from

pursuing their desired career or looking for opportunities to work or study abroad Accordingly, the researcher feels the urge to find out the reasons for the silence of students in speaking class and experiment various solutions to help them gain confidence as well as take their chances to learn and practice English

Another reason for carrying out this study is the fact that willingness to participate

in class has been found to vary according to the context (Liu & Jackson, 2009) Since not

so many studies have previously dealt with confidence in a Vietnam L2 context, this paper

is an attempt to contribute to knowledge in the field of L2 teaching, taking the issue of reticence into account in a Vietnamese EFL classroom

2 Aims and objectives of the study

This action research project was conducted to aim at solving the problem of reticence in speaking activities which possibly caused students’ low achievement in English subject at university

The specific objectives which guide the study as outlined as follows:

1) To identify the given class’s current level of reticence and possible causes; 2) To evaluate the impact of the intervention on the students’ reticence level

3 Research questions

This paper is expected to answer these following questions:

1) What was the level of reticence in English speaking activities of students before the research project?

2) To what extent was reticence changed after the intervention as perceived by teacher and by students?

4 Scope of the study

This research was carried out in the school year 2016 – 2017, in a class of 24 students at University of Science, Vietnam National University, Hanoi during a course of 6 weeks (from August to October), which is equal to half of a semester These students were at pre-intermediate level, and had studied English for two semesters before that The course book employed was New English Files Intermediate (Oxeden, 2007) Since the teacher/ researcher’s major concern is

reticence in speaking activities, this study concentrates on activities that involve/ require speaking skills only Among many research approaches, this study employs action research as the main approach to collect and analyze data

5 Methods of the study

As mentioned in the previous part, the researcher chose action research for this study for several reasons Unlike other types, action research is considered

"practical research" since the matter of the research is rooted from real situations, real problems identified by researchers, and it proposes measurements to solve those problems or improve the situations Brown (2005, as cited in Songsiri, 2007, p.50) agreed that action research does not only benefit learners but also aids teachers in enhancing their teaching effectiveness This study employed such tools

as questionnaire, observation and reflective report for each stage of the study

6 Organization of the study

The study is divided into five chapters:

Part A: Introduction

Part B: Development

Chapter 1: Literature Review

This chapter reviews the current theories on reticence To be specific, definition, possible causes and solutions proposed by previous studies will be mentioned

Chapter 2: Methodology

The Methodology chapter explains why action research was chosen as the research method, shows the steps of how the research was conducted, and justifies data collection instruments and data analysis methods

Chapter 3: Findings and Discussion

In chapter 3, the actions, findings and analysis of the findings of the research are provided in response to the research questions

Part C Conclusion

This part summarizes the findings of the action research, acknowledges the

limitations and offers suggestions for further research

PART B DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1 LITERATURE REVIEW

1 Speaking skills

Among four skills in English learning, speaking and writing are categorized into productive group Speaking is the bridge to reach other skills, helps learners to read better, to listen more effectively and to write more accurately Speaking is surely the most effective means of communication (Ur, 1996)

There are two important reasons why speaking should be taught in classroom First, speaking is considered “a survival skill in real life” (Ur, 1996, p.134) In this era of globalization when English has been regarded as the international language, it is essential for any individual who desires to interact with the surrounding world to be able to speak this language Speaking aids learners to develop not only socially but also academically since it is an indispensable tool for thinking and learning Secondly, the ability to speak English is a good source of motivation for learners The mastery of speaking skills in English is a priority for many second or foreign language learners Richards (2009) pointed out “learners consequently often evaluate their success in language learning as well as the effectiveness of their English course on the basis of how well they fell they have improved in their spoken language proficiency” (p.21) Nunan (1991) agreed with this point of view, claiming that success is measured in terms of the ability to carry out a conversation in the target language It can be concluded that a lot of language learners correlate their proficiency in speaking with their overall ability in the target language, which means that if they are able to speak well, they are more likely to be confident and motivated in studying the language These are the reasons for which speaking skills are hardly neglected in language classroom

Common problems in EFL speaking class:

There are several discussions about problems that come from body of the students their self The problems are commonly become obstacles in teaching speaking Some major problems, according to Brown (2000) and Harmer (2007), are native language, age, exposure, motivation and concern for good speaking

Other specific problems that are commonly observed in the language classroom are related to individual learners’ personalities and attitudes to the learning process and learning speaking in particular They can be defined as follows inhibition (fear of making mistakes, losing face, criticism; shyness), lack of things

to say (learners have problems with finding motives to speak, formulating opinions

or relevant comments), low or uneven participation (often caused by the tendency of some learners to dominate in the group), mother-tongue use (learners find it easier

or more natural to express themselves in their native language) (Ur 1995, 121) As many teachers’ observations indicate, the above situations occur in language classrooms regardless of the level of proficiency or the number of students in the group It seems that all of these phenomena share a relation with reticence of students in speaking activities This is to say that reticence, with its expressions such as inhibition, lack of things to say or low participation, is one of the problems that need to be addressed since it impedes the process of teaching and learning in speaking classroom

2 Reticence:

2.1 Definitions of reticence:

The major characteristic of a reticent person is avoidance of social situations

in which they feel inept (Phillips, 1997) Phillips (1984) stated: “when people avoid communication because they feel they would lose more by talking rather than by remaining silent, we refer to it as reticence” (p.52)

Keaton and Kelly (1999) redefined reticence basing on Phillip’s theory as follow: When people tend to avoid communication because they believe it is better

to remain silent than to risk appearing foolish, this behavior is referred to as

reticence Reticent individuals are those who tend to avoid communication due to the threat of negative evaluation Keaton and Kelly (1999) also asserted that reticence, as a behavioral response, is not always problematic in social communication However, it does become problematic when chronic silence prevents an individual from obtaining his or her personal or professional goals

2.2 Reticence in classroom

Student’s lack of activeness in class is a common problem that has been experienced by a great number of language teachers, especially those who work with Asian students Some demonstrations of students’ reticence are their withdrawal, or fear of interacting with teachers and peers, silence in group discussion and hesitation/ refusal when answering direct questions

Reticence, to some degree, is a strong indicator of academic performance Reticence has been proved to have a detrimental effect on students’ confidence, self-esteem and level of participation Reticent learners suffer from mental blocks during spontaneous speaking activities, lack confidence, are less able to self-edit and identify language errors and are more likely to employ strategies such as skipping class (Liu, 2011) Anxious students are also more likely to forget previously learned material, volunteer answers less frequently and have a greater tendency to remain passive in classroom activities than their less reticent counterparts

Moreover, reticence is not just a problem for individuals themselves By not sharing what they know, those silent students deprive their classmates of opportunities to benefit from their knowledge, insights, and thinking (Liu, 2011) In

a classroom environment, one’s contributions stimulate more and better thinking from others; everyone in a classroom needs to participate – by discussing and by listening to others All students are benefit from idea and perception sharing Consequently, students’ reticence is destructive for teaching and learning process Therefore, the reticent problem deserves to be seriously studied and solutions are expected by all who are concerned with teaching and learning

2.3 Causes of reticence in EFL classroom:

Reticence in English classroom is often considered to correlate with foreign language anxiety The anxiety here stands for the feeling of uneasiness, worry, nervousness and apprehension experienced by non-native speakers when learning or using a second or foreign language Nevertheless, anxiety is only one among many other factors causing unwillingness to speak up of learners

Different researchers have employed different ways of identifying students’ reasons of reticence Using interviews, observations, and journals written by second/foreign language learners, researchers have managed to discover why some language learners choose to remain silent in language classrooms (Dwyer and Heller-Murphy, 1996; Flowerdew and Miller, 2000; Liu, 2005; Donald, 2010; Riasati, 2014) These causes can be summarized as follow:

(1) low self-esteem: students who think of themselves as unable to communicate successfully, so they tend to remain silent out of shame;

(2) fear of negative evaluation when they give inaccurate response;

(3) fear of success: this seemingly strange phenomenon occurs when a student interacts successfully; they consider their success as luck or coincidence and then is afraid that others expecting them to continue excellent performance in the future, which they cannot guarantee

(4) communication apprehension – a fear of communicating with or in the presence

2.4 Foreign Language Class Anxiety Scale (FLCAS)

In attempt to establish a valid and reliable anxiety measure specific to foreign language learning, Horwits (1986) and colleagues developed an instrument called FLCAS to measure the level of learners’ anxiety In their conception, language learning anxiety, can be subcategorized into three distinct forms of performance anxieties namely communication apprehension, test anxiety and fear of negative evaluation

Anxiety has been shown to be one of the major causes for reticence in language class in previous studies (Dwyer and Heller-Murphy, 1996; Liu, 2005; Donald, 2010) High level of anxiety is equivalent to high level of reticence Consequently, the teacher/ researcher found FLCAS a reliable tool to identify students’ reticence

The original FLCAS questionnaire consists of 33 items which can be divided into 3 categories (Communication Apprehension, Test Anxiety and Fear of Negative Evaluation) Among items of each category, there are positively keyed and negatively keyed ones However, all of these items are presented randomly in the

survey without the three category names

Basing on the causes of reticence in language class identified by previous studies and on Liu (2009) adapted questionnaire, some items are precluded or reworded and some others are added to better reflex the situation in the teacher/ researcher’s English classroom and the categories are rearranged The complete

questionnaire used in this study can be seen in Appendix 1

2.5 Possible solutions for reticence in EFL class:

2.5.1 Solutions for general reticence in EFL class:

There have been very few researches exploring the resolutions for the problem of reticence in English class Nguyen, H (2010), Riasati (2014), Songsiri (2007) have pointed out several techniques to encourage reticent students to speak

in classroom Their proposed solutions have a lot in common and all agree on some main points such as: the significant role of communicative language teaching (in

which communication strategies are emphasized), classroom atmosphere, group work, students’ anxiety reduction and students’ attitude Many of these techniques are based on the Cognitive, Affective and Situational Framework put forth by Nation (2007)

a Reduce the level of task difficulty

From Nation (2007)’s point of view, if students do not know enough, they will not be able to perform the task well, and this is one of the causes of students’ unwillingness to speak Teachers can make tasks more accessible for students by (1) giving students more time to do tasks, (2) bringing the tasks within students’ experience and (3)allowing students to collaboratively solve communicative tasks

b Promote positive attitudes among students

Students who have positive attitudes towards language learning are less likely to suffer from language learning anxiety and more likely to participate actively in learning tasks (Tsiplakides & Keramida, 2010) The following techniques can help the teacher build up positive attitudes among students so that they can feel free to speak in the language class First, it is important to change students’ negative beliefs and attitudes towards mistakes, let them know that making errors is a part of learning; hence, meaning-focused oral activities should be utilized Secondly, students’ self-confidence can be boosted by creating various opportunities for classroom success in using spoken English (Oxford, 1999) If easy tasks, clear and simple goals are used in the first place and completed by students, students can achieve sense of success and high self-perceived communication competence more easily Last, Young (1991) suggested that teacher can lower students’ anxiety in the classroom by finding out what students are anxious about, then helping them ease some of their fears and teach them strategies such as self-talks and doing relaxation activities to deal with fears

c Build a supportive learning environment

If students can feel a sense of support from their teacher and classmates, it is more likely that they will be willing to speak in the target language The following

are some techniques that teachers can use to create a supportive atmosphere for students First, teacher may encourage peer support in the classroom to help students feel secure about their answers or performance later Also, teachers are suggested to be sensitive when assigning students into groups since causes for

reticence varies from student to student Next, it is common that students at low

level are not yet able to convey all of their ideas Therefore, they should be allowed

to use L1 when appropriate Last, it is important to make the classroom environment

a non-threatening place by avoiding the following actions: correcting mistakes on the spot, calling on students at random, calling on students without allowing them to prepare for the answers, and calling on a student simply because he/she is quiet or not concentrating (Young, 1991)

2.5.2 Possible solutions for reticence in speaking activities in EFL class

a Communication strategies training

Speaking competence is constructed from two basic parts which are linguistic competence and communicative competence The former includes the ability to pronounce correctly, a sufficient amount of vocabulary and mastery of syntax in another language (Nunan, 1999) The other element, communicative competence involves a range of sociolinguistics and conversational skills which help speakers to know how to converse appropriately

Any language course is sure to include knowledge about pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar, which ensure the practice for linguistic competence However, when a student has not yet mastered the language, they need communicative competence to make up for breakdown in communication due to insufficient competence The more students have communicative competence, the greater confidence they have In other words, communicative competence plays an important role in motivating students to speak Therefore communication strategies will be used as a tool to increase students’ competence and activities are needed to enable this Oxford (in Nunan and Carter, 2001, p vi) believed that:

Strategies are an important factor to develop communicative competence Learners

developing appropriate learning strategies have greater self-confidence and learn more effectively

According to Bygate (1987), communication strategies include achievement

strategies and reduction strategies The former involves attempting to compensate

for speaker’s language by improvising a substitute, while the latter means reducing the message so as either to bring it within the scope of speaker’s knowledge or else

to abandon the message and go on with something the speaker can manage In this study, the aim is to encourage students to speak up in class instead of avoiding communication problem; consequently, achievement strategies are preferred to be applied There are various types of achievement strategies that students may use, including:

the target language The teacher/ researcher finds this strategy impractical for Vietnamese students as their mother-tongue share very few pronunciation rules in common with English

b Borrowing a word from mother-tongue: when lack vocabulary in the target

language, speaker may use L1 occasionally with the hope that the interlocutor will get the message This strategy is feasible in a language class where all students have the same mother-tongue

c Literally translating a mother-tongue word: for example, a Portuguese

speaker could try the word “feast” instead of “party” or “holiday”, based on “festa” However, this strategy also requires a certain vocabulary and similarity between mother-tongue and target language

the basis of his or her knowledge of the language For example, “airball” can be used instead of “balloon”

e Paraphrasing: searching the speaker’s knowledge of the target-language

vocabulary to find an alternative to the expression that they need The speaker can look for a synonym or a more general word

drawback of this strategy is that it can only be applied for available objects, and required the “acting” ability of the speaker

From the experience of the teacher/ researcher, strategies (a) and (c) are hardly used by Vietnamese students due to aforementioned reasons, strategy (f) is sometimes employed The rest of the strategies (b, d, e) are most feasible for level

of her students

b Brain-storming strategies training:

Brainstorming is an activity used to generate ideas in small groups The purpose is to generate as many ideas as possible within a specified time-period These ideas are not evaluated until the end and a wide range of ideas is often produced Each idea produced does not need to be usable Instead, initial ideas can

be viewed as a starting point for more workable ideas The principle of brainstorming is that you need lots of ideas to get good ideas

In diagnosing phase, the teacher/ researcher has identified one of the key factor preventing students from speaking up in class is their lack of ideas She is convinced that brainstorming is an effective strategy to help students cope with idea shortage

In order to find out why some learners are more successful than others, Rubin (1975) studied the characteristics of good learners and explained why brainstorming is a useful tool in classroom

(1) Brainstorming invites the learners to organize existing knowledge in their own minds It works to activate the resources of the student by creating a series of connecting ideas This leads to an organization of language

(2) Brainstorming can help learners to take charge of their own learning Learners begin examining their existing resources and identifying gaps in their knowledge

This allows learners to become involved in the selection of language used in the speaking task

(3) Brainstorming can help students to learn to take risks There are no 'right' or 'wrong' answers in brainstorming and no danger of teacher correction By carrying out a simple brainstorming warm-up, students can obtain a sense of competence and feel more confident in raising their ideas

As discussed in this section, brainstorming can help our students to become better learners Moreover, they will learn language from each other and by interacting together they will become better communicators

Brainstorming has a wide range of application In EFL class, it can be employed in different stages of a lesson; therefore, it is believed to be an effective strategy that aid speaking activities Basic brainstorming training for speaking activities in class includes four following steps: (1) Identifying the topic/ question/ argument, (2) Contributing ideas, (3) Categorizing ideas into groups and (4) Selecting most suitable ideas

c Motivational feedback:

Edge (1993) asserted that the key to learning is motivation When teaching a particular group, there are a lot of factors which may make students fail to achieve the lesson objectives, among which poor motivation is a common cause Tucker et

al (2002) suggested that motivation directly affects academic achievement, whereas the other factors only have indirect influence on learners through motivation

Dörnyei (1994) asserted that teacher’s feedback plays a significant role in forming learners’ motivation Research on reticence has also pointed out that many students refuse to speak in class due to their fear of negative evaluation from teachers This means the teacher needs to be sensitive in giving feedback if she desires to motivate reticent students Tosti (2006, p 6) defined two types of feedback: motivational feedback and formative or corrective feedback In this study, the teacher/ researcher focused more on using of motivational feedback since she desired to boost the motivation of students

Regarding F Hyland and K Hyland’s (2001) study, praise can be considered

in terms of its functions as feedback Praise is performed in different ways and for different purposes Mueller and Dweck (1998) stated that feedback for effort can affect students’ goals and attributions First, effort-related feedback could “lead students to focus on the process of their work and the possibilities for learning and improvement that hard work may offer” (p 34) Since it places emphasis on efforts, students may focus on the development of their skills through the mastery of new material, and then they continue displays of persistence, enjoyment, and good performance Second, students who are praised for their hard work may learn to improve their performance to achieve their goals regardless of their poor performance which is considered as a temporary “lapse in effort rather than as a deficit in intelligence” (Mueller & Dweck, 1998, p 34)

In terms of corrective feedback, researchers have agreed that it is associated with L2 learning, because it leads learners to notice L2 forms (Bitchener & Knoch, 2010) However, there is no uniformly agreed conclusion that feedback has a direct impact on learners’ oral performance Truscott (1999) claimed orally direct correction has no impact on learners’ grammatical accuracy in speech

Feedback is employed in this project with the purpose of encouraging students, lessening their fear of negative evaluations in the hope that students will

be more active in speaking activities Accordingly, in the intervention phase of this project, the teacher/ researcher utilized more motivational feedback, especially effort feedback than other types of feedback

3 Related studies:

Students’ reticence in EFL class is an issue that has been exploited in various aspects Beside a large number of studies carried out investigate factors underlying students’ reticence and its effects on studying process, there are other research attempting to promote their confidence in foreign language classroom by employing different measurements Meihua Liu (2011) explored correlation between Foreign language anxiety and English learning motivation and found out that these two

factor significantly negatively related with each other Donald (2010) employed error correction and extended wait-time to promote learners’ participation in language classroom Songsiri (2007) carried out a research improve Thai students’ motivation to speak English through a range of self-design materials and activities used for promoting students’ confidence in speaking English

One common point shared by these studies is the employment of Foreign Language Class Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) developed by Horwits (1986) Meihua Liu (2009), in his investigation into Reticence and Anxiety in Oral English Lessons, made use of an adapted version of FLCAS to calculate reticence level of students This current study is inspired by Liu’s research and also applies his version of questionnaire as a research instrument

SUMMARY:

In this chapter, key concepts related to the study have been defined, including speaking skills, reticence and Foreign Language Class Anxiety Scale Previous studies relating to reticence in language classroom are also reviewed, which provided a list of possible causes and solutions for reticence in English classroom The suggested solutions for reticence in speaking activities include three measurements: brainstorming strategies, communication strategies and motivational feedback

CHAPTER 2 METHODOLOGY

1 Background of the study

1.1 Description of the English course and textbook

For English subject in Hanoi University of Science, the course book employed is New English File Intermediate (Student book) by Clive Oxenden & Christina Latham-Koenig (2007) Supplementary materials include New English File Intermediate (Work book) and English Pronunciation in Use – Elementary by Johnathan Marks (2007) Besides, students are provided with an exercising book prepared by teacher staff basing on the main course book

English subject is taught in the first 3 semesters of college years, with different syllabuses and studying materials for different levels from A1 to B1 (according to CEFR) Achieving B1 level is the prerequisite for students in order to graduate There are 6 English sessions per week, divided into 2 periods (2 days in a week) with 3 sessions for each day One class will work with one or two teachers during their course

Students are supposed to finish this language requirement after 3 semesters

In fact, this is challenging for many students as they have to retake the standardized test several times, or to delay this subject and come back when they have done all other subjects This, together with the nature of credit learning, results in mixed-level classes

1.2 Participants

The researcher was in charge of a class of 24 second year students majoring

in different natural sciences including Math, Biology, Physic and Environmental Science There are 18 females and 7 males, ranging from 18 – 21 years old In terms

of language level, these students have already passed the English A2 course and received equal learning opportunities as well as learning materials such as course books or supplementary materials from the teacher

It is the fact that high school students in Vietnam have the tendency to prioritize certain subjects that help them to pass university entrance exams and

choose to neglect the others Consequently, the majority of students in this study, who majors relate to science, did not take English lessons seriously in high school since their majors are sciences The research was carried out in semester 1 of their second academic year At this point of time, students were supposed to have completed level A2 of CEFR and be ready to study to achieve the next level (B1) However, a number of students did not pass the A2 exam, still they are allowed to take B1 course in order to keep up with their graduation plan Accordingly, a high percentage of these participants have rather low English proficiency

Additionally, it is a common situation in Vietnam that English subject is mainly taught with grammar-translation approach, which leads to the neglect of necessary language skills, one of which is speaking Students rarely have chances to practice speaking and dealing with communicative situation Hence, a great number

of university students cannot even produce simple sentences or hold a basic conversation in English after several years of learning English in high school

What is more, language proficiency seems to vary among students from different regions In general, students from big cities are more likely to be familiar with English thanks to their easier access to learning materials, studying facilities as well as qualified teachers On the other hand, those for students in provinces and villages are limited

2 Action research

2.1 Rationale for action research

Action research is the process of systematic collection and analysis of data in order to make changes and improvement or solve problems (Wallace, 1998, p.1) Nunan (1992, p 17) saw action research as, “A form of research which is becoming increasingly significant in language education.” People who want to bring about change must learn about the situation that they wish to influence and then consult closely with the people most likely to be affected by the project Research matters originate from teachers’ own problems and concerns in their own class, and action

research is carried out by practitioners/teachers to find out the solutions to their current classroom problems

Action research can help a researcher fill the gap from theory to practice Most other classroom research which is implemented by outside-class researchers for the purposes of “theory construction and testing”; in many such cases, there are hardly any attention paid to the voices of teachers On the other hand, action research can improve the current teaching situation in terms of boosting teachers’ professional development, teacher training and presenting to an institution evidence

of the need for change Elyildirim and Ashton (2006, p 4)

When compared to traditional research, action research proves to be more suitable for the aim of this study for several reasons summarized in the following table:

Table 1 Comparison between traditional research and action research

Before planning actions, action researchers have to carefully investigate and collect sufficient evidences to identify students’ problems In the next step, the researcher is able to improve the situation after thoroughly understanding what they were facing Hence, the very nature of what the teacher or the research was trying to

do is problem-solving, not only problem-identifying Indeed, Dick and Swepson (2013) emphasize that one type of research method cannot serve every purpose of

researchers According to Glickman, Gordon and Ross-Gordon (2009), while other traditional research methods tend to take developing new knowledge as the final purpose, action research has the purpose of solving practical problem and improving practice Although action research is not the key to solve every issue, it is precious way for practitioners who desire to improve their practice (Dick and Swepson, 2013) For the stated reasons, the researcher of this study considered action research a practical solution to her classroom problem, rather than the generalization of the results found by someone else from their own teaching context

2.2 Action research model

Waters-Adams (2006) described the process of action research in five main stages

Step1: Problem Identification Problems that occur in the classrooms from

previous experience are identified This is when the teacher notices a problem in his/her classroom

Step 2: Preliminary Investigation Further investigations about the problem are

conducted in order to help researchers to have more insight of the situation In this step, the teacher spends time observing the class and taking notes of their behavior

Step 3: Hypothesis After observation, the teacher forms a question or hypothesis as

to the cause of the problem

identifying problems or concerns within a

classroom

conducting a preliminary investigation

(data-gathering)

forming assumptions or hypotheses

devising and implementing some form of intervention or treatment to address the problem

evaluating the effects of this practice

Figure 1 Waters-Adams’s action research model (2006)

Step 4: Intervention After observing the class and forming the hypothesis, the

teacher plans the lessons and tries out strategies which may solve problems defined

by the hypothesis

Step 5: Evaluation After a certain period of time, the teacher consciously observes

or measures the class again to see if there has been any improvement

3 Research instruments

Action research is employed by the teacher/ researcher to bring about

improvement in her classroom This study made use of questionnaire, classroom

observation and reflective report as tools to collect data

3.1 Questionnaire

Questionnaire is employed at the beginning phase of the study to diagnose the level of students’ reticence before intervention as well as the major reasons for reticence of student; questionnaire is used once more after intervention to investigate the effectiveness of speaking activities applied by teacher in the perception of students

Dörnyei (2003) suggested that questionnaire has always been used as one of the most common methods of data collection in both quantitative and qualitative studies A well-designed questionnaire is capable of obtaining a great deal of needed information “in a systematic manner” (pp.9-10), and helps the researcher to save a lot of time and effort However, not everyone could design a good questionnaire to elicit the needed information A poorly designed questionnaire may make a topic-interesting research terribly fail (Dörnyei, 2003) For these reasons, the researcher decided not to design a questionnaire by herself, but adapting existing ones whose validity and reliability have been already proved over time

The questionnaire used in this study utilizes the 33-item Foreign Language

Class Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) (Horwitz et al 1986) To fit the present research,

some modifications were made to the original questionnaire In addition, some more items were added to the questionnaire to better reflex the situation in the teacher/

researcher’s English classroom (See appendix 1) Also, the research rearranged the

categories of items in the original questionnaire so that they match with possible causes of reticence which have been found out by previous research The

components of the questionnaire used in this study can be seen in appendix 2

Designed on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from “Strongly Disagree” to “Strongly Agree” Since students’ proficiency was not enough to ensure their understanding when reading the items in English, all of the items were translated into Vietnamese before being implemented to make sure that students did not misunderstand any point

This questionnaire was administered to students twice, at the beginning of the study and after intervention to measure students’ anxiety levels at those two points of time This way, the researcher was able to see the change in students’ level

of reticence after implementing her solutions

Regardless of its design and efficiency in collecting data, questionnaire can

be misinterpreted by the respondents and truthfulness of respondents cannot be ensured Consequently, information from questionnaire is verified with classroom observation and students’ reflective reports

3.2 Classroom observation

Classroom observation offers a numerous of advantages for teachers/ researchers at individual level: (1) permit researchers to study the processes of education in naturalistic settings; (2) provide more detailed and precise evidence than other data sources; and (3) stimulate change and verify that the change occurred The teacher observed the lessons to measure how student’s reticence changes during the intervention process To be specific, teacher of the class and a guest teacher kept a weekly record of students’ behavior in the classroom during the whole term In particular, she was asked to note down whether the students were reticent, active, anxious, or confident in different classroom activities: presentation, pair work, group work, and teacher-student activity The expression of activeness in these speaking activities was agreed upon in advance by the two observers They based on certain expressions of students when participating gin these activities to

decide their level of activeness: frequency of contributing ideas to the group/ pair, withdrawal from group/ pair discussions, doing their own things when other members are working or simply not paying attention to the discussion

3.3 Reflective report

Pennington (1992, cited in Varasarin, 2007, p.82) mentioned two useful roles

of reflective reports Firstly, it can be a tool for students to be aware of their own feelings and level of reticence in speaking activities, which allows them to recognize their own improvement after the project is done Secondly, through the report, perception of the learners as well as their recognition of what of the course is the most valuable to them In this study, reflective reports were used by students to self-evaluate their improvement and record their attitude towards the training course Besides, based on these reflections, the researcher was able to identify limitations of the training course and most valuable things that students had gained from it Similar to questionnaires, the guidance of the reflective report was given in Vietnamese so that students could have full understanding of what the researcher

wanted to convey (See appendix 4)

4 Research procedure

In data collection and analysis, students’ names are coded according to their number of order in the class’ checklist To be specific, with the purpose of making it more convenient for observers to keep track on each individual, students have a small badge with number stick onto their shirts’ front This way, instead of trying to recall name of each students, observers can simply refer to their number on the checklist and quickly note down their behavior in speaking activities Also, in data analysis, students’ names are coded as S1 to S24 in order to avoid confusion for the researcher, as well as ensure anonymity for participants

4.1 Research steps:

This study follows Water-Adams’ five-step action research model (2006) In

step 1 (problem identification) of this action research, at the beginning of the

semester, the teacher noticed that most students in class were unwilling to speak

Therefore, she spent two weeks on step 2 (preliminary investigation), the

questionnaire which measures level of reticence was administered to the

participants and then collected Next, for step 3, basing on the gathered data from the questionnaires, the teacher/ researcher formed a hypothesis of possible reasons

leading to reticence in speaking activities and then devised solutions to improve the

situation Step four – intervention – is when the teacher makes change to her

lessons plan and implemented measurements that are supposed to reduce students’ reticence in speaking activities, including brainstorming strategies communication,

communication strategies training and motivational feedbacks In the last step –

evaluation, the teacher utilized different research instruments to check if there is

any decrease in students’ reticence or not The instruments employed in this step are

the second questionnaire, classroom observation and students’ reflective reports

4.2 Data analysis

After gathered, the questionnaire will be assessed and analyzed to identify the recent level of reticence in English class and the major reasons causing students’ reticence Each items in the questionnaire has a numerical value ranging from 1 to

5 Positively keyed items have ascending value from “strongly disagree” (1 point) to

“strongly agree” (5) while negatively keyed ones have descending value from

“strongly disagree” (5) to “strongly agree” (1) The maximum mark a respondent can gain is 210 when he/she chooses all strongly agrees for positively keyed items and all strongly disagrees for negatively keyed ones One the other hand, the minimum mark is 42, which means choosing all 1-point-value alternatives The mark can be interpreted as: the more points a person gets in this survey, the less reticent he/she is

Classroom observation checklist also follows a 5-point Likert Scale, which indicates students’ activeness with five levels from “Inactive” (1 point) to “Active” (5 points) Along with questionnaires’ result, statistics from observation checklists provide information about changes in level of reticent of each student throughout 6 weeks of intervention

Information from students’ reflective reports are analyzed and quoted as the evidence in the study

All the collected data cooperated to help the researcher gain a thorough overview on the problems and seek out the best solutions

4.3 Procedure of the intervention

Teacher’s self-observation and reflection helped record what happened in the classroom The intervention was a week-by-week action project which lasted for six weeks According to the syllabus, the English B1 course started at the beginning of September and lasted for fifteen weeks The researcher project tried to cover half of the semester (before mid-term test) Week 1 and week 2 in the syllabus were pre-process stages in which problem was identified with the first surveys The intervention was adapted starting from week 3 to week 8 of the syllabus

Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Pre-

Table 2 Timeline of intervention phase

Week 1 and Week 2: pre-intervention

Week 3: Start of brainstorming training

From this week on, the teacher/ researcher invited a colleague teacher to observe students behavior in speaking activities, using the observation checklist

Period 1:

In order to help students generate ideas for group discussion and form an outline for presentation on certain topics, teacher introduced students to group brainstorming strategies, following four basic steps: (1) Identifying the topic, (2) Contributing ideas in group, (3) Categorizing ideas into groups, and (4) Selecting the most suitable ideas

The sample topic for brainstorming was “What can you do to keep healthy?” This is a familiar topic to every student and does not require any argument First, the teacher organize a game in which students are divided into two groups; members of each group, in turn, had to read out loud every words that come

to their mind when thinking of “keeping healthy” and try to outnumber the other group The purpose of this competitive game is to force students to think fast without feeling stressful All relevant words are written down onto the board

In the next step, teacher asked students whether they see connection between these words, and how they would arrange words into different group Students were given some minutes to discuss in group of 4 or 5 After that, teacher and students group the written words together into categories such as “sport”,

“diet”, or “bad habits” At this point, teacher introduced students to mind-mapping strategies, thanks to which they can arrange ideas into groups systematically

Subsequently, basing on the generated words and groups, students are asked

to think of an outline for a short speech about ways to keep healthy Teachers suggested that it would be difficult to include every detail into the speech, so students should choose only the ideas they want to discuss

Last, teacher delivered an informal sample speech about keeping healthy, using words and ideas from the brainstorming session Homework for students is writing a short paragraph about keeping fit, using generated words and ideas

At the end of the period, teacher provided students with handouts of reading materials relating to the theme of family and guiding questions The reading articles were collected from online magazines and simplified Also, new or relevant vocabulary of the theme was underlined Students were expected to read the

handout at home to prepare for the next lesson by translating underlined vocabulary into Vietnamese and give answers to the guiding questions

Period 2:

As students had been provided with reading materials about the topic of the lesson, the questions for discussing/ brainstorming in this period was “Do you prefer living in a nuclear or extended family?” Students were divided into 6 groups

of 4 Three groups were in charge of brainstorming supporting ideas for the advantages of living in a nuclear family and the other three groups thought about those of living in an extended family Teacher and colleague observed the discussion and note down students’ behavior

After students had finished generating supporting ideas, the teacher helped them to form an outline to compare the advantages of living in two kinds of family

by arranging ideas on the board Then, students were given some minutes to look at the ideas, make preparation before required to individually give one reason for their preference of type of family Students were allowed to use dictionary if necessary

Brainstorming activities took place every period, either for group discussion, pair discussion or for preparation of individual presentation

Week 4 and Week 5: Communication strategies training

Communication strategies were taught in 2 weeks, 4 periods Four achievement strategies were introduced to students including (1) Using body language (miming), (2) Asking for help, (3) Coining words, (4) Paraphrasing respectively The training started from the strategy that the teacher assumed to be easiest and most helpful for students

In her book “Teaching communication strategies”, Ogane (1998) offered a

series of activities together with thorough instructions and handouts that help teachers to get students practice these strategies effectively An illustration of this is

“Guess the words” game in which students are required to explain an assigned word for their partners to guess This game is one of several activities to practice

paraphrasing Handout for “Guess the word” game can be found in Appendix 8

The handouts provided by Ogane (1998) are originally designed for Japanese students; hence, the teacher/researcher applied adaption to make them usable in her Vietnamese classroom

In each period in week 4 and 5, students learned how to apply each strategy

in conversations with teacher and peers Class observers took notice of how much students were able to utilize communication strategies in speaking activities and whether these strategies assisted students to become more active and less anxious

Week 6 – Week 8

In the rest of time, class activities kept on involving brainstorming activities and communication strategies Reading materials relevant to lessons’ themes were always issued to students in advance so that they have more time and resource to prepare for in-class activities

Week 9 and Week 10: evaluating the effect of the intervention

In week 9, teacher administered the questionnaire for students the second time to investigate their level of reticence after the intervention In week 10, interviews were carried out with three students that showed most improvement and three students without any noticeable change in reticence level

Throughout this procedure, motivational feedback was adopted by teacher

when giving comments on students’ performance The teacher followed these criteria when giving motivational feedbacks to students:

(1) Not all mistakes need correcting as long as students can deliver the message (2) Effort feedback is delivered right after students’ performance Teacher focuses

on positive traits that students displayed in their performance, corrects only a few mistakes on form if necessary

(3) Detailed corrective feedback is noted down by teacher during students’ performance, then teacher either handed the written feedback to students individually or had a short and informal oral feedback session with each student at break time or at the end of the class

A sample of lesson plan for speaking session throughout 6 weeks can be

found in appendix 5

SUMMARY:

In this chapter, explanation of the research design and research methods used

in this research has been provided Action research was employ together with such instruments as the adapted version of Foreign Language class Anxiety Scale questionnaire, classroom observation and students’ reflective report Measurements utilized in the intervention phase are brainstorming training strategies, communication training strategies and motivational feedbacks

CHAPTER 3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

This chapter presents the research findings which are organized according to the research questions of the study Numbers and figures collected from questionnaires and observations are visually illustrated in diagrams together with data analysis in written form Reflective reports are quoted as detailed explanations for these data The chapter consists of result section, which provides full descriptions of the collected data, and discussion section, which is more interpretive and explanatory in light of research questions These two sections may not always

be clearly separated but intertwined in data analysis

1 Research question 1: What is the recent level of reticence in English speaking activities of students?

The purpose of this part is not only to measure how reticent students are before the intervention, but also to find out major reasons for the problem, which aid teacher/ researcher in adjusting her lessons for intervention

First questionnaire’s result:

The overall pattern of questionnaire result is that the number of items with score 1 or 2 is dominant, while those with score 3 occur not as frequent, and those with score 4 and 5 rarely appear This means a majority of students choose Agree