AN ACTION RESEARCH ON IMPROVING STUDENTS’ PRONUNCIATION THROUGH FOCUSED TASKS FOR THE SECOND YEAR NON ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT ECONOMICS DEPARTMENT OF HAI PHONG UNIVERSITY

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES PHẠM HẢI YẾN AN ACTION RESEARCH ON IMPROVING STUDENTS’ PRONUNCIATION THROUGH FOCUSED TASKS FOR THE SECOND-YEAR NONENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS AT ECONOMICS DEPARTMENT OF HAI PHONG UNIVERSITY NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ VIỆC NÂNG CAO PHÁT ÂM CHO SINH VIÊN THÔNG QUA BÀI TẬP TRỌNG ĐIỂM ĐỐI VỚI SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ HAI KHOA KINH TẾ TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC HẢI PHÒNG M.A MINOR THESIS Major: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60.14.10 HANOI – 2012 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGEMENT i ABSTRACT .ii LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES iii PART A: INTRODUCTION Rationale………………………………………………………… Statement of the problem……………………………………… Purposes of the study Research questions Scope of the study………………………… Research method Significance of the study………………………………………… ………… Design of the study…………………………………………………………… PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW Overview of approaches and methods in pronunciation teaching 1.1 Overview of approaches in pronunciation teaching 1.2 Overview of methods in pronunciation teaching Overview of tasks 2.1 Task definition …………………………………………………… 2.2 Task type …………………………………………………………………… 10 2.3 Task components…………………………………………………………… 12 Task-based language teaching … 13 3.1 Definition of task-based language teaching………………….….………… 13 3.2 The framework of task-based language teaching…………………………… 15 3.3 Principles for task-based language teaching………………………………….16 Related studies …17 v CHAPTER II: METHODOLOGY Argument for the use of focused tasks to improve second year students’ English pronunciation .19 Rationale for the use of an action research 26 Background of the study .29 3.1 Participants……………………………………………………………………29 3.2 The English and pronunciation program………………………………… 30 Instruments 31 Intervention 34 Research program 34 Procedures…………………………………………………………………… 36 CHAPTER III: FINDINGS Students’ problems in English sound pronunciation 37 1.1 Students’ problems with English vowels 37 1.2 Students’ problems with English consonants 41 1.3 Students’ problems with English sounds in “ed” and “s/es” endings……… 47 Possible reasons for the students’ weak pronunciation competence 49 2.1 The teachers’ and students’ awareness of and attitude on English pronunciation and students’ problems in English pronunciation 49 2.2 Students’ ability on English pronunciation 53 2.3 Students’ pronunciation learning at secondary schools and during the previous years of the university 55 2.4 Other reasons………………………………… …………………………….57 Comparison of the students’ pronunciation performance in the pretest and the posttest……………………………………………… ………………… …… 58 The students’ participation in other English courses during the time between the pretest and the posttest 61 The students’ attitude and their justification of the focused tasks on pronunciation given in the research 61 CHAPTER IV: DISCUSSION AND IMPLICATION vi Discussion of research questions 63 Pedagogical implication 70 PART C: CONCLUSION Conclusions 74 Limitations of the study 75 Suggestion for further study 76 REFERENCES 78 APPENDICES I vii PART A: INTRODUCTION Rationale English has been playing a more and more important role in the trend of globalization in every field all over the world Good English grammar knowledge, reading and writing skills are not enough to meet the demand of the new conditions any more New life requires us the ability to communicate directly in real-life situations This means that it is necessary for us, especially our students, the owners of the future, to be skillful in English speaking and listening To achieve this, good pronunciation is a factor, which can’t be lack of, because weak English pronunciation results in low effect of English speaking and many difficulties in English listening However, in my experience as a teacher of English for three years, English pronunciation has not paid enough attention to by many second year non-English majored students at Hai Phong University Many pronunciation errors have been made by the students here This can be recognized in their speaking in every normal English period or their English speaking final tests in previous years or partly in bad results in listening tests recently Thus, dealing with the students’ problem of pronunciation is very necessary and urgent This is the responsibility of the students themselves and their teachers as well As a teacher of Hai Phong University, I have taken much notice of what can be used to improve the students’ English pronunciation In the communicative language teaching approach, tasks are widely used to improve many students’ language skills such as listening, speaking, reading and writing In my opinion, focused tasks, which have become more and more familiar with both students and teachers nowadays, may be useful to help improve pronunciation because of their advantages to students According to the web Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, Communicative tasks have Task-based learning is advantageous to the student because it is more student-centered, allows for more meaningful communication, and often provides for practical extra-linguistic skill building As the tasks are likely to be familiar to the students (eg: visiting the doctor), students are more likely to be engaged, which may further motivate them in their language learning Additionally, tasks promote language acquisition through the types of language and interaction they require Although the teacher may present language in the pre-task, the students are ultimately free to use what grammar constructs and vocabulary they want This allows them to use all the language they know and are learning, rather than just the 'target language' of the lesson On the other hand, tasks can also be designed to make certain target forms 'task-essential,' thus making it communicatively necessary for students to practice using them In terms of interaction, information gap tasks in particular have been shown to promote negotiation of meaning and output modification The need of improving the students’ English pronunciation at Hai Phong University and the advantages of using tasks in language teaching motivated me to the research on: “An action research on improving students’ pronunciation through focused tasks for the second-year non-English major students at Economics Department of Haiphong University” Statement of the problem The detailed current situation of teaching pronunciation at Economic Department, HaiPhong University will be analyzed in the next chapter In this part, we only look through the major characteristic of the statement of the problem As a teachers at English Department of Haiphong university, I have realized that Vietnamese students in general and economic students in Haiphong university in particular have a lot of problems concerning their pronunciation though there have been much innovation in teaching and learning English in their secondary and high schools Thanks to the reformations in education system at secondary and high schools for the recent years, Vietnamese students now have chances to learn English in all four skills – reading, listening, speaking and writing – rather than only reading and grammar as it used to be in the past However, a great number of students who even become university students still cannot listen or speak English well For example, most of the students in HaiPhong University failed in listening Toeic test in the grading exams at the beginning of school year in 2012 Another example is the fact that, many students having good knowledge of English but their speaking is not understandable in class when they answer teachers’ questions though they can write the answers correctly The main reason for these problems lies in their bad pronunciation Another fact is that many non English major students graduated from University also have the same problems They cannot listen and speak well in their job I myself met a very young bank teller at a big bank in Hai Phong who was very embarrassed and failed in a conversation with a foreign guest in a simple situation in his job The guest could not understand his speaking and finally the teller wrote his words on a paper, and the information exchange was carried out on paper It is undeniable that, the failure in communication in this case was not the knowledge but the pronunciation problems In fact, we can meet many similar cases in work environment everywhere, in which the people in non English major fields cannot use English in communication in spite of many years of learning English This means that the pronunciation was not improved during the long time of learning English at secondary, high schools and Universities From some above examples, it seems to us that students’ pronunciation has not been concerned enough in either schools or universities and pronunciation teaching and learning English pronunciation there still meets many problems leading to the low effectiveness in this work With the wonders about the statement of the problems, the writer decided to research on it Purposes of the study This research was designed to improve the students’ pronunciation performance by using focused tasks Generally, it has three purposes: - To investigate a number of common English pronunciation problems faced by second year non-English majored students at Hai Phong university However, due to the limitation of time, the research only focused on a number of English sounds - To find possible reasons for the weak English pronunciation ability of the students - To justify the effect of using focused tasks on the students’ English pronunciation Research questions With the above purposes, the research is conducted to answer the following questions: What are the students’ most common problems regarding some English sounds? What are the possible reasons for the students’ weak pronunciation of English? How can focused tasks improve students’ English pronunciation? Scope of the study The research was conducted on the second year non-English majored students at Economics department of Hai Phong University Regarding its scope, the research was only aimed at justifying the effect of focused tasks on the students’ pronunciation of English sounds Other aspects of English pronunciation would not be investigated Even though the researcher use speaking tests as an important instrument for the research, only issues concerning the students’ pronunciation of English sounds were taken into consideration Research method The method used in this study is action research, with the use of some instruments such as observation, questionnaires, speaking test and interviews Action research was chosen for the study because the aim of the study was improving the students’ pronunciation within a certain context The combination of different instruments in the research would help to get reliable data and help the researcher have a good investigation into the problems that the students were having Significance of the study The study can be much beneficial to English teachers, students and researchers Firstly, English teachers, especially those who have never had enough attention to their students’ English pronunciation and how to improve it, will have some new experiences on this problems and a new look at the methodology of pronunciation teaching- using focused tasks The study hopes to be a sample or suggestion for them to develop focused tasks in pronunciation lessons and other English skill lessons as well Furthermore, the limitation of this research and problems during the application of focused tasks in teaching pronunciation will be valuable for English teachers so that they can conduct Task- based English period more smoothly and successfully Secondly, for students, the new method is expected to bring a lively and interesting environment for their pronunciation lessons in which they can benefit directly Students can experience a new way of learning pronunciation and have more inspiration with pronunciation Besides, they can also get some good experiences for their self- studying to improve their English pronunciation Finally, for the researchers, the study can provide useful information for further studies of the same topic in the future Briefly, English teachers, students and researchers can benefit from the results of this research Design of the study The study consists of three parts: Part A - Introduction - presents an overview of the study in which the rationale for the research, the research statements, the purposes, the research questions, the scope of the study, the research method, the significance of the study and the design of the study were briefly presented Part B – Development: Chapter I - Literature review - reviews the background theory relevant to the study, including the definition of focused tasks It also presents a number of researches in which techniques or tasks have been used to help students make improvement in their language study Chapter II - Methodology – is a detailed discussion of the method used in the study including justification for the use of focused tasks and action research It also gives the description of research components such as participants, contexts, research instruments…, as well as research program Chapter III – Findings – shows the findings of the research which express the effectiveness of the study Chapter IV – Discussions and implications – discusses the findings of the research, gives implications Part C: - Conclusion- presents the conclusions, limitations of the research Besides, this part makes recommendations for further research in the same field PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW Overview of approaches and methods in pronunciation teaching 1.1 Overview of approaches in pronunciation teaching According to Celce-Murcia., et al, (1996, p.2)in Teaching Pronunciation, there are two general approaches to the teaching of pronunciation in the modem times, namely intuitive- imitative approach and analytic-linguistic approach An intuitive-imitative approach depends on “the learners’ ability to listen to and imitate the rhythms and sounds of the target language without the intervention of any explicit information.” This means the teaching of pronunciation depends largely on the teacher’s turning on and rewinding a cassette player (or any other instrument), and the main activities in the class are listening and repeating Of course, in order to this, there must be the supply of authentic materials as well as recording devices to use during the lesson The teacher has no responsibility to explain how sounds are formed or produced Learners their main task of listening and imitating, and it is expected that they will gradually gain pronunciation competence An analytic-linguistic approach “utilizes information and tools such as a phonetic alphabet, articulatory descriptions, charts of the vocal apparatus and other aids to supplement listening, imitation, and production.” In this approach, learners are given explanation as well as training on how to form particular sounds of the target language This approach is actually a further development of the first approach rather than to replace it because is still makes great use of authentic materials, as well as listening and imitating phases during the lessons Today, the dominant teaching approach has been the Communicative Approach Under this approach, the main objective of language is communication Therefore, students are not required to have a native-like pronunciation, but intelligible one This is a kind of “accepted pronunciation”, which means students may make some mistakes provided those mistakes not affect negatively on the comprehension of the listeners or cause misunderstanding k Only in the parts of lessons for pronunciation l In the parts of lessons for pronunciation and during teaching new words in every period 30 In your opinion, the time for pronunciation teaching in class was: c enough b not enough c much 31 How did you teach English pronunciation in the class? i Teacher read and asked your students to repeat j Teacher described the way to pronounce, read to modal and asked students to repeat k Teacher described the way to pronounce, played CD or tape player for your students to listen and asked students to repeat l Other ways: ……………………………………………………… 32 How often did you use CD or tape players in pronunciation teaching? c Every time b sometimes c never d rarely 33 Besides asking students to repeat in class, did you use different activities to help your students improve their pronunciation? g Exercises : never □ h Games: never □ rarely□ sometimes □ usually □ rarely □ sometimes □ usually □ i Group work and pair work: never □ rarely□ usually sometimes □ □ 34 In your opinion, how many of your students could read the words in a dictionary correctly with the phonetic transcription? c