Developing speaking skill of young learners through cognitive perspectives at atlantic languages and informatics school

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES - ĐỖ THỊ HUYỀN THESIS SUMMARY DEVELOPING SPEAKING SKILL OF YOUNG LEARNERS THROUGH COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVES AT ATLANTIC LANGUAGES AND INFORMATICS SCHOOL (PHÁT TRIỂN KỸ NĂNG NÓI CỦA HỌC VIÊN NHỎ TUỔI THÔNG QUA QUAN ĐIỂM TRI NHẬN TẠI TRƯỜNG NGOẠI NGỮ TIN HỌC ĐẠI TÂY DƯƠNG) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Hanoi, 2014 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES - ĐỖ THỊ HUYỀN THESIS SUMMARY DEVELOPING SPEAKING SKILL OF YOUNG LEARNERS THROUGH COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVES AT ATLANTIC LANGUAGES AND INFORMATICS SCHOOL (PHÁT TRIỂN KỸ NĂNG NĨI CỦA HỌC VIÊN NHỎ TUỔI THƠNG QUA QUAN ĐIỂM TRI NHẬN TẠI TRƯỜNG NGOẠI NGỮ TIN HỌC ĐẠI TÂY DƯƠNG) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Supervisor: Dr Phạm Hữu Đức Hanoi, 201 DECLARATION OF AUTHORSHIP I, ĐỖ THỊ HUYỀN, declare that this graduation thesis is original and has not been submitted for assessment elsewhere I declare that this assignment is my own work and does not involve plagiarism or collusion Date: … / … / 2014 Signature Đỗ Thị Huyền ACKNOWLEDMENTS This study has been completed with the help and support of many people Therefore, I am grateful to all of them First, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Mr Phạm Hữu Đức, PhD, my supervisor, for his instructive suggestions and valuable comments on the writings on this study Without him, the present study would not been accomplished At the same time, I also give my thanks to all students at Atlantic Languages & Informatics School (ALIS) who took part in the research for their active cooperation Last but not least, I would like to give my sincere thanks to my family, who have always inspired and encouraged me to complete this study ABTRACT This research aims to develop speaking skill of young learners through Cognitive perspectives at Atlantic Languages & Informatics School ( ALIS) The participants were 18 primary school students including 10 females and males aged from to 10 years old They studied three lessons a week (each lesson lasts 90 minutes) and all the learners had been learning English at ALIS for eight months This study focused on the development of young learners‟ speaking skill at ALIS by applying one of cognitive strategies in teaching process: imagery The author hopes that this study will help students develop their English speaking skill in a natural way through the use of pictures TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Declaration of authorship i Acknowledgements ii Abstract iii Table of contents iv List of tables vi PART A: INTRODUCTION Rationale The scope and subject of the study Significance of the study Purposes of the study Research questions Methods of the study Organizations of the study PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Concepts of speaking 1.1.1 What is speaking skill? 1.1.2 Communicative competences 1.1.2.1 Grammatical competence 1.1.2.2 Sociolinguistic competence 1.1.2.3 Discourse competence 1.1.2.4 Strategic competence 1.2 Young learners 1.3 Cognitive perspectives 10 1.3.1 Definition of cognitive perspectives 10 1.3.2 Cognitive theory on learning 12 1.3.3 Kinds of cognitive strategies in language teaching 15 1.4 Pictures 16 1.4.1 Types of pictures 16 1.4.2 Why use picture in speaking class? 18 CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 2.1 Participants 20 2.2 Data collection 22 2.2.1 Data collection instrument 22 2.2.2 Data collection procedure 23 CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 3.1 The students‟ speaking ability development 25 3.2 Influences of using pictures in the teaching learning process 28 3.3 Summary 30 PART C: SUGGESTIONS AND CONCLUSION Overview 31 Limitations of the study 32 Suggestions for further study 32 REFERENCES 34 APPENDICES: pre-test and post-test LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Record of students‟ test scores 25 Table 2: t-test 26 Table 3: ranking scale 27 Table 4: The score frequency gained in both pre and post test of students‟ speaking ability 28 Part 1: INTRODUCTION Rationale English is the international language Almost all the people from many different countries around the world use it to communicate “English is spoken as a first language by more than 300 million people throughout the world’s population speaks English with some degree of competence It is an official or semi- official language in over 70 countries and it plays a significant role in many more” (A S Hornby, 2005: 91) It is also widely known as a tool for international communication in transportation, commerce, banking, tourism, technology, diplomacy, and scientific research Therefore, teaching and learning English is very important and necessary because mastering it is the best and the shortest way for us to have many opportunities to reach the success of life Realizing the significance of this language, more and more Vietnamese people at different ages start to learn it A long time ago, English was learnt at secondary school and college Today, in our country education system, students are introduced to English at elementary school According to Vietnam‟s Ministry of Education and Training (MOET), by 2020 all senior high school students will have to study English as a compulsory subject Nguyen (2011, as cited in Le, 2013) pointed out that some private schools in the larger cities in Vietnam have taught English courses to the first grade (6 periods per week) Beside the lessons at primary school, the increasing number of parents let their kids attend English courses at the private language centers There are many reasons that parents let their kids go to study at these centers Some want their kids to be familiar with English while the other people simply expect their children to have higher marks at school No matter what reasons are, this statement is very praiseworthy As we know, listening and speaking are the two most important skills and related to each other in terms of communication, but “speaking seem intuitively the most important” ( Ur,1996, p.120) During the process of teaching English to young learners at ALIS, I recognize that teaching speaking is not an easy job at all Unlike the usual way of learning of teenagers or adults, the very young learners are unable to concentrate for an extended period time Therefore, the teachers have to apply activities in class to make them less bored To help students make better in speaking activity, I consulted some methods to increase their motivation and to improve their speaking ability These above reasons gave me a desire to conduct the study: These above reasons gave me a desire to conduct the study: “Developing speaking Skill of Young Learners through Cognitive perspectives at Atlantic Languages & Informatics School (ALIS)” I hoped this research will be a helpful contribution in teaching and learning English to enhance speaking ability for the young learners The scope and subject of the study This study investigated the effects of cognitive strategies in teaching and learning speaking at ALIS Because of the limit of the study, I will focus on one of cognitive strategies: Imagery through using pictures in teaching progress; the study will carried be out in English classes for young learners at ALIS; The study involves the participation of 18 learners who are attending” LET‟S GO 2” class Significance of the study: Because the study was conducted on a small scale with a group of LET‟GO classes at a language and technology school, the researcher hopes to contribute to the teaching of speaking English at ALIS The result of the study is considered helpful for teachers and learners at this school This study will be a useful material for teachers of English at ALIS, especially for those who are in desire of developing and improving their students‟ speaking SUMMARY OF THE THESIS Part I: INTRODUCTION Rationale English is the international language Almost all the people from many different countries around the world use it to communicate Therefore, teaching and learning English is very important and necessary because mastering it is the best and the shortest way for us to have many opportunities to reach the success of life Realizing the significance of this language, more and more Vietnamese people at different ages start to learn it Today, in our country education system, students are introduced to English at elementary school According to Vietnam‟s Ministry of Education and Training (MOET), by 2020 all senior high school students will have to study English as a compulsory subject Beside the lessons at primary school, the increasing number of parents let their kids attend English courses at the private language centers There are many reasons that parents let their kids go to study at these centers Some want their kids to be familiar with English while the other people simply expect their children to have higher marks at school No matter what reasons are, this statement is very praiseworthy During the process of teaching English to young learners at ALIS, I recognize that teaching speaking is not an easy job at all The very young learners are unable to concentrate for an extended period time Therefore, the teachers have to apply activities in class to make them less bored To help students make better in speaking activity, I consulted some methods to increase their motivation and to improve their speaking ability These above reasons gave me a desire to conduct the study: “Developing speaking Skill of Young Learners through Cognitive perspectives at Atlantic Languages & Informatics School (ALIS)” I hoped this research will be a helpful contribution in teaching and learning English to enhance speaking ability for the young learners The scope and subject of the study This study investigated the effects of cognitive strategies in teaching and learning speaking at ALIS Because of the limit of the study, I will focus on one of cognitive strategies: Imagery through using pictures in teaching progress; the study will carried be out in English classes for young learners at ALIS; The study involves the participation of 18 learners who are attending” LET‟S GO 2” class Significance of the study: Because the study was conducted on a small scale with a group of LET‟GO classes at a language and technology school, the researcher hopes to contribute to the teaching of speaking English at ALIS The result of the study is considered helpful for teachers and learners at this school This study will be a useful material for teachers of English at ALIS, especially for those who are in desire of developing and improving their students‟ speaking Purposes of the study This study focused on the development of young learners‟ speaking skill at ALIS by applying one of cognitive strategies in teaching process The writer hopes to help students develop their English speaking skill in a natural way using pictures Besides, she desires to contribute to the teaching and learning of English to enhance speaking ability for young learners Research questions With the purposes of the study, my research questions are: What are the effects of pictures on students‟ achievement? What are the students‟ attitudes towards using pictures in English class? Methods of the study On one hand, the analysis is involved in the process of data collection and analysis The data collected will go through analysis and yield conclusion about the subjects of the study The instruments for this process include the pre- test and final speaking test score On the other hand, the students‟ attitude of cognitive strategies reflected through the teacher‟s observing students in the activities, have been subjectively analyzed Thus, main instruments for data collection are used in this study, including the test score and teacher‟s observation Hopefully, the study will yield beneficial results which support the learning and teaching speaking in the future The organizations of the study The study comprises three parts: Introduction, Methodology, and Conclusion Part one, INTRODUCTION, presents an overview of the study in which the rationale, the aims, and the significance of the study, the research questions, the method, the scope and the design of the study are presented The next part provides the DEVELOPMENT of the thesis with three chapters Chapter presents the literature review with some aspects of speaking such as definition of speaking, communicative competnces; what the cognition is, some kinds of cognitive strategies in learning English language Chapter is research methodology In this chapter, the focus will be on background information of the subject of the study, the instruments used to collect data, the procedure of data collection as well as the data analysis procedures Chapter 3, findings and discussions, presents a description of data analysis and discussions With the description of data analysis through two instruments: and the pretest and post-test, I explored some interpretations of the findings The last part CONCLUSION is devoted to the overview of the study This chapter also provides the limitations of the study as well as some suggestions for further study Part II DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Concepts of speaking 1.1.1 What is speaking skill? 1.1.2 Communicative competences 1.1.2.1 Grammatical competence 1.1.2.2 Sociolinguistic competence 1.1.2.3 Discourse competence 1.1.2.4 Strategic competence 1.2 Young learners 1.3 Cognitive perspectives 1.3.1 Definition of cognitive perspectives 1.3.2 Cognitive theory on learning 1.3.3 Kinds of cognitive strategies in language teaching 1.4 Pictures 1.4.1 Types of pictures 1.4.2 Why use picture in speaking class? CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 2.1 Participants The study was carried out at ALIS The participants of the study were 18 students including 10 females and males They were learning at the primary school with the age ranging from to 10 years old They studied three periods a week (each period last 90 minutes) and all of them had been learning English at ALIS for eight months The process of teaching speaking English by using pictures to young learners consists of four steps as follows Warming up Warming up is the first step in the teaching process In this stage, the writer presented the new materials to the students Presentation In the second activity, the writer began to explain the materials to the students In learning English, there are four skills, which must be mastered They were listening, speaking, writing, and reading However, the author focused on teaching speaking a Teaching vocabulary In this skill, the author used pictures to make the students interested in learning After they finished and the students knew the names of all the objects on the pictures, the writer showed the pictures again one by one and asked the students to say the names of the thing to check whether they spoke to her well or not b Teaching Speaking In teaching speaking, the writer led the students to some communicative activities She used pictures to make her easier in delivering the materials When the topic is about transportation, she showed some picture of the transportation Then, she asked some students to answer the questions about the pictures This activity could make the students understand the objects and help them relate to the topic the author is going to teach 2.2 Data collection 2.2.1 Data collection instrument As the author stated in the Introduction part, the data of research was gained through the employment of two research instruments: testing (pre-test & post-test), classroom observation 2.2.2 Data collection procedure In this single-group experiment, a pre-test and a post-test are given to one group to measure the effect of the instructional activity Before introducing an activity, the author gave a pre-test Next, the author applied the activity, gave a post-test that is comparable to the pre-test, and finally analyzed pre-post differences CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 3.1 The students’ speaking ability development Our first research question concerns the effects of pictures on students‟ achievement of spoken production The raw data showed that the participants‟ paper scores range from above 60 to almost 100; however, most (n = 18) of the participants‟ scores fall between 65 and 85; nevertheless, most (n= 18) participants‟ forum scores were above average As shown in Table 1, the participants' scores were similar in terms of the mean, standard error of mean, median, standard deviation, and range A t-Test was used in this context Table 1: Record of students’ test scores Student Pre- test Post- test 80 90 78 85 75 79 80 92 70 85 85 95 82 93 79 83 83 88 10 65 73 11 78 86 12 69 75 13 81 90 14 90 96 15 75 86 16 68 70 17 83 88 18 72 80 Table 2: t-test Variable Variable Mean 77.38889 85.22222 Variance 43.4281 55.12418 Observations 18 18 Pooled Variance 49.27614 Hypothesized Mean Difference Df 34 t Stat -3.34772 P(T