The exploitation of cooperative activities for teaching speaking skill to the 12th form non specialized english students at bac ninh specialized high school

1 Vietnam National University, HANOI UNIVERSITY oF languages AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY of Post- graduate studies -*** NGUYỄN THUÝ NHUNG The exploitation of cooperative activities for teaching speaking skill to the 12th form non-specialized english students at bac ninh specialized high school ( Sử dụng hoạt động hợp tác việc dạy kỹ nói cho học sinh lớp 12 không chuyên tiếng Anh Trường Trung học Phổ thông Chuyên Bắc Ninh ) M.A Minor Programme Thesis Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60 14 10 HANOI, 2010 Vietnam National University, HANOI UNIVERSITY oF languages AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY of Post- graduate studies -*** NGUYEN THUY NHUNG The exploitation of cooperative activities for teaching speaking skill to the 12th form non-specialized english students at bac ninh specialized high school ( Sử dụng hoạt động hợp tác việc dạy kỹ nói cho học sinh lớp 12 không chuyên tiếng Anh Trường Trung học Phổ thông Chuyên Bắc Ninh) M.A Minor Programme Thesis Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60 14 10 Supervisor : Trần Hiền Lan, M.A HANOI, 2010 TABLE OF CONTENTS Declaration i Acknowledgements ii Abstract iii Table of contents .… iv List of abbreviations and tables … vi PART 1: INTRODUCTION Rationale Aims of the study Research question Methods of the study Scope of the study Design of the study PART 2: DEVELOPMENT Chapter 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 The teaching and learning of the speaking skill 1.1.1 Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) 1.1.1.2 The nature of CLT 1.1.1.2 Features of CLT 1.1.2 The role of speaking in foreign language teaching 1.2 Cooperative learning and its activities 1.2.1 What is cooperative learning? 1.2.2 Essential components of cooperative learning and activities 1.2.3 Cooperative learning techniques and activities in a speaking lesson .11 1.2.4 The role of cooperative activities in teaching speaking skill 13 Chapter 2: THE STUDY 16 2.1 Background of the study 16 2.1.1 The learning and teaching situation 16 2.1.2 The learners 16 2.1.3 The teachers of English group 17 2.1.4 The teaching material 18 2.2 Research methods 18 2.2.1 The participants 18 2.2.2 Data collection instruments 18 2.2.3 Procedures 19 2.2.4 Methods of data analysis 19 Chapter 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION 20 3.1 Analysis of the questionnaires 20 3.1.1 Results of teachers‟ survey questionnaire 20 3.1.2 Results of students‟ survey questionnaire 24 3.2 Analysis of the researcher’s class observation 28 3.3 Findings 29 Chapter 4: RECOMMENDATIONS 31 PART 3: CONCLUSION 37 References 40 Appendices Appendix 1: Questionnaire for teachers I Appendix 2: Questionnaire for students …IV LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND TABLES Abbreviations CLT: Communicative Language Teaching BNSHS: Bac Ninh Specialized High School EFL: English as a Foreign Language Tables Table 1: Data collected from teachers Table 2: Data collected from students Table 3: Description of classes observed PART 1: INTRODUCTION Rationale st Entering the 21 century, under the impact of globalization Vietnam is facing a range of political, social, economic, technological and educational changes It is widely accepted that the shift from a central economy to a mixed system with both socialist and market sectors since the late 1990s has required the Vietnamese education system to carry out remarkable changes Today, people insist that education and training must not only be able to equip students with new scientific and cultural knowledge but also develop their reasoning thought, creative abilities and team work skills Language teaching is a complex process involving many interrelated factors Besides suitable and effective methods of teaching language, classroom interaction is considered as the most vital element in language learning process The emphasis on individual achievement and transmission of information has become inadequate in supporting the development of students‟ thinking and learning skills The best way is to enable students to become actively involved in their learning processes, which will provide them with more opportunities to develop important knowledge and skills for today‟s labour market It is clear that one of the main goals of learning English is to use it effectively in communication Speaking skill, more or less, is an important skill that students must acquire in the learning process Since the application of the new textbooks, speaking skill has had a different position at upper secondary schools As we know, learning a foreign language is a process in which learners not have a natural communication environment like native people Thus, in order to help students master a foreign language as a means of communication, the teacher plays an important role in finding out the ways to make their speaking lessons more interesting and productive Accordingly, nowadays, instead of making use of activities that demand accurate repetition and memorization of sentences and grammar patterns, activities that ask learners to negotiate meaning and to interact meaningfully are required 10 All the reasons mentioned above encouraged the researcher to carry out the study "The exploitation of cooperative activities for teaching speaking skill to the 12 th form non- specialized English students at Bac Ninh Specialized High School.” with the hope to contribute her small part to improving the teaching and learning of the speaking skill for the th 12 form non - specialized English students at her school Aims of the study The study aims at:  investigating the current situation of teaching and learning speaking skill th for the 12 form non - specialized English students at BNSHS  evaluating the use of cooperative activities in speaking lessons  offering some suggestions on using cooperative activities in speaking lessons to promote students‟ speaking ability Research question For the purpose of investigating the current situation of using cooperative activities in speaking lessons, the researcher set up the following research question to guide her in doing this research: “To what extent the teachers at Bac Ninh Specialized High School exploit cooperative th activities in speaking lessons for the 12 form non - specialized English students?” Methods of the study To conduct the study, quantitative and qualitative methods will be used The data th collected will come from two sources: the 12 form non - specialized English students and teachers of English at Bac Ninh Specialized High School Questionnaires and classroom observation will be used to collect information and evidence for the study All the comments, recommendations and conclusions provided in the study will be based on the data analysis Scope of the study th This study limits itself to the application of cooperative learning for the 12 form non - specialized English students‟ speaking skill It is concerned with the context at Bac Ninh Specialized High School 11 Design of the study This study includes three main parts: the introduction, the development and the conclusion The first part, “Introduction”, provides the basic information such as rationale, aims, research question, methods, scope and design of the study The second part, “Development”, consists of the four chapters: Chapter one, Literature review, deals with theoretical background about communicative language teaching, speaking skill and cooperative learning Chapter two, The study, is an overview of the reality of teaching and learning speaking th skill for the 12 form non - specialized English students at Bac Ninh Specialized High School In this part, the school, the subjects and instruments used in the research will be discussed Chapter three, Data analysis and discussion, deals with analyzing the data Chapter four, Recommendations, focuses on some suggestions on using cooperative activities in speaking lessons The last part, “Conclusion”, presents the summary of the major findings; points out some shortcomings revealed during the process of completing this research paper and suggests further studies 12 PART 2: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW To begin with the study, in this chapter, the researcher will present some theoretical background based on which the study will be carried out The first section overviews the teaching and learning of the speaking skill Then cooperative learning and its activities are discussed in the second section 1.1 The teaching and learning of the speaking skill A glance through the past century or so of language teaching will give an interesting picture of how varied approaches and methods applied in language teaching are David Nunan (1991b: 228, cited in Bang, N & Ngoc, N.B) remarks “It has been realized that there never was and probably never will be a method for all” As a matter of fact, there is no perfectly good language teaching method for all, instead we need to get on well with the approach to language teaching we have chosen and design effective tasks and techniques informed by that approach New methods have appeared, developed and replaced the previous ones for the only purpose: to find out the best way to teach a foreign language In recent years, there has been a preference for learning foreign languages in general and English in particular as a means of communication Thus, Communicative Language Teaching becomes the most preferable method The following part will concern with the communicative approach and its implication for teaching and learning the speaking skill 1.1.1 Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) Being founded in the early 1960s “CLT” has recently become a fashionable term to cover a variety of developments in syllabus design and to a lesser extent, in the methodology 13 of teaching a foreign language, especially English CLT is emphasized as an appropriate st approach to language teaching for the 21 century 1.1.1.1 The nature of CLT For many years, language teaching was seen as helping learners develop linguistic competence – that is, helping students master the sounds, words and grammar patterns of English The idea was that by studying the bits and pieces of a language, students could eventually put them all together and communicate In the mid - 1970s the notion of linguistic competence came to be viewed as a component of the broader idea of communicative competence According to Canale and Swain (1980), the second language learners cannot be expected to achieve a satisfactory level of communicative competence if no knowledge of probability of occurrence of grammatical forms and communicative function is developed Their view of communicative competence consists of four areas of knowledge and skills Grammatical competence Communicative competence Sociolinguistic competence  Grammatical competence: Ability to use correct grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation  Sociolinguistic competence: Ability to use appropriate language in different contexts and settings  Discourse competence: Ability to combine language elements to show cohesion in form and coherence in thought 43 that is best suit students in his class, it is a good idea not to have the same students working together for all activities  Forming groups Indeed, group formation is an important factor in creating positive interdependence (Olsen and Kagan, 1992) First, deciding on the size of the groups is necessary This will depend on the tasks the teacher has to carry out, the age of the learners and the time limits for the lesson In some ways, two is an ideal size because of greater participation Also, smaller groups are easier to coordinate owing to the interaction of fewer people For drill and practice type activities where the number of student‟s responses is important, the teacher can choose a small group size However, larger groups offer the possibility of differing opinions and perspectives in relation to experience Then for more complex tasks such as discussion or problem solving activities, there should be more group members Next, assigning students to groups is included Groups can be teacher-selected, random or student-selected Nonetheless, teacher-selected is recommended as the usual mode so as to create groups that are heterogeneous on such variables as ability, sex or background This provides opportunities for students to learn from individual differences as well as promotes the sharing of ideas, integration and cooperation Lastly, each group member should be assigned a role in a group such as time keeper, noise monitor, turn-taker monitor, recorder, summarizer or speaker These roles specify responsibilities that the group needs in order to complete the joint task  Clear task and instruction Once the teacher has decided on the cooperative activity, it is significant to have all of the students in class understand their tasks When students are asked to their tasks without receiving clear step-by-step instructions, they will feel bored and not be involved in the learning activities So the teacher must explain to the group members why they will work in 44 groups and what they will have to At times, the teacher should also model the tasks and check students‟ understanding before putting them in groups and asking them to work together When students are working in their groups, some helpful signals might be given to let students know they should bring their discussions to a temporary halt include clapping his/her hands, knocking on the board or flicking the lights on and off When students lead class activities, they can use the same signals  Discipline Teacher sometimes worries about noise and indiscipline when students work together As mentioned above, physical arrangement of the group is important The closer together students sit, the quieter they can talk This not only helps reduce the noise level in class but also helps foster cooperation and minimizes the chance of someone being left out What is more, if the teacher can control discipline in class, cooperative activities involving pair work and group work will be very successful In each lesson the objective of the activity, discipline requirements and other behavioral rules used should be explained The students need to know how to work in a group and at the end of each class they reflect on that day‟s process in order to improve next time They are responsible for their discipline during the process Additionally, the teacher needs to move around the classroom to see what progress learners are making and what problems are coming up He or she can give advice, encouragement and extra individual help when it is appropriate or necessary  Teacher’s monitoring In order to use cooperative activities successfully, teacher‟s role is very important His role is that of a guider, a facilitator, a helper, an assessor, and a model for the students These are the roles which make students feel relaxed and motivated to talk and have discussion with each other The teacher does not dominate the teaching - learning situation and he gives all students the best chance to express themselves freely in English 45 Initially, the teacher checks with the groups to make sure that students understand what they are supposed to be doing and have all necessary materials before they begin Then while students work with one another, the teacher monitors the groups by walking around to make sure they stay on task and use the target language well if this is an in-class activity He is also available to answer any questions or problems that may arise He should encourage peer teaching and learners‟ self effort More attention and support should be paid on low level students He should encourage the shy, timid students as well as calm down the compulsive talker Students are required to work in groups cooperatively At the same time, the teacher should resist over-supervising group work Groups should be allowed to try to overcome difficulties on their own before the teacher intervenes When students are discussing, the teacher tries not to interrupt them if they make errors Instead, the teacher can write typical problems that he can hear on the board and ask the students to offer suggestions Afterwards, when the group finishes with its activity, the final product, or parts of it, should be shared with the whole class This might take the form of a formal presentation, a discussion, or a chance for everyone to ask questions Remember that both group and individual performance are necessary The teacher can assign each student a grade on his / her portion of a team project or call on a student at random to share with the whole class, with group members, or with another group In addition, the teacher should give constructive feedback, which will help students to progress and enhance their future motivation  Learning atmosphere The more students work in cooperative groups, the more they understand, retain, and feel better about themselves and their peers Working in a cooperative environment encourages student responsibility for learning Moreover, by having peer support, student motivation is increased Students can overcome their shyness and inhibitions with ease to talk when they are in small groups In a safe and supportive space, the learners, particularly the weaker ones, feel more comfortable to show their feelings and thoughts They also have more courage to take risks of making mistakes when learning and practising the language among their friends Thus, students have chance to participate actively in the group discussion by 46 giving as many ideas as they can and participate in giving a summary of the discussion and present in front of the whole class orally as well In any case, the teacher‟s job is to his/her best to provide students with the proper relaxing atmosphere that would help them improve their oral performance and gain new communication experiences With the help of cooperative activities, the teacher can this easily To conclude, teaching speaking skill in a foreign language context is not an easy task rather it puts heavy demands on both the teacher and the students who learn this skill to communicate with the target language In 2006 the Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training introduced a new high school curriculum This led to a significant change in English teaching and learning: from the deep-rooted grammar-translation method to the communicative one Thereby students, nowadays, are engaged in the learning process instead of passively listening to the teacher It is noted that cooperative learning is student-centered, leading to an emphasis on learning as well as teaching and to more student ownership of responsibility for that learning Cooperative activities are effective in increasing motivation for learning, fostering positive feelings toward classmates, and increasing performance on learning, reasoning, and problem solving In cooperative activities, students are trained to be cooperative and active learners By shifting from dependence on teachers, cooperative activities help students become independent learners and form a community of learners among themselves For this reason, once teachers have decided to implement cooperative activities in their classrooms, there are many decisions that must be made Teachers must decide how they will form groups, how they will ensure active participation for all students and how they will evaluate students‟ learning All in all, different aspects concerning how to use cooperative activities successfully in speaking lessons have been presented in this chapter Hopefully, these suggestions will promote the effectiveness of speaking activities in order to improve the teaching and learning of the speaking skill 47 PART III: CONCLUSION Summary of the study The study has been mainly concerned with the problems arising from the application of cooperative activities in teaching and learning speaking skill This research work attempted to study the exploitation of cooperative activities in order to develop speaking skill for the 12 th form non-specialized English students at BNSHS In the study, both theory and practice were taken into consideration For the theoretical basis, the researcher has reviewed relevant concepts of speaking skill and of cooperative activities A lot of reference materials have been gathered, analyzed and presented thoroughly For the practical basis, based on the current situation of teaching and learning speaking skill at BNSHS, survey questionnaires and researcher‟s class observations were carried out to gather the most reliable data for the study As discussed earlier, it is important to give students opportunities to use verbal language for different purposes and situations In the process of learning English, students need an environment where they can talk not only with their teacher but also with their peers Thus, cooperative learning is chosen for implementation in order to increase the frequency of interaction among students By organizing cooperative activities in speaking lessons, the teacher can promote learners‟ language learning and therefore improve their communicative competence Indeed, with the use of two instruments mentioned above, this study has answered the research question Most teachers and students are well aware of the importance of speaking skill Besides, they all have positive attitudes towards the role of cooperative activities to speaking teaching and learning The results have pointed out the application of cooperative activities in speaking lessons can be seen through the use of pair work and group work At BNSHS, students work in pairs and groups very often However, activities involving pair work and group work become cooperative ones only when the teacher does his best to carefully plan, monitor and facilitate the activities for maximum group effectiveness Through the class 48 observations, the researcher got to know that not all necessary actions were carried out when these activities were organized so they were not exploited to the full Moreover, not all students were aware of their responsibility in the speaking process so these activities seemed to be less effective Based on such findings, it is apparent that speaking skill can be developed mostly through interaction and cooperative activities so the teacher‟s duty is to bear in mind the principles of Cooperative learning method and be flexible to apply them in practical teaching situations Here, with the aim of using cooperative activities successfully in speaking lessons the researcher has suggested six aspects which should be considered including classroom arrangement, forming groups, clear task and instruction, discipline, teacher’s monitoring and learning atmosphere Working on this study, the researcher has found that exploiting cooperative activities effectively will motivate students to speak English more Also, she has made a great effort and gained an insight into how speaking skill has been taught and learned at BNSHS and recommended some appropriate ways to conduct cooperative activities with the hope that they will be helpful for teachers in their teaching Limitations and suggestions for further research Although the study has accomplished the aims set at the beginning, unavoidably, it has some drawbacks due to the time limit, lack of resources and the researcher‟s poor experience in carrying out a research As mentioned above, the observations were done but not frequently The information obtained may be limited and not be very accurate because when being observed, the teachers and the students could teach and learn differently from the way they usually for fear of being negatively evaluated Moreover, this research is limited in the sense of exploiting cooperative activities for teaching speaking skill to the 12 th form non - specialized English students at BNSHS only Thus, their opinions might not be those of all the students at BNSHS in particular and all students learning English nationwide in general 49 No single research is flawless, so is this study With a view to improving students‟ speaking ability, further researches can be conducted with a wider range of population and can cover larger aspects of English language teaching:  Employing cooperative activities to develop other language skills such as listening, writing and reading skills  Applying cooperative learning in self-study and extra-curricular activities for language learners Once again, I would like to thank Mrs Tran Hien Lan for her precious guidance, insightful comments and also the teachers as well as the students at BNSHS for their cooperation in fulfillment of my thesis In any research, mistakes are unavoidable so all the constructive remarks and suggestions on this study will be highly appreciated 50 REFERENCES Bang, N & Ngoc, N.B (2001), A Course in TEFL, Theory and Practice I, II, III Hanoi National University Press Bailey, K.M (2005), Practical English Language Teaching: Speaking, Mc Graw – Hill Brown, H.D (1994), Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language, Prentice Hall Regents London Byrne, D (1991), Teaching Oral English, London: Longman Canale, M & M Swain (1980), Theoretical Bases of Communicative Approaches to Second Language Teaching and Testing, Applied Linguistics, (1): 1-47 Canh, Le Van (2004), Understanding Foreign Language Teaching Methodology, Hanoi National University Press Carter, L et al (2001), Improving Social Skills at the Elementary Level through Cooperative Learning and Direct Instruction, Faculty of Education, Saint Xavier University M.A.Thesis Retrieved from http://www.eric.ed.gov Coelho, E (1992b), Jigsaw: Integrating Language and Content, In C Kessler 129-152 George M Jacobs & Ana Christina Dasilva Iddings (2006), Cooperative Learning and Second Language Teaching, Cambridge University Press 10 Ghaith, G (2002), The Relationship between Cooperative Learning, Perception of Social Support, and Academic Achievement, Department of Education American University of Beirut, Beirut, Lebanon, Volume 30, Issue 3, September 2002, pp 263-273 Retrieved from http://www.sciencedirect.com 11 Johnson, D.W & Johnson, R.T (1999a), Learning Together and Alone: Cooperative, th Competitive and Individualistic Learning (5 ed), Boston: Allyn and Bacon 12 Johnson, D.W., R Johnson, R.T & Holubec, E.J (1993), Cooperation in the th Classroom (6 ed), Edina, MN: Interaction Book Company 13 Khaled Mohsen Mohammed Zuheer (2008), The Effect of Using a Program Based on Cooperative Learning Strategy on Developing some Oral Communication Skills Of 51 Students, at English Department, Faculty of Education, Sana'a University M.A Thesis Retrieved from http://www.eric.ed.gov 14 Larsen – Freeman, D (1986), Techniques and Principles on Language Teaching, Oxford: Oxford University Press 15 Lie, A (2000), Cooperative Learning: Changing Paradigms of College Teaching, Petra Christian University Surabaya, Indonesia, pp121-131 Retrieved from http://www.eric.ed.gov 16 Littlewood, W (1981), Communicative Language Teaching, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 17 Nunan, D (1999), Second Language Teaching and Learning, Heinle & Heinle Publishers 18 Olsen, R & S Kagan (1992) About cooperative learning In C Kessler (ed), Cooperative Language Learning: Teacher’s Resource Book New York: Prentice Hall 1-30 19 Ransdell, M (2003) Cooperative Learning in Elementary Science Classrooms, Faculty of Education Memphis University ERIC #: (ED481104) 20 Richards, J.C & Rodgers, T.S (2001), Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 21 Roger T & David W Johnson (1994), An Overview of Cooperative Learning, Retrieved from http: //www.co-operation.org/pages/overview paper.html 22 Ur, P (1996), A Course in Language Teaching, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 52 APPENDICES APPENDIX QUESTIONNAIRE FOR TEACHERS The following questionnaire is designed for the study on "The Exploitation of Cooperative Activities for Teaching Speaking Skill to the 12 th Form Non - Specialized English Students at Bac Ninh Specialized High School” The researcher would be grateful if you could help her with answers to the questions below All the information you give will be used for the research purpose only Your co-operation is highly appreciated Thank you! Please give some information about: - Your age: ………… - Your years of teaching English: ……………… Please choose your answers by circling the letters You can have more than one choice for questions 4, 8, 10 & 11 Which of the four language skills you like teaching most? a Speaking b Listening c Reading d Writing How important you think speaking skill is in learning English? a Very important b Important c Unimportant d Neutral Your reason (please specify): …………………………………………………………………………………………… … ………………………………………………………………… What you think about the content of speaking lessons in the course book? a Very difficult b Difficult c Easy d Neutral 53 How you organize your class speaking activities? a Individual work c Group work b Pair work d Whole class How often you organize group work or pair work in your class? a Always b Often c Sometimes d Never On what basis you often group your students for pair work and group work? a Location b Ability c Relation among students d Others (please specify) ……………………………………………………………………………………………… Do your students like working cooperatively on the assigned tasks? a Yes b No Which of the following activities you use in speaking lessons? a Problem solving b Information gap c Role-play d Discussing e Story-telling f Games g Others (please specify)…………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………………… What you often when your students are doing activities in pairs or groups? a Remain in your seat b Stand in front of students, near the blackboard c Walk around and give help d Others (please specify)………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… 54 10 What difficulties you have when students work together? a Unequal participation b Lack of cooperation c Too much noise d Others (please specify)…………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………… 11 What are the benefits of cooperative activities to oral work? a Enhancing students‟ social skills b Improving students‟ relationship with others c Leading to great motivation toward learning speaking skill d Increasing students‟ participation e Others (please specify)…………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… 12 Do you think that cooperative activities should be further exploited to improve students’ speaking ability? a Yes b No Thank you very much for your help and cooperation! 55 APPENDIX QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENTS The following questionnaire is designed for the study on "The Exploitation of Cooperative Activities for Teaching Speaking Skill to the 12 th Form Non - Specialized English Students at Bac Ninh Specialized High School” The researcher would be grateful if you could help her with answers to the questions below All the information you give will be used for the research purpose only Your co-operation is highly appreciated Thank you! Please give some information about: - Your class: ………… - Your years of learning English: ……………… - The place you come from: ……………… Please choose your answers by circling the letters You can have more than one choice for questions 3, &11 What you think about the importance of speaking English? a Very important b Important c Unimportant d Neutral Your reason (please specify): …………………………………………………………………………………………… … ………………………………………………………………… How you find speaking lessons in your class? a Interesting b Boring c Difficult In which way you like practise speaking? a Individually c In a small group b With a partner d With the whole class d Easy 56 How often does your teacher ask you to work together in speaking activities? a Always b Often c Sometimes d Never Who you often work with in pair work and group work? a Students sit next to you b Students are your close friends in the class c Students have the similar ability with you d Others (please specify)…………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………………… Does your teacher often use English in your speaking class? a Yes b No Which of the following activities does your teacher organize for you to learn speaking? a Problem solving b Information gap c Role-play d Discussing e Story-telling f Games g Others (please specify)…………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………………… Are your teacher’s instructions for speaking activities clear? a Yes b No What does your teacher often when you are doing activities in pairs or groups? a Remains in the teacher‟s seat b Stands in front of you, near the blackboard c Walks around and gives help d Others (please specify)…………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………………… 57 10 What you often when working in pairs or groups? a Work with great interest b Remain silent c Chat with other members about other topics d Speak Vietnamese e Others (please specify)…………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………………… 11 What effects cooperative activities have on your speaking learning? a Creating an environment for productive learning b Providing peer support c Decreasing anxiety d Helping you be more involved in speaking activities e Others (please specify)…………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………………… 12 Do you think that cooperative activities should be further exploited to improve your communicative competence? a Yes b No Thank you very much for your help and cooperation! ... English students at Bac Ninh Specialized High School. ” with the hope to contribute her small part to improving the teaching and learning of the speaking skill for the th 12 form non - specialized English. .. research: ? ?To what extent the teachers at Bac Ninh Specialized High School exploit cooperative th activities in speaking lessons for the 12 form non - specialized English students? ” Methods of the study... QUESTIONNAIRE FOR TEACHERS The following questionnaire is designed for the study on "The Exploitation of Cooperative Activities for Teaching Speaking Skill to the 12 th Form Non - Specialized English Students