teachers’ beliefs on the use of authentic materials in teaching speaking at high schools in ho chi minh city

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HO CHI MINH CITY OPEN UNIVERSITY TEACHERS’ BELIEFS ON THE USE OF AUTHENTIC MATERIALS IN TEACHING SPEAKING AT HIGH SCHOOLS IN HO CHI MINH CITY A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in TESOL Submitted by: DOAN THI NIEM Supervisor: Dr NGUYEN DINH THU Ho Chi Minh City, October 2018 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HO CHI MINH CITY OPEN UNIVERSITY TEACHERS’ BELIEFS ON THE USE OF AUTHENTIC MATERIALS IN TEACHING SPEAKING AT HIGH SCHOOLS IN HO CHI MINH CITY A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in TESOL Major: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) Code: 60 14 01 11 Submitted by: DOAN THI NIEM Supervisor: Dr NGUYEN DINH THU Ho Chi Minh City, October 2018 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I hereby declare that I am the sole author of this master thesis entitled “Teachers‟ beliefs on the use of Authentic Materials in teaching speaking at high school in Ho Chi Minh City”, and that I have not used any sources other than those listed in the references I further declare that I have not submitted this thesis at any other institution in order to obtain other degree Ho Chi Minh City, 01 August 2018 _ i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to all those who gave me the possibility to complete my research I would like to thank my supervisor Nguyen Dinh Thu Ph.D for his patience, enthusiasm, motivation, and unstinting support of my research His encouragement, constant guidance and creative criticism helped me in all time of research and writing of this thesis This research could not be done without his continuing support, and I am so glad to have him as my supervisor in doing this research Besides my supervisor, I thank my TESOL classmates for their encouragements and valuable suggestions in commenting on my first draft of questionnaire and interview questions I appreciate their helps and the great time we worked together Lastly of all, I would like to thank my family for their love, continuing supports and confidence in my efforts Special thanks to my devoted husband who supported my decision to attend the MA TESOL course at Ho Chi Minh City Open University and always be with me whenever I need, and my lovely little daughter, who always waited patiently for me to return home and play with her ii ABSTRACT Speaking is regarded as the most important skill that needs to be acquired by students in learning English for communication In reality, to that end, however, many students experience difficulties in using English to communicate Those difficulties appear because students lack topical knowledge and vocabulary Therefore, using authentic materials (AMs) in teaching speaking is an appropriate way since it relates directly to the real world The research will examine the congruence between teachers‟ beliefs on the use of AMs in teaching speaking, and their classroom practice The population for this research is English teachers in Ho Chi Minh City and the sample is 66 English teachers at seven high schools This research adopts a quantitative research using descriptive analysis with cross-sectional design Quantitative data, collected from copies of questionnaire, are analyzed by SPSS software version 20.0 and supplemented with one-to-one interviews The results showed that most teachers approved the effects of the use of AMs in teaching speaking; however, almost all the high school teachers did not frequently exploited that kinds of materials in their speaking classes This incongruousness is stemmed from some factors such as time, students‟ knowledge and English level, fixed curriculum, as well as the diversity and complexity of authentic materials iii TABLE OF CONTENTS STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii ABSTRACT iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv LIST OF CHARTS AND FIGURES viii LIST OF TABLES ix LIST OF ABBREVIATION x CHAPTER 1.1 Background to the Study 1.2 Rationale for the Study 1.3 Research Questions 1.4 Significance of the Study 1.5 Overview of the Study CHAPTER 2.1 Teachers‟ Beliefs 2.1.1 Definition of Teachers‟ Beliefs 2.1.2 Category of Teacher Beliefs 10 2.1.3 Relationship between Teachers‟ Beliefs and Practices 11 2.2 Authentic Materials 12 2.2.1 Definition of Authentic Materials 12 2.2.3 Advantages and Disadvantages of Using Authentic Materials in the Classroom 13 2.2.4 Criteria for Choosing Authentic Speaking Materials 15 2.3 Speaking 16 2.3.1 Definition of Speaking 16 2.3.2 Components of Speaking 17 2.3.3 The Importance of Speaking 17 iv 2.3.4 Methods of Teaching Speaking 18 2.3.4.1 The Grammar-Translation method (GTM) 18 2.3.4.2 The Audio-Lingual Method (ALM) 19 2.3.4.3 Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) 19 2.4 Descriptions of English Textbooks Used at Vietnamese High Schools 21 2.5 Studies on the Use of AMs in the Teaching of English Language 24 2.6 Research Gap 28 2.7 Summary………………………………………………………………………… 29 CHAPTER 30 3.1 Research Design and Research Process 30 3.1.1 Research Design 30 3.1.2 Research Process 32 3.2 Research Site and Participants 33 3.2.1 Research Site 33 3.2.2 Participants 34 3.3 Research Instruments 35 3.3.1 Questionnaire 35 3.3.1.1 Rationale for the Questionnaire 35 3.3.1.2 Description of the questionnaire 36 3.3.2 Interview 38 3.3.2.1 Rationale for the Interview 38 3.3.2.2 Description of the Interview 38 3.4 Data collection procedure 39 3.4.1 Administering the questionnaire 39 3.4.2 Conducting the Interview 40 3.5 Date Analysis Procedure 40 3.5.1 Quantitative Analysis for Questionnaire 40 3.5.2 Qualitative Analysis for Interview 40 3.6 Summary………………………………………………………………………… 40 v CHAPTER 41 4.1 Data Analysis 41 4.1.1 Analysis of the Questionnaire 41 4.1.1.1 Reliability of the Questionnaire 41 4.1.1.2 Teachers‟ Beliefs 42 4.1.1.2.1 The Role of Authentic Materials in Teaching Speaking 42 4.1.1.2.2 The Contrast between the Local English Textbooks and Authentic Materials 43 4.1.1.2.3 The Effects of Using Authentic Materials in Teaching Speaking 45 4.1.1.2.4 The Selection of Authentic Materials in Teaching Speaking 46 4.1.1.3 Teachers‟ Practices 49 4.1.1.3.1 Teaching Approach of Speaking Skill 49 4.1.1.3.2 The Frequency of Using the Authentic Materials in Teaching Speaking 51 4.1.1.3.3 The Types and Sources of the Most Used Authentic Materials 52 4.1.1.3.4 The Hindrances on Using the Authentic Materials in Teaching Speaking 54 4.1.2 Analysis of the Interview 55 4.1.2.1 The Teachers‟ Beliefs about the Effects of Using Authentic Materials in Speaking Classes at the High School Context (Interview Question 3) 55 4.1.2.2 The Teachers‟ Beliefs about the Roles of Authentic Materials in Speaking Classes at the High School Context (Interview Questions 2, 4) 58 4.1.2.3 The Teachers‟ Perceptions about the Challenges of Using Authentic Materials in Speaking Classes at the High School Context (Interview Question 5) 59 4.1.2.4 The Teachers‟ Beliefs about Selecting Authentic Materials for Their Effective Teaching of Speaking Skill (Interview Question 6) 60 4.1.2.5 The Teachers‟ Actual Practices of Using Authentic Materials in Teaching Speaking at the High School Context (Interview Questions 1, 7, and 8) 62 vi 4.1.2.6 The Teachers‟ Revelation of The Factors Impacting the Relationship between Their Beliefs and Actual Practices of Using Authentic Materials in Speaking Classes (Interview Question 9) 65 4.2 Discussion of Findings 67 4.2.1 Research Question 67 4.2.2 Research Question 70 4.2.3 Research Question 71 4.3 Summary………………………………………………………… … 72 CHAPTER 73 5.2 Strengths and Weaknesses of the Methodology 74 5.2.1 Strengths 74 5.2.2 Weaknesses 75 5.3 Implications 75 5.4 Suggestions for further research 77 5.5 Summary 78 REFERENCES 79 APPENDIX A 92 APPENDIX B 97 APPENDIX C 98 vii challenging than local textbooks Textbooks are generally lacking in natural use of English In terms of teaching grammar for speaking, local textbooks are more effective than authentic texts Local textbooks often ignore the cultural aspects of a language Item About effects of using authentic materials in teaching speaking Students show greater learning motivation when you use authentic materials Authentic materials help to build students‟ confidence in 10 speaking English Authentic materials broaden students‟ knowledge, and 11 experience of various cultures in which English is used Using authentic material is a good way to introduce students 12 to the idea of “English-as-a-global-language” Authentic materials support a more creative approach to 13 teaching speaking Item About the selection of authentic material in teaching speaking When selecting authentic texts, their length is my prime 14 consideration Selecting authentic texts which are suitable for students‟ 15 English level is time-consuming 16 17 18 19 20 It is difficult to find texts that match the content of the school‟s curriculum It is difficult to find texts that are relevant to students‟ lives and interests It takes a lot of effort and creativity to exploit authentic texts When using authentic texts, teachers should endeavor to take advantage of the linguistic and cultural opportunities presented by the texts When I manage to use authentic materials in my English classes, I feel that I am a more competent English teacher 94 Part C: Teachers’ Practice Direction: Read the questions below and put a check mark next to the answers that most closely match your feelings about each based on your own teaching experience with regard to using authentic materials in English language classrooms 21 What method of approach you use to teach speaking? And how often you use?  Grammar translation method never rarely sometimes usually always sometimes usually always usually always  Audio-lingual Method never rarely  Communicative language teaching never rarely sometimes 22 How often you use authentic materials in your English language classes? never rarely sometimes usually always 23 What kind of authentic materials you mostly use in you speaking teaching?  Listening-viewing materials (TV commercial, radio news, cartoons, songs, movies, comedy shows, documentaries)  Authentic visual materials (street signs, magazines and newspaper pictures, postcard, wordless street sign, stamps)  Authentic printed materials (sport reports, newspaper articles, tourist information brochures, maps, TV guides, grocery coupons, restaurant menus, train tickets, maps) 95 24 What are the sources that you would use to obtain authentic speaking materials?  Internet  TV, Video  Newspapers and Magazines  Radio  Others (please specify) ………………………………………………………… Part D: Factors Hindering Beliefs and Practices 25 What factors you think affect your beliefs and practices on using authentic materials on teaching speaking for high school students?  Class size (i.e., the number of students in speaking classrooms)  Class duration (i.e., the length of time per speaking period)  Learners‟ knowledge and level of English (e.g., vocabulary, grammar, topical knowledge)  Teacher‟s preparation time  The challenges of selecting AMs (it is difficult for teacher to find the appropriate authentic texts)  The cultural issues (need opportunities to introduce cultural issues to students)  Others (Please specify)………………………………………………………… 96 APPENDIX B INTERVIEW QUESTIONS Q1: In your teaching of speaking at high school context, which approaches you frequently follow? Please, specify your answer Q2: Do you like to use authentic materials in your teaching practice of speaking skill? Q3: How you think about the effects of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? Q4: How you think about the roles of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? Q5: What are the challenges of using authentic materials for teaching speaking at high school context? Q6: Referring from your knowledge and experiences, what should high school teachers to select and use authentic materials appropriately? Specify your response Q7: How often you employ authentic materials in your speaking lessons? Q8: Can you describe the types and sources of the authentic materials which I utilized? Q9: What are difficulties or hindrances that impact your utilization of authentic materials in speaking teaching? Give some examples 97 APPENDIX C INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPTS Transcript 1: Q1: In your teaching of speaking at high school context, which approaches you frequently follow? Please, specify your answer F1.1: Frankly speaking, I still use Grammar-Translation Method most of the time to run the speaking lessons although the claimed methodology of the current textbooks such as Tieng Anh 10, Tieng Anh 11, and Tieng Anh 12 is communicative or task-based In specific, I have to introduce language input first, and then let my students practice these language structures and given vocabulary in a tightly controlled manner Q2: Do you like to use authentic materials in your teaching practice of speaking skill? F1.2: Yes, of course, I actually approve of using authentic materials in speaking teaching Q3: How you think about the effects of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? F1.3: In my opinion, there are a lot of good effects that AMs bring to the students‟ speaking learning and teachers‟ speaking teaching As for students, AMs can speed up their motivation since these teaching materials are colorful, eye-catching and impressive to them Besides, when getting chances to learn from AMs, students are exposed to the real-life language used by native speakers As a result, the students can use these expressions, language structures for communication in real contexts Furthermore, authentic materials can enhance students‟ cultural awareness of English language speakers Indeed, Tieng Anh 10, Tieng Anh 11 and Tieng Anh 12 mostly focus on Vietnamese cultural aspects As for teachers, when using AMs, teachers are urged to innovate teaching ways so that they can exploit these materials effectively regarding many aspects such as curriculum, students‟ proficiency levels, etc In other words, their existing teaching approaches can become more creative and vivid It is clear that AMs are beneficial to teach and learn English speaking Q4: How you think about the roles of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? 98 F1.4: It is clear that AMs benefit both teachers and students in the area of teaching and learning speaking skill Thus, the teachers need to exploit AMs frequently but effectively and suitably in speaking classrooms Of course, the teachers still follow the content of the English textbook series Q5: What are the challenges of using authentic materials for teaching speaking at high school context? F1.5: Coupled with some good advantages, using AMs also drives some certain challenges First, AMs contain many difficult vocabulary and structures This places a heavy burden on teachers‟ shoulder when they must make the authentic material language and content appropriate to students‟ levels of proficiency and cognition Consequently, it is time-consuming In some cases, if the language structures and vocabulary are too far from students‟ existing language proficiency, it can demotivate them and make them much frustrated Q6: Referring from your knowledge and experiences, what should high school teachers to select and use authentic materials appropriately? Specify your response F1.6: First, teachers must choose AMs relevant to the textbooks‟ content and the lesson objectives Second, because AMs contain many difficult words and complicated structures, teachers should choose and adapt appropriately from what is available to suit students‟ language capacity and cognition level Q7: How often you employ authentic materials in your speaking lessons? F1.7: Although the AMs can build up students‟ oral performance well, I only rarely exploit these materials if any due to some challenges which I mentioned above Q8: Can you describe the types and sources of the authentic materials which I utilized? F1.8: Let me remember I used TV guide to ask students to orally describe it In another case, I employed a picture of a picnic trip and had them work in groups to make a short story Or I introduced a visual map and asked them to work in pairs for some communicative functions such as asking direction, making suggestions, thanking, etc I collected these pictures, maps, TV guide from the Internet source and printed them in hand-outs 99 Q9: What are difficulties or hindrances that impact your utilization of authentic materials in speaking teaching? Give some examples F1.9: There are a few hindrances negatively impacting my utilization of AMs for speaking teaching First, the students‟ English proficiency levels and their cognition levels ask teachers to select, exploit, and modify AMs appropriately Second, I not much have time to invest for employing these materials which costs much time since I have to spend time on other schooling tasks Transcript 2: Q1: In your teaching of speaking at high school context, which approaches you frequently follow? Please, specify your answer F2.1: I often use two approaches in my speaking class namely Grammar-Translation Method and Audio-Lingual Method I reckon that these approaches can suit the existing level of proficiency of almost all high school students They need to be equipped with the language forms prior to their speaking practice Of course, I admit that these approaches more or less impede their natural use of English in communication Q2: Do you like to use authentic materials in your teaching practice of speaking skill? F2.2: AMs are beneficial and I like using it for my teaching any language skills if possible Q3: How you think about the effects of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? F2.3: Using AMs in speaking class can benefit both teacher and students First, these interesting materials may motivate my students so much in their speaking learning To elaborate, AMs can give my students a feeling that they are learning the real language At the same time, colorful pictures, symbols, images, layouts, etc from the AMs engage the students a lot into learning Another advantage of AMs is that they provide students with a set of different natural language expressions, language structures, and vocabulary in conjunction with communicative functions Consequently, the students can make use of these linguistic advantages to build up communicative competence Moreover, AMs will introduce many cultural aspects of native English speakers instead of only Vietnamese culture in the current textbooks And, the students will be able to cope with many situations in which English speakers are from various cultures Of course, the teacher can 100 develop and renew the current teaching methods in case of exploiting AMs as well as get access to many different useful instructional sources Q4: How you think about the roles of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? F2.4: AMs, according to my viewpoint, are necessarily presented to the language curriculum since they have a lot of advantages not only for teachers but also for students And, in some cases, teachers should create opportunities for their students to contact with authentic materials in their speaking learning Q5: What are the challenges of using authentic materials for teaching speaking at high school context? F2.5: When using AMs, both teachers and students face some challenges To teachers, searching and selecting AMs also cost much time for preparation to suit students‟ cognition, language proficiency and unit theme as well To students, language structures and task types on AMs often cause weak students to be frustrating and tedious Q6: Referring from your knowledge and experiences, what should high school teachers to select and use authentic materials appropriately? Specify your response F2.6: When selecting and exploiting AMs for speaking teaching, high school teachers should take some considerations To give some examples, teachers need to consider if the AMs can help their students develop speaking skills via communicative functions and language structures Furthermore, teachers need to check if vocabulary and structures and cultural issues contained in the AMs are suitable to the students‟ linguistic proficiency, cognition level, as well as attractiveness From that, selecting and adapting AMs can bring about expected benefits Q7: How often you employ authentic materials in your speaking lessons? F2.7: Only seldom In fact, I still use speaking activities composed in the textbooks Q8: Can you describe the types and sources of the authentic materials which I utilized? F2.8: When teaching speaking section of Tieng Anh 10, Unit 7, I showed my students a set of pictures about mass media types, and I let them work in groups to choose the most favorite type and explaining the reasons, expressing its advantages and disadvantages 101 Indeed, I adapted speaking activities available in this section As my observation, I considered that is an interesting and efficient lesson Especially, there is a time when I showed my students a mini 1-2 minute documentary video to get them to identify some natural disasters Afterwards, I asked them to work in groups to name these disasters and giving causes and effects of these disasters as well as making suggestions to reduce them I remember that is Unit 10, Tieng Anh 11 Yet, there can be denied that employing a video in such a class takes up much time for installation Q9: What are difficulties or hindrances that impact your utilization of authentic materials in speaking teaching? Give some examples F2.9: In fact, I faced some certain problems when using AMs in speaking classes First, words and structures of AMs are complex and difficult compared with students‟ English level and cognition This urges me to spend much time selecting, adapting and simplifying them as well as re-deigning task types to facilitate their speaking learning One the other hand, I not possess much time for this behavior Second, the class duration for each class is rather short, only 45 minutes per period; therefore, I almost always depend on the textbooks‟ speaking activities Transcript 3: Q1: In your teaching of speaking at high school context, which approaches you frequently follow? Please, specify your answer F3.1: Depending on the task types, or unit theme, I will apply teaching approaches suitably Sometimes, I follow Audio-Lingual Method, seldom Communicative Language Teaching, but I mostly favor Grammar-Translation Method instructions In general, I must make sure that my students are provided a sufficient language input beforehand which is basement for their speaking practices Q2: Do you like to use authentic materials in your teaching practice of speaking skill? F3.2: I totally like these teaching materials due to reasons Generally, they are so good Q3: How you think about the effects of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? F3.3: According to my perspectives, AMs are extremely beneficial to the students and even the teachers To specify my thought, these kinds of teaching materials facilitate 102 students‟ speaking learning considerably since they provide real language structures and broaden an understanding of various cultures These are inevitable elements for building up students‟ speaking performance, that is, they can communicate by English naturally and sensitively in real contexts […] About teachers, they also take advantage of authentic materials to innovate their existing teaching ways as well as expand topical knowledge Q4: How you think about the roles of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? F3.4: We cannot deny the practical effects of AMs in speaking teaching and learning Therefore, they should be more introduced to high school students in speaking class It goes without saying that we have to use the current textbooks as the main teaching materials and AMs should act as a supplement Q5: What are the challenges of using authentic materials for teaching speaking at high school context? F3.5: When it comes to some challenges of using AMs, we should first mention to difficulties that teachers should have encountered with First, teachers have to work hard to choose AMs suitable to the students‟ interest, language ability, and cognition as well as compatible with the curriculum content Second, teachers have to modify their existing teaching approaches so that they can utilize the chosen AMs vividly Concerning students, some students, especially low-level students can be demotivated if the authentic materials‟ language structures are too difficult to them Q6: Referring from your knowledge and experiences, what should high school teachers to select and use authentic materials appropriately? Specify your response F3.6: First, teachers capture what communicative functions and the textbook topic will be taught, then they can select appropriately However, as AMs include difficult words and structures, teachers need to simplify them to reduce their difficulty level In addition, attractiveness of pictures, maps, etc should be considered Q7: How often you employ authentic materials in your speaking lessons? F3.7: Let me see I almost never exploit these materials in designing and manipulating speaking lesson plans Yet, I also once intended to use them 103 Q8: Can you describe the types and sources of the authentic materials which I utilized? F3.8: Regarding types and sources of AMs, I only used simple things such as pictures or maps or reports available on the Internet for my students‟ speaking activities because I still focused on speaking activities available in the textbooks Q9: What are difficulties or hindrances that impact your utilization of authentic materials in speaking teaching? Give some examples F3.9: Seemingly, duration for each speaking class is rather short Furthermore, due to being responsible for schooling duties, I have rather little time for seeking supplementary materials as efficiently as possible, although I think that AMs beyond the textbooks will have positive effects on encouraging my students to learn speaking Transcript 4: Q1: In your teaching of speaking at high school context, which approaches you frequently follow? Please, specify your answer M4.1: Admittedly, I still apply Grammar-Translation Method approach for my speaking teaching I teach vocabulary, language structures, and language functions first and then ask my students to practice them on the given-themes This approach, in high school context and conditions, is deemed to be suitable and quite effective I think that Q2: Do you like to use authentic materials in your teaching practice of speaking skill? M4.2: To be honest, the AMs are considered to be an effective tool in teaching language functions And, there is no reason that I not like to use them Q3: How you think about the effects of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? M4.3: I think that one reason why authentic materials are so important for language learning, especially to speaking skill, is that they are a window into various cultures Actually, students can get exposed to many cultural aspects in which English is naturally used, while English textbook series compiled by Vietnamese authors pay much attention to Vietnamese cultural values Besides, language expressions, structures and grammar appeared in the authentic materials are realistic and suitable to the daily communicative situations More importantly, authentic materials may accelerate students‟ learning 104 motivation due to their attractiveness These are for students In their teaching practice, teachers can become more creative and active in selecting, adapting and using authentic materials for teaching purposes Q4: How you think about the roles of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? M4.4: Although authentic materials are beneficial to learning and teaching English speaking and high school context as a typical case, they should play a role of a supplement to the current textbooks due to some reasons […] However, it is sure that authentic materials are necessary to strengthen the students‟ speaking performance in reality Q5: What are the challenges of using authentic materials for teaching speaking at high school context? M4.5: In fact, most of authentic materials contain difficult vocabulary, and complex structures, and therefore them lead to difficulties for low-level students and easily make them demotivated Of course, teachers have to spend much time selecting and preparing for speaking lessons In other words, it takes teachers a lot of effort and investment to exploit authentic materials effectively And, especially, teachers, according to my view, have to become more competent to manage the utilization of authentic materials Q6: Referring from your knowledge and experiences, what should high school teachers to select and use authentic materials appropriately? Specify your response M4.6: I consider that selection of authentic materials needs to comply with some principles For example, the prerequisite is that the content of authentic materials must be similar to the textbook content and accompanied communicative functions Following that, authentic materials must be selected based on their suitability to students‟ proficiency level, their cognitive demands and their interest Especially, teachers have to design task types appropriately on the selected AMs to facilitate students‟ speaking learning Q7: How often you employ authentic materials in your speaking lessons? M4.7: Actually, I rarely search, exploit and deploy the AMs in my speaking teaching 105 Q8: Can you describe the types and sources of the authentic materials which I utilized? M4.8: I only used pictures and brochures pursuant to the unit theme For example, I download some eye-catching pictures of women‟s role in current society from the Internet and stuck them on the board Then I asked them to work in groups to express their opinions on the difference women‟s roles in the past and now And, brochure was cut from magazines and copied in many hand-outs to the students when I taught Unit 15, Tieng Anh 10 which is about cities My students had to work in pairs to play a role, a tourist and a guide I just remember that Q9: What are difficulties or hindrances that impact your utilization of authentic materials in speaking teaching? Give some examples M4.9: The first difficulty is that my time on exploiting authentic material sources is limited Thus, I seldom use these materials I still use speaking activities in the textbooks The second one is that my students‟ English proficiency levels are quite low, so it often takes me a plenty of time to seek AMs and adapt them suitable The third difficulty is that each speaking period only lasts 45 minutes, so I mostly utilize speaking tasks in the textbooks to save time Transcript 5: Q1: In your teaching of speaking at high school context, which approaches you frequently follow? Please, specify your answer F5.1: I mostly employ Grammar-Translation Method and occasionally Audio-Lingual Method to help my students to familiarize the language structures, expressions, and language functions Afterwards, they can use them to make dialogues on the given topic I consider that these approaches are helpful to both high school teachers and students Q2: Do you like to use authentic materials in your teaching practice of speaking skill? F5.2: Yes, if possible, I think that language teachers should exploit these materials especially in our introduction of communicative functions to our students 106 Q3: How you think about the effects of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? F5.3: Under my view, I appreciate the positive effects of AMs on teaching and learning speaking skill at high schools First, authentic materials provide students with an exposure of natural language structures and expressions written by native speakers Second, they present several cultural aspects of English speakers Therefore, students can develop their communicative competence based on their understanding of language knowledge and cultural awareness And, teachers also learn a lot from authentic materials; for example, they get more understanding of language and culture, as well as they modify their existing teaching ways Q4: How you think about the roles of authentic materials in speaking teaching and learning at your high school? F5.4: I think that AMs are extremely necessary to teaching and learning of speaking skill at high schools based on their effects mentioned above In other words, students can improve their speaking performance when they are much exposed to authentic materials Nevertheless, they can act as a supplement to the current local textbooks Q5: What are the challenges of using authentic materials for teaching speaking at high school context? F5.5: I can name some challenges of using and learning on AMs First of all, teachers should be more creative, flexible, and laborious to select and use AMs effectively because many of them contain complex structures and difficult vocabulary and different culture issues Besides, if AMs are too difficult to students‟ proficiency and cognition level, many students can get bored or even exhausted Q6: Referring from your knowledge and experiences, what should high school teachers to select and use authentic materials appropriately? Specify your response F5.6: According to my viewpoint, teachers need to select AMs in conjunction with the fixed curriculum pre-determined by MOET Besides, when selecting these supplementary materials, teachers need to take students‟ English level, cognitive degree, and cultural fitness into accounts Then adapt them appropriately Of course, this process takes up much time 107 Q7: How often you employ authentic materials in your speaking lessons? F5.7: Not often, only occasionally For instance, if I find out that those AMs are feasible to use in reality, I apply them Q8: Can you describe the types and sources of the authentic materials which I utilized? F5.8: Based on my students‟ level of proficiency, I only exploited authentic printed materials such as map or TV guide or weather report as they contained both photos and words The photos helped my students to be motivated in their speaking learning since these printed materials were eye-catching and colorful while the words provided certain language inputs As a result, my students were able to speak something Q9: What are difficulties or hindrances that impact your utilization of authentic materials in speaking teaching? Give some examples F5.9: Let me remember Actually, I encountered with some visible challenges regarding using AMs for speaking class First, most of AMs are complex in terms of vocabulary, structures, content, which requires language teachers like me to simplify them beforehand A great part of my high school students are still weak at English level and background knowledge, so selecting and using AMs is also influenced by this Besides, preparation for speaking class within authentic materials is time-consuming while I not really have much time for it 108 ...MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HO CHI MINH CITY OPEN UNIVERSITY TEACHERS’ BELIEFS ON THE USE OF AUTHENTIC MATERIALS IN TEACHING SPEAKING AT HIGH SCHOOLS IN HO CHI MINH CITY. .. beliefs and their Questionnaire actual use of authentic materials in teaching speaking? What factors Interview affect the teachers‟ use of authentic materials in teaching speaking at high schools? ... Research question 1: What beliefs high school teachers hold about the use of authentic materials in teaching speaking? Research question 2: How often and what kind of authentic materials they use? Research