Classroom activities to stimulate 10-form students’ presentation in english speaking lessons at marie curie high school, hai phong

Classroom activities to stimulate 10-form students’ presentation in english speaking lessons at marie curie high school, hai phong

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BÙI THỊ ÁNH TUYẾT

M.A MINOR THESIS

CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES TO STIMULATE 10-FORM STUDENTS’PRESENTATION IN ENGLISH SPEAKING LESSONS AT MARIE

CURIE HIGH SCHOOL, HAI PHONG

(Các hoạt động trong lớp học để khuyến khích khả năng trình bày tiếng Anh

của học sinh lớp 10 trường THPT Marie Curie, Hải Phòng)

Field: English teaching methodology Code: 60 14 10 Cohort: MA 15

Hanoi, 2009

7 DESIGN OF THE STUDY 3

PART II: DEVELOPMENT 5

CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

1.1 SOME DEFINITIONS 5

1.2 FACTORS PREVENT STUDENTS FROM PRESENTING A TOPIC 5

1.2.1 Factors of Foreign Language Anxiety 5

1.2.2 Factors associated with Learner’s own sense of ‘self’ and ‘language classroom environment’ 8

1.2.3 Classroom procedure 10

1.3 Socio-cultural factors 11

1.3.1 Social environment for L2/FL acquisition 11

1.3.2 Errors in social setting 12

1.4 COMMUNICATIVE CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES 12

1.4.1 Purpose 12

1.4.2 Requirements 13

1.4.3 Types of communicative classroom activities 14

1.5 INTEGRATING SKILLS AND PRESENTATION 16

1.5.1 Important of integrating skills 16

1.5.2 Presentation through reading activities 17

1.5.3 Presentation through writing activities 17

1.5.4 Presentation through listening activities 17

CHAPTER II 19

THE STUDY 19

2.1 Aims 19

2.6.1 Survey questionnaire for teachers 23

2.6.2 Survey questionnaire for students 25

2.7 Discussion of the findings 27

 Suitable Level of Difficulty 40

 Pair work and group-work 40

 Mistake correction 41

PART III 42

1 Summary of the study 42

2 Limitations of the study 43

3 Suggestions for further study 43

REFERENCES 44APPENDIX 1 IAPPENDIX 2 IIIAPPENDIX 3 V

This thesis is concerned with stimulating 10-form students’ presentation in Englishspeaking classroom Specifically, a survey will be taken on teachers of English and 10-form students at Marie Curie High school in Hai Phong city to consider how Englishspeaking lessons are conducted and how students respond to English speaking lessons Thethesis also study students’ difficulties when participating in English speaking lessons Thisthesis also recommends some practical tips and typical classroom activities which wereapplied by the author and suggested by teachers of English at Marie Curie High school toimprove quality of teaching and learning presentation in English.

My thanks also go to 10 teachers and 100 students at Marie Curie High school inHaiphong who provided me with valuable data for the study so that I can have a betterview of activities in presentation task in English speaking classes at Marie Curie Highschool in Haiphong.

Finally, I would like to thank my family for their special care and support.

CA: Communication ApprehensionCLT: Communicative Language Teaching EFL: English as Foreign Language

ELT: English Language TeachingESL: English as Second LanguageFL: Foreign Language

L1: First LanguageL2: Second Language

This research is motivated by both subjective and objective reasons Subjectively, doing aresearch on Methodology, especially on teaching speaking is very useful for a teacher ofEnglish Objectively, the importance of English in communication is increasinglyemphasized, while the present English teaching at Vietnam’s high schools seems to facewith an obstacle in improving learners’ communicative competence According toCommunicative Language Teaching (CLT), the purpose of language teaching and learningis to develop communicative competence in the target language Littlewood also states:

“One of the most characteristic features of Communicative Language Teaching is that itpays systematic attention to functional as well as structural aspects of language”.

However, the traditional method applied at Vietnamese secondary schools does not complywith the textbook at all Most teachers focus on teaching vocabulary, grammar, reading andwriting skills They do not pay adequate attention to speaking and listening skills As aresult, this leads to some problems Learners can be good at written English but they havedifficulty in using it in oral communication Besides, their English is not good enough touse in real communicating situations Moreover, teaching and learning conditions atVietnamese secondary schools are face with some drawbacks A class of 45 to 50 learnersis not appropriate for language teaching and learning Therefore, a suggested solution is

that teachers should apply suitable classroom activities to stimulate learners’ speakingability right from the beginning

Hopefully, this study will make a small contribution to the application of communicativelanguage teaching approach in developing the 10th form learners’ ability in presentation atVietnamese secondary schools in general and at Marie Curie high school in Haiphong inparticular.

2 OBJECTS OF STUDY

Due to actual English teaching and learning conditions, so far the most widely usedEnglish textbooks at Vietnamese high schools have been applied to 7-year English course.Thus, the subjects of the study will be the high school students who use 7-year Englishtextbooks For the limitation of the study, it can only focus on the 10th form Marie Curiehigh school students.

Situational survey will be conducted on the students’ learning style and motivation, theirproblems in English presentation tasks The study will also be conducted on teachers’techniques to raise students’ ability of presentation.

Questionnaires will be given to analyze learners’ attitude towards presentation tasks aswell as teachers’ techniques in speaking classes and needs in foreign language teachingand learning.

6 RESEARCH HYPOTHESES

Perhaps one of the obvious problems is the lack of students’ interest and activeparticipation in learning activities Traditional methods of teaching in English classroomshave focused on passive learning This problem is probably caused by less exciting andpractical activities of teachers The questions to be dealt with are:

How important is presentation to foreign language learning?

What should be done to stimulate the 10th form Marie Curie High school students inpresentation tasks in an English speaking class?

7 DESIGN OF THE STUDY

The study is intended to consist of three parts:

1 Part 1 – Introduction: give reasons for choosing the thesis, objects, aims and scopeof the study as well as the methodology of the study

2 Part 2 – Development: will be divided into three chapters:

Chapter 1: Literature Review focus on some definitions of presentation, types ofpresentation Some factors that prevent students from presenting a topic andcommunicative classroom activities are also mentioned as the basis of the thesis Finally,the thesis discuss the important of integrating skills, the relation between presentation andother skills including reading, writing and listening.

Chapter 2: The study gives the data analysis from the survey of 10 teachers ofEnglish and 100 students at Marie Curie High school to make the foundation for theactivities in chapter 3.

Chapter 3: indicates some typical activities and practical tips for teacher tostimulate 10-form students’ presentation in an English speaking lesson and examples forillustration.

3 Part 3 – Conclusion: summarizes the study, limitations of the study and suggestionsfor further study

PART II: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1 SOME DEFINITIONS

Presentation is generally defined in different dictionaries is to show and to explain thecontent of a topic to an audience or to audiences According to Wikipedia – The FreeEncyclopedia, presentation is the process of showing and explaining the content of a topicto an audience The same definition is also recognized by Longman Language Activator(1998: 1017) – To present is to be the person who tells the people watching or listeningabout the different things what will happen or are happening

For 10-form students, presentation is simplified and limited in a given topic In a typical10-form English speaking lesson, students are asked to make small presentations based ona given topic The lesson is normally built up with three tasks:

- Task 1: Students practice sample dialogues to have a general understanding aboutthe topic;

- Task 2: Students participate in group discussion, in which students express theirideas and get to know the others’ ideas on the given topic

- Task 3: From the ideas collected from discussion task, students integrate the ideasto make a presentation This presentation will be presented by a student on behalfof his/her group.

1.2 FACTORS PREVENT STUDENTS FROM PRESENTING A TOPIC1.2.1 Factors of Foreign Language Anxiety

Anxiety has been found to interfere with many types of learning but when it is associatedwith learning a second or foreign language, it is termed as ‘second/foreign languageanxiety’ It is a complex and multidimensional phenomenon (Young, 1991) and can bedefined as a subjective feeling of tension, apprehension, nervousness, and worry associated

with an arousal of the automatic nervous system Is has been found that the feeling oftension and nervousness center on two basic task requirement of foreign language learning:listening and speaking because both the skills can not be separated

According to Horwitz et al (1986: 127), there are three related performance anxieties: (1)communication apprehension (CA); (2) test anxiety; (3) fear of negative evaluation Due toits emphasis on interaction, the construct of communication apprehension is also relevantto the conceptualization of foreign language anxiety (McCroskey, 1977) The descriptionof these components will lay the foundations for the concept of second/foreign languageanxiety, providing an insight to comprehend the sources or causes it can originate from

 Communicative Apprehension (CA)

The speaking skill is so central to our thinking about language learning that when we refer

to speaking a language we often mean knowing a language MacIntyre and Garder (1991)

points out that the skill which produces most anxiety is speaking This anxiety comes inpart from a lack of confidence in our general linguistic knowledge but if only this factorwere involved, all skills would be affected equally What distinguishes speaking is thepublic nature of the skill, the embarrassment suffered from exposing our languageimperfections in front of others.

One of the most studied topics in the field of speech communication is the tendency on thepart of some people to avoid, and even, fear, communicating orally Horwitz et al (1986:128) define communication apprehension (CA) as “a type of shyness characterized by fearor anxiety about communicating with people”

Communication anxiety may be specific to just a few settings (e.g., public speaking) ormay exist in most everyday communication situations, or may even be part of a generalanxiety trait that arises in many facets of an individual’s life (Fiedman, 1980) Learners’personality traits such as shyness, quietness, and reticence are considered to frequentlyprecipitate CA These feelings of shyness vary greatly from individual to individual, andfrom situation to situation McCroskey and Bond (1980) found seven factors that couldresult in a quiet child (this can equally offer explanation of adult CA); (1) low intellectualskills, (2) speech skill deficiencies, (3) voluntary social introversion, (4) social alienation,

(5) communication anxiety, (6) low social self-esteem, (7) ethnic/cultural divergence incommunication norms While communication apprehension is one of these factors, theothers can lead to communication apprehension.

Communication apprehension obviously plays a large role in second/foreign languageanxiety People who are apprehensive speaking groups are likely to be ever in more troublewhen doing so in a second/foreign language class, where in addition to feeling less incontrol of the communicative situation, they also may feel that their attempts at oral workare constantly being monitored This apprehension is explained in relation to the learner’snegative self-perceptions caused by the inability to understand others and make himselfunderstood McCroskey (in Apaibanditkul, 2006: 4) labels this kind of apprehension –which Neer refers to as “apprehension about classroom participation” – as classroomcommunication apprehension.

 Test anxiety

An understanding of test anxiety is also important to the discussion of foreign languageanxiety Text anxiety, as explained by Horwitz et al (1986), refers to a type of anxietystemming from a fear of failure Test anxiety is quite common in language classroom atany levels.

Unfortunately, for highly anxious students, second/foreign languages, more than any otheracademic subject, require continual evaluation by the teacher – the only fluent speaker inthe class It is also important to note that oral testing has the potential to provoke both testand oral communication anxiety

 Fear of Negative Evaluation

Fear of negative evaluation is an extension of the second component (test anxiety) of

second/foreign language anxiety because it is not limited to test-taking situations; rather, itmay occur in any social, evaluative situation, such as interviewing for a job or speaking insecond/foreign language class It is also broader in the sense that it pertains not only to theteacher’s evaluation of the students but also to the perceived reaction of other students as

well Besides, students, when making presentations, may be anxious due to their insufficient background knowledge on the topic discussed.

In spite communication apprehension, test anxiety, and fear of negative evaluation provideuseful conceptual building blocks for a description of second/foreign language anxiety, it ismore than just the conglomeration of these three components We conceive foreignlanguage anxiety as a distinct complex of self-perception, beliefs, feelings, and behaviorsrelated to classroom language learning arising from the uniqueness of the languagelearning process What makes language learning a distinct and unique process is itsinteraction with the concept of ‘self’.

1.2.2 Factors associated with Learner’s own sense of ‘self’ and ‘language classroomenvironment’

As mentioned above, the language anxiety is related to three components All the threecomponents are strongly linked with learners’ sense of ‘self’, as it is learners’ ‘self’ whichis at risk of failure or being negatively evaluated in any test-like situation or a situationwhich requires communication in front of others This risk to one’s sense of ‘self’frequently occurs in a L2/FL classroom This section reviews literature on languageanxiety related to learners’ sense of ‘self’ and ‘language classroom environment’.

 Self perceptions

According to Horwitz et al (1986: 128), perhaps no other field of study poses as much of athreat to self-concept as language study does They believe that any performance in L2 inlikely to challenge an individual’s self-concept as a competent communicator, which maylead to embarrassment Laine (1987: 15) indicates that self-concept is the totality of anindividual’s thoughts, perceptions, beliefs, attitudes and values having reference to himselfas object This self-concept forms the basis of the distinction between language anxiety andother forms of academic anxieties The importance of the disparity between the ‘true’ or‘actual’ self as known to the language learner and the more limited self as can be presentedat any given moment in the foreign language would seem to distinguish foreign languageanxiety from other academic anxieties such as those associated with mathematics orscience.

 Learners’ belief about language learning

As language learning poses a threat to learners’ self-concept, in response learners maygenerate some particular beliefs about language learning and its use Certain beliefs aboutlanguage learning also contribute to the student’s tension and frustration in the class Forexample, the followings are such reported beliefs:

“I just know I have some kind of disability: I can’t learn a foreign language no matter howhard I try.” (Horwitz et al 1986: 123)

“Russian is too hard I’ll never be able to learn Russian enough to go to Russia and talk topeople” (Tittle, 1997: 15)

Such beliefs have been found to cast a considerable influence upon the ultimateachievement and performance in the target language In Ohata (2005: 138), a number ofbeliefs derived from learner’s irrational and unrealistic conceptions about languagelearning, such as

1) Some students believe that accuracy must be sought before saying anything in theforeign language,

2) Some attach great importance to speaking with excellent native (L1)-like accent, 3) Others believe that it is not ok to guess an unfamiliar second/foreign language word, 4) Some hold that language learning is basically an act of translating from English or anysecond/foreign language,

5) Some view that two years are sufficient in order to gain fluency in the target language, 6) Some believe that language learning is a special gift not possessed by all

These unrealistic perceptions or beliefs on language learning and achievement can lead tofrustration or anger towards students’ own poor performance in a second/foreign language.

 Instructors’ beliefs about language teaching

Just like learners’ beliefs about language learning, some instructor’s beliefs about languagelearning and teaching have also been found to be a source of anxiety Onwuegbuzie (1999:220) asserted instructors’ belief that their role is to correct rather than to facilitate studentswhen they make mistakes Further, he stated that the majority of instructors consideredtheir role to be less a counselor and friend and objected to a too friendly and inauthoritativestudent-teacher relationship The researcher also reported that students realize that someerror corrections are necessary but they consistently report anxiety over respondingincorrectly and looking or sounding ‘dumb’ or ‘inept’ Young (1991: 429) mentioned the

view that the problem for the student is not necessarily error correction but the manner of

error correction – when, how often, and most importantly, how errors are corrected.

In addition to error correction, some instructors have been reported not to promote pair orgroup work in fear that the class may get out of control, and think that a teacher should bedoing most of the talking and teaching, and that their role is more like a drill sergeant’sthan a facilitator’s These beliefs have been found to contribute to learner’s languageanxiety (Young, 1991: 428) Recognition or awareness of these beliefs by both thelearners, as well as the teachers, is essential for effective reduce of language anxiety inlearners.

1.2.3 Classroom procedure

Giving a short talk or presentation in the class has also been reported to be highly anxietyinducing, which makes the classroom environment more formal and stressful for thelearners Different activities in the classroom procedure, particularly those that demandstudents to speak in front of the whole class, have been found to be the most anxietyprovoking For instance, Koch and Terrell (1991) found that more than half of theirsubjects in their Natural Approach classes – a language teaching method specificallydesigned to reduce learner’s anxiety – expressed that giving a presentation in the class, oralskits and discussions in large groups are the most anxiety-producing activities They alsofound that students get more anxious when called upon to respond individually, rather thanif they are given choice to respond voluntarily In addition, students were found to be more

relaxed speaking the target language when paired with a classmate or put into small groupsof three to six than into larger groups of seven to fifteen students Similarly, Young (1991:429) added that more than sixty-eight percent of her subjects reported feeling more

comfortable when they did not have to get in front of the class to speak Earlier, Horwitz et

al (1986: 123) reported the same:

“Sometimes when I speak English in class, I am so afraid I feel like hiding behind mychair When I am in my Spanish class I just freeze! I can’t think of any thing when myteacher calls on me My mind goes blank.”

This suggests that any measure to treat language anxiety should not fail to exploit learningenvironments where students feel free of anxiety For this, Communicative LanguageTeaching (CLT) approaches are often recommended by the researchers to provide such andunthreatening environment where students talk to one another and not exclusively to theteacher

1.3 Socio-cultural factors

In the previous parts, it has been viewed that difficulties in learning L2/FL can explain thepotential causes of language anxiety at the output stage of language learning within theclassroom setting However, language anxiety may also be an outcome of social andcommunicative aspects of language learning The following parts will review the literatureon language anxiety from a socio-cultural perspective of language learning and its use.

1.3.1 Social environment for L2/FL acquisition

Environment, where the target language is not used as L1 in the community, providesL2/FL learners only limited and sometimes faulty input For such learners, the only input isteachers’ or classmates’ talk – both do not speak L2 well Learners in such environmentsare exposed to the language only in the classroom where they spend less time in contactwith the language The limited exposure to the target language and lack of opportunities topractice speaking in such environments result into embarrassment or stress for them whenthey are required to speak both in and out of the class.

1.3.2 Errors in social setting

Although it is clear that language learning cannot be without errors, errors can be a sourceof anxiety in some individuals because they draw attention to the difficulty of makingpositive social impressions when speaking a new language (MacIntyre & Gardner, 1989:cited in Horwitz & Gregersen, 2002: 562) Errors in social settings are mostly overlookedif they do not interfere with meaning because people consider it impolite to interrupt andcorrect somebody who is trying to have a conversation with them Interlocutors only reactto an error if they cannot understand the speech and try to adjust their speech with thespeaker in their effort to negotiate for meaning It is only in the classroom environment thatfeedback on errors is provided frequently; this leads many learners to frustration andembarrassment by making them conscious of their deficiencies.

1.4 COMMUNICATIVE CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES1.4.1 Purpose

Communicative activities are those which exhibit the characteristics at the communicativeend of our continuum Learners are somehow involved in activities that give them both thedesire to communicate and a purpose which involves them in a varied use of the targetlanguage Such activities are vital in a language class since the learners can do their best touse the language as individuals, arriving at a degree of language autonomy Littlewood(1981) favored the opinion that it is quite necessary to consider the following purposes ofcommunicative activities:

 They provide ‘whole-task practice’ In foreign language learning, our means for

providing learners with whole-task practice in the classroom is through variouskinds of communicative activities, structured in order to suit the learners’ level ofability.

 They improve motivation The learners’ ultimate objective is to take part in

communication with others Their motivation to learn is to be sustained if they cansee how their classroom learning is related to this objective and helps them toachieve it with increasing success

 They allow natural learning Languages takes place inside the learners and, as

teachers know to their frustration, many aspects of it are beyond their pedagogicalcontrol It is likely, in fact, that many aspects of language can take place onlythrough natural processes, which operate when a person is involved in using thelanguage for communication If this is so, communicative activity (inside or outsidethe classroom) is an important part of the total learning process.

 They can create a context which supports learning Communicative activity

provides opportunities for positive personal relationship to develop among learnersand between learners and teacher These relationships can help to ‘humanize’ theclassroom, and to create an environment that supports the individual in his effort tolearn Oral communicative activities apply the same purposes, as communicativeactivities are operated mainly through oral communication.

1.4.2 Requirements

In order to get involved in activities in an English speaking class, teachers of Englishshould pay attention to the following requirements (Ur, 1996: 120):

 Learners talk a lot As much as possible of the period of time allotted to the

activity is in fact occupied by learner talk This may seem obvious, but often mosttime is taken up with teacher talk or pauses.

 Participation is even Classroom discussion is not dominated by a minority of

talkative participants: all get a chance to speak, and contributions are evenlydistributed

 Motivation is high Learners are eager to speak: because they are interested in the

topic and have something new to say about it, or because they want to contribute toachieving a task objective

 Language is of an acceptable level Learners express themselves in utterances that

are relevant, easily comprehensible to each other, and of an acceptable level oflanguage accuracy

1.4.3 Types of communicative classroom activities

Because communicative principles can be applied to the teaching of any skill, at any level, andbecause of the wide variety of classroom activities and exercise types, description of typicalclassroom procedures used in a lesson based on CLT principles is not feasible However, mostpractitioners of CLT accept the general procedure with the following communicative activitiesin their materials and language class provided by Littlewood (1981).

Pre-communicative activities: Structural activities

Quasi-communicative activitiesCommunicative activities: Functional communication activities

Social interaction activities Pre-communicative activities

These activities are ones to prepare for the communicative activities which learners arerequired to do.

In pre-communicative activities, the teacher isolates specific elements of knowledge andskills which compose communicative ability, and provide the learners with opportunities topractice them separately This first kind of activities is sub-divided into structural activitiesand quasi-communicative activities

 Structural activities

Structural activities focus on the grammatical system, describing ways in which languageelements can be combined These activities consist of pronunciation, vocabulary andstructure practice

 Quasi- communicative activities

Quasi-communicative activities consist of one or more typical conversational exchanges.Some resemble drills, but others are closer to dialogues These quasi-communicative

activities are intended to help the learners relate forms and structures to communicativefunction, specific meaning, and social context.

In short, the aim of pre-communicative activities is to practice using acceptable languagefluently, without being concerned to communicate meanings effectively.

 Communicative activities

These activities require the learners to integrate his pre-communicative meanings Indiscussing the various examples of communicative activities, Littlewood proposes todistinguish between two main categories: functional communication activities and socialinteraction activities.

 Functional communication activities

Functional communication activities are those which emphasize the functional aspect ofcommunication – the ability to find language which convey in intended meaning effectivelyin a specific situation The main purpose of the activity is that learners should use thelanguage they know in order to get meanings across as effectively as possible Success ismeasured primarily according to whether they cope with the communicative demands of theimmediate situation Some examples of these activities are questions and answers, open-ended responses, interview based on a text, information-gap activities, role-plays, etc  Social interaction activities

Social interaction activities are those which place emphasis on social as well as functionalaspects of communication Learners must still aim to convey meanings effectively, butmust also pay greater attention to the social context in which the interaction takes place.Success is now measured not only in terms of functional effectiveness of the language butalso in terms of the acceptability of the forms that are used In the early stages of learning,acceptability may mean little more than a reasonable degree of accuracy in pronunciationand grammar Later, it will increasingly come to include producing language which isappropriate to specific kinds of social situation Examples of these activities arepair/group-work activities such as simulations, role-plays, and discussions.

1.5 INTEGRATING SKILLS AND PRESENTATION1.5.1 Important of integrating skills

The term “integrated skills” is frequently used as if it was almost synonymous withreinforcement Viewed in this way, the process of integrating language skills involveslinking them together in such a way that what has been learnt and practices through thetasks of one skill is reinforced and perhaps extended through further language activitieswhich bring one or more of the other skills into use.

Therefore, typically, a piece of spoken language, in the form of a dialogue, will befollowed by relating writing activities Indeed, this pattern-oral work leading to readingand writing- has almost become the classical model for the organization of learningmaterials into “lesson” or “units” The extent to which this is done and the way in which itis implemented, in the form of teaching materials will be influenced by such factors as thelevel of the course, the relative importance of skills for the learners, and the view taken ofthe optimum ordering of the skills, but overall, this kind of skill linking is regarded aspedagogically sound

This consumption can be supported by the importance of integrated skills activities asfollows (Donn Bryne, 1987)

1 They provide opportunities for using language naturally, not just practicing it.2 Many pair- and group work activities call for a variety of skills, sometimes

simultaneously in order to involve all the learners.

3 Learners seem to learn better when they are engaged in activities which involvemore than one skill.

We are not of course suggesting that single-skill activities are not effective: there will infact be many occasions when we shall ask the learners just to talk or read or write, becausethis is appropriate Equally, however, we should be looking for opportunities to knittogether, because this is what happens in real life.

1.5.2 Presentation through reading activities

It is clear that, integrating skills is useful to create or to prepare contexts for practicing andusing the intended language item or skill In additions, the use of one skill leads quitenaturally to the use of another As a result, reading is likely to lead to speaking To givesimple example, if we read an advertisement for a job in the newspaper, we may discuss itwith someone else or ring up and enquire the advertising company about the job

More specifically, in the classroom, if we are looking for sources of talk, whether guidedor free, it is apparent that many of these come from reading activities Learners will, ofcourse, need dialogues as conversational models but these are not necessarily the beststimuli for talk A reading text on an interesting or relevant topic may be much moreproductive, often because the ideas are presented more directly Through reading thelearners can also greatly expand their receptive knowledge of the language, especially inthe often area of vocabulary.

1.5.3 Presentation through writing activities

Similarly, writing activities are sources of talk A writing activity, done collaboratively inpairs or small groups, will be accompanied by a good deal of talk-talk that is needed to“get something done” For example, to prepare for a discussion, learners in pairs or groupstake notes of their ideas and arguments It is the same in problem- solving activities,learners prefer to note down solutions to speak fluently and logically There are many otherspeaking activities necessarily prepared by writing activities in advance Generally, thewriting activities before presenting a topic are very beneficial, especially for languagestudents at elementary level They can write to arrange ideas and memorize words andexpressions as well, which will help them to speak more easily and confidently.

1.5.4 Presentation through listening activities

Like reading and writing activities, listening activities do create a stimulus for speakingactivities For example, students hear a short conversation (or an extract from a longconversation), which provides very few clues as to what the speakers are talking about.The learners themselves have to decide who the speakers are, where they are, what they are

talking about and possibly what will happen next This type of listening then, leads onnaturally to discussion In another listening activity, learners are given some information,for example about a town (places of interest, facilities, etc.) in the form of a talk orconversation, on the basis of which they have to plan a visit The planning involvesdiscussion and decision-making activities; making choices between places, events;activities for which the background information is made available in the recorded form However, oral communicative activities through listening comprehension require learnersto have a comparatively good listening ability so that learners can catch information andideas for speaking activities afterwards Therefore, it is necessary for learners to do simplelistening activities right from the beginning of the course and then they can gradually dooral communicative activities effectively based on listening comprehension.

2.2 Informants

The informants participating in the survey are 100 grade 10th students of two Englishclasses at Marie Curie High school They almost come from Hai Phong city Most of themhave been learning English for four years at lower secondary school However, only fewstudents could express intelligibly in English This means that they were beginners inspeaking English when they entered high school Few of them can talk about topicsrequired in the English text book

2.3 Hypotheses: Remarks on some problems of English learning and teaching atMarie Curie High school, Hai Phong city.

2 3.1 Materials

The English materials used in Marie Curie High school language classes are very limited.They are almost only the textbooks compiled by Vietnamese teachers It is hard forstudents to have authentic materials such as English newspapers and magazines, visual andaudio aids Therefore, their English lessons are less exciting The learners also find it hardto get access to the real “language”

2.3.2 Teachers’ method

Most teachers of English, not only at Marie Curie High school, but also in other highschools, tend to focus on teaching grammatical structures, vocabulary, reading and writingskills to help their students get good scores in examinations Besides, they tend to applytraditional techniques of the traditional method, for example, repeating dialogues in thetextbooks, giving questions for students to answers Due to this method, the students havelittle interest in English lessons and their learning is passive and unsuccessful Moreover,their speaking ability is not practiced and improved

2.3.3 Students’ motivation

So far, the major aim of Marie Curie High school students in learning English is still aimedat passing school written examinations In fact, these examinations are mostly based ongrammatical structures, vocabulary, reading comprehension, and writing skill.Consequently, despite their interest in developing speaking and listening skills forcommunication, they would rather study the above mentioned language components andskills Therefore, they hardly have opportunities to develop speaking skill in Englishlearning.

The second reason, in my opinion, is the names of characters and scenes in the text book.Students may not be interested in the book since learning English with Vietnamese namesand Vietnamese scenes seem not to make an impression that they are learning “realEnglish” in “English speaking environment” but learning English with the Vietnamese inVietnam’s situations.

The last but not least, visual aids and audio aids are not always available due to inadequateinvestment in language teaching and learning in Vietnam Consequently, textbook seems tobe the only source of learning for students and teachers

In general, one of the clearly seem features of the high classroom atmosphere is the lack ofinterest Most of the classroom activities concentrate on teaching and practicing languagestructures As a result, during the lesson, the learners do most repetition, substitution,memorizing activities, or answering questions based on texts and so on They do not have

much time to use English in oral communication Therefore, when doing speakingactivities, they often cope with such problems as “inhibition”, “nothing to say”, “mother-tongue used”

Besides, the teaching and learning process focusing much on grammar, reading and writingskills can cause tension to learners They can be tired of difficult grammatical exercisesand boring writing practice In short, the classroom atmosphere at Vietnamese high schoolsdoes not seem to create an appropriate environment and stimulus for the students to presenttheir ideas.

2.4 Methods

The survey questionnaires were used in the research as the main source of information Itwas conducted with two sets of survey questionnaires for 10 teachers and 100 students atMarie Curie High school.

The survey questionnaire for teachers consisting of nine questions was designed to elicittheir views on the following aspects (Appendix 1):

- The role of presentation in English teaching (questions 1, 2, 3, 4)

- The difficulties when teaching cross- cultural knowledge in conversation classes(question 7)

- The useful activities in the conversation class (questions 5, 6)

- The classroom interaction mode in a presentation task (questions 8, 9)

The survey questionnaire for students consisting of nine questions was designed to elicittheir views on the aspects as follows (Appendix 2):

- The role of presentation in English learning (questions 1, 2, 3)- The way they obtain information for presentation task (question 4)

- The motivating activities in the English speaking class (questions 5, 6, 7)

- The difficulties when doing presentation activities in the speaking class (questions 8, 9)

(Questions 7 has more than one answer)

Table 2: Data collected from survey questionnaire for students Choices (Percent)

2.6.1 Survey questionnaire for teachers

The survey questionnaire for teachers was conducted with 10 teachers of English at MarieCurie High school Data collected from the survey was analyzed according to the fouraspects listed in 2.4

 Teachers’ attitudes towards the role of presentation in English teaching andlearning (questions 1, 2, 3, 4)

For question 1 – “How important is presentation to English learning and teaching?” almostteachers (60%) have positive attitudes towards the role of presentation to English learningand teaching There are only 10% of the teachers think that it is not important at all

For question 2 – “How often do you find yourself motivated enough to teach presentationin your speaking lessons?” 80% of the teachers say that they sometimes find themselvesmotivated enough to have presentation topics discussed in their lessons 10% of theteachers rarely do and the other 10% never do This data indicates that though mostteachers understand the important role of presenting task, they do not always havediscussions about topics required in their lessons There are various reasons that do notmotivate the teachers to teach presentation in their speaking lessons: they lack ofbackground knowledge about the topics, they do not feel well before class, they do notthink that students are interested and comprehensively understand the topics, etc.Consequently, the time they spend on presentation task is rather short: 70% of the teachersspend 10-20 minutes for their students discussing and do presentation task, 20% spend 5-10 minutes and the rest 10% spend no time for this task

Perhaps, answers for question 4 – “In your opinion, does presentation teaching requirespending a lot of time reading materials before each lesson?” could give an explanation tothe problems raised in question 2 and 3 There were 50% of the teachers thinking thatpresentation teaching requires spending a lot of time reading materials before each lessonbut students have to study so many other subjects, such as Mathematics, Physics,Chemistry, Literature, etc., which make teachers exposed to the risk that they can notconduct a presentation task when students have no preparation Still, the percentage ofthose who suppose that not always do they make such kind of preparation is 40% In fact,this is a matter of teachers’ background knowledge of discussed topics

 Their opinions of the useful presentation activities in the conversation class(questions 5 – which activities do you often carry out in a speaking lesson? And