Towards improving studens speaking fluency through pair work and group work

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VINH UNIVERSITY LÊ THỊ CẨM LINH TOWARDS IMPROVING STUDENTS’ SPEAKING FLUENCY THROUGH PAIR WORK AND GROUP WORK MASTER‘S THESIS IN EDUCATION NGHE AN - 2016 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VINH UNIVERSITY LÊ THỊ CẨM LINH TOWARDS IMPROVING STUDENTS’ SPEAKING FLUENCY THROUGH PAIR WORK AND GROUP WORK Major: Teaching English to speakers of Other languages (TESOL) Code: 60140111 MASTER‘S THESIS IN EDUCATION Supervisor: NGƠ ĐÌNH PHƯƠNG, Assoc Prof Dr NGHE AN - 2016 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I hereby acknowledge that this study is mine The data and findings discussed in the thesis are true, used with permission from associates and have not been published elsewhere Author Le Thi Cam Linh i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This study could not have been completed without the help of many respected and beloved people I would like to thank them all Firstly, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to Assoc Prof Dr Ngo Dinh Phuong, my supervisor, for his valuable guidance, comments and enthusiastic encouragement during the completion of the research Without his help, this thesis would not be finished Secondly, I would like to thank all instructors in MA course at Foreign Language Department, Vinh University who gave me much knowledge and valuable materials in the lectures during the course Those helped me much to complete this thesis I am grateful to teachers of English and students at Nam Dan I High School They significantly contributed their opinions and suggestions to my research Finally, I also should give my special thanks to my family members for their warm support and encouragement during the time I conducted this thesis ii Abstract With the recent growth of English as an international language of communication, there is clearly a need for learners to speak and interact in a multiplicity of situations through the language That is why enabling students to be communicatively competent in the target language is apparently the goal for language teachers As far as speaking skills is concerned, pair and group work activities are not only important in improving students’ speaking ability in language class but also help develop the most highly value soft skills such as interpersonal skills, team work skills, decision making and problem solving skills etc This research provides a closer look at the effect of pair and group work activities in language classroom on the improvement of students’ speaking fluency by analyzing the total number of comprehensible words spoken, the number of pauses and the number of repetition of words, phrases or clauses per minute Recording, classroom observation are carried out in the quasi-experiment; and at the end of the experiment, an attitude questionnaire is delivered to find out students’ attitude towards the pair and group work activities used in class A brief discussion on teaching techniques and suggested action plan to implement these activities more effectively in speaking class has also been suggested afterwards based on the results of experimental teaching and the attitude questionnaire It is hoped that the study will be useful for those who are interested in the issue for further study and for the devoted teachers who have been continuously seeking useful teaching techniques to apply in their class Above all, the researcher believes that the students at Nam Dan I high school – the participants in the quasiexperiment will benefit greatly from this study iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Contents Page SUB COVER PAGE i STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP ii ACKNOWLEGDMENTS iii ABSTRACT iv TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS LIST OF TABLES CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 The aim of the research 1.3 Research questions 1.4 The scope of the study 1.5 The organization of the thesis CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 10 2.1 Theory of speaking 10 2.2 The importance of speaking in different teaching approaches 11 2.2.1 The Grammar-Translation Method 11 2.2.2 The Audio-lingual Method 12 2.2.3 Communicative Language Teaching Method 13 2.3 Different aspects of teaching speaking 15 2.3.1 Characteristics of a successful speaking activity 15 2.3.2 The assessment of speaking proficiency 17 2.3.3 Speaking fluency 20 2.3.4 How to improve speaking fluency 21 2.4 Pair work and group work activities 23 2.4.1 Definition of pair work and group work activities 24 2.4.2 Procedures for pair work and group work 25 2.4.3 Positive effects of pair work and group work activities on speaking fluency 29 2.4.3.1 Pair and group work activities help increase students’ motivation 29 2.4.3.2 Pair and group work activities help increase students’ learning effectiveness 30 2.4.4 Negative effects of pair work and group work activities on speaking fluency 32 2.5 Summary 34 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 35 3.1 Research questions 35 3.2 Description of variables 35 3.3 Research methods 36 3.3.1 Recordings 36 3.3.2 Classroom observation 36 3.3.3 Questionnaire 38 3.4 Subjects of the study 39 3.5 Data collection procedure 41 3.5.1 The placement test 41 3.5.2 Quasi-experiment 42 3.5.3 The attitude questionnaire 43 3.6 Data analysis 44 3.7 Summary 45 CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 46 4.1 The results 46 4.1.1 The effects of pair and group work activities on improving students’ speaking fluency 46 4.1.1.1 The results of A1 group 46 4.1.1.2 The results of A2 group 47 4.1.2.2 Students’ opinions about the activities used in class 50 4.1.2.3 Most effective activities in speaking class 51 4.1.3 Classroom observation 53 4.2 Summary of major findings 54 CHAPTER 5: RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION 56 5.1 Conclusion 56 5.2 Recommendations 57 5.2.1 Changes in teachers’ preparation for pair work and group work activities 57 5.2.2 Changes in teachers’ attitude towards their roles in pair and group work activities 59 5.3 Limitations and implications for further studies 60 REFERENCES ……………………………………………………………………………… 61 Appendix I Appendix IV Appendix VI Appendix VIII Appendix XI Appendix XII Appendix XIII Appendix .XIV Appendix XVIII Appendix 10 XXIX Appendix 11 XXXI Appendix 12 XXXIII LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CEFR The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages CLT Communicative Language Teaching ELT English Language Teaching ESL English as a Second Language GCSE General Certificate of Secondary Education IELTS International English Language Testing System L1 First Language L2 Second Language LIST OF TABLES Table 4.1: The mean scores of A2 group 47 Table 4.2: The mean scores of A1 group 48 Table 4.3: Results of the experimental group – class 11C1 49 Table 4.4: Students’ sense of improvement in their speaking fluency 50 Table 4.5: Students’ opinions about the activities used in class 52 Table 4.6: Activities which students find the most effective 53 Lesson plan for the control group – Class 11C10 Unit 4: Volunteer work Lesson B: Speaking I Objectives: By the end of the lesson, students will be able to: - Identify types of volunteer work - Talk about volunteer work II Materials: Textbook, pictures handouts III Anticipated problems: - Students may not have enough vocabulary to talk about the topic, so T should be ready to provide help IV Procedure: Stages Procedure Warmer Game: Competition game – Describing pictures - Tell the rule of the game - Stick pictures on the board - Have the students work individually Students are required to describe the activity in each picture in one sentence only Ask students to present their answers and the students who is quicker and has the most correct and meaningful sentences will be the winner - Stick pictures on the board Describing the pictures : The student is teaching the poor children The students are taking part in directing the traffic XXIII Interactions Time Groups 5’ The medical students are examining the old people 10 The students are collecting the rubbish 11 The students are helping the soldiers to build the road 12 The students are taking care of the disadvantaged children Declare the winner Lead-in:-Do you want to be a volunteer? -Have you ever done volunteer work? Today, we will talk about types of volunteer work (See pictures in the lesson plan above) T-Ss Prespeaking Pre-teaching vocabulary : invalid (n ) (picture +situation ) martyr (n) (situation ) : liệt sỹ Example: Do you know Nguyễn Văn Trỗi? He is considered a …………………… intersection (n) (picture ): disadvantaged (a) (explanation): or enough money Checking : Matching - Work individually - Ask students to match the words with their Vietnamese meaning Reading and Distinguishing - Work individually - Ask students to read the activities and XXIV 5’ decide which of them volunteer work is - Call on some students to give the answers - The rest of the class gives comments Pairs Expected answers : - Helping people in the remote or mountainous are - Giving care and comfort to the poor and the sick - Providing education for disadvantaged children - Joining the Green Saturday Movement Whilespeaking Pairs 5’ Pairs 9’ Task 1: Pair work - Ask students to work in pairs to practice speaking the dialogue - Go around the class to help students with difficulties - Call on some pairs to role play in front of the class Task 2: Dialogue-building - Before doing the task, teacher asks them to read the model conversation on page 50 Then students read the list of volunteer activities and the exact things related to them - Teacher gets across to students that one activity in the first column can go with several activities in the second column XXV -Teacher may require students to match each activity on the left with corresponding activities on the right Suggested answers Helping people in - Teaching the mountainous areas children to read and write - Giving them money Helping old or sick - Clearing up the people house -Doing their shopping -Cooking meal Helping -Teaching the disadvantaged or children to read and handicapped children write - Listening to their problems -Playing games with them - Taking them to places of interest Taking care of war - Listening to their invalids and proplems thefamilies of matyrs - Cleaning up their houses - Doing their shopping XXVI - Cookinh meals Taking part in - Directing vehicles directing the traffic at the intersection - Helping old people and young children - Ask Ss to work in pairs to make a similar conversation, using the activities given in task 2.p 50 - Work with a student to give a model Example: A: What kind of volunteer work are you participating in? B: I’m talking part in directing the traffic A: What exactly are you doing? B: I’m directing vehicles at the intersections A: Do you enjoy the work? B: Yes, I enjoy the work very much because I like helping people - Call on some pairs to act out the conversations - Make corrections in pronunciation and grammar Postspeaking Groups Small talk - Talk about kind of volunteer work - Work individually “What should you to help children in poverty in your hometown?” - Take turns to report their ideas XXVII 12’ - Give feedback Suggested ideas: - saving pocket money - raising money - collecting old clothes - collecting old textbooks and toys Example: Homework Information searching: Individuals -Tell students to search on the Internet the information about some volunteer organizations in the world XXVIII 1’ Appendix 10 Data collected from the recordings of A2 group A2 - 11C1 No 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Size Full name Nguyễn Khắc Ngọc Phan Công Tuấn Đinh Thị Phương Nguyễn Anh Đậu Công Võ Văn Đinh Xuân Trung Nguyễn Thanh Nguyễn Thành Nguyễn Lê Thành Lê Hoàng Thái Trần Hồng Nguyễn Thị Mai Bùi Danh Dương Đức Lê Thị Thanh Trần Đăng Nguyễn Lê Thị Phương Nguyễn Trọng Anh Anh Chi Dũng Dụng Đoàn Đức Hiền Huy Long Quân Quân Quỳnh Sinh Tài Tâm Thành Thảo Thảo 76 72 68 67 65 71 72 63 62 74 75 79 73 65 68 70 70 68 64 77 71 70 72 64 70 74 68 63 72 77 75 75 69 72 69 73 66 65 XXIX Hesitation 79 70 72 70 67 73 75 68 68 76 75 73 72 68 74 73 72 71 70 3 3 4 3 4 2 3 3 3 4 Repetition 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 3 3 3 3 4 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 A2 - 11C10 No 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 Full name Nguyễn Thị Vân Nguyễn Hoàng Nguyễn Thị Quỳnh Lê Thị Ngọc Mai Thị Ngọc Nguyễn Hữu Trần Thị Nguyễn Khắc Nguyễn Thị Nguyễn Thị Thu Nguyễn Thị Thùy Lê Thị Nguyễn Thị Lê Đậu Thị Phan Thị Hà Nguyễn Thị Thúy Nguyễn Thị Lê Thị Nguyễn Thị Thúy Lê Thị Size An Anh Anh Ánh Ánh Hào Hằng Hoàng Huệ Huyền Linh Mai Na Nhung Sang Sương Tâm Tuyết Vân Yến 67 63 62 70 71 65 66 64 69 65 71 63 64 67 65 72 70 67 73 66 68 62 63 69 67 67 65 63 68 63 73 67 66 69 67 73 71 65 69 64 Hesitation 68 63 67 71 69 67 64 68 65 65 72 69 70 68 67 70 69 69 68 67 XXX 4 3 3 3 3 3 2 4 4 3 3 3 3 3 Repetition 3 3 4 3 3 2 4 3 4 5 4 5 3 5 5 3 4 3 5 4 4 4 4 Appendix 11 Data collected from the recordings of A1 group A1 - 11C1 No 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 Size Full name Trần Thị Hoài Hồ Thị Diệp Phan Quốc Nguyễn Thị Linh Đàm Quang Ngô Mỹ Trần Bá Bùi Anh Trần Thị Thu Nguyễn Đình Bảo Nguyễn Thị Lê Thị Khánh Nguyễn Thu Nguyễn Hữu Nguyễn Thị Minh Nguyễn Thị Hồi Hồ Thị Phương An Anh Bảo Chi Chính Duyên Dũng Đức Hà Hưng Lệ Linh Sang Sáng Tâm Thanh Thảo Hesitation Repetition 40 37 42 38 35 37 39 40 41 36 38 37 39 35 42 42 40 39 43 39 44 45 43 40 39 42 41 46 40 47 49 45 46 50 44 51 46 49 48 48 46 49 53 44 50 7 8 7 8 6 7 7 6 7 6 7 6 8 7 6 6 6 7 7 6 6 7 6 6 5 6 7 33 37 39 45 44 46 8 7 7 XXXI A1 - 11C10 No 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Size Full name Nguyễn Phan Trâm Trần Thị Lan Đinh Hồng Lê Thị Nguyễn Thị Thanh Đinh Thị Khánh Nguyễn Thị Khánh Đặng Thị Lê Thị Thùy Nguyễn Thị Kim Nguyễn Thị Nguyễn Thị Tú Trần Thị Nguyễn Thị Nguyễn Thị Nguyễn Thị Hồ Thị Thu Phạm Thị Tố Đường Thị Hải Anh Anh Hiếu Hoài Hoài Huyền Huyền Linh Linh Ngân Nhã Oanh Oanh Thảo Thắm Thùy Uyên Uyên Yến 39 37 36 41 40 37 40 38 35 38 45 43 35 37 42 39 38 39 42 Hesitation 40 39 39 43 39 41 41 39 36 37 44 47 39 38 40 39 37 43 40 40 41 41 43 38 42 39 42 37 39 42 46 43 38 43 41 41 45 40 XXXII 7 7 10 7 8 8 7 7 9 7 8 7 Repetition 7 8 9 8 8 6 7 6 7 6 6 6 6 6 6 7 5 6 6 7 6 6 6 5 6 6 Appendix 12 Action plan ACTION PLAN Unit Personal experiences Type of activities: Pair work and group work Objectives: Talk about their personal experiences and how they affect their life, practice asking and answering about someone’s experiences Level: English 11 Time: 45 minutes Materials: Charts Procedures I Warm up: Games “Mime your past” ( pair work and group work) II Matching Put the students into pairs: Ask them to match things they might have done experienced in box A and how the experiences might have affected them in box B III Eliciting and introducing useful structures - What you say to talk about someone’s experience that might have affected them? - Expected answers: + Have you ever………… ? + When did it happen? + What were you thinking and feeling when it happened? + How did the experience affect you? IV Re-ordering Pair work (Put the lines of the dialogue in the correct orders) V Role-play drilling - Hang on the chart with the dialogue - Ask students to work in pairs to practice speaking the dialogue XXXIII VI Dialogue- building Working in pairs Call on some pairs to act out the dialogue ACTION PLAN Unit A party Types of activities: Pair work and group work Objectives: - Talk about the party, know how to plan a party Level: English 11 Time: 45 minutes Materials: pictures, cards (see appendix) Procedure I Warm - up : Matching (see appendix) Divide the class into group of four or five Give each group a card Ask students to match the pictures with their names II Question and answers Ask students to work in pairs to ask and answer the questions about the party they have been to Whose party was it? When and where was it held? What did you there? What sort of food and drink did you have? How did you enjoy it? III Discussion Have the students to work in groups of four or five to discuss the questions: “What you think of when you want to plan a party? IV Role- play Work in pair to make a plan for the party V Discussion XXXIV Put students in groups of or Discuss the question “In your opinion, what is your ideal party? What is it like? ACTION PLAN Unit Competitions Types of activities: Pair work and group work Objectives: talk about the competitions and contests, practice asking for and giving information about types of competitions Level: English 11 Time: 45 minutes Materials: Pictures and hand outs (see appendix) Procedures I Warm – up Matching - Divide the class into groups - Stick pictures of some competitions and cards with words about types of competition on them (see appendix) - Number the pictures and letter the cards - Put them in mixed order - Ask each group to nominate representatives to go to the board one by one to write the answers II Hand out - Give handouts to each student “Which competitions you like or dis like? Put a tick in the right column Compare the answers with your partners.” III Interviewing XXXV - Asking their partners how she / he feel about each type of the competitions/ contests - After interviewing their partners, the interviewer report in front of the class IV Guessing games - Divide the class into groups - Talk about a competition or a contest they have recently joined or seen on TV - Each group choose the best students to take part in the games ACTION PLAN Types of activity: Pair work and group work Objectives: Practice giving their opinions about the causes and the problems facing over populous countries Level: English 11 Time: 45 minutes Materials: Handouts Procedure I Ordering Have the students work in groups, give a set of cards, each of which carries a letter Students work together to put them in the right orders to make a meaningful word II Discussing Talk about the causes to population explosion Work in group of four or five to discuss then present their ideas III Listing the problems - Work in pair to discuss and list the problems - Teacher work with a student to give a model A: What can be problems that face poor or overpopulated countries? B: I think people living there have bad living conditions and not have enough food to eat XXXVI A: And what’s more there aren’t enough jobs for everyone……… - Report their opinions in front of the class IV Working out the solutions - Work in groups - Situation: If you were a Prime Minister of Viet Nam, what would you to solve the problems of overpopulation? V Talk about the problems of overpopulation and offer solutions Discuss in groups then the representatives report their ideas XXXVII ... improve speaking fluency 21 2.4 Pair work and group work activities 23 2.4.1 Definition of pair work and group work activities 24 2.4.2 Procedures for pair work and group work. .. effects of pair work and group work activities on speaking fluency 29 2.4.3.1 Pair and group work activities help increase students’ motivation 29 2.4.3.2 Pair and group work activities... effects of pair and group work activities on improving students’ speaking fluency The effects of pair work and group work activities on the improvement of speaking fluency of the students in speaking