Factors prevent students from speaking English in- 123docz.net

CHAPTER III: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION

3.1 Results from students‟ pre- treatment questionnaire

3.1.2 Factors prevent students from speaking English in the classroom

Factors Students Percentage

a. My English grammar is poor. 44 63%

b. I don‟t have enough words about the

topic. 31 44%

c. I am afraid of grammar mistakes. 38 54%

d. I can‟t speak a complete sentence. 35 50%

e. I can only speak only one or two words in

English. 8 11%

f. I cannot speak what I think because I

don‟t have the necessary words 45 64%

Table 3.2: Factors prevent students from speaking English in the classroom

As can be viewed from the table, 64% of the students could not find words and 63% of the students with poor grammar to express their opinion when speaking. In fact, the problems for the high school students were the lack of vocabulary and grammatical knowledge for learning. The next, which affected 54 % of the respondents, was that they were afraid of making grammatical mistakes during their speech. It was not surprising to find out that 50% of the students who couldn‟t speak a complete sentence. This fact was due to the fact that many students lacked of necessary words of the topic (44%). A small amount of the students (11%) could only speak one or two words in English. In conclusion, the main reason preventing students from speaking in English class was their lack of vocabularies and structures.

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3.2 Results from students’ post- intervention questionnaire and interview for the students

3.2.1 The students’ attitude and motivation to learn English when they are taught lexical chunks

In the questionnaire, the first three statements were designed to explore the students‟ motivation toward speaking lessons using lexical chunks. The result from the answers to the questions shows that students were more interested in speaking lessons when they were provided lexical chunks.

Statements

Number of respondents (%) Strongly

disagree Disagree Don‟t

know Agree Strongly agree 1. I feel more confident in

speaking lessons when introduced more lexical chunks

4.3% 21.4% 4.3% 47.1% 22.9%

2. I feel more willing to participate in speaking activities when taught lexical chunks.

5.7% 18.6% 2.9% 41.4% 31.4%

3. I fell more motivated to speak when introduced lexical chunks

2.9% 24.3% 1.4% 37.1% 34.3%

Table 3.3: The degree of students’ attitude and motivation in speaking lesson after being taught lexical chunks

The table 5 shows that 70% of the participants felt more confident in speaking lessons when introduced more lexical chunks while the number of students who disagreed with the statement and did not know their answers

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was only 30%. As students felt more confident in speaking lesson with lexical chunks, they were also willing to participate in speaking activities. As can be seen, the number of the students felt more willing to participate in speaking activities when taught lexical chunks went up 72.8% compared to only 24.3%

of the students had opposite attitude. For this statement 2.9% of the students had no idea. The statement three of the question 2 concretely affirmed students‟ motivation in speaking lessons when taught lexical chunks. In response to this statement, 71.4% strongly agreed and agreed that they felt more motivated to speak after being introduced lexical chunks in comparison with 27.1% of the students opposed to the above idea and 1.4% of the students did not know their answers.

3.2.2 The students’ opinions about the benefits of using lexical chunks in speaking lessons

The next four statements in the questionnaire were designed to elicit the students‟ opinions about the benefits of being taught lexical chunks in the class. For the statement 4, the students were asked to show their opinion about the accuracy in speaking English when taught lexical chunks.

Statement

Number of respondents (%) Strongly

disagree Disagree Don‟t

know Agree Strongly agree Learning lexical chunks

helps me speak more accurately.

10% 21.4% 4.3% 35.7% 28.6%

Table 3.4:Students’opinions about the accuracy in speaking lesson when taught lexical chunks

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In response to the statement, which asked the students to state their opinions about the accuracy in speaking English, the number of the students strongly agreed and agreed that they could utter their sentences more accurately was 28.6% and 35 .7% respectively. Only 31.4% of the students strongly disagreed and disagreed with the accuracy of using lexical chunks in speaking English, and 4.3% of the students did not know their answer.

Presented in the chart, the students‟ response to this statement can be illustrated as follows:

Figure3. 4: Students’ opinions about the accuracy in speaking lesson when taught lexical chunks

The statement 5 of the question 2 was designed to explore the students‟

opinions about the fluency in speaking English resulting from using lexical chunks.

Statement

Number of respondents (%) Strongly

disagree Disagree Don‟t

know Agree Strongly agree Learning lexical chunks

helps me speak more fluently.

7.1% 22.9% 2.9% 40% 27.1%

Table 3.5: Students’ opinions about the fluency in speaking lesson when taught lexical chunks

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Most students (67.1%) thought that using lexical chunks helped them speak English more fluently. Only 30% of the respondents thought that using lexical chunks did not improve their fluency in speaking English. 2.9% of the respondents did not know whether learning lexical chunks resulted in their fluency in speaking English or not. The chart 5 below is the illustration of the table 5

Figure 3.5: Students’ opinions about the fluency in speaking lesson when taught lexical chunks

The statement 6 of the question 2 was designed to find out students‟

general opinion about their improvement in speaking English when taught lexical chunks. In response to this statement, most students concluded that they could speak English better after learning lexical chunks. The findings are shown in the table 6 below:

Statement

Number of respondents (%) Strongly

disagree Disagree Don‟t

know Agree Strongly agree Learning lexical chunks

helps me to speak English better

5.7% 25.7% 2.9% 45.7% 20%

Table 3.6: Students’ opinions about their improvement in speaking English when taught lexical chunks

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As can be seen from the following table, the number of the students agreed and strongly agreed that learning lexical chunks helped them to speak English better went up 65.7% compared to only 31.4% of the students had the opposite opinion. 2.9 % of the students did not know whether learning lexical chunks helped them to speak English better or not. The table 6 was calculated by percentage as in the following figure:

Figure 3.6: Students’ opinions about their improvement when taught lexical chunks

Using lexical chunks not only brought about the benefits in speaking English as mentioned in the literature part and discussed above but also helped students understand grammar better. The following table describes the students‟ opinion about the advantage of learning lexical chunks in understanding English grammar.

Statement

Number of respondents (%) Strongly

disagree Disagree Don‟t

know Agree Strongly agree I understand English

grammar better by learning lexical chunks.

12.9% 25.7% 5.7% 40% 15.7%

Table3.7: Students’ opinions about the advantage of learning lexical chunks in understanding English grammar

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As can be viewed from the table 7, the number of the students thought that learning lexical chunks helped them understand English grammar better was 55.7% in comparison with 38.6% of the students who had the opposite opinions about the advantage of learning lexical chunks in understanding English grammar. 5.7% of the students did not know whether learning lexical chunks helped them understand English grammar better or not.

3.2.3 The students’ opinions about factors affecting the effectiveness of learning lexical chunks in speaking lessons

To answer question 2, the students listed some common factors that affect the effectiveness of learning lexical chunks in speaking lessons.

Common factors affected the effectiveness of lexical chunks in speaking lessons

Number of respondents (%) 1. Not accustomed to learning and speaking a long

phrase 31.4%

2. Hard to notice what lexical chunks could be

useful to learn and recall later on 40%

3. Difficult to learn too long lexical chunks

containing slots and permitting variables 24.3%

4. Few common lexical chunks relating to the topic 18.6%

5. Too far review tasks and activities in the

textbook to practise with lexical chunks 22.9%

Table 3.8: Common factors affected the effectiveness of lexical chunks in speaking lessons

As can be seen from the table above, the first problem mentioned by many students was learning habit. In fact, 31.4% of the respondents

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complained that they were not used to learning and speaking a long phrase.

This was due to the fact that they were familiar with traditional instruction of teaching single words and grammar rules. The second quite popular problem, accounting for 40% of the respondents, was that they had no the concept of lexical chunks in their mind. As a result, they felt hard to notice what lexical chunks could be useful to learn and recall later on. Next, 24.3% of the respondents faced the difficulty in learning too long lexical chunks containing slots and permitting variables. 18.6% of the respondents complained that there were few common lexical chunks relating to the topic which still caused difficulties during their oral speech. The last problem that many students mentioned was the lack of review tasks and activities in the textbook to practise with lexical chunks (22.9% o f the respondents).

3.2.4 Students’ recommendations for the improvement of learning lexical chunks in speaking lessons

Students‟ recommendations for the improvement of learning lexical chunks in speaking lessons

Number of respondents (%) 1. More activities and exercises to practise with

lexical chunks 32.9%

2. How to learn and notice what lexical chunks

could be useful to learn and recall later on 37.1%

3. More common lexical chunks relating to the topic 25.7%

Table3.9: The students’ recommendations for the improvement of learning lexical chunks in speaking lessons

The question 3 was designed to explore changes in order to learn lexical chunks in speaking lessons more effectively.

Each student expressed different recommendations to learn lexical chunks better in their speaking lessons. The recommendations mentioned

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above are the most popular. As can be seen from the table, most students, accounting 32.9%, expected that the teacher should design some more activities to practise with lexical chunks. The number of the students suggested that the teacher should teach them how to notice and learn lexical chunks was 37.1%. Last but not least, many students (25.7%) expressed that they expected ore common lexical chunks relating to the topic delivered by the teacher.

3.3 Summary

Chapter 3 has analyzed and discussed the data collected from the pre- intervention and post-intervention survey questionnaires employed in the study. The result of the quantitative analysis shows that lexical chunks bring out benefits (enhancing students‟ motivation in communicative activities, promoting students‟ fluency and accuracy in their oral speech and helping students understand English better) in supporting students in learning to speak English. However, using lexical chunks to support students in learning to speak English also faces some difficulties such as students‟ learning habit and teacher‟s experience in teaching with new method.

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CHAPTER IV: MAJOR FINDINGS

This section presents the answers to the original research question and sub- questions proposed in the part three of this thesis

Research question 1: To what extent does the use of lexical chunks influence the students’ motivation to speak English as measured by their self-reported changes in their confidence and participation in speaking English?

From the investigation results, it could be concluded that using lexical chunks did enhance and support 12th form students at Vu Tien High school of Thaibinh in learning to speak English.

The results of the survey questionnaire showed that most of the respondents held a more positive attitude toward speaking lessons when taught lexical chunks. The effectiveness of teaching lexical chunks was shown in the students‟ higher motivation (71.4% of the students)to speak in the new environment, more confident (70% of the participants) in using language in communicative activities and more willing to participate in speaking lesson( 72.8% of the students).

Research question 2: What do the students self-report on the benefits of using lexical chunks to their speaking English in the classroom?

The effectiveness was also shown in the fluency and accuracy of students‟ when they use lexical chunks in their oral speech. 67.1% of the students agreed that they could speak English more fluently and 64.3% of the students agreed that they could speak English more accurately. They liked this type of teaching method not only because of the improvement in their speaking but also because of the improvement in the knowledge of English.

In fact, the students were really aware of the effectiveness of learning lexical chunks, in helping them achieve both vocabularies and rules of grammar.

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55.7% of the students thought that learning lexical chunks helped them understand English grammar better which must be very useful for the production of language such as speaking and writing skills.

However, it is important to note that the effectiveness of the use of lexical chunks reported here is self-reported by the students. It was not measured by standardized tests. In other words, there are threats to both the reliability and validity of the research findings. However, reliability and validity are not the goal of any exploratory action research, which is primarily aimed at helping teachers in their attempts to find solutions to a particular teaching problem of their own.

Research question 3: What are students’ perceived difficulties in learning to speak English with this teaching strategy?

The first obstacle in using lexical chunks to support 12 th form students at Vu Tien school of Thai Binh in learning to speak English stayed in students‟ learning habits. In fact, they were accustomed to learning sing words and grammar rules separately but lexical chunks. The next difficulty contributing to limiting the effectiveness of using lexical chunks to teach speaking English belonged to the students themselves. They lacked of sufficient learning strategies in noticing and learning lexical chunks. The next obstacle belonged to my experience in methodology of the new teaching method. I lacked of extra exercises for learners to practice with lexical chunks and I expected to teach too many chunks at one lesson. It can be concluded that more experience teachers and students‟ better learning strategies may further improve the effectiveness of using lexical chunks in speaking lesson.

Basing on the survey post –intervention questionnaire, it was me who contributed to the way of improving the current situation as well as increasing the effectiveness of future applications of this approach. The subjects

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