2.4.2.1. Teachers’ instruction
Due to the special requirement of English language teaching which focuses on language skills, each skill may have different oral instruction in order to boost students‟ language ability in specific language skills. Given the current study focusing on English communicative teaching context, teaching English speaking and listening is concentrated on in this paper. Kayi (2006) defines teaching speaking as an activity of instructing students how to produce the English speech sounds and sound patterns in selected words and sentences appropriate with social settings with stress, intonation, and rhythm. The instruction language is thus explicit and clear enough for students to follow.
From which, students‟ listening skill is also improved based on the recognition of English sounds, the proper use of language, the understanding of the context of interaction. This means teaching speaking English is not only about teaching students on vocabulary and pronunciation but also how to produce them in a proper manner, which is about instructing verbal and nonverbal language elements. Nunan (2003) indicates teaching speaking is to teach students how to use English confidently and naturally through meaningful ideas and logical sequence in order to express themselves. Magna (2008) indicates that students‟ oral interaction seems to be better in a more confident and open teacher/students relationship. To teach a student to successfully perform English speaking ability means to teach that person
successfully use verbal and vocal components in English language. That means the instruction should focus on how to produce words correctly, select words properly and put stress and intonation appropriately to make meaningful utterances.
2.4.2.2. Teachers’ questions
The idea of learning through social constructivism is not new (Vygotsky, 1978).
The way the teacher responds to student would contribute to the student learning progress. Teacher responses are important to students as it can help students to grow, to foster their speaking skills through constantly interacting with others (their peers or the teacher). Questioning is a necessary tool for EFL teachers to call for student contribution and participation in class. This is also a way for EFL students to improve their communicative skills in the second language. EFL teachers normally used questions to double check for student knowledge, to test their level of understanding, and to engage students in the lesson.
Currently, the requirement that students should have the language competence allows more practical questions. Liu and Zhu (2012) categorize the teacher questions into two types, display questions and referential questions. Display questions are used to extract student knowledge about a learning point, for example,
“what is the adjective of the word “beauty?”. Referential questions are also what, why and how questions but require individualized informative answers (Liu and Le, 2012). As the purpose of asking referential questions is to collect personal sharing, the types of questions should not be restricted within wh-questions. It could be any type of questions including yes/no questions as long as students are given space to express their ideas more and more. Each student will have an individual answer for the same question. As the communicative competence is one of important goals in EFL teaching, referential questions are expected to help boost the student practice and their motivation in engaging in the classroom interaction. The students are
aware of the space for them to contribute to the teaching session through open ended questions. Unlike display questions which function as testing student knowledge, referential questions facilitate students‟ involvement and personal sharing, which in return promote student interaction in English classes. By this way, questions should be asked to individual students to enquire direct, personal answers.
2.4.2.3. Teachers’ feedback
Feedback is a chance for the language instructors to add on more values to students‟
improvement process by giving space for students to reflect on what they have done and how they should do to improve their language competency. Nunan (1991) identifies feedback in two ways, positive and negative feedback. In which, the author emphasize the power of positive feedback as it can help students grow in the language learning journey. Positive feedback forms are praises, praises plus comments or repetition, questions to other students, and guidance for self-correction (Liu et al., 2012). “Automatic” praises like good, very good, ok, and so forth are of concern as its effectiveness on student learning is unclear (Nunan, 1991).
Additionally, as classroom is a simulation of social interaction where interlocutors‟
comment can be seen as a type of feedback, teachers‟ comments may need to be included in the item of teacher feedback. This brings to the idea that feedback from EFL teachers in class should be real and appropriate to embrace student growth and success.
From what have been discussed, the teacher talk or teacher interaction in EFL classroom is actually the language of low-context communication in terms of directness, verbal-based style, self-enhancement and person-orientation. This framework of individualistic interaction style in EFL classroom context may pose some concerns for Vietnamese EFL teachers, who belong to a collectivistic culture, in their daily classroom interaction.