LÊ THỊ TUYẾT MAI VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES Lê Thị Tuyết Mai ENGLISH LANGUAGE USING ROLE - PLAY TO IMPROVE THE FIRST - YEAR STUDENTS’ ENGLISH SPEAKING SKILL AT VIETNAMESE UNIVERSITY OF TRADITIONAL MEDICINE MA THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE COURSE: 2016 – 2018 HANOI, 2018 VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES Lê Thị Tuyết Mai USING ROLE-PLAY TO IMPROVE THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS’ ENGLISHSPEAKING SKILL AT VIETNAMESE UNIVERSITY OF TRADITIONAL MEDICINE Field: English Language Code: 8220201 Supervisor: Phạm Hiển, Ph.D HANOI, 2018 DECLARATION BY AUTHOR I declare that this “Using role play to improve the 1st year students' English-speaking skill at Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine” is created by my own findings and I am the sole author of this thesis To the best of my knowledge, with the exception of the indication of reference, this is carried out without using any other author’s work and is submitted after a carefully checking progress in order to fulfill the requirements of the M.A degree Author’s signature Lê Thị Tuyết Mai Approved by SUPERVISOR Phạm Hiển, Ph.D Date: ……………………………… i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis is completed with lots of working hours and is contributed by a large amount of enthusiasm, effort and assistance from many people First and the foremost, I would like to express my gratitude to my supervisor, Phạm Hiển,Ph.D for all of his support If it had not been for his guidance, as long as the advice and comments from him, I would not complete this research paper Moreover, I would like to send my special thanks to all of teachers at Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine for all their help and suggestion which are very necessary and useful to me during the progress of completing this Additionally, I am so grateful for all of the assistance from the students at Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine with their answers for all of the interview, I would not have completed this research paper otherwise Last but not least, I would like to send my special thanks to my beloved family, who are always supportive and enthusiastic to me during the progress of making this ii ABSTRACT This is created and completed on the purpose of researching the way of using Role-Play as an effective teaching method, especially in the scope of teaching English at universities According to the theoretical foundation about Role-Play implementation, the aim of this is to enhance the English-speaking competence of students in the first year of the university Furthermore, applying Role-Play method is becoming more and more popular in teaching and guiding English speaking skill to the students, therefore, this focuses on analyzing the necessity as well as the way of using this helpful method in universities, particularly the Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine Figures, data and information was collected and analyzed mainly through surveys, questionnaires and interview which was conducted by 100 first-year students at Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine The benefits, positive effects, as well as challenges of applying this teaching method are analyzed in this Furthermore, some suggestions for overcoming these difficulties are also mentioned iii TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION BY AUTHOR i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii ABSTRACT iii LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES vii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 Aims of the Study 1.3 Research Questions 1.4 Scope of the Study 1.5 Significance of the Study 1.6 Research Methods 1.7 Organization of the Study CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 An Overview of a Method of Teaching and Learning the Skill of English-Speaking 2.1.1 A Language Teaching Method with Surprising Effectiveness: Communicative Language Teaching Approach (CLT) 2.1.1.1 Communicative Language Teaching Approach: Definition 2.1.1.2 An Overview of CLT Approach’s Aims 2.1.2 A Description of an Effective Way of Learning English-Speaking Skill 2.2 An Introduction of Role-Play in Teaching the Skill of Speaking 2.2.1 Definition of Role-Play 2.2.2 Forms of Role-Play 2.2.3 The Steps for Role-Play Activity 10 iv 2.2.4 The Necessity of Role-Play Method in Teaching the Skill of Speaking 13 2.2.5 The Teachers’ Role in this Activity 13 2.3 Chapter Summary 14 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 15 3.1 Research Questions 15 3.2 Research Participants: The Researcher and The Subjects 15 3.3 Research Procedure 15 3.4 Instruments of Collecting Data 15 3.4.1 Survey Questionnaires 15 3.4.2 Observations 17 3.4.3 Interview 18 3.5 Assessment 18 3.6 Chapter Summary 18 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 19 4.1 A Brief Analysis of the Survey’s Results 19 4.1.1 Questionnaires 19 4.1.1.1 Questionnaire for Students 19 4.1.1.2 Questionnaire for Teaches 38 4.1.2 Interviewing 46 4.1.2.1 Teachers’ Interviewing 46 4.1.2.2 Student’s Interviewing 48 4.1.3 Observations 49 4.1.3.1 The first Observation 49 4.1.3.2.The second Observation 51 4.2 Discussions 52 4.2.1 Research Question 1: 52 v 4.2.2 Research Question 2: 52 4.3.Assessment: 53 4.3.1.Class’s Situation before Applying Method 53 4.3.2.Application Progress 55 4.3.3.Class’s Situation after Applying Method 55 4.4.Chapter Summary 57 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 59 5.1 Recapitulation 59 5.2.Concluding Remarks 59 5.3.Implications 60 5.4 Limitations and Suggestions for Further Studies 60 REFERENCES I APPENDIX: QUESTIONNAIRES III vi LISTS OF TABLES Tables of Students’ Survey Questionnaire Analysis Table 1: Students’ Level of Involvement in a Particular Lesson 20 Table 2: Students’ Opinion about Role-Play Activities done in Class 21 Table 3: Students’ Level of Impression on the Activities 21 Table 4: Was Students’ Confidence improved after Exercises 22 Table 5.1: Students’ Opinion about Today’s Lesson: LEVEL OF HELPFULNESS 23 Table 5.2: Students’ Opinion about Today’s Lesson: LEVEL OF DIFFICULTY 24 Table 6: The Skill Needs Improving 25 Table 7: Self-evaluation of Students about their Communicative Skill in English 26 Table 8: Whether Developing Speaking Skills during Classes is Essential 27 Table 9: Do you find it difficult to communicate in English? 29 Table 10: Factors Prevent Students from talking English fluently 30 Table 11: Have you ever played a role during a language lesson? 31 Table 12: Preference for Playing Roles than other Activities in Class 32 Table 13: Frequency of using Role-Play in English Speaking Classes of Students 33 Table 14: Feelings when Participating in Role-Play Activities 34 Table 15: Difficulties in Applying Role-Play in Speaking Classes 35 Table 16: Factors Influencing Role-Play Classes 36 Table 17: Reasons for the Excitement of Role-Play Classes 37 Tables of students’ survey questionnaire analysis Table 1: Viewpoint of Teachers on Student’s Speaking Competence 38 Table 2: Viewpoint of Teachers about Students’ Attitude to Learning Speaking 39 Table 3: Teachers’ Application of Role-Play Method in Class 40 vii Table 4: Benefits of Applying Role-Play 41 Table 5: Level of Difficulties in Applying Role-Play 42 Table 6: Difficulties when Applying Role-Play: Reasons 43 Table 7: Frequency of Using Role-Play in Class 44 Table 8: Viewpoint about Students’ Enhancement 44 viii First of all, there is an improvement in the usage of vocabulary among students in various speaking topic Basing on new words provided by teachers, they have a chance to apply them simultaneously and directly to their conversation Moreover, combining with the regular checks from teachers, in order to find out whether they can memorize these new words or not, students can remember and apply these words spontaneously; and now, all of them can use words at the level of A2, even some ones can use words at level B1, a very potential improvement to the students at first year at university Furthermore, their pronunciation, speaking speed and grammatical aspect used in their conversation have been improved as well This is a part of a conversation about the topic of “Occupation” after applying Role-Play method: Situation: Two of you are friends and both of you haven’t seen each other for a long time Ask and answer about the other’s current job - Student A: Good morning, my friend How’s it going? - Student B: Everything’s fine and going smoothly I am about to take a new job - Student A: Oh, really? What is it? What you do? Don’t tell me that you are going to be an artist again? - Student B: Absolutely not I will take a new job at a factory, I am an engineer in it - Student A: Congratulation! Happy to hear that - Student B: How about you? Where are you working at? - Student A: I am an English teacher at Nguyen Hue Secondary School […] 56 It can be seen that the whole conversation, in comparison with the previous one, the one which spoken before applying the method, is completely different More complex and uncommon words were used, grammatical aspects were used correctly and suitably Furthermore, when students come to the board, standing in front of the class to speak, they are no longer shy anymore They are confident and willing to speak, with an enthusiastic tone of voice In conclusion, there has been a definite improvement of students’ speaking competence after applying Role-Play 4.4 Chapter Summary From the questionnaire surveys’ results and the answers of both students and teachers which were mentioned and analysed above, it can be concluded that applying Role-Play method brought an unexpected effectiveness to the procedure of teaching English-teaching skill for first-year students at Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine Not only were there the vocabulary ranges and grammatical aspects related to speaking, but there was also the attitude to learning speaking of students to be improved Many students like this new method, and they show their willingness and enthusiasm in each speaking lesson Although there are some current difficulties for teachers to apply, most of them agreed that this is an effective method to use in class and they usually use it to improve students’ speaking competence 57 58 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 5.1 Recapitulation This section indicates the overall conclusion of the study on integrating Role-Play activities in teaching English speaking skills to first-year students at Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine This study aims at analyzing the effects of using Role-Play and the difficulties of applying for teacher and students as well as suggesting some solutions to these problems In order to achieve the target, observation forms, interviews and questionnaires were employed to collect the required information From the data, it can be obviously seen that most teachers of English at this university have included Role-Play in the syllabus, which brought a great effect on students’ English-speaking competence 5.2 Concluding Remarks It can be concluded from the is that Role-Play is a great method to apply in class, and both teachers and students also acknowledge the usefulness of Role-Play The first advantage of this activity which could be mentioned here is to boost students’ confidence, imagination and creativity as well Moreover, not only could it help mimic the real-life situations in a natural way but students could also learn about daily-life topics However, this advantageous method also brings about several drawbacks to teacher and students The limitation of students’ oral performance is one of the most challenging issues in applying these activities It leads to the fact that teachers are reluctant to apply this activity frequently Meanwhile, the almost biggest concerns of students are their level of confidence and limited vocabulary Expressing the characters’ ideas and feelings challenges students’ confidence and fluency However, during the observation section, students seemed to be actively involved in Role-Play activities and their interests in speaking also 59 seemed to increase It can be generalized that communicative approach and Role-Play activities should be often use in teaching English because of the effectiveness in increasing students' interest in learning speaking It is expected that Role-Play activity will be more helpful and will be applied more and more frequently 5.3.Implications It can be seen that Role-Play plays an important part in improving students’ English-speaking competence; accordingly, teachers should apply this effective more regularly and think about some more ways to improve and innovate in-class activities to make each speaking lesson becomes an interesting and exciting environment for student to develop their ability 5.4 Limitations and Suggestions for Further Studies The study contains some limitations that should be noted Firstly, because of limit of time, we just can interview some teachers and students about applying role- play activities, there are some other teachers and a lot of students cannot have a chance to express their opinion; therefore, the results are not various Moreover, it is limitation at time of observing teachers' teaching There are just two periods of two classes were observed so the scopes of the study are limited Last but not least, the research needs to experiment in reality In other words, we need to really teach some classes those applying Role-Play activities Hopefully, the mentioned limitations will help other researchers have some useful experiences in their further related studies First of all, we should enlarge the amount of research participants The more research participants' answers researchers collect the more reliable results they get, for example, further studies can involve more teachers and students in interview so that they can get more information about their research 60 participants' attitude toward research object In addition, the effectiveness of Role-Play will be recognized easily if researchers spend much time on observing more lessons taught by high school teachers It is also better if further researchers have a chance for real teaching time that Role-Play is applied It is hoped that these suggestions will help further researchers have better experience for their studies In brief, though contains certain limitations, it has been completed with greatest efforts, therefore, sympathetic comments and suggestions 61 are highly appreciated REFERENCES Byram, M., & Fleming, M., (Eds.) (1998) Language learning in Intercultural Perspective: Approaches through Drama and Ethnography Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress Byrne, D (1983) Cuecards In S Holden (Ed.), Second Selections from Modern English Teacher (pp 90-91) Harlow: Longman Chaney, A L., & Burk, T L (1998) Teaching Oral Communication in Grades K-8 Boston, Boston University Press Harasim, L., Starr, R., H Teles, L &Turoff, M (1995) Learning networks: A field guide to Teaching and Learning online.Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Horner, D., &Mc.Ginley, K (1990) Running Simulation/Games: A step-by-step guide In D Crookall& R Oxford (Eds.), Simulation, gaming and language learning (pp 33-45) New York: Newbury House Publishers Kodotchigova, M (2001) Role-Play in Teaching Culture: Six Quick Steps for ClassroomImplementation.Russia:Tomsk State University Press Ladousse,G (April 1987) Role Play: Resources Book for TeacherSeries Canada: Oxford University Press Canada Livingstone C (1983).Role Play in LanguageLearning, United Kingdom: Longman Press Littlewood, W (1981).Communicative LanguageTeaching – An Introduction Cambridge: Cambridge University Press McGill, I &Beaty, L (1995) Action Learning: A Guide for Professional, Management and Educational Development New York: Kogan Page Mergie S Berns (1984).Contexts of Competence: Social and Cultural Considerations in CommunicativeLanguage Teaching (Topics in I Language and Linguistics), the United Kingdom, Springer Milroy, E (1982) Role-Play: A Practical Guide Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press Milroy, J (1982) Probing under the tip of the iceberg: Phonological 'normalization' and the shape of Speech Communities In Romaine, S (ed.), Sociolinguistic Variation in Speech Communities London: Edward Arnold, 1982 35-47 Spada, N (2007).Communicative Language Teaching: Currents Status and FutureProspect, Canada: The University of Toronto Nunan, D.(January 1991) Communicative Tasks and the Language Curriculum TESOL Quarterly 25: 279–295 Sandra, S (1983).Communicative Competence: Theory and Classroom Practice Texts and Contexts in Second Language Learning The Addison-Wesley Second Language Professional Library Series; United States of America: McGraw-Hill Higher Education Shaw, M.E., Corsini, R J., Blake, R.R & Mouton, J.S (1980) Role Playing: A Practical Manual for Group Moderators San Diego: University Associates Turner, D A (1992) Roleplays: A Sourcebook of Activities for Trainers London: Kogan Page Van Ments, M (1999) The Effective Use of Role-Play London: Kogan Yule, George (2006) The Study of Language (3rd edition.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press II APPENDIX: QUESTIONNAIRES Questionnaire for teachers: My name is , teacher at This questionnaire is designed for our research on applying Role-Play activity in teaching speaking for first-year students at Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine Your assistance in completing the following items is greatly appreciated Please feel free to complete this questionnaire because your identification in any discussion of the data will not be mentioned Thank you very much for your cooperation How you think about your student’s speaking competence? A Very good B Good C Pretty good D Not good How you think about students’ attitude to learning speaking? A Like very much B Like C Like a little D Do not like Have you ever used Role-Play method in class? A Yes B No What you think is the benefit of Role-Play method? A A chance to practice speaking B Using English more correctly III C Increasing confidence D Improving creativity In your opinion, what is the level of difficulties in applying Role-Play? A Very difficult B Difficult C Normal D Very easy In your opinion, what is the difficulty when applying Role-Play? A Students’ poor speaking competence B Lack of basic grammar and vocabulary C Poor involvement of students D Activities are too strange What is your frequency of using role play in class? A Usually B Sometimes C Rarely D Never What you think about students’ improvement? A Improved very much B Improved C Improved a little D Not be improved IV Questionnaire for students: Hello everybody! My full name is Le ThịTuyết Mai I am working at Vietnam University of traditional medicine I am carrying out my M.A on “Using Role Play to improve the 1st year students’ English-speaking skill at Vietnamese University of traditional medicine” So, I would appreciate your cooperation in answering the questionnaires carefully and truthfully Your information will bring success to my Hope to receive your cooperation Thanks a lot! Class: Sex: Male □ Female □ Please tick or circle your answer (you can make more than one choice if necessary) or give your ideas After taking part in a lesson using Role-Play; what you think about your level of involvement in this particular lesson? A Active B Little participation C No participation at all D Difficult to determine What is your opinion about Role-Play activities done in class? A I like it B I not like it C I not know What is your level of impression on the activities? A Attractive B Interesting C Somehow useful D A little bit impressed E No impression at all V Do you think that your confidence improved after exercises? A Yes B No C Not very much There are 02 questions for item 5: 5.1 What is your opinion about today’s lesson; regarding to LEVEL OF HELPFULNESS? A Very helpful B Useful C Not helpful at all D Difficult to determine 5.2 What is your opinion about today’s lesson; regarding to LEVEL OF DIFFICULTY? A Very difficult B Difficult C Easy D Very easy E Difficult to determine What is the skill you need improving? A Grammar B Listening C Reading D Speaking E Writing Let’s make a Self-evaluation of students about their communicative skill in English (5 is the best; is the worse): _ VI Do you agree that developing speaking skills during classes is essential? A Strongly agree B Agree C Disagree D Strongly disagree E No opinion Do you find it difficult to communicate in English? A Yes B No C I not know D Depends on the conversation’s topic 10.What factor prevents you from talking English fluently? A Pronunciation, accent B Lack of vocabulary C Using grammar D Contents understanding E No difficulties 11.Have you ever played a role during a language lesson? A Yes B No C I not remember 12.Do you prefer playing roles than other activities in class? A Yes B No C Difficult to determine 13.How often Role Play is used in English speaking classes? VII A Usually B Often C Sometimes D Seldom E Never 14.How you feel when using Role Play in English speaking/communicating classes? A Anxious B Boring C Enthusiastic D Normal Reasons: 15.What the difficulties you face when using Role Play in speaking classes? A Using wrong grammar structures in sentences B Lacking vocabulary C Being shy and passive when communicating D Lack of the partner’s cooperation Others: 16.According to you, what factors influence a role play classes? A Topic B Atmosphere C Partner D Teacher’s helping VIII Reasons: 17.According to you, what method made Role Play more effective and exciting? A Various topics B Taking a lot time for learning and presentation C Having some necessary vocabulary and grammar structure from teacher D Choosing group freely Others: 18.Do you have any suggestions for Role Play in your speaking classes? Thank you IX ... ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES Lê Thị Tuyết Mai USING ROLE- PLAY TO IMPROVE THE FIRST -YEAR STUDENTS ENGLISHSPEAKING SKILL AT VIETNAMESE UNIVERSITY OF TRADITIONAL MEDICINE. .. theoretical foundation about Role- Play implementation, the aim of this is to enhance the English- speaking competence of students in the first year of the university Furthermore, applying Role- Play method... to carry out the thesis Using role play to improve the 1st year students' English- speaking skill at Vietnamese University of Traditional Medicine By doing this , we believe that it can help teachers,