TABLE OF CONTENTS Pages INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale of the study… 2 Aims of the study……………… .3 Scope of the study ………… Research methods of the study……… .3 DEVELOPMENT Theoretical background…… 2 Findings and discussion 2 Methodology… 2 Data analysis and discussion…… …………………………….7 2.2.2.1 Problems that students often meet in English speaking lesson 2.2.2 Teachers’ problems in speaking lessons…………………………………… …………………… 2 Some suggestions for solutions………………………………….8 2 Some advice for teachers in general……………………8 2 Some suggestions for a successful speaking skill lesson and to motivate students…………………………………………10 2 3 Sample lesson plans……………………………… …16 CONCLUSION………………………………………….…… 19 LIMITATION AND SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY.… 20 References Appendix 1 INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale of the study In English teaching, the main objective is to prepare students for communication in the real world and it is very important for a learner to efficiently equip himself with four skills: Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing, together with relatively sufficient background knowledge Among those skills, speaking is a crucial part of language learning The mastery of speaking skill in English is a priority for many second or foreign language learners However, despite its importance, for a long time, teaching speaking has been under valuated Traditional teaching methods have seemed to emphasize the learning of language system (rules of grammar and, lists of vocabulary items ) as a goal in its own right and failed to give learners an ability to gain realistic experiences in actually using the language knowledge gained Moreover, very often when people study a language, they accumulate a lot of academic knowledge, but then find that they can't actually use this language to express what they want to Nowadays, things have been different Today's world requires that the goal of learning speaking English should develop students' communication skill so that students can express themselves and use the target language to state opinions, express their feelings and exchange information Many new teaching methods have been introduced and applied to serve the basic need of English learners Among them, communicative approach and learner-centered approach seem to be the most effective ways to teach oral communication And we should apply these methods in teaching the four skills and focus on designing speaking activities in appropriate stages of English lessons while teaching other skills so that students always have a lot of chances to practise speaking while learning English In Viet Nam, there has been also a reform in teaching English in secondary schools as well as High schools The new series of textbooks presently used in secondary schools and high schools were designed in view of communicative language teaching method The topics of the lessons given in the textbooks are really interesting and based on real- life situations that require communication However, in spite of many efforts of teachers and others, the results we get from our students are unsatisfactory Students still complain that they find speaking lessons really stressful and thus speaking is a difficult skill to master As a matter of fact, most of our students, even though, start to learn English since the very early year of school (even from the first grade), cannot communicate with people from English speaking word with confidence From my experience as a teacher of English at Tinh Gia (TG1) high school for 12 years, I have realized the bitterly disappointing truth that after about seven years or more of studying English, what our students get is almost a “dead” language In other words, many students who have studied English for many years (7 years) leave school have left school without being able to speak an intelligible sentence That is why I felt the urge to research about it and took appropriate actions It is time the great efforts were made by teachers to improve the quality of English speaking lessons as well as to meet the teaching goals and to help students overcome difficulties in expressing their thoughts, ideas, and feelings in English This issue has brought me a great desire to conduct action research in order to examine factors that cause barriers in English speaking for students at TG1 high school as well as to motivate students in English speaking lessons With this study, the researcher hopes to help students at TG1 high school to have a better English speaking skill and can communicate with foreigners in English with confidence Aims of the study The study aims at: - Investigating and discovering obstacles or difficulties that both students and teachers have encountered in English speaking lessons at TG1 high school - Suggesting techniques and activities applied in English speaking lessons to motivate students and help them develop speaking skill Scope of the study With this study, the researcher puts focus on investigating and discovering obstacles or difficulties encountered with students in English speaking lessons at TG1 high schools From these findings, the internal and external causes are analyzed to give some suggestions for tackling them in order to motivate students and help improve students’ speaking skill The study was conducted on the students of grade 10, 11, 12 at TG1 high school with the textbook “Tiếng Anh 10”, “Tiếng Anh 11”, and “Tiếng Anh 12” Research methods of the study In order to get the goals of the study, a wide range of data are gathered, questionnaires and follow-up interviews are analyzed Therefore, all comments, remarks, suggestions, and conclusions provided in the study are based on the results of the data analysis DEVELOPMENT Theoretical background 1 What is language teaching and learning? "Teaching is guiding and facilitating learning, enabling the learners to learn, setting the conditions for learning." [2] Foreign language learning, like other subjects, is part of the overall development of all students Through learning a foreign language, the students can enrich their experience of life, broaden their world vision, and enhance their thinking skills Language learning is most effective when students' interest, motivation and attitudes are taken into consideration Therefore, evaluation should be summative and formative and designed and administered to encourage the learners rather to frustrate them It should be carried out in terms of what students can rather than what they cannot In addition, learning a foreign language is a process which requires learners to integrate many language skills including: Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing Learners of a second or foreign language can not only read different texts in different subjects with varying degrees of detail and difficulty but also communicate with native speakers orally It is generally accepted nowadays that speaking is a key skill for most students learning a foreign language In short, Speaking skill plays a vital role in teaching and learning a foreign language This fact calls for suitable teaching methods to help the students become more active in English speaking lesson 2 What is the goal of teaching speaking? In the book Language Learning Strategies by Rebecca L Oxford, she writes: "A more practiced eye, a more receptive ear, a more fluent tongue, a more involved heart, a more responsive mind are the characteristics we want to stimulate in students to enable them to become more proficient language learners." [3] In other words, the goal of teaching speaking skills is communicative efficiency Learners should be able to make themselves understood, using their current proficiency to the fullest They should try to avoid confusion in the message due to faulty pronunciation, grammar, or vocabulary, and to observe the social and cultural rules that apply in each communication situation However, most of my students are only reading and trying to memorize, using their words only with vague applicability Their minds, most of the time, just seem to be waiting to be fed It is hard to say that any other senses are involved, and certainly not that they are learning with interest They are neither using what they have grasped nor using what they have currently learned from the given dialogue In a word, they are not improving their speaking ability Yet speaking ability is so crucial to language learners Therefore, it’s time to have some changes in our way of teaching so that the students would be stimulated, interested, motivated to speak and finally become masters of speaking the language 2 FINDING AND DISCUSSIONS 2 Methodology 2 1 Method orientation This study employed the quantitative method This method helped to provide quantified background data, which aims to understand problems that students and teachers of Tinh Gia High School meet in their English speaking lessons The data and information collected lay the foundation for my study 2 The subjects The subjects for this study consist of 209 participants placed into two groups: The first group includes teachers Tinh Gia High School (where seven year program English textbooks are in use) The other group is composed of 200 students: 90 students of class 10A 9, and class 10A in Tinh Gia I High School and 110 students of class 11A1, 11A2 and 11A7 All the students follow the same course of English and their textbooks in use are Tieng Anh 10, and Tieng Anh 11 2 Data collection With the view to discovering problems with speaking activities that students and teachers often face in English speaking lessons, I asked my colleagues, who teach the same subject, some questions about their teaching methods, visited their classes, and asked the students' opinion about it In addition, a questionnaire was designed for the students In order that the respondents could be free to express their specific thoughts about the items raised in the questionnaire, some questions are open-ended or have the free answer (often put at the last choice of the answer), and students can write their answer in Vietnamese 2 The Interview The questions for the teachers focus on these points: - Problems and difficulties that teachers meet in English speaking lessons - How to motivate students in speaking activities - How to help our students deal with a lack of knowledge of language forms - How to provide feedback to our students to encourage them in their learning - How to encourage our students to take responsible for their own learning 2 The questionnaire Comprising questions, The questionnaire was delivered to 90 students of class 10A7, and class 10A9 and 110 others students of class 11A1, 11A2 and 11A7 in Tinh Gia I High School All questions were written in simple English in order to make sure that students could fully understand all the questions before answering Their answers were also given in Vietnamese allowing them full expression of their ideas (These questions are included in the appendix.) Question 1: Do you like speaking English in your class? Why/Why not? A Yes B No (Please give some reasons for your answer, you can write in Vietnamese if you like) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… Question 2: In English speaking lessons, you spend most of the time speaking English? A I speak English most of the time B I speak Vietnamese most of the time C I speak both English and Vietnamese Question 3: Are there a wide variety of speaking activities in your speaking lessons? A Yes, there are always a lot B No, there are a few C Other answer (you can write in Vietnamese if you like) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………… Question 4: Does your teacher often speak English or Vietnamese in class? A Almost Vietnamese B Almost English C Other answer (you can write in Vietnamese if you like) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… Question 5: Do you often work in pairs or in groups in speaking activities? A Sometimes B very often C rarely Question 6: When working in pairs or groups, you think every member of your group has equal chance to speak English? A Yes, every member of my group can have chance to speak up B No, only some ‘top’ students in my group can speak C Other answer ( you can write in Vietnamese if you like ) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… ………………… Question 7: Do you think Speaking skill is important? Why/Why not? (Please explain your answer, you can write in Vietnamese if you like ) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… ………………… Question 8: What difficulties you have when speaking English in classes? (you can write in Vietnamese if you like ) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… ………………… 2 Data analysis and discussion From the results of the questionnaire as well as from the observation and follow-up questions, I recognize that the problems with speaking activities in English classes at Tinh Gia High School can be generalized as follow 2 Problems that students often meet in English Speaking lessons Students are inhibited, afraid of speaking or unwilling to speak English in class Most students (about 75%) are inhibited, afraid of speaking or unwilling to speak English in class Unlike reading, writing and listening activities, speaking requires some degree of real-time exposure to an audience There are different situations that can cause students inhibited or even dread speaking a foreign language in the classroom, such as: - Lacking vocabulary - Worrying about their accent - Being frustrated about constructing the sentences with correct grammar - Being afraid of making mistakes - Being fearful of criticism or losing face - Being shy of the attention that their speech attracts Students have nothing to say in some speaking activities About 70 % of students say that they have nothing to say in some speaking activities Even if some students are not inhibited, they often complain that they cannot think of anything to say They have no motive to express themselves beyond the guilty feeling that they should be speaking Most of my colleagues realized that our students are not in the habit of speaking English Although many students have a good vocabulary and grammar grasp, they are still reluctant to speak This may demonstrate that a good command of vocabulary and grammar is not enough In the other hand, they must be prepared to be in the habit of speaking English During speaking lessons, students have low or uneven participation Only one participant can talk at a time if he or she is to be heard; and in a large group this means that each one will have only very little talking time This problem is compounded by the tendency of some learners to dominate, while others speak very little or not at all Students use their mother – tongue (Vietnamese) almost all the time About 85% of students admitted that they use their mother – tongue (Vietnamese) almost all the time They explain that because it is easier, because it seems unnatural to speak to one another in a foreign language, and because they feel less ‘exposed’ if they are speaking Vietnamese 2 2 Teachers’ problems in Speaking lessons Teachers speak their native language (Vietnamese) in English teaching classes almost all the time The fact that English teachers in Tinh Gia High School speak Vietnamese in their classes seems to be so popular that they consider it unavoidable Unfortunately, this has unexpectedly killed the students willingness to speak English Teachers talks too much in class, letting their students few chances to participating in speaking activities These teachers are using the out-dated traditional teaching method in which students are not stimulated to learn actively In other words, by this way of teaching, students are not provided a positive learning environment to encourage them to speak more, but instead they become passive learners and what they grasp is a “dead” language 2 Some suggestions for solutions 2 Some advice for teachers in general Firstly, the teachers themselves must make great effort to change their method of teaching I myself have been applying some tips as follow and I have gained some positive results - Reduce your TTT (Teacher Talking Time) in the classroom, by giving simple and clear instructions, by asking one or two students to show (by means of speaking) that they understood the task instructions, and also by asking other students to answer a student's question Being a teacher of English is different from being a lecturer - Increase STT (Student Talking Time), again, by asking other students to answer a student's question, by showing pictures related to the topic of the class and, without saying a single word, eliciting students' participation - Avoid yes/no questions; prefer those questions that make students speak in order to make themselves clear - Pay attention to the way of correcting students Sometimes, even when the teacher’s intention is simply to help a certain student, he/she may make things even worse to them For instance, if teacher wants to show a certain mistake to a student, instead of saying "Oh! this is not correct, " or "You made a mistake, " or "Oops! don't say this or that, " etc you'd better say "Maybe you should change this or that " or "Why don't you use ", or "Well, it may be even better if you do/say " or "Very good try, but you'd better say/do " or "Nice try/beginning Now why don't you ?" or "Good participation/answer, now I will make it better " etc - When watching student A for mistakes, don't be so close to them because this will make them even shier Instead, get close to another student or simply stand back or pretend being interested in something different, picking up a book or going back to your table etc This will make students feel more comfortable and increase STT - When your students are having fluency practice (for instance, free conversation), which is totally different from pronunciation or grammar practice, never correct them, unless something really serious happen Let them talk! Let them feel that they can communicate in despite of their mistakes in pronunciation, grammar etc Praise them for speaking!!! Show satisfaction!!! - Not only encourage them to watch movies Give them tips on what and how to select what really matters, based on what they are interested in For instance, taking notes on useful sentences/phrases and thinking about which environment or opportunity they could put those selected sentences in action (among friends, with a teacher, at work, at the club etc), just for practice - Never forget! Participating/speaking is what really matters in this case, and when a student participates (answering questions, clarifying, helping other in English, arguing etc) ACCEPT that as something GOOD, despite of being right or wrong, otherwise you take the risk of making your student shier and shier (lack of participation) - All classes should start with pair work on a topic on which most have experience or opinion During these , pens are down and teacher goes round the U-shaped classroom, answering mostly vocabulary questions when students call -Sir or Peter Students know they can talk about other things if they have finished discussing the topic, and those who become silent early are asked a further question to discuss A general discussion of the topic follows, with extensive use of the board for notes - For the first class, students usually start introducing themselves to each other in pair work, with a small A5 document providing some grammar and vocab This is a springboard for similar work at the beginning of every class A mark with coefficient 2/10 includes this as participation - Outside the classroom, I encourage joining chat rooms, which is a kind of written conversation where and when students must quickly come up with a reply or question, yet having a few seconds to think of contents and language use I also regularly advertise local language cafés, lecture hours, day trips to and weekends in London, and always speak in English to any student -and some staff- out of the classroom - Of course, all students can not be expected to possess the same level of intelligence and grasping ability, but a teacher's ability lies in making a lesson/ message as easily understandable by the poorest student as by the best in the classroom As regards the original question by LB as to how to improve "speaking skill" of your students, I feel interactive mode of class room teaching works better - We need to make a friendly atmosphere in class room so that students don't hesitate to interact Personally for me it’s very easy, as most of my PG students are nearly my own age (mostly 5-6 years junior to me) As a routine, I spare last 10 minutes of my lecture for students to speak on the subject just taught I facilitate the things in friendly manner, and they really enjoy it And yes, I have observed perceptible improvement in their speaking ability and confidence 2 Some suggestions for a successful speaking skill lesson and to motivate students There are many rules we must remember while teaching speaking so that we can help students improve their speaking skill: Firstly, teachers must make sure that students feel safe and confident while they express themselves Personally I think that , the first thing that teachers have to to help students improve their speaking skill is that they have to help them overcome their feelings of shyness and nervousness when practicing English in their class One of the best ways to solve this problem is to put them in 'safe' situations in class where they are inspired and encouraged to try using the language from their 'store' Organizing communicative activities in pairs, in groups is also an effective way to serve this aim Working in pairs, in groups, students will feel less anxious than when they are 'on show' in front of the whole class together Moreover, pair-works and group works can help shy students who would never say anything in a whole class activity have the confidence to open their mouths Students can also learn from each other's new ideas so that they will have something to speak in front of the class later Another thing that teacher should remember to help students have confidence in speaking is teacher's positive corrections and feedbacks Making errors is a natural and unavoidable part of the learning process, but how to correct the students’ errors is particularly important Teachers need to provide appropriate feedbacks and corrections, but don't interrupt the flow of communication Take notes while pairs or groups are talking and address problems to the class after the activity without embarrassing the student who made the error We can also write the errors on the board and ask who can correct it Teachers should encourage their students to speak whatever they can and focus on what they have got right, not on what they have got wrong We should also help them to develop positive attitudes towards their friends’ errors and to correct themselves Teachers should try to develop for themselves positive strategies of error corrections When students achieve success in oral communication, they will feel confident, secure and enjoy learning English; they will have confidence to take part in communicative activities later Secondly, teachers must pay attention to warm-up activities: Warm-up is also an important part which contributes to the success of a speaking lesson Warm-ups help our learners put aside their daily distractions and focus on English If they haven't used English all day, they may take a little while to shift into it Warm-ups also encourage whole-group participation which 10 can build a sense of community within the group and they can help to arouse student' interest in speaking We should vary warm-up activities to attract our students' attention and interest because if they feel good about the lesson from the beginning they'll make a good contribution to it These may be a discussion, a picture describing activities or playing a game, brainstorming etc In order to have a good preparation, the teacher does different things to arouse students’ interest, i.e brainstorming, musical warmer, word card, etc Before a new lesson I often motivate the students by chatting to them about the topic of interest, giving them preparation tasks or quick warm-up to get them in the right mood for speaking Brainstorming is one of the simplest, but the most effective kind of motivation because it takes a short time I can write key words on the blackboard and the class is encouraged to think of ideas, words, phrases associated with them Example 1: Speaking in unit 12-English 10 When I teach speaking in unit 12 - English 10, I may present a picture of a famous singer or musician and asks them the following questions Who is she? Do you like her? If not, who is your favorite singer? What kind of music does she sing? Teacher leads in new lesson Example Example 2: Speaking/Unit 15/English 12 Teacher may raise some questions and ask students to discuss in pairs: Do you think that women are as intelligent as men? Do they have equal rights in the family and in the society? Students ask and answer in pairs, then some students present their answer, teacher leads in new lesson Example 3: Speaking-unit 6-English 12 T asks students to play a guessing game:" Find someone who "Teacher divides the class into groups Teacher gives some information about some popular and interesting jobs in the society and asks student to guess what job it is Each time they can guess they got one point Thirdly, students must be well-prepared and instructed before they practices peaking Another point that makes it difficult for students to practise speaking is that their knowledge of the language is poor and they don't have ideas to talk about the topic; (their language competences, vocabulary and grammar are limited) so in order to help students practice, teachers have to provide them with necessary language input and give students clear instructions Example : Task 2/speaking/unit 7/English 12 11 Teachers have to present some verbs used with the collocations given in the task by asking students to the matching A B Build Teacher's salary Provide Curriculum and textbook Reform More school Apply Teaching and learning method Train More highly qualify doctors Raise More equipment and facilities Teachers also have to elicit the meaning of some words or phrase in the task Example 2: Speaking/unit11/English 10 Before students practise, teachers have to present the form and use of conditional sentences type which is used to express a regret about what you did in the past Example 3: Speaking /unit3/English 12 Teacher presents some ways of giving and responding to compliments Giving compliments Responding to compliments - You really have a beautiful blouse, Barbara - Thank you, Phil That's a nice compliment - What a beautiful blouse it is ! - You've got to be kidding! I thought it was terrible - How beautiful you are! -Thanks, Peter It's nice of you to say so -Congratulation You've played so well today -Thank you Your compliment is really encouraging -Your hairstyle is terrific Fourthly, Varying communicative activities is also important As I have just presented above, effective methods of teaching indirectly encourage oral interaction and they can provide motivation The direct way to promote oral communication is to provide students with opportunities to participate and to communicate with each other so that students can learn the language from speaking The more opportunities of speaking the language they have, the more fluent they become Actually, various activities in each lesson adds interest to students and can help with making students more dynamic and active In speaking, students will be motivated if teachers provide them with various communicative activities Below are some common speaking activities that I often carry out in my classes to make my speaking lessons more interesting and to motivate my students in practicing English: Discussions : In an discussion students may aim to arrive at a conclusion, share ideas about an event, or find solutions in their discussion groups Before the discussion, it is essential that the purpose of the discussion activity is set by the teacher In this way, the discussion points are relevant to this purpose In an 12 discussion teacher can form groups of or students Then each group works on their topic for a given time period, and presents their opinions to the class For efficient group discussions, it is always better not to form large group because quiet students may avoid contributing in large groups Generally speaking , in class or group discussions, whatever the aim is ,the students should always be encouraged to ask questions , paraphrase ideas, express upport, check for clarification, and so on Role play: One other way of getting students to speak is role-playing Students pretend they are in various social contexts and have a variety of social roles In role-play activities, the teacher gives information to the learners such as who they are and what they think or feel Thus, the teacher can tell the student that "You are David, you go to the doctor and tell him what happened last night, and…" [1] Information gaps: in this activity students are supposed to be working in pairs One student will have the information that the other partner does not have and the partner will share their information Information gap activities serve many purposes such as solving a problem or collecting information These activities are effective because everybody has the opportunity to talk extensively in the target language the aim of this activity is to get learners to use the language they are learning to interact in realistic and meaningful ways, usually involving exchanges of information and opinions Brainstorming: This helps students produce ideas in a limited time The good characteristics of brainstorming is that the students are not criticized for their ideas so students will be open to sharing new ideas Brainstorming is one of the simplest, but the most effective kind of motivation because it takes a short time Teacher can write key words on the blackboard and the class is encouraged to think of ideas, words, phrases associated with them Storytelling:| students can briefly summarizes a tale or story they heard from somebody beforehand, or they may create their own stories to tell their classmates Storytelling fosters creative thinking Interviews: Students can conduct interviews on selected topics with various people It is a good idea that the teacher provides a rubric to students so that they know what type of questions they can ask or what path to follow, but students should prepare their own interview questions Reporting Before coming to class, students are asked to read a newspaper or magazine and, in class, they report to their friends what they find as the most interesting news Students can also talk about whether they have experienced anything worth telling their friends in their daily lives before class Group planning tasks: An example of this is planning a party or an excursion for the whole group In this activity , teachers should allow them a good amount of time to prepare for a presentation in which they attempt to persuade the rest of the class to agree with their arrangements Picture Narrating: This activity is based on several sequential pictures Students are asked to tell the story taking place in the sequential pictures by paying attention to the criteria provided by the teacher as a rubric 13 Rubrics can include the vocabulary or structures they need to use while narrating Picture Describing : One way to make use of pictures in a speaking activity is to give students just one picture and having them describe what it is in the picture For this activity students can form groups and each group is given a different picture Students discuss the picture with their groups, then a spokesperson for each group describes the picture to the whole class This activity fosters the creativity and imagination of the learners as well as their public speaking skills Last but not least, we should also pay attention to these points: The communicative activities listed above can help teachers a lot in promoting their students' speaking skills because they are quite interesting and they give students a reason to speak in different situations and about different topics However, how should teachers run an activity effectively so that they can achieve their aims is also a problem The basic route-map plan for running a simple EFL activity (English as a Foreign Language) below has been proved to be effective Before Speaking - Create an interest in the topic of the lesson, - Provide the students with the language they will need to any speaking activity - Focus on, Brainstorm or pre-teach the language/vocabularies/phrases that students will need to successfully complete the speaking task - Set up a structure so that students know what are they going to speak and Why - Teachers make sure there is a communicative aim and set a time limit - Students may need a model to base their own conversation on The models could be printed, could be a demonstration of the conversion that they have seen or listened to or could be a skeleton conversation written on the board While Speaking - When students are speaking, monitor but not intervene unless they ask for help or are doing the task wrongly - Allot a time limit for each and every speaking activity Take into consideration those activities that involve either group or pair work - Keep the activity fun and simple Make sure the instructions are also crystal clear - Don’t overdo speaking activities in one lesson - Make sure you aim for a balance between speaking and listening - Have a back-up plan for the entire class and for individual students who are withdrawn - Always reflect on what can you as a teacher to help students improve their speaking skills - Use picture prompts Depending on the variety of visual resources and class level and ability, a teacher can brainstorm with the class a variety of sentences, 14 (key) words, and phrases around a particular category or situational context that is the building block for a presentation - Follow-up with a memory game or exercise Students then work in pairs writing down or translating the words they remember After Speaking - Give students feedback on how they have done and then respond to the useful language that came up during the activity and language problem that occurs - Despite all these, I believe before we engage our students in any classroom activity, it is best to know the students background, their anxiety level, the classroom environment and motivation To sum up, the more diverse and creative your speaking activities become, the easier it will be to train your students to improve their speaking skills and speaking exercises will become much more automatic Example: Task 2-speaking-English 10/page 67 This task is a discussion activity  Before the lesson ( teacher prepare at home )  In class : To lead in and prepare students for the activity, I may show them the model of the boat and ask them about the different characteristics of each section/present some useful expressions for expressing agreements and disagreements /teacher asks some good students to make an example in front of the class before each group practise  Set up the activity : I would like you to work in groups of or students ,deciding the best seat for each person mentioned in task 1.You have minutes to complete the task  Run the activity : Teacher lets students to carry out the discussion in groups, move around and monitor the class  Close the activity : Teacher asks some groups to perform in front of the class and gives feedbacks  Post-activity : Teacher asks students to present their choice ( which seat is the most suitable for them ) Presenting our opinions and feelings in front of a lot of people in our native language has been a challenge to many people and using another language to convey what we want to say is of course more challenging Therefore if the teacher does not encourage his students and make them feel good about their teacher and their lessons, the class will become tense and dull Interaction can't take place in the class effectively As a teacher in a language class, we should always create a good class atmosphere from the beginning because our students, especially young students, will have no communication if they don’t feel good about their teachers and their English class 15 Moreover, the main aim of organizing a communicative activity is to get students to speak, then one way to achieve that would be for the teacher to reduce his/her own contributions Probably the less the teacher speak, the more space it will allow the students It could be useful to aim to say nothing while the activity is underway, and save any contribution for before and after 2 3 Sample lesson plans (Applied in Teaching Tiếng Anh 11) Unit 1: Friendship Part B Speaking (English 11) Purpose: The purpose of the lesson is to get the students to practice talking about the qualities of good and bad roommates Target Language: Describing people and their habits Procedure: Warm up: Group Discussion  Where you live?  Do you live in a dormitory or with your family?  Who you live with?  What you think about shared accommodation?  What are the pros and cons of shared accommodation? Task 2: Role-play Set-up: The class is divided into two groups: Group 1: These students have a room for rent at their house because a roommate has just moved out They will need a Room for Rent Role Card and a Room for Rent Activity Sheet Group 2: These students have a friend who is looking for a place to live They will need a Friends Looking for a Place to Live Role Card and a Students with Friends Needing a Room Activity Sheet The students should be given some time to read their role cards, ask questions about vocabulary and then write down the concerns (from the role cards) into the table headings (on the activity sheets) 16 Divide the class chairs into two lines facing each other (or if you like, have an inner circle and outer circle) One line is for students with rooms to rent (Group 1)and the other line is for students who have friends who need a place to live (Group 2) Group students approach group students and ask them if the group students know anybody who needs a place to live Group students tell them they have a friend who is looking for a place Group will then ask questions to make sure that their friend will be happy in the shared accommodation Group students then ask questions about the friend to make sure that the friend is compatible Task 3: Role play Journalist Her / his name Dialogue build Interviewee ? ? ? Date of birth His/ her personalities ? (friendly, honest, helpful……) What made her successful ? Unit 9: The Post Office Part B- Speaking (English 11) Role-play: I Need to Mail This Letter to Mexico Purpose: Student can talk about delivering letters, parcels, packages, and postcards Warm-up: As one possible warm-up, I bring a letter and a parcel into class and tell the class that I have to deliver these I ask where the post office is After I get directions, I tell them I'm worried because the letter is a very important letter and I don't want it get lost in the mail or I tell them it's my friend's birthday next week and I want the parcel to get there on time I see what responses this elicits Hopefully, somebody will suggest I use a special delivery Then we talk about rates and schedules writing down expressions on the board as needed 17 Another possible warm-up is to give the parcel and letters to the students and then start the class with: Welcome to Chris's Post Office How can I help you? If the students simply say that they want to mail the parcel, I counter with: That'll be $1000 dollars please (or you could use an outrageous amount in the local currency) Hopefully, this will draw a shocked response and they should start inquiring as to why it's so expensive I tell them it's because of its super speedy delivery This should get them to inquire about other more reasonable options, which is a big part of the role-play Class Activity: Task 2: Make a conversation from the suggestions : Clerk: Good morning Can I help you? Customer: Yes I would like to have a telephone line installed at home Cal.: OK Where you live? Cuss: I live in Ngoc Ha street When can you install it? (When will take installation take place?) CL.: We can install it one week after you register (The installation will take place one week after you register.) Cus.: Can you come on Friday? Cl.: Yes, that’s fine Have you got a telephone yet? Cus.: Yeah I have a telephone already How much is the installation fee and monthly fee? CL.: The installation fee is 600 thousand Dong and the monthly fee is 30 thousand Dong including VAT Could you please fill this form? Task 3: Making a dialogue Dialogue 1: A: Good morning Can I help you? B: yes I would like to subscribe to Lao Dong daily newspaper A: Yes, how long would you like to get the newspaper? B: For a year please A: Where would you like to get the newspaper? B: At home I live at 67 Ngoc Ha street A: ok 67 Ngoc Ha street B: Oh, can I get the newspaper every morning before 6.30? A: Before 6.30? Well, it might be a little bit too early How about before 7.30? B: OK That’s fine Thank you! A: All right Could you fill in this form please? Dialogue2 : A: Good morning What can I for you? B: Yes I would like to send a greetings card and some flowers to my friend on her birthday 18 A: Right When is your friend’s birthday? B: It’s May 16th A: What kind of flowers would you like to send? B: Roses A bunch of red roses please A: Would you like to have the card and the flowers delivered on May 16 th or a day before? B: On May 16th It’s best to deliver in the early morning> A: OK I make a note for that Could you please fill in this form? And don’t forget to write the recipient’s address clearly CONCLUSION Obviously, the ability to communicate in a second language clearly and efficiently contributes to the success of the learner in school and success later in every phase of life Therefore, it is essential that language teachers pay great attention to teaching speaking Rather than leading students to pure memorization, providing a rich environment where meaningful communication takes place is desired With this aim, various speaking activities such as those listed above can contribute a great deal to students in developing basic interactive skills necessary for life These activities make students more active in the learning process and at the same time make their learning more meaningful and fun for them By describing and interpreting the data collected through action research conducted in Tĩnh Gia high school, firstly, I managed to investigate the obstacles or problems that make students unwilling to participate in speaking activities in class, and then, gave some suggestions for teachers in order to develop students’ speaking skill as well as to improve English speaking lessons Carrying out this study, I myself, as a teacher of English, have obtained invaluable experiences in my teaching career To be successful in teaching English, what the teachers should bear in their minds is that the goal of language teaching is the learners can “live with” their target language In other words, what students get must be a “living language”, with which they can communicate with the others rather than a “dead language” which they only “read” and write in the exam papers The key point of language teaching is that students are consciously encouraged to learn the language by using and participating in activities I have been making great attempts to provide more topics and chances for them to work in pairs, in groups, and to individual or group presentation, to show likes or complaints, to share joys or cares, to solve problems and so on As a result, students’ communicative skill has been improved considerably In conclusion, only the teachers' earnest desire to mend their teaching methods can stem the heavy anxiety and worry from the students' minds As a result of more varied methods, the students' ability of speaking along with their active engagement with vocabulary, interest, confidence, thinking ability, etc, 19 are all improved In doing action research I have actually varied my teachingmethods and improved the situation LIMITATION AND SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY During the process of carrying out the research, due to the time limit and shortage of material and knowledge limitation, although efforts and energy have been devoted, mistakes and shortcomings are inevitable Findings from this study mainly based on the results of the data collection and interviewing and questionnaire (conducted only on small number of students in Tinh Gia High School), information was; therefore, not in-depth These call for further investigation which is needed for the carrying out on larger student population to have more reliable data analysis Moreover this thesis can not cover all the difficulties that students encounter in speaking lessons and suggestions for solutions that may be helpful to the teachers and to students to achieve their goals This also leaves a gap for other researchers Finally, the study merely investigates the contemporary situation at TG1 high school Therefore, it would be interesting to conduct a similar study in other schools and compare the results Hopefully, other colleagues will also find the thesis useful and we will see other possibilities for thoughtful innovations in teaching methods in order to further the research Leader’s confirmations (Xác nhận thủ trưởng đơn vị) Thanh Hoa: May, 20th 2016 I strongly ensure this is my own work 20 DECLARATION I hereby certify that the thesis entitled: HOW TO MOTIVATE STUDENTS IN SPEAKING LESSONS AND IMPROVE THEIR SPEAKING SKILLS is the result of my own research for the better English speaking lessons at Tinh Gia high school and that, it has not been published or submitted for any other purposes Teacher in charge Lê Thị Xuân 21 References English Harmer, J 1984 The Practice of English Language Teaching London: Longman H Douglas Brown 1987 Principles of Language Learning and Teaching, second edition Rebecca L Oxford 1990 Language Learning Strategies Truong Vien (University of Hue), Nguyen Hoa (Hanoi University) English Language Teaching Methodology (2002) Truong Vien (University of Hue), Nguyen Hoa Hanoi (University) English Language Teaching Methodology, Shape of a lesson teaching the ‘What’ and teaching the ‘How’ (2002) Vietnamese SGV, SGK Bộ GD-ĐT Sách “ Một số vấn đề đổi phương pháp dạy học bậc THPT môn tiếng Anh Bộ GD-ĐT Tài liệu tập huấn đổi phương pháp môn tiếng Anh English language Teaching Methodology cuả Bộ GD- ĐT 2003 Các SKKN đạt giải cấp nghành STT Tên đề tài Xếp loại Một số giải C pháp nhằm nâng cao chất lượng dạy học nghe môn Tiếng Anh bậc THPT Cấp Tỉnh Năm 2010 22 Appendix QUESTIONNAIRE - For students (Bảng câu hỏi khảo sát - Dành cho học sinh lớp 10A7, 10A9, 11A1, 11A2 11A7 ( Năm học 2016-2017) trường THPT Tĩnh Gia 1) The purpose of this questionnaire is to find out problem or difficulties that students and teachers often meet in English speaking lesson Your responses are very important to the success of the survey The data will be used only for the purpose of research, not for any other purposes Your cooperation will be highly appreciated (Bảng câu hỏi nhằm phục vụ cho đề tài nghiên cứu “ Những giải pháp nhằm giúp học sinh THPT nâng cao kỹ nói Tiếng Anh” Các câu trả lời học sinh nhằm giúp tìm khó khăn vấn đề mà học sinh giáo viên thường gặp học “Speaking” Nhờ đó, người thực đề tài tìm giải pháp khả thi để giải vấn đề Các giữ liệu điều tra phục vụ cho đề tài nghiên cứu, khơng mục đích khác.) Sự hợp tác em đóng góp quan trọng cho đề tài Please feel free to write down some information about yourselves (Hãy điền thông tin cá nhân vào phần đây) Name:………………………….…Male/female:………Class …… Please put one tick ( ) next to your choice in answering the following questions For some questions, you can choose more than one possibility (hãy đánh dấu ( ) vào phương án mà em chọn cho câu hỏi sau) Question 1: Do you like speaking English in your class? Why/Why not? A Yes B No (Please give some reasons for your answer, you can write in Vietnamese if you like) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… Question 2: In English speaking lessons, you spend most of the time speaking English? A I speak English most of the time B I speak Vietnamese most of the time C I speak both English and Vietnamses Question 3: Are there a wide variety of speaking activities in your speaking lessons? A Yes, there are always a lot B No, there are a few C Other answer (you can write in Vietnamese if you like) 23 …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………… Question 4: Does your teacher often speak English or Vietnamese in class? A Almost Vietnamese B Almost English C Other answer (you can write in Vietnamese if you like) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… Question 5: Do you often work in pairs or in groups in speaking activities? A Sometimes B very often C rarely Question 6: When working in pairs or groups, you think every member of your group has equal chance to speak English? C Yes, every member of my group can have chance to speak up D No, only some ‘top’ students in my group can speak C Other answer ( you can write in Vietnamese if you like ) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… ………………… Question 7: Do you think Speaking skill is important? Why/Why not? (Please explain your answer, you can write in Vietnamese if you like ) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… ………………… Question 8: What difficulties you have when speaking English in classes? (you can write in Vietnamese if you like ) …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… ………………… ………….The End………… 24 ... entitled: HOW TO MOTIVATE STUDENTS IN SPEAKING LESSONS AND IMPROVE THEIR SPEAKING SKILLS is the result of my own research for the better English speaking lessons at Tinh Gia high school and that,... in English Speaking lessons Students are inhibited, afraid of speaking or unwilling to speak English in class Most students (about 75%) are inhibited, afraid of speaking or unwilling to speak English. .. nghiên cứu “ Những giải pháp nhằm giúp học sinh THPT nâng cao kỹ nói Tiếng Anh” Các câu trả lời học sinh nhằm giúp tìm khó khăn vấn đề mà học sinh giáo viên thường gặp học Speaking Nhờ đó, người