VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES HUỲNH THỊ NHẬT UYÊN APPLYING A BLENDED LEARNING PROGRAM TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ IELTS SPEAKING PERFORMANCE IN AN IELTS SPEAKING CLASS: AN ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT (ÁP DỤNG MỘT CHƯƠNG TRÌNH HỌC KẾT HỢP CÔNG NGHÊ ̀ ́ ̉ THÔNG TIN VAÒ LƠṔ HOCC̣ TRUYÊN THÔNG ĐÊCAỈ THIÊṆ KHA NĂNG NÓI IELTS CỦA HOCC̣ SINH TRONG MÔṬ LỚP HOCC̣ NÓI ́ IELTS: NGHIÊN CỨU CAI TIÊN SƯ PHAṂ) M.A MAJOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field : English Teaching Methodology Code : 60140111 HÀ NỘI – 2017 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES HUỲNH THỊ NHẬT UYÊN APPLYING A BLENDED LEARNING PROGRAM TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ IELTS SPEAKING PERFORMANCE IN AN IELTS SPEAKING CLASS: AN ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT (ÁP DỤNG MỘT CHƯƠNG TRÌNH HỌC KẾT HỢP CÔNG NGHÊ ̀ ́ ̉ THÔNG TIN VAÒ LƠṔ HOCC̣ TRUYÊN THÔNG ĐÊCAỈ THIÊṆ KHA NĂNG NÓI IELTS CỦA HOCC̣ SINH TRONG MÔṬ LỚP HOCC̣ NÓI ́ IELTS: NGHIÊN CỨU CAI TIÊN SƯ PHAṂ) Field : English Teaching Methodology Code : 60140111 Supervisor : Dr Huynh Anh Tuan HÀ NỘI – NĂM 2017 CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I certify that the major thesis entitled “Applying a Blended Learning Program to improve students‟ IELTS speaking performance in an IELTS speaking class: an action research project” is the study of my own research and the substance of this research has not been submitted for a degree to any other university or institution Hanoi, 2017 Approved by SUPERVISOR i DEDICATION I would like to dedicate this work to:  my beloved father  my mother who has sacrificed her life for me…… … a friend of mine whose love, continual support, and patience encouraged me to reach my goal……   my adorable sister who supported me until the finish of this research ……  all those who gave me love, strength and patience… ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First, my respect and appreciation is to my dear mother, the greatest mother in the world, my beloved father and my sister whose prayers and love guided, helped and supported me to carry out this work My gratitude is deeply paid to my supervisor, Dr Huynh Anh Tuan for his invaluable assistance and insightful guidance on every taken step of the research Special thanks are due to two friends of mine - The Nguyen, who devoted his time and experience to cooperate with me during my thesis work, and Truong Giang Do, who dedicatedly cooperated with me in designing the Website (iespeaking.club) for the Blended IELTS speaking course in my research Finally, my great appreciation is to the teachers and students of the Institute of Equest Education, where the study was carried out iii ABSTRACT This thesis explores the design of a blended learning environment in an onground traditional face-to-face IELTS course and seeks to determine the extent to which the Blended IELTS speaking course significantly affects the improvement in students‟ IELTS speaking performance as well as the learner satisfaction levels toward the model in terms of their improvement in IELTS speaking performance 30 ELT students from two IELTS classes (intermediate level) were involved in an IELTS intermediate course (IELTS 5.5) lasting for 16 weeks in the Institute of Equest Education This course covered all the four skills of IELTS (Listening, Reading, Writing and Speaking), but only Speaking skill was the focus for the researcher to design the blended learning environment Every two weeks, each participant was asked to complete a variety of assignments both online and offline such as recording an audio The audio recorded interview of each student or a pair of students must be posted on the web page and the other students in the class will comment on the recorded audios in a certain lesson with the management of the researcher Multiple data collection instruments were used in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the blended course including pre-test and post-test, observations, survey questionnaire and interviews The results from the data revealed that the Blended IELTS speaking course significantly affected the improvement in students‟ IELTS speaking performance In addition, most of the participants were satisfied with the Blended IELTS speaking course in terms of their improvement in IELTS speaking performance, instructor‟s feedback and the interaction and communication aspects; by contrast, they showed dissatisfaction with peer feedback due to weak peer feedback, which could be considered the only drawback of the blended course Albeit results of the present research indicated that Blended IELTS speaking course was perceived positively by learners, further research is still necessary to examine if the identical results and findings might be achieved in other courses in different educational environments iv TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Statement of the problem 1.2 Aim and objectives of the study 1.3 Research questions 1.4 Significance of the study 1.5 Scope of the study 1.6 Organization of the study Chapter II: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Introduction 2.2 IELTS speaking 2.2.1 The IELTS speaking test: an overview 2.2.2 IELTS speaking performance through Performance Descriptors 2.2.2.1 Fluency and coherence in IELTS 2.2.2.2 Lexical resource in IELTS 2.2.2.3 Grammatical range and accuracy in IELTS 2.2.2.4 Pronunciation in IELTS 2.3 Blended Learning 2.3.1 What is blended learning? 2.3.2.The Terminologies: E-learning and Blended Learning 15 2.3.3 Characteristics of blended learning 17 2.3.4 Levels of blended learning 18 2.3.5 Methods of the Blend 20 2.3.6 Factors that influence the application of blended learning and promote successful blended learning 21 2.3.7 Learning outcomes in blended learning environment 22 2.3.8 Advantages and disadvantages of blended learning 25 2.3.8.1 Advantages of BL 25 2.3.8.2 Challenges of blended learning 26 2.4 Theoretical framework 27 2.5 The review of related studies 34 2.6 Conclusion 36 v CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 37 3.1 Introduction 37 3.2 Research questions 39 3.3 Research approach 41 3.4 Strengths and weaknesses of action research 43 3.5 The Validity and Reliability of the Action Research 43 3.6 Research design 43 3.6.1 Participants of the study 43 3.6.2 The researcher 43 3.6.3 Data collection methods 44 3.6.3.1 Pre-test and post-test 44 3.6.3.2 Blended IELTS speaking course Satisfaction Survey 44 3.6.3.3 Interviews 46 3.6.3.4 Observations 47 3.7 Data collection Procedure 47 3.7.1 Phase One: Pre-intervention (The Observing, Planning and Designing of the Blended Learning Environment for the IELTS speaking course) 47 3.7.1.1 Statement of the problem 47 3.7.1.2 The blended learning model for the Blended IELTS speaking course 48 3.7.2 Phase Two While intervention (Implementation of Blended Learning Environment) 55 3.7.3 Phase Three Post intervention (Evaluation of the Blended IELTS Speaking program) 58 3.8 Data analysis procedures 59 3.8.1 Quantitative analysis 59 3.8.2 Qualitative analysis 60 Chapter RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 61 4.1 Introduction 61 4.2 The significant level of the blended IELTS Speaking course in the improvement of students‟ IELTS speaking performance 61 4.3 Participants‟ Satisfaction levels with Blended IELTS speaking course .64 4.3.1 Participants‟ general satisfaction with Blended IELTS speaking course .68 vi 4.3.2 Participants‟ satisfaction levels with the Blended IELTS speaking course in terms of the improvement in their IELTS speaking performance 70 4.3.3 Participants‟ satisfaction with the feedback aspect of the blended IELTS speaking course 72 4.3.4 Participants‟ satisfaction towards the Communication and Interaction aspects of the Blended IELTS speaking course 72 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 76 5.1 Summary 76 5.2 Conclusion 79 5.3 Implications 81 5.4 Recommendations for Further Research 82 REFERENCES 84 APPENDICES 91 vii LIST OF THE TABLES Table 2.1: Opposed Forms, Contexts and Practices in Blended Learning 12 Table 3.1: Survey questions mapped to research question and survey question type 45 Table 4.1: Paired Samples Statistics 62 Table 4.2: Paired Samples Test 62 Table 4.3: The students' mean scores, standard deviations, t-value and level of significance of the study samples in the pre-test and post-test of the students‟ IELTS speaking performance 62 Table 4.4: The recommended table for analyzing the effect size level 63 Table 4.5: The effect size of the Blended IELTS speaking course on the students‟ IELTS speaking performance 63 Table 4.6: Participants‟ general satisfaction with the blended IELTS Speaking course 65 Table 4.7: Participants‟ satisfaction levels with the Blended IELTS speaking course in terms of the improvement in their IELTS Speaking performance 68 Table 4.8: Participants‟ satisfaction towards the feedback aspect of the Blended IELTS speaking course 70 Table 4.9: Participants‟ satisfaction with communication and interaction 73 VII Appendix E Lesson plans LESSON TOPICS Introduction – an overview of Orientation IELTS speaking and speaking part VIII Games Travel and holidays IX Describing people X Teacher feedback on previous While speaking: homework assignment on website Activity (individual activity) Warm-up activity After speaking Homework Before speaking XI IELTS speaking part (session 1) IELTS speaking part (session 2) XII IELTS speaking part (session 3) XIII Appendix F: Pre-test and post-test scores Number 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 XIV Phạm Ph Thẩm Na Nguyễn Đ Nguyễn V Đinh Thị Hà Thị T Đặng Hữ Đỗ Hải L Phạm Ho Hoàng M Nguyễn A Nguyễn T Nguyễn V Nguyễn H Nguyễn B Mai Nhậ Hoàng Đ Hoàng T Nguyễn Đ Phạm Xu Tạ Quốc Lưu Phư Phạm Vâ Nguyễn T Nguyễn L Ngơ Mạn Hồng D Trương T Từ Anh D Lê Minh Appendix G: IELTS Speaking Band Descriptors XV ... CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I certify that the major thesis entitled ? ?Applying a Blended Learning Program to improve students‟ IELTS speaking performance in an IELTS speaking class: an action research. .. is to provide a BL model for teaching and learning IELTS speaking through blending a traditional face -to- face class and online learning environment to enhance the quality of IELTS speaking teaching... the action research is to evaluate the extent to which the BL model is significant in improving students‟ IELTS speaking performance in an intermediate IELTS speaking class and move it to a largely