Khóa luận A study on denotation and connotation in English - Pham Thi Huyen Huong

Nội dung text: Khóa luận A study on denotation and connotation in English - Pham Thi Huyen Huong

1. BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC DÂN LẬP HẢI PHÒNG ISO 9001 : 2008 KHÓA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP NGÀNH: NGOẠI NGỮ HẢI PHÒNG – 2012
2. HAIPHONG PRIVATE UNIVESITY FOREIGN LANGUAGES DEPARTMENT GRADUATION PAPER A STUDY ON TECHNIQUE TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILL FOR SECONDARY STUDENT IN QUANG NINH By: Pham Thi Huyen Huong Class: NA1201 Supervisor: Mrs. Nguyen Thi Thuy Thu HAI PHONG – 2012
3. BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC DÂN LẬP HẢI PHÒNG Nhiệm vụ đề tài tốt nghiệp Sinh viên: Mã số: Lớp: .Ngành: Tên đề tài:
4. Nhiệm vụ đề tài 1. Nội dung và các yêu cầu cần giải quyết trong nhiệm vụ đề tài tốt nghiệp ( về lý luận, thực tiễn, các số liệu cần tính toán và các bản vẽ). 2. Các số liệu cần thiết để thiết kế, tính toán. . . 3. Địa điểm thực tập. .
5. CÁN BỘ HƯỚNG DẪN ĐỀ TÀI Người hướng dẫn thứ nhất: Họ và tên: Học hàm, học vị: Cơ quan công tác: Nội dung hướng dẫn: Người hướng dẫn thứ hai: Họ và tên: Học hàm, học vị: Cơ quan công tác: Nội dung hướng dẫn: Đề tài tốt nghiệp được giao ngày tháng năm 20 Yêu cầu phải hoàn thành xong trước ngày tháng năm 20 . Đã nhận nhiệm vụ ĐTTN Đã giao nhiệm vụ ĐTTN Sinh viên Người hướng dẫn Hải Phòng, ngày . Tháng năm 20 . HIỆU TRƯỞNG GS.TS.NGƯT Trần Hữu Nghị
6. PHẦN NHẬN XÉT TÓM TẮT CỦA CÁN BỘ HƯỚNG DẪN 1. Tinh thần thái độ của sinh viên trong quá trình làm đề tài tốt nghiệp: 2. Đánh giá chất lượng của khóa luận (so với nội dung yêu cầu đã đề ra trong nhiệm vụ Đ.T. T.N trên các mặt lý luận, thực tiễn, tính toán giá trị sử dụng, chất lượng các bản vẽ) 3. Cho điểm của cán bộ hướng dẫn : (ghi bằng cả số và chữ) Hải Phòng, ngày tháng năm 20 Cán bộ hướng dẫn (họ tên và chữ ký)
7. NHẬN XÉT ĐÁNH GIÁ CỦA NGƯỜI CHẤM PHẢN BIỆN ĐỀ TÀI TỐT NGHIỆP 1. Đánh giá chất lượng đề tài tốt nghiệp về các mặt thu thập và phân tích tài liệu, số liệu ban đầu, giá trị lí luận và thực tiễn của đề tài. 2. Cho điểm của người chấm phản biện : (Điểm ghi bằng số và chữ) Ngày tháng năm 20 Người chấm phản biện
8. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT During the process of completing graduation paper, I have received warmly help from my supervisor, teachers and students of Cam Son Secondary School, family and friends. First of all, I would like to show my deep gratitude to Mrs. Nguyen Thi Thuy Thu who directly guides me. Thanks to her useful advises and detailed comments in the preparation as well as the correction. Besides she always supported and created favorable conditions for me to complete perfectly this graduation paper. Secondly, I would like to send my sincere thank to the headmaster of Cam Son Secondary School for giving a chance to talk and exchange ideal with teachers and students. I also send my special thanks to all English teachers at school in general and Mrs. Nguyen Thi Khuyen in particular for contributing her ideals and experiments to help me enrich my thesis and limited knowledge in time of real survey at school. Thirdly, I would like to express my deepest appreciation to my family especial my parents who always take care of me and empowered me to complete this thesis. Lastly, I warmly thank to all my friends for their directly help and encouragement with source materials in writing process. Hai Phong, December, 2012 Student Pham Thi Huyen Huong
9. TABLE OF CONTENT ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TABLE OF CONTENT PART I: INTRODUCTION 1 I. Rationale 1 II. Aims of the study 2 III. Scope of the study 2 IV. Method of the study 3 V. Comments on the survey questionnaires 3 V.1. Comments on informants 3 V.2. Comments on the survey questionnaires 3 V.2.1.Purpose of the survey questionnaire 3 V.2.2.Design of survey questionnaires 4 VI. Design of the study 4 PART II: DEVELOPMENT 6 CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 6 I. Understanding speaking skill 6 I.1. What is speaking? 6 I.2. What is speaking skill? 7 I.3. Relationship between speaking and three other skills 8 I.3.1.Relationship between speaking and listening 8 I.3 2.Relationship between speaking and reading 9 I.3.3.Relationship between speaking and writing 9 I.4. Types of speaking 9 I.4.1Form- focused speaking 10 I.4.2.Meaning-focused speaking 10 I.4.3.Fluency focused speaking 10 II. Teaching speaking skill 11 II.1.The important roles of teaching speaking skill 11
10. II.2.What makes a successful speaking skill lesson 12 II.2.1 Teacher’s role 12 II.2.2 Learner’s role 13 II.2.3.Participant is even 13 II.2.4.Motivation is high 13 II.2.5. Language is of an acceptable level of language accuracy 14 II.2.6. Language input 14 II.2.7. Structured output 15 II.2.8. Communicative output 15 II.2.9. Speaking activities teachers sould be used in the classroom 16 II.2.9.1. Controlled activities 16 II.2.9.2. Guided activities 17 II.2.9.3. Creative or free communication 18 II.3. Difficulties that teachers face while teaching speaking skill 18 II.3.1 Large classes 18 II.3.2 Classroom arrangement 19 II.3.3 Reluctance of student 19 III. Procedure of a speaking lesson 20 III.1. Warm- up 20 III.2. Pre – speaking 20 III.2.1 Brainstorming 21 III.2.2 Game 21 III.2.3 Picture 26 III.3. While- speaking 27 III.3.1 Chain stories 28 III.3.2 Information gap 28 III.4. Post –speaking 29 III.4.1. Complete sentence 29 III.4.2 Role play 31 III.4.3 Discussion 32
11. CHAPTER 2: DATA COLECTIONS AND ANALYSIS 34 I. Brief introduction of Cam Son Secondary School in Quang Ninh 34 I.1. English teaching staffs 34 I.2.The students 35 I.3. English learning and teaching condition 35 I.4. Official textbook 36 II. Data collections and anaysis 36 II.1. The role of teacher in speaking lesson 37 II.2. The role of learner in speaking lesson 38 II.3. The role of speaking skill 38 II.4. The difficulties that teacher face while teaching 40 II.5. Teacher‟s opinion in organizing English speaking groupwork 41 II.6. Teacher‟s opinion about applying free talk in speaking lesson 41 II.7. Teacher‟s opinion on using speaking acitivities to encourage students to speak 42 III. Main finding and discusion 44 CHAPTER 3: SOME SUGGESTED TECHNIQUES TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILL FOR SECONDARY STUDENTS IN QUANG NINH 46 I. Group work 46 I.1 How to set up group work 46 I 2 The advantages of small group work 47 II. Base the activity on easy language 47 III. Make a careful choice of topic and task to stimulate interest 49 IV. Give some instruction or training in discussion skills 50 IV.1 Roll the ball 51 IV.2 Information gap 51 IV.3 Telephone conversations 52 V. Keep students speaking the target language 52 V.1 Preparing to keep students speaking the target language 53
12. V.2 Teaching in the target language 53 VI. How to encourage students to speak 54 VI.1 Encourage student interaction 54 VI.2 Give plenty of controlled and guided practice 54 VI.3 Make speaking activities communicative 54 VI.4 Plan speaking activities carefully 55 PART III: CONCLUSION 56 REFERENCES 57 I. Books 57 II. Websites 57 APPENDIX 1: SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRS
13. PART I: INTRODUCTION I. Rationale A great number of non- English as well as native English speaker use English as an important medium of international communication is every part of the world. English is no longer the language used solely in English speaking countries; rather it is internationally used. As the English language has become an essential factor in strengthening trade and travel in many countries, the necessity of knowing and using this communication through modern technology and media communication devices such as mobile telephone, electronic mail and the Internet. Undoubtedly, people around the world need English as the main medium of their communication via devices. For this reason, speaking is an important skill for the people who are learning English because in verbal communication we cannot communicate with each other without understanding them. Therefore teaching and learning English are very important and necessary because mastering English seems to be one of the best and the shortest ways for us to have a great deal of opportunities to reach the success of life. As for Vietnamese students, especially the secondary students have many difficulties in learning and practicing English speaking skill. They also fall into confusion when speaking English because of their lack of professional knowledge, confidence and surely good learning methods. The goal of teaching speaking, surely, is to improve the oral production of the student. Students 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. Speaking well also helps students to access up – to – date 1
14. information in fields including science, technology and health. Good English speakers will be in a strong position to help their country‟s economic, social and political development. So by learning to speak English well, students are able to gain a valuable skill which can be useful for their career and contribute to their communication and country. All these above reasons have inspired the writer to do research on speaking skill and as a result, a research title goes as: “A study on technique to improve speaking skill for Secondary student in Quang Ninh”. II. Aims of the study My study is aimed at: - Outlining the definitions of speaking skill and the characteristics of teaching speaking skill, the difficulties teachers cope with when teaching speaking skill. - Pointing out some techniques which can be used to teach speaking skills for Secondary students in Quang Ninh . - Implementing the survey questionnairs to the teachers at Cam Son Secondary school to explore the real situation of teaching English-speaking skill in Secondary student in Quang Ninh. - Suggesting some effective activities used to teach speaking to secondary student at Secondary school to encourage them to speak. III. Scope of the study Due to the limitation of time, resources and knowledge of the author, this study only focuses on giving out the definition of speaking skill and implementing the survey questionnaire to find out difficulties that the teacher 2
15. face while teaching process, then suggesting some effective activities to help teachers encourage students to be active in a speaking lesson. IV.Method of the study This study has been completed in the following methods: - To study from related books, documents and websites to collect to get background knowledge. - To consult ideas and opinions from my supervisor, peers, teachers at Cam Son Secondary School in Quang Ninh. - To conduct the survey questionnaires to the teachers at Cam Son Secondary in Quang Ninh with determination to discover their recognition level, learning attitude and the difficulties have existed up to now. V. Comments on the survey questionnaires V.1 Comments on informants The survey is conducted with twenty teachers at Cam Son Secondary School in Quang Ninh. V.2 Comments on the survey questionnaires V.2.1 Purpose of the survey questionnaire With a view to provide a thorough insight into the real situations of teaching speaking, survey within the scope of the study is conducted in Cam Son secondary school. The major aim of the study is to collect and analyze data regarding to recognition and the utilization of speaking. The survey questionnaires are designed for the following purposes: 3
16. - To find out the attitudes, thoughts, behaviors of student with English in general and English speaking in particular. - To check and evaluate ability of student in using English for communicating. - To know the difficulty that teacher and student get in teaching and learning process. The findings are served as the cornerstone for the technique suggestion in the next chapter. V.2.2. Design of survey questionnaires The survey questionnaires consist of 7 alternative questions designed for teachers to study the reality of teaching speaking skill in Cam Son Secondary School. Teachers were asked to tick the most suitable answers which correspond with their opinion. VI.Design of the study The study consists of three main parts: Introduction, Development, and Conclusion Part I: Introduction shows the rationale, the aims, the scope, the method, and design of the study. Part II: Development includes three chapters: Chapter 1: Literature review aims to answer the questions related to speaking that introduces the speaking skill and its feature. Chapter 2: “Techniques to improve speaking skill for Secondary student in Quang Ninh” referred to the analysis and findings obtain from the survey questionnaires made to survey teachers of Cam Son Secondary school. This 4
17. helps examine the real situation of teaching speaking and the need of using various activities in speaking lessons. Chapter 3: Some suggested activities to improve secondary student‟s speaking skill in Quang Ninh. Part III: Conclusion. 5
18. PART II: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND I. Understanding speaking skill I.1. What is speaking? Speaking is an interactive process of constructing meaning that involves producing and receiving and process information (Brown, 1994; Burns & Joyce, 1997). Its form and meaning are dependent on the context in which it occurs, including the participants themselves, their collective experiences, the physical environment, and the purposes for speaking. It is often spontaneous, open-ended, and evolving. However, speaking is not always unpredictable. Language functions (or patterns) that tend to recur in certain discourse situations (e.g., declining an invitation or requesting time off from work), can be identified and charted (Burns &Joyce, 1997). For example, when a salesperson asks "May I help you?" the expected discourse sequence includes a statement of need, response to the need, offer of appreciation, acknowledgement of the appreciation, and a leave-taking exchange. Speaking requires that learners not only know how to produce specific points of language such as grammar, pronunciation, or vocabulary (linguistic competence), but also that they understand when, why, and in what ways to produce language (sociolinguistic competence). Finally, speaking has its own skills, structures, and conventions different from written language (Burns & Joyce, 1997; Carter & McCarthy, 1995; Cohen, 1996). A good speaker synthesizes this array of skills and knowledge to succeed in a given speaking act. 6
19. I.2. What is speaking skill? Speaking is the productive skill in the oral mode. It, like the other skills, is more complicated than it seems at first and involves more than just pronouncing words. There are three kinds of speaking situations in which we find ourselves:  Interactive,  Partially interactive, and  Non-interactive. Interactive speaking situations include face-to-face conversations and telephone calls, in which we are alternately listening and speaking, and in which we have a chance to ask for clarification, repetition, or slower speech from our conversation partner. Some speaking situations are partially interactive, such as when giving a speech to a live audience, where the convention is that the audience does not interrupt the speech. The speaker nevertheless can see the audience and judge from the expressions on their faces and body language whether or not he or she is being understood. Some few speaking situations may be totally non-interactive, such as when recording a speech for a radio broadcast. Here are some of the micro-skills involved in speaking. The speaker has to:  Pronounce the distinctive sounds of a language clearly enough so that people can distinguish them. This includes making tonal distinctions.  Use stress and rhythmic patterns, and intonation patterns of the language clearly enough so that people can understand what is said.  Use the correct forms of words. This may mean, for example, changes in the tense, case, or gender. 7
20.  Put words together in correct word order.  Use vocabulary appropriately.  Use the register or language variety that is appropriate to the situation and the relationship to the conversation partner.  Make clear to the listener the main sentence constituents, such as subject, verb, object, by whatever means the language uses.  Make the main ideas stand out from supporting ideas or information.  Make the discourse hang together so that people can follow what you are saying. I.3. Relationship between speaking and three other skills According to Forseth. R and Carol. H (1994:43), speaking related to the following skills: I.3.1 Relationship between speaking and listening In learning English as a foreign language, the learner cannot develop speaking skills unless he develops listening skills; to successful conversation, he must understand what is said to him. Later on, the ability to understand the native speaker in direct conversations, on the radio or tape may be very important for him to further study the language and communicate in it Besides, listening to spoken English is an important way of acquiring the language of “picking up” structures, vocabulary. In the Vietnamese situation where the learners do not have a chance to hear English spoken around them every day and cannot acquire it easily the teacher needs to give them as much opportunity to listen to spoken English on tape as possible. 8
21. The speaker usually directs his speech at the listener, taking the listener‟s character, intention, attitude, etc into account when speaking and often respond s directly to her reactions, whether verbal or non-verbal, by changing or adapting this discourse. I.3.2 Relationship between speaking and reading Like listening, a receptive skill, reading also has some relations with speaking in term of developing each other. Normally, a speaking lesson begins by text which students should find some information for their speaking activities. It may be a paragraph, a magazine, a report, and a book this show that, reading supports speaking by providing necessary information. Students must have enough information, then, they can use it in speaking production. Therefore, students should be encouraged to read for not only having more information, knowledge but also improving vocabulary. I.3.3 Relationship between speaking and writing The relationship between speaking and writing, firstly, will look at factors affecting the choice between speaking or writing and how these factors affect the style and language used. The factors include being face-to- face, saving face, permanence, interactivity in for amativeness, and context dependence in which both speaking and writing can be located , rather than occurring as polar opposites. A spoken and written on the same topic will different in language use relating to grammar, lexis, and style. I.4. Types of speaking In speaking class, according to Brun, A & Joyce, H (1997), students must be exposed to three key items: 9
22. I.4.1. Form- focused speaking Form-focused instruction, that is, attention to detail of pronunciation grammar, vocabulary, and so forth When learners begin speaking in another language, their speaking will need to be based on some form- focused learning. An effective way to start is to base speaking on some useful, simple memorized phrases and sentences. These may be greetings, simple personal description, and simple questions and answers. As their proficiency and experience in the language develop, most of these sentences and phrases may be re-analyzed and incorporated into the learner‟s system of knowledge of the language; language use based on memorization can be the starting point for more creative use of the language. I.4.2. Meaning-focused speaking Meaning-focused instruction, that is, opportunities to produce meaningful spoken messages with real communicative purposes. In addition to form-focused speaking, language learners should be exposed to and given chances to practice and use meaning-focused communication, in which they must both produce and listen to meaningful oral communication. I.4.3. Fluency focused speaking Fluency in speaking is the aim of many language learners. Signs of fluency include a reasonably fast speed of speaking and only a small number of pauses. These signs indicate that the speaker does not have to spend a lot of time searching for the language terms needed to express the message. 10
23. II. Teaching speaking skill II.1. The important roles of teaching speaking skill According to Joanna .B, Westrup. H (2003: 12). Many teachers worldwide have to teach mainly grammar and vocabulary because these areas are tested in examinations. This means that speaking is a neglected language skill in many classrooms. Students may have a good knowledge of grammar and a wide vocabulary: they can use this knowledge to pass examinations, but they find it more difficult to speak English outside the classroom. So why is it important for students to learn to speak English, and for teachers to learn to teach speaking? More and more educators, governments, ministries of education and employers need people who can speak English well. Companies and organizations want staff who can speak English in order to communicate within the international marketplace. Students who can speak English well may have a greater chance of further education, of finding employment and gaining promotion. Speaking English well also helps students to access up-to-date information in fields including science, technology and health. Good English speakers will be in a strong position to help their country‟s economic, social and political development. So by learning to speak English well, students gain a valuable skill which can be useful in their lives and contribute to their community and country. There are also very good educational reasons to practice speaking during a lesson:  Speaking activities can reinforce the learning of new vocabulary, grammar or functional language; 11
24.  Speaking activities gives students the chance to use the new language they are learning.  Speaking activities give more advanced students the chance to experiment with the language they already know in different situations and on different topics. All this helps students to learn English better and success in their examinations. II.2. What makes a successful speaking skill lesson According to Nguyen Bang and Nguyen Bang Ba Ngoc (2002: 68) a successful speaking activity is characterized as below: II.2.1 Teacher‟s role As started by Nguyen Bang and Nguyen Bang Ba Ngoc (2002: 66) the role of teacher is necessary for learner: Firstly, teachers need to become effective mediators. Secondly, they need to be able to take on such roles as advisors, consultants, co- communicators, partners and joint problem – solvers. Thirdly, teachers‟ attitudes towards the value of learning strategies is crucial, as this will inform everything that the teacher does and therefore pervade the delivery of the whole curriculum. The successful teacher may not be one who merely provides specific learner training task, but rather, one who is aware of the strategy implications of every language learning that they give. Teachers would then habitually draw the attention of their learners to develop an awareness of how they go about their learning, and seek, through the process of mediation, to gradually give control to their learners. 12
25. II.2.2 Learner’s role As much as possible of the period of time allotted to the activity is in fact occupied by learner talk. This may seem obvious, but often most time is taken up with teacher talk or pauses. The learners bring to the task of learning different characteristics such as age, gender, personality, motivation, self- concept, life experience and cultural background, all of which influence the way in which they go about of learning. It is, therefore, over simplistic to assume that all learners will use or should be taught the cam strategies in the same way. What apparent from a constructivist learning, they make their own personal sense of the skills and strategies influences that surround them. A crucial aspect of strategy training is that learners develop a sense of personal relevance or personal authenticity. Rather than asking them to use particular strategies simply because the teacher tells them to, it is more beneficial to help individuals to discover and develop those that are most significant and personally relevant to them. Within this process, the learner‟s knowledge, in its boarder context of knowledge of the self, feeling and emotions, personal aims and motivation, will be significant in discovering personal authenticity in how to learn. II.2.3 Participant is even Classroom discussion is not dominated by a minority of talkative participants; all get a chance to speak, and contributions are fairly evenly distributed. II.2.4 Motivation is high Learners are eager to speak: because they are interested in the topic and have something new to say about it, or because they want to contribute to achieving a task objective. 13
26. II.2.5. Language is of an acceptable level of language accuracy Learners express themselves in utterances that are relevant, easily comprehensible to each other, and of an acceptable level of language accuracy. Besides, to help students develop communicative efficiency in speaking, instructors can use a balanced activities approach that combines language input, structured output, and communicative output. II.2.6. Language input Coming in the form of teacher talk, listening activities, reading passages, and the language heard and read outside of class. It gives learners the material they need to begin producing language themselves. Language input may be content-oriented or form-oriented. Content-oriented input focuses on information, whether it is a simple weather report or an extended lecture on an academic topic. Content-oriented input may also include descriptions of learning strategies and examples of their use. Form-oriented input focuses on ways of using the language: guidance from the teacher or another source on vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar (linguistic competence); appropriate things to say in specific contexts (discourse competence); expectations for rate of speech, pause length, turn-taking, and other social aspects of language use (sociolinguistic competence); and explicit instruction in phrases to use to ask for clarification and repair miscommunication (strategic competence). In the presentation part of a lesson, an instructor combines content-oriented and form-oriented input. The amount of input that is actually provided in the target language depends on students' listening proficiency and also on the situation. For students at lower levels, or in situations where a quick explanation on a grammar topic is needed, an explanation in English may be more appropriate than one in the target language. 14
27. II.2.7. Structured output In structured output, students may have options for responses, but all of the options require them to use the specific form or structure that the teacher has just introduced. Structured output is designed to make learners comfortable producing specific language items recently introduced, sometimes in combination with previously learned items. Instructors often use structured output exercises as a transition between the presentation stage and the practice stage of a lesson plan. Textbook exercises also often make good structured output practice activities. II.2.8. Communicative output The learners' main purpose is to complete a task, such as obtaining information, developing a travel plan, or creating a video. To complete the task, they may use the language that the instructor has just presented, but they also may draw on any other vocabulary, grammar, and communication strategies that they know. In communicative output activities, the criterion of success is whether the learner gets the message across. Accuracy is not a consideration unless the lack of it interferes with the message. In everyday communication, spoken exchanges take place because there is some sort of information gap between the participants. Communicative output activities involve a similar real information gap. In order to complete the task, students must reduce or eliminate the information gap. In these activities, language is a tool, not an end in itself. In a balanced activities approach, the teacher uses a variety of activities from these different categories of input and output. Learners at all proficiency levels, including beginners, benefit from this variety; it is more motivating, and it is also more likely to result in effective language learning. 15
28. II.2.9. Speaking activities should be used in the classroom Interactive activities can be divided for convenience into the following categories. II.2.9.1. Controlled activities For example: repetition practice of set sentence, prompted by picture or word cue – to improve the accurate use of words, structures and pronunciation, and to foster confidence. - Matching: Learners are told to match words with suitable pictures; cards or objects provided by the teacher. - Odd- man- out: Learners are told to pick out a strange word from given group then say or write it out – the strange is the new word. The word cat is the newly taught word. - Grouping: Learners are given a list of ten or twenty words to group into 2 or 3 topic groups. For example: mother, chair, desk, father, son, board, bench, daughter, uncle, and niece. - Arrangement: Learners are given some groups of disordered words, each of which is enough for a sentence, to rearrange into correct sentences then to pronounce them out. - Blank filling: Learners are given some sentences with some words missing (the practiced word), then they have to choose the suitable words from given group to fill in - Substitution: Learners are given some defining sentences, each with an open blank to be substituted with an intended word. 16
29. II.2.9.2. Guided activities Guided activities are aimed at giving chances to use the new word in less and less controlled contexts. At the end of this stage, they can use it in speaking. For example: model dialogues which the students can change to talk about themselves and to communicate their own needs and ideals; task which the students carry out using language ( structure and/ or vocabulary ) which has been taught beforehand. - Replacement: Learners are given some sentences to replace some of their parts with their own words, keeping them meaningful. - Longer gap filling or sentences / paragraph completion: Learners are given some unfinished sentences or short paragraphs to complete with their own words, provided that the sentences are meaningful. These may be done with the help of such provided visual aids as picture, cards, drawings, charts, etc - Re expression / Paraphrase: Learners are given some sentences or short paragraphs with complicated expressions to understand. They use their simple words to re- expressions or paragraph them, causing no changing in meanings. - Sentence making: Learner can make up their own sentences with given words, picture, cards, drawing, charts, etc - Story, text, news retelling or summarizing: Learners can read or listen to a story, text, piece of news then they retell or summarize it in their own words. - Guided description: Learners are given an object, a set of related pictures or drawing with some suggested questions, then they describe it in an oral or written paragraph 17
30. II.2.9.3. Creative or free communication These activities are designed to give either creative practice opportunities for predicted language items, or general fluency practice, where the specific language focus is less relevant. The students are given the opportunity to experiment, to see how far they can communicate in situations where all the choices of language used are made by the people speaking; to practice the fluent use of language they know. In general, these activities both increase the student motivation, since the students talk for themselves, bridge the gap between the rather artificial world of the classroom, with its controlled language practice, and the real world outside. Of course, any situation the teacher sets up in the classroom for such experimentation will, to a certain extent, determine the language used. II.3. Difficulties that teachers face while teaching speaking skill According to Nguyen Bang ft Nguyen Bang Ba Ngoc (2002: 78), the difficulties that teachers often face with are listed as below: II.3.1 Large classes  It's difficult to keep good discipline going in a large class.  You have to provide for more children of different ages and different abilities, wanting to learn different things at different speeds and in different ways.  You can't easily give each child the individual attention they need.  You may not have enough books or teaching and learning aids. 18
31. II.3.2 Classroom arrangement The number of students in some classes are about 40 -50 students, in some places this number go up to the hundreds. Therefore, teacher have difficulty with their teaching when the learner noisy, inattentive, badly- behaved or quite simple out of control, for example, fighting in class, forgetting to do homework, teasing the others, eating chewing gum, sleeping over the lesson and so on. These violations of class regulations often trouble the teacher as he/she has to discontinue his/her teaching to deal with them and the solution of each violation may take a lot of class time. The consequence is that the teacher cannot finish his/her teaching plan. These problems are really troublesome for the teacher. II.3.3 Reluctance of student The students can get bored very easily, especially when they do not understand the new language item or skill being taught or when they are not eared for enough by the teacher. Sometimes, it is impossible for the teacher to find topics, activities and techniques that keep them all interested. When they lose interest, they often become trouble- makers in class. These prevent and distract the others from doing their language activities seriously and smoothly. In addition, only few learners who are more proficient and confident dare to take part in the practice activities or respond to the teacher, the others do not seem to have enough courage and chance to say anything in class. These learners often keep quiet and will gradually lose their interest in learning English if the teacher does not have any way to active them to participant in the language activities in class. This is really a difficult task for the teacher. 19
32. III. Procedure of a speaking lesson III.1. Warm- up Warm up strategies for our classroom is an excellent teaching tool! We all know that starting the lesson with a good hook activity sets us up for a better chance of success. For example: Matching: ( Tieng Anh 8 – Unit 7 – Page 69) Divide the class in to two groups. Match each verb to is past participle Be Gone See Collected Go Lived Do Seen Eat Attended Write Done Live Been Work Written Attend Eaten Collect Worked According to Nguyen Bang ft Nguyen Bang Ba Ngoc (2002: 72) III.2. Pre – speaking Decide your aims: what you want to do and why. Try to predict what the students will bring to the activity and any problem they may have. Will they have something to speak about? Are they capable to do the activity successfully? Do they have the necessary language? Will the students find the activity interesting, useful, and fun? Work out how long the activities will take and tailor it to the time available. Prepare the materials. Work out your instructions. Some activities can be used in this part are listed below: 20
33. III.2.1. Brainstorming On a given topic, students can produce ideas in a limited time. Depending on the context, either individual or group brainstorming is effective and learners generate ideas quickly and freely. The good characteristic of brainstorming is 36 that the students are not criticized for their ideas so students will be open to sharing new ideas. Teacher gives a phrase which is the main topic of the lesson and asks students to find things related to the given word. Example given : (Tieng Anh 8- Uni 5- Page 49) Teacher gives the phrase “Subjects of school” and then let students 5 minutes to speak as much things as they can think about that phrase. Table Math Subjects of school Chemical education Physical III.2.2. Game III.2.2.1. Hang man Game Teacher thinks of a word and writes down dashes which are the series of letters that make up the word. Student guesses relevant letters, and then teacher has to fill it on the relevant dash. If they guess wrong word, teacher may draw parts of a man hang on a gallows. The guess continues until the word has been found or the hang man drawing has been finished. 21
34. Example given : Teacher gives students topic on Hang man. Teacher writes down 7 dashes which represent 7 letters of the word and suggests. Let students guess the word until they find the word or the drawing it, the hang man is finished. W _ _ _ _ ord: _ _ _ 0 G E uess: M isses: 1 W _ _ _ _ ord: _ _ _ G T 22
35. uess: M e isses: W _ _ _ _ ord: _ _ _ 2 G A uess: M e,t isses: W _ A _ _ ord: _ A _ 3 G O uess: M e,t isses: 4 W _ A _ _ ord: _ A _ 23
36. G I uess: M e,o,t isses: W _ A _ _ ord: _ A _ 5 G S uess: M e,i,o,t isses: W _ A _ _ ord: _ A _ 6 G N uess: M e,i,o,s,t isses: 7 W _ A N _ _ ord: A N 24
37. G H uess: M e,i,o,s,t isses: W H A N _ _ ord: A N 8 G R uess: M e,i,o,s,t isses: W H A N _ _ ord: A N 9 G uess: M e,i,o,r,s,t isses: Guesser loses – the answer was HANGMAN. III.2.2.2. Opposite Crossword Teacher distributes worksheets for students to work in pairs. Students look at the Opposite word in the worksheet and guess appreciate this word, 25
38. and then fulfill the entire crossword. Teacher calls students to share their answer. Example given: DOWN ACROSS 1.What is the opposite of white? 2.What is the opposite of bad? 3. Happy is the ___ of sad 5.What is the opposite of far? 4. What is the opposite of wet? 6.What is the opposite of sad? 5. What is the opposite of South? 7.What is the opposite of hard? 6. What is the opposite of sick? 8.What is the opposite of cold? 7. What is the opposite of thick? 10.What is the opposite of low? 11. What is the opposite of West? The answers are: DOWN ACROSS 1. Black 2. Good 3. Opposite 5. Near 4. Dry 6. Happy 5.North 7.Soft 6. X 8. Hot 26
39. 7. Thin 10. High 11. East III.2.3. Picture III.2.3.1. Matching Teacher hangs on 2 posters: pictures (poster1) and phrases (poster 2). Picture and phrases are arranged illogically. Students have to match pictures (poster1) suitable for phrases (poster2). Example given: III.2.3.2 Picture description: Have a close look at the picture and decide on how to structure your picture description. What is important or special? What should the viewer pay attention to? Example given: Look at the picture. Work with a partner. Talk about the position of each item. 27
40. III.3. While- speaking Arouse the student interest through visuals, a short lead- in talk, etc. Remind students of any structure or vocabulary useful – perhaps leaving them on the board for reference. Set up the activity so that the students know the aims of the activity and what they are to do. This means giving clear instructions and checking that they have been understood. Make sure the students have enough time to prepare, perhaps in pairs/groups, before asking them to tackle the main activity. Don‟t forget that the students are probably getting useful speaking practice at this stage too. Make the activity even more “process” rather than “product” – based by encouraging rehearsal if appropriate, particularly with role plays. Monitor the activity: don‟t interrupt except to provide help and encourage if necessary; try to keep a low profile. Watch the pace – don‟t let the activity drag on and remember to leave time for feedback. Evaluate the activity and the student performance in order to provide feedback later but don‟t jump in with instant corrections. There are some activities which can be applied in while- speaking part as follow: III.3.1 Chain stories 28
41. Give each student a card with a simple form of a verb written large. The verbs may have regular irregular past form or the teacher can use a mixture. The students supply the past form. Put students into group of five or six. Give each group a sentence to begin their story. Going around in their circle, the students give a sentence to their story, using their verb. The stories may be serious or funny, but they should make some sort of sense. Example given: Starting sentence: Yesterday, I decide to go to the park Student 1: I saw and old man sitting on the bench Student 2: The old man was reading a newspaper Student 3: The newspaper fell off the bench when the old man got up. After the groups have finished, they may repeat their story for the class, write their stories, or just end the activity in the group. III.3.2. Information gap The students do the activity in pairs. Both students have a map of the same town. On the student A‟s map some of the places are not marked. Student A asks student B for direction to these places. Student B gives the directions, student A marks them on his/her map. If student A has places included on his/her map that is not on that of student B, the role can be reversed. Example given: Student A‟s information sheet Person‟s Form Occupations Weekends Movies 29
42. name 1.Jill Doctor Romance (female) 2. Professor Go fishing 3. Janet Cleveland Action Student B‟s information sheet Person‟s Form Occupations Weekends Movies name 1. New York Relax at home 2. Martin Spain Comedy 3. Footballer Camping III.4. Post –speaking Note down glaring and recurrent errors in grammar, pronunciation, use of vocabulary. Individual mistakes might be discussed (in private) with the students concerned and you might recommend suitable remedial work to do at home. Mistakes which are common to the class can be mentioned and then practiced later. III.4.1. Complete sentence Teacher hangs the worksheet on the blackboard. Remind students the related words. After students give their answer, teacher corrects and gives the key. 30
43. Expample given: (Tieng anh 8 – Unit 4 – Page 44) Complete the sentences. Use the prepositions in the table. in November 1997 between 7 am and 8 pm on Monday, July 2 after 3 pm at 6 pm before a) I‟ll see you on Wednesday. b) I‟m going to Laos ___January. c) We must be there ___8: 30 and 9:15. d) The bank closes ___3 pm. If you arrive ___3 pm, the bank will be closed. e) I‟ll home ___seven because I want to see the seven o‟clock news. After that, teacher gives the appropriate answer: a) I‟ll see you on Wednesday. b) I‟m going to Laos in January. c) We must be there between 8: 30 and 9:15. d) The bank closes before 3 pm. If you arrive after 3 pm, the bank will be closed. e) I‟ll home at seven because I want to see the seven o‟clock news. III.4.2. Role play 31
44. Teacher asks students to work in pair or group to make a role play about the situation in front of class. Example given: (Tieng anh 8- Unit 2.-Page 20) Complete the dialogue. Ba and Bao are talking arrangements to play chess. Practice the dialogue with a partner. They make similar arrangements. Ba: Hello, 0313712733 Bao: Ba: Hello, Bao. How are you? Bao: Ba: Great. Me too Bao: Ba: I‟m sorry. I can‟t play chess tonight. I‟m going to do my homework. Bao: Ba: Yes, tomorrow afternoon is fine. Bao: Ba: At the Central Chess Club? Ok. Let‟s meet at the front door. Bao: Ba: Great. See you tomorrow afternoon at 2 o‟clock. After that, teacher gives the appropriate answer: Ba: Hello, 0313 712 733 Bao: Hello, It‟s me,Bao. Ba: Hello, Bao. How are you? 32
45. Bao: Fine, thanks. And you? Ba: Great. Me ,too. Bao: Would you like play chess tonight? Ba: I‟m sorry. I can‟t play chess tonight. I‟m going to do my homework. Bao: Will you be free tomorrow afternoon? Ba: Yes, tomorrow afternoon is fine. Bao: Where will we meet? Ba: At the Central Chess Club? Ok. Let‟s meet at the front door. Bao: That‟s fine. Ba: Great. See you tomorrow afternoon at 2 o‟clock. III.4.3. Discussion Groupings of three to five students are good for effective discussion. Everyone is able to contribute to the discussion as a listener and as a speaker. In addition, a small group draws out quieter students who may not contribute to larger group discussions. Before discussion begins, it is necessary for the group to establish the purpose: it is important that discussion questions are consistent with the purposes set by the group. Example given : (Tieng anh 8- Unit 6- Page 60) Work with a partner. Ask and answer questions about Y & Y Spring activity program. 33
46. When do they collect and empty garbage? On January 9 At Dong Xuan Where do they collect Market. and empty garbage? They start at 8 am What time do they start and finish work? and finish at 5 pm. Young and Young Pioneers Organization Spring Activity Program Activity Place Date Time Collect and empty Dong Xuan Market Jan.9 8 am – 5 pm garbage City centre streets Plant and water trees Feb. 2 7 am – 10 along streets City rest home and pm Help the elderly and orphanage Mar. 26 street children Central stadium 7 am – 4 pm Have big gathering to support cultural – sport Apr. 15 programs 5 pm – 9 pm 34
47. CHAPTER 2: DATA COLECTIONS AND ANALYSIS This chapter aims at showing the attitudes and the expectations of Cam Cam Son Secondary students in Quang Ninh towards teaching English speaking skill. The first section in the chapter reveals the reality and the second deals with the results and analysis of the collected data from survey questionnaires. I. Brief introduction of Cam Son Secondary School in Quang Ninh Speaking is one of the four important skills in English. It helps student become more self-confident in communication. However, it is difficult to practice it in teaching and learning. It needs the teacher‟s enthusiasm and the student‟s effort to decide the success of the lecture. I.1. English teaching staff English teachers of Cam Son Secondary School in Quang Ninh are excellent teachers. Most of them are enthusiastic with their job and love their students. They graduated from University and have experience in teaching English. At first period they approached to relatively use specific teaching material- speaking teaching material. Moreover, they actively use and get along with the way of organizing a speaking lesson. In each lesson, they often get use of modern teaching equipment into the teaching course such as: board, the video. They combine them with the lesson content, so many lessons become vivid, attractive and highly effective. However they still face certain difficulties in the implementation of the operation, teaching speaking skill, in 35
48. the selection of techniques appropriate to each lesson, each stage of the lesson. I.2. The students The school has 1000 students divided into 16 classes, in which 200 are 8th grade students which are enrolled in 4 classes. Students are intelligent, dynamic and interested in English subject. They are step by step familiar with speaking skill. Many students can understand quite well the English accent in the tape. Most of them can make sentences easily appropriate with teacher‟s requirement. Some students had a skill, high technique in learning process. However, many students have a little opportunity to talk, exchange, and access to public information in order to practice speaking English. Some students feel shy when speaking English because they are afraid of making mistake. English speaking is a new subject to students. Therefore, they get many confuses in keep up with the speed of understand what foreign says in cassette. The number of students in some class is big. Besides, the class is so noisy that teachers have to spend much time on controlling the students and cannot have enough time to conduct more speaking activities. I.3. English learning and teaching condition Cam Son Secondary School of Cam Pha town, Quang Ninh province. The school was founded in 1973 and named Cam Son Junior School. To 1996 - 1997 it is exchanged into Cam Son Secondary School. School has four big blocks with modern techniques. Classes are large and clear in which tables and chairs are suitable size with most of the student. Besides the students always learn hard and have big effort in learning. During the last 36 years, school received a warming help from the leaders of the provinces, towns, 36
49. wards and branches of Education, the Board of Representatives parents, companies, factories and construction support to invest new construction material and continuous improvement of the school on a spacious standard. In the last ten years the school has being maintained traditional “teaching well and learning well", and got achievements also awarded from many certificates of merit, reward flags, medals. I.4. Official text book English 8 is a text book which continously improves English speaking level of the students by combining it with to listening, reading and writing skill in higher rate. In one lessons which has a vivid and various content. It includes 16 units for 90 periods. Each unit consists of the following parts: - Getting started - Listen and read - Speak - Listen - Read - Write - Language focus II. Data collections and analysis After the survey was implemented, the statistic were totaled up and indicated throughout the following charts. Each chart shows us the number of students who chose the most suitable answer for them in each question. This 37
50. number is counted in percentage unit and the kind of chart are bar, pie, table The data can be easily seem in the chart and in the right of chart are the explanations. II.1. Question 1- Appendix 1: The role of teacher in speaking lesson. 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Very Not very Important Not important important important Chart 1: The role of teacher in speaking lesson The chart above illustrates the role of teacher in speaking lesson. You can see from the chart, most of teachers realized that their role were very important which accounts 80%, a small percentage of teachers (20%) chose are important. None of them think their role is not very important or not important. This indicates that their role have big influence on teaching process. It is difficult to compare the important role between the teacher and the learner. Therefore, their responsibilities are developing an awareness of how they go about their learning, and seek, through the process of mediation, to gradually give control to their learners. In essential cases, the teachers and students work in one group to support to each other. 38
51. II.2.Question 2 – Appendix 1: The role of learner in speaking lesson. 100% 50% 0% Very Not very Important Not important important important Chart 2: The role of learner in speaking lesson The learners also have important role as much as the teachers. According to survey with a lot of students, most of them thought that it was very important (75%), 25% choice important. And none of them think that is not very important or not important. As I say above relationship between the teachers and the students are parallel actions. Teaching activity cannot implement without one of them. Thus, when students are asked the survey questionnaire, they feel confusing to choose. The learners play role as receiver what teacher express. Besides the traditional trend which choosing logic of teaching content make center, a new trend appear that is student center. Many researches indicate that in modern society, studying process is controlled by the learners. II.3. Question 3 – Appendix 1: The role of speaking skill As you can see from the pie chart speaking skill is very important with the highest rate (55%). Besides speaking skill, there are three others skills as reading, listening and writing. Communication becomes essential skill in 39
52. modern life. It is a mean to express own feeling which we are still poor understand or distorted. And the number of teachers who thinks that the role of speaking skill is important which occupied 43%. If you can use it fluently, you can get a lot of chances in the future. At school, the student can communicate with their teacher even foreigner. It is really a easy thing if you aware it‟s role. Everywhere you go you can find language. The teachers always try to practice for their students every day to make them become automatic order to every when you can see any signal, you can call them easily. The smallest rate (2%) is decision of some teachers with considering that if they cannot know how to combine all four skills in teaching lesson, they will not have effective learning period. But in my opinion, professional in each skill is necessary to become a well- rounded communicator but the ability to speak skillfully provides the speaker with several distinct advantages. The capacity to put words together in a meaningful way to reflect thoughts, opinions, and feelings provides the speaker with these important advantages. None of them think speaking play a very unimportant role. 2% Very important 43% Not very important Important 55% Not important 0% The pie chart 1: The role of speaking skill 40
53. II.4. Question 4 – Appendix1: The difficulties that teacher face while teaching speaking skill to the students Disadvantages The percentage Large class. 50% Classroom arrangement 35% Reluctance of student 15% Table 1: Disadvantage while teaching Besides advantages, the teacher can face many difficulties. The uncontrolled of class because of too large of class is the highest rate, taking up 50 % out of 100% in survey questionnaire. The teachers cannot have enough reference materials for all of them. Even, they get difficult to keep good discipline going in a class. In secondary school, the average number of the students in one class is 45- 50 students. It is difficult for teacher to organize one game or divide the class into group, pair group, outside activity It occupied 35% out of 100 % of survey questionnaire. They have to spend a lot of time to keep the students silent. Even the stability of class accounts for nearly a half of time period. Most of students are young children, sometimes they don‟t obey and do anything teacher require. 41
54. II.5. Question 5 – Appendix 1: Teacher’s opinion in organizing English speaking group work Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% Chart 3: Teacher’s opinion in organizing English speaking group work In this question, the number of teachers always uses group work occupied 50 % and the number of teachers often uses group work took up 30%. In large class, the student can be work together, support ideal and share knowledge with each other. The students will have to listen to the teacher speak in long time. Even group work can deal with the case of lacking text book in urgent situation. Meanwhile, the number of teachers sometimes even rarely uses group work accounted 20%. It means that they don‟t like using group to teach speaking in class. II.6. Question 6 –Appendix 1: Teacher’s opinion about applying free talk in speaking lesson Many teachers asked this question agree it‟s necessary to use free talk in speaking lesson, occupied 50%. Most of students are afraid of speaking English because they feel shy or lack of confident. If the teacher knows to way to creative environment to encourage them, the ability of them wills more developing. Miss Khuyen, English teacher of 8Ath grade comment that if we let student speak what they think in regularly, you can realize their errors 42
55. to correct them and encourage them in later speaking. And this activity help students feel interested in English and want to say it more. 20% of teachers don‟t usually let student speak. They try to focus on teaching all things until time up. Always Often Sometimes Rarely Never 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% Chart 4: Teacher’s opinion about applying free talk in speaking lesson II.7. Question 7 – Appendix 1: Teacher’s opinion on using speaking activities to encourage students to speak Frequenc y Never Rarely Sometimes Often Always Activity Matching 0% 10% 30% 50% 10% Question 0% 5% 20% 60% 15% Picture 0% 2% 45% 30% 17% Description Story telling 0% 45% 25% 0% 30% 43
56. Information 35% 45% 20% 0% 0% gaps Discussion 20% 10% 30% 0% 40% Role plays 0% 5% 10% 30% 65% Complete 0% 5% 10% 75% 10% Sentence Table 4: Teacher’s opinion in giving activities to encourage student speaking English As you can see from table 4, you can realize that 50% of teachers often use games in teaching lesson. To be more specific, they apply most of games which require high focusing and fast interaction (50% for matching, 60% for question). Games help students not only understand lesson more but also give time to relax. Moreover, games creative comfortable environment to children can develop their ability. From there they can listen and understand also practice impassively. To stimulate responsibility of student in working group, the teacher also apply interesting games which have high attraction such as, discussion (40%) and role play (65%). These games require students know how to practice with friend as teamwork. They can exchange knowledge, correct mistake and reinforce more grammar, vocabulary. Thanks to the students can form skill and technique to practice activities, games, homework well. Besides, it is encourage the loving with English subject. Sometimes, teachers let student use what they studied to describe the picture (45%). It also stimulates children‟s imagination and decrease the confusing of them when speaking English. 90% of the teachers share that they 44
57. often use games in checking the homework or make circumstance to introduce and start a lesson. They connect them with advance exercises not to make student feel exhaust after long lesson. In teaching process, teacher has to try to combine knowledge content and the language practicing form appropriately and effectively. Some games are not still applied in the lesson for example information gap (35%), story telling (45%) or discussion (20%). Maybe it don‟t make student feel attraction even creative tired with them. Student like games that they think it is easy. In conclusion, after finishing survey, I affirm that teacher apply games in lesson make high effectively. The class is very exciting, the students can remember and understand lesson in long time, many week students become more confident when communicating with their friend. In fact, the student can hold lesson content occupied 90% directly on period. III. Main finding and discussion As this survey questionnaire, I just conducted the surveys questionnairs to a small number of teachers, the result can incompletely reflect all shortcomings or strengthen points of real situation of teaching speaking in Secondary School in Quang Ninh. But I hope that the findings and the discussion following can supply the useful information to some extends. In secondary school, the number of student is quite big. The teacher cannot control all of them. They spend a lot of time to deal with outside problems. It interrupts the lessons and teaching plans of the teacher. They also get a difficulty in giving more activities in teaching period because of time limitation. 45
58. The students can get bored very easily, especially when they do not understand the new language item or skill being taught or when they are not eared enough by the teacher. Many traditional teaching techniques are still applied. A small number of students feel shy and afraid of speaking. They don‟t have attraction with speaking English. The teachers cannot encourage students to participate in the language activities in class. After surveying, I realized that the teacher rarely give the student a chance to free talk. They still get many difficulties when speaking English. The least frequently used activities such as story telling, information gap are not applied. In chapter 2, through survey questionnaires for the teachers, we have an overview on English teaching and learning situation at Cam Son Secondary School in Quang Ninh as well as the fluency of a doped teaching techniques and their effectiveness from teachers‟ point of view. Basing on the result of the survey, chapter 3 will provide us with some suggested techniques to teach English speaking skills for Cam Son Secondary students in Quang Ninh. 46
59. CHAPTER 3: SOME SUGGESTED TECHNIQUES TO IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILL FOR SECONDARY STUDENTS IN QUANG NINH I. Group work This increase the sheer amount of learner talk going on in a limited period of time and also lowers the inhibitions of learners who are unwilling to speak in front of the full class. I.1 How to set up group work Be sure to fully explain the procedure before splitting the class up. Always demonstrate either yourself of with the help of a volunteer exactly what they have to do. Ask them to tell you what they have to do before they do it (in their mother tongue if need be) to check their understanding. Have fill in activities ready for the quick finishers – but be sure that they have completed the task correctly first and haven‟t just finished early because they misunderstood what they had to do. Don‟t forget to have feedback time after pair work so that the children don‟t feel that they have been wasting time. It‟s important to share their work as a whole group although this doesn‟t have to be systematic. Set a clear time limit. Control who works with who so children aren‟t always being dominated or dominating others. 47
60. I.2 The advantages of small group work Gives learners more speaking time Changes the pace of the lesson Takes the spotlight off you and puts it onto the children Allows them to mix with everyone in the group Gives them a sense of achievement when reaching a team goal Teaches them how to lead and be led by someone other than the teacher It allows you to monitor, move around the class and really listen to the language they are producing. II. Base the activity on easy language In general, the level of language needed for a discussion should be lower than that used in intensive language- learning activities in the same class: it should be easily recalled and procedure by the participants, so that they can speak fluently with the minimum of hesitation. It is a good idea to teach or review essential vocabulary before the activity starts. 48
61. We can give easy games along with lesson to attractive learner. Its can can increase rhyming, auditory discrimination, vocabulary, and attending skills. The first game is great for your little one who has just learned to rhyme. What you will need for this game is some cards with words or pictures. These cards should come in pairs so that every word or picture has a rhyming word that goes along with it. You may sit down with your child and create these or you can go to your nearest discount store and find a pack of rhyming words. Once you have these hide the cards around your home but have your child hold on to the corresponding rhyming words. Now you can see that this has turned into a sort of hide and seek game. Your child will go around and try to find the cards that match. To make it even more fun, time them and see how many they can find in 3 or 5 minutes. You can play a similar game with a group of children. Pass out the cards to everyone. When you say 'go', they must see how fast they can find their partner with the right rhyming card. The second game requires no materials, just a good memory. You can use all kinds of different vocabulary but we will start with body parts. Point to 49
62. your nose and ask your child, 'What's this'? They will of course say 'nose' and then take a turn to say 'What's this'. Each time someone takes a turn they must recite the previous items named. The idea is to see how far you can go before forgetting the order of words that were named. This game can be played with all kinds of vocabulary such as furniture around the room, colors, or people's names. III. Make a careful choice of topic and task to stimulate interest On the whole, the clearer the purpose of the discussion the more motivated participants will be. Think about your audience: The first thing you should always do is put yourself in your audience‟s shoes and consider what like to hear and why. Who are you speaking to? What do they care about? Connect: If you have an idea for a topic, look for a way to relate it to your audience. Don‟t just talks about a topic in general – try to help your audience understand and care about it. Consider your own knowledge and background: What do you care about? The easiest speeches to deliver are ones on a topic that you know inside and out. Your own passion and knowledge about a subject will come through in your presentation with very little effort. 50
63. Look for timely topics: Pick up a newspaper or check the headlines on Internet. Sometimes an interesting story can spark your creativity. Plus, it gives you a great way to open your speech. Consider what actions you would like your audience to take when you finish speaking: How should they feel after hearing you? What would you like them to do? Instead of just speaking about a topic, think instead about trying to persuade your audience to take a certain action or change or behavior. IV. Give some instruction or training in discussion skills If the task is based on group discussion them include instructions about participation when introducing it. For example, tell learners to make sure that everyone in the group contributes to the discussion; appoint a chairperson to each group who will regulate participation. We can give some activities working in pair work. It can allow them mix their ideas in group. 51
64. IV.1. Roll the ball This can be used to practice any language that requires a question/answer pattern. They can roll the ball to each other and have to say the appropriate sentence as they roll the ball. E.g. “Hello” “Hello” “What‟s your name?” etc Remembering the sentences they practice should be fairly short. IV.2. Information gap Give each pair a picture. The pictures should be nearly the same with two or three elements missing from each picture. Without showing each other the pictures they should describe the missing objects. They will practice color, 52
65. prepositions of place, and adjectives such as big, small Then they can compare their pictures IV.3. Telephone conversations Sitting back to back they can practice telephone language or just simple exchanges that don‟t have to be connected to the telephone itself. Sitting back to back should arouse their interest and help train them with listening skills. It‟s a challenge, but a fun one! V. Keep students speaking the target language You might appoint one of the groups as monitor, whose job it is to remind participants to use the target language, and perhaps report later to the teacher how well the group managed to keep to it. However, when all is said and done, the best way to keep students speaking the target language is simply to be there themselves as much as possible, reminding them and modeling the language use yourself: there is no substitute for nagging. 53
66. V.1 Preparing to keep students speaking the target language Often you will observe lessons before you start teaching your own small groups. When you do this, note the instructions teachers use. Teachers are usually very consistent in the phrases they employ. The language you hear is therefore language that the pupils will be familiar with and you should try to use it consistently in your lessons too. If the teacher is using English, is s/he doing so for a particular reason? Identify which target language phrases the teacher uses to praise pupils. Note these and try to use them in your lessons. Ask if your department has a target language policy with a list of instructions to which you could refer. Perhaps your school uses pictures (flashcards) that illustrate the target language so that pupils understand what they are being asked to do. Are these displayed in classrooms? If so, why not make your own set for your lessons with a translation on the back? You can turn them over if pupils are having difficulty understanding what you are asking them to do. V.2 Teaching in the target language Some students will be used to a French only, German only, Spanish only environment – others will not. Try to stay in your own language as far as possible. You will be mainly practicing and reinforcing language, not 54
67. introducing it so your pupils should understand a lot of what‟s going on. Reinforce what you are saying with mimes and gestures – put your hand to your ear for „listen‟, turn your hand round for „repeat‟, pretend to write for „write‟. You may have seen teachers in your department using such techniques. You may need to slow down a little bit when you speak, but be natural. Pupils will have to cope with native speaker speed when they visit the target language speaking country and you have a very valuable role to play here in preparing them for this experience. Try to simplify the language that you use. Always use the same classroom instructions and use visual aids to support meaning wherever possible. Use text to support your words. Write words on the board that may help pupils with meaning. VI. How to encourage students to speak VI.1. Encourage student interaction A teacher should aim to create a comfortable atmosphere where students are not afraid to speak and enjoy communicating with him/her and their fellow students. VI.2. Give plenty of controlled and guided practice. 55
68. Generally, the lower the level of the students the more controlled and guided practice, compared with free practice, you will do. However, even quite advanced students often welcome the chance to get their tongues round new vocabulary and grammar structures, expressions and model sentences before using them “in real like situations”. VI.3 Make speaking activities communicative The aim of communication activities is to encourage purposeful and meaningful interaction between students. Communicative tasks are designed so that students have a reason or a purpose for speaking: they are bridging information or finding out about the opinion gap; they are asking for or giving real information or finding out about the opinions of their fellow students. Not only are these activities which mirror real – life interaction. Even quite controlled activities can be made communicative if the students are talking about real events and opinions. In free activities students have to listen and respond in real time without knowing what is about come next and successful communication is of greater priority than complete grammatical accuracy. VI.4 Plan speaking activities carefully Speaking activities need to be very carefully structured at first, especially at lower level, so that the students have few demands on them. It is often difficult for students to come up with ideas at the same time as having to cope with the language. They need something to speak about such as a picture; or a purpose – like performing a role play from a context of a reading text. As they become used to doing controlled and guided activities students become surer of themselves and more adventurous so that free activities can be attempted. 56
69. Free activities, however, still need careful planning if they are not to fall flat. Carefully set up tasks (role play, picture description, debate, problem solving, ranking tasks, etc ) provide a reason, purpose and guidelines within which students can speak more freely. 57
70. PART III: CONCLUSION At Secondary level, it‟s necessary to teach English speaking. However, teaching and studying speaking are still a new issue to both teachers and students. Therefore, the difficulties that the teachers and the students face with are unavoidable. My graduation paper studies on techniques to improve speaking skill for Secondary students in Quang Ninh. Along with the real survey given to the teacher, I collected data and realized obstacles and disadvantages which teachers got in teaching process. I also gave some specific techniques to help teachers encourage and promote their students to speak English. In fact that, to speak English fluently. learners have to practice every day cause it is a process in long time. I hope the activities given in this study can be applied in lessons by teachers to teach speaking more effectively, and students will be more active, self- confident in understanding and gaining knowledge. Due to the time limitation and knowledge, my study only focuses on a small part of teaching English speaking to 8th grade students. Besides, the mistakes, the shortcoming are unavoidable. Thus, I still expect that this research can receive highly precious comments and suggestions from readers. 58
71. REFERENCES I. Books 1. Erik Palmer,Kelly Gallaghe, (1953). Well Spoken: Teahing Speaking for all students. 2. Forseth. R And Carol. H. Methodology handbook for English teacher in VietNam – VietNam English Language Institute/ American. 3. Joanna Baker,Heather Westrup, (2003). Essential Speaking Skill, A Handbook for English Language Teacher. Great Britain, Cambridge University Press. 4. Martin Bygate, (1987). Speaking. Oxford University Press 5. Nguyen Bang, Nguyen Bang Ba Ngoc, (2002). A Course In TELF, Theory and Practice I. Hanoi. 6. Nguyen Bang, Nguyen Bang Ba Ngoc, (2002). A Course In TELF, Theory and Practice II. Hanoi. 7. Nguyen Bang, Nguyen Bang Ba Ngoc, (2002). A Course In TELF, Theory and Practice III. Hanoi. II. Websites 1. Website: www.sil.org 2. Website: tailieu.vn 3. Website: nclrc.org 59
72. APENDIX 1: SURVEY QUESTIONNAIR (For teachers informant ) This survey questionnaire is designed for twenty teachers at Cam Son Secondary School in Quang Ninh. Your assistance in completing the following items is greatly appreciated. You can be confident that you will not be indentified in any discussion of the data. Would you kindly complete the questionnaire below to me? Thank you very much for your assistance. * Please tick (√) where appropriate. - Age: + Above 20 + Above 40 + Above 30 + Above 50 - Gender: + Male + Female Question 1: What do you think about the role of teacher in a speaking lesson? a. Very important B. Not very important C. Important D. Not important Question 2: What do you think about the role of learner in a speaking lesson? A. Very important B. Not very important C. Important D. Not important Question 3: What do you think about the role of speaking skill? A. Very important B. Not very important C. Important D. Not important Question 4: What difficulties do you often face while teaching speaking? 60
73. A. Large class. B. Classroom arrangement. C. Reluctance of student. Question 5: Do you often use group work in speaking lesson? A. Never B. Rarely C. Sometimes D. Often E. Always Question 6: Do you often apply free talk in speaking lesson? A. Never B. Rarely C. Sometimes D. Often E. Always Question 7: How often do you use these activities to teach speaking skill? Answer the question by ticking √ where appropriate Frequency Never Rarely Sometimes Often Always Activity Matching Question Picture Description Story telling Information gaps Discussion Role plays Complete Sentence 61