MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
VINH UNIVERSITY
LÊ QUỐC NGUYÊN
SOME SUGGESTIONS TO IMPROVE SPEAKING
SKILL FOR THE SECOND YEAR STUDENTS AT
THANH HOA UNIVERSITY OF CULTURE, SPORTS
AND TOURISM (TUCST)
MASTER’S THESIS IN EDUCATION
NGHỆ AN - 2014
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MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
VINH UNIVERSITY
LÊ QUỐC NGUYÊN
SOME SUGGESTIONS TO IMPROVE SPEAKING
SKILL FOR THE SECOND YEAR STUDENTS AT
THANH HOA UNIVERSITY OF CULTURE, SPORTS
AND TOURISM (TUCST)
Major: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL)
Code: 60.14.01.11
MASTER’S THESIS IN EDUCATION
Supervisor: M.A. PHAN THỊ HƯƠNG
NGHỆ AN - 2014
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STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP
I hereby acknowledge that this study is my own work. The data and findings
discussed in the thesis are true, used with permission, and have not been published
elsewhere.
Author
Lê Quốc Nguyên
v
TABLE OF CONTENTS

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LIST OF TABLES, GRAPHS AND FIGURES
Table 1: Teachers’ experience of teaching
Table 2: Difficulties from Students
Table 3: Teacher pedagogical Practices in teaching speaking skill
Table 4: Students’ opinions on inappropriate teacher pedagogical
practices in English speaking lessons
Table 5: Teachers’ English communicative competence
Table 6: Students’ history of learning English
Table 7: Students’ time of learning English
Table 8: Students’ attitude towards speaking skill
Table 9: Factors making the students unwilling to speak in class
Table 10: Students’ difficulties in learning speaking
Table 11: Students’ interest in speaking
ABBREVIATIONS
TUCST: Thanh Hoa university of Culture, Sports and Tourism
STT: Student talk time
TTT: Teacher talk time
EFL: English as foreign Language
ESL: English as Second Language
GE: General English
ESP: English for Specific Purpose
ELT: English language teaching
CLT: Communicative language Teaching
No of Students: Number of Students
No of Teachers: Number of Teachers
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PART A: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale
Nowadays, English plays an important role in all over the World. People use

This study will try to find out problems and suggest some solutions to improve
the teaching and learning English speaking skill for students at TUCST.
2. Scope of the study
The researcher doesn’t think that he will deal with all speaking problems of
current materials used for non major students of culture management in this study.
It is too broad. Therefore, the focus of this study is to investigate speaking
difficulties experienced by teachers and non- English major students of culture
management at TUCST when using the course book “Life lines”, then suggest
solutions to the problems in order to help students improve their speaking skill.
3. Aims of the study
The study is carried out with aims to:
- Investigate the students’ attitude toward speaking skill
- Investigate teachers and non- English major students’ areas of speaking
difficulties
- Give some suggestions to solve the problems so as to improve teaching
and learning speaking skill.
In order to achieve the aims set forth, the following research questions are
posed.
1. What are the difficulties met by the second year students of culture
management when they learn speaking skill at Thanh Hoa University of Culture,
Sports and Tourism?
2. What are the difficulties for the teachers in teaching speaking skill?
3. What are effective solutions to those difficulties?
4. Significance of the study
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The study is expected to enhance teaching method of speaking to the second
year students and the students’ learning of speaking skill.
5. Methodology
The study will be carried out based on material collection and survey
questionnaires.

skills, listening and speaking, are called the oral skills due to the manners by which
they are formed. The last two, reading and writing, are called the literacy skills as
they connect with manual script.
When children grow in their language ability and use, they don’t use individual
skill, they use skills more flexible and know to combine other skills to make a
completed conversation such as they can listen while they are speaking, they can
read while they are writing. As a teacher, you will be reading your lesson plans and
then speaking to your students. All of the skill areas are related to each other and
used in coordination with each other.
Many studies showed that some learners are very good at memorizing words and
grammar rules, but they still cannot speak well. They can read better than they
speak. A child doesn’t learn to speak like this, he learns to listen then he imitates to
speak long before learning to write and read.
These studies help us know that it is better to begin with speaking, because after
learning to speak, it is easier to develop reading and writing skills in the foreign
language classroom. But, language teachers have found it is difficult to develop
their students’ speaking skills after reading and writing
1.2. Definition of speaking
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Speaking is regarded as very important for language teaching and learning.
Speaking is a bridge to reach other skills. It helps learners to read better, to listen
more effectively and to write more accurately. Speaking is surely the most effective
means of communication. (Ur, 1996)
Brown (1983) also states that “Speaking is an interactive process of constructing
meaning that involves producing, receiving and processing information”. From this
state, we see that speaking is a complex process and its content depends on the
context, purposes of speaking, participants take part in the process and
communicative skill of speakers and listeners.
Mai Thanh Thu (2008) carried out researched on some difficulties which
students faced in speaking. She also stated that:

skill, and they all try to find out the nature of speaking, speaking act, in which the
speakers, speaking process, and speaking message are emphasized.
1.3. Spoken language and communication
Speaking is the productive, oral skill. Speaking consists of producing systematic
verbal utterances to convey meaning (utterances are simply things people say).
Speaking is “an interactive process of constructing meaning that involves producing
and receiving and processing information” (Florez, 1999, p.1). It is “often
spontaneous, open-ended and evolving” (ibid., p.1), but it is not completely
unpredictable.
Communicative activity is a complex process. When communication takes place
speakers and hearers usually change their turns. At that time they themselves feel
that they want to speak out or write down something they want to express their idea
and share their opinion with the others.
In oral communication process, the roles of speakers and listeners are
interchanged; information gaps between them are created and then closed with the
effort from both sides. In organizing classroom oral practice, teachers should create
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as much information gap as possible and teachers’ vital duty is to encourage
communication which yields information gaps. Teachers should also bear in mind
the differences between real-life oral communication and classroom oral
communication.
According to Broughton (1980:25), “all living creatures have some means of
conveying information to others of their own group, communication being
ultimately essential for their survival;” beside the verbal communication, man uses
the non- verbal communication to communicate each other. But they mainly
communicate through spoken language. Today, it is commonplace to say that
“Language is never used for its own sake, but always for the sake of achieving an
objective, or to perform a function, to persuade, in form, inquire, threaten, etc.” (Ur,
1981:3).
Brown and Yule’s opinions (1983), spoken language consists of short,

Donne Byrne (1986) also says: “Dialogues seem to be best suited to the teaching
of the spoken language”. In this study, the researcher will use the dialogue as an
effective way to improve speaking skill for non-major students of culture
management at Thanh Hoa University of Culture, Sports and Tourism.
1.5. Speaking skill
Many language learners think that you can master a language if you speak
fluently; it seems that speaking ability is the measure of knowing a language. As for
them, fluency is the ability to converse with others much more than the ability to
read, write or comprehend oral language. Language learners regard speaking is
most important skill they can’t get progress in acquiring language if learners do not
learn how to speak or do not get any opportunities to speak in the language
classroom, they may soon get de-motivated and lose interest in learning. On the
contrary, if the right activities are taught in the right way, speaking in class can be a
lot of fun, raising general learner motivation and making the English language
classroom a fun and dynamic place to be.
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The skill of speaking has been recently considered by many methodologists a
priority in language teaching. Of all the four skills, Ur (1997: 120) concludes,
speaking seems intuitively the most important. Most language learners, she adds,
are primarily interested in learning to speak.
In Nguyen Thi Thu Linh’s study(2008), she carried out to compare some
researchers’ view about concept of speaking skill and showed that Numan has
similar view, he says that “the ability to operate in a second language can be
actually equated to the ability to speak that language”. Another researcher shares
the same idea that Hedge, he gives the evidence that speaking has recently obtained,
at least from textbook writers, the attention it deserves: “Learners need to develop at
the same time knowledge of grammar, vocabulary, functional language and
communicative skills. Attention to the systems of language is crucial, but the
development of fluency and contextual appropriacy are equally important goals”.
Speaking is fundamental to human communication. Different linguists have

vary.
Present themselves as good models of oral language.
Establish strategies to manage all form of communication to ensure all students
have fair and equitable opportunities to develop their interpersonal speaking and
listening skills, e.g. small and large group work discussions.
Donn Byrne (1976:3) has a clearer explanation for the teacher’s roles as follows:
* The teacher acts as an informant at the presentation stage
In this stage, teacher knows clearly items what he/she is going to present,
teacher chooses the useful ways and new material to present, he/ she will organize
the lesson in the way to save time and make it most clearly to understand and
remember. The students listen to the teacher’s presentation and try their best to
understand and memory. In this stage, the students only listen and memory, teacher
controls all class activity, but teacher has to know that he must save time, present
the new items clearly and as fast as he can. This act saves time for students to
practice at next stage
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* The teacher as a conductor and monitor at the practice stage
At this stage, teacher finishes his presentation, student understands and
remembers the new items, teacher talking time is less and student talking time
increases. Now, teacher’s role is an instructor and observer. The students practice
what they are introduced. In this stage, teacher doesn’t introduce new item but,
while student are practicing they can ask their teacher to explain or instruct more if
they get troubles
* The teacher as a guide at the production stage
At this stage, the students are given enough new language item, they have just
practiced the new language item in the practice stage. But they haven’t known to
use language in real life and this is a big problem in learning speaking skill. Most of
students at Thanh Hoa University of Culture, Sports and Tourism usually said that
they don’t know why they have to learn English; they don’t know to use what they
learnt in real life. so, this stage, students have much more changes to apply what

autonomy and skills in learning how to learn.
1.7 Stages of teaching speaking
According to Methodology course 1- Teaching the skills (Ha Noi 2002: 42-43)
there are three stages in a speaking lesson: pre-speaking, while- speaking, and post-
speaking. Each stage the teacher and the learner has their own activities and in each
stage, speaking activity has its own characteristics.
1.7.1 The pre - speaking stage
As we mentioned about the teacher’s role in teaching speaking skill. At first
stage, the teacher talking time is much, he/ she dominates class activities. It is the
same way, in pre- speaking stage, teacher is the centre. He will present new items
and introduce it to students, he organizes his lesson in the way that student can
understand and memory the new language items easily. Contract the teachers’ roles.
In this stage, students only listen and observe teacher’ introduction.
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So far, oral materials are written mainly in two forms in every course book.
They are dialogue and prose. And obviously these two forms must be presented in
defend ways.
According to Byrne (1991:22) introduction of the procedure in which the ten
different steps are used to present a dialogue. They are:
Establish setting by using pictures (at this phrase English should be used as
much as possible)
Draw out learners’ experience related to situation.
Explain some key words.
Set listening task by asking key information of the dialogue.
Ask learners to listen without looking at the books.
Allow learners to have a look at their books when necessary.
Ask the learners to listen and repeat
Ask learners to pick up difficulties (good chance for learners to soak) and
explain difficulties.
Ask them to practice ( Role- play)

students’ mistakes, the teacher shouldn’t stop students when they are speaking. In
this stage, teacher plays a monitors’ role and help the weaker student if they can’t
follow the others.
1.7.3 The post - speaking stage
This stage is time for learners to speak English, at pre- speaking and the while-
speaking stage, Learners are the role of listener, most of time, and their teacher
gives instruction and practice. At the post- speaking stage, students are given more
chances to practice freely. A real chance to speak English takes place when the
learners are able to use English naturally for themselves, not for their teacher. To
practice effectively, teachers should ask learners to work in pairs or work in group.
Group work and pair work play an important part in making learners practice
speaking. By doing group work and pair work, all learners can have chance to
participate in task. Time can be saved and learners seem more confident.
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In the while- speaking stage, the students are required to practice, but they have
to practice follow some models and at the post – speaking stage, the students
continue practicing, they do an extension speaking activity, it helps students to
express and share their view to another groups or partners. Through this, students
feel they have studied something meaningful, they can use language for their own,
they know how to apply what they have studied in real life. the teacher in this stage
must take on the role of a manager or a guide in order to give feedback, correct
serious mistakes, give students marks and set personal goals for improving their
speaking abilities.
Byrne (1988:2) concludes that in order to improve speaking ability of learners,
three phases above should be followed orderly. But in fact, they might not be
applied as expected due to time limitation, types of learners and materials in use.
The phases can be overlapped or run into one another provided that we keep our
aim to get the learners to communicate. However, teachers ought to pay attention to
what has been spoken by the students during the Practice and Production phases so
that they can see how far students have improved their speaking ability and what

Vietnamese are very different to English. Moreover they always think of what they
are going to say in Vietnamese first then translate into English. This make them
think slowly and the order of the words in the sentences may be wrong. One more
reason for students making mistakes in speaking class may come from their teacher
who believes that some small mistakes of grammar or pronunciation do not matter
as long as the student gets his message across. In some language classroom,
students haven’t been prepared well about what they are going to speak, they may
be forced in to activities and in an effort to deal with them they make mistake
because they to do something they have been shown how to do, or they have not
mastered sentence the all construction so it’s not really a mistake at all.
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