VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES
GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

Lê Thị Hồng Tuyến

USING WARM-UP ACTIVITIES TO IMPROVE
THE STUDENTS’ SPEAKING SKILLS: AN
ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT AT DONG
NAI TECHNOLOGY UNIVERSITY

MA THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE

HANOI, 2019


VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES
GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

Lê Thị Hồng Tuyến

USING WARM-UP ACTIVITIES TO IMPROVE
THE STUDENTS’ SPEAKING SKILLS: AN
ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT AT DONG
NAI TECHNOLOGY UNIVERSITY

Field: English Language
Code: 8220201
Supervisor: Bùi Thị Thục Quyên, Ph.D.

HANOI, 2019


I am most thankful to my colleague – Ms. Pham Thi Kim Tuoi and the
students at Dong Nai Technology University for their support in data
collection.
Finally, my special thanks go to my family, for their love and support
throughout this project. Without their encouragement I could not have completed
this thesis.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
DECLARATION BY AUTHOR ........................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ..................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT ........................................................................................... vii
LIST OF FIFGURES ............................................................................. viii
LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS........................................................ ix
LIST OF ABBREVIATION USED IN THE THESIS .......................... xi
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ....................................................... 1
1.1Rationale ........................................................................................... 1
1.2 Aims of the study ............................................................................. 2
1.3 Research questions ........................................................................... 2
1.4 Scope of the study ............................................................................ 2
1.5 Significance of the study ................................................................... 3
1.6 Research methods ............................................................................. 3
1.7 Structure of the study ........................................................................ 3
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................... 5
2.1 Nature of language skills and oral communication .......................... 5
2.1.1 Nature of language skill ................................................................ 5
2.1.2 Oral communication ...................................................................... 5

3.5.2 The questionnaire .......................................................................... 31
3.5.3 Class observation .......................................................................... 32
3.6 Summary .......................................................................................... 32
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS .............................. 33
4.1 Research question 1: Students’ thoughts about English speaking ... 33
4.1.1 The difficulty level of English speaking ....................................... 33
4.1.2 Students’ difficulties in English speaking lessons ........................ 34

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4.2 Research question 2: students’ attitudes toward using warm – up
activities in English speaking lessons .................................................... 35
4.2.1 How much students liked warm – up activities in general ........... 35
4.2.2 The effectiveness of warm – up activities in speaking lessons ..... 36
4.2.3 Students’ difficulties when participating in warm – up activities 37
4.2.4 Suggestions from students to improve warm –up activities ......... 38
4.2.5 Warm – up activities in speaking lessons preferred by students .. 39
4.3 Research question 3: revised warm – up activities and their effects
on students .............................................................................................. 40
4.3.1 Word jumble race .......................................................................... 41
4.3.1.1 Data from Questionnaire 2 .......................................................... 41
4.3.1.2 Data from the observation sheets ................................................ 43
4.3.2 Remembering pictures .................................................................. 45
4.3.2.1 Data from Questionnaire 2 .......................................................... 45
4.3.2.2 Data from the observation sheets ................................................ 47
4.3.3 Mimic ............................................................................................ 49
4.3.3.1 Data from the Questionnaire 2 .................................................... 49
4.3.3.2 Data from the observation sheets ............................................... 51
4.3.4 Words of mouth ............................................................................. 53

Appendix 4: Pre – test ............................................................................ XI
Appendix 5: Post – test .......................................................................... XIII
Appendix 6: Rubrics of the pre – test .................................................... XV
Appendix 7: Rubrics of the post – test ................................................... XVI

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ABSTRACT
For some recent years, English has played more and more important part
in Vietnam, and it has been taught in many levels of Vietnamese schools as a
compulsory subject. So far, there have been remarkable changes in the way of
teaching and learning English speaking. However, students’ speaking skills
are still far from satisfaction. How to improve students’ performance in
speaking has been a big question for every English teacher. It is also the
question that has inspired the researcher to investigate the use of warm – up
activities to improve her students’ speaking skills. In attempt to fulfill this
thesis, there were two classes which attended in this research. Class A studied
English speaking skills with warm – up activities but class B studied without
warm – up activities. The final results were very surprising. Warm – up
activities basically have had a very little effect on students’ speaking skills.
From the final results, some suggestions have been drawn out to help use
warm – up activities more effectively. It is hoped that this thesis will be found
of value to those who have great interest in using warm – up activities in
speaking lessons.

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LIST OF FIGURES


Table 2: Students’ difficulties in English speaking lessons

34

Table 3: How students feel about WAS

35

Table 4: Students’ difficulties when joining WAS in speaking
Lessons

37

Table 5: What the teacher should do to improve WAS

38

Table 6: WAS in speaking lessons preferred by students

39

Table 7: The effectiveness of Word jumble race

41

Table 8: Strengths and weaknesses of Word jumble race

42



49

Table 16: Strengths and weaknesses of Mimic

49

Table 17: Students’ participation level in speaking lesson with
Mimic

50

Table 18: Mimic

51

Table 19: The effectiveness of Words of mouth

53

Table 20: Strengths and weaknesses of Words of mouth

53

Table 21: Students’ participation level in speaking lesson with
Words of mouth

54

Table 22: Words of mouth


CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Rationale
In Vietnam, English has been considered one of the most necessary
subjects for students in all levels of educational system. Nevertheless, how to
teach English in general and speaking skill effectively in particular is still
controversial. Moreover, speaking skill is believed the most essential skill
because it is the most effective tool to carry out a conversation.
Thanks to the CLT, many changes have been made in classroom’s
atmosphere to help learners involve actively and positively during the class
time. Hence, WAS are also highly recommended in English speaking classes
because they stimulate students to engage and speak in English (Lassche,
2005; Hadfield, 2000; Robertson & Acklam, 2000).
In fact, at DNTU, although teachers have created several WAS before
each lesson, their students still find it difficult to start talking in English
during class time. Honestly, the researcher is also in the same situation. The
WAS which are carried out in the author’s classrooms seem to be useless. The
students are not willing to participate in those activities or even after joining
the warming up, they show no interest in new speaking lessons. Therefore,
how to encourage students to speak English and feel free to participate in
speaking activities is the worry of many teachers including the author.
Facing such a problem, the author wants to know the reasons behind her
students’ unwillingness of participation in WAS and find out the possible
solutions. Based on students’ perception of WAS, the author will redesign

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some activities, then, apply them in to her speaking classes to observe the

Dong Nai. This group of students had learned an English course with the
researcher; however, they had very bad speaking skills with unknown reasons.
The WAS in this study were chosen and revised according to the students’
opinions.
1.5 Significance of the study
Once this study has been completed, it is expected that it will help the
teacher discover the problems behind her students’ failed performances in
speaking lessons. Then, basing on students’ opinion, the teacher can create
more suitable WAS to make her speaking lessons more attractive and
engaging. This means learners will also feel more appealed to the speaking
lessons right at the beginning and be able to enhance their speaking skills.
1.6 Research methods
The study based mainly on the pre – test, post – test, survey
questionnaires, observations. Two sets of questionnaires were designed and
delivered to students at the beginning of the course and after each speaking
lesson. The observation forms were filled during two cycles. The pre – test
was done at the beginning of the course and the post – test was in the end of
the course. The collected data was analyzed both quantitatively and
qualitatively.
1.7 Structure of the study
The study consists of five chapters:
Chapter 1 – Introduction: The first chapter gives reasons for choosing
the thesis, scope and aims of the study as well as the research method and the
structure of the study.
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Chapter 2 – Literature Review: This chapter focuses on an overview of
nature of language skills and oral communication, speaking skill, Action
Research as well as previous studies on using WAS to improve or develop

face – to – face conversations, group discussions, telephone calls and other
circumstances in which spoken word is used to express the meaning.” Thanks
to oral communication, humans can express and understand each other.
Likewise, it is through oral communication students can express themselves,
acquire new concepts, exchange ideas and experience the joy of using
language to build their own new knowledge.

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2.2 Speaking skills
2.2.1 Concepts of speaking
There are various definitions of the word “speaking” which are suggested
by many language researchers all over the world. Brown (1994) and Burns &
Joyce (1997) define that speaking is an interactive process of constructing
meaning that involves producing, receiving and processing information. It
means that speaking does not include only saying but understanding and
replying to the other speaker in a conversation.
Bygate (1987) defined speaking as the production of auditory signals to
produce different verbal responses in listeners. It is regarded as combining
sounds systematically to form meaningful sentences. Florez (1999), Howarth
(2001), and Abd El Fattah Torky (2006) defined speaking as a two – way
process including a true communication of opinions, information, or
emotions. This view regards the spoken texts as the collaboration between
two or more persons in the shared time and the shared context.
In conclusion, speaking is an interactive process between speakers and
listeners. Both speakers and listeners must cooperate, exchange and
understand each other’s opinions in the same context and period of time.
2.2.2 The importance of speaking
Children normally learn to speak before they know how to read and

time constraints. Speaking skill enables individuals to produce sentences for
the real communication, in other words they actually like to communicate in
language to get specific objectives (McDonough & Shaw, 1993).

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To summarize, speaking is a complicated skill. To achieve it
successfully, a speaker must master so many subskills such as grammar,
vocabulary, pronunciation, fluency or even listening skill. However hard it is,
speaking is still the integral part of human life. People speak every day to
express their ideas and transform the information. So, it is very important for
students to learn speaking.
2.2.3 Characteristics of speaking skills
According to Mazouzi (2013), learners’ activities should be designed to
achieve the balance between fluency and accuracy. Both fluency and accuracy
are important elements of communicative approach.
Fluency is the first characteristic of speaking performance. According to
Hughes (2002), fluency is the learners’ ability to speak in understandable way
so as not to break down communication because listeners may lose their
interest. Hedge (2000) also expressed that fluency is the ability to answer
coherently by connecting the words and phrases, pronouncing the sounds
clearly, and using stress and intonation.
Accuracy is the second characteristic of speaking performance. When
learning a foreign language, students should be accurate. Therefore, teachers
should emphasize accuracy in their teaching process. Learners should pay
attention to the exactness and the completeness of language form when
speaking such as focusing on grammatical structures, vocabulary, and
pronunciation (Mazouzi, 2013).
According to Thornbury (2005), learners’ correct use of grammatical

say a foreign language in front of their classmates. They are worried about

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making mistakes, being criticized, losing face or feeling shy of their friends’
attention towards themselves.
The second problem is that learners always complain that they cannot
think of anything to say. They do not have any reason to express themselves
except the guilty feeling that they should be speaking. Rivers (1968) showed
that learners often say nothing because their teachers have chosen a topic that
is not suitable for them or they do not have enough knowledge about it. The
above idea is supported by Baker and Westrup (2003) who said that it is very
difficult for learners to tell something in a foreign language because they have
little opinions about what to say, which vocabulary to apply, or how to use
grammar correctly.
The third problem in the speaking class is that the participation is very
low. According to Tuan and Mai (2015), with a large number of students in
the class, each student will have limited time to speak. If one student talks,
others have to listen to him/her. Moreover, in a mixed – ability class, some
students will dominate the whole class while others talk very little or not at
all.
The last problem related to the speaking ability is that when some
learners share the same mother – tongue, they try to use it in the speaking
class because it is very easy for them (Tuan & Mai, 2015). Especially when
the teacher asks their students to discuss in groups, it is difficult to keep the
whole class to the target language.
In summary, when learning a new language, students cannot avoid facing
troubles and difficulties. Each student has his own problems which are
different from the others’. Some may have problems with the ideas but some

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lesson topic; therefore, students can take part in different activities more
easily to develop their language skill in other stages (p. 13). The following
diagram which shows some of the principles of warm – up activity is taken
from Velandia (2008, p. 13).

Figure 1: Principles of warm – up activities
In another research of Robertson and Acklam (2000), they also described
the main features of a warm – up activity. They include that a warm – up
activity needs to be interesting to motivate the students. Because a warm – up
activity is a short activity, it is not the main part of the lesson. Moreover, it
can be used to give students an opportunity to recall the previous knowledge.
However, Robertson and Acklam (2000) had disagreed with Velandia (2008)
that a warm – up activity must be related to the lesson topic. They mention

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