VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

------

NGUYỄN THỊ HỒNG HẠNH
M.A. MINOR PROGRAM THESIS

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE APPLICABILITY OF CRITICAL
STRATEGY IN GROUP WORK TO THE TEACHING OF SPEAKING
SKILLS FOR THE SECOND YEAR STUDENTS AT ENGLISH
DEPARTMENT OF HONG DUC UNIVERSITY

( Nghiên cứu khả năng ứng dụng chiến lược phản biện theo nhóm vào
giảng dạy kỹ năng nói cho sinh viên năm thứ hai khoa Tiếng Anh
trường Đại Học Hồng Đức tỉnh Thanh Hoá )

Field

: English Language Teaching Methodology

Code

: 60.14.10

HA NOI - 2011


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES


TABLE OF CONTENTS
page
DECLARATION ..........................................................................................................

i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ..........................................................................................

ii

ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................

iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS .............................................................................................

iv

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS .......................................................................................

vii

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES ............................................................................

viii

PART A: INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................

1


4

1.1 Introduction ...........................................................................................................

4

1.2 An Overview of Speaking ....................................................................................

4

1.2.1 Definitions of Speaking ..................................................................................

4

1.2.2 The Importance of Speaking in Language Teaching and Learning ................

5

1.2.3 The Principles for Teaching Speaking ............................................................

6

1.2.4 The Communicative Approach to Teaching Speaking ..................................

7

1.2.4.1 CLT and Teaching Speaking in the Classroom Context

7

11

1.3.3.2 Group Discussion ......................................................................................

12

1.3.3.3 Seminar .....................................................................................................

13

1.3.4 Factors Affecting CS Application in Group Work .........................................

13

1.3.4.1 Student Variables ......................................................................................

14

1.3.4.2 Teacher Variables .....................................................................................

15

1.3.4.3 Language Environment and Course Book ................................................

16

1.3.4.4 Tests and Evaluations ...............................................................................

16


19

2.3.2.2 The Classroom Observations ....................................................................

20

2.4 Data Analysis ........................................................................................................

20

2.4.1 Data Analysis of the Survey Questionnaires ..................................................

20

2.4.1.1 Data Analysis of the Teachers' Survey Questionnaire ..............................

20

2.4.1.2 Data Analysis of the Students' Survey Questionnaire...............................

27

2.4.2 Data Analysis of the Class Observations.........................................................

36

2.5 Summary ...............................................................................................................

37



41

PART C: CONCLUSION ...........................................................................................

42

1 Conclusion ...............................................................................................................

42

2 Limitations of the Study ..........................................................................................

43

3 Recommendations for Further Study .......................................................................

43

REFERENCES .............................................................................................................

44

APPENDICES ..............................................................................................................

I

Appendix 1: Survey Questionnaire for Teachers ........................................................

I

FLD:

Foreign Language Department

HDU:

Hong Duc University

No:

Number of responses

SLA:

Second Language Acquisition


viii

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES

CHARTS
Chart 1: Teachers' beliefs and attitudes towards the role of CS in group work to the
students' speaking skills development
Chart 2:

The teachers' beliefs and attitudes of the topics in the current course books to
CS application in group work

Chart 3:


Types of techniques and activities used by the teachers

Table 5:

The difficulties affirmed by teachers

Table 6:

Solutions suggested by teachers

Table 7:

The students' beliefs about their English proficiency

Table 8:

The students' profits gained from CS in group work

Table 9:

The students' preferences for the techniques the teachers used

Table 10: The students' difficulties in preparing the contents of the topics or the tasks
Table 11: The students' difficulties in delivering presentations
Table 12: The students' suggestions for their difficulties
Table 13: The students' suggestions for teachers

to


Secondly, opponent strategy in groups is one of the teaching techniques designed in the
communicative approach which emerges as the latest development because of its


2

superiority. In the view of this approach, the learner is considered the center of the learning
process, the teacher servers as a facilitator, allowing students to be in charge of their own
learning. Breen, M. and Candlin, C.N. (1980) stated that learners should be active in
groups as well as in classroom activities to enhance their interactive learning to be
communicatively competent. However, there is a fact that not all learners are participants
in the speaking lessons because of shyness, lacking motivation or poor knowledge of
pronunciation and vocabulary. Thus, in order to involve all learners in class activities, it is
the teachers' business to design and apply techniques to increase students' participation in
class activities and makes them more active. CS in groups is one of the feasible methods to
motivate students to participate heartily in speaking activities in the class.
Finally, the paper is implemented to investigate the effectiveness of applying this
technique and from that discovering its strong and weak points to set up the most relevant
ones in terms of contents. The results obtained based on the theoretical background and the
present use of it at the Foreign Language Department, HDU would help students to raise
their speaking skills as well as improve teachers' teaching methodologies in relation with
the process of renovation for teaching at the Foreign Language Department, HDU
currently.
2. Aims of the Study
The research focuses on investigating the practice of the critical strategy used by the
teachers at English Department of Hong Duc University and giving some suggestions for
applying CS to enhance the students' speaking skills. The specific aims of the research are
as follows:
-


and their interactions during the lessons.
6. Design of the Study
The study is divided into three parts: Part 1 is the introduction including the rationale, the
aims, the research questions, the scope and methods of the study; Part 2 is the
development, which consists of three chapters: chapter 1 is the literature on knowledge of
speaking skills, of the Critical Strategy (CS) and offactors affecting the application of CS
in the teaching of speaking; Chapter 2 is the study, which presents the actual procedure of
the study including the setting, subjects, sample, instrumentation, data collection and data
analysis; chapter 3 is the major findings and discussion.; Part 3 is the conclusion, which
contains the main points discussed in the paper, some limitations of the study and future
research will be presented.


4

PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
1.1 Introduction
This chapter is concerned with some of issues in the theories of the speaking skills and of
the Critical Strategy. This review of related literature focuses on the two following
sections: (1) theoretical background of speaking skills; (2) theoretical background of CS.
1.2

An overview of speaking skills

1.2.1 Definitions of Speaking
In English study, speaking can be considered as a major component or an inseparable part
of any language learning process. Therefore, speaking has been the object of numerous
studies with varieties of definitions.
Speaking, according to Donough and Shaw (1993), is a skill which enables people to

the learners with a truly proficient ability of language are not only able to speak English
spontaneously at a normal conversational rate, but also to maintain their accuracy.
The second one, as explained by M.Beily (2005:125) encourages learners to take
reasonable risks in English. Advanced students have a functional range of vocabulary and
can generally make themselves understood and get their needs met. They have mastered
many English grammar patterns and sometimes they get comfortable with their level of
proficiency and seem to stop trying to improve their English. Therefore, it is a teacher who
stretches learners' proficiency by encouraging them to try new things and take reasonable
risks in speaking English.
The third one means that learners should be given opportunities to "notice the gap". It
refers to the learners realizing that the way they are saying something in the target
language differs from the way native or proficient speakers say it. This awareness can be
about individual words, grammar rules, idioms, appropriate phrases, pronunciation-any
component of the language they are learning. We as teachers can do to help learners
become more self-aware by a variety of tasks and materials for speaking activities.
These principles are good orientations for teaching speaking skills. It is hoped that
language teachers can help their students by drawing suitable strategies to practice
speaking skills in the classroom more effectively.


7

1.2.4 The communicative approach to teaching speaking
1.2.4.1 CLT and teaching speaking in the classroom contexts
In the past several years, although there has existed a variety of approaches for language
teaching, CLT is always the popular approach and has strongly influenced on the language
teaching in Vietnam, especially in teaching speaking skills to advanced students.
CLT marks the beginning of a major innovation within the language teaching which is
widely accepted nowadays. It emphasizes that the goal of the language learning is to
develop

8

1.2.4.2 Speaking activities
Based on the theory and characteristics of CLT, Littlewood (1981) lists two main types of
communicative activities which he calls: "functional communication activities and social
interaction activities". The main purpose of the former encourages learners to use the
language they know to get meaning across as effectively as possible such as tasks that
learners note similarities or differences in sets of pictures, discover missing feature in a
map or picture, or know how to complete a map, follow directions, and solve problems
from shared cues. The latter activities including conversation and discussion sessions,
dialogues and role-plays, simulations, improvisations and debates emphasize on social as
well as functional aspects of communication.
To advanced learners who have a large range of vocabulary and grammar, a variety of
tasks and activities designed in line of CA including information sharing, negotiation of
meaning, and interaction are necessary because they can help teachers stimulate learners'
natural oral communication in the classroom.
1.2.4.3 Problems with speaking activities
It is acknowledged that enables the learners to participate in communicative speaking
activities in the classroom is not easy. In order to do that well, according to Ur (1996:121),
teachers come across the problems, for instance, students' inhibition about saying
something in the target language because they are worried about making mistakes, fearful
of criticism or losing face, or simply shy of the attention that their speech attracts; learners'
poor ideas to express themselves beyond the guilty feeling that they should speak; uneven
or low participation of learners in communicative activities in groups because each one has
only very little time for talking or the tendency of some learners to dominate the group
while others speak very little or not at all; or mother-tongue use in discussion because
learners feel less "exposed" if they are speaking their mother, particularly unusual topics.
The above mentioned problems create a lot of difficulties for teachers to organize
communicative activities in the classroom. Therefore, it is said that teachers have to
overcome those to design and carry out successful speaking activities in the classroom.

to be a great challenge for teachers to conduct CS in English speaking teaching, but CS


10

actually realizes the students-centered teaching mode and brings about a lot of benefits for
teaching in general, and for the development of students' speaking skills in particular.
First and foremost, it encourages students to practice speaking more. Based on the
principles and theories of CA, teachers create various kinds of tasks like role-play,
simulation and group discussion or presentation and so on to increase the intellectual and
emotional participation or involvement of the individual students in solving a particular
problem. These activities make teaching process communicative, which can motivate
students’ passion and enhance “the interactive communication” in the classroom. In
addition, when they come together in groups with a given topic or task, each of them is
responsible for their own study that is very important to achieve general goals of the group.
Therefore she feels that she is making useful contribution to the group and that is
significant because it helps build up interest, self-confidence in expressing her ideas in
front of the class or interact with the others in the target language.
Furthermore, CS improves students' practical speaking skills. It is true that teaching
speaking to students means helping them have good communicative skills when leaving
school. To achieve this, CS is considered as one of the most effective techniques since it
focuses on practicality and feasibility, whose terminal objective is to cultivate students’
language skills and practical communicative competence. In a speaking lesson with CS,
students practice the language they have learnt in meaningful ways such as skills to express
wishes, ideas or opinions, negotiate or solve problems, or establish and maintain social
relationships, or interrupt the others in the polite ways through the real life situations
related to the target language community. More particularly, through interacting with the
classmates, students will get a lot of experience to communicate well outside classroom.
Finally, CS enhances language and presentation skills. Thinking clearly and systematically
can improve the way learners express their ideas. In learning how to analyze the logical

may intervene when practical help is needed to reach a final agreement on the topic
discussed.
For the mentioned above points, it is noted that oral presentation including informative
presentations, an instructional presentation, arousing presentations, a persuasive
presentation, a decision-making presentation, as Randall P. Whatley lists (see http: //
www.cs.wisc.edu/%7Emarkhill/conference-talk.html) is a helpful strategy to improve
students' speaking skills and thereby develops their personal confidence.


12

1.3.3.2 Group discussion
Group work is commonly the choice of teachers because large classes do not allow them
to create enough opportunities for all learners to participate in classroom communicative
activities at the same time. According to Brown (1994), group work offers various
advantages: (i) It generates interactive language; (ii) It offers an embracing affective
climate; (iii) It promotes learners responsibility and autonomy; (iv) It is a step toward
individualizing instruction.
Besides, it is agreed that group work also contains some certain disadvantages such as the
teacher is no longer in control of the class; students will use their mother tongue; students'
errors will be reinforced in small groups; teacher can not monitor all groups once; and
some learners may prefer to work alone (Brown, 1994). However, according to Brown,
group work can be conducted successfully if teacher takes into consideration various
factors like the way to group students, abilities, personal characteristics, etc. S/he also has
to make sure that every student has got chance to speak and does not interfere much with
their talk. Moreover, an appropriate task including games, role-play and simulation, drama,
project, interview brainstorming, information gap, jig saw, problem solving, decision
making, and opinion exchange whose topics refer to daily life is also very important to
promote successful group discussion.
In a group discussion, the class is divided into small groups of 3-4 students to work

creative thinking through a well ordered presentation and ability to express. The success of
the seminar depends on several factors, but the contents of the topics chosen, which decide
to the degree of students' participation and interest, are more important above.
Seminar is the most complex form of CS. It not only requires a high level of students'
spoken skills and their language knowledge but also requires more time for preparation
than the other strategies. However, it may be very effective to help students have fluent
and logic speaking skills.
1.3.4 Factors affecting CS Application in group work in the speaking lessons.
Making a success of speaking teaching not only depends on the useful strategies but also
comes from the factors affecting their application, which are student variables, teacher
variables, language environment and course book, tests and evaluations.


14

1.3.4.1 Student variables
It is acknowledged that students are the key factors deciding the success or failure in
language teaching process. Students' participation and interest to speaking activities are
governed by the reasons such as their motivation, beliefs and attitudes, learning styles,
anxiety and confidence.
The first looks at motivation as " some kind of internal drive that encourages somebody to
pursue a course of action" (Jeremy Harmer, 1991) or is an inner drive, impulse, emotion,
or desire that encourages one to do a particular action. In his opinion, motivation
influences people's actions or thoughts to pursue a particular goal. In language learning,
students with positive motivation will learn faster, more active and effective with more
efforts than s/he does under normal circumstances.
The second sees students' beliefs and attitudes as the way to approach their learning. It is
noted that beliefs for the status of spoken language, teaching methods, the relationship
between teachers and students, among students, and confidence of using the language will
stimulate them participating heartily in speaking activities of the classroom. In contrast,

(Freeman, 1986). Teachers' beliefs are found on the goals, values, teachers hold in relation
to the content, process of teaching and their understanding of the systems in which they
work and their roles within it. These values and beliefs affect teachers' decision and action.
Richards and Lockhart (1996) suggest that if teachers believe in the effectiveness of a
particular approach or method of teaching, they will consistently to implement it in the
classroom, on the contrary they will not carry out it successfully. Therefore, it is not
deniable that teachers' beliefs or attitudes have an effect on the classroom behavior,
influence what learners learn, and are potent determinants of teachers' teaching style.
Lastly, Wilkins (1976:53) states that teachers' skills, knowledge, personality and
proficiency in the target language play an essential role in the class. If teachers do not have
a deep and thorough knowledge of the subject, they will lose students' confidence that
influences students' beliefs, attitudes and interest in speaking activities. Apart from the
quality of teachers' knowledge, a good relationship with their students not only increase the
learning motivation but also make applying a new teaching method more successful.
In conclusion, as it is proved above, the role of the teachers in the classroom is extremely
important. Variables related to teachers' beliefs and attitudes, teachers' qualities and
personalities will impact on the process of teaching and learning a foreign language.


16

1.3.4.3 Language environment and course book
Teaching and learning English in a foreign language environment impose a lot of
challenges for teachers and students because the reinforce of an English-speaking
environment is not continual. Consequently, the experience of practicing real language in
different contexts is limited that may decrease students' motivation in the classroom.
Actually, course book and syllabus play a vital role in English teaching and learning,
especially spoken English. If the contents of the course book are suitable to students’
knowledge, they will much help develop students’ speaking competence. Conversely, it
will be a very difficult job for teachers to increase students’ language competence.

2.2 The context of the study
The study was conducted at the Foreign Language Department (FLD), Hong Duc
University (HDU) in which 13-year-old English Department is one of the major
departments. It was founded in 1998 with its main aim being training teachers of English
who would work in most of the junior high schools in Thanh Hoa province. For the past
years, the need for teachers of English has been satisfied, so besides training teachers of
English for the Province, the Department focuses on providing English major learners with
the background knowledge of the language and skills helpful for their future jobs.
However, being a new Department, everything has been in the process of innovation and
development for better things both teaching and learning.
With respect to teaching, seminars and reports of science research on teaching
methodologies concerning speaking, every year, are held to create opportunities for the
teaching staff to make contributions to improving the quality of teaching and learning. Of
all the methods applied, the techniques or strategies and tasks designed and organized in
line of Communicative Approach with the learner-centeredness are often appreciated.
With regard to learning, students are expected to be active in self-studying, peer and group
cooperating to exchange the information and opinions to the others in the classroom They
are also stimulated participating in activities outside the classroom like English clubs, job
interviews, etc so as to get valid experience and improve their speaking skills.
As for the second-year students who have mastered many English grammar patterns,
developing their speaking skills is considered to be very important. They have 3 periods
per week with 3 credits for each term, equal to 45 periods. In each term, students are
required to complete six progress tests every two or three weeks (20%), a mid-term test


18

(30%) at the seventh week and a final test at the fifteenth week (50%). This assessment not
only sees the students' progress and the effectiveness of the techniques as well as the
materials used but also motivates students in class speaking activities.