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

--------------------

NGUYỄN THỊ YẾN

DIFFICULTIES IN TEACHING TOEIC SPEAKING
SKILLS TO STUDENTS AT BAC HA
INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY
(Những khó khăn trong việc dạy kỹ năng nói TOEIC cho

sinh viên trường Đại học Quốc tế Bắc Hà)

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60.14.10

HANOI – 2013


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

--------------------

NGUYỄN THỊ YẾN


5. Methodology ....................................................................................................... 4
6. Organization of the study ................................................................................... 4

PART B: DEVELOPMENT .............................................................................. 5
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW ................................................................... 5
1.1. An overview of the TOEIC test ....................................................................... 5
1.2. The TOEIC speaking test ............................................................................... 6
1.3. Difficulties in teaching TOEIC speaking skills ............................................... 9
1.3.1. Difficulties from teachers ........................................................................... 9
1.3.2. Difficulties from students ......................................................................... 10
1.3.3. Difficulties from objective factors ............................................................ 13
CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY ........................................................................... 15
2.1. The research context ...................................................................................... 15
2.1.1. Description of the English language teaching and learning at BHIU ......... 15
2.1.2. Description of the students at BHIU ......................................................... 16
2.1.3. Description of the teachers at BHIU ......................................................... 17
2.2. Methods of the study ..................................................................................... 18
2.3. Research design ............................................................................................. 19
2.3.1. Sample and sampling................................................................................ 19
2.3.2. Research instruments................................................................................ 20

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2.3.3. Data collection ......................................................................................... 22
2.3.4. Data analysis ............................................................................................ 22
CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS..................................................... 24
3.1. Difficulties in teaching TOEIC speaking from teachers’ perspectives ........ 24
3.1.1. General difficulties ................................................................................... 24
3.1.2. Specific difficulties .................................................................................. 26


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Appendix C: Questionnaire for students .............................................................. VIII
Appendix D: Questionnaire for teachers ................................................................ XII
Appendix E: Transcript of group interview .......................................................... XIV
Appendix F: Sample of information gap activity............................................... XXVI
Appendix G: Sample of graphic organizer ...................................................... XXVIII

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
TOEIC

The Test of English for International Communication

TOEFL

The Test of English as a Foreign Language

IELTS

The International English Language Testing System

GMAT

The Graduate Management Admission Test


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PART A: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale of the study
Nowadays, with the rapid pace of globalization, English as an international language
is playing a more and more important role in all walks of life. As a result, the
teaching of EFL has been paid more attention than ever before. English has become
a compulsory subject in all education institutions from primary schools to
universities. To meet the demand of the society, a lot of reliable international English
tests such as IELTS, TOEFL, GMAT,….have come into being. It is, however, a fact
that most of these tests serve the academic purpose. That is to say they aim at
providing learners with academic English for their further study, especially for
overseas study. Obviously, a very important sector of English learners has been left
behind with very few tools to evaluate their English – English for the workplace.
Recently, BULATS and BEC have been introduced to ease the situation but they seem
not to fully satisfy most of the learners’ expectation.
Businesses, government agencies and English-language learning programs around
the world have been using the TOEIC test as the standard for English-language
assessment in the workplace for more than 30 years. Today, more than 10,000
organizations in 120 countries turn to the TOEIC test to make their hiring,
placement and training decisions. While TOEIC listening and reading tests have
been widely used, TOEIC speaking and writing tests are considered fairly new to
English-language learners despite their introduction in December 1996. The
introduction of TOEIC speaking and writing test was to satisfy the increasing need
of the global workforce for employees who are capable of speaking and writing at a
certain level. In Vietnam, most of the colleges choose to focus on the traditional
version of TOEIC test: TOEIC listening and reading. Meanwhile some others start
to integrate TOEIC speaking and writing into their syllabus with a view to
providing students with an effective tool to apply for their future jobs.

3. What are the lecturers’ suggestions to overcome these difficulties?
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3. Scope of the study
It is a fact that there are many different types of difficulties which lecturers may
encounter when teaching TOEIC speaking. However, this paper only focuses on the
most common difficulties voted by lecturers and students in teaching TOEIC
speaking in general and in teaching 6 parts of the TOEIC speaking in specific. Some
suggestions will also be made by the lecturers with a view to improving the
teaching of TOEIC speaking in BHIU.
Since this study is carried out to figure out BHIU lecturers’ difficulties in teaching
TOEIC speaking, the findings of this paper may not be necessarily generalized to
lecturers at other universities.
4. Significance of the study
The globalization of education has triggered a greater demand for good English
speaking ability in the job market. As a new and worldwide standard of English
language learning, the TOEIC test has added speaking to its original format as a
way to prove the importance of speaking in the real workplace. Nevertheless, very
few colleges take advantage of this new format and adapt it to their syllabus. Also,
even less research on the TOEIC test, especially on TOEIC speaking has been
implemented. All the previous research on TOEIC speaking focuses on proving the
reliability and validity of this test (“TOEIC Research”).
The lecturers of TOEIC speaking have met some certain difficulties but seem to
have no chance to raise their voice, to discuss with other colleagues and to figure
out the best solutions to their problems. This study is carried out to set a light on
this important issue. BHIU lecturers as well as students are expected to recognize
lecturers’ difficulties in teaching TOEIC speaking while the lecturers themselves
can possibly gain some advice to overcome these difficulties from their colleagues.
All in all, the teaching of TOEIC speaking is expectedly, to some extent, improved

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PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
1.1 An overview of the TOEIC test
TOEIC (Test of English for International Communication) is designed to set the
global standard for assessing English proficiency for business. That is to say TOEIC
questions “simulate real-life situations that are relevant to the global workplace”
while its score reports “provide accurate, meaningful feedback about a test-taker's
strengths and weaknesses, along with a description of the English-language
strengths typical of test-takers performing at various score levels” (“The TOEIC
Tests — the Global Standard for Assessing English Proficiency for Business”).
To achieve this primary goal, standardization of format and criteria for assessment
are essential for both the examiners and the candidates. The TOEIC test consists of
two main parts: The TOEIC test and TOEIC Bridge™.
The TOEIC Bridge™ test is a paper-and-pencil test that measures a test taker's
ability to listen to and read everyday English. It may be considered a bridge to link
up English language learners to the TOEIC test which has been widely used by
companies, institutions as well as private test takers to measure the level of English
language learners in the workplace.
The TOEIC Listening and Reading test was developed about 30 years ago as a
measure of receptive language skills and has been widely accepted and used
worldwide. This test measures a non-native speaker’s listening and reading skills in
English as these skills are used in the workplace. The TOEIC Listening and Reading
is a paper-based test which lasts for 2 hours (45 minutes for Listening section and
75 minutes for reading section). The total scores range from 10 to 990 for both
sections.
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opinion toward an issue.
Communicative competence in TOEIC speaking
The TOEIC speaking test was developed to align as closely as possible with
theories of Communicative Competence (Powers et al, p. 1). As a tool to evaluate
communicative competence of language learners, TOEIC speaking test is designed
to cover five components of communicative competence. Different scholars defined
and classified communicative competence in different ways, but the description of
Hedge (2000) may be considered the most elaborate. Communicative competence
includes 5 main components: linguistic competence, pragmatic competence,
discourse competence, strategic competence and fluency.
Linguistic competence means that learners can build a range of vocabulary in the
first place. They are then required to pronounce the forms accurately, to use stress,
rhythm and intonation to express meaning. It is also necessary to for them to learn
the script and spelling rules. Another requirement is accuracy in the grammatical
forms of language, in syntax and word formation.
To achieve pragmatic competence, learners need to use stress and intonation to
express attitude and emotion. The relationship between grammatical forms and
functions are also supposed to be learnt. It is essential to learn a scale of formality,
to understand and use emotive tone, to use the pragmatic rules of language and to
select language forms appropriately to topics, listeners, etc…..
Discourse competence shows how sentence elements are tied together. It means the
ability to take longer turns, to use discourse makers and cohesive devices, as well as
to open and close conversations.

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Strategic competence is the ability to use language strategies to compensate for gaps
in skills and knowledge. In other words, learners are encouraged to take risks in
both spoken and written language, and to use a range of communication strategies.

as those of speaking skill.
According to Larsen-Freeman’s view, difficulties in language teaching in general
and difficulties in teaching speaking skill in particular may stem from teachers,
students together with objective factors affecting the teaching process (LarsenFreeman, 1986).
1.3.1 Difficulties from teachers
The teachers’ inappropriate pedagogical practices may, to some extents, cause
troubles to their English teaching. Two most popular difficulties may result from the
teachers’ inability to adjust the amount of teacher talk in class and to use
appropriate teachers’ error correction techniques.
1.3.1.1 The amount of teacher talk
According to Nunan (1991), “Teacher talk is of crucial importance, not only for the
organization of the classroom but also for the processes of acquisition. It is
important for the organization and management of the classroom because it is
through language that teachers either succeed or fail in implementing their teaching
plans. In terms of acquisition, teacher talk is important because it is probably the
major source of comprehensible target language input the learner is likely to
receive.”
It is, however, proved in a lot of research that teachers tend to make up over 70% of
the total talk in the classroom (Chaudron, 1988; Cook, 2000). Once teacher talk
dominates the classroom, students will have less opportunity to further practice the
language and hence tend to be unable to develop their language proficiency.

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1.3.1.2. Teachers’ correction techniques
Students’ errors are crucial evidence to show how they acquire the language
through certain strategies or procedures (Brown, 1994). Consequently, it turns to
teachers’ duty to correct students’ errors to clarify students’ understanding of
meaning and construction of the language.

represents what a society thinks and does, while its language expresses and
embodies the ideas of that society. In other words, if a learner expects to speak a
language well, he must appreciate the way it is used in social contexts. According to
Berns (1990), each language has its own rules of application as to when, how and to
what degree a speaker may impart a given verbal behavior to one’s conversational
partner. Hence, it is challenging for non-native speakers to choose the appropriate
forms for different communicative situations.
One of the most evident learning experiences is students’ learning style. Keefe
(1979) defined learning style as “cognitive, affective and physiological traits that
are relatively stable indicators of how learners perceive, interact with and respond to
the learning environment.”
Willing (1987, as cited in Bailey 2005, pp. 169-170) divided learners into four
groups basing on their behaviors. Concrete learners are the students who feel really
interested in social aspects of language learning whereas analytical learners prefer
working individually on reading and grammar. The third type of learners is called
communicative learners who are really willing to communicate with other speakers.
The last type, authority-oriented learners tend to be independent and prefer to work
in non-communicative classroom. It is clear from Willing’s classification that the
participation in oral activities of a class will be certainly at a low degree if most of
the students belong to concrete and authority-oriented group.
Ellis (1985, p.120) divided learners’ learning styles into two main types: extrovert
and introvert. Obviously, extrovert learners are more willing to interact with others

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than the introvert ones, and so they are often more successful in oral
communication.
In short, it’s very necessary for teachers to take into consideration students’
different learning styles to improve their teaching.

motivational components. The first one involves the learners’ interest and needs to
syllabus, teaching materials, teaching methods and learning tasks. The second
concerns such factors as the lecturer’s personality, teaching method, modeling, task
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presentation and feedback. The third one relates to the characteristics of the
learners’ group cohesiveness, classroom goals being structured as cooperative,
competitive or individualistic (Dornyei, 2001). To get students really motivated,
lecturers need to ensure all the three sets of components which are, however, very
difficult to satisfy. Hence, in his book, Nunan (1999) pointed out some main
reasons for students’ de-motivation. Students’ de-motivation may result from lack
of success over time or lack of perception of progress. It is possibly caused by
teachers’ uninspired teaching or simply their boredom with the subjects. Another
reason is the lack of perceived relevance of materials. Failing to get the goals of the
instructional program or receive appropriate feedback also makes students demotivated.
Anxiety is “the subjective feeling of tension, apprehension, nervousness, and worry
associated with an arousal of the autonomic nervous system” (Shank, & Terril,
1995). In Zhang’s research (2006), he identified some main causes of language
anxiety including less proficient English, fear of making mistakes, large class size,
unwillingness to take risks, low tolerance of ambiguity and competitiveness.
Obviously, all mentioned studies agree on the popularity of difficulties from
students in the EFL speaking classroom. These difficulties (stemming from cultural,
linguistic, and affective factors) need considering carefully so that students’
participation will be increased and teachers’ speaking lessons can be improved as a
result.
1.3.3 Difficulties from objective factors
A lot of recent studies have pointed out difficulties caused by large and multilevel
classes. According to Le Phuoc Ky (Teacher’s Edition, 2002), the number of
students should be kept small to maximize the interaction between teachers and

founded, the teaching and studying of English have been always paid serious
attention to and become one of the most outstanding features of BHIU in
comparison with other private universities. With 700 hours of English study,
graduate students are supposed to be able to have communicative competence at
intermediate level. Students also have opportunities to study with foreign teachers
during the first two years. During the first year, students have time to revise all their
previous English studies and develop their General English communicative
competence in all four skills: speaking, listening, reading and writing. Moving on to
the second year, students are supposed to improve their four basic skills for English
for Business Communication. The basic knowledge of Business is expected to set a
good and firm foundation for students to study two terms of TOEIC.
During the last two terms, TOEIC (reading, listening, speaking) are obligatory
subjects in the syllabus. TOEIC writing is, however, excluded as students have
already studied English for Commercial Correspondence and there is no need for
them to study over writing skill again. The exclusion of TOEIC writing skill also
results from the limited time for the last two terms. That is to say instead of
studying 10 periods or 8 periods per week like in the first two years, students have
only 6 and 3 periods per week to study the TOEIC test in the fifth and sixth term
respectively. Each term lasts 14 weeks, hence in total the preparation for the TOEIC
listening, reading, speaking tests is in 168 periods. TOEIC speaking is spent 56
periods for the whole course.

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The two course books used for TOEIC speaking are TOEIC Speaking by Lee Seyeong and TOEIC Speaking Flow by Kim Hyeonju – Lee Boyeong. As mentioned
earlier, the TOEIC speaking test is a computer-based test which needs preparing
carefully before the exam. In BHIU, the TOEIC test is not carried out according to
the standard requirements. Instead of speaking to a computer, students still go into
the exam room and are interviewed by teachers. For this issue, the reliability and

competence in general and TOEIC speaking skills in specific.
2.1.3 Description of the lecturers at BHIU
Together with students, lecturers play a vital role in the second language
acquisition. BHIU lectures may be divided into two main categories. The first one
includes seven full-time lecturers who have been teaching TOEIC speaking skills.
The second one consists of the 13 visiting lecturers, three of who have experience in
teaching TOEIC speaking skills.
With regard to lecturers of TOEIC speaking, most of them are quite young, in the
age range between 22 and 38. Being young and active, they try to apply different
teaching methods to improve their lessons. Nevertheless, these young lecturers are
quite inexperienced in teaching preparation courses for the international tests like
IELTS, TOEFL or TOEIC.
In terms of qualifications, most of the lecturers have master degrees in English
language teaching with an exception of two lecturers. Some are also trained in
Business Administration, the background of which is of great help to their teaching
of Business Communication as well as TOEIC.
As teaching The TOEIC speaking test in BHIU, the lecturers have confronted a lot
of difficulties which will be made clear in the latter part of this study.

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2.2 Methods of the study
According to Cohen and Manion (1985) (as cited in Nunan (1992)), “surveys are
the most commonly used descriptive method in educational research”. It is due to
the fact that they are suitable to different studies from “large-scale” investigations to
“small-scale” ones carried out by a single researcher. In particular, in survey
research, the researchers do nothing to the subjects of research rather than collect
data from them. In other words, the data are gathered from people or things without
altering anything (Nunan, (1992)). For this reason, this study made use of survey