SKKN Suggestions for improving speaking skill in the new textbook “Tieng Anh 10” to encourage students’ participation in speaking activities

PART I:  INTRODUCTION 

• Justification of the study 

   In process of teaching and learning English, it is acknowledge that one of the most important skills in learning English as well as another language is speaking skill. Speaking not only helps students improve their communicative competence but also enables them to develop language skills such as: listening, writing, and reading. Thus, it is extremely important in teaching language, especially teaching communicative English. 

  Besides, in teaching reality, many teachers find it difficult to teach students with speaking skill for the reason that they have chance to practice a lot of interesting topics. But students have many mistakes that make incorrect intonation and pronunciation. This fact is true at Le Viet Thuat High School in the progress of helping students with accessing to direct communication and improving their communicative competence at the first year stage at High School. 

      To some extends, we try to conduct the study entitle: “Suggestions for improving speaking skill in the new textbook “Tieng Anh 10” to encourage students’ participation in speaking activities”. We hope that our study will be a useful material that helps teachers improve their students with speaking skill. 

• Aims and Objectives of the study  

• To investigate these factors affecting speaking skill of the 10th grade students at Le Viet Thuat High School. 
• To explore some difficulties in speaking skill of the 10th grade students at Le Viet Thuat High School. 
• To provide some suggestions and implications in English learning and make a contribution to teaching materials.  

• Scope of the study 

  The study deals with the problem that students of the 10th grade at Le Viet Thuat High School usually have when they have speaking lesson in classrooms. These problems are caused by some factors. Some solutions and implications will be given for students in speaking skill.  

• Methods 

   There are two approach methods: qualitative and quantitative.  The authors use qualitative method to explore attitudes, feeling and experiences of the students through interview and survey in a class. This can get an in-depth opinion from participants. 

Action researches help us a lot in communications and agreement between the authors and students. Quantitative methods are also used to generate statistics through the use of handout and question list paper. Students must fill in the question lists and the authors will get the figure to find out the good result. 

• Qualitative 

  Using questionnaires is one of the most commonly used by the researchers. In this way, teachers or researchers use a questionnaire including a number of questions relating to the information they are looking for. It is always a list of questions, teachers deliver it to students, ask them to fulfill the requirements of the questionnaire. The biggest advantage of this method is that it can assess the rate of difference factors that influences individuals. However, this way of research is more complicated than observation. 

  There are two types of questionnaires: choosing and giving detail. The answerers can choose one or more answers from the list suggested or give their own ideas about certain circumstances. 

  Today more and more researchers apply this method to collect information because it is cheap and convenient. It is more trustful when you collect the data. 

• Quantitative 

Qualitative is a very useful method to do research as it supports the researchers with the necessary information to do the research deeply and comprehensively. 

  This way is helpful with the researchers who can sit in the class and directly experience the real atmosphere of the class. 

  To implement this study, the authors decide to apply these methods for recognizing their advantage and trustworthiness. The authors assume that these methods are the most suitable because of their accuracy and popularity. 

• Study and experimental time 

 The topic was studied and conducted extensive pedagogical experiments at schools from the 2020-2021 school year. The process of completing data and the project is in the school year 2021 – 2022. 

PART II:  INVESTIGATION 

                         CHAPTER 1:  THEORETICAL BACKGROUND  

1.1. Skill definition 

  Skill is common term that is mentioned regularly in people’s daily life. Many researchers have tried to find out the definition of the term. There are a number of definitions for this technical word therefore. 

   However the most commonly used one is stated in the Wikipedia Encyclopedia, according to the writer, “a skill is the learned capacity to carry out predetermined results often with the minimum outlay of time, energy, or both. In other words the abilities that one possesses. Skills can often be divided into domain-general and domain-specific skills. For example, in the domain of work, some general skills would include time management, team work and leadership, self-motivation and others, whereas domain-specific skills would be useful only for a certain job. Skill usually requires certain environment stimulation and situations to assess the level of skill being shown and used”. 

1.2. Speaking skill definition    

  Speaking is a basic skill that language learners should master with the other language skills. It is defined as a complex process of sending and receiving messages through the use of verbal expressions, but it also involves non-verbal symbols such as gestures and facial expressions. Hedge (2000: 261) defines speaking as “skill which people are judged while first impressions are being form”.    

  Speaking is the process of building and sharing meaning through the use of verbal or non-verbal symbol, in a variety of context (Chaney, 1998, p13). It is said that speaking is a crucial part of second language learning and teaching. According to Carol, speaking is the productive skill in the oral mode. Like other skills, it is more complicated than it seems at first and involves more than pronouncing words. For this skill, pronunciation is only a component among which make the success of the conversation. The essential components ensuring the process of the communication probably are pronunciation, intonation, accent, etc. 

2.1. Characteristics of speaking skill