THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES GRADUATE PAPER TITLE: AN INVESTIGATION ON DIFFICULTIES IN SPEAKING ENGLISH OF STUDENTS IN GRADE 7TH AT SAIGON CONNECTION ENGLISH CENTER Student name: Nguyen Cao Hong Hanh Student code: 1722202010074 Class: D17AVGD01 Course: 2017-2021 Major: English for Teaching Lecturer: Ms Nguyen Ngoc Thao, MA Binh Duong, November 2020 THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES GRADUATE PAPER TITLE: AN INVESTIGATION ON DIFFICULTIES IN SPEAKING ENGLISH OF STUDENTS IN GRADE 7TH AT SAIGON CONNECTION ENGLISH CENTER Student name: Nguyen Cao Hong Hanh Student code: 1722202010074 Class: D17AVGD01 Course: 2017-2021 Major: English for Teaching Lecturer: Ms Nguyen Ngoc Thao, MA Binh Duong, November 2020 i STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP Student full name: Nguyen Cao Hong Hanh Student ID: 1722201020074 Title paper: An investigation on difficulties in speaking English of students in grade 7th at Saigon Connection English Center I hereby confirm that I am the sole author of the paper presented Where the work of others has been consulted, this is duly acknowledged in the paper’s bibliography I have also not consulted any other unnamed online sources All verbatim or referential use of the sources named in the bibliography has been specifically indicated in the text Binh Duong, November 2020 NGUYEN CAO HONG HANH ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS To all teachers at the Thu Dau Mot University, To be able to finish my reports, I am received the enthusiastic support from many people It would be remiss of me to not send my gratitude to those who care, help and guidance me until now First of all, I would like to thank all of lecturers in Thu Dau Mot University for providing me much knowledge and skills in English area via subjects in the education program Four years is the period of courses which are helpful to apply important experiences to prepare for my life after graduation Next, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my teacher’s guidance, Ms Nguyen Thanh Thao, who transfers of precious experience, teaches and supports me a lot during this work Many people, especially my classmates have made valuable comment suggestions on my paper which gave me an inspiration to improve the quality of the assignment Again, I sincerely thank everyone who has helped me during this time! iii ABSTRACT In the era of modernization nowadays, the question whether English has become a pivotal part of human, especially on students provoke a controversy Some people hold the view that it is considered as a beneficial approach for students to boost their career prospect English is taught in all universities in Vietnam Speaking plays an important part in language teaching and learning There are many factor influences on speaking skills There are many activities that are being done to help the learning overcome the difficulties but still limited Research to explore the speaking difficulties of 7th graders at SaiGon Connection English Center Furthermore, research aims to uncover the causes of those difficulties The researcher uses exercise methodology to identify and measure 7th graders' speech difficulties at SaiGon Connection English Center Study designer questionnaire for application on sample research Such questions will be suggested to each student to check for speaking difficulties and the staffing of those difficulties The results show that there are a number of reasons why students have difficulty in speaking for reasons such as inhibition, nothing to say, low or uneven participation, and mother-tongue use Researchers have adopted some of the most important recommendations, which is to establish an appropriate set of supports and encourage students to speak English regularly This report is an attempt to find out the factors for 7th graders difficulty speaking at SaiGon Connection English Center iv TABLE OF CONTENTS STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ABSTRACT TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES LIST OF FIGURES CHAPTER INTRODUCTION 1.1 BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY 1.2 PURPOSES OF THE STUDY 1.3 RESEARCH QUESTIONS 1.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY CHAPTER LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 DEFINITIONS OF SPEAKING 2.2 THE IMPORTANCE OF SPEAKING 2.3 TEACHING OF SPEAKING 2.4 FACTORS THAT CAUSE SPEAKING DIFFICULTIES TO EFL LEARNERS CHAPTER METHODOLOGY 3.1 RESEARCH METHODS 3.1.1 Qualitative method 3.1.2 Quantitative method 3.2 POPULATION AND SAMPLE 3.3 RESEARCH INSTRUMENTS 3.3.1 Observations 3.3.2 Interviews 3.3.3 Questionnaires 3.4 DATA ANALYSIS v 3.4.1 Identification 3.4.2 Classification 3.4.3 Description 3.4.4 Explanation CHAPTER RESULT AND DISCUSSION 4.1 THE MAIN SPEAKING DIFFICULTIES ENCOUNTERED BY GRADE STUDENTS 4.2.1 Inhibition 4.2.2 Mother tongue use 4.2.3 Language’s difficulties 4.2.4 The knowledge of the topics 4.3 FACTORS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO THE EXISTENCE OF THESE DIFFICULTIES 4.3.1 The limit of time 4.3.2 Teaching strategies 4.3.3 Outdoor activities 4.3.4 Curriculums CHAPTER CONCLUSION 5.1 SUMMARY OF THE KEY FINDINGS 5.2 LIMITATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 5.3 CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS REFERENCES APPENDIX vi LIST OF TABLE Table 1: The teachers’ opinions about difficulties in teaching speaking vii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: The students’ difficulties in speaking viii CHAPTER INTRODUCTION 1.1 BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY Language plays an important role in human life As the interface's approach, language is meant to be important in presenting opinions to others Everyone can reveal their information and how they feel using language The reality is that humans are inseparable from life, language, and communication Speaking is the best way to communicate English is a necessary language which is used as an aspect of communication all over the world It appears in business, economy, media, travelling, communicate activities, etc Learning English is the best way to help us in the future That is the reason why we choose and follow learning English English is a compulsory subject learned by students from elementary to university Speaking, listening, reading and writing skills must be learned to get a foreign language Speaking is one of the most important skills that needs to be developed and improved as an effective means of communication Speaking English allows people to send and receive information to others Speaking English is not easy for students, because in order to speak fluently and understand well, students must learn seriously, they must learn about Vocabulary, Pronunciation, and Grammar and they must have willingness Obviously, it is necessary to develop communication skills English oral communication skills are part of this skill set, and thus, students should be supported to gain these skills Learners of English at SaiGon Connection English Center often not have opportunities to speak English outside the classroom, and for many of them, the course book is the only place where they have chance to learn English Although speaking is considered a main language skill that students should improve, it has been widely noticed that they face many difficulties in speaking English 1.2 PURPOSES OF THE STUDY The study is aimed to find out the factors which students in grade 7th faced to and lead to the difficulties in speaking CHAPTER RESULT AND DISCUSSION 4.1 THE MAIN SPEAKING DIFFICULTIES ENCOUNTERED BY GRADE STUDENTS *Questionnaire results You are anxiety You not remember the vocabulary You not know how to say in sentence You use Vietnamese to discuss You have nothing to say 20% 27% 13% 23% 17% Figure The students’ difficulties in speaking According to Figure 1, a majority of the students (27%) strongly agreed that they were anxiety when speaking in front class 23% of students were admitted that their knowledge of vocabulary was limited 20% of them agreed that they were lack of knowledge 17% of them were worried about making a complete 10 sentence when speaking And the last 13% of the students claimed that they were using their mother tongue to talk in class To get more details about the difficulties that the students in grade 7th encountered in speaking English at SaiGon Connection English Center, the researcher will analyze these difficulties to make obviously 4.1.1 Inhibition While observing the classroom, students noticed that their participation was very low These are for the reasons mentioned earlier for inhibition Up to 27% of students rated highly agreed anxiety for speaking The observation revealed that most students showed symptoms of anxiety The causes of the students’ anxiety are: fear of mistakes, lack of self-confidence, lack of motivation and the students’ shyness Through the observation, the researcher discovered that when one student came in front the class or stand in their seat to answer a question or talk about a topic, if he had said something wrong, his classmates would laugh at him, leading to create a fear of mistakes when speaking Fear of mistake becomes one of the main factors of students’ reluctance to speak in English in the classroom With respect to the fear of making mistake issue, Aftat (2008) adds that this fear is linked to the issue of correction and negative evaluation Learning English is a means of learning how to communicate with others by speaking English [1] Lack of confidence in speaking English is related to the previous problem encounter in class Students explained that they were not confident in themselves to speak English in front of people Lack of confidence about themselves and their English necessarily suffer from communication apprehension This is often because the teacher is discouraged enough to speak English in public Usually, teachers discourage them from speaking English in the classroom or in front of everyone They learn the English language but they not know how to speak Motivation is one of the keys to success when it comes to speaking Therefore, teachers need to pay attention to this, so find a variety of methods to motivate their students To help students overcome their lack of motivation, Dornyei (2001) [7] Printer, A (2006) proposes four stages that can encourage students' motivation, as follows: The first stage is to facilitate learning, practice and 11 teaching This means that English teachers should create a pleasant and supportive environment in the classroom The second stage is to introduce motivational techniques by creating materials that are relevant to students The next stage is care to maintain and protect students' motivation by offering activities that stimulate and foster confidence, and cooperation among students The final stage is to turn reviews and feedback into positive experiences Shyness is also one of the biggest factors that prevent students from speaking English It is the kind of feeling that students feel when speaking English They are not ready in front of teachers and their friends Therefore, paying attention on this aspect is also quite important in order to help the students their best in their speaking performance in the classroom (Gebhard, 2000) [9] In line with this, Baldwin (2011) further explains that speaking in front of people is one of the more common phobias that students encounter and feeling of shyness makes their mind go blank or that they will forget what to say Due to shyness, they are not confident when speaking, cannot remember the correct grammar rules and vocabulary when speaking English Due to shyness, they feel uncomfortable and anxious in front of people when speaking English [4] 4.1.2 Mother-tongue use According to Chart 1, 13% of the students claimed that they were using their mother tongue to talk in speaking English parts During classroom observations, students spoke Vietnamese when they were given topics or tasks to discuss The researcher found some reasons contribute to the use of native language in speaking English The first reason was the students did not know how to express their ideas in English so they discussed by Vietnamese to get information Moreover, students used their native language due to lack of vocabulary and grammar problems in building sentences when speaking Another reason that belong to the teachers’ attitudes, when the students discussed in Vietnamese, the teachers just ignored or sometimes they said the students should not be spoken Vietnamese in class, then over 4.1.3 Language’s difficulties The data gathered through observations revealed that students were struggling to find vocabulary when trying to speak English, reflecting their insufficient 12 vocabulary The data gathered from Figure had supported this because 23% of the students affirmed they did not have ability to remember the words or how to put it into a sentence, it is belonging to the grammar structure Through observation, the researcher found that the students read what they had written on a piece of paper because they did not remember the structures and vocabulary to speak Through Figure 1, 17 % of the students were still confused in the handling of the English grammar system They confused the English grammar and the usage of tenses Students have difficulty understanding their present tense, past tense, future tense They not know how to use prepositions, adjectives and adverbs in a sentence 4.1.4 The knowledge of the topics Through the data collection, 20% of students were lack of the knowledge of the topics The other factors contributing to students’ difficulties in speaking English that the research found in this research were limited vocabulary that was caused by the laziness of the students to read the sources such books, magazines, newspaper, stories that was provided by the teacher and learn new words because they thought it would not necessary for them They did not have motivation in learning new words outside of the field of study Students felt anxious to speak because they did not know the meaning of words or sentences Moreover, if they had limited vocabularies, students found it difficult to convey what they wanted to say Furthermore, students were not only lack of vocabulary but also the basic knowledge They got the topic and they did not know how to develop the topic because of their limited knowledge 4.2 FACTORS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO THE EXISTENCE OF THESE DIFFICULTIES *Interview results Question: What you think cause the difficulties in teaching speaking? 13 Number (%) Time is limited in class (20%) Teaching vocabulary and grammar is not assist students speaking (30%) 3.Not much students extracurricular activities in (30%) The textbook is not focusing on speaking English (20%) take part Table 1: The teachers’ opinions about difficulties in teaching speaking According to Table 1, a half of the teachers believed that teaching strategies (30%) and outdoor activities (30%) were two mainly difficulties in teaching speaking that lead to the problems that students have to face with The other teachers thought the limit of time (20%) and curriculums (20%) were two more factors that lead to the existence of these difficulties There are a number of essential factors that contribute to the existence of these troubles Through observation the class and interview the teachers, the researcher found out some basic problems, leading to the reason why students got troubles in speaking English There is the limit of time, teaching strategies, outdoor activities, and curriculums 14 4.3.1 Limit of time All interviewed teachers emphasized the importance of teaching speaking as it is an important skill of the English language Although they think that teaching speaking is extremely important, they not spend enough time doing it, they explain it because there is not enough time to it One of the teachers in SaiGon Connection English Center said that in a lesson, he had many steps to accomplish, he did not want to be late Through the Table 1, the limit of time due to the reason the center's program manager requires that they have to follow the specific program of center and they must complete all the steps in that program It proves that teachers are only concerned with the quality of their lessons and how to complete the steps given in the program That also means, they will ignore some important skills, especially speaking skill 4.3.2 Teaching strategies Through observation, the researcher noticed that teachers focused on teaching grammar points and vocabulary items rather than teaching speaking There is very little chance for students to practice talking to each other because the average number of students in class is from 20 to 25, even with the opportunity to work in pairs or groups, the class will be noisy, the teacher cannot listen at all student's mistakes when pronunciation, or even if they are invited by the teacher in front of the class to talk, a maximum of 10 students are allowed In addition, the interview pointed to another reason, that was 30% of the teachers though lack strategies for teaching speaking Teachers believe that teaching grammar and vocabulary is enough to help students speak English In fact, it is not working Moreover, teachers are not aware enough that it is not necessary to focus on teaching according to the program, and that is why students need more speaking lessons to improve their speaking skills Furthermore, it is found that teachers tend to use a lot of native language during class, especially when they explain a grammar point or give the meaning of certain words and sometimes the instruction of exercises They explain this by saying that they have no other solution to ensure that students understand the point of view In contrast, they can explain in English in the simplest way, for 15 instance “Color the picture, then go in front the class and talk about your picture”, the teacher also can use body language to describe the action required The use of native language in the classroom has shown that the teacher, himself does not have an appropriate teaching strategy, and uses native language as an alternative However, it can be sure that using a lot of native language will reduce the amount of time speaking English between teacher and student, as well as student to student 4.3.3 Outdoor activities In fact, outdoor activities can be another alternative to deal this problem From the interview with teachers, students are encouraged to participate in activity conducted once a month with the foreign teacher However, only excellent students take part in activities, but once a month leaves limited opportunities for using English Even when a foreign teacher participates in the classroom at the center, their chances of using English still not improve, because the time is too short, only an hour, there are only days for foreign teachers, it is impossible for them to communicate As the teachers have pointed out, students are not given other opportunities as needed to use English In other way, the students' exposure to English is mostly limited to the classroom Actually, speaking activities in class are discouraged, resulting in limited speaking ability of students The teacher thinks that there are no place students can go and use English outside of the classroom 4.3.4 Curriculums During the interview, the teachers said that the 7th grade student's teaching curriculum at the center (Solutions) mainly focuses on reading and writing skills They assume that speaking English in class has passed the learning process, for example, when students read the text request, they had the opportunity to speak English Although there is a speaking part in each lesson, students have the opportunity to work in pairs or groups to talk about a topic in the unit, but the teacher cannot control whether they speak or not During class observation, students English speaking time is limited They cannot actively ask questions according to the grammar they have learned Students fell into a passive state, when the teacher asked, it was the time to speak English in 16 class, and most of them answered incorrectly with grammar or just with single words Teachers sometimes not pay attention to the students’ mistakes because the class is crowded, so it causes a lot of noise That limits the opportunities for children to interact with English as well as communicate in English *Observation results: Class observations were carried out to find out what difficulties that the students have in speaking lesson The following problems are the most common ones in the classes observed:  When the students were asked to work in pairs or groups, they tended to use Vietnamese to discuss about the topics or tasks instead of using English  The students looked nervous when they spoke in front of the class Sometimes, they did not know what to say and kept silent  They read what they had written on a piece of paper They did not remember the structures and vocabulary to speak naturally  The teachers did not pay attention to students’ speaking errors and the time for speaking English was limited  The teachers had to a lot of things in a forty- five- minutes period They were always in a hurry  The teachers used native language a lots in class 17 CHAPTER CONCLUSION 5.1 LIMITATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS Basing on the results of the study, there are some recommendations both teachers and students at SaiGon Connection English Center As for teachers, they should help their students overcome inhibition and shyness by having friendly behaviors to make students feel comfortable when speaking in the class, reminding students not to worry about making mistakes About the students, they should practice speaking English outside the classroom more often by reading the conversations in the textbook with your classmates, joining speaking club where they can use English to communicate Finally, they should use English in the class instead of Vietnamese to make it better for themselves 5.2 CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS As mentioned earlier, this study aimed to investigate the difficulties that the students in grade 7th at Saigon Connection English Center encountered in speaking English and the factors that contribute to the existence of these difficulties The results of the study indicate that the students faced many problems such as inhibition (higher anxiety, lack of self-confidence, lower motivation), mother tongue use, language’s difficulties and the knowledge of the topics The students were unable to speak English because they lacked of the necessary vocabulary items and grammar structures They also had troubles in sentence formation skills, leading to the use of their mother tongue Students also thought that making mistakes in front of their classmates is very embarrassed, leading to not wanting to speak in order to avoid such situations The results also show that there were many factors affecting to the existence of these difficulties as follow: the limit of time in teaching speaking, teaching strategies, outdoor activities, and curriculums Research showed that the teachers believed in the importance of teaching speaking, but they not have enough time to that part Moreover, the teachers focused on the lesson’s progress to emphasizes reading and writing instead of teaching speaking 18 About the suggestion is that the teachers should give students more opportunities to speak English in class by using some speaking activities that require students to speak or give them some easy topics to talk first and try to contact with the students 19 REFERENCES [1] Aftat, Mokhtar, (2008), Motivation and Genuine learning [Online] Available: http://www.englishteacher1.com/motivation.html (March 15, 2011) [2] Al-Sibai,D.(2004) Promoting oral fluency of second language learners: Educational linguistics Department of English King Saud University [3] Baker, J., & Westrup, H (2003) Essential Speaking Skills: A Handbook for English Language Teachers London: Continuum [4] Baldwin, Caroline, (2011) How to Overcome Shyness During an OralPresentation [Online] Available: http://www.ehow.com/how_7852354_overcome-shyness-during-oralpresentation.html (February17, 2011) [5] Brown, H D (1994) Teaching by Principles - An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy Prentice Hall Regents [6] Chaney, A L., & Burk, T L (1998) Teaching Oral Communication in Grades K-8 Boston: Allyn and Bacon [7] Dornyei, Z 2001 Teaching and Researching Motivation England: Pearson Education Limited [8] Efrizal, D (2012) Improving Students’ Speaking through Communicative Language Teaching Method at Mts Jaalhaq, Sentot Ali Basa Islamic Boarding School of Bengkulu, Indonesia International Journal of Humanities and Social Science, 2(20), 127-134 [9] Gebhard, G.J (2000) Teaching English as a Foreign or Second Language USA: The University of Michigan Press [10] Haozhang, X (1997) Tape Recorders, Role-Plays, and Turn-Taking in Large EFL Listening and Speaking Classes [11] Harmer, J (1991) The Practice of English Language Teaching The 3th Edition Longman: London and New York [12] Littlewood, W (1981) Communicative language teaching Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [13] Littlewood, W (2007) Communicative Language Teaching Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 20 [14] McDonough, J., & Shaw, C (1993) Materials and Method in ELT; A Teacher’s Guide UK: Blackwell Publishing Ltd, p 134 [15] Rabab’ah,G (2005) Communication problems facing Arab learners of English Journal of Language and Learning, 3(1), ISSN 1740-4983 [16] Scrivener, J (1994) Learning teaching Oxford: Macmillan Publishers Limited [17] Ur, P (1996) A course in Language Teaching: Practice and Theory Cambridge University Press, Cambridge [18] Zhang, S (2009) The role of input, interaction, and output in the development of oral fluency English Language Teaching,2(4),91–100 21 APPENDICES APPENDIX A: STUDENTS’ QUESTIONNAIRES My name is Nguyen Cao Hong Hanh I am a student of class D17AVGD01 This survey questionnaire is designed for my graduation paper namely: “AN INVESTIGATION ON DIFFICULTIES IN SPEAKING ENGLISH OF STUDENTS IN GRADE 7TH AT SAIGON CONNECTION ENGLISH CENTER” All your personal information as well as the data collected will be kept confidential and not be used for the other purposes Your assistance in completing the following questions is greatly appreciated Please put a tick in the box () beside the option(s) you choose Part I: Demographic information Gender Age - - -15 How long have you been learning English? -7 years -4 years more than years Part II: Factors affecting students’ speaking problems How much you like speaking English in class? Very much Rather Normal Little Not at all How often you practice speaking English outside class? Always Usually ix Do you think speaking good English help you easily find a job in the future? How you feel in speaking class? Motivated Anxious Confident What factors affect your speaking? (You can have more than one choice) Other factors (please specify)………………………………………… 10 Which problems you encounter in learning speaking skill? (You can have more than one choice) You not know how to say in sentence You use Vietnamese to discuss You have nothing to say x APPENDIXE B: TEACHERS’ INTERVIEW: What you think cause the difficulties in teaching speaking? xi ... ? ?AN INVESTIGATION ON DIFFICULTIES IN SPEAKING ENGLISH OF STUDENTS IN GRADE 7TH AT SAIGON CONNECTION ENGLISH CENTER? ?? All your personal information as well as the data collected will be kept confidential... FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES GRADUATE PAPER TITLE: AN INVESTIGATION ON DIFFICULTIES IN SPEAKING ENGLISH OF STUDENTS IN GRADE 7TH AT SAIGON CONNECTION ENGLISH CENTER Student name: Nguyen Cao Hong Hanh... investigation on difficulties in speaking English of students in grade 7th at Saigon Connection English Center I hereby confirm that I am the sole author of the paper presented Where the work of others