Nghiên cứu thiết kế các hoạt động ngôn ngữ giao tiếp bằng lời trong câu lạc bộ tiếng Anh trường THPT Xuân Huy nhằm nâng cao năng lực nói của học sinh

i
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES
 * 


NGUYỄN THANH BÌNH

DESIGNING ORAL COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES
FOR AN ENGLISH CLUB AT XUAN HUY HIGH SCHOOL
TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ SPEAKING COMPETENCE


Nghiên cứu thiết kế các hoạt động ngôn ngữ giao tiếp bằng lời
trong câu lạc bộ tiếng Anh trường THPT Xuân Huy
nhằm nâng cao năng lực nói của học sinh



M.A MINOR THESIS

FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY
CODE: 60140111
SUPERVISOR: Dr. DUONG THU MAI

Hanoi, 2014

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DECLARATION
I hereby certify that this thesis is entirely my own work. I have provided fully
documented references to the others‟ work. The material in this thesis has not been
submitted for assessment in any other formal course. I also accept all the requirements
of ULIS relating to the retention and use of M.A Graduation Thesis deposited in the
library.

Research‟s signature



Nguyen Thanh Binh

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First of all, I wish to send my sincere thanks to my supervisor, Duong Thu Mai,
Ph.D. for her valuable guidance, helpful suggestions and critical feedback throughout
the research.
Also, I would like to acknowledge my gratitude to all the lecturers in the
Department of Postgraduate Studies, College of Foreign languages, VNU for their
useful lessons from which have inspired me to conduct this thesis.
I am greatly indebted to my students- the members in Xuan Huy English Club
and my colleagues at Xuan Huy high school for their participation and assistance
without which this study could not have been successful.
Last but not least, I would like to express my special thanks to my loving
parents, my husband, my children and my close friends who offered me their love,
care, support and encouragement so that I could accomplish my study.

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ABSTRACT
This study is an attempt to investigate the designing of oral communicative
activities for an English club at Xuan Huy high school to improve students‟
competence. The main purposes of the study are to find out the needs for improving
speaking competence of students from Xuan Huy High school and the effectiveness of
the speaking activities designed according to students‟ needs and applied in Xuan Huy
School‟s English Club.
The study reviews theoretical background relating to Communicative Language
Teaching (CLT) in teaching speaking, characteristic of Communicative Language
Teaching, teaching speaking according to CLT, English speaking club in CLT before
presenting the instrumentation, data collection and data analysis of the study. To be
specific, two sets of questionnaires were administered to discover the students‟ needs
about oral communicative activities as well as their perception of the use of these
activities in Xuan Huy English Club. Moreover, interviews were delivered to seven
teachers to investigate their needs about oral communicative activities. Lastly, English
Club meeting observations were also employed to clarify and test the validity of
information about the effectiveness of designed activities. Basing on the findings of
the studies which revealed teachers and students‟ need about oral communicative
activities, the researcher provided some suggested activities for enhancing students‟

speaking competence. The finding also discovered students‟ good and bad perception
about applied oral communicative activities.













v
TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii
ABSTRACT iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS v
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS vii
LIST OF TABLE AND FIGURES viii
PART A: INTRODUCTION 1
1. Rationale 1
2. Objective of the study 2
3. Research questions 2
4. Scope of the study 2
5. Methodology 2

6. Design of the study 3
PART B: DEVELOPMENT 3
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 3
1.1. Communicative Language Teaching 3
1.1.1. The concept of Communicative Language Teaching. 3
1.1.2 Characteristics of Communicative Language Teaching. 4
1.2. Teaching speaking according to Communicative Language Teaching 5
1.2.1. Definition of Speaking 5
1.2.2. The nature of speaking in oral communication 5
1.2.3. Definition of Speaking Competence 6
1.2.4. Communicative activities in CLT 6
1.2.5. Oral communication in CLT approach viii
1.2.6. Types and design of oral communicative activities 8
1.2.7. Evaluating oral communicative activities 11
1.3. English Speaking Clubs in CLT 11
1.3.1. Definition of Clubs 12
1.3.2. The roles of English speaking club in CLT 12
1.4. Previous studies in the world and in Vietnam about designing communicative
oral activities. 12
CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 13
2.1. The contexts of the study 14
2.1.1. An overview of the English Club of Xuan Huy high school 14

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2.1.2. Students at Xuan Huy high school 14
2.1.3. Teachers at Xuan Huy high school 14
2.1.4. Facilities at Xuan Huy high school 15
2.2. Participants and setting of the study 15
2.2.1. Participants: 15
2.2.2. Setting of the study 15

2.3. Data collection 16
2.3.1. Data collection instruments 16
2.3.2. Data collection procedure 18
2.3.3. Data analysis procedures. 19
CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 20
3.1. Students‟ need analysis and teachers' interview 20
3.2. Students‟ perceptions about English oral communicative activities 26
3.3. Findings from English observation 30
CHAPTER 4: DESIGNING ORAL COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES 32
4.1. Face to face games (group work) 32
4.2. Face to face game (Pair work) 33
4.3. Circle conversation (group work) 34
4.4. Language Camp (group work) 34
4.5. Treasure hunting? (Group work) 36
4.6. Question bags. (Group work) 36
4.7. Mystery crosswords. (Group work) 37
PART C. CONCLUSION 38
1. Major findings 38
2. Limitations and suggestions for further study 39
REFERENCES 40
APPENDIX






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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

CLT Communicative Language Teaching
MA Master of Arts
MOET Ministry of Education and Training
VNU Vietnam National University, Hanoi
EFL English Foreign Language

viii
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES
1. Figures:
Figure 1: How oral communicative activities can help students 26
2. Tables:
Table 1: How oral communicative activities can help students 22
Table 2: Patterns of speaking activities teachers often use to teach speaking skills in
classroom 23
Table 3: Students‟ preference for the types of oral communicative activities 24
Table 4: factors may encourage students to communicate in oral communicative
activities. 25
Table 5: What teachers should do to create good relationship and to help students in oral
communication. 25
Table 6: Frequency in organizing oral communicative activities 27
Table 7: The content of oral communicative activities 27
Table 8: the most suitable way that teachers or facilitators give feedback with students'
wrong answers 28
Table 9: Students‟ assessment about oral communicative activities 29
Table 10: Students‟ assessment about their friends' enjoyment with all oral
communicative activities 29
Table 11: The most effective pattern to improve students' speaking competence 30
Table 12: Assessment about oral communicative activities students participated in 30
Table 13: What teachers did to create good relationship and to help students in oral
communication. 31
Table 14: Assessment about the time spent on applied oral communicative language
activities. 32
Table 15: Assessment about the content of oral communicative activities 32
Table 16: The effectiveness of oral communicative activities 33

1
PART A: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale
Speaking is a very important part in studying English and in order to
communicate one to each other, make good communication, people need to speak.
Having good English speaking competence is very essential especially for the students
because it becomes the bridge for them to know the world. However, the problems that
teachers and students of English in Vietnam, especially in mountainous areas cope
with are having few opportunities to use English in authentic contexts outside the
classroom for learners, the students‟ characteristics are being quiet and shy, the
teachers' difficulties in controlling oral communication activities in large classes, or
the lack of oral communicative activities in the textbooks. As a consequence, learners
have many problems, especially in oral communication. When they try to express
themselves orally, they only pronounce isolated words and disconnected sentences
making their production poor and meaningless. Moreover, since speaking is required
in academic and professional performances, the lack of oral production skills becomes
a serious disadvantage. There may be two main reasons for this. The first reason,
which is a basic one for every high school students, is low motivation in studying. It is
undeniable that passing examinations is one of the most important motivations in
studying. However, according to the policy from MOET, the semester and final
examinations only focus on reading skills through the multiple-choice format. The lack
of background knowledge is the second basic reason for students having poor speaking
competence.
Against the problems above, in recent years, one of the key tasks of the school
year in which the Department of Education and Training has given to all local high
schools, including Xuan Huy high school, is organizing English speaking activities in
English club so that students have opportunities to enhance their language skills and
create “language environment”.

This actual requirement sets a challenging task for teachers of English in Xuan
Huy high school, which is to design communicative activities which can provide
students with “real” contexts for negotiating meaning so that they can develop
communicative competence. This is also the reason why this study in designing oral
communicative language activities for an English club at Xuan Huy high school to
improve students‟ competence was conducted with the hope of enhancing the ability to
speak for students. Helping students to have better English speaking competence also
means helping them in choosing their field of study and looking for opportunities in
the future.

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2. Objective of the study
For the above-given reasons, the main purposes of the thesis are as the following:
(1) Discussing the needs for improving speaking competence of students from Xuan
Huy High school.
(2) Investigating the effectiveness of designed oral communicative language activities
for an English club at Xuan Huy high school to improve students' speaking
competence.
3. Research questions
The study intends to find out the answers to the following questions:
What are the students‟ needs about activities to improve their speaking
competence?
What are the teachers‟ needs about activities to improve their students‟
speaking competence?
Which oral communicative language activities should be designed for an
English club at Xuan Huy high school to improve students' speaking competence?
What is students‟ perception of the designed activities?
4. Scope of the study
At present, speaking a foreign language represents one of the essential
requirements of today's society. Besides other skills and knowledge, it is considered one

of the most influencing factors while applying for a job or sustaining in a particular work
position under the condition of advancing the language level. Speaking is a broad and
complex area that takes much time to study by linguists. Moreover, the establishment and
maintenance of Xuan Huy English club has contributed to the improvement of students‟
speaking ability. Therefore, this study mostly focused on designing some oral
communicative language activities for English club at Xuan Huy high school to improve
students' speaking competence. Because of the limited time and within an M.A. minor
thesis, the researcher intends to make a brief view of the current situation of teaching and
learning English speaking skill in Xuan Huy high school, identifies teachers and students‟
preferences and demands about English speaking activities in English Club, then applies
some designed oral communicative activities and examines the effectiveness of these
activities in improving students‟ speaking competence.
5. Methodology
In order to accomplish this study, quantitative method was mainly used. The
data collected for the study comes from two sources: All members in English club and
all teachers of English at Xuan Huy high school.

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Survey questionnaires, two for students (pre- and post- designing
questionnaire), were used to gather information and evidence for the study.
In addition, to make the data collected more reliable and authentic, qualitative
data were also collected with two instruments: a follow up interview and an informal
observation.
6. Design of the study
The thesis organized around three parts with three chapters:
Part A: Introduction consists of reasons for the study, objectives of the study,
research questions, scope of the study, methods and design of the study.
Part B: Development is divided into three chapters:
Chapter 1 reviews the theoretical background relating to Communicative Language
Teaching (CLT) in teaching speaking, characteristic of Communicative Language

Teaching, teaching speaking according to CLT, English speaking club in CLT.
Chapter 2 presents the methodology of the study including the background
information of the context where the study is conducted, the subjects, the instruments
used to collect data, and the procedures of data collection. Furthermore, a detailed
description of data analysis is presented; and some explanations and interpretations of
the findings of the study are given in this chapter.
Chapter 3 Designing oral communicative activities
Chapter 4 Provides finding and discussion of the study.
Part C: Conclusion Gives recapitulation summarizes the main points which have
been explored in the study, and made some recommendations on how designing oral
communicative language activities should be used to improve students‟ speaking
competence. It also discusses the limitations of the study and makes some suggestions
for further research.
PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
As a way of start, the study provides the notions of Communicative Language
Teaching and theoretical background about Teaching speaking according to
Communicative Language Teaching and English Speaking Clubs in CLT.
1.1. Communicative Language Teaching
1.1.1. The concept of Communicative Language Teaching.
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) is an approach to the teaching of
second and foreign languages that emphasizes interaction as both the means and the
ultimate goal of learning a language. It is also referred to as a “communicative

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approach to the teaching of foreign languages” or simply as the “Communicative
Approach” (CLT, 2003).
Communicative language teaching makes use of real-life situations that
necessitate communication. The teacher sets up a situation that students are likely to
encounter in real life. Unlike the audio-lingual method of language teaching, which

relies on repetition and drills the communicative approach can leave students in
suspense as to the outcome of a class exercise, which will vary according to their
reactions and responses. The real-life simulations change from day to day. Students‟
motivation to learn comes from their desire to communicate in meaningful ways about
meaningful topics. Berns (1984) explains that “language is interaction; it is
interpersonal activity and has a clear relationship with society. In this light, language
study has to look at the use (function) of language in context, both its linguistic context
(what is uttered before and after a given piece of discourse) and its social, or
situational, context (who is speaking, what their social roles are, why they have come
together to speak)” (Berns,1984)
1.1.2 Characteristics of Communicative Language Teaching.
The fundamental principle of CLT is to enable learners to understand and use the
target language for communication. Two basic assumptions underlying this approach to
language learning are that the core of language learning is the development of
communicative competence and that the starting point for language learning is not
grammatical rules but context, function, meaning and the appropriate use of the language.
Richards and Rogers identify the distinct characteristics of communicative
language teaching as (1986):
"Language is a system for the expression of meaning. The primary function of
language is for interaction and communication function of language. The structure of
language reflects its functional and communicative uses. The primary units of
language are not merely its grammatical and structural features, but categories of
functional and communicative meaning as exemplified in discourse".
This approach calls for radically different ideas of language teaching. One
major shift is that language learning has become student-centre. Lessons are planned
in such a way that all the students can engage in interactive activities.
Moreover, authentic and meaningful communication should be the goal of
classroom activities. Group work and pair work are employed to promote
communication and getting the meaning across. Authentic materials, such as
newspaper articles, radio programmes, video-tapes, train-timetables etc., are used to

bring the real world elements into the classroom. Situations are simulated but

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interaction and task complete within real-time are genuine. Role-plays centre on
communicative functions.
In addition, fluency is an important dimension of communication. The objective of
language learning is to communicate; attempts to communicate are encouraged at the very
beginning. Errors are unavoidable but accuracy is judged in context rather in structures and
forms. Learning is a process of creative construction and involves errors.
1.2. Teaching speaking according to Communicative Language Teaching
1.2.1. Definition of Speaking
As noted in Bygate‟s opinion (1987), speaking is considered as a skill, not just
knowledge because the speakers not only know how to make utterances and adapt them to
each circumstance but also have a skill of making fluent conversations. Moreover, he
distinguished the term of “skill” into two basic ways: “motor - perceptive skills” and
“interaction skill”. He clarifies that the former involves perceiving, recalling, and
articulating in the correct order sounds and structures of the language and the later is the
skill of using both knowledge and motor - perceptive skills to achieve communication.
Furthermore, interaction skills can involve the management of interaction which illustrates
the way to make communication smooth and the negotiation of meaning which considers
about how utterances are understood explicitly.
Another distinction when considering the development of speaking skills is
between monologue and dialogue. According to Richard (2008), who expanded Brown
and Yule‟s framework

(after Jones (1996) and Burns (1998), the functions of speaking,
can be classified as interaction, transaction and performance. In his research, each of
these speech activities is quite distinct in terms
of
form and function and requires

different teaching
appr
oaches
. Understanding these aspects of oral language helps the
interlocutor be confident speakers of a foreign language. They may be helpful for
organizing our classrooms, evaluating our learners‟ evaluating our learners‟
performance, especially for developing oral activities in the classroom and real - life
communication.
1.2.2. The nature of speaking in oral communication
To discuss the nature of speaking in oral communication, Byrne (1986) is of the
opinion that, “speaking is a two-way process between a speaker and a listener (or
listeners), involving the productive skill of speaking and the receptive skill of
understanding (or listening with understanding)”. He means that there is a close
relationship between the speaking skills and listening skills in normal, authentic oral
communication. Byrne (1986) also says that both speakers and listeners have a
positive function to perform: The speaker has to decode the message to be conveyed in

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appropriate language, while the listener is supported by “prosodic features” such as
stress and intonation, which are a part of the utterance‟s meaning as well as by facial
and bodily movement such as gestures.
From the aforementioned nature of spoken language, it is clear that the major
purpose of teaching and learning speaking is to train learners for oral fluency, the
ability to express themselves reasonably and accurately in every oral communication.
Therefore, understanding the nature of the spoken language helps learners feel more
confident in communicating with others, thus they can participate successfully in
communication. For language teachers, taking the nature of spoken language into
account will help them find out the suitable methods and techniques to motivate and
improve their students‟ language competence for authentic communicative purposes.
1.2.3. Definition of Speaking Competence

According to Oxford Advance Dictionary by Hornby, competence is (of person)
having ability, power, authority, skill, knowledge, etc, (to do what is needed). While
according to Chomsky (1998) the meaning of ability or competence is “the speaker-
hearer‟s knowledge and ability thus includes concepts of appropriateness and
acceptability. The study of competence will inevitably entail consideration of such
variables as attitude, motivation, and a number of socio cultural factors”.
Nolasco (1997) notes that speaking ability is not fluent speaking but
conversation, speaking competence means conversation ability or conversation skill. It
performs mutual interdependent, interactive nature of conversation. It is an awareness
activity as well as feedback activity so that a series of tasks is developed to sharpen the
students‟ awareness on the activity and assess their own progress performance. When
those awareness and feedback activities done gradually, automatic conversation
becomes accustomed; speaking ability, in this case, conversation skill, needs gradual
practice-controlled, awareness, and finally fluency conversation.
1.2.4. Communicative activities in CLT
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) is the most influential language
teaching methodology in the world. CLT views language as a vehicle for
communication, and communicative competence as its aim of teaching.
Communicative activities include any activities that encourage and require a learner to
speak with and listen to other learners, as well as with people in the program and
community. Communicative activities have real purposes: to find information, break
down barriers, talk about self, and learn about the culture. Even when a lesson is
focused on developing reading or writing skills, communicative activities should be
integrated into the lesson.

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Furthermore, many researchers in CLT define that language learning should not
only focus on the grammatical structure of the language but also on language use in
real-life situations. In addition, in the classroom setting, CLT requires more than just
attention to strategies for presenting the structure and the functions of language.

Savignon (2001) suggests that CLT “requires the involvement of learners in a dynamic
and interactive process of communication” (p.237). Richard and Rodgers (2001) state
that, "the Communicative Approach in language teaching starts from a theory of
language as communication" (p.159). Communicative Language Teaching thus
encourages learners to communicate in a meaningful way using the target language
from the very initial stage. While using the language, accuracy is important but
communication precedes it. So, it is advocated in CLT that if messages are understood,
accuracy may be achieved later. Learners are considered as active participants in the
language learning process.
In general, CLT suggests that foreign language learners should base on the use
of target language and practical communication, especially, through the
communicative activities.
1.2.5. Oral communication in CLT approach
According to Byrne (1986), “Oral communication is a two-way process between
speaker and listeners or listeners, and it involves the ability of speaking and the receptive
skill of understanding”. As Brown (1994), also asserts that the integration of listening and
speaking skills is termed as oral communication skills because listening can be developed
indirectly by integrating it to speaking. The literature states that communication is an
exchange of ideas between people either orally or in writing. It is also an exchange of
meaning and understanding. Meaning is central to communication.
Oral communication is transfer of information from sender to receiver by means of
verbal and visual aid. Oral communication which is a quick and direct method brings
many benefits in communicative activities. It helps to convey the message
immediately to the receiver. It enables in obtaining immediate feedback and hence is a
form in which two-way communication can be enabled. The other main advantage of
this communication method is that it helps in conveying the message with the desired
pitch and tone that is needed for the message. It also saves on time in a huge way and
saves enormously on effort that is spent ().
Overall, communication is the exchange of ideas, information between two or
more persons. When communication takes place, speakers feel the need to speak, want

something to happen such as expressing pleasure, charming listeners, etc and select the
language they think is appropriate for their purpose. In order for communication to be

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successful, there should be a desire for the communication to be effective both from the
point of view of speakers and listeners. In most of the processes of communication, the
roles of speakers and listeners are interchanged; information gaps between them are
created, and then closed with the effort from both sides.
1.2.6. Types and design of oral communicative activities
A great number of oral communicative activities are mentioned in teaching
methodology books, and their classification is distinguished according to each author's
point of view.
Littlewood (1981) suggests the two sets of activities. The first type is
“functional communication activities” involving only communication of information in
which the learners identify similarities and differences in a set of pictures, discover
missing features in a map or picture, reconstruct story sequences or problem-solving
tasks. The second type is “social interaction activities” in which the learners use
English as a teaching and learning medium in order to implement conversation,
discussions sessions, dialogues, role plays, stimulation, improvising and debates in
classroom context. Different from the perspective about types of activities of
Littlewood, Harmer (1983) defines a distinction between “practice” activities and
“communicative” activities in which oral “practice” activities include “oral drills,
information gap activities, games, personalization and localization, oral activities”
and “communicative” activities consist of “reaching a consensus, relaying
instructions, communicative games, problem - solving, interpersonal exchange, story
construction, simulation and role play”. What‟s more, activities may also be clarified
as activities for accuracy that aim at learners‟ competence in producing right words,
phrases or sentences and activities for fluency that aim at learners‟ capacity to
maintain the flow of speech with ease and comfort.
Similar to Harmer, Ur (1981) offers a variety of types of oral activities,

including communication games, but also including a wider variety of group activities.
These are classified into three main types: brainstorming, organizing and compound
activities.
Brainstorming activities: guessing games, finding connections, ideas from a
central theme, and implications and interpretations.
Organizing activities: Comparison, detecting differences, putting in order,
priorities (rating; survival games; features and functions), choosing candidates, layout
problem, and combining versions.
Compound activities: Composing letters, debates, publicity campaigns, surveys,
planning projects.

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When designing oral communicative activities properly, the teacher should be
aware of students‟ English proficiency levels. With each level, the teacher should
consider the different types of syllabus, methods, techniques as well as speaking
materials and types of activities at each procedure of language teaching.
Oral communicative activities which develop learners‟ ability to express
themselves through speech would therefore seem an important component of a
language course. As a result, teachers should try to design and administer
communicative activities. Ur (1996) defines that there are four characteristics of a
successful communicative activity:
Students talk a lot: As much as possible of the period of time allotted to the
activity is in fact occupied by student talk. This may seem obvious, but often most
time is taken up with teacher talk or pauses.
Participation is even: Classroom discussion is not dominated by a minority of
talkative participants; all get a chance to speak and contributions are fairly evenly
distributed.
Motivation is high: Students are eager to speak because they are interested in the
topic and have something new to say about it, or because they want to contribute to
achieving a task objective.

Language is of an acceptable level: Students express themselves in utterances that
are relevant, easily comprehensible to each other, and of an acceptable level of
language accuracy.”
In addition, Ur (1996) describes some problems happening to the students. Firstly,
they are often inhibited about trying to say something in English in class, but they are
often worried about making mistakes, fearful of criticism or losing face, or simply shy
of the attention that their speech attracts. Secondly, even though they are not inhibited,
they cannot think of anything to say or have no motive to express themselves. Thirdly,
some students have low participation in the speaking practice. Furthermore, in classes,
the mother tongue often dominates while the target language is simply neglected.
Knowing these things can help teachers understand and design oral communicative
activities carefully to avoid these problems.
From the point of view of above researchers, it is possible to say that speaking
activities can be characterized as more or less interactive. Putting learners in pairs or
small groups is the good way to motivate learners in each other communication
perfectly. For these reasons, it is crucial for teachers to provide more and more
interesting speaking activities for students to practice creative uses of the language. In

10
the framework of this study, the oral communicative activities will be selected from
the perspective of the researchers mentioned above:
Dialogue
It gives students opportunities to practice and revise the rhythm, intonation as well
as the speech sounds correctly. Through practicing dialogue, students are able to know
how to express ideas in such variously communicative context.
Information - gap
This activity is one of the easiest and most interesting forms of communicative
activity in the speaking class. The students can implement by the way in which one
person shares information which the others don‟t know in pair or group work. This
kind may encourage students‟ thoughts and highly motivate.

Discussion
According to Ur (1996), discussion is the most natural and effective way for
students to talk freely in English by thinking out some problems or situations together
through verbal interchange or ideas. Particularly, in discussion, students can express
and share ideas or opinions in constructive and cooperative atmosphere without
threatening. There are different types of discussion activities such as describing
pictures, picture differences, things in common, solving a problem.
Role - play
This activity is really useful to involve the learners into the realistic situation; but
when practicing this speaking type, the teacher should be careful when giving the
suitable role for each participant due to his personalities. Byrne (1986) suggests that
the teacher can provide a guideline for role - play practice such as open - ended
dialogues, mapped dialogues, role instructions, and scenarios with the aim of helping
learners fulfill their roles creatively. It can be often happened in pairs. It can be greatly
effective if the students are confident and cooperative because they perform
comfortably with their capacity, enthusiasm and well - prepared presentation and
instructions.
Interviews
Students interview each other using questions given by the teacher or made by
them. This activity is really useful to practice speaking and listening skills. It is also
helpful when giving students chances in working - situational speaking
environment. Likely, questionnaires and quizzes can be designed relating to a topic of
some kind such as likes and dislikes about food, leisure activities. Students may
interview more than one student. After that, they are asked to report the results of what
have been learned.

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Communication games
Communication games are based on the principle of the information gap. Students
are put into situations which are “game - like” and have to use all and any language

they possess to complete the game.
1.2.7. Evaluating oral communicative activities
Researchers convey different perspectives to the aspects of oral communicative
activities. Patton (1988) defines evaluation as: “The practice of evaluation involves the
systematic collection of information about the activities, characteristics, and outcomes
of programs, personnel, and products for use by specific people to reduce
uncertainties, improve effectiveness, and make decisions with regard to what those
programs, personnel or products are doing and emphasizes a systematic collection of
information about a broad range of topics for use by specific people for a variety of
purposes”. This definition is quite useful as it is comprehensive, flexible and broad. In
this study, the author mainly focuses on some main checklists to evaluate the oral
communicative language activities.
The evaluation of the oral course is mostly based on the students' classroom
performance. According to Brumfit (1984), the fluency and accuracy are also the
criteria to evaluate communicative activities. He suggests that “ the demand to
produce work for display could be supplied conflicted directly with the demand to
perform adequately in the kind of natural circumstances for which teaching was
presumably a preparation. Language display for evaluation ended to lead to a
knowledge, problem solving and evidence of skill-getting. In contrast, language use
requires fluency, expression rules, a reliance on implicit knowledge and automatic
performance ”. In addition, Richards (2005) also proposes a list of criteria for macro
level of evaluation which concerns three factors namely teachers, learners and tasks.
Due to the focus of this study, the criteria concerning learner factors are presented here.
Therefore, there are six criteria will be applied in this study as following: The
organization, the procedure, the atmosphere, teaching strategies, teacher‟s qualities and
learners.
As mentioned above, the main criteria for evaluating speaking activities are
whether enough different types of speaking activities are relevant to language input
and communicative aims or not. When evaluating activities, teachers consider
speaking topics, students‟ interest in practicing speaking. Teachers will have a good

orientation toward adjusting speaking more suitable. These criteria will be the
background for the construction of the questionnaires in this study.
1.3. English Speaking Clubs in CLT

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1.3.1. Definition of Clubs
According to Macmillan Dictionary, Club is an organization for people who have a
common interest in a particular activity or subject. Club in Oxford dictionary is defined as
an association or organization dedicated to a particular interest or activity.
A club is also defined in that is a heavy stick,
generally used as a weapon, or a group of people who common together for a common
interest, or a place where people dance and drink at night.
1.3.2. The roles of English speaking club in CLT
An English club is a place for ESL language learners to use English beyond the
ESL classroom and in real life situations. Eckard and Keamy (1981) stated that „the
major goal of EFL education is to teach students how to speak English well enough to
converse spontaneously and naturally‟ (p.2). This is especially important in the context
of an English Club.
There are many reasons for maintain and development of an English club.
Students who lack interaction, motivation in the classroom, either because they are
introvert, shy or they have a low language level, the English club might be a good
solution to involve them with their friends in doing various activities and to make
weak student active. The good thing of an English club is giving students chance to
study English with fun and it is also a place for students to improve their English. In
addition, an English club also can help students enhance communication and
collaboration, foster creativity and innovation, encourage autonomous learning, create
an atmosphere of ease and relaxation, cultivate good hobbies and habits, and make
new friends.
1.4. Previous studies in the world and in Vietnam about designing communicative
oral activities.

Communicative Language Teaching has been widely explored and studied by
many researchers in the field of English language teaching. There have been a lot of
researches and theories in the last twenty years which involve interaction between
learners in the world and in Vietnam.
The thesis by Wang Cheng-jun, 2006 was “Designing Communicative Tasks for
College English Courses”. In the thesis, the author gave a brief account of
communicative tasks design, points out the key issue in designing communicative
tasks for college English language teaching.
The second thesis was “Designing some extra speaking activities based on
business English for pre-intermediate second year students of faculty of economics-
Vietnam National University, Hanoi” which was written by Nguyen Thi Hong Van,

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2006. In the thesis, the author gave her students questionnaire to have an overview of
real conditions directly influencing on the effectiveness of the activities, and then she
presented several mostly common and effective activities as the representatives due to
the limit of Minor Thesis framework.
The thesis by Le Thi Huong (2007) was “Designing extra speaking activities
based on “English for Tourism” for third year students at Tourism Faculty, CSSH –
VNU”. With the hope of motivating students to speak more in class, the author
analyzed the situational needs and students‟ needs. The results of this analysis were the
basis for designing some extra speaking activities. The author made a great
contribution to the teaching and learning ESP at Tourism Faculty, CSSH – VNU.
However, this is the first study that specifically deals with oral communicative
language activities in Xuan Huy high school context. Hence, this study was carried out
to design some oral communicative language activities for the English Club to
improve speaking competence in the Xuan Huy high school context.
Summary: Chapter 1 has presented some theoretical background knowledge
related to the topic of the study. It has discussed some concepts and ideas concerning
to the issue of speaking in general and oral communicative activities in particular.

The following chapter will display the detailed description of the methodology, the
procedures and the results of the study under the light of the above discussed
theories.




CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY
In this chapter, the method carried out the research on the designing oral
communicative language activities for an English club at Xuan Huy high school to
improve students‟ competence is presented. As a way of start, the study will first
provide the background information about Xuan Huy English club where this study
was conducted; then the writer will present a small-scale research to find out the
answer to four research questions:
(1) What are the students‟ needs about activities to improve their speaking
competence?
(2) What are the teachers‟ needs about activities to improve their students‟
speaking competence?

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(3) Which oral communicative language activities should be designed for an
English club at Xuan Huy high school to improve students' speaking competence?
(4) What is students‟ perception of the designed activities?
2.1. The contexts of the study.
2.1.1. An overview of the English Club of Xuan Huy high school
Following distributed programs, Director‟s decision No.1764/QD-GD
24/12/2009 and No.79/KH-SGDĐT 28/8/2013 of the Department of Education and
Training - implementation plan for the regular educational mission of the school year
2013- 2014, English teachers at Xuan Huy high school established and maintain the
English Club with the aim of creating a playground for all students who want to

improve English abilities, especially in communication and in the specialized fields
such as learning, hobbies, films and cinema, friendship, etc. For those purposes, the
administers of the club, with many helps, have planned and organized many meetings
of English Club in school year with the criteria: Creating a fun and relax atmosphere
for all club‟s members; Supplementing English skills naturally through games,
conversations and other activities such as celebrating the St. Valentine‟s Day,
Christmas‟s Day, Teacher‟s Day, The Language Day, Everyone in the English Club
does all the activities, no one says „no‟ to anything, everyone has a lot of fun and they
are all friendly with each other.
2.1.2. Students at Xuan Huy high school
The majority to students in the study Xuan Huy high school come from
communes in Yen Son district where there are difficult situations for living and
learning. Most of their parents are farmers. Some of them do not spend much time for
their children. Most of students received their primary and secondary education at
Chan Son, Thang Quan, Tu Quan, so the learning conditions are very poor and they
deprived of chances to speaking English. Most students are good at grammar, but bad
at listening and speaking skills so that using English to communicate is a big challenge
for most of them. The foundation of English clubs has created an environment for
students to learn more effective. Joining English club all the students always attend
with serious attitude. Moreover, they really want to improve their speaking
competence.
2.1.3. Teachers at Xuan Huy high school
The staff of English teachers, the school has 7 English teachers consisting of 1
male and 6 females, who are aged from 32 to 54. They have few opportunities to
upgrade their teaching, and do not have good teaching facilities and materials to help
their work. For example, because of limited facilities condition, teachers have to teach

15
in large-sized classes. There are at least 40 students for each class. Therefore, teachers
will face with some problems in monitoring work, giving feedback, setting up

communicative tasks as well as paying attention to all students during class time.
Despite all these advantages, they are very active, hard-working, kind-hearted and
enthusiastic in working.
2.1.4. Facilities at Xuan Huy high school
At Xuan Huy high school, English teaching and learning activities are mostly
carried out inside the classrooms which are designed for lecture lesson. It means that the
seats are arranged orderly in front of the teacher in rows, and classroom equipment is
just a chalkboard. There are two general purpose classrooms with computers; however,
these computers were not in synchronization with internet connections. Moreover, these
rooms are not large enough to organize the different activities perfectly so some
activities in English club are sometimes organized on the ground. However, this is not a
big problem to all members in Xuan Huy English club.
2.2. Participants and setting of the study
2.2.1. Participants:
The total number of the students in the survey was 62 of which 35 were females
and 27 were males. All of them came from the countryside, among them 78% were
living in villages and only 22% were living in town. When participating in this study,
they were in the second term of the school year 2013-2014. All the students who joined
in English club with serious attitude were good at grammar, but very bad at speaking
because they have limited vocabulary and they often use mother tongue. Hence, most of
them are not confident to use English in speaking. Seven teachers of the school were
selected to obtain qualitative data via interviews. Those teachers are different in terms of
experience (ranging from 9 years to 30 years).
All the student participants took part in the survey by responding to the two
kinds of questionnaires. The teachers were interviewed.
2.2.2. Setting of the study
The study was conducted at an English Club at Xuan Huy high school, a suburb
school of Tuyen Quang city, Tuyen Quang province. Like other high schools in
Vietnam, English was taught here as a compulsory subject. However, the teaching of
English, especially teaching English speaking has met some difficulties. The first

difficulty is that English is not paid much attention by most of students in school. The
second is that teachers have to teach in the large size classes. Therefore, teaching
English speaking is very difficult for teachers. The third problem is that most of the

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students are lack of background knowledge from lower secondary schools. The last is
the lack of materials and facilities.
When Xuan Huy English Club was founded, some of the students with the
passion of English had a place for exchanging and learning outside of class time. It is
advisable for the teachers to employ various oral communicative language activities to
arouse students‟ interest in learning English speaking. They, then, may improve their
speaking competence and other language skills.
2.3. Data collection
2.3.1. Data collection instruments
In order to carry out this research, the researcher used different types of research
instruments such as questionnaires and interviews. Added to that, English Club meeting
observations were also employed to supplement for the above instruments.
2.3.1.1. Survey Questionnaires for students
The instruments used in this study consisted of two questionnaires: A need
based questionnaire and a perception one. Survey questionnaires are considered as one
of the most effective instruments for collecting data. According to Gillham (2004),
using questionnaires has some advantages: They are low cost in time and money; the
inflow of data is quick and from many people; data analysis is relatively simple and
question can be coded quickly; there is lack of interviewer bias.
Although the questionnaire is the main instrument, this study encompasses the
use of quantitative and qualitative research methods. The qualitative data are gained
from the interviews with teachers of English when developing and revising the
questionnaire. After this step, quantitative data are obtained from the self-report
questionnaire with the students. In order to make sure that the participants can
understand correctly the content of the questionnaire, the questionnaire items are

presented in Vietnamese as well. This helps to ensure that the questionnaires are fully
filled in and answered without any misunderstanding. If the respondents were unclear
about the meaning of a question, they could ask for clarification. At first, the purpose
of enquiry was explained and the things that respondents are wondering were
immediately clarified. This helps diminish the percentage of unfilled questions.
Pre-treatment questionnaire
Investigating the students' needs about oral communicative activities can help
teachers understand and design useful and interesting activities in enhancing students'
speaking competence. Therefore, using questionnaires is suitable for the present study.
The Pre-treatment survey questionnaire was designed with two main parts with 13
questions (See Appendix 1). Each question has one function for the aim of the research.

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Part I was about the students‟ personal information which included students‟ gender,
place of domicile and the number of years they have learnt English. Part II was designed
to elicit the students‟ needs about English speaking activities. The first and the second
questions are provided to ask students about how oral communicating activities in
English can help them and the way they prefer to work. The third question suggests
some oral communicative activities that they may prefer. The fourth and the fifth
questions aims at finding the factors that can encourage them to communicate and the
good ways that their teachers should give to create good relationship. The sixth and the
seventh questions are given to investigate the suitable duration for an oral
communicative activity. The eighth question is designed to find out students' preference
about the content of the activities. The last question investigates the most suitable way
that teachers should give feedback with wrong answers. The content of this
questionnaire was designed based on the literature review of good oral communicative
activities (Section 1.2.6 chapter 2)
Post-treatment questionnaire
Post-treatment questionnaire encompassed 11 questions which were divided
into two parts (See Appendix 4). The content of this questionnaire was designed based on

the literature review of good oral communicative activities (Section 1.2.7 chapter 2) Part
I was the same as part I in pre- treatment questionnaire. Part II included 8 questions
which would gather information about students‟ perception about designed oral
communicative activities. The first and second questions aim to find out students'
assessment about effectiveness and students enjoyment about these activities. The
third question investigate pattern which brought the most effective to improve
students' speaking competence. The fourth question is used to define what students
thought about oral communicative activities that they participated in. The fifth
question is designed with the purpose of investigating the students' view about the way
that their teachers create good relationship with them. The three last questions are
provided to help writer define students' assessment about the duration, the content and
the effectiveness of oral communicative activities which were applied in English Club.
2.3.1.2. Teachers interviews
The interviewer can pursue in-depth information around the topic at
convenience. To be more detailed, in this study, semi-structured interviews were
conducted to allow new and open ideas to be brought up during the interview. Data
collected from the interview were also analyzed with the same means made in analysis
in questions for easy comparison between the students' thoughts, comments, and
teachers' ones.