skkn tiếng an h11 TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING SKILLS BY USING COMMUNICATIVE TASKS

TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

USING

INTRODUCTION
Vinh Cuu, which is one of the largest districts in Dong Nai Province, has
attracted a lot of foreign companies and factories. Many foreigners work in the
companies and factories need to use English to interact with their customers,
their workers and partners. In order to communicate to foreigners, to find good
jobs, many young people and students have to be good at speaking English . Of
course, more and more people want to use it as a means of communication at
work, in business and tourism. As a teacher, I am aware that English has been
one of the compulsory subjects in secondary schools and high schools in
Vietnam. In the first term of the school year 2015, all grade 10 students in Dong
Nai Province had to take communicative English tests with the four language
skills: Listening, speaking, reading and writing. Therefore, English teachers
have the responsibility for training and helping their students to become good
communicative English users. In teaching the four language skills, we think that
speaking is the most important skill, but the teaching of speaking in my school
has not been effective in terms of communication.

STUDENTS’ LEARNING PROBLEMS
Many students in Tri An School are not good at oral communication in
English for a number of reasons: First, they have very few learning speaking
strategies because they are usually provided with grammar and language
structures which their teachers think that these structures are important for the
first and second term examinations. Second, they are very shy when they speak
out in front of the class because they are not usually trained to use English

communicatively. Finally, many tasks in the textbooks : English 10, English 11
and English 12 are not suitable for students’ learning needs.
As a teacher of English, I think that teaching English for “spoken
communication” is essential. However, my personal experience of its methods is
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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

USING

still limited due to many following reasons: The students have very few chances
for communication due to the large number of students, time limitations,
grammar translation method. Most of the teachers don’t get familiar with natural
responses to communicative situations except for questions and answer activities
between teacher and students. Therefore, the students are not confident enough
to express themselves in English.
As a teacher, I know that there are a lot of methods that can be applied in
the class. However, in this research I focus on grade 11 students’ speaking skill
because speaking is a productive skill. It involves using speech to express
meanings to others. Interaction is two-way communication that involves using
language and body language to keep our listeners involving in what we are
saying and to check that they understand our meanings.

LITERATURE REVIEW
We all know the importance of speaking, teaching speaking to the ultimate goal
of our English language teaching. Speaking is one of the crucial productive

skills and people can evaluate our English competence by listening to our
speaking first.
Nunan (1991) wrote, "Success is measured in terms of the ability to carry out a
conversation in the (target) language." Therefore, if students do not learn how to
speak or do not get any opportunity to speak in the language classroom, they
may then get frustrated and lose interest in learning the language. Our
responsibility is to improve students’ four language skills: Listening, speaking,
reading and writing. I think speaking is the most important skill for my students
because the purpose of our English course is really to enable our students to
communicate effectively. In fact, if the appropriate communicative tasks or
activities are taught in the right way, speaking in class can be a lot of fun. The
achievement in learning speaking will increase students’ motivation.

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

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In recent research, it is true that in a language class, it is necessary for the
teacher to create a positive classroom atmosphere so that he or she can
encourage the students to communicate with each other. By doing this, the
students can express their ideas, feelings and opinions without feeling afraid of
making mistakes. Besides, the students can conduct communicative tasks in an
effective way. Many researchers emphasize the importance of teaching
conversations or role play to English language teaching.

Jack C. Richards emphasizes that communicative practice refers to activities
where practice in using language within a real communicative context is the
focus, where real information is exchanged, and where the language used is not
totally predictable.
In agreement with Richards, Willis (1996) states that creating a low stress
atmosphere and using the language for real purposes are ways to get meaningful
communication and through interaction and students have the opportunity to
acquire discourse skills. Willis also points out that the essential conditions for
effective language learning, such as exposure, use, and motivation. In agreement
with Willis, Nunan (1991) says that task-based learning views the learning
process as a set of communicative tasks that are directly linked to the curricular
goals they serve. He also stresses the crucial role of communicative tasks in
task-based teaching and learning. He says that task-based teaching involves an
approach where communicative tasks are particularly important because
students need to be involved in interactions in the classrooms and real life. As a
result, this view changes the approach of designing tasks to be developed in the
classroom.

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

USING

TASK MODIFICATION
Roger Nunn suggests that teachers must take into account the following

criteria when they design tasks and exercises for English learners or students.
Let’s consider the areas:
Simulating "Real" Conversation
Classroom tasks are simulations and can only approximate real-life
communication, but real-life skills, such as adjusting to an interlocutor's
contribution can be built in. Tasks designed to practise interactive ability should
be an appropriate task for students. They must be able to imagine themselves in
the situation.
Exchanging
An interactive task should require students to exchange information,
opinions, attitudes, but not for its own sake. There should be a real purpose;
each participant should need to find something out from the others in order to
complete the task.
Comprehensible Input
The task should require the participants to make sure they fully
understand what the others tell them and to make themselves fully understood to
the others. In this way, students will need to adjust to each other's contributions.
Improvising
The

task

should

require

both

predictable

and

unpredictable

communication. Real conversation always involves unpredictability so an ability
to improvise needs to be practised. For example, an attempt to come to an
agreement is unpredictable. There is no requirement to actually reach an
agreement, so the participants may develop the conversation freely. On the other
hand, they must exchange the information for an agreement to be possible and
cannot easily avoid asking questions.

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

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Mixed- Ability
For mixed-ability courses, tasks should favour the production of
contributions of all kinds. They should allow both weak and strong participants
to extend themselves to their full ability. For strong participants, making
themselves understood to students with less linguistic ability is a useful skill.
Opportunity and time must be available for candidates.
(Roger Nunn - Kochi University, Japan)
In order to make the tasks more effective and relevant and appropriate for our
students, I often redesign the tasks to meet the students’ learning goals. Let’s

have a look at the following task design.

Part one: English 11- Unit 1: Friendship (Page 16)
Task 3 (Task from the textbook)
Role - play: Talk about a famous friend.
Journalist

Interviewee

You are interviewing the interviewee You have a friend whom you admire
about a friend of his or hers who has greatly. She/ He has just won the
just won the first international prize first
in Mathematics.

international

Mathematics.

You

prize
are

in
being

interviewed by a journalist about him
or her.

Before you start, agree upon the basic profile of the friend. Use the following

suggestions to ask and answer questions:
• his/ her name
• date of birth
• his/ her physiccal characteristics
• his/ her hobbies

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

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• his/ her personalities
• why he/ she is interested in Math
• how much time he/ she spends on Maths every day
• what makes him/ her a good friend
• what made him/ her successful
• what he/ she does in his/ her free time
Useful language:
His or her personalities:
Friendly, humorous, quick-witted, good-natured, helpful, honest, pleasant,
caring
How he or she won the prize:
Studious, intelligent, keenly interested in Mathematics, eager to learn, patient,
calm

Newly- designed Task
1. Role- playing:
Instruction:
Work in pairs to play roles in the dialogue. Change the
roles when you have finished.
Journalist: Hello. Our guest today is Phuong, a student who has
won a gold medal in Physics. We can see you’re very excellent. So
Phuong, do you admire anybody?
Phuong: Yes, of course. That is my best friend. I so much admire
him because he is very intelligent and he has just won the first
international prize in Maths.
Journalist: What’s his name?
Phuong: His name is Long.
Journalist: What is his date of birth?
Phuong: Uh, it’s on 23rd September 1998.

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

USING

Journalist: I want to know details of himself. What are his
physical characteristics?
Phuong: Well, he’s tall and thin. Sometimes I see him as a scientist
in his short-sighted glasses.

Journalist: Oh, maybe he is very handsome. How about his
personalities?
Phuong: You know? I admire Long because of not only his
excellence but also his good personality. In spite of being a good student,
he is very modest and he always helps friends in learning. He also has
sense of humour that makes people laugh a lot.
Journalist: Long is such a perfect student. Why is he interested in
Maths?
Phuong: Well, he said he loved Maths when he was a little boy. He
likes counting, figures.
Journalist: Does he spend all his time studying Maths?
Phuong: He spends much time studying it but not all of it. He
always has a suitable schedule between studying and playing.
Journalist: What does he do in his free time?
Phuong: He plays sports with his friends. Sometimes he plays
rubikcube.
Journalist: After your share, I know how he has such a great
success. That’s all interesting. Thanks for your share. I hope to see you
and Long someday. Goodbye.
Phuong: Bye. See you soon.

Rationale: After the weaker students have already practised playing roles in
the dialogue, they can make questions with cues based on the dialogue. The
students work in pairs to make their own dialogue, using their own ideas. This
task is considered “a communicative task” because the students can exchange
real information. They use their own ideas to interact with each other. We
should help students practice playing roles with a model first, then they can
make their own dialogue. They are provided with opportunities to decide on
things in the dialogue and this is considered as simulation.
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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

USING

2. Making questions:
Instruction: Work in pairs to make correct questions, using the word
provided. Then, ask your partner to answer the questions to make your own
dialogue.
Name

What

Date of birth

What

Physical characteristics

What

Personalities

How about

Interest in Maths

Why

Time he/ she spends on Maths

Does he………………?

Hobbies

What

Suggested Questions
Name

What’s his/ her name?

Date of birth

What is his date of birth?
What are his/ her physical

Physical characteristics

characteristics?

Personalities

How about his/ her personalities?

Interest in Maths

Why is he/ she interested in Maths?
Does he/ she spend all his/ her time

Time he/ she spends on Maths

studying Maths?
What does he/ she do in his/ her free

Hobbies

time?

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

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Part two: English 11 - Unit 3: A Party (Page 36)
Task 2 (Task from the textbook)
Work in pairs. Tell your partner about the party.

Newly-designed Task
1. Role- playing:
Instruction: Work in pairs to play roles in the dialogue. Change

the roles when you have finished.
Ngoc: Hi! Hang.
Hang: Hello, Ngoc.
Ngoc: Well, you look nice today.
Hang: Thank you. You are, too.
Ngoc: Where did you go last night?
Hang: Oh, I went to my friend’s birthday party.
Ngoc: Who did you go with?
Hang: Well, I went with some of my friends.
Ngoc: How did you go there?
Hang: Year, we went there by motorbikes.
Ngoc: What did you give her?
Hang: Oh, we bought a very beautiful dress for her. We hope she will like
it.
Ngoc: That sounds interesting. Were there a lot of people there? Did you
know most of them there?
Hang: Uh, there were a lot of people. Some of them were my friends and
the others were her relatives that I didn’t know.
Ngoc: What did you do at the party?
Hang: Well, firstly we sang the song “Happy Birthday!” together and
then we ate candies, birthday cakes and played some games.

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

USING

Ngoc: How interesting it was! What time did it finish?
Hang: Oh, at nine o’clock. I am really interested in talking with you but I
have some things to do. Goodbye for now!
Ngoc: Bye. See you later.
Hang: Thank you.

2. Making questions:
Instruction: Work in pairs to make correct questions, using the word
provided. Then, ask your partner to answer the questions to make your
own dialogue.
Birthday party

Where

With some of friends

Who

By motorbikes

How

A very beautiful dress

What

A lot of people
Sing songs and eat candies,

birthday cakes
At nine o’clock

Were there……
What
What time

Rationale: Helping students to make questions is a very important strategy in
teaching oral discourse because in real life sometimes we ask and sometimes we
make responses. We do this in order to help students increase their ability to
make questions in real life.

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

USING

Suggested Questions
Birthday party

Where did you go last night?

With some of friends

Who did you go with?

By motorbikes

How did you go there?

A very beautiful dress

What did you give her?

A lot of people
Sing songs and eat candies,
birthday cakes
At nine o’clock

Were there a lot of people there?
What did you do at the party?
What time did it finish?

Part three: English 11- Unit 9: The Post Office (Page 104)
Task 3 (Task from the textbook)
Work in pairs. Imagine that one of you is a clerk at the post office and the other
is a customer, make a dialogue for each of the following situations.
1. You want to subscribe to the Lao dong Daily for a year and have the
newspaper delivered to your home every morning before 6.30. Your address is
67 Ngoc Ha Street, Hanoi.
2. Your best friend’s birthday is on 16th May. You want to use the Flower
Telegram Service provided by the post office to send her a greetings card and a
bunch of red roses on her birthday.

Newly- designed Task

1. Role- playing:
Instruction: Work in pairs to play roles in the dialogue. Change
the roles when you have finished.
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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

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Clerk: Good morning. Welcome to Thanh Ba post office.
Can I help you?
Thuy: Good morning. Well, I want to subscribe to the newspaper?
Clerk: Which newspapers do you want to subscribe to?
Thuy: Well, I want to subscribe to the Lao Dong Daily.
Clerk: How long have you used this service?
Thuy: For a year, please. Can you start tomorrow?
Clerk: Certainly. What’s your address?
Thuy: Well, my address is 67 Ngoc Ha Street, Hanoi.
Clerk: Ok. My staff will deliver the newspaper to your house at
7.00 a.m.
Thuy: Could you deliver the newspaper before 6.30? Because I
have to go to school at 7.00 a.m.
Clerk: Yes, of course. We will deliver it bebore 6.30.
Thuy: How much is the fee?
Clerk: Well, do you pay for per month or for a whole year?
Thuy: Uh, just per month.

Clerk: Yes, it’s 30.000 VND per month. Can you fill in this form?
Thuy: Yes. Here you are. Thank you.
Clerk: You’re welcome. It’s my pleasure.
Thuy: Oh, it’s too late. I have to go home. See you later.
Clerk: Bye. See you next time.

Rationale: After the weaker students have already practised playing roles in
the dialogue, they can make questions with cues based on the dialogue. The
students work in pairs to make their own dialogue, using their own ideas. It is
very essential to help students make questions in teaching oral discourse. We do
this in order to help students develop their ability to make questions in real life.

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

SKILLS BY

USING

2. Making questions:
Instruction: Work in pairs to make correct questions, using the word
provided. Then, ask your partner to answer the questions to make your own
dialogue.
Greetings
The Lao Dong Daily
For a year

Can………?
Which
How long

67 Ngoc Ha Street, Hanoi.

What

Before 6.30

Could

30.000 VND per month

How much

Suggested Questions
Greetings
The Lao Dong Daily

Hi! Can I help you?
Which newspapers do you want to subscribe
to?

For a year

How long have you used this service?

67 Ngoc Ha Street, Hanoi.

What’s your address?

Before 6.30

Could you deliver the newspaper before
6.30?

30.000 VND per month

How much is the fee?

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

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REFERENTIAL QUESTIONS
Besides using dialogues, I often make referential questions when I teach
the four language skills: Listening, speaking, reading and writing because using
more referential questions in the classroom will provide students with
opportunities for real communication. I also encourage my students to make
referential questions so that they can exchange real information in the class. As
Nunan (1994) says: Referential questions are questions we ask someone because
we don't know the answer. In a language classroom, this can mean questions that
the teacher asks students and students ask each other. He also explains that

referential questions can be compared to display questions, for which the answer
is already clear and the teachers ask just to see if the students know the answer,
or for language manipulation. We should consider the following example :
English 11- Unit 10: Nature In Danger - Reading - After you read (Page 117)
Find out why some animals have become extinct.
We should consider this question “People kill animals for fur, skin and food.
People keep animals as pets. People hunt or capture animals for recreation or
entertainment.Which is the most important cause, in your opinion? Why?”
(Referential question).
The students will have opportunities to express their opinions, exchange
real information with each other by deciding on the most important cause. This
means that I am successful in helping them to produce real communication.

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
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CONCLUSION
It is the second time I have written this research paper, I expect that the
research will bring good results to me and other teachers in Tri An High School.
I strongly hope that communicative tasks in teaching speaking skills are not
only useful for students but also for teachers and my school.
Teaching speaking in a communicative way can be applied in all classes.
As for students and teacher’s perspectives to teaching and learning grammar,

this approach to teaching speaking will change their thinking that the teachers
only make use of all exercises in the textbook without any improvements, but it
is the teacher’s job to design communicative tasks or activities in order to help
students to achieve their communication goals of learning and teaching.
Finally, I would be very thankful for any comments and suggestions
regarding possible improvements.

MẠCH THI THU NGA

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TEACHING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ SPEAKING
COMMUNICATIVE TASKS.

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REFERENCES
Brand, S.T. and Donato, J. M, (2001). Storytelling in Emergent Literacy:
Fostering Multiple Intelligences, Thomas Learning, USA.
Brown, H Dough. (1994). Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to
Language Pedagogy. Prentice Hall Regents.
Harmer, J.(2001) The Practice of English Language Teaching, Pearson
Education Ltd
A Training Course for TEFl, Oxford

Hubbard and Jones, P&H.(1983).
University Press.

Keppel, G. (1991).Design and analysis: A researcher’s handbook (3 rd ed )
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Larsen-Freeman, Diane. (1986).Techniques and Principles in Language
Teaching, Oxford University Press.
Littlewood , W. T. (1992). Teaching Oral Communication, Blackwell
Publishers, UK
Roger Nunn - Kochi University (Japan)
Ur, P. (1996) A Course in Language Teaching: Practice and theory, Cambridge
University Press.
Willis, D. and J. Willis (2007)Doing Task-based Teaching, Oxford University
Press.
Willis, J. (1996). A framework for task-based learning. London: Longman.

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