(Luận văn thạc sĩ) Sử dụng ghi hình video để giúp học sinh lớp 11 cải thiện kỹ năng nói tại trường THPT chuyên Cao Bằng

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY
SCHOOL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES
––––––––––––––––––––––––––

NGUYEN THI LE THU

THE USE OF VIDEO RECORDING TO HELP 11TH GRADE
STUDENTS IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILL AT CAO BANG
GIFTED HIGH SCHOOL
(Sử dụng ghi hình video để giúp học sinh lớp 11 cải thiện kỹ năng
nói tại trường THPT Chuyên Cao Bằng)

M.A THESIS
Field: English Linguistics
Code: 8220201

THAI NGUYEN - 2018


THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY
SCHOOL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES
––––––––––––––––––––––––––

NGUYEN THI LE THU

THE USE OF VIDEO RECORDING TO HELP 11TH GRADE
STUDENTS IMPROVE SPEAKING SKILL AT CAO BANG
GIFTED HIGH SCHOOL
(Sử dụng ghi hình video để giúp học sinh lớp 11 cải thiện kỹ năng
nói tại trường THPT Chuyên Cao Bằng)

M.A THESIS
(APPLICATION ORIENTATION)

Field: English Linguistics
Code: 8220201
Supervisor 1: Dr. Hoang Thi Ngoc Diem
Supervisor 2: Dr. Nguyen Trong Du

THAI NGUYEN - 2018


DECLARATION
I hereby certify that the thesis entitled “The use of video recording to help
11th grade students improve English speaking skill at Cao Bang Gifted High
School” is the result of my own research for the Degree of Master of Arts. It has not
been submitted to any other university or institution wholly or partially.
Researcher’s signature

Nguyễn Thị Lệ Thu

i


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to express my deepest thanks to Dr. Hoang Thi Ngoc Diem and Dr.
Nguyen Trong Du for their assistance, encouragement as well as their guidance they
gave me while I was doing my research.
I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to all lecturers at
the Department of Post-graduate Studies, School of Foreign Languages, Thai Nguyen
University, whose support and considerations have enabled me to pursue the course.

I am also thankful to selected 11th grade students from at Cao Bang Gifted High
School for their whole-hearted participation in the study.
Last but not least, I owe my sincere thanks to my family members who have
always inspired and encouraged me to complete this study.
Eventually, the study has been completed to the best of my knowledge;
however, mistakes and shortcomings are unavoidable. Therefore, I am looking
forward to receiving comments and suggestions from readers for the perfection of the
course work.

ABSTRACT

ii


Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) is now recognized as a popular
teaching approach in Vietnam. It puts much emphasis on developing students’
communicative competence. While applying CLT into practice, teachers have been
applying various techniques to increase students’ participation in English classes.
Among a variety of teaching techniques to stimulate students to talk, video recording
is seen as a promisingly effective one. This research aimed to find out the
effectiveness of using video-recording on improving students’ speaking skill among
11th form students at Cao Bang Gifted high school. The participants were 30 students
in 11th grade at Cao Bang Gifted High School. The data was collected by survey
questionnaires, semi-structured interview, observations and speaking tests. The
research findings indicate that the application of using video-recording method can
improve students’ speaking ability. The results from the pre-test and post-test show the
improvement of students speaking ability with regards to the use of grammar,
vocabulary, pronunciation, fluency, and comprehension. The study also proves that
applying video-recording method in teaching speaking can raise students’ interest and
motivation to speak and share ideas with their friends in groups.

TABLE OF CONTENT

iii


DECLARATION ........................................................................................................ i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................... ii
TABLE OF CONTENT ............................................................................................ iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ................................................................................... vi
LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES ......................................................................... vii
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ............................................................................1
1. Rationale .................................................................................................................1
2. Aims of the study ....................................................................................................3
3. Research questions ..................................................................................................3
4. Scope of the study ...................................................................................................3
5. The significance of the study ..................................................................................4
6. Methods of the study ...............................................................................................4
7. Design of the study.................................................................................................5
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ................................................................5
1.1. Speaking skill .......................................................................................................6
1.1.1. Definition of speaking skill ...............................................................................6
1.1.2. The importance of speaking skill ......................................................................7
1.1.3. Factors affecting English speaking abilities......................................................7
1.2. Teaching speaking skill ........................................................................................8
1.2.1. Definition of teaching speaking ........................................................................8
1.2.2. Assessing speaking skill ....................................................................................8
1.2.3. Techniques to improve speaking skill .............................................................10
1.3. Application of technology in language teaching................................................12

1.3.1. Video recording ...............................................................................................14
1.3.2. Benefits of using video recording in speaking teaching .................................15
1.4. Previous studies………………………………………………………..…….....18
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ......................................................................18
2.1. Research procedure ...........................................................................................18

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2.2. Setting of the study ...........................................................................................19
2.3. Subjects of the study .........................................................................................20
2.4. Intervention description .....................................................................................21
2.5. Data collection instruments ................................................................................22
2.5.1. Questionnaire ..................................................................................................22
2.5.2. Tests ................................................................................................................23
2.5.3. Observations ....................................................................................................23
2.5.4. Structured interview ........................................................................................24
2.5.5. Data synthesis..................................................................................................25
2.6. Data analysis procedure .....................................................................................25
2.7. Statistical Hypothesis .........................................................................................26
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS ................................................28
3.1. Data analysis ......................................................................................................28
3.1.1. Research question 1: The students’ attitudes toward English speaking skill? ..........28
3.1.2. Research question 2: The effectiveness of using video recording on
improving English speaking skill for 11th gradestudents at Cao Bang gifted
high School ...............................................................................................................32
3.2. Findings and discussions ....................................................................................38
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION ...............................................................................41
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................45
APPENDICES ........................................................................................................... I

v


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
CEFR

: Common European Framework of Reference for Languages

CLT

: Communicative Language Teaching

EFL

: English as a Foreign Language

ESL

: English as a second language

FL

: Foreign language

ICT

: information and communication technology

MALL

: Mobile- Assisted Language Learning

MoET

: Ministry of Education and Training

OHPs

: Overhead projectors

vi


LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES

CHARTS:
Chart 3.1. The importance of learning English speaking skill............................... 29
Chart 3.2. Students’ difficulties in learning speaking English .............................. 31
Chart 3.3. The Comparison between the Students’ Pre-test .................................. 34
and Post-Test MeanScores ................................................................................. 34

TABLE:
Table 3.1. Students’ attitude towards the learning of speaking English ................. 30
Table 3.2. The Students’ Pre-test and Post-Test MeanScores ............................... 32
Table 3.4. Paired Samples Statistics ................................................................... 34
Table 3.5. Paired Samples Test........................................................................... 35

vii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale
Nowadays, English has become more and more important as an international
language. In Vietnam, a large number of students are required to learn it through
compulsory programs in schools and universities. With the crucial role of English in
the path of industrialization and modernization of the country as well as in the process
of integration and globalization in the world, in 2008, the Prime minister approved
the project entitled “Teaching and Learning Foreign Language in the National
Education System, Period 2008-2020” to thoroughly reform foreign language
teaching and learning in the national education system (MoET, 2008).This major aim
of the project is to completely change teaching and learning method in national
education system with the aim that most of the young graduated from vocational
school, college and university can use foreign language indecently, confidently in
communication, learning and working in integrated, multi- language, multi- cultural
environment by 2020; make foreign language the strong point of Vietnamese.
(MoET, 2008)
Specifically, required by Project 2020, by the year 2010, students graduate
from primary school, they need to reach A1 level in the Common European
Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR); students finish secondary school,
they are compelled to get A2 level in CEFR and students have to qualify B1 level
in CEFR when they graduate from high school. However, many of them fail to
learn it successfully.
It can be said that these objectives of the Project 2020 are ambitious and hard
to achieve. In many English classrooms, specially in an EFL (English as a Foreign
Language) classroom students have few opportunities to speak English. According to
KateBell (2011), “An EFL classroom is in a country where English is not the
dominant language. Students share the same language and culture. The teacher may
be the only native English speaker they have exposure to. Students have very few
opportunities to use English outside of the classroom”. In many EFL classrooms, the

1


students usually keep quiet in English lessons. Many students are too shy to express
themselves in English. It is hard for them to respond spontaneously and naturally.
Consequently, students had limited success in developing English speaking skill. In
such a situation, the communicative language teaching approach is seen as a solution
to increase student-talk and improve communicative competence for EFL students.
In the field of language teaching in Vietnam, Communicative Language
Teaching (CLT) has been widely applied recently. However, its result is not effective.
Le and Roger (2009) mentioned that in recent years, national curriculums based on
CLT principles have been introduced into school systems in many Asian countries
but the results have not always been successful.The current state of teaching and
learning English has been investigated in a lot of research. There is a fact that students
must pass examinations in English to graduate.
Additionally, studying a foreign language is considered difficult; therefore, a
good teacher should choose an appropriate technique to make it easier for them to
learn, so it is necessary for a teacher to use a teaching technique to enable students to
use their communication competence optimally. Using technology in the class is one
of ways to help students to develop speaking skill.
From my practical experience, using video recording brings a number of
benefits when it is used in the classroom. First of all, it enables students to record
their voice or to edit the recordings as they desire to enhance its quality. Second,
students can make video clips with their own scripts so that they can listen again to
their own voice at home by means of a mobile phone or a computer. As a result,
students can lessen their anxiety in working on communicating in English. This is
important given the fact that students’ anxiety is a typical classroom issue in many
Vietnamese high schools. Finally, using video recording is instrumental to promote
learner autonomy since they can learn English in accordance with their own time and

interest outside the school where teachers’ direct supervision is absent.
As a teacher of English at Cao Bang Gifted High School in Cao Bang, which
is a mountainous area, I find the students have good knowledge. However, most
students at my school are ethnic minorities. They come from many districts and the

2


learning conditions are very poor and they are deprived of chances to speak English.
In addition, outside class time, the communicative environment in English is limited.
They have got little chances to communicate with foreigners. As a result, they feel
scared of speaking English, of making mistakes, and of not conveying their
sentiments to listeners. Furthermore, my students have limited vocabulary. Hence,
most of the students are not confident to use English in speaking class. Although
speaking skill is very important, there are not many researches of speaking skill to be
conducted. Especially, nobody in Cao Bang studies about using modern technology
to improve speaking skill, whereas smart phones used too much in daily life are not
exploited.
Based on the consideration above, the present study tries to investigate the use
of video recording to help 11th grade students improve English speaking skill at Cao
Bang gifted high School.
2. Aims of the study
The study is conducted to meet the following aims:
 to identify the 11th non English major students’ attitudes at Cao Bang Gifted
High School toward English speaking skill.
 to examine the effects of using vide recording in teaching and learning
English speaking skill for 11thnon English major students at Cao Bang Gifted
High School.
3. Research questions
The following research questions will be investigated in the study:

 What are the students’ attitudes toward English speaking skill?
 What is the effectiveness of using video recording on improving English
speaking skill for 11th grade students at Cao Bang Gifted High School?
4. Scope of the study
Due to the limit of the thesis, only Cao Bang Gifted High School was chosen
as the research setting. This study is concerned with using video recording to improve
non English major students’speaking skill in grade 11 at Cao Bang Gifted High

3


School. Therefore, the research is not planning on studying a larger number of the
whole students at Cao Bang Gifted High School.
5. The significance of the study
Firstly, the study is conducted to find out the effectiveness of using video
recording to enhance students’ speaking skill. Hopefully, the findings of the study
contribute theoretically and practically to the improvement of teaching and learning
process. It can bring a number of benefits to involved parties namely students,
teachers, educational administrators and researchers of the related fields.
Secondly, teachers at Cao Bang Gifted High School as well as English teachers
in Cao Bang province are those who receive benefits from the information the
research provides. The findings can be used as a reference for teachers. Teachers will
have an overall look at the situation of using video recording to stimulate students to
talk.
Thirdly, the study is also important for the students. It is expected that the
students can more actively participate, will not be nervous to speak English, be brave
and confident to answer teachers’ questions, and be able to communicate English
well.
Finally, the study can give contribution to other researchers as references in
conducting further research. They may get other techniques to encourage students to

talk. In general, students, teachers, educational administrators and researchers are
those who are likely to benefit from the study.
6. Methods of the study
Based on the purposes of the study, the researcher used mixed-method study
(both qualitative and quantitative) in this research. The qualitative data will be
collected with the use of questionnaires for students to identify the students’ attitudes
toward English speaking skill and an interview will be conducted with students who
are randomly selected for further information of the study. Observation is also used
to find out the real effects of technique. In addition, the researcher uses Microsoft
Excel and SPSS software to analyzed quantitative data which were gained through
assessing students’ speaking performances. This program was used to find out the

4


mean scores of each speaking aspect based on the speaking rubric used. The analysis
was done for both pre-test and post-test scores. Hence, the result of the analysis was
used to find out the improvement of the students’ speaking skills. Also, all comments,
recommendations and conclusions will be made based on the data analysis and
hopefully, the data collected will contribute to the confirmation and support of the
results which have been gained from the previous studies.
7. Design of the study
This minor thesis is divided into five chapters.
CHAPTER 1, INTRODUCTION, presents the rationale, the aims, and
research questions, significance of study, method and design of the study.
CHAPTER 2, LITERATURE REVIEW, presents various concepts most
relevant to the research topic suchdefinition of speaking, the importance of speaking,
factors affecting English speaking abilities, technologies used in teaching English
speaking skill, the importance of using technologies in teaching, the importance of
using video recording in teaching English speaking skill.

CHAPTER 3, METHODOLOGY, provides the methodology underlying the
research which includes the general information about study subjects, the current
state of teaching and learning speaking at Cao Bang Gifted High School. This chapter
also focuses on the methods of data collection.
CHAPTER 4, FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION, gives a detailed presentation
of data and a detailed description of data analysis. Some explanations and
interpretations of the findings of the study are also presented.
CHAPTER 5, CONCLUSION, emphasizes the implication of the study in
which certain video recording for improving speaking skill to for 11thnon English
major at Cao Bang Gifted High School. Furthermore, this chapter also points out the
limitations of the study and provides some suggestions for further studies.

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

5


This chapter presents background knowledge of English speaking skill, the
importance of speaking, teaching speaking skill, discussion of issues and aspects
concerning the topic of the study.
1.1. Speaking skill
1.1.1. Definition of speaking skill
Speaking skill can be defined in many ways. In language teaching, we often talk
about four language skills (speaking, listening, reading and writing) in terms of their
direction and modality. Language generated by the learners (speaking and writing) is
regarded productive, language directed at the learners (reading and listening) is known
as receptive language cited in Bailey and Savage (1994). Modality refers to the medium
of language (whether it is aural/oral or written). Therefore, Bailey and Savage (1994)
considered speaking as the productive, oral skill.
Speaking is an interactive process of constructing meaning that involves

producing and receiving and processing information (Brown, 1994; Burns, 1997). It
is not only often spontaneous, open-ended, and evolving but it is also not completely
unpredictable. Meanwhile, Bygate (1987) defines speaking as “oral expression
involves not only the use of the right sounds in the patterns of rhythm and intonation,
but also the choice of words and inflections in the right order so as to convey the right
meaning”. He also comments that speaking is, in many ways, an undervalued skill.
Perhaps this is because almost all of us can speak so we take the skill too much for
granted.
However, Bygate (1987) is reasonable when he claims, “speaking is a skill
which deserves attention every bit as much as literacy skills, in both first and second
language”. The learners are often expected to speak with their high confidence to
implement their most basic transactions. Therefore, it is the vehicle of social
relationships, ranking, of professional advancement and of business. It is also a
medium to learn language. To sum up, speaking is believed to be one of the most
challenging skills and should be paid more attention in both learning and teaching.
Bygate’s definition of speaking seems to be coincided with the author’s viewpoint on
speaking.

6


1.1.2. The importance of speaking skill
Speaking is the most important skill to acquire while learning a languagesince
it helps to identify who knows or does not know a language. Pattison (1992) points
out that when people mention knowing or learning a language, they mean being able
to speak the language.
In a social context, social roles are likely to be taken by those who learn and
know how to speak, but not by those who do not have this skill. It cannot be denied
that speaking reserves as much attention as or even more attention than writing skill.
In order to carry out many of the most basic transactions, it is necessary for learners

to speak with confidence.
From those points, we can draw a conclusion that speaking ability is one of the
important and necessary skills in language teaching program. It is suitable with the
development rules of human beings because a person can speak before reading and
writing. That’s the explaination why speaking ability should be educated within the
language area.
1.1.3. Factors affecting English speaking abilities
The success or failure in learning English speaking depends on many factors.
However, there are three most important factors affecting speaking skill: motivation,
attitude and learning strategies.
Motivation is the first vital factor which influences on a language learner.
Gardner (2001) mentioned that motivation refers to the driving force in any situation.
Motivation to learn the second language is considered as requiring three elements in
the socio-educational model. First of all, the motivated individual makes an effort to
learn the language. That is, there is a persistent and consistent attempt to learn the
material by doing homework, by seeking out opportunities to learn more, by doing
extra work and so on. Next, the motivated individual who wants to achieve the
goalwill express the desire to succeedand try to achieve success. Then, the motivated
individual who enjoys the task of learning the language say that it is fun, challenging,
and enjoyable, though enthusiasm may be less than at other times.

7


Attitude is also regarded as an important factor which has an influence on the
language learning. Gardner and Lambert (1972) considered attitude as the persistence
that a learner has to follow an object. Language learning attitude has a relationshipto
motivation. Language learners having extrinsic orintrinsic motivation will have the
more positive attitude than those are not motivated or who consider language learning
a compulsory subject.

With second or foreign language education, key figures have used a number
of definitions of language learning strategies in the field. In this point, Tarone (1983)
described a language learning strategy as “an attempt to develop linguistic and
sociolinguistic competence in the target language to incorporate these into one’s
interlanguage competence”. Rubin (1987) later claimed that “language learning
strategies are strategies which contribute to the development of the language system
which the learner constructs and affect learning directly”.
1.2. Teaching speaking skill
1.2.1. Definition of teaching speaking
According to Nunan (2003), teaching speaking is regarded as a way to teach
ESL learners how to produce the English speech sounds and sound patterns. It can
enable learners to use word and sentence stress, intonation patterns and the rhythm of
the second language; choose appropriate words and sentences according to the proper
social setting, audience, situation and subject matter. The aim of teaching speaking is
to teach the learners how to organize their thoughts in a meaningful and logical
sequence, how to use the language quickly and confidently with few unnatural pauses,
which is called fluency.
1.2.2. Assessing speaking skill
Assessing speaking is a crucial problem in teaching and learning English which
is done by the teacher. Nevertheless, it is quite a complicated thing to do due to some
factors that need to be considered during the process on how well someone can speak.
There may be different scores of the students from one teacher to another. To
overcome with that problem, several scores need to be assigned by teacher for each
response, and each score represents one of several aspects like pronunciation, fluency,

8


vocabulary use, grammar, and comprehensibility, Brown (2004).
Spratt (2005) stated that assessment means collecting information about

learner’s performance in order to make judgments about their learning. Teacher can
use formal assessment and informal one to assess students’ performance. In formal
assessment it can be carried out through tests or exams and the teacher gives their
work a mark or a grade, while in informal assessment students are assessed through
observing or monitoring by the teacher during the teaching and learning process.
Additionally, Thornbury (2005) explores that there are two main methods to
assess oral speech. They are holistic scoring and analytic scoring. Holistic scoring,
which is giving a single score on the basis of an overall impression, is quick in
assessing and probably adequate for informal assessing progress. On the other hand,
analytic scoring means giving score by separating score for different aspects of the
task. Although it takes longer time, it is perhaps fairer and more reliable for teacher
to measure students’ performances.
Last but not least, the researcher sees the need for defining the constituents of
speaking. This work is particularly important, because defining speaking construct
means defining what we are assessing. According to Glenn Fulcher (2003), the
speaker must know the grammar and vocabulary of the language, must master its
sound. All the knowledge of the grammatical or phonological mentioned above may
become useless if the speaker violates the pragmatic conventions known as “rules of
speaking”. For example, he may not understand other's implication or more seriously,
may imply something that he does not wish to communicate. He also needs to be able
to open and close conversations in acceptable ways. Besides, he needs to know just
when to begin speaking, when to stop. Finally, it is important for him to be aware of
the cultural taboo and sensitive to social context.
Then the purpose of assessing speaking is to collect evidences in the speech
which support an inference about the construct as defined in the framework above.
However, when a teacher or assessor listens to a learner’s speech production and
makes judgments about her overall oral proficiency, she may focus on the syntactic
accuracy and pronunciation of the learner’s speech (i.e., the mechanical aspects of

9

the learner’s speech) and, consequently, may underrate the importance of
sociolinguistic elements, such as politeness (Chalhoub-Deville & Deville, 2005). In
odder to conduct a good assessment of second language speaking, the framework is
of great use because it helps the assessor to build the assessing criteria.
In conclusion, assessment is a process which is used to measure the students’
performances. Different types of assessment can be chosen for different purposes,
which depend on each teacher. The researcher then refers to the speaking rubric
included grammar, fluency, pronunciation, vocabulary, and comprehension adapted
from Brown (2001) to assess the students’ speaking performances.
1.2.3. Techniques to improve speaking skill
There are many techniques to promote speaking skill. As Hayriye Kayi (2006)
inferred from many linguistics on her article on the internet on Teaching English as
A Second Language (TESL) Journal, activities such as role play, storytelling and
picture describing can be employed to enhance speaking skill.
According to Hayriye Kayi (2006) one way of getting students to speak is roleplaying. Students imagine they are in different social contexts and have a range of
social roles. In this activity, the teacher gives information to the learners such as who
they are and what they think or feel. After discussing, students act out their
performance in front of the class.
An important way which can be used to improve speaking skill is story telling.
Harmer (2007) claimed that storytelling is one of the ways in teaching speaking. A
tale or story can briefly be summarized bystudents when they heard from somebody
beforehand, or they may make up their own stories to tell their classmates. Story
tellingnot only develops creative thinking, but also helps students express ideas in the
format of beginning, development, and ending, including the characters and setting a
story which has to have. Besides, riddles or jokes can be told by students. For
example, at the beginning of the lesson, the teacher may call a few students to tell
short riddles or jokes as a warm- up activity. The aim of this activity can help the
teachers address students’ speaking ability and get the attention of the class.

10


Another way to enhance students’ talk in a speaking activity is giving students
just one picture and having them describethe picture. Gerlach and Elly (1980) stated
that the functions of describing pictures are to practice describing things and using
preposition of position, to practice listening and speaking to direction, to train
students’ creativity and retell story in speaking English. For this activity the teachers
divide the class into groups and each group is given a different picture. The picture is
discussed by students with their groups and then a representative for each group
describes the picture to the whole class. This activity helps the teachers foster the
creativity and imagination of the learners as well as their public speaking skills.
Alternatively, Justine (2007) mentioned an effective way in his research that
teacher could record the audiofile with pictures and play the recording as many times
as it was needed depending on the level of difficulty and the ability of the students to
enhance the students’ oral skill. The use of voice recordings can increase learner
motivation to speak and build up general speaking skills.Recording students voices to
help them improve their speaking will probably not be your most popular teaching
method at first. When your students see the benefits, however, they will probably ask
you to do it again, however. Students recorded each other in groups of four or five
using their own mobile phones or camera and shared their recordings in small groups.
While playing the recordings back to each other they identified frequent errors and
compared and contrasted their efforts.
Teachers can use above activities to teach speaking. An activity which is
chosen must relateto the topic and objective of the lesson. Moreover, the teacher
should consider the situation and condition of the students and materials that will be
taught. For instance, role play can be used to teach some expressions. Teachers can
ask students to summarize a listening task basing on some pictures given in the book
or use pictures to present with their partner and then they should act them out in front

of the class. In addition, teachers can ask students to make a video or show a video
on any topic and the students then express their opinions about the videos and share
the ideas to other students. These activities can be useful for the teachers to help
students speak and express their ideas in English.

11


1.3. Application of technology in language teaching
Technology becomes part of our daily lives. Many jobs were not required to
use technology in the past, but do require the use of technology today. Additionally,
people use technology to search webs, play games, learn foreign languages, relax and
in more ways.At schools, many teachers apply technology in teaching and learning,
which has motivated students in learning language as well as subjects. There fore,
technology is regarded as a high priority at schools.
In Vietnam and in the world, the educational technologies are currently used
by teachers or educators. According to Le Xuan Mai and Vo Nguyen Hong (2014),
technologies such as computers, the Internet, software, applications have been widely
used in every aspect of society, and they are increasingly used in educational
contexts.Vietnam, a developing country in Southeast Asia, has transformed its
educational system in accordance with the global tendency to integrate information
and communication technology (ICT) into education.
Recently, in classrooms modern media such as radios, cassette players,
recorders, movies, televisions, computers, projectors, etc have contributed to the
renovation in teaching and learning. Nguyen Lan Trung (2002) points that they have
changed classroom structures and have assisted learners’ acquisition of knowledge.
Teachers have given fascinating and understandable activities in foreign language
classroom to motivate learners, which is due to the usage of modern media.
It should be started with the definition of applying technology in foreign
language (FL) teaching. According to Warschauer and Meskil (2000), nearly every

type of FL classroom teaching has it own technologies to support. The first
technologies based on classrooms with chalks, blackboards, pens, papers and
textbooks. FL teachers following the grammar- translation method considered the
blackboard as a perfect vehicle for the one way teaching method of information
transmission. Echoing this, Harmer (2001) notes that the chalkboards provide a
motivating focal point for the classroom emphasis and can be used for variable
purposes such as: note pad, explanation aid, picture frame, public workbook, game
board or notice board. Although the chalkboard is still seen in many classrooms

12


globally, new technologies have been increasingly introduced into the classroom to
add the traditional chalkboard. In fact, the availability of pictures, charts, radios,
cassette players, recorders, overhead projectors (OHPs), movies, televisions, etc…
has considerably changed the classroom structures, and approaches to learning and
teaching including second and/or foreign language learning and teaching. For
example, OHPs can help display the texts or exercises, pictures or diagrams, or
students’ writing in very high quality that makes them more vivid compared to those
on the board. Songs and stories recorded on audio tapes provide interesting classroom
environments. Videos are means to bring the real-life things and events into the
classroom (Harmer, 2001).
The profitability of technology is regarded vital, especially by the young
generation of language teachers who understand and support the idea of technology
in the classroom, on the contrary to the older generation which disapproves and
undervalues its importance.
Recently, technology has played an important role in English teaching and this
matter is very clear to Vietnam at this time. Le Xuan Mai and Vo Nguyen Hong
(2014) claimed that to foster the implementation of information and
communicationtechnology (ICT)in education, particularly in teaching English, the

Vietnamese government and the Ministry of Education and Training (MoET) have
issued policies and invested in ICT infrastructurenation wide. Two examples of such
policies are Decision 1400/QD-TT gon the Scheme of Teaching and Learning
Foreign Languages in the National Educational System Period 2008-2020 and
Directive 55/2008/CT-BGDD Ton Promoting Teaching, Training and Applying ICT
in Teaching Period 2008-2012. According to Quach (2004), the director of the
Information Technology Centre at MoET, the government supports the latter policy
decision through cooperation agreements with ICT companies in order to build
technology infrastructure, particularly in the education sector. MoET has also
organized training work shops on ICT for instructors and administrators. Therefore,
being an English teacher means that you have to keep up with the trend of applying
technology in the regional English FL teaching. Under the view of technology used

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in teaching and learning FL in Vietnam, there has been a significant research in this
matter. In using video in FL teaching listening and speaking, Tuan (2005) stated that
when the teachers of language use some means of technology such as video, the
students’ eyes are caught because video excites their interests in the meaning of the
words and images or sounds. In his study, Tuan (2005) designed a syllabus for
teaching listening and speaking using video with better results and attitude of
participants in his research.
In summary, as the use of English has increased in popularity so has the need
for qualified teachers to instruct students in the language. Truthfully, there are
teachers who use modern technology, but the majority of teachers still teach in the
traditional methods. None of these traditional methods are bad or damaging the
students.However, there are many more opportunities for students to gain confident
practice and extend themselves, especially for English as a second language (ESL)
students who learn the language for more than just fun. To keep pace with English

language teaching and gain more confidence, students have to stride into the world
of multimedia technology.
Technology with its potential benefits is capable of helping resolve certain
problems raised by the introduction of aCommunicative Language Teaching (CLT)
approach into the Vietnamese language classrooms. These problems involve
Confucian educational values, examination-oriented educational system, class
management, and authentic communication. Lots of studies were done to examine
this problem. Some of them showed better results while others indicated negative
resultssince technology did not come up to the teaching expectations and
consequently, teachers judged the work with technology as a time-consuming activity
in FL teaching and learning. In other words, the benefits of technology in foreign
language learning remain inconclusive, and this is the motivation for the researcher
to carry out the present study.
1.3.1. Video recording
In order to increase the amount of extensive practice of speaking skills out of

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class, to foster self-reflection, and to enhance learners’ oral language skills, a number
of multimedia technologies have been recently employed in language classes (Lynch,
2001, 2007; Christianson, Hoskins, &Watanabe, 2009). Out of these, digital audio
and video recordings have received considerable attention from educators and
researchers, in particular those interested in promoting learner self-reflection (Pop,
Tomuletiu, & David, 2011; Mennim, 2003, 2012; Cooke, 2013). Hence, digital
recordings have been used not only in teaching, but also the assessment of speaking
skills as a component of oral speaking portfolios (Cheng & Chau, 2009).
Generally, the type of language learning which integrates mobile technology
as the media of learning is usually called as MALL (Mobile- Assisted Language
Learning). That is the result of the rapid growth of technology to pedagogical area

especially in language learning. The cause of this problem is the continuous
interaction of students to technology, such as mobile phone, internet and computer.
These devices become an important part of life for some students.
There are a number of affordances which can be facilitated by MALL. One of
the activities is video recording. It makes use of camera inside mobile phone for
educational purpose. Especially in teaching and learning speaking, the camera is used
to create video recording task. Therefore, the use of video recording is related to taskbased learning. It mentions language learning activities which ask students to actually
perform language skill or ability.
Cheng and Chau (2009) also explored the potentials of digital video for
fostering self- reflection in an e-portfolio mediated learning environment. The results
showed that learners found creating digital video for reflection relevant to their
learning needs, particularly for cultivating their listening and speaking skills.
1.3.2. Benefits of using video recording in speaking teaching
Many language learners regard speaking ability (production skill) as a
measurement of FL competence. Fluency is considered as the ability to converse with
others, much more than the ability to read, write or comprehend oral language. These
learners regard speaking as the most important skill they can acquire and assess their

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progress in terms of their accomplishments in spoken communication. However, if
English learners want to be good at communication, they have to be good at listening
(reception skill), because of their receiving information to respond the suitable
language materials. As the importance of speaking and listening integration in
teaching and learning FL, there have been lots of research carried out to find out more
proper ways or steps to improve these oral skills. Some of popularity teaching steps
are mentioned here to find out the benefits of using record software in FL teaching
and learning.
Speaking skill is now teaching in the time of CLT approach, the role of teacher

is to facilitate and monitor learners without interruption, then to give feedback in the
post language activity (Canh, 2004). To explore the teaching points of this skill, the
video recording can be an effective means of teaching speaking in terms of students’
motivation, good teaching techniques and updating teaching methods. The benefits
of using video recording in the classroom can be listed as follows:
Firstly, students can be motivated by video-recording in learning English
skills. Students can record their voices or cut, mix any pieces of speech, sounds or
videos to paste into FL lessons with a view of catching eyes or attracting their
friends’attention. Therefore, using video-recording will bring certain benefits if the
teachers and students are equipped with computer techniques. Secondly, videorecording can be a useful technique in teaching and learning language, especially in
listening and speaking skills. As far as we know, in teaching listening, if the teachers
knowing how to use some softwares with video-recordings can take advantage of
them. For instance, they can cut, mix, edit or create a recording or a video clip for
listening tasks or teaching new words. In addition, it can not be complicated for
teachers to get feedback and avoid student' abusing key materials in listening by
editing or making their own audio files to get the convincing results in class or at
home. In contrast, teachers can use suitable tools to make listening tests more
effective; teachers can mix or create the recordings to match with her educational
target instead of oral reading.

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