Exploring the Use of Teacher’s Questioning and Students’ Interaction in Speaking Classes at Tran Hung Dao High School

VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY-HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGE & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES
*****************

PHẠM THANH XUÂN MỪNG

EXPLORING THE USE OF TEACHER’S QUESTIONING
AND STUDENTS’ INTERACTION IN SPEAKING
CLASSES AT TRAN HUNG DAO HIGH SCHOOL
(NGHIÊN CỨU TÌM HIỂU VIỆC SỬ DỤNG CÂU HỎI CỦA GIÁO VIÊN
VÀ TƯƠNG TÁC CỦA HỌC SINH TRONG GIỜ DẠY NÓI
TẠI TRƯỜNG THPT TRẦN HƯNG ĐẠO)

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS
Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60140111

Hanoi – 2015


VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY-HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGE & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES
*****************

PHẠM THANH XUÂN MỪNG

EXPLORING THE USE OF TEACHER’S QUESTIONING
AND STUDENTS’ INTERACTION IN SPEAKING
CLASSES AT TRAN HUNG DAO HIGH SCHOOL

(NGHIÊN CỨU TÌM HIỂU VIỆC SỬ DỤNG CÂU HỎI CỦA GIÁO VIÊN
VÀ TƯƠNG TÁC CỦA HỌC SINH TRONG GIỜ DẠY NÓI
TẠI TRƯỜNG THPT TRẦN HƯNG ĐẠO)

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS
Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60140111
Supervisor: Dr. Vũ Thị Thanh Nhã

Hanoi – 2015


DECLARATION
I hereby declare that the minor thesis entitled “Exploring the Use of
Teacher’s Questioning and Students' Interaction in Speaking classes at Tran
Hung Dao High School” is the result of my own work and effort in partial
fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts at Faculty of PostGraduate Studies, Hanoi University of Languages and International Studies,
Vietnam National University. The material in this research has not been submitted
to any other university or institution wholly and partially.
Phạm Thanh Xuân Mừng

i


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would, first of all, like to express my gratitude to my supervisor, Dr Vu Thi
Thanh Nha for her valuable suggestions, enthusiasm, academic guidance,
encouragement and precious advice on the thesis.
I would like to show my sincere thanks to all my lecturers at the Postgraduate
Studies Department, University of Language and International Studies, Vietnam

National University, Hanoi for their valuable lectures, which laid the foundation for
this study.
My thanks also go to the teachers and students at Tran Hung Dao High School
where my study was carried out.
Last but not least, my heartfelt thanks go to my family for their support and
encouragement throughout my study in Nam Dinh.

ii


ABSTRACT
This study was conducted with 3 teachers and 132 students of grade 10 at Tran
Hung Dao High School with the data collected from the class observations in the
classroom settings. The study focused on finding out the types of questions the
teachers used in English speaking lessons and exploring students' interaction to the
teachers' questions.
The findings of the study showed that the three teachers used three main types
of questions, namely display questions, referential questions and yes/no questions in
which the display questions were most frequently asked, followed by yes/no questions
and referential questions were rarely asked. Regarding the purposes of questions,
display questions were mainly asked with diagnostic and instructional functions.
Yes/no questions aimed to function as diagnostic and motivational tools. The
purpose of referential questions was to motivate students by asking information
about students themselves. Also, the findings indicated that most of the students‟
responses were very brief, with one to three words and many questions were not
answered. Longer responses up to nine words could be found in a few instances.
However, these longer responses accounted for a small percentage. Besides, the use
of referential questions in the investigated lessons did not seem to be successful and
effective. The findings revealed that there were not many longer responses when
referential questions were asked. Next, the way that the teacher asked the students

to explain their answers resulted in longer responses. However, most of the teachers
did not focus on follow-up questions or the ways of giving feedback. In brief, the
teachers at THD High School were not skillful in using their questioning and need
training more in applying this technique in speaking.
Therefore, this thesis proposes some useful implications to the teachers who
want to have more effective questioning in order to promote interaction in their
classroom. It is also hoped that the results of the thesis will provide useful information
and lessons for those who want to do research at the schools with similar teaching
conditions

iii


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
CLT: Communicative Language Teaching
F: Feedback
L2: Second Language
No: Number
No of Qs: Number of Questions
No of Rs: Number of Responses
S: Student
Ss: Students
T: Teacher
THD: Tran Hung Dao
Y/N Question: Yes/No Question

iv


LIST OF TABLES

Page
Table 1: The summary of the class observation data

20

Table 2: Examples of different types of teacher questions

22

Table 3: Types of questions asked by the three teachers

24

Table 4: The length of students’ responses for different types

28

of questions asked by the three teachers

v


TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION .............................................................................................. i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS............................................................................ ii
ABSTRACT .................................................................................................... iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ....................................................................... iv
LIST OF TABLES .......................................................................................... v
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION .................................................................. 1
1.1. Rationale of the study ............................................................................ 1

1.2. Significance of the study ........................................................................ 2
1.3. Aims, objectives of the study and research questions ........................... 3
1.4. Scope of the study .................................................................................. 3
1.5. Method of the research ........................................................................... 4
1. 6. Organization of the thesis ..................................................................... 4
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW...................................................... 6
2.1. Interaction in class.................................................................................. 6
2.1.1.What is classroom interaction? ........................................................ 6
2.1.2 The role of classroom interaction in L2 acquisition ........................ 7
2.1.3. Interaction Patterns.......................................................................... 8
2.2. Teacher‟s questioning in interaction ...................................................... 9
2.2.1. Definition of questions .................................................................... 9
2.2.2. Functions of teachers‟ questions ..................................................... 9
2.2.3. Types of questions......................................................................... 10
2.2.4. Effects of teacher questions .......................................................... 13
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY............................................................... 15
3.1. The setting of the study ........................................................................ 15
3.1.1. An overview of the research site ................................................... 15
3.1.2. English teachers in Tran Hung Dao High School ......................... 15
3.1.3. The syllabus of teaching and learning English 10 in Tran Hung
Dao High School ..................................................................................... 16
3.2. Methods of the study ............................................................................ 17

vi


3.2.1. The participants of the study ......................................................... 17
3.2.2. Data collection instruments ........................................................... 19
3.2.3. Procedures ..................................................................................... 21
3.2.4. Methods of Data analysis .............................................................. 21

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ......................................... 23
4.1. Findings ................................................................................................ 23
4.1.1. Types of questions the teachers asked frequently in the
investigated lessons ................................................................................. 24
4.1.2. Effects of the types of questions teachers asked on the students‟
interaction ................................................................................................ 27
4.2. Discussion ............................................................................................ 33
4.2.1. Types of questions the teachers asked frequently in the whole class
teaching portion of the lessons ................................................................ 33
4.2.2. Effects of the types of questions teachers asked on the students‟
interaction ................................................................................................ 34
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS............................ 38
5.1. Conclusion............................................................................................ 38
5.2. Implications .......................................................................................... 39
5.3. Limitations and suggestions for further studies ................................... 41
REFERENCES .............................................................................................. 43
APPENDIX : OBSERVATION SHEET ........................................................ I

vii


CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1. Rationale of the study
English has been seen as the most important foreign language in Vietnam
since the 6th National Congress of the Vietnamese Communist Party in 1986
initiated an overall economic reform known as “Doi moi”. Young people realize the
need of learning English for a plenty of reasons such as getting jobs in foreign
companies, studying abroad, and travelling. Nevertheless, according to Van (2006),
the quality of teaching and learning foreign languages at both general and tertiary
levels in Vietnam is still very low, which is far from meeting the present country‟s

demand of socio-economic development
“Though the aims of the curriculum at secondary school are to train
the four skills and students‟ required language proficiency is upperintermediate level. However, their real level is just somewhere between
elementary and lower-intermediate. Many school leavers cannot read simple
texts in English nor communicate with English speaking people in some
most common cases. Actually the real focus of teaching and learning English
in both lower secondary and secondary schools is completing English
grammar and vocabulary exercises, in order to pass the final exams (even the
entrance exams of many universities and colleges in Vietnam) which mainly
consist of grammar and vocabulary tasks only” (Tien, 2013, p.66).
This situation is true in my teaching context at Tran Hung Dao High School
in Nam Dinh. Our students learn English to pass the compulsory exams, so they
practise doing exercises relating to the tests such as grammar, vocabulary, reading
skills and pronunciation. Although teaching methodology has changed from
translation method to communicative method, students do not focus on speaking
and listening skills. For them, these skills will be practiced later when they have
entered university. The consequence is that students cannot communicate despite
the fact that they have been learning English for many years. This way of students‟
thinking has an influence on teaching and learning speaking in class. As a teacher, I

1


realize the need to help students master speaking skill as well as find out how to
teach students this skill effectively.
There exist a number of techniques useful for teaching speaking skill, one of
which is teacher‟s questioning. Questioning plays a pivotal role not only in teaching
speaking skill in particular but also in teaching learning English in general (Gall,
1970). “Questioning has been considered as one of the most essential and important
techniques during instructional processes since Socrates times. Questioning takes up

most of teacher talk and it has been proved to have a great influence on classroom
interaction”( Xiaoyan, 2008, p.93). Obviously, many studies (Long & Sato, 1983;
Brock, 1986; Shomooshi, 1997; Camak, 2009)

have focused on the use of

questioning as a universal pedagogical approach. Despite these studies and their
findings, how teachers ask effective questions to create students‟ interaction is an
under-researched issue in my context. My big concern is whether teachers at Tran
Hung Dao High School effectively use teacher‟s questioning in speaking classes or
not. My interest in finding out teacher‟s questioning and students‟ interaction in
speaking classes has inspired me to do a study titled “Exploring the Use of
Teacher’s Questioning and Students' Interaction in Speaking classes at Tran
Hung Dao High School”.
1.2. Significance of the study
Theoretical significance of the study: The study synthesized the
understanding of teacher questioning in terms of the types of question, functions of
questions and the effects of teacher‟s questioning on students‟ interaction in
speaking. Moreover, the study suggested how to effectively use teacher‟s
questioning in speaking classes in English 10 to stimulate students‟ interaction.
Practical significance of the study: The study was conducted with the
expectation that its results would be useful for myself, for my students and for my
colleagues at Tran Hung Dao (THD) High School. Based on the findings,
conclusion can be made on what types of questions should be applied and how to
use them in speaking classes in English 10 to enhance students‟ interaction. Hence,

2


it can be a considerable contribution to teaching and learning speaking skill

effectively and enjoyably at THD High School. More importantly, findings in this
project can, hopefully, be first steps to further study or discovery to encourage
students to speak English with confidence. The research might inspire students to
speak English-the skill used to be challenging with them.
1.3. Aims, objectives of the study and research questions
The research aims to explore the use of teacher questioning and students'
interaction in speaking classes at Tran Hung Dao High School. Thus, the objectives
of the thesis are:
1.

finding out question types used by teachers in speaking classes with specific

purposes;
2.

determining the effects of teacher‟s questioning on students‟ interaction and

3.

giving suggestions and recommendations in using teacher questioning in

order to raise teacher‟s effective questions at Tran Hung Dao High School.
Based on the objectives of the thesis, the research questions are:
1.

What question types are used by teachers in speaking classes?

2.

What are the effects of teacher‟s questioning on students‟ interaction?

1.4. Scope of the study
There are a variety of techniques to stimulate students' interaction in class
activities. However, because of the time and length constraint of the study we only
focused on teacher questioning, which is considered to occur in almost every lesson
and to be teachers‟ important technique.
Among performance indicators for language skills, reading, speaking,
writing, and listening, speaking was chosen for our study. We chose this skill
because of the following reasons. Firstly, it is the skill that my students need
improving and do not pay enough attention to. Secondly, it is the best in expressing
the students' verbal interaction. Lastly, it is easy to observe and record.
The study focused on the student-instructor interaction only.

3


The study was conducted with 3 teachers and 3 classes of grade 10 in 6
periods. Each period lasted 45 minutes.
1.5. Method of the research
The study was conducted in the following procedures:
First, class observation was designed to study teacher questioning including
the types of questions, functions of questions and students‟ interaction to teacher
questioning in speaking lessons.
Then, the data were collected, sorted and analyzed quantitatively and
qualitatively to obtain realistic results.
Finally, pedagogical implications for the use of teacher questioning to raise
teacher‟s effective questions were proposed based on the results found from the data
collection instrument.
1. 6. Organization of the thesis
The thesis consists of five chapters, appendices, and references.

Chapter 1, Introduction, states the reasons why the study is carried out, the
significance of the study, the target, research questions, the scope, the method of the
study and an overview of the thesis.
Chapter 2, Literature review, presents the relevant theoretical basis for the
study, relating to student interaction and teacher‟s questioning in language
classroom, and previous studies relating to the field.
Chapter 3, Methodology, describes the research methods and
instruments used for the completion of the work, that is the description of how the
study is implemented, namely the setting, participants, data collection instruments, data
collection procedures and methods of data analysis.
Chapter 4, Findings and Discussions, presents, analyzes and discusses the
findings.
Chapter 5, Conclusion and Implications, presents three sections. The first
section presents the conclusion of our study. The second section gives some

4


implications for using teacher‟s questioning effectively in speaking classes. The last
section discusses the limitations of the study and suggests further studies.

5


CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
In this chapter, we review the theoretical background and previous studies related to
the research area of the thesis: teacher-student interaction and teacher‟s questioning
in language classroom. Hence, this chapter is divided into 2 sections. The first one
indicates interaction in class including definitions of classroom interaction, role of
classroom interaction in second language (L2) acquisition and patterns of classroom

interaction. The second section looks into teacher‟s questions as an aspect of
classroom interaction in EFL context. This section consists of definition of
questions, functions of teacher‟ questions, types of questions and effects of
questions on students‟ interaction.
2.1. Interaction in class
2.1.1.What is classroom interaction?
In the era of communicative language teaching (CLT), students learn to
communicate through interaction in the target language. Interaction is the heart of
communication and it is what communication is all about (Brown, 1994). So far, it
has been defined in a number of different ways.
First of all, Ellis (1994, p.11) defines interaction as "when the participants of
equal status that share similar need, make an effort to understand each other".
Interaction, based on Brown's (2007) definition, is the collaborative exchange of
thoughts, feelings, or ideas between two or more people resulting in a reciprocal
effect on each other. Sharing the same view, Wells (1981) believes that interaction is a
collaborative activity involving a triangular relationship between the sender, the
receiver and the context of situation. In brief, interaction relates to a collaborative effect
between two or more participants in a specific context.
Applying the understanding about interaction in a language classroom
context, Hall (2000) claims that classroom interaction is simple. It is the talk that
occurs in the classrooms between teachers and students and among students. Long
(1980, p.47) gives a clearer definition: "Interaction is used in general sense, referring

6


to any sort of classroom interaction, student-student or teacher-student interaction,
group discussions, and any type of classroom participation" .
While the above views of classroom interactions were considered, we take
Brown's (2007) view because it is salient in our classroom context when speaking skill

is taught. It means that in the context of this study classroom interaction is defined as
the communication between the teacher and the students to exchange thoughts, feeling
or ideas about any topic in the lessons in classroom context. This study focuses on the
teacher student interaction because “the quality of this interaction is thought to have a
considerable influence on learning" (Ellis, 1986, p.395). Ellis (1986) argues that
successful learning depended more on the type of interaction than the method used.
While interaction amongst learners is also a vital issue, this area is not the focus of the
current study.
2.1.2 The role of classroom interaction in L2 acquisition
Interaction is the key to L2 learning and it is really necessary for second
language acquisition (Ellis, 2008). There have been a number of other studies about
the role of interaction in L2, Brown (2007) finds that interaction is an important
word for language teachers; it is the heart of language teaching and learning.
Sharing the same viewpoint, Hall and Verplaetse (2000) insist on the importance of
interaction that teachers and students work together to create the intellectual and
practical activities that shape both the form and the content of the target language as
well as the processes and outcomes of individual development through their
interaction with each other.
Another role of interaction emphasized by Thomas (1987) is that it is
interaction that forms the basis of an effective pedagogy for L2 instruction.
Interaction itself fosters the acquisition of communicative linguistic skills-the major
objective in the L2 curriculum. He stresses that interaction in language classroom
will lead learners to better learning and will activate their competence; an increase
in the amount of classroom interaction will help foreign language learners learn the
target language easily and quickly.

7


Considering all different views about roles of interaction in L2 learning

presented above, we could conclude that interaction plays an important role not only
in shaping the patterns of communication in L2 classroom but also in creating
opportunities for students to use language for classroom learning and L2
acquisition. Different interaction patterns will be described in the next section .
2.1.3. Interaction Patterns
Given interaction patterns, Moore (1989) reports that interaction comes in
many shapes and factions. They include learner-learner interaction, learner-content
interaction and learner-instructor interaction. While learner-learner interaction is
defined as interaction between one learner and other learners alone or in groups
with or without the real time presence of an instructor, learner-content interaction is
referred to as interaction between the learner and the content of the subject of the
study. Learner-instructor interaction is defined as the interaction between the learner
and the teacher. Looking at interaction from another perspective, Thomas (1987)
believes that there are two kinds of interaction: verbal interaction and pedagogic
interaction. Verbal interaction is a continuous, shifting process of speech acts, social
actions performed through language by addresser, and intended to have some sort of
effect upon the addressee. Pedagogic interaction parallels verbal interaction but the
difference is that pedagogic interaction is the interaction between teaching and
learning.
In the literature on classroom discourse, among interaction patterns, the
three-move (or triadic) initiation-response-feedback (IRF) pattern, originally
described by Sinclair and Coulthard (1975), is traditionally considered as the basic
unit of analysis. This pattern is made up of three turns: the teacher initiates a
linguistic interaction (generally directing a question to a selected child), the pupil
provides a response, and the teacher replies with feedback. Research on classroom
interaction shows that IRF is a pervasive and dominant pattern, and a fundamental
feature of classroom talk (Liu, 2008).

8

Our study is conducted in the classroom and the focus is teacher questioning;
therefore, the focused interaction in this project is teacher-student oral interaction or
teacher-student verbal interaction.
2.2. Teacher’s questioning in interaction
Questioning has been, for thousands of years, one of the most popular
techniques of teaching and serves as the principal way in which teachers control the
classroom interaction and much class time has been devoted to it. In order to make
teacher‟s questioning understood clearly, we are going to present definition of
questions, functions of teachers‟ questions, types of teacher‟s questions and effects
of teacher‟s questions herein.
2.2.1. Definition of questions
Questions have been given different ways of definition. Questions are
generally concerned with information-seeking and stimulate some kind of mental
activity or thinking (Hunkins, 1989). A question is broadly defined as any sentence
having either an interrogative form or function (Riegle, 1974). Questions are
instructional cues or stimuli that convey the content elements to be learned and
directions for what they [students] are to do and how they are to do it ( Levin&
Long,1981). In summary, we support Hunkins‟s (1989) view on the definition of
questions because it is suitable for our teaching context.
2.2.2. Functions of teachers’ questions
There are many distinct functions for the various questions that are used in
classrooms. It is important to actively consider the functions for the questions
asked.
According to Ur (1996), teachers can use questions to attract students in the
lesson and make them participate actively through speech. By using questioning
techniques, teachers can get students to be active in their learning and they not only
provide poor students with a chance to take part in but also encourage students to be
self-confident.

9


According to Kauchak and Eggen (1989, cited in Xiaoyan , 2008, p.93), the
functions can be basically grouped into three categories: diagnostic, instructional
and motivational, but a single question can usually serve more than one function. As
a diagnostic tool, classroom questions allow the teacher to glimpse into the minds of
students to find out not only what they know or don‟t know but also how they think
about a topic. The instructional function means that questions can be used as a
technique to facilitate learners to learn the new knowledge in the learning process.
As to motivational function, skillful use of questions can effectively involve
students in the classroom discourse, encouraging and challenging them to think.
Kindsvatter and Ishler (1988) claim that as a two-way interaction,
questioning process has its potential to stimulate students‟ interaction, thinking and
learning. The use of questions can thus change the way of teacher monologue and
involve students in the active classroom interaction, which is much helpful to the
development of their language competence.
To sum up, questions can function as tools of diagnosis, instruction and
motivation. It is vital to determine the purposes and functions of questions before
making questions because they can help teachers scaffold their types of questions.
2.2.3. Types of questions
There are different question forms in teaching-learning process. Grouping
questions differs according to different authors.
In one of the earliest taxonomies, Bloom (1956, cited in Brown, 2007, p.
172) categorizes questions into the following groups:
1. Knowledge: the recalling of formerly-learned material
2. Comprehension: the ability to understand the meaning
3. Application: the ability to use learned materials such as rules, methods,
concepts, principles, laws and theories in new and concrete situations
4. Inference: the ability to form conclusions that are not directly stated in

instructional materials.

10


5. Analysis: the ability to breakdown material into its elements so that its
organizational structure may be understood. This may involve the classification of
parts, exploration of the association between them, and identification of
organizational principles
6. Synthesis: the ability to collect different parts and put them together to
create a new whole. Synthesis encourages learners to form something new and rely
on innovative and creative thinking.
7. Evaluation: the ability to assess the value of materials, the explanation to
problems or the details about particular cultures.
From another perspective, Barnes (1976, cited in Ellis, 2008, p.797), for
instance, distinguishes four types of questions: (1) factual questions (e.g. What?),
(2) reasoning questions (e.g. How?, Why?), (3) open questions, which require no
reasoning, (4) social questions, that are questions that affect learner behavior
through controlling or appealing. Barnes (1976) also makes a distinction between
closed questions (i.e. questions that are structured with just one acceptable answer
in mind) and open questions (i.e. questions that permit a number of different
acceptable answers).
The next category of questions, display/referential questions, relates to the
nature of interaction generated (Tsui, 1995). For display questions, the teacher
already knows the answers. They are asked in order to check if the students know
the answers. On the contrary, for referential questions, the teacher does not know
the answers and the students answer the questions in order to give the teacher
information (Tsui, 1995). It is believed that closed or display questions elicit “short,
mechanical responses” while open or referential questions elicit “lengthy, often
complex responses” (Ho, 2005, p.298). Another type of questions, the yes/no

questions, is categorized by Thompson (1997) according to “the grammatical form
of the question”.
It seems that open or referential questions are more preferred on pedagogical
grounds because they are the questions commonly asked in the „real world‟ of

11


students outside the classroom (Long & Sato, 1983). However, “there is a
divergence between what theorists would consider to be good practice and what is
actually going on in classrooms”(Banbrook & Skehan, 1989, p.142). In a traditional
language classroom, factual questions are the most common while open questions
are the least common (Myhill, Jones, & Hopper, 2006). Also, in Burns and Myhill‟s
(2004) research study in which episodes of fifteen minutes from 54 lessons were
drawn from Year 2 and Year 6 classes, the analyses showed that the most common
form of questions asked by the teachers is the factual questions (64%).
In general, each author has their own way of classifying questions. In our
study, we use both Tsui‟s (1995) categories and Thompson‟s (1997) types to code
our data, which means that we use 3 types of questions: wh-questions including
display questions, referential questions and yes/no questions. The reason for our
choice of display questions, referential questions and yes/no questions is that they
signal the types of responses related to meaningful communication in the language
classroom. Display questions refer to questions whose answers the teacher knows
whereas referential questions are those that students answer to give the teacher
information (Tsui, 1995; Xiaoyan, 2008). Moreover, display questions limit
students‟ responses to one word or phrase answers. In contrast, referential questions
provide opportunities for students to express their thoughts and ideas, listen to
divergent opinions from fellow classmates and develop their confidence to move
beyond conventional patterns of thinking (Chi, 2010; James & Carter, 2006). For
yes/no questions, they can be used for a number of purposes, for example, to request

information, to display or test knowledge or as rhetoric (Thompson, 1997).
Although answering to yes/no questions is quick and efficient, the posing of such
questions does not allow students to become initiators of communication. However,
there is a tendency to commonly use this type of questions. The tendency to rely on
such questions will affect students‟ performance in other areas of skill development
(Chi, 2010). In our study, we investigated students‟ interaction in speaking classes;
therefore, we intended to explore how the three types of questions asked by the

12


investigated teachers would influence students‟ interaction and whether these
questions could stimulate long conversations in speaking classes.
2.2.4. Effects of teacher questions
The effects of display questions on students‟ discourse patterns were
generally considered to be negative but positive for referential questions (Chi,
2010). Brock (1986) conducted a research study in which the effects of referential
questions on adult ESL classroom discourse were investigated. In this study, four
experienced ESL teachers and twenty-four non-native speakers (NNSs) enrolled in
classes in the University of Hawaii‟s English Language Institute were involved.
Two of the teachers were trained to use referential questions in classroom activities
while the other two teachers were not provided with any training. The findings
showed that the treatment-group teachers asked more referential questions than did
the control-group teachers. Each teacher was randomly assigned to teach six
students for a period of forty minutes. The findings also indicated that the students‟
responses in the treatment-group classes were significantly longer and syntactically
more complex than those in the control-group classes. This suggests a positive
correlation between asking referential questions and students‟ production of target
language. In Ernst‟s (1994) research, it was found out that when the teacher asked
display questions, students‟ responses were brief, with little elaboration. Lastly,

Goodwin (2001, p.11, cited in Myhill, Jones, & Hopper, 2006, p.15) argues that
“pupil responses tend to be short, and the teacher does not encourage elaboration of
responses” when the display questions are asked. For the yes/no questions
suggested by Thompson (1997), Gower, Philips, and Walters (1995, cited in
Thompson, 1997) point out that these questions are easier for learners to answer and
they do not need to produce much language output.
In general, the results of the previous studies have proved that teachers
frequently use display questions in class while they rarely ask referential questions.
Also, the findings show the responses elicited by display questions are usually brief,
with little elaboration; however, the responses to referential questions are usually

13


longer and syntactically more complex. In our study, we aim to find out the types of
questions asked frequently in the lessons by the teachers and their effects on the
students‟ interaction.
To sum up, the theoretical backgrounds of the study concerning teacherstudent interaction and teacher‟s questioning in language classroom have been
reviewed in chapter 2. In the next chapter, we are going to describe the methodological
issues of the study.

14


CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY
Chapter 2 has reviewed the theoretical backgrounds of the study including
definitions of classroom interaction, role of classroom interaction in second
language (L2) acquisition, patterns of classroom interaction, definition of questions,
functions of teacher‟ questions, types of questions and effects of questions on
students‟ interaction. This chapter describes the setting of the study, data collection

instruments, participants, data analysis procedures, and methods of data analysis.
3.1. The setting of the study
3.1.1. An overview of the research site
Tran Hung Dao High School, where the study was conducted, is a public
school situated in Nam Dinh city in Nam Dinh province. It has 35 classes with 1460
students in the school year of 2014-2015. The average number of students in each
class is 45. Being one of the best schools in Nam Dinh province, it is cared and
invested by both Nam Dinh Department of Education and Training and the
Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training. The school is equipped with
modern facilities supporting for learning and teaching English effectively such as
computers, projectors, cassette players and language teaching labs. The classrooms
are separated from the road; therefore, the students are not disturbed by noise. The
principal of the school always pays attention to English subject; therefore, she
organizes English competitions such as English public speaking contest, and
Olympic contest. Moreover, English is a compulsory subject in any exam of the
school. Students also have opportunities to communicate with native speakers
thanks to native volunteers coming to work at school. The above information partly
reflects the administrators‟ attitude to English teaching and learning at the school.
In general, students have good studying condition.
3.1.2. English teachers in Tran Hung Dao High School
In school year 2014-2015, there are nine English teachers at Tran Hung Dao
high school, all of whom have graduated from pedagogic universities and have
English teaching experience for years, aged from 31 to 52. Among nine teachers of

15


English, two had chances to go to Singapore for improvement in Methodology.
Eight out of nine teachers have a C1 certificate. On average, one teacher gives
fifteen to seventeen lessons per week along with a great deal of such work as

preparing and marking tests, training gifted students, training students for IOE and
English public speaking contest organized every year. Since students‟ demand is to
pass the exams and the principal, as well as the parents of the students judge the
teachers basing on the students‟ results, many teachers focus on teaching for exams.
They pay more attention to providing exercises to help students practise skills for
exams than teaching students skills for communication. Moreover, some teachers
adopt old-style methods in which teachers provide knowledge and students take
notes and do drills. In brief, the teacher‟s English language is recommended to be
good enough to teach English for general courses, but their method of teaching is
still problematic.
3.1.3. The syllabus of teaching and learning English 10 in Tran Hung Dao High
School
Like other high schools in the country, English is a compulsory subject in the
curriculum at Tran Hung Dao High School. “Tiếng Anh 10” prescribed by the
Ministry of Education and Training are edited for the seven-year program from
“Tiếng Anh 6” to “Tiếng Anh 12”. “Tiếng Anh 10” was introduced in the whole
country in 2006 and has been applied in teaching and learning English since then.
“Tiếng Anh 10” includes sixteen units which are theme-based and divided into 105
forty-five minute periods during 35 weeks of a school year. Nevertheless, according
to the Ministry of Education and Training, Unit 15 is omitted in order to decrease
pressure on students. Sixteen units deal with different themes such as daily life,
social issues, sports, music which may interest students more in the subject. Each
unit consists of five parts namely reading, speaking, listening, writing and language
focus. The content of most five parts is presented through task-based teaching.
More importantly, units cover all four language skills adequately and allow for an
integration of skills before and after stages. Thus, it seems to look more

16