The effects of role play activities on speaking skill for 4th grade students an action research project at yen vien town primary school

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
.....................o0o.....................

NGUYỄN THỊ PHƢƠNG THẢO

THE EFFECTS OF ROLE-PLAY ACTIVITIES ON SPEAKING SKILL FOR
4TH GRADE STUDENTS: AN ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT AT YEN
VIEN TOWN PRIMARY SCHOOL
(Hiêụ quả của hoa ̣t đô ̣ng đóng vai trong ki ̃ năng Nói đố i với ho ̣c sinh lớp 4:
Mô ̣t nghiên cƣ́u hành đô ̣ng ta ̣i Trƣờng Tiể u ho ̣c Thi trấ
̣ n Yên Viên)

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60140111

HANOI - 2017


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
.....................o0o.....................

NGUYỄN THỊ PHƢƠNG THẢO

THE EFFECTS OF ROLE-PLAY ACTIVITIES ON SPEAKING SKILL FOR
4TH GRADE STUDENTS: AN ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT AT YEN

VIEN TOWN PRIMARY SCHOOL
((Hiêụ quả của hoạt động đóng vai trong kĩ năng Nói đối với học sinh lớp 4:
Mô ̣t nghiên cƣ́u hành đô ̣ng ta ̣i Trƣờng Tiể u ho ̣c Thi trấ
̣ n Yên Viên)

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60140111
Supervisor: Dr. Đỗ Thị Thanh Hà

HANOI - 2017


DECLARATION
I myself declare that this minor thesis entitled “The effects of role-play activities on
speaking skill for 4th grade students: An action research project at Yen Vien Town
Primary School” is my own work and has not been submitted in substance for any
other degree or award.

Hanoi, 2017

Nguyễn Thi Phƣơng
Thảo
̣

i


ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Firstly, I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to my supervisor, Dr.
Do ThiThanh Ha, for her enthusiastic guidance, support and feedback throughout
the steps of doing the research. I am grateful for her useful and sufficient source of
materials which helps me a lot for the interesting and relevant data. Moreover, the
supervisor‟s patience of reading and correcting the mistakes and errors makes great
improvement of the thesis from the content to the grammatical issues.
Secondly, I would like to express my sincere thanks to the Principal of Yen
Vien Town Primary school. Without her permission, I cannot carry out this
research. In particular, I feel greatly indebted to the teacher and the students in class
4A2 for their enthusiastic co-operation during more than two months of working.
More importantly, I would like to send my regards to the staff of the
Department of Post Graduate Studies at College of Foreign Languages, Vietnam
National University, Hanoi for their useful materials which help to make this thesis
valuable.
Last but not least, my special word of thanks to my husband and my family
for their inspiration and moral support they provided throughout my research work.

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ABSTRACT
This study focuses on the improvement of students‟ speaking skill before and
after implementing role-play activities. In order to meet the objectives of the study,
a group of 45 students and the English teacher of that group were taken into
investigation. Pre-test and post-test were done to assess students‟ improvement.
During the time of the research, observation notes were also used to record the
strengths and weaknesses of the students in each week. In addition, another
questionnaire was delivered after the post-test to investigate students‟ attitudes
toward using role-play activities. Then the data were analyzed both quantitatively
and qualitatively.

The results of the study showed that there was a small change of students‟
overall score before and after implementing the action. It can be seen that most of
the students had improvements in fluency and comprehension. It means that to some
extent using role-play activities in classroom is effective. The study also found out
that students would rather speak in groups than in pair or through role-play. It is
suggested that the lesson plan should be more interesting to the students, so they
will prefer using role-play.

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Harris‟ oral English rating scale frame .......................................................19
Table 2: Students‟ result of questionnaire 1..............................................................24
Table 3: Students‟ pre-test result...............................................................................27
Table 4: Students‟ post-test result .............................................................................28
Table 5: Students‟ result of questionnaire 2..............................................................31

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Kurt Lewin‟s action research design .........................................................16
Figure 2: Students‟ overall score improvement ........................................................27
Figure 3: Students‟ pre-test result .............................................................................29
Figure 4: Students‟ post-test result ............................................................................29

v

TABLE OF CONTENT
DECLARATION ........................................................................................................ i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ......................................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT .............................................................................................................. iii
LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................................... iv
LIST OF FIGURES.....................................................................................................v
TABLE OF CONTENT ............................................................................................ vi
CHAPTER 1 – INTRODUCTION .............................................................................1
1.1 Rationale ............................................................................................................1
1.2 Aim of the study ................................................................................................2
1.3 Scope of the study ..............................................................................................2
1.4 Significance of the study ...................................................................................3
1.5 Statement of the research questions ...................................................................3
1.6 Organization of the study...................................................................................3
CHAPTER 2 - LITERATURE REVIEW ...................................................................5
2.1 Theoretical background of speaking skill ..........................................................5
2.1.1 The understanding of speaking ...................................................................5
2.1.2 Teaching speaking .......................................................................................5
2.1.3 Classroom speaking activities .....................................................................6
2.2 Theoretical background of role-play .................................................................7
2.2.1 The understanding of role-play ...................................................................7
2.2.2 Types of role – play .....................................................................................8
2.2.3 The function of role – play ..........................................................................8
2.2.4 The significance of role – play ....................................................................9
2.3 Teaching speaking by using role – play ..........................................................11
2.4 Previous research findings ...............................................................................13
CHAPTER 3 - METHODOLOGY ...........................................................................15
3.1 Time and place of the research ........................................................................15

3.2

The participants ...........................................................................................15

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3.3

Research design ...........................................................................................15

3.4 Research procedure ..........................................................................................16
3.5 Technique of collecting data ............................................................................18
3.5.1 Observation ...............................................................................................18
3.5.2 Interview ....................................................................................................18
3.5.3 Questionnaire .............................................................................................19
3.5.4 Test ............................................................................................................19
3.6 Technique of data analysis...............................................................................22
3.7 Criteria of the action success ...........................................................................22
CHAPTER 4 – DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS ............................................23
4.1 Findings for research question 1: .....................................................................23
4.2

Findings for research question 2: ................................................................26

4.3

Findings for research question 3: ................................................................30

CHAPTER 5 – CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION ............................................33

5.1 Conclusion .......................................................................................................33
5.2 Limitations of the study ...................................................................................35
5.3 Pedagogical implications .................................................................................35
5.4 Suggestion for further studies ..........................................................................36
REFERENCES ..........................................................................................................37
APPENDICES............................................................................................................. I

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CHAPTER 1–INTRODUCTION
1.1Rationale
English has been considered as an international language for many years.
Almost all the people from many different countries around the world use it to
communicate. Today teaching English for young learners is an interesting topic for
many researchers. Moreover, in this globalization era, millions of people want to
improve their English speaking or to ensure that their children achieve good
speaking skill. Since language is a means of communication, it is not enough for
students to learn words, phrases, grammatical features if they want to produce
language in their daily communication or interact with others in English. The most
important thing in teaching speaking is how to activate all the language elements
such as pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary which students have possessed to
communicate. The goal for students learning English speaking is that they are able
to use English to communicate effectively and appropriately. Students have to be
able to express their thoughts, ideas and feelings orally in English without thinking
for a long time before saying what they want to say.
Based on the observation at some 4th grade English classes at Yen Vien
Town Primary School in Gia Lam District, Hanoi City, I found that students are
poor in English speaking skill. They use the course syllabus which belongs to
Ministry of Education and Training. They study English twice a week and each

period lasts forty minutes. There are many reasons that students have difficulties in
learning English, particularly speaking skill. First of all, the students do not spend
much time communicating and talking in English. The number of students who can
speak English fluently is limited. In general, students are less confident while
speaking in front of the class because they are worried about making mistakes.
Some of the students do not feel confident so that they never volunteer to speak. It
can be realized that the students seem to be passive during speaking lessons. They
just repeat the dialogues or conversations mechanically without any creation. Days

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by days their speaking ability is not much improved, especially some students do
not want to speak or express their ideas. The teachers need to find out a solution to
help their students become more interested and active when they practice speaking.
Role-play technique may bea suitable tool for both the teachers and the students to
improve the students‟ speaking skill in English classrooms. Role-play activities may
give students an opportunity to practice communicating in different social contexts
and different social roles.
Therefore, I would like to propose the study entitled“The effects of role-play
activities on speaking skill for 4th grade students: An action research project at
Yen Vien Town Primary School.”
1.2 Aim of the study
The aim of this study is to investigate if role play activities have impact on
students‟ speaking skill. In addition, this study is to prove that students can get
better language communication by using role-play activities. The results of this
research will be the answer for the advantages of role-play in a small speaking class.
The change in students‟ speaking ability is what this study really wants to focus on.
Finally, this study has an intention of examining students‟ attitudes toward the use
of role-play activities. It means whether role-play has influence on the learning

attitudes of the students. In the same context with the same teaching activity how
students can get the learning target. This confusion will be discussed in this study
with the hope to enhance the speaking ability of young learners.
1.3 Scope of the study
The study was conducted in class 4A2 at Yen Vien Town Primary School in
Gia Lam District, Hanoi City. The number of students in this class is 46 (26 males
and 20 females). The learning target is that students are able to communicate
effectively using their own language elements including pronunciation, grammar
and vocabulary. The study was done in a classroom with the hope to improve

2


students‟ speaking ability.
1.4 Significance of the study
This study plays a significant role in changing the way students practice
speaking tasks from repetition into role-playing. Role-play activity has effects on
improving students‟ speaking ability. It encourages students to talk in the speaking
lessons with different roles in different situations. This research also contributes to
English teaching adaptation in Yen Vien Town Primary School. What concluded
from the research will be practically applied to the teaching methods for small
students. Moreover, the theories in this research help to contribute to the knowledge
of CLT in English classes. The teachers will have a thoughtful understanding of L2
acquisition, and they will find a suitable way to teach speaking for their children.
Finally, some suggestions can be given for further studies about role-play activities
and other related issues.
1.5 Statement of the research questions
The research objective is to discover if there is any effect of using role – play
activities in speaking lessons. In addition, the study focuses on the process of
applying this technique and the benefits that students can get when they practice

speaking using role-play. The students‟ progress reflects both the effects of roleplay activities and the teacher‟s feedback. It also reflects the students‟ attitudes
toward role – play activities. Based on those purposes the research questions are
given as following.
1. What is the situation of teaching and learning speaking at the primary school?
2. To what extent is students’ speaking skill improved through role- play?
3. What are students’ attitudes towards using role-play?
1.6 Organization of the study
This minor thesis consists of five chapters.

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Chapter 1: Introduction
The reasons for choosing the research content, the aim of the study and the
statements of the research questions are mentioned in this chapter.
Chapter 2: Literature Review
This chapter provides the theoretical background of speaking and role play as well
as some previous studies about using role play activities to teach speaking.
Chapter 3: Methodology
In this chapter, an introduction to the action research and the technique of data
collection are clearly stated.
Chapter 4: Data Analysis and Findings
The fourth chapter deals with the results of the study.
Chapter 5: Conclusion and Suggestion
The last chapter includes the summary of the study, pedagogical implications and
some suggestions for further studies

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CHAPTER 2 - LITERATURE REVIEW

In order to do the research, a list of basic definitions and conceptsare
presented such as definition of Speaking, Teaching speaking, and Role-playing.
These definitions are concluded from the research findings which play an integral
role as the theoretical perspectives for further studies.
2.1Theoretical background of speaking skill
2.1.1 The understanding of speaking
Speaking is an action that involves producing, receiving and processing
information in spoken language to conveying the information or expressing one‟s
thoughts and feeling (Brown, 1994; Burns & Joyce, 1997). Nunan (1999) asserts
that speaking requires that learners not only know how to produce specific points of
language such as grammar, pronunciation, or vocabulary ("linguistic competence"),
but also that they understand when, why, and in what ways to produce language
("sociolinguistic competence").
2.1.2 Teaching speaking
According to Nunan (2003), teaching speaking is to teach EFL learners to
produce the English speech sounds and sound patterns, to use word and sentence
stress, intonation patterns and the rhythm of the second language, to organize their
thoughts in a meaningful and logical sequence, to use language as a means of
expressing values and judgments and to use the language quickly and confidently
with few unnatural pauses, which is called as fluency.
Teaching speaking aims at enhancing students‟ communication skills. Only
by improving their speaking ability can the students express themselves and practice
speaking fluently in real situations. Teaching speaking is important, which asks the
teacher to find appropriate teaching methods in order to motivate the students. The
teacher should understand well how to create a good learning atmosphere which

5

includes relationship between teacher and students, enjoyable classroom
atmosphere, and the freedom for students to convey their ideas and perform in front
of the class.
2.1.3 Classroom speaking activities
To help students develop their communicative efficiency in speaking, there
are some activities used in the classroom. According to Celce-Murcia (2001), there
are some major types of speaking activities that can be implemented.
The first type is discussion which is probably the most commonly used in
speaking activities. It can be considered as an effective activity because it can
activate and involve students in classroom teaching. Typically, students are
introduced to a topic via a video tape, a story, a listening or reading passage, then
they need to work in groups or in pairs to discuss related topic in order to come up a
solution or a response. This type of activity may need time to prepare because
students have to assemble their thought before any discussion. Therefore, teacher
must take care in planning and setting up a discussion activity.
The second type of speaking activities is prepared speech which students can
choose a free topic and make their own speech to present in front of the class. The
topics for speeches depend on the level of the students and the focus of the class.
The teacher can provide the structures for the speech to help the students. The key
strategy in this activity is the assigned task for both the speaker and listeners. It is a
good idea to assign some responsibilities during the speeches to avoid boring
atmosphere. It is an excellent time to require peer evaluation of classmate‟s speech.
Another type of classroom speaking activities is role play in which students
are assigned roles and a scene, information or clue to create a dialogue. It is one
way of getting students to speak in different social context and to assume varied
social roles. Role plays can be performed from prepared scripts or a set of prompt
and expression. This type of activity requires students‟ creativity and social
knowledge.

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The next one is conversation that can be considered as one of the recent
trends in oral skill pedagogy. It focuses on having students analyze and evaluate the
language that they or others produce. It means that students must be aware of many
features of language in order to become competent speakers. A good conversation is
the one in which both the speaker and the listener must understand and catch the
other‟s ideas.
The last type is information-gap activity in which each student has different
information and they need to obtain information from each other. Information-gap
activities are excellent activities as they force the students to ask each other
questions; these activities help make the language classroom experience more
meaningful. These activities help move the students from working in a more
structured environment into a more communicative environment.
2.2 Theoretical background of role-play
2.2.1 The understanding of role-play
According to Richards and Rodgers (2001), role-play refers to a game that
the teachers and the students play in carrying out learning task as well as the social
and interpersonal relationship between the respondents. In addition, role-play is an
activity for bringing real language situations which can help the learners to acquire
the language. (Najizade, 1996). Moreover, students pretend they are in various
social contexts and have a variety of social roles. In role-play activities, the teacher
gives information to the learners such as who they are and what they think or feel.
Thus, the teacher can tell the student that "You are David, you go to the doctor and
tell him what happened last night, and..." (Harmer, 1984). To my position, the
definition of Harmer is quite important because it is appropriate to the working
thesis. The way Harmer describes role-play is understandable and practical,
especially for the intermediate students. In order to investigate the effects of roleplay on speaking skill, a range of activities which use role-play technique are

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applied in the classroom. The procedure is actually as same as the description of
Harmer.
2.2.2 Types of role – play
There are two broad types of role play activities often used in English
language classrooms: scripted and non-scripted role plays. To perform role-plays
of the scripted type, the students will have to work in pairs or small groups. They
are given prompts related to the target scenarios. Then, they will have to use the
prompts as the model to form the target dialogue. The students rehearse that
dialogue before performing it in front of the class. In the non-scripted role play, on
the other hand, the students are assigned to perform the role play activity in front of
the class based on the prompts given without preparing or writing the script in
advance.
Choosing which types of role play to use depends on the level of the students
and the target scenarios. The participants in my research are small children of 4th
grade, therefore it is reasonable to use scripted role play. Students will find it easy
to practice and they may learn more from what they have prepared to talk in front of
the class.
2.2.3 The function of role – play
It can be seen that the way of teaching English in Vietnam schools mostly
approaches grammar translation methods and examination oriented. Both the
teachers and students become passive while this method is applied in EFL
classroom. Adian Doff (2002) pointed out the problems of those English teaching
methods, and argued that there is a need to develop more diverse English teaching
methods or activities. The aim is to develop the ability of speaking English among
the students. The English learning environment in our country does not encourage
the students be active and confident. That is why Vietnamese students have
common weakness in their speaking ability. They have little chance to practice

conversation, even in the second language classrooms. In order to encourage
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students to speak in public, role -play is often used by teachers as one of the
teaching methods.
Maxwell (1997) states that the purpose of role-play is "to improve students'
verbal and nonverbal communication skills and to link and use previously built
schemas, in both structured and improvised situations "His opinion shows that role play could improve students in verbal or nonverbal communication while they are
performing their roles in the conversation. James G. Clawson (1997) concluded that
"A common theme in the benefits of using role play is that the technique can bring
abstract discussions alive, make them live, and in so doing, open up student's
willingness to learn" When the students participate in the dialogues created by
teachers or taken from the text books, they will be required to play the roles of the
characters in the dialogues, therefore, they will find it easier to use the conversation
in daily lives. Acting in real situations is better than reading or repeating as exact as
in the books. Daily conversation will create lots of unpredictable situations that
make students confused how to deal with. Using role play in teaching speaking
involves the students to the practical communication. It means that they will be
trained in many situations so they will become familiar and confident. Role-play
helps learners to deal with daily conversations, motivate them to speak English
fluently and accurately. Accordingly, role-play helps create a safe environment for
students to practice their language skills.
2.2.4 The significance of role – play
It can be said that role play is one of the activities to promote speaking. By
implementing role play technique the students learn how to express ideas, opinions,
or feeling to others by using words or sounds. Ladousse (1995) explains that role
play uses different communicative techniques and develops fluency in the language.
Moreover, Bailey and Nunan (2005) make it more detail that role plays can be
excellent procedures for helping students learn and practice important speech acts,

9


vocabulary, and grammatical structures. It is important for the teacher to set up role
play that are realistic, plausible, and related to the real situations in daily life. Role
play can improve learners‟ speaking skill in any situation, helps learner to interact
and motivate them to speak by their own words. Ladousse also provides five
reasons why role – play is beneficial to speaking skill. First, a very wide variety of
experience can be brought into the classroom and we can train our students in
speaking skill in any situation through role play. Second, role play puts students in
situation in which they are required to use and develop their language which are so
necessary in daily communication. Third, some people are learning English to
prepare for specific roles in their lives. It is helpful for these students to have tried
out and experimented with the language they will require in the friendly and safe
environment of a classroom. Fourth, role play helps shy students by providing them
with a mask. Fifth, perhaps the most important reason for using role play is that fun.
Snarski (2007) explained that there are five advantages in applying role play
technique in the language classroom. They are: whole class participation, integrated
observation task, varying proficiency levels, pragmatic practice and critical thinking
skill. In addition, role playing can be used as an effective assessment tool. When the
students are presenting their role play, it will be easy to know if they have grasped
the grammar point, content, vocabulary, or other new information presented to
them. They will display what they have learned and present that knowledge to the
class.
In short, role play is considered as an effective technique in teaching and
learning a foreign language. It is used not only to promote the students‟ speaking
skill but also to assess the students‟ language use. Applying role – play in English
speaking class helps the learners gain better knowledge and have good
communication skill.

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2.3 Teaching speaking by using role – play
The teacher needs to decide the context for the exercise and the roles that the
students will play. If the students are taking human roles, the context is generally a
specific problem such as working in an office or dealing with persons. Lessons need
to be carefully explained and supervised so as to involve the students and to enable
them to learn as much as possible from the experience. However, a well – done
scenario never runs the same way twice. The teachers should teach their students
things they might not ordinarily have learned. In addition, the explanations and
instructions tend to be fun for all involved. Role play is not a simple work because
of its careful preparation and instructions. If the teachers do not use this technique
appropriately, the learners may feel boring and unmotivated.
Huang (2008) usually uses six major steps in the procedure.
 Decide on the Teaching Materials
The teacher must decide which teaching materials will be used for role play
activities. The teaching materials can be taken from text books or other materials
such as picture books, story books or comic books. The material is selectedby the
teacher each week. The teacher can also create his or her own authentic teaching
materials for role play activities. The teaching materials should be decided based on
students‟ level and interest and teaching objectives.
 Select Situations and Create Dialogues
Situation to be role played should be selected. For every role play situation, dialogs
should be provided (by the teaching materials or by the teacher) or created by the
student themselves.
 Teach the Dialogs for Role Plays

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The teacher needs to teach the necessary vocabulary, sentences, and dialogues for
the role play situations. The teacher need to make sure the students know how to
use vocabulary, sentences and dialogs before doing role play activities, otherwise,
the teacher should allow students to ask how to say the words they want to say.
 Have Students Practice the Role Plays
Students can practice in pairs or in small group. After they have played their own
roles a few times, have them exchange roles. That way, students can play different
roles and practice all of the lines in the role play. When students are confident
enough to demonstrate or perform in front of the class, the teacher can ask them to
do so for their classmates.
 Have Students Modify the Situations and Dialogs
Once students have finished and become familiar with an original role play
situation, they can modify the situations and/or dialogs to create a variation of the
original role play.
 Comprehension
Finally, the teacher shall evaluate the effectiveness of the role play activities and
check if students successfully comprehend the meanings of the vocabulary,
sentences, and dialogs. There are several ways to do students evaluations. Students
can be given oral and listening test relating to the role plays. The example of oral
tests can be in the following way: students are asked to answer some simple
questions relating to the role plays, students are asked to reenact the role plays,
students are asked to translate the role plays into their native language.

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2.4 Previous research findings
There are various researches that discover the effects of role play technique

in teaching speaking for students, especially the young learners. These studies
pointed out that role play is beneficial to the teaching of speaking and it can help the
students to communicate better.
Woodhouse (2007) suggested how role play could be used as a beneficial
technique for „personal development‟ through case studies in „healthcare strategy‟
with a group of nursing students and how video recordings helped to observe the
gradual progress of the individuals in „a constructive way‟(p. 75). His case study
was aimed to see the personal development in behavior of individuals by videotaping the performance but in this study I use the speaking observation form to see
the gradual progress in the speaking skill of the learners.
Al-Senaidi (2009) investigated on „The effectiveness of using role play to
improve the oral fluency of Grade 4 learners‟ by using a series of role play giving
situations a day before and video recorded to re-examine their performance. One
different thing in my research is that we give feedback immediately after the
students‟ performance. The students follow and work on it to ensure their progress.
Liu and Ding (2009) used role-play technique to see how the students
performed in groups when they were given a familiar situation to role play in. They
also observed the learner‟s language potency and how the errors can be corrected as
well as how to give feedback to the learners for further improvement. In my study, I
followed the same procedure for feedback as in the case study of Liu and Ding. I let
the students know what they need to do to have better performance by using oral
feedback. The students will get benefits and improve accordingly.
Qing (2011) experimented role-play in the intermediate level and noticed
that role play could increase students‟ intercultural awareness and develop overall
communicative competence. He stated that content based role plays give the
students chances to discover different cultures in detail. My research also focuses on

13


cultural communication awareness, but it is not the main target of the study.

Applying role play aims at developing students‟ communication skills through their
roles in different situations.
To sum up, these studies proved that role-play technique is effective in
improving students‟ learning skills. Most of the researches showed that the learners‟
personal growth and development is possible using role play because this activity is
“interactive, creative, interesting and motivating”. Based on the mentioned studies,
my own research is carried out to find out whether role-playing is beneficial to
primary student in enhancing their speaking skill.

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CHAPTER 3 - METHODOLOGY
3.1 Time and place of the research
The research was held at class 4A2 of Yen Vien Town Primary School in
Gia Lam District, Hanoi. This classroom action research was done in 8 weeks from
the beginning of March up to the middle of May of school year 2016-2017.
3.2 The participants
The participants of this study are 46 students of grade 4A2 and the English
teacher of the class. The students are all non- English major and the teacher has
been teaching English for 10 years. She has worked with 4th grade students for
many years from the time of using old textbook until now.
3.3 Research design
This study was done by using classroom action research in which ideas are
tried out in practice as a means of improving teaching and learning. The aim of
classroom action research is to help a teacher find out what is happening in his or
her classroom, and to use that information to make wise decisions for the future. In
his 1946 paper "Action Research and Minority Problems", Kurt Lewin described
action research as "a comparative research on the conditions and effects of various
forms of social action and research leading to social action" that uses "a spiral of

steps, each of which is composed of a circle of planning, action and fact-finding
about the result of the action". The research is designed, carried out, and
implemented by teachers themselves in order to improve teaching in their own
classrooms. In this way, educators could better deal with everyday practical
problems rather than the theoretical problems identified by pure research. The
action research framework is most appropriate for the educators who recognize the
existence of shortcomings in their educational activities. But they must identify the
problem, formulate a plan, carry out an intervention, evaluate the outcomes and
develop further strategies to deal with the problem.

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The following map shows the model of action research designed by Kurt
Lewin.
Figure 1: Kurt Lewin’s action research design
Acting

Planning

Observing

Reflecting

According to this map, classroom action research consists of four basic steps. The
first step is planning in which classroom instructional strategy is prepared to solve
the problems in the study. The second step is acting in which the researcher takes
part in the process of trying out the strategy to test how much the strategy can solve
the classroom problems. The next step, observing, is the process of collecting data
indicating the success of the strategy. The focus of the observation is on the data

related to the criteria of success that have been decided. The final step, reflecting, is
the process of analyzing data to determine how far the data collected have shown
the success of the strategy in solving the problem. Reflection also shows what other
problems may occur during the implementation process.
3.4 Research procedure
The research is carried out steps by steps with the help of both the teacher
and the students in the class. Firstly, a careful plan is given to make sure that
everything will be done effectively. In this preliminary step, choosing suitable
material plays an important role to motivate students in speaking lessons. After that,
a set of role play situations including scripted and non-scripted ones are suggested
to practice. During the time of applying role-play, the evaluation form for each

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