Developing the speaking competences of primary school students in english as a foreign through drama activities
von Bui Thi Hong Minh
Datum der mündl. Prüfung:2016-12-05
Erschienen:2018-04-03
Betreuer:Prof. Dr. Carola Surkamp
Gutachter:Prof. Dr. Henning Klöter
Gutachter:Prof. Dr. Birgit Schädlich
Dateien
Name:Drama activities develop English speaking co...pdf
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Description:drama activities help students develop English speaking competence
Zusammenfassung
Englisch
English was first introduced as a taught foreign language in Vietnam in 1986, yet more than 40 years later the Vietnamese people still find it difficult to speak the language. To improve the students’ proficiency in speaking English, the Vietnamese government developed a series of new textbooks based on the Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) approach. CLT is a learner-centred, interaction-driven and authentic materials-driven teaching approach. The CLT method of interest in this study is the teaching of drama. Learners have shown significant improvements in their speaking-related parameters through drama studies all over the world. However, the CLT approach has found little success in Vietnam in the past (Ellis 1994). The reasons why CLT has failed to be successfully applied in Vietnam may be due to a number of reasons, such as the influence of Confucianism on Vietnamese culture, the traditional grammar-based examination system, the number of students per class, and the infrequent use of the English language in daily life. To overcome these challenges, this research project is designed as an experimental study that aspires to increase the students' competency in speaking English by using drama activities in order to employ the advantages of CLT, while at the same time minimizing the effects of the above-mentioned factors. In this study, a group of Grade 4 students in a rural primary school in Vietnam was randomly assigned to a control or experimental group. Before starting the experiment, both groups were administered questionnaires to measure their initial levels of motivation and their attitudes to learning a foreign language. They were also tested to evaluate their speech competence levels. The research group followed a learner-centred syllabus, based on drama activities; meanwhile, the control group continued with their daily routine in the English language class. After the four months of the experiment, both groups were administered post-experiment questionnaires to check their levels of motivation and their attitudes. Post-experiment speech competence tests were given to both groups to again test the development of their total speaking competences. As a result of the drama lesson plans, the experimental group showed statistically significant increases in all measures of their speaking competences in comparison to the control group, while the control group showed increases in a limited number of areas such as grammar. The findings of this study differ from the literature, which has found that a CLT approach cannot be applied in Vietnam (Ellis 1994), and are promising from the perspectives of parents, educators and policymakers.
Keywords: drama activities + primary school students + English speaking competence