VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY-HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES DEPARTMENT OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES **************** NGUYỄN DƢƠNG HÀ COLLOQUIAL LANGUAGE USED IN SPEAKING CLASSES BY THE ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE FACULTY – THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY (Ngôn ngữ thơng tục sử dụng tiết học nói sinh viên chuyên ngành tiếng Anh Khoa Ngoại Ngữ - Đại học Thái Nguyên) M.A Minor Thesis Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60 14 10 Hanoi – 2012 VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY-HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES DEPARTMENT OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES **************** NGUYỄN DƢƠNG HÀ COLLOQUIAL LANGUAGE USED IN SPEAKING CLASSES BY THE ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE FACULTY – THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY (Ngôn ngữ thông tục sử dụng tiết học nói sinh viên chuyên ngành tiếng Anh Khoa Ngoại Ngữ - Đại học Thái Nguyên) M.A Minor Thesis Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60 14 10 MA course: 18 Supervisor: Nguyễn Hƣơng Giang, M.A Hanoi - 2012 TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i ABSTRACT ii TABLE OF CONTENTS iii LISTS OF ABBREVIATIONS vi LISTS OF TABLES AND CHARTS vi PART I – INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale of the study Aims of the study Research questions Significance of the study Scope of the study Method of the study Design of the study PART II – DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1.1 Stylistic varieties of English language 1.2 Colloquial English speech 1.2.1 Key terms: Colloquial/ informal/ casual/ conversational English 1.2.2 General characteristics of colloquial English speech 1.2.3 Main features of colloquial English speech 1.2.3.1 Phonetic and phonological features 1.2.3.2 Morphological features 10 1.2.3.3 Syntactical features 10 1.2.3.4 Lexical features 11 1.2.4 Significance of colloquial English speech 14 1.3 Colloquial English speech used by the native 15 CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY 16 2.1 Data collection 16 2.1.1 Participants 16 2.1.2 Instrument 17 2.1.3 Data collection procedures 17 2.2 Data analysis and discussion 18 2.2.1 Analysis of the questionnaire for students 18 2.2.1.1 Students‟ language background 19 2.2.1.2 The students‟ perceptions of colloquial English speech 20 2.2.1.3 The attitudes of students to the use of colloquial English in speaking classes 26 2.2.1.4 Analysis of colloquial English used in FLF English major students‟ speech 29 2.2.2 Analysis of teachers‟ interview responses 35 2.2.2.1 Teachers‟ definitions of colloquial English speech 35 2.2.2.2 Teacher‟s opinions of the importance of colloquial English speech teaching 36 2.2.2.3 The teaching of colloquial English speech in Foreign Language Faculty 36 2.2.2.4 Teachers‟ assessment of their students‟ competence of speaking colloquial English in the classroom 37 2.2.2.5 Teachers‟ list of possible factors influencing students‟ colloquial English speech use in the classroom 38 CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND IMPLICATIONS 41 3.1 Findings 41 3.1.1 The frequency of using colloquial English speech in the classroom 41 3.1.2 Students‟ competence of using colloquial English speech 42 3.1.3 Factors influencing the students‟ competence of using colloquial English speech 42 3.2 Implications 44 PART III – CONCLUSION 47 Conclusions 47 Limitations and recommendations for further research 47 REFERENCES 48 APPENDIX I APPENDIX VII LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS A1: American teacher A2: American teacher EOA: English oral proficiency at the advanced level ESL/EFL: English as a Foreign Language/ English as a Second Language FLF: Foreign Language Faculty G1: Group1 G2: Group G3: Group G4: Group V1: Vietnamese teacher V2: Vietnamese teacher V3: Vietnamese teacher LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES Chart 1: The distribution of students‟ high interest in four language skills Chart 2: Students‟ self-assessment of their competence of speaking colloquial English Chart 3: Teachers‟ assessment of their students‟ competence of using colloquial English Table 1: Participants‟ personal information Table 2: Participants‟ perceptions of the context where colloquial English speech is used Table 3: Participants‟ perceptions of the role of colloquial English speech Table 4: Participants‟ perceptions of the specific features of colloquial English speech Table 5: Students‟ attitudes to the use of classroom colloquial English speech Table 6: Analysis of phonetics features used in students‟ speaking classes Table 7: Analysis of morphological features used in students‟ speaking classes Table 8: Analysis of syntactic features used in students‟ speaking classes Table 9: Analysis of lexical features used in students‟ speaking classes Table 10: Teacher‟s opinions of the importance of colloquial English speech teaching PART I – INTRODUCTION Rationale of the study English nowadays is not the language of each separate country but has become an international language This language is considered as a tool to help people all over the world communicate and understand one another However, people who use English as a foreign language (EFL) often find it difficult to communicate effectively with the native and their communication, in most cases, is assessed to be unnatural, „bookish‟ and even inappropriate with the speaking setting For example, when best friends or classmates talk to each other in informal settings, they often use such overly formal words and expressions as „Sir‟, „May I‟ or „Would you like‟, etc Even though most native speakers accept such errors in the speech of non-native speakers, they may feel uncomfortable because of the non-native‟s overly formal language It is said that, sometimes, register errors can be as serious as social gaffes if the language is not appropriately used in a specific speaking context Moreover, when listening to daily conversations on the tape and in the real life, the researcher realised that colloquial language is much used by the native speaker This realisation has been consolidated by the exploration of the other researchers that in the native‟s speech, actually, „real people don‟t talk like books‟ but use mostly „the language of the streets‟ that consists of various colloquial or informal expressions (Engkent, 1986: 225) and it is the non-standard or colloquial expressions that are the uniqueness of everyday English used by the native (Suksriroj, 2009: 12) However, when listening to these conversations, many students including English majors at Foreign Language Faculty (FLF) find it hard to get the ideas although there are not many new words on the listening script Obviously, most of them have quite good command of English grammar, speak English accurately and are able to understand speech which is deliberately addressed to a foreign student but have much difficulty in following speech which is primarily addressed to native speakers as well as in communicating effectively with them That fact urged the researcher to explore the use of colloquial language by English major students at the place where the researcher is working and the study on colloquial English in the speaking classes has been carried out Aims of the study The study aims at assessing FLF English major students‟ frequency and competence of using colloquial English in their speaking classes Then, the study focuses on investigating the factors influencing the use of colloquial English in the classroom setting so that teachers can find out effective ways to make this style more accessible to students The further purpose of this study is to help non-native students minimize the register errors and be as likely to speak English as the native Research questions This study will seek the answers to the above mentioned issue through three research questions as follows: How frequently English major students in Foreign Language Faculty (FLF) use colloquial English in their speaking classes? How does the frequency reflect the students‟ competence of speaking colloquial English in their classroom? What factors influence the students‟ acquisition of colloquial English in their speaking classes? Significance of the study Using colloquial language in the appropriate context will be the key to communication success Thus, the study on colloquial English used in the non-native‟s speaking classes can partly contribute to the improvement of learners‟ communicative competence with the native in the real social setting More importantly, this may be useful for students to improve their comprehension skills such as listening and reading in real contexts because colloquialisms are frequently used in speeches and texts produced by the native Thanks to that, students will gain their self-confidence when communicating with native people It is hoped that this study will open a new way to make communicative language teaching method more accessible to students If this study is done, teachers and textbook writers may have a new look at the status of English speaking teaching in classroom, so they may pay more attention to the register errors in students‟ use of English in the class Scope of the study There are many important perspectives of language use, but this study just focuses on the conversational register with the use of colloquial style In this study, colloquial speech will be defined only as informal/ everyday conversational speech The study will be based on the main features of colloquial English speech to find out the frequency of informal language produced by English major students in their speaking classes The participants are all fourthyear students majoring on English in Foreign Language Faculty – Thai Nguyen University These students are selected because they have gained basic knowledge and sufficient techniques in speaking They are considered to be at the advanced level and know a lot of English At this level, we need to show students what still has to be done and provide them clear evidence of progress We can this through a concentration not so much on grammatical accuracy, but on style and perceptions of appropriacy, connotation and inference, helping students to use language with more subtlety (Jeremy Harmer, p 13) Method of the study With the aim of seeking the answer to the issue raised above, survey research was used in this study with the instruments such as questionnaires, interview transcripts and field notes Aiming at exploring the frequency of students‟ colloquial English use in their speaking classes to assess students‟ competence of using colloquial language and finding out the factors influencing the students‟ competence of colloquial English, questionnaires with closed-ended questions and Likert-type scales were delivered to the fourth-year students Besides, the researcher conducted semi-structured interviews with both native and nonnative teachers with the help of the audio recorder and field notes to find out the factors affecting the use of colloquial English in students‟ conversational classes Design of the study The study includes three main parts as following: The first part – Introduction – provides the motivation for the research, identifies the aims, research questions, significance, scope, methods and design of the study The second part – Development – consists of three chapters Chapter 1- Theoretical background - provides an overview of theories for the study Chapter – Contents of the study – investigates the issue of using colloquial English in the classroom with the help of questionnaires and interviews through data analysis, and discussion Chapter – Findings and implications – summarizes the main results and provides suggestions to the teaching and learning of colloquial English speech in the classroom The last part - the Conclusion – focuses on the study summary, limitations and recommendations for further research PART II – DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 1.1 Stylistic varieties of the English language The authors of handbooks on German, English and Russian stylistics propose analogous systems of styles based on a broad subdivision of all styles into two classes: literary and colloquial and their varieties These generally include from three to five functional styles Functional styles (FS) are the subsystems of language, each subsystem having its own peculiar features in what concern vocabulary means, syntactical constructions, and even phonetics Since FS will be further specially discussed in the study, three popular viewpoints in English language style classifications will be limited In 1960, the book „Stylistics of the English Language‟ written by M D Kuznetz and Y M Skrebnev appeared The book introduced a brief outline of stylistic categorization The styles and their varieties distinguished by these authors included: Literary/ Bookish Style: a publicist style; b scientific (technological) style; c official documents Free/ Colloquial Style a literary colloquial style; b familiar colloquial style Kuznetz and Skrebnev in this book stated the definitions of bookish and colloquial styles The bookish style is a style of a highly polished nature that reflects the norm of the national literary language The bookish style may be used not only in the written speech but in oral, official talk Colloquial style, on the other hand, is the type of speech which is used in situation that allows certain deviations from the rigid pattern of literary speech used not only in a private conversation, but also in private correspondence So the style is applicable both to the written and oral varieties, and the terms "colloquial" and "bookish" not exactly correspond to the oral and written forms of speech However, Maltsev (1973) suggests two terms "formal" and "informal" and states that colloquial style is the part of informal variety of English which is used orally in conversation ... colloquial English in their speaking classes Then, the study focuses on investigating the factors influencing the use of colloquial English in the classroom setting so that teachers can find out effective... speech The study will be based on the main features of colloquial English speech to find out the frequency of informal language produced by English major students in their speaking classes The participants... does the frequency reflect the students‟ competence of speaking colloquial English in their classroom? What factors influence the students‟ acquisition of colloquial English in their speaking classes?