USING ROLE PLAY TO IMPROVE FIRST YEAR NON ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS ‘S SPEAKING COMPETENCY IN TERMS OF FLUENCY IN T&M EDUCATION CENTER As reviewed in the previous work, role play can be seen as one of the successful strategies to help students enhance their speaking competency (Nunan (1991), Ladousse (1987) and Livingstone (1983)) In the aspect of improving student’s speaking fluency, role play seems to stimulate students to speak with motivation, confidence, body language and meaning transference In the context of T & M Education Center, role play is not familiar with students and rarely applied in many speaking lessons Students there often practice speaking based on text books’ activities and teachers’ guides Repeated activities together with boring and tiring speaking lessons prevent my students from speaking with their enjoyment and motivation Moreover, my students, like other Vietnamese students, usually confront with a lot of difficulties in speaking abilities They may lack of vocabulary to speak or they are too shy They have little time to speak in the class; hence, their interaction is slow One more important obstacle is that they feel ashamed when making mistakes so they try to hide themselves and say as little as possible to avoid their errors Realizing these matters in my class, I am conducting a study to know whether role play can help to develop their speaking skill in terms of fluency Two research questions were raised to find a better teaching method to improve the situation: ‘Can role play help to improve students’ English speaking competency in terms of fluency?’ and ‘What are students’ attitudes toward role play activity in a speaking lesson? To collect the data for the research, a variety of books and journals have been reviewed carefully to find out proper methods Therefore, this study’s purpose is to review on some main research methods and to examine the appropriate ones to be applied in this work The application of these research methods will be discussed in details later To present the reasons for choosing some particular methods, an overview of research methods will be looked through quickly to ensure that all choices are clarified meaningfully and suitably A numerous works have discussed and supplied fundamental and important theories on research methods as can be seen in Brown (1988), Creswell (2003), Hinchey (2008) There is hardly any significant difference in the ways these works defining and classifying research methods Most researchers agree that there are two major kinds of research methods: quantitative method and qualitative method On the contrary, Brown (1988) depicted a broader view of research methodology and he divided it into two types; primary research and secondary research due to the sources of information that the researchers want to collect He then subdivided primary research into case studies and statistical studies, secondary research into survey and experimental studies His work in 1988 only focused on statistical researches and he motivated teachers to use these methods when showing clearly what should be done in each step during the process of a statistical research Brown probably used a different term for quantitative research there In fact, statistical research shares the same value with quantitative ones It is likely that with the emergence of qualitative researches in the twentieth century, his views are no longer the hottest and the most attractive ones Moreover, a great demand from teachers who consider themselves as researchers requires a strong development of qualitative researches which focus on human’s perceptions, not statistical evidences Recently, a mixed- method research which combines quantitative and qualitative method is often listed as the third type of research method as in works of Creswell (2003) and Muijs (2010) It is believed that this combination will increase the validity and reliability of the research According to Creswell (2003), a quantitative research is ‘one in which the investigator primarily uses positivist claims for developing knowledge’, whereas a qualitative research is ‘one in which the inquirer often makes knowledge claims based primarily on constructivist perspectives’ (p 18) In order to address the terms of positivist and constructivist, a clear explanation can be found in Hinchey’s work (2008) She initially states the definition with an interesting saying: ‘‘It is not a black or white issue’’ (p 19) These words beautifully captured the description of two research paradigms, positivist and interpretivist or constructivist They originated from the true value of knowledge that the true is out there in the world or the true depends on each one’s perception For positivist research paradigm, she discusses that the behaviors of human can be discovered universally like natural sciences through conducting trial experiments Therefore, the truth is stable, fixed and unchanged in any conditions The role of researchers here is out of the truth, in other words, they are objective in the way they discover the findings On the contrary, interpretivist research paradigm seeks the truth in particular settings and conditions The researchers are involved in the process of observing and analyzing the truth Therefore, in Hinchey ‘s ideas, the knowledge may vary because of different ways of seeing it and it depends on a number of factors such as culture, interests, personal experience and so on She showed precisely that “interpretivist can be useful to others when they offer new insights into related situations” (p 24) That means interpretivist approach can explore the truth from different angles with more critical thinking Hinchey (2008) presented the two paradigms as a foundation for further explanation of quantitative and qualitative research method She explained that “quantitative research is used interchangeably with positivist research” (p 27) They might be different in some cases; however, they were similar in depending on statistical analysis That means qualitative falls on interpretivist paradigm which bases on the analysis of behaviors Apart from Hinchey, there are many works focusing on the difference between quantitative research and qualitative research Most researchers discovered the difference from his/her perceptions so that their ideas are correlated and supplemental to one another Muijs (2010) distinguished two methods in a clear and easy-tounderstand analysis He pointed out four main types of research questions which belong to quantitative research These questions require the numerical methods to answer such as “How many” Especially, he highlighted that “quantitative research is good at providing information in breadth, from a large number of units, but when we want to explore a problem or concept in depth, quantitative methods can be too swallow” (p 7) From his point of views, qualitative research can supply a deeper analysis and in the process of gathering data, unexpected outcomes may appear In the work focusing on qualitative methods by Family Health International et al (2005), a more detail comparison between the two types was well presented They showed that the most important difference was their flexibility In qualitative methods, data were collected considerably through asking open-ended questions As a result, the responds for these questions were flexible and changeable These questions enable participants to express their own ideas freely, not in a fixed response format as in quantitative methods It seems that in some cases, qualitative methods are more useful and effective than quantitative ones However, the matter of effectiveness depends on what the researcher wants to find out and which paradigms he/she chooses to follow in the first stage of doing researches “You can never empirically or logically determine the best approach This can only be done reflectively by considering a situation to be studied or your own opinion of life” (Arbnor & Bjerke, 1997, p.5, cited in Blaxer, Hughes & Tight, 2010, p 58) Basing on these above differences of the two research approaches, this study will be located in interpretivist paradigms and qualitative methodologies will be used to collect the data for finding the answers for two research questions It is important to restate that this research‘s aim is to explore student’s attitudes towards role play application in a speaking lesson As a result, the research’s objects cannot be in numerical forms for analyzing and they require in-depth analyses The sample size is also small; hence, only qualitative methods are suitable to find the outcomes for this study After considering many research methods, this study will use semi-structured interview, observation and narrative inquiry as its tools to collect data The combination of three research methods is essential to ensure the validity and reliability of the outcomes As stated in Chapter in a series of edition by Dahlberg and McCaig (2010), this combination can be called triangulation methods which enable this study to achieve better and reliable results Hinchey also supports this idea by showing that triangulation application can avoid ambiguity and improve confidence in the findings First of all, semi-structured interview can be regarded as one of the most common qualitative methods (Smith & Bowers-Brown, edited by Dahlberg & McCaig, 2010) A very simple definition of semi- structured interview can be found in Hinchey’s work (2008) “Semi-structured interview is an interview in which the researcher asks some predetermined questions but also allows interviewees times and opportunity to explore other areas they think relevant” (p 82) Three kinds of interviews were discussed in Hinchey’s views as structured- interview, semi-structured and unstructured interview Most researchers agree with this classification as Patton (2002), DiCiccoBloom & Crabtree (2006) They also stress that the crucial advantage of semi-structured interview is its flexibility by using open-ended questions That enables interviewees to express their feelings freely Additionally, it creates a warmer and comfortable atmosphere to increase the trustworthiness between interviewers and interviewees For some authors as Turner (2010), interviews, in general, help to explore the truth deeply through a variety of participants’ stories based on their own experiences, beliefs, and viewpoints This advantage was significantly acknowledged by Marshall & Rossman (1989) as “The process takes in a wider variety of information than if there were fewer participants- the familiar trade-off between breadth and depth Immediate follow-up and clarification are possible”(p.102) However, they realized some main disadvantages of interview The data collected from interview can be difficult to analyze because of its complexity There are many factors affecting to the interview process such as the relationship and trustworthiness of interviewers and interviewees, the topics, the interviewees’ characteristics , for example, they are excited to talk or they are shy, preserved and not want to share so much and so on Semistructured interviews seem to possess all these strengths and weaknesses as a general interview But it is different from other types of interviews It is less structured than structured interview, so it is more flexible The interviewees are free to talk and the interviewers can probe intermediate questions following interviewees ’responses In addition, it is easier to be analyzed than unstructured interviews because it has a list of guided questions for participants to follow An example of using semi- structured interview is a study of Lupton (1988) She wanted to know about food preferences of participants Then she conducted thirty three semi-conducted interviews which were carried out by four female interviewers of whom she was included Lupon used many open-ended questions to ask participants about their food preferences For example, she wanted to know which kinds of food people liked or disliked; which types were considered to be healthy or unhealthy; which types were seen as a good way to lose weight or gain weight; were there any changes in food preferences when they grow up In the process of an interview, many new questions were asked to satisfy the purpose of the study In the study of Pham (2006), a semistructured interview was carried out in seven English educators in Vietnam He wanted to look for the reason why teachers seem to neglect doing research in their institutions He emailed to 21 English teachers all around the country to invite them to participate in the interview There are only seven teachers to whom he could access to have a face- to- face interview Before the interview, a set of predetermined questions in open-ended forms was delivered to them so as to guide them through the content before the real talks The native language for both the researcher and the participants, Vietnamese, was used in the interview After that these talks were transcribed and translated into English There were two participants to check for the accuracy of the transcripts The interviews helped to reveal one of some main reasons for his research questions He found out that Vietnamese teachers did not want to research because they did not have enough time available One more reason was that they felt discouraged because there is no hope for their research findings to be disseminated In Pham’s study, interviews are used practically to seek the findings for his questions It can be inferred from the above strengths that interview is a useful tool to collect the data for my research The second method will be reviewed and taken a great consideration is observation Observation is defined as a process of watching and participating in a natural setting to study about people‘s activities in this environment (Kawulick, 2005) Marshall & Rossman (1989) previously took observation as “a fundamental and highly important method in all qualitative inquiry” (p 99) It is clearly demonstrated that to catch all the moments in a speaking lesson, observation seems to be very effective to describe students’ performance and attitudes According to Schmuck (1997) (cited in Kawulich, 2005, p.2), this method “provide researchers with ways to check for nonverbal expression of feelings, determine who interacts with whom, grasp how participants communicate with each other’’ This idea is of significant importance for this study because it aims to examine students’ performance in terms of fluency in a speaking lesson That means observation can easily check whether students interact with one another; whether they use their body language to communicate successfully; and whether they can transfer the meaning of the conversation with their high motivation and excitement According to Van Lier‘s classification (1988), observation methods are divided into two kinds: participant observation and non-participant observation Later they were called convert and open observation as in Smith & Bowers-Brown (2010).Van Lier showed that the most commonly used in classroom research was non- participant observation That meant the observer did not participate into the classroom lesson They sat from afar like birdwatchers They focused on what they wanted to find out and took notes with careful attention In his views, this method has some main advantages It is easy to carry out in any classroom conditions Its results can be used to analyze and evaluate teacher’s teaching ability, methods and techniques It can also evaluate students’ attitudes, levels and learning styles in some cases However, there are some problems when applying this method As in his book, Van Lier (1988) emphasized that “an observer may never be able to observe a natural, undisturbed lesson” (p.39) There is a tendency that when teachers and students realize the occurence of unfamiliar observer in the class, they will behave in different ways They may try to hide their mistakes and conduct the lesson with their best efforts Especially it is likely true in teaching and learning contexts in Vietnam where people seem to consider losing face as an unacceptable experience Everything will be well prepared and as I remember when I was a student, teacher designed special questions and gave students beforehand They would then act like a perfect machine which had been programmed in advance Consequently, the results might not reflect real situations of any classrooms Moreover, this method required experienced observers who had to be expertise in the evaluation process They strictly followed the principle and ethics of classroom observation One more thing was that their opinions and evaluation were totally subjective Van Lier significantly stated that it was quite difficult to keep a truly objective observation because unintended factors from personal perspectives might appear These factors could result in unreliable findings and solutions In short, a clear view for both strengths and weakness of observation should be taken into account carefully before applying it in this study Taking an example of Dixon’s study in 2013, he discovered the disconnection between teachers and young learners in a Grade class (Students from to years old) He watched the teaching practice from the back of the classroom and realized that the teacher had no connection with her students, even ones who were in trouble and wanted a help from the teacher Dixon claimed that young students were expected to be cared for their interests and needs Teachers, hence, would know how to engage each child in the lesson and how to see teaching process through students’ eyes By analyzing the photos taken during the lesson, combining with all field notes from his observations, he concluded that in the context of South Africa, students had no place for themselves to participate in classroom’s activities Moreover, old practices in education prevented teachers from connecting with their students They were considered as the most powerful and dominant in the class In his study, observation proves to be a very suitable and effective tool to collect the information The third method will be presented in this study is narrative inquiry To begin with the definition of narrative inquiry, it is very interesting to quote a thoughtful saying from Butler-Kisber (2010) which was adapted from a North American perspective As in his saying, narratives were used to “bring silenced voices to centre stage” (p 63) It is considered as one of the most important feature of narrative inquiry in terms of exploring people’s thoughts, beliefs, and their hidden or unheard stories Most researchers agree with the definition that narrative inquiry is a qualitative method which uses participants’ stories to gather the data Chase (2005) explained that a narrative story tell important things or bring a close relation about life from its inception Before the time of Chase, Richardson (1995) highlighted the value of using narrative as “If we wish to understand the deepest and most universal of human experience, if we wish our work to be faithful to the lived experiences of people,…then we should value the narrative” (pp.218-219) Bell (2002) also had a very interesting way of seeing narrative when saying that “they provide a window into people’s beliefs and experiences” (p 209) These authors share a true value of one of the most significant strengths of narrative It is its ability to convey people’s living authenticity underneath their stories Bell developed his idea in 1997 which clearly showed some main advantages of narrative as: providing a deep analysis on people’s experience; opening new assumption to the surface and illuminating the temporal motion of experience (p.209) However, he realized some weaknesses of narrative application In his view, narrative is hard to apply for a large number of samples because of time consuming Additionally, the collaboration between researchers and participants played an important role in the success of a narrative process Especially, he stressed the most serious problem was the ethics of story tellers Barkhuizen (2008) discovered that narrative inquiry was so powerful in helping him to integrate into Afrikanans- speaking teachers’ lives They came from South Africa and were living in New Zealand then He wanted to unveil the experiences of being immigrants in a new country Two teachers who were named Betty and Roxanne told him about their early living experience there After that they shared and analyzed these stories as a part of the course assessment He suggested that this way of using narrative could be very useful for other teachers under the same circumstances Particularly, these teachers, after reflecting their own problems, could themselves chase their own solutions Cadman and Brown (2011) used narrative to investigate living conditions of English teachers in remote Aboriginal Australia, where the new policy was implemented to improve English competency for students Through the stories of three teachers, they saw, what they called, ‘shocking moments’ of their lives the first time they taught there In this context, they found out that “narrative inquiry became a convincing and salient methodology for our research” and “saw the potential to flesh our teachers’ lived experience” (p 446) These two mentioned studies are worth considering for choosing an appropriate method for this study After looking carefully through three research methods, I will use them to collect the data for checking my hypothesis In T & M Center, a course includes 24 lessons, equal to 48 learning hours There are 24 students in my class, males and 15 females I plan to apply role play activities in four weeks (equal to 12 lessons because they have three lessons per week) Due to limited time and it is a private center, so it is not easy to ask for permission from the Director for a longer time to pilot a new method After four weeks of role play implementation, I will spend time to conduct an interview with my students I choose those who are volunteers to participate in my research I intend to interview no more than ten students, so in case there are more than ten volunteers, I will choose ten out of them randomly The semi-structured interview will focus on some main questions: What you think about role play? How you feel when taking part in a role play activity? How does role play motivate you to speak? What you like/ dislike about role play? These questions will be designed in open- ended forms to let students talk as much as they can As reviewed in the first stage, a semi- structured interview is flexible and easy to extend to other questions, which enables students to feel comfortable and relaxed as if they were in a daily talk with their teacher (Hinchey, 2008) Therefore, there will be more than four basic questions to ask and these questions will arise when these interviews happen It takes about 30 minutes for each interview section Then I will record these interviews; transcribe them after finishing 10 interviews The data will be coded and analyzed depending on different themes At that time I will know students’ feelings, attitudes towards role play activities If interview is conducted after four weeks of role play application, then observation will be conducted during the four weeks Three volunteer teachers who are teaching at T & M will be the observers in six lessons Time limitation prevents me from asking them to observe for more than six lessons When they observe, they will take notes and pay attention to some main points of the speaking practice Four criteria of a successful speaking ability in terms of fluency will be the yardstick for their notes They are the way students using their body language, meaning transference, the way they speak with enjoyment and motivation and whether they are confident or not when they speak to their friends I will collect these notes and analyze to find out how my students perform in four weeks Three volunteer teachers, after giving me their notes, will continue to write narratives to reveal what role play can bring to them on the perspectives of teachers These stories will help me to discover their thoughts, beliefs, and experience on teaching role play in a speaking lesson I will give them a limitation for a story of 500 to 800 words to shape their writing length in order to avoid the waste of time and effort Before conducting this study, I realize some problems in ethics that often happen in a qualitative research According to the theory of Smith (2010) (edited by Dahlberg & McCaig), I will strictly follow his guidelines for acknowledging these arising problems First of all, before I conduct my research, I have to inform to all participants the detailed information of the study The informed consents will be given for all participants and it is essential to give them all related information that they want to know I will make the plan as explicit as possible and clearly demonstrate what I want to find out, what I expect to get after the study This helps to provide participants a clear view of what will happen in the process of doing the research as well as the time schedule Participants must be ones who are volunteers to take part in the program They have the right to withdraw at any time they need, and to refuse to be involved in any researches In case they are on the half way of the program and for some reasons, they not want to continue, it is necessary to get their permission for the usage of their data in the study Besides, when conducting interviews with students, I will ask for their permission for recoding in tapes of their voices If they not like, I will switch off the tape before starting the conversation All the information collected from them will be kept secretly and only used for my research’s 10 purposes I also have to ask for permission from the Director of T & M Center, and then ask the voluntary and collaboration of my colleagues To sum up, this study will bring a new approach to teaching methods for both teachers and learners in EFL context They will have a clearer and more detailed view about role play and its application in a speaking lesson Moreover, it helps to guide students to a successful communication which can be achieved not only through the ability to use a language, but through other supporting factors such as body movement, meaning transference and motivation It can create a new further step for doing another research in case role play is proved not to be a proper choice in this context (Words count: 4,265 words) 11 References Barkhuizen, G ( 2008) A Narrative Approach to Exploring Context in Language Teaching ELT Journal, 62 (3), 231-239 Bell, J S (2002) Narrative Inquiry: More than just Telling Stories TESOL Quarterly, 36, 207212 Blaxter, L., Hughes, C., & Tight, M (2010) How to research Maidenhead: Open University Press McGraw-Hill Education Brown, J D (1988) Understanding research in second language learning: A teacher's guide to statistics and research design Cambridge Cambridge University Press Butler-Kisber, L (2010) Qualitative inquiry: Thematic, narrative and arts-informed perspectives Los Angeles: Sage Cadman, K., & Brown, J (2011) TESOL and TESD in Remote Aboriginal Australia: The "True" Story? TESOL Quarterly, 45(3), 440-462 Creswell, J W (2003) Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed method approaches Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage DiCicco‐Bloom, B., & Crabtree, B F (2006) The qualitative research interview.Medical education, 40(4), 314-321 Dixon, K (2013) A Change of Perspective: Seeing through Children at the Front of the Classroom, to Seeing Children from the Back of the Classroom Studies in Philosophy and Education, 32 (3), 273-284 Family Health International., Mack, N., Woodsong, C., & United States (2005).Qualitative research methods: A data collector's field guide North Carolina: FLI Hinchey, P H (2008) Action research primer New York: Peter Lang Kawulich, Barbara B (2005) Participant Observation as a Data Collection Method Qualitative Social Research (2), retrieved from http://www.qualitative-research.net/fqs/ 12 Marshall, C., & Rossman, G B (1989) Designing qualitative research Newbury Park, Calif: Sage Moen, T (2006) Reflections on the narrative research approach International Journal of Qualitative Methodology, 5(4), Article Retrieved from http://www.ualberta.ca/~iiqm/backissues/5_4/html/moen.htm Muijs, D (2010) Doing quantitative research in education with SPSS: Sage Pham, H, H (2006) Researching the Research Culture in English Language Education in Vietnam TESL Journal 10 (2) 2-19 Smith, M & Bowers-Brown, T Different Kinds of Qualitative Data Collection Methods.(2010) In Dahlberg, L.& McCaig, C (Eds.) Practical research and evaluation: A start-to-finish guide for practitioners 111-125 London: Sage Smith, M (2010) Ethics and Research Governance In Dahlberg, L.& McCaig, C (Eds.) Practical research and evaluation: A start-to-finish guide for practitioners 111125 London: Sage Turner, D.W., III (2010) Qualitative interview design: A practical guide for novice investigators The Qualitative Report, 15(3).754-760 Retrieved from http://www.nova.edu/ssss/QR/QR15-3/qid.pdf Van, L L (1988) The Classroom and the Language Learner: Ethnography and second Language classroom research London: Longman 13 [...]... other supporting factors such as body movement, meaning transference and motivation It can create a new further step for doing another research in case role play is proved not to be a proper choice in this context (Words count: 4,265 words) 11 References Barkhuizen, G ( 2008) A Narrative Approach to Exploring Context in Language Teaching ELT Journal, 62 (3), 231-239 Bell, J S (2002) Narrative Inquiry:...purposes I also have to ask for permission from the Director of T & M Center, and then ask the voluntary and collaboration of my colleagues To sum up, this study will bring a new approach to teaching methods for both teachers and learners in EFL context They will have a clearer and more detailed view about role play and its application in a speaking lesson Moreover, it helps to guide students to a successful... Education in Vietnam TESL Journal 10 (2) 2-19 Smith, M & Bowers-Brown, T Different Kinds of Qualitative Data Collection Methods.(2010) In Dahlberg, L.& McCaig, C (Eds.) Practical research and evaluation: A start-to-finish guide for practitioners 111-125 London: Sage Smith, M (2010) Ethics and Research Governance In Dahlberg, L.& McCaig, C (Eds.) Practical research and evaluation: A start-to-finish guide for. .. (1989) Designing qualitative research Newbury Park, Calif: Sage Moen, T (2006) Reflections on the narrative research approach International Journal of Qualitative Methodology, 5(4), Article 5 Retrieved from http://www.ualberta.ca/~iiqm/backissues/5_4/html/moen.htm Muijs, D (2010) Doing quantitative research in education with SPSS: Sage Pham, H, H (2006) Researching the Research Culture in English Language... just Telling Stories TESOL Quarterly, 36, 207212 Blaxter, L., Hughes, C., & Tight, M (2010) How to research Maidenhead: Open University Press McGraw-Hill Education Brown, J D (1988) Understanding research in second language learning: A teacher's guide to statistics and research design Cambridge Cambridge University Press Butler-Kisber, L (2010) Qualitative inquiry: Thematic, narrative and arts-informed... Perspective: Seeing through Children at the Front of the Classroom, to Seeing Children from the Back of the Classroom Studies in Philosophy and Education, 32 (3), 273-284 Family Health International., Mack, N., Woodsong, C., & United States (2005).Qualitative research methods: A data collector's field guide North Carolina: FLI Hinchey, P H (2008) Action research primer New York: Peter Lang Kawulich,... (2011) TESOL and TESD in Remote Aboriginal Australia: The "True" Story? TESOL Quarterly, 45(3), 440-462 Creswell, J W (2003) Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed method approaches Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage DiCicco‐Bloom, B., & Crabtree, B F (2006) The qualitative research interview.Medical education, 40(4), 314-321 Dixon, K (2013) A Change of Perspective: Seeing through Children at... Governance In Dahlberg, L.& McCaig, C (Eds.) Practical research and evaluation: A start-to-finish guide for practitioners 111125 London: Sage Turner, D.W., III (2010) Qualitative interview design: A practical guide for novice investigators The Qualitative Report, 15(3).754-760 Retrieved from http://www.nova.edu/ssss/QR/QR15-3/qid.pdf Van, L L (1988) The Classroom and the Language Learner: Ethnography