Sáng kiến kinh nghiệm Using some effective activites for the production part in grammar lessons to improve speaking skill for 10th form students

 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1	 
INTRODUCTION	2 CONTENT	 3	 PART 1: : THEORITICAL AND PRACTICAL BACKGROUND	3
: Theoritical and practical background	3 
: Practical background	 4
PART 2: THE SOLUTION	 	6
2.1 : Presentation	 8 
2.2 : Questionaire	9
2.3 : Project based activity	11 
2.4: Describing the pictures	12
2. 5: Role- play	15 
2.6: Chain games	17
2.7 : Mapped dailogue	17
2.8: Discussion	19
PART 3 : DISCUSSION	21
CONCLUSION	25
REFERENCE	26
APPENDICES	27
INTRODUCTION
Nowadays the trend of international intergration in many fields, including the field of education has put English a position of paramount importance. Seeing the importance of this languge in international communication as well as in international intergration education in Viet Nam chooses English as a subject that plays a major role. English is not only neccessary for the tourism , foreign trade ... but also a subject in GCSE examination. So, each student needs a certain level of English to prepare for their exam and after graduating they must have at least the ability to communicate , read and write some common texts. To achieve these requires, both teachers and students must work very hard, creatively all the time. In teaching learning process, the teachers need to renovate teaching method to make students active and fun. The differrent ways will help students to practice skills effectively and give them the ability of using foreign languages.
English has four skills : reading, speaking, listening and writing. Foreign language learning requires students and teachers to focus on all skills because they are applied in daily life. And linguistic knowledge is also very improtant for students when they study English because it always plays the role of the means and conditions to form communication skills. Therefore, when studying language, students must focus on phonetics, vocabulary and grammatical points. With the knowledge, students know about the linguistic, special knowledge about grammar, they can use them for communication.
In fact, the students at my school can do written tests about grammartical knowledge rather well but they meet problems in speaking. Because the teacher often asks students to do exercises in their text books after they are introduced grammartical points, not use them to communicate. So, teaching speaking skill for students in grammar lessons is very neccessary.
To help students speak English better, I designed some activities for production part of language focus periods of English 10. From the activities I applied, I have written a teaching experience named: “ Using some effective activites for the production part in grammar lessons to improve speaking skill for 10th form students.”
From the above discussion, my experienced ideas will make a little contribution on applying the vocabulary and grammartical points for developing English speaking skill for 10th students. 
CONTENT
PART 1: THEORITICAL AND PRACTICAL BACKGROUND
1.1 : Theoritical background
* What is grammar ?
In order to tackle the issues related to language awareness and use, it is important to first give a definition of grammar. According to David Crystal ( “ In Word and Deed.” TSE Teacher, April 30, 2004) , “Grammar is the structural foundation of our ability to express ourselves. The more we are aware of how it works, the more we can monitor the meaning and effectiveness of the way we and others use language. It can help foster precision, detect ambiguity, and exploit the richness of expression available in English. And it can help everyone-not only teachers of English, but teachers of anything, for all teaching is ultimately a matter of getting to grips with meaning”. So, a grammar is a description of the rules of the structure of a language; the way words combine, the order they come in, the way they change according to their relationship to other words, how they build up into units like a sentence etc.
We can have other definition of grammar is that grammar is the characteristic system of inflections and syntax of a language and it is a system of rules that defines the grammatical structure of a language. 
* What is teaching grammar?
Grammar is very important and central to the teaching and learning of languages because it helps the learners express their ideas that are understood by the listeners. It is also one of the more difficult aspects of language to teach well.
Many people, including language teachers, hear the word "grammar" and think of a fixed set of word forms and rules of usage. They associate "good" grammar with the prestige forms of the language, such as those used in writing and in formal oral presentations, and "bad" or "no" grammar with the language used in everyday conversation or used by speakers of nonprestige forms. 
When teaching grammar, many teachers often teach a set of forms and rules. They teach grammar by explaining the forms and rules and then drilling students on them. This result is bored, disaffeted students who can produce correct forms on exercises and tests, but consistently makes errors when they try to use the language in context. Meanwhile, other language teachers, influenced by recent theoretical work on the difference between language learning and language acquisition , tend not to teach grammar at all. Believing that children acquire their first language without overt grammar instruction, they expect students to learn their second language the same way. They assume that students will absorb grammar rules as they hear, read and use language in communication activities. This approach does not allow students to use one of the major tools they have as learners: their active understanding of what grammar is and how it works in the language they already know. 
From two ways of teaching grammar above, we see that teaching forms and rules in grammar lessons is neccessary but undestanding the meaning of grammatical points and then using them for communication are more important. So, appying the communicative approach in teaching grammar can balance these extremes. This aproach recogrnizes that overt grammar instruction helps students acquire the language more efficiently, but it incorporates grammar teaching and learning into the larger context of teaching students to use language. Instructors using this model teach students the grammar they need to know to accomplish defined communication tasks.
The purpose of teaching grammar in new trend is helping students communicate in real situations. To gain this goal, teacher must let students speak , speak and speak. This means that in process of teaching grammatical points, teacher should design the activites to develope speaking skill for students.
1.2 : Practical background
At my school, in grammar lessons, students are often required to do exercies in their books to apply knowledge they have learnt. These controlled and repeatedly activities make students feel bored and they do not have many chances to practice what they have learnt in communication. So, designing activites for students to speak at class when they study grammatical points is neccesary.
In the early school year, I did two surveys in class 10A4 at my school to check students’ ability of understanding and using the grammatical points they learnt: The first survey was done to check the ability of doing exercises in written test and the second survey was done to check the ability of speaking ( including accuracy and fluency) 
The first survey was a multiple choice exercises with content about the use of be going to and present progressive ( Unit 6- English 10 ) :
Choose the best answer to complete each following sentences:
1. I feel terrible. I think I_________sick.
A. will be B. am going to be C. am being D. was going to be
2. The cat is just behind the rat. It _____________the latter.
A. is catching B. was catching C.is going to catch D. are going to catch
3. You are going to repaint your room,____________?
A. aren’t you B. are you C. don’t you D. won’t you
4. My mother is going to___________a new bicycle for me at my birthday next week.
A. have bought B. to buy C. buying D. buy
5. Some students in my class _____________their summer vacation at home.
A. are not going to spend B. are going to not spend
C. are not going to spending D. are not spending
6. He has just filled that bucket with water. ______________wash the car, isn’t he?
A. Is he going to B. He is going to 
C. He is going C. He is going to wash 
Key: 1.B 2. C 3. A 4. D 5. A 6. B
With the exercise above, I see that there are about 30% students to get mark 10; 40% students to get mark 8-9; 20% students get mark 6-7; 10% students get mark 4-5. This result shows that students can do exercises in written tests quite good and they can use the grammartical points for doing exercises in their books rather correctly.
But when I ask students to use be going to and present progessive to make a dialogue to talk about the birthday party next week, they meet some mistakes ( The second survey )
 The conversation
 Error analyzing
Hoa : Good evening, mum!
Mum : Good evening. What are you writing, Hoa ?
Hoa : I’m writing a letter to dad to tell about the plan for my birthday.
Mum : Really ? Your birthday will come .
Hoa : Yes, it’s on Saturday this week. And I will celebrate it on Saturday night.
Mum : All right. What is your plan for the party ?
Hoa : I am going to inviting all my classmates and some neighbours.
Mum : What about food and drink ?
Hoa : I going to buy a birthday cake, some fruit and drink such as : apples, mangoes, oranges and Cocacola.
Mum : are you going prepare pop music?
Hoa : No, I am going not to play pop music but prepare dance music
Mum : That’s sounds interesting.
Hoa : Thanks mum! I hope my dad will be at home on my birthday
-will come: Wrong tense
- will celabrate: Wrong tense
- going to inviting: Wrong form of tenses
- I going to buy: Short of “be”
- going prepare: short of “ to”
- going not to play: wrong order of the sentence
I also did the same surveys with other grammatical points such as: Used to + infinitive; Tenses; Comparision...and realized that students can do better at written tests than oral tests because they are rarely taught how to speak at grammar lessons. Almost teachers only focus on presenting structures and rules to do exercises in their books.
To help students correct the mistakes mentioned above, I design some effective activities for the production part in grammar lessons of English 10. With these activities students can understand more the grammatical points they have learnt and apply them in real situations for communication.
PART 2: THE SOLUTION
There are many writings about improving speaking English accuracy and fluency, they are both techniques and activities. We can apply these theories for our teaching and learning process. But with the level of my students, I have some other techniques and activities to motivate them to speak English . From these exercies, students will know how to apply vocabulary and grammartical structures to communicate and the grammar lessons become more interesting for them.
In English 10, students study many grammartical structures and they are used a lot in speaking everyday such as : tenses, questions, relative clauses... So, I have designed 8 types of exercies to apply these grammatical points. I applied these ativities to give the production for students after they are introduced grammar structures and after they have done some kinds of exercies in their text books.The activities I applied are:
- Presentation : This activity is used to raise students’ speaking ability in front of class by talking about themself or some other discussions.
- Questionaire : It is used to help students be more confident in talking by doing a survey and then making the report.
- Project based activity: It is used to help student know how fluency they speak English by record what they had spoken.
- Describing the pictures : Students know how to tell information appeared in the pictures and this activities make them more motivative in learning.
- Role- play : This activity helps students act as the person in the situation and make them feel they are the person in the real situations.
- Chain games : It is used to help students create in giving information. They can like this very much.
- Mapped dailogue : Students can make a mini - dailogue depending on some suggestions ( word cues, pictures...).
- Discussion : Students can give out their ideas about some problems or give out the reasons for their choice of something.
During the process of practicing, teacher notes students about the pronunciation of words, linking words ( stand- up, look- at, it’s my friend...) , or intonation of the sentences and encourage them trying to avoid the hesitation , pause in speaking( John, John or J-J-John...). And here are the uses of these activities in real lessons.
2.1 : Presentation ( Applied in Unit 1: A day in the life of....)
* Unit 1 : A day in the life of...
a. Aim of activity: This activity is used in Unit 1 to help students talk about themself by using The present simple tense, past simple tense and adverbs of frequency.
b. Time for activity: 8 minutes
c. Way of organising : Pairwork and individual work
d.Preparation: Teacher prepares a poster on the board with brainstorming information: 
 Talking about yourself, base on the information
 1. Name
` 
 YOURSELF
3. Family
 4. Hobbies
5.Daily activities
6.Activities last Sunday
2.Date/Place of birth
e. Procuduce: 
* Step 1: Teacher hangs out the poster on the board, asks students to work in pairs in 3 minutes to share information about themselves, base on the infomation on the poster. Teacher notes students to speak in sequence from 1 to 6. Teacher can guide students to start the presentation with : 
Hello/ Hi/ Good morning everybody. My name is.................Today, I am very happy to talk to all of you about myself.................................................................................
and to fininsh the presentation with:
That’s all. Thanks for your listening. Have a good day!
Or students can choose other ways to present information.
Teacher can gives out a model for the class with low or average level of students:
Hello everybody! My name is Hong. Today I am very happy to talk to all of you about myself. I was born on 12th April 1997 in Vien Thanh and now I am 16 years old. There are four people in my family : my parents, my brothers and I. Now we are living in Vien Thanh village. I love my family very much. I like reading picture books such as: Doremon, Conan and I often listen to music in my freetime. Everyday, I get up at 5 a.m to study old lesson. I go to school in the morning and sometimes in the afternoon. At 5 p.m, I usually play volleyball with my friends and I often help my mother cook dinner at 6 p.m . In the evening, I do my homework at 8 p.m and go to bed at 10.30. 
It was very special for me Last Sunday. I went to the beach with my family. It was very interesting. That made me feel stronger for a new week.
That’s all. Thanks for your listening. Have a good day!
* Step 2: After 3 minutes, teacher calls students to go to the board and present in front of the class. Teacher asks other students to comment students’ speaking
2.2 : Questionaire
( Applied in Unit 2, Unit 12, Unit 14 )
* Unit 2 : School talks 
a. Aim of activity : This activity is used to help students to be more active and confident in communication by applying Wh- questions for speaking.
b. Time of activity : 7 minutes
c. Way of organising : Group work of four
d. Preparation: Teacher preapare a questionaire like this on hand out:
A Questionaire
Questions to ask
Me
 Fr.1
 Fr.2
 Fr.3
1. Date and place of birth
2. Height
3. Weight
4. Brother(s) & Sister(s)
5.Means of transport
6. Secondary school
7.Favourite subject
8.Favourite sport
9. Favourite music
10. Future job
e. Proceduce : 
* Step 1 : Doing a survey
Teacher delivers handout to each group of students and gets them to go around to interview other students information in the notes and complete the answer sheet by using Wh- questions in 3 minutes. 
Ex : A : When and where were you born ?
 Fr.1 : ( I was born ) on 1st March , 1997 in Vien Thanh
 Fr.2 : ( I was born ) on 5th May , 1997 in Son Thanh
 A: How tall are you ?
 Fr.1: I’m 1.5 metres
 Fr.2 : I’m 1.56 metres
 A: ...........................................................................................
* Step 2: Making a report
Teacher calls 3 students to report their results before the class and gives feedback.
Suggested report : I’ve known that Lan was born on 1st March 1997 in Vien Thanh. She is 1.5 metres in height and 43 kilos in weight. She has only a sister, no brother. Lan often goes to school by bike at 6.30 o’clock. Vien Thanh Upper- secondary school is her old school. She likes studying Maths, English and Geography.Volleyball is her favourite sport. When she has free time, she often listens to pop music . She wants to become a doctor in the future.
2.3 : Project based activity : 
( Applied for Unit 3, Unit 5 )
* Unit 5: Technology and you
a. Aim of activity : This activity is used to feedback student’s talking by asking them to use The past perfect or past tenses to tell a piece of news. They can use other tenses if neccessary.
b. Time : 8 minutes
c. Way of organising : Groupwork of four 
d. Preparation :- Teacher asks students to prepare information for a piece of news at home. The news may be not real.
- Teacher prepares a micro and a mobile phone. 
e. Proceduce :
* Step 1: Teacher supposes that a student is an M.C of VTV News Program and gets them to use their information they prepared at home to make some news in 3 minutes in group of four. (The new is not too long ). They can choose any news in the group to talk by using past perfect , past tenses or they can choose other tenses to talk if neccessary.
* Step 2: Teacher asks about 3 Ss to go to the board to play an M.C to speak the news they have prepared. And teacher uses the mobile phone to record. ( Teacher notes students about the non-verbal communication while speaking ). After that, teacher plays the record and asks the rest students to decide who is the best M.C
Suggested news :
Good evening everybody! This is our VTV News. A student comes from Yen Thanh village, Nghe An province has just got the first prize for Olympic English test through internet . Her name is Tran Thi Lan Anh. Now she is in the 10th form students of NamYen Thanh high school. She has just come back home from Ha Noi. Before she attended the competition, she had studied and practiced English very hard. She had listened and spoken English by the time she went to bed . So, she gets the success now. We admire her very much.
2.4 : Describing the pictures 
( Applied for Unit 4, Unit 10 )
* Unit 4: Special education
a. Aim of activity : This activity is used to help students raise ability of decsribing something appearing in the pictures by using the structure : Used to + infinitive .This kind of exercise often gives students the interest and motivation in learning. 
b. Time of activity : 8 minutes
c. Way of organising : group work of four.
d. Preparation : Teacher prepares two pictures of their village in the past and now
 The village in the past The village now 
e. Proceduce: 
* Step 1: Teacher hangs out two pictures on the board and asks students to look at the pictures to talk about the differences between two pictures in group of 4 in 3 minutes ( Picture 1: Your village in the past; Picture 2 : Your village now ). Students use structure : Used to + infinitive / Didn’t use to + infinitive and the present tenses to speak.
Teacher can suggest students to talk about : houses, trees, roards, means of transport, entertainment, school, electricity, work
* Step 2: After 3 minutes,