Teaching the students of class 11A3 to speak english naturally through “effortless english” method at Quan Son 2 upper - Secondary school in Quan Son, Thanh Hoa
In the last two decades, English has been a compulsory subject in schools, colleges and universities throughout Vietnam. Although, the learning and teaching of English have been paid much attention to, there exits certain problems in learning English in Vietnam, especially in upper- secondary schools. Despite the fact that upper- secondary school students have a large amout of vocabulary and structure, they tend to find that it is difficult to use what they have to speak, especially in communication in real life.
The GCSE examination and the entrance examination for upper- secondary school students are replaced by only one examination- the national examination. English is one of the core subjects, which are complusory in this examination. Therefore, Students have invested a lot of time in studying it.
However, it can be said that most of students are stressed and frustrated about their speaking abilities. Some feel completely hopeless and feel they will never be able to speak English powerfully.
Generally speaking, students often feel nervous or shy when they try to speak English. They even struggle to understand what someone is saying to them despite years of study. They are embarrassed about their pronunciation or worried that they speak too slowly. Despite the fact that they have vocabulary and grammar, it is difficult for them to actually to use their English to speak.
Table of content Page Chapter 1: Introduction 1 Rationale 1 Research scope ... 1 Aim of the study.. ... 2 Methods of the study..2 Chapter 2: Literature review 3 2.1. Effortless English..3 2.2. Seven essential rules of “ Effortless English” method......3 Chapter 3: The application of “effortless english” Method in teaching the students of class 11A3 to speak English naturally at Quan Son 2 Upper Secondary school 10 3.1. The purpose. .10 3.2. The participants 10 3.3. Time and the process of this application..10 3.4. Some important points of” Effortless English” method used in this study.10 3.5 Some suggested listening topics.......... 11 3.6. An illustrating example for a lesson.11 3.7. The result and findings of the study.16 Chapter 4: Conclusion 17 References ( enclosed CD with the listening tracks of the illustrating lesson) Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1 Rationale In the last two decades, English has been a compulsory subject in schools, colleges and universities throughout Vietnam. Although, the learning and teaching of English have been paid much attention to, there exits certain problems in learning English in Vietnam, especially in upper- secondary schools. Despite the fact that upper- secondary school students have a large amout of vocabulary and structure, they tend to find that it is difficult to use what they have to speak, especially in communication in real life. The GCSE examination and the entrance examination for upper- secondary school students are replaced by only one examination- the national examination. English is one of the core subjects, which are complusory in this examination. Therefore, Students have invested a lot of time in studying it. However, it can be said that most of students are stressed and frustrated about their speaking abilities. Some feel completely hopeless and feel they will never be able to speak English powerfully. Generally speaking, students often feel nervous or shy when they try to speak English. They even struggle to understand what someone is saying to them despite years of study. They are embarrassed about their pronunciation or worried that they speak too slowly. Despite the fact that they have vocabulary and grammar, it is difficult for them to actually to use their English to speak. Quan Son is one of the mountainous districts of Thanh Hoa province. The living condition and studying condition are poor and restrict. Although students who are in grade 11 have been learning English for 6 years, they still feel that English is a very difficult subject, especially the speaking skill. They have many difficulties in using English to speak or communicate with others. Besides, Quan Sơn has the boder with Lao and a lot of foreigners come here every year. They mainly use English to communicate with people living here. However, most of them can’t speak English, even students. For these reasons, I would like to choose the topic” teaching the students of class 11A3 to speak english naturally through “effortless english” method at Quan Son 2 upper- secondary school in Quan Son, Thanh Hoa” in the hope of guiding upper-secondary students, especially the students of class 11A3 at Quan Son 2 upper- secondary school the ways to speak English naturally. I also expect that this study may help the students be able to gradually speak English easier and more fluently without hesitation and nervousness. 1.2. Reseach scope The study focuces on applying” Effortless English” method in teaching speaking to the students who are in grade 11 so that they can speak English easily and naturally in studying as well as in real life. 1.3. Aim of the study The study is aimed to help the students of class 11A3 use English naturally in speaking step by step. 1.4. Methods of the study In order to achieve the above aim, the teacher supplies topic- listening videos or tapes . After that, students will have time to lisen them again and again. After listening in a period of time, they will gradually know spoken English and speak natuarally. Chapter 2: Literature review 2.1. Effortless English “Effortless English” is a teaching method developed by A. J. Hoge- a native English teacher. He is the author of ” Effortless English- Learn to speak like a native”, the host of “ The Effortless English Show” with over 40 million downloads worldwide. This method includes seven essential rules for learning English which can lead learners to fluency. “Effortless English” is going to be the result of the work learners put in everyday. By following his system, learners will make progress and achieve the result of speaking naturally and “ effortlessly” ( unforced, without stress, hesitation or nervousness). In other words, “effortless” is the result, not the beginning. The goal is to speak English efforlessly. In fact, the name Effortless English was inspired by the Taoist idea of “ wu wei” or effortless effort. It’s a description of that flow state where learners can be expanding a lot of effort and yet it feels totally effortless and natural, not forced. So the point is that “Effortless English” is not about laziness, quick, fixes or impossible scams “Effortless English” mean learners speak English fluently. They do not struggle as they speak. They do not feel nervous or stressed. They do not think about grammar rules or translation. When learners speak English effortlessly, they communicate their ideas clearly. They express their feelings powerfully. They focus on connecting with other people, not on conjugating verbs. They actually enjoy the process of speaking English as they work, travel and learn. Effortless English enables learners to learn English naturally and autommatically- the way children learn before they enter school. In this method, learners are trained to speak English easily, fluently and naturally. 2.2. Seven essensial rules of “Effortless English” method 2.2.1 The first rule- Learn phrases, not individual words A phrase is a group of words. It’s not a whole sentence but a part of a sentence. When finding a new word, learners always write down the phrase it is in. When they review, they always review all of the phrase not an individual word. For example, they have the word "hate", and they want to learn this new word. They just write down the word "hate", and then they will find in their dictionary the meaning and then they'll memorize it. Hate, hate, hate, hate. That's the old way. In school they probably remembered a lot of individual words. They had those big vocabulary lists, they tried to memorize all of them, trying to remember all these individual single words. It's not a good way to learn. Much better if they learn a phrase, a group of words. They find these phrases in the real English podcasts that they're listening to, in the real English story books that they're reading. So they don't memorize a list in a book. They listen to real English and when they hear a new word they write it down. Or when they're reading a story book and they see a new word, they write it down. But do not just write down that word, they write down the whole phrase. Instead of saying "hate", and they just write down "hate", they would say... they would write down "John hates ice-cream". They write down the whole phras, because phrases give they a lot of information, much more information. Firstly, phrases are easier to remember, because they have meaning, they have a kind of a picture, a story, especially when learners get them from something that they're reading or listening to. They'll remember it. "John hates ice-cream". They remember the whole story, they remember who John is, they remember that he had ice-cream and then they remember he hated it, he didn't like it. So they have all these extra pieces of information, all this extra information helps them remember the meaning of the phrase and the meaning of that word. So it helps their memory. Much easier to remember. Secondly, when they learn phrases, they are learning grammar also. They are not only learning an individual word, they're learning grammar, they're learning how to use that word correctly. They don't need to think about the grammar. They don't need to know the rules. It's automatic. This is another way that native speakers learn English grammar. They learn groups of words, not just one word by one word by one word. Word by word is slow and it doesn't help, and they don't learn any grammar. But when they learn a whole phrase, they write down a phrase, they're getting extra information. . For example "John hates ice-cream". Just that word, that -s on the end: "hates", John hates. They know from grammar study that they're making the subject and the verb agree. They don't need to think about that. Just write down the phrase "John hates ice-cream" and study it, and review it. Always learn the phrase, not just that word. And so, in the future, whenever they say "he hates ice-cream", "she hates ice-cream", they will add that S, the "sss", because that's how they learned it. They learned it correctly. On the other hand, if they learn it from a text book, they just learn: the word "hate" means "does not like". And they only learn that form, "hate", "hate", "hate", and they study, they study, they study, they memorize it. That's when they start making mistakes, because they learned it only this one way. They didn't learn it with other words, so sometimes they'll say "he hate ice-cream". They'll forget the S because they, they never learned it correctly in a sentence. Therefore, every time they find a new word, they shoud write the phrase or the sentence. When they review that word again, when they study it again, always study the entire phrase or sentence. Never study just the word, always the whole phrase. Do this every time. Their grammar will begin to improve. It'll improve much faster. And they'll remember the vocabulary faster and more easily. And they will use that vocabulary more quickly. So they get a lot of great benefits. A lot of great stuff happens when they learn phrases instead of words. Therefore, students shoud learn phrases, not individual word as the first rule when they want to speak English easier and more fluently. 2.2.2. The second rule- Grammar study kills your English speaking When learners study grammar rules, they focus on grammar rules, they focus on analysing English. In other words, they think about English, they think about the past tense, the present tense, the future, the present perfect, the past perfect. For writing English, They can go slowly, they can write very slowly, they can think about it, they can erase when they mistake. But for speaking there's no time. They do not have time to think about the rules for the present perfect tense in English when they're listening and speaking. There's no time. Someone asked them a question, and they must answer immediately. They have no time to think about preposition, verb tenses How do native speakers learn grammar? An English native speaker never studied grammar rules. Not until high school, and he/she studied grammar rules for writing. In college, native speakers study grammar rules again. For writing. But not for speaking. Native speakers learn through listening, through hearing correct grammar, again and again and again and again. A lot of correct grammar. So the best way to learn English grammar is through input. In other words, English coming in, mostly through their ears . If they focus on grammar rules, it will hurt their speaking. They'll speak more slowly, they'll understand more slowly. In conclusion, to speaking English naturallly, learners should not care much about grammar rules. 2.2.3. The third rule- Learn with your ears, not with your eyes Listening, listening, listening and more listening is the key to speaking excellent English. It's the most important thing because if learners listen a lot, they will learn vocabulary, grammar so they will get faster and understand better. Listening is kind of the magic key to great English speaking. There's a lot of research about this and it all shows the same thing: listening is the most important thing they can do. When they learned English in school they probably learned mostly with their eyes. Most English schools, middle school, high school, university, private English schools focus on text books in the classroom. So that's the problem. In school, basically, they learn with their eyes, learn to write English. They also learn to think about English. So they know a lot about grammar rules. In fact, they know more about grammar rules than most Americans, most Canadians, most British people because native speakers don't study that stuff very much. Native speakers learn to speak English with their ears, by listening, listening, listening. And that's what they must do if they want to speak English quickly, easily, automatically, correctly, just like a native speaker. The most important thing is they must listen to easy English. It must be easy. What they should understand 95% [per cent] or more without stopping, without a dictionary. They want a lot of easy English listening. Now, they might try children's programmes. They might try children's audio books. Or maybe audio books for teenagers, like Americans who are 13, 14, 15 years old. If that's too difficult, find something easier. If something's more difficult they can still use it, but they usually need the text, they need to be able to read it. They can get an audio article or a speech, or a lesson, and they have the text, so they can read and listen at the same time. But listening is the most important thing. Listen, listen, listen. Every chance they have. Get an i-pod, they know, get an MP3 player or an i-pod. Listen to English all the time. Listen in the morning when they get up, listen when they go to work, or when they're at home, listen when they're at lunch, listen when they're coming home from work, listen in the evening. Lots and lots and lots of English listening. Lots of easy listening. 2.2.4. The fourth rule- Repetition is the key to spoken mastery Deep learning basically means repeating what they learn again and again. Most schools have a lot of pressure to go fast. Students have to learn more vocabulary, new grammar every week. So, the problem is, the students learn a lot of stuff, but then they forget it, they forget what they learnt. Or they remember the basic idea but they can't use it. So, for example, all students who have studied English learned the past tense, they learned the past tense, but they studied it in a text book and then, they went and they learned more grammar. They learned possessives, the future, the present perfect, etc They're constantly going very fast, so they never mastered the past tense. They did not learn the past tense deeply like a native speaker. That's why they make mistakes with the past tense. They studied many years but they still make mistakes with the past tense. It's because they never mastered it,. So they need to slow down and repeat everything they learn again and again. For example, when people use Efforrtless English lessons, they listen to the same lesson set, the same group of lessons, the same topic, every day for two weeks. It's the same lessons, maybe two or three lessons, they listen to the same ones on Monday, Tuesday, same lessons, Wednesday, same lessons, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, for one week, two weeks. If it's still difficult, then they do it again, three weeks, four weeks. It's not a race. They want to learn everything very deeply so that they really learn it, so that they never forget it, so they can really use it. That's deep learning. They can have a few things or maybe they have two or three audio articles and each day they listen to them all, but then they repeat them again. They're learning deeply. Even after they know the vocabulary, continue listening to the same thing. Because knowing the vocabulary just means they can take a test and they say the meaning, but when they hear it, do they instantly understand it? Can they use it quickly and easily, automatically? If the answer's no, they need to repeat more, they need to listen to that same word, phrase, sentence, article, lesson, again and again and again. Many, many times. This is one of the key secrets to speaking faster and learn grammar. For example they listen to a story in the past tense. Listen to that story again and again , one week, two weeks, three weeks. Then another story in the past tense, one week, two weeks, three weeks. And then another story in the past tense, one week, two weeks, three weeks. They never stop! So they never stop this basic, key, verb tenses, grammar, learning all of it, -... the most common words, they keep listening to them like a native speaker, they hear them every single day. They repeat them again and again. They just need more repetition, they learn more deeply. Focusing on the most common verbs, the most common vocabulary, the most common English, through listening and then repeat. When they do that, that's the key, that's the secret, that's how they will develop, that's how they will get automatic speaking. 2.2.5. The fifth rule- Learn grammar intuitively and unconsciously We tell the same story but we change the point of view. In other words, we change the time, for example. Or we change the grammar somehow in the story. : For exaple: There is a boy, his name is Bill. Bill goes to the store. He buys a bottle of water. He pays two dollars for the water. He has a lot of money. That's the little story in the present, and all they need to do is just listen to it. Listen, listen, listen, listen again. Deep learning, they repeat it a lot of times. Next, the same story, but now it's the past: There was a boy named Bill. Yesterday, he went to the store. He bought a bottle of water. He paid two dollars for the water. He had a lot of money. . Now, in a normal point-of-view story, longer and it's more difficult. Don't think about the grammar rules, they do not think "oh, this is the past tense, oh, paid is an irregular verb". Just listen to the story and understand the meaning. That's all they need to do. Listen to the first story, understand the meaning. Listen to the second story, understand the meaning. That's all. There will be a boy. His name will be Bill. He's going to go to the store and he'll buy a bottle of water. He's going to pay two dollars for the water. So that's the end of our short example in the future. They just listen to this little easy story in the future. They listen in the present. They listen to the past. They listen to the future. And then they can do it again, they can practise There was a boy. Since last year, he has gone to the store every day. He has bought a bottle of water every day. And every day, since last year, he has paid two dollars for the water. He had a lot of water. He was a very famous man. So, they don't need to know the name of the grammar or the verb tense that are used. It's called the present perfect but they don't need to know that. All they need to do is listen to the story. They understand the meaning. But they don't need to think about that. That's why these stories are so easy and powerful. They just listen. They listen to story number one. They listen to the story number two, the story number three, the story number four, and they learn the grammar like a native speaker, like a child. When they learn grammar like this, using these kinds of stories, it goes deep. They learn to use grammar automatically, quickly. They learn to understand it instantly, quickly, automatically. They don't need to think about a bunch of rules. They Forget the rules, they don't need to know them. They want to learn it automatically, the same way all native speakers learned English grammar. Learn English grammar using these point-of-vie
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