Key Factors Influencing Learners' Oral Fluency in English Speaking Classes: A Case at A Public University in Viet Nam
Key Factors Influencing Learners' Oral Fluency in English Speaking Classes: A Case at A Public University in Viet Nam
Key Factors Influencing Learners' Oral Fluency in English Speaking Classes: A Case at A Public University in Viet Nam
6 (2020) 93-108 93
Abstract: In the field of English language learning, speaking is regarded as one of the most important
skills to be developed and enhanced continually as means of effective communication. In most English classes
at universities, many students find it difficult to express themselves in spoken English. So this research aims
to investigate prominent factors affecting fluency of second-year students in speaking skill. The study uses
mixed research methods with two data collection instruments namely survey questionnaire and semi-structured
interview. The participants joining the survey questionnaire include 98 English non-majored students who were
taking the English speaking course in their second semester at a university. The semi-structured interviews
were conducted with 15 teachers and 15 students. The findings reveal that the group of affective factors is the
prominent one, and then followed by automation, error correction and performance factors influencing their
oral fluency. Therefore, some useful recommendations focusing on interactive strategies to minimize learners’
difficulties in oral fluency as well as develop their fluency in English speaking performance in this study could
be taken into account for EFL teachers in English speaking classes.
Keywords: Oral fluency, prominent factors, fluency, fluency focus, fluency-based activities.
1. Introduction 1
if learners follow the wrong way in learning
“Why are students at universities quite English speaking. Achieving fluency in
hesitant in speaking even though they have English language or any other languages is a
been learning English since they were at goal of any serious learner at universities who
secondary school?” desires to have better career opportunities.
A quick survey by a group of teachers at
This question has usually obsessed two a university for second-year English non-
of us as education researchers during the time majored students shows that the majority of
teaching speaking English language and this is students (99%) agreed that speaking English
also the reason that motivates us to implement fluently was absolutely necessary for their
this study about fluency in speaking. jobs in the future. However, when being asked
Oral fluency has different levels: about how much they liked speaking English
elementary, intermediate and advanced but it in class, only a small number of students
is truly not easy to reach each of these levels (14,4%) preferred to speak English in class
and more than half of them (67%) thought that
*
Corresponding author. Tel.: 0936848766, they had speaking difficulties such as a lot of
Email: phibi1010@gmail.com
94 D. T. B. Ngoc, T. T. Dung / VNU Journal of Foreign Studies, Vol.36, No.6 (2020) 93-108
pauses, a lot of hesitation, lack of confidence. and too many pauses to cause barriers or
Shumin (2002) reveals that knowing language incidents in communication (Nation, 1991).
grammatical and semantic rules are not enough Bailey (2005, p. 5) states that fluency is “the
to learn to speak a foreign language. Therefore, capacity to speak fluidly, confidently, and at a
some of the key factors influencing students’ rate consistent with the norms of the relevant
oral fluency in English speaking performance native speech community.” In other words,
should be taken into consideration and if fluency is “the features which give speech
these factors can solve the fluency problems the qualities of being natural and normal,
in speaking, learners will improve their ability including native-like use of pausing, rhythm,
of speaking fluently. To speak fluently is not intonation, stress, rate of speaking, and use
simply a matter of developing speaking skills of interjections and interruptions” (Richards,
and strategies, but it involves a number of Platt & Weber, 1995, p. 108). In Hedge’s view
factors including affective factors, cognitive (1993), fluency is attributed to “the ability
factors, performance factors, linguistic factors to link units of speech together with facility
and without strain or inappropriate slowness
(Thornbury, 2005). However, there are very
or undue hesitation”. These definitions
few studies covering all factors influencing
mainly focus on the fluidness and confidence
learners’ fluency in speaking and realizing
of producing speech without too much
key factors as well. It is questionable whether
hesitations and pauses. From all the review
only accuracy focus is enough in speaking
above, it is ultimately said that fluency in
classes or not and what key factors affect
speaking emphasizes more on meaning and
the restriction of oral fluency in language
natural requirement of the utterances rather
learners. This research is absolutely necessary
than form or grammatical structures. In this
to investigate fluency and accuracy balance
research, the authors show that fluency plays a
in speaking class and key factors affecting
key point in learners’ speaking skill compared
learners’ oral fluency in speaking classes.
to accuracy in the way that focuses learners
The aim of the study is to find out prominent on less hesitation, fewer pauses and the speed
factors affecting learners’ oral fluency in English increase in speaking in order to reinforce
speaking classes. In addition, some significant learners’ confidence in speaking.
guidance is included to help minimize the
problems and develop oral fluency in learners 2.2. Fluency-based activities
based on prominent factors examined in this
According to Bailey (2003), fluency-
study. More detailed, there is a research question
based activities include:
of the study listed as follows:
What are the key factors that influence • Information -gap
learners’ oral fluency? • Jigsaw activities
2. Literature review • Roleplays
Besides, fifteen teachers who have been conduct the individual interviews consisting of
teaching English for the second-year students 2 questions. All 15 teachers were also included
were also invited to take part in the interview in the semi-structured one-on-one interviews
in the study. There are two males and 13 composing of 4 questions. The questions of
females in this group of teachers and they the interviews served the purpose of obtaining
have from 5 to 10 year experience in teaching detailed information about the respondents’
English for second year university students. feelings in speaking classes and their opinions
on some strategies used to improve oral fluency
4.2. Research instruments and procedures
in English speaking. To get reliable data, the
This study used a mixed methods design researchers transcribed the answers of the
which is the collection of both quantitative and interviewees as immediately as possible, no
qualitative data to understand and explain the more than one day after the interviews.
research problem. The researchers chose survey
4.3. Data analysis and interpretations
questionnaires as the main instrument to gather
quantitative data and then conducted interviews The procedure of data analysis is
to get in-depth qualitative data for the study. as follows. The results of the survey
The survey questionnaire for students which questionnaire were analyzed with the help of
consists of 8 questions was mostly adapted from the Google docs application and displayed in
the survey questionnaires conducted by Marriam, the form of statistics. Then, the data collected
Muhammad and Ashiq (2011) and Nguyen and from the interviews were analyzed and
Tran (2015) because the questions in their surveys presented parallel with the results collected
were suitable to collect data for our study. Besides, from the questionnaire. In this case, the
some questions in our survey were designed based researchers compared the data taken from the
on the theoretical knowledge related to the research questionnaire with the in-depth data from the
topic covered in the literature review. First, the interviews.
questionnaire was piloted and administered to
5. Findings and discussion
ten second-year non-English majored students of
the university who were not included in the study The major results of the study are
in order to get feedback whether the instructions summarized as follows:
and the wording questions can be understood by
Figure 2 illustrates the results of some
the research participants. After tryout and piloting,
problems in oral fluency activities the students
the questionnaire was reviewed by two research
were facing from the perspectives of the
experts. Next, the questionnaire was delivered
students.
to the research participants. Oral instructions
and explanations were given in detail to the
students face-to-face by the researchers before
they answered the questionnaires to avoid any
misunderstandings.
Then, semi-structured one-on-one
interviews for both students and teachers were
carried out by the researchers. The researchers Figure 2: Students’ problems in English oral
chose randomly 15 out of 98 students to fluency
VNU Journal of Foreign Studies, Vol.36, No.6 (2020) 93-108 99
It can be seen from Figure 2 that most to meet the requirements of their course.
of the students (89%) felt hesitant to speak Nevertheless, they still felt nervous and afraid
English in their English classes. They hesitated of making mistakes, which resulting in their
to speak English because they were not sure hesitation and inappropriate pauses when they
whether they used English appropriately or speak in class.
not. More than a half (65.3%) stated that they In brief, the data from Figure 2 obviously
did not know whether their pauses in their shows that hesitation is the most problematic
English speaking chunks were suitable or not. matter among five listed problems to the
Meanwhile, just a little under a half (49% and students. In the study about students’ speaking
43.7%) revealed that they could not think of problems Nguyen and Tran (2015) confirms
anything to say or could not express the ideas that when students want to say something in
in their minds in English speaking lessons, English they are sometimes inhibited. They
and only a small number of the students are worried about making mistakes and
(15.3%) chose the problem resulting from fearful of criticism. Rivers (1968) thinks that
their partner’s reactions. learners often have nothing to say probably
As described in Part 4.1 above, in the because their teachers select a topic that
English courses the students are required is not appropriate for them or they do not
to complete the online lesson before each have enough information about it. Baker
offline lesson to prepare input knowledge for and Westrup (2003) also supports the results
their speaking activities in class. However, shown in Figure 1 and states that it is very
the results collected in Figure 2 made the difficult for learners to speak something
researchers desire to find the causes of the fluently in English when they have few ideas
students’ problems. Therefore, they asked about what to say, which vocabulary to apply,
the students in their first interview question. or how to use grammar accurately.
Above two third of them (12 out of 15) shared The results in Table 1 below demonstrate
that they prepared their online lessons before the factors leading to the referred problems
attending the offline lessons with their teachers the students faced in their oral fluency above.
Table 1: Factors affecting students’ English oral fluency
the students (13 out of 15) said that they felt be the cause leading to the second problem
anxious in most of their English speaking the students suffered in Figure 2. Schmidt
classes, which supported and confirmed (1992) pointed out that if the speed process
the collected results in Table 1. Therefore, was repeated automatically by English
now the hidden reasons for the students’ big learners daily, their fluency in speaking would
problem might be revealed. In other words, achieve. Nguyen (2015, p. 52) also defended
the group of affective factors, especially that “fluency derives from automation”.
“fear of making mistakes”, was found out
Chances of speaking English and the English
as the main cause of making the students
environment were presented as the prominent
hesitate to produce language in conversations.
factors influencing the Chinese students’ oral
Similar to this finding, Yurong and Nan
fluency in the study carried out by Zhang et
(2008) confirmed that four affective factors
al. (2004).Therefore, if the students do not
determined the production of oral English
in their study about the effects of affective practice speaking English regularly, they
factors on students’ English oral fluency. definitely cannot express themselves fluently.
Tanveer (2007) also pointed out that students’ They might pause inappropriately in their
feeling of anxiety or nervousness may impede speaking sequences or chunks of language.
their language learning and performance Besides, Bohlke (2014) ever indicated that
abilities. Additionally, Wu and Lin (2014) whether the students could produce language
agreed with the result that too much anxiety fluently in communication or not depended
led to low willingness to communicate. In the much on their automation which resulted
long run it would have bad effects on learners’ from their exposure to English environment.
achievement in a second language classroom. Students could gradually use language
Around three quarters of the students naturally and unconsciously thanks to diving
viewed automation factor - lack of speaking in English speaking environment frequently.
practice - as an influential factor to their oral The students’ exposure to English speaking
fluency. This factor can be easily inferred to environment can be seen in Table 2.
Firstly, the data in Table 2 indicates The data revealed that the current distribution
that the frequency of students’ responses in of speaking activities in the English lessons
English was not high with the percentage of are appropriate or even advantageous for
“43%, 32.5%, 23.3%, 1.2%” for the options promoting students’ speaking fluency because
of “sometimes, rarely, usually, always” it is much beyond the total time for fluency-
respectively. Secondly, in terms of giving based activities recommended by Brumfit
instructions, 66.7% of the participants shows (1985) as mentioned earlier in this study.
that their teachers sometimes used English
to give instructions in class, while 28.2% Lastly, referring to participation in some
chose the option of “usually” and a very extra English activities outside the classroom,
small number of them (4.6% and 0.5%) it is noticeable that the proportion of the
chose the categories of “rarely” and “always” students’ frequent attendance was low with
respectively. Thirdly, it can be seen from 8.1% for “always” and 15.3% for “usually”.
Table 2 that the large number of the students Meanwhile, the majority of them (55.6%)
(88.7%) agreed on the high frequency of sometimes and rarely joined some outside-
teachers’ translating instructions from English class English activities; even 11% never
to Vietnamese in speaking class. attended any English clubs or tutorial groups.
In the first interview question for teachers, Apparently, the data in Table 2 showed that
the researchers asked them about the reasons the students were currently in a limited
for these dominant statistics. They explained English speaking environment outside the
that most of the time the students asked for classroom. This fact might explain the
the translation because they could not fully students’ difficulties in willingness to express
understand the instructions in English. Besides, their ideas in English without hesitation or
in order to know whether the amount of time in inappropriate pauses.
the English classes supports the students’ oral Again, as can be seen from Table 1, nearly
fluency or not, the teachers were interviewed three quarters of the students thought it was
about the percentage of fluency activities in
the factor of error correction causing fluency
each lesson in the second question. To make
problems. This factor seemed to be closely
sure that all the teachers were clear about
related to some affective factors presented
the features of fluency-based and accuracy
beforehand. This meant that the students
based activities, the researchers explained to
might feel shy if their speaking mistakes were
them briefly beforehand. All of the teachers
mentioned by the teachers. Then, they had
claimed that about 50-75% of the speaking
tasks in their textbook were fluency-based anxiety or fear of making mistakes in speaking
activities. Moreover, these tasks were always class. Nguyen and Tran (2015) also reported
repeated in every lesson in their textbooks. teachers’ feedback as one of the factors
Besides, they shared that all the textbooks affecting students’ speaking performance in
used in their English courses were specifically their study. Besides, the data in Table 1 infer
designed for their own students’ majors and that the students paid much attention to the
for internal circulation only. In other words, feedback or error correction on their speaking.
the board of qualified English teachers of the Figure 3 showed the frequency of the teachers’
university designed the textbooks for their error correction for their students’ speaking
own students based on their need analysis. performance.
102 D. T. B. Ngoc, T. T. Dung / VNU Journal of Foreign Studies, Vol.36, No.6 (2020) 93-108
Figure 3: Frequency of the teachers’ error The last group of factors shown in Table 1
correction including time for preparation, time allowed to
perform a speaking task and listeners’ supports
In Figure 3, over 80% of the participants belonged to the category of performance
stated that they were given feedback or error factors. The small number of the students
correction very often. Therefore, how the (17.6%), under a half (42%) and a small
teachers expressed their opinions on their minority (10%) chose the listeners’ supports,
students’ oral work was also a matter of the time for preparation, time allowed to
concern and questioned in the survey. The perform a speaking task respectively as the
result of this was shown in Figure 4. factors affecting their fluency. Preparation
for the task was also mentioned as a factor
affecting L2 learners’ oral fluency in speech
production in the study performed by Rezail
and Okhovat (2016).
Figure 5 revealed more detailed
information about this performance factor
category.
Figure 4: Teachers’ reactions to students’
mistakes during oral work
The data in Figure 4 was similar to the Generally, students’ performances were
results the researchers obtained later from supported by both their teachers and their
the interviews with the teachers in the third classmates as shown in Figure 5. They were
question. Most of the teachers saved their given time to prepare as well as perform
noted comments and delivered them after the their speaking tasks. Furthermore, in the last
students’ performance. They explained that interview question, the teachers said that
this strategy of correcting mistakes could they usually set a flexible time limit, ranging
help to maintain students’ speaking without from 5 minutes to 12 minutes, for students’
disturbing their performance or even making speaking performances. Besides, they also
VNU Journal of Foreign Studies, Vol.36, No.6 (2020) 93-108 103
explained that the time limit set actually Vietnam, Khong’s study (2019) only showed
depended on the aims of each speaking task, some problems in improving students’ fluency
but they always tried to help students boost in which learning styles, students’ habit of
their speaking fluency. The minor impacts using mother tongue, students’ low motivation
of the performance factors on the students’ and low English level accounting for poor
speaking fluency in their current situation vocabulary, structure, and poor pronunciation
showed us the suitable link to the last problem are listed but which key factors were not
the students had in table 1. mentioned as the main problems among those
in oral fluency. Additionally, the studies have
In short, the findings from the questionnaire
some limitation of the fact that the study
and interviews for the research question
only focused on single factors - affective
demonstrated that among five listed problems
factors, cognitive factors or ranked into the
in English speaking classes, hesitation was
prominent factors and secondary factors but
recognized as the students’ biggest one. Also,
there is the close relationship between factors
the group of affective factors, especially fear
affecting learners’ oral fluency, which were
of making mistakes, was found out as the key
the clues for researchers to compare and
factor influencing the students’ oral fluency.
contrast the results. If the studies only assess
Then, it is followed by three other factors
single factors to come to the conclusion
in sequence of decreasing numbers of the
about the influence on learners’ oral fluency,
students affected namely automation, error
those might not be deep enough in context
correction and performance.
of speaking classes and have not indicated
To compare with some previous studies which factors are key factors among groups
in the past, some distinctive differences in of factors influencing learners’ oral fluency in
our study are shown. Specifically, research speaking classes. Moreover, in these studies,
on factors affecting learners’ fluency in there was a lack of participation in teacher
speaking skill in language learning has been interviews which played a significant role in
mostly limited especially about finding the the objective evaluation of learners’ fluency
key factors on speaking fluency. Zhang et al. problems in speaking classes in order to get
(2004) studied factors influencing Chinese reliable results. Specially, in Vietnam, there
college students’ oral fluency and the results is a serious lack of studies on oral fluency in
were to represent the prominent factors - speaking classes. Our study could solve these
chances of speaking English and the secondary gaps and give some suggestions for educators
factors - the environment of the target culture. to indicate which the key factors in learners’
However, in the Yurong and Nan’ study (2008), oral fluency are in order to make progress to
the two researchers focused on how affective learners’ oral fluency.
factors influencing College English students
on oral English fluency and concluded that 6. Conclusion and Recommendations
affective factors firmly control the process
6.1. Conclusion
of oral output. Rezail and Okhovat’s study
(2016) only focus on cognitive factors in Achieving fluency in speaking English is
second language fluency and the variables an important goal for any English language
Complexity and Preparation affecting second learners. Accordingly, comprehending the
language oral performance. Especially in problems related to fluency and factors causing
104 D. T. B. Ngoc, T. T. Dung / VNU Journal of Foreign Studies, Vol.36, No.6 (2020) 93-108
APPENDIX 1
SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENTS
This survey questionnaire is designed for the study namely “Key factors influencing learners’
oral fluency in English speaking class: A case study at a public university in Vietnam”. Your
assistance in completing the following questions is greatly appreciated. Please put a tick (v) in the
box beside the option(s) you choose.
Part I: Demographic Information
1. Gender:
o Male
o Female
2. How long have you been learning English?
Less than 5 years
o 5 - 10 years
o Over 10 years
Part II: Factors affecting students’ fluency in speaking performance
1. What problems do you encounter in English speaking? (You can choose more than one
option)
o Problem 1: I cannot think of anything to say
o Problem 2: I pause suddenly and inappropriately while speaking English.
o Problem 3: I hesitate to speak English because I am not sure whether I use English
appropriately or not.
o Problem 4: I don’t know how to express the ideas in my mind.
o Problem 5: I can’t reply because I don’t understand what my partner is saying in the
conversation.
2. What factors affect you the most in English speaking performance? (You can choose more
than one option)
o Fear of making mistakes
o Confidence
o Anxiety
o Teachers’ feedback on speaking activity
o Time for preparation
o Time allowed to perform a speaking task
o Listeners’ support
o Lack of background information
o Lack of grammar and lexis
3. How are the performance conditions in English speaking class? (You can put as many ticks
as you want)
Yes No
1. Are you given plenty of time to perform a speaking task?
2. Do you prepare for a task before the task is performed?
3. Do you have the pressure to perform well?
4. Are the listeners supportive?
VNU Journal of Foreign Studies, Vol.36, No.6 (2020) 93-108 107
APPENDIX 2
For teachers
1. How often do you translate the instructions from English to Vietnamese in speaking classes?
Why?
2. How much percentage of fluency activities (small talk, picture description, find someone
who, problem solving, information-gap activities, etc.) are there in each English speaking lesson?
Please answer as detailed as possible.
3. When do you often correct your students’ mistakes: during or after their English speaking?
Why?
108 D. T. B. Ngoc, T. T. Dung / VNU Journal of Foreign Studies, Vol.36, No.6 (2020) 93-108
4. How often do you set time pressure for your students’ speaking performance or let them
speak all the things they’ve prepared for their talk? Why?
For students
1. Do you prepare your online lessons before attending the offline lessons? Why are you still
not sure whether you use English appropriately or not?
2. How do you generally feel when practicing speaking in each English speaking lesson?
3. Does your teachers’ error correction help to improve your English speaking fluency? Why/
Why not?
Tóm tắt: Trong lĩnh vực học ngoại ngữ, kỹ năng nói được coi là một trong những kỹ năng quan trọng
nhất cần được phát triển và nâng cao liên tục để đảm bảo giao tiếp hiệu quả. Trong hầu hết các lớp học
tiếng Anh ở bậc đại học, sinh viên thường gặp khó khăn trong việc diễn đạt ý tưởng bằng tiếng Anh. Vì vậy,
nghiên cứu này được thực hiện nhằm tìm ra yếu tố quan trọng ảnh hưởng đến việc nói tiếng Anh trôi chảy
của sinh viên năm thứ hai. Nghiên cứu này sử dụng phương pháp nghiên cứu hỗn hợp, trong đó bảng điều
tra và phỏng vấn được áp dụng làm công cụ để thu thập dữ liệu định lượng và định tính cho nghiên cứu.
Có 98 sinh viên năm thứ hai thuộc hệ không chuyên tiếng Anh tham gia trả lời câu hỏi trong bảng điều tra.
Thêm vào đó, các tác giả thực hiện các cuộc phỏng vấn cá nhân với 15 giáo viên và 15 sinh viên trong nhóm
trên. Kết quả nghiên cứu cho thấy các nhân tố về cảm xúc chính là yếu tố nổi bật nhất ảnh hưởng đến việc
nói tiếng Anh trôi chảy của sinh viên; sau đó là nhân tố về sự chủ động, việc sửa lỗi của người dạy và việc
trình bày bài nói. Từ đó, các tác giả đưa ra một số đề xuất nhằm giảm thiểu những khó khăn trong việc nói
tiếng Anh trôi chảy và cải thiện mức độ nói tiếng Anh trôi chảy của sinh viên. Đồng thời, đây cũng là những
đề xuất hữu ích cho các giáo viên ngoại ngữ trong việc dạy kỹ năng nói cho người học.
Từ khóa: nói trôi chảy, yếu tố nổi bật, sự trôi chảy, sự tập trung vào mức độ trôi chảy, các hoạt động
tập trung vào mức độ trôi chảy.