Improving students' English speaking skills through interactive approach in a private lower secondary school in Karachi Pakistan

Date of Award

8-1-2009

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Master of Education (M. Ed.)

Department

Institute for Educational Development, Karachi

Abstract

Literature shows that interactive approach such as learning games is one of the interesting strategies to improve students' English speaking skills, but little attention is given to study it in the context of Pakistan. Thus, this study aimed at improving students' English speaking skills through the interactive approach of 'learning games' in a private lower secondary school in Karachi. It followed qualitative paradigm and collaborative action research approach in accordance with the nature of the research question. Likewise, intervention was given to the whole class but actual participants were six mixed ability level students of class 7 and a language teacher. The data was collected through observations, interviews, field notes, audio tape recorder and some relevant documents analysis. The findings reflect that interactive learning games (passing parcel box game, snowball game and guessing game) were fruitful for students in several ways. Firstly, findings showed that learning games made activities interesting and created fear free environment in the classroom. Therefore, it motivated students towards the lesson, made their learning long-lasting and improved their confidence. Secondly, learning games provided students with ample opportunities to listen to each other's ideas and speak the target language and improved their English speaking skills. Snowball game provided students with an opportunity to test their memory and guessing game improved their questioning skills. Thus, it recommends the teachers to include leaning games in their school. Thirdly, students were motivated towards the classroom activities by giving responsibility to a student in each group, playing pop music and sharing of written classroom norms with students. It also enhanced students' social skills and maintained discipline in the classroom by reducing noise. Fourthly, the researcher and participant teacher overcame the local languages and code-switching by speaking simple English and using appropriate body language because they provided clear spoken message to students. Thus, the study recommends the language teachers to use simple language with students. Fifthly, demonstration helped students to learn how to and when to play the games and how to speak relevant content. Therefore, it recommends the school authority to introduce demonstration strategy in school. This study facilitated 'us' (the participant teacher and researcher) to identify our strengths and areas for improvement and we learned to teach speaking skills practically through interactive learning games. Finally, there was no separate period for teaching English speaking and listening skills in the concerned school. Hence, it is recommended that it would be better if the school authority distributes equal marks for each skill and develops a time table with equal time for teaching all four language skills.

This document is available in the relevant AKU library

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