M01638
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
Recorded-Role Play in EFL Classroom: A Way of Maximizing Students’ Potential in
Speaking
Krismiyati
Faculty of Information Technology, Satya Wacana Christian University
krismi@staff.uksw.edu
Abstract
Teaching English for non English Department students will be quite a challenge as the students
have various background and interest. Handling those students in a big number in a class that
requires them to speak is another impending challenge. This is an action research on role-play
in English classroom for Information Technology students. This study tries to see whether
recorded-role play could maximize students’ potential in speaking. This study involved 30
students taking English course in Information Technology Faculty. The students were given a
situation in which they had to act the role play. They drafted the role -play before they recorded
it. The result shows that students felt less tense in acting the role. They also got more time to
practice their pronunciation before recording. It even gave students who felt reluctant and shy in
the class to actively participate. In addition, students could play around with the supporting
background sound to show their creativity. Surprisingly, most students do their best to show their
effort in their speaking as the end-product would be played in the classroom, even the most quiet
students performed really well. Finally, this recorded-role play proved to be an effective way to
maximize students’ potential in speaking.
Key Words : recorded-role play, speaking, pronunciation, potential
Introduction
Teaching speaking in a class consisting of 30 students in university level with various levels of
English is quite challenging as most of the time Indonesian and English are used to
communicate. It needs a careful consideration in delivering the material and activities since it has
to accommodate students’ various ability and learning styles. Harmer (2007,p.123) states that
“one of the main reasons for getting students to speak is that speaking activities provide
rehearsal opportunities – chance to practice real-life speaking in the safety of the classroom”. It
explains the fact that speaking activity is often the only situation where students have to practice
their English especially when it functions as a Foreign Language situation (EFL hereafter).
However, it is not an easy thing to get the students actively participate in speaking activity like
what happens in this context. If the teacher is faced with difficulty of getting students to speak,
the students actually also get a problem of learning to speak in English. It is in line with Nunan
(2003,) saying that it is a challenge for students in foreign language context to learn speaking
skills as they usually get few opportunities to use the target language outside classroom situation.
It happens in the class in which this study takes place, students usually prefer using Indonesian to
English as they feel more comfortable with it. They tend to keep quiet rather than having
themselves speaking in English. Most of the time when asked about why they tend not to speak
in English, they will come up with their argumentation that they are afraid of making mistake
especially grammar and pronunciation. For them, being asked to speak in English is a really big
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 1
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
fear that they want to avoid if it is possible. Hearing themselves pronouncing wrong English
words will create another shame for them. Whenever they are given chance to speak then what
comes into their mind is thinking of good and accurate grammar to utter. They consider being
silent as a safe way to avoid the shame they might get. It is pretty clear that students in this
context of study are reluctant to participate in English speaking class due to their preference of
using their first language and their fear of making mistakes in their oral practice. In order to cope
with the situation faced in the teaching learning process, this study tries to implement recordedrole play, an alternative way to get students to speak. Besides, it also a way to see whether it
could maximize students’ potential in speaking.
Teaching Speaking
Mastering speaking skills for foreign language learners will likely be their priority in learning
(Richard, 2008). Therefore, it is important to make all the students actively participate in a
speaking class so that they could improve their speaking skills. This could be able achieved when
there is a synergy between the teacher and the students. Wallace, Stariha, & Walberg (2005)
mention that there are some things those teachers should do to improve students’ speaking skills.
Some of them are, providing opportunities for the students to practice their speaking skills. They
could also sharpen their adaptability in various speaking circumstances, as normally certain
circumstance will differ from the other in term of form of speech that they could use. In addition,
Wallace et al. (2005) explain that it is also important for the teachers to help the students
reducing their speaking fears. It is quite common that for EFL students, speaking the target
language is not an easy thing to do. Students have many considerations on whether they have to
speak the language. The teachers could provide the opportunity for the students to overcome
their fear by assigning them to speak in a larger group. The more the students are given this kind
of opportunity, the more likely the students will be able to improve themselves in handling larger
audiences.
Other aspects that need to consider in teaching speaking is style of speaking and function of
speaking (Richard, 2008). Style of speaking is different from one to other circumstances. It also
reflects role, age, and status of participants in interactions (Richard, 2008, Wallace, et al , 2005).
Style of speaking will also create politeness in social interaction which is important in creating
harmonious social relations (Richard, 2008). Further he mentions that speaking function is
another important aspect that establish and maintain social interactions. Students need to
understand each function to be able to address any situation appropriately. In short, teachers
should always bear in the mind with the focus of the activity that they want their students to
master in order to perform their communication appropriately.
In order to provide students with opportunity for practicing their skills, teachers could carry out
various activities. This also could be one way of exposing the students to variety learning
experiences (Wallace, et al, 2005). The varied activity in speaking could be ranging from
interaction talk to transactional talk such as role plays (Richard, 2008). Bailey (2005,p. 101)
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 2
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
mentions that “role plays are the ideal vehicle for practicing speech acts with intermediate
learners. Role-plays allow students to try out appropriate English utterances in potentially
difficult situations, before they must use them in real life”. It suggest that role play could carry
out the interaction function students could explore in practicing their speaking skills. It could be
the safest way that students perform repeatedly before they immerse in real life situation they
may encounter. Assigning role play to students will demand the students to effectively use their
linguistics and discourse strategies (Bailey, 2005). It means that students will have to apply their
competences appropriately as the situation in the role play required.
Apart from those competences, students will also apply their extra linguistics knowledge when
they perform the role play. The extra linguistics knowledge may consist of topic, cultural
knowledge, knowledge of the context, and familiarity with the other speakers (Thornbury, 2006).
It is clear that the students will use this extra linguistics knowledge in their role play. The more
familiar the students with the topic, the easier the role play will be. It is usually easy for the
students to talk about something that is close to them or that they have been exposed in their
daily life (Thornbury, 2006 &Louma, 2004). It also applies with the familiarity with other
speakers, the more familiar they are, and the less tense they feel. When the students are assigned
to work with someone they know well, they will feel more secure affectively.
Elements of Role Play
The students will be able to communicate effectively once their linguistic competence has been
developed (Bailey, 2006). Therefore, it is important for the teacher to help students in developing
this competence such by providing them with phoneme, morpheme, words and grammar. Louma
(2004 p.96)) explains that “speaking activities involving a drama element, in which learners take
an imaginative leap out of the confines of the classroom, provide a useful springboard for reallife language use”. One of speaking activity that involves drama element is role play. Role play
needs situation or context and it does need to be performed by the students. In this case, students
are assigned with particular situation and they need to act out as if they are in the real life
situation. It is a way of simulating a situation that students may encounter in the real world
(Louma, 2004). She then explains that context usually refers to anything in the speaking
situation. The situation normally describes the time, place, or setting of the play and it usually
replicates the situation in real life. Besides, it may cover other aspects such as cognitive and
experiential like the language use experiences that the speaker may bring into the situation and
the goal that the conversation has to achieve (ibid). Further she mentions that it provides a
greater range of vocabularies compared to those normally available in classroom talk (ibid).
The next important element is role for the play. Louma (2004) says that there is an “adoption of
another persona” such as pretending to be a barber and customer in a barber shop, a bank clerk
with the customer, a hotel receptionist and a hotel guest, etc. With the role, students could get the
opportunity to try out appropriate utterances, which is sometimes takes place in difficult
situation, before the actually use them in real life situation (Bailey, 2005). Once students get the
role to play, they then could act it out. When students perform the role play, it is usually affective
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 3
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
by several factors such as cognitive, affective, and performance (Louma, 2004). The cognitive
factors cover the familiarity with the topic and participant or partner. Meanwhile, the affective
factor includes the feeling towards the topic, such as whether the students are interested to the
topic. For the performance factor, it usually relates to the planning and rehearsal time for the role
play (Louma, 2004). The more time that students allocate for planning and rehearsing their role
play, the easier the role play will be.
Method
This section discusses the method implemented in the study. It starts with explanation on the
context of the study. It then continue with how the recorded –role play works. Finally it describes
how the study will see the response of the students regarding the implemented recorded role
play.
This study involves 30 students taking English course with different level of English ability.
They also have different major such as informatics engineering, visual communication design,
information system, ICT teacher education, and public relations. All of them have passed Basic
English course offered at faculty level.
This study follows Burns (2009) action research consisting of plan – act- observe- and reflect.
The planning phase covers what will be the focus of the research. In this case, what things to be
done to overcome the reluctance of the students in speaking class. It then comes to the point of
planning of activity that students have to carry out in relation to role-play. Further step is
determining which language item will be covered as the basis of the role-play. The acting phases
is the implementation of the planned activity and see how it goes. The final step is reflecting on
the implementation, identifying which one goes well and which part does not work as it is
supposed to be.
The students were assigned to work in pairs. In organizing this pair work, the students were
paired based on friendship principle. This was to make sure that students were put friends with
friends to avoid that they may work with somebody that was unpleasant (Harmer, 2007). Each
pair was given a situation of role-play to work. They were assigned to draft the role-play. Then
the draft was checked to see the grammar and word choice. Done with checking the draft,
students then were given the chance to practice their role-play script. This was also the time for
the students to get their pronunciation checked. After the students felt that their role-play was
fixed then they had to record themselves acting the role-play. Once their role-play recorder, it
was played to the whole class so that each student could hear and comment on their recorded
role-play.
There was also informal discussion in the classroom after the recorded role-play was played.
Besides, they were given open-ended questions to answer related to the process of their recorded
role-play. The purpose of the open-ended questions was to get students opinion on the
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 4
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
implementation of recorded role-play. The main reason of using questionnaires is its
impersonality. It means that the questions are the same for every participant. It does not change
according to the way the replies develop (Walliman, 2001).
Discussion
This section will discuss the implementation of recorded -role play method and how the students
respond to it.
The first step done for the recorded role play was pairing the students in the classroom. After
explaining the language item needed for the role play, students were given chance to practice the
language item explained before through exercises in group or in pairs. The students were then
paired to work on a given situation later on. After all students were paired, they were given the
situation. There were two situations for the whole class. Once each pair got their situation, they
had to work with their partner to script the role-play.
Before doing their role-play scripting, they were explained that they needed to use the language
item had been discussed. It was also the time for the students to have discussion for the pairs to
explore of how their role play should look like and what things needed to include. Once they
were done with the script, the teacher then check for the diction and grammar. After being
corrected by the teacher, the scripts of role play were returned to the students. The students then
got the chance to practice their pronunciation. It was the time for the students to get feedback on
their speaking performance such as pronunciation and intonation.
Having finished their practice, the students could carry on to their next step, which was recording
the role-play. The recording itself was done by the students at home. It was done so to give the
students more time to rehearse and edit their record before finalizing and submit them in class.
The students were given a whole week to worked on the recording and editing. Before they
recorded the role-play, they were informed that apart from pronunciation and the content of the
role-play, their creativity would be part of the assessment. Surprisingly, most of the pair
submitting the role-play, they put any necessary music, sound or noise as the background to
make their role play sound naturally as if it happens in real life situation.
After the students submit the recorded role-play, it was played in the class. Every body got the
chance to listen to what their friends had done and there was an informal session afterwards
discussing on how they did the role-play. It was also the time to get the idea on their opinion
about the role-play informally. From the informal discussion, most students mention that it was a
great idea to get the students record the role-play rather than having them performed directly in
front of their friends. They mentioned that it reduced their tense. In addition, it gave them more
time to rehearse and correct their mistake whenever possible. Lastly, it gave them time to explore
as much as possible to perform their best because there was no time limit. This first cycle of
action research had some downside. Firstly, there were still some students who just read the
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 5
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
script with less care of the pronunciation and intonation. It might be caused by the limited
practice in the classroom. Besides, it there was still lack of organization here and there as this
was something new for the students. Apart from these unexpected results, most of the students
were satisfied with the result. From the recorded role-play, it could also tell that students, who
usually were less active in the class, showed their effort and involved in the role-play.
In order to address the lack of the first cycle, the second cycle of action research was carried out.
The next cycle followed the same phase of the first cycle. The only difference was that the time
allocated for in class practice after the script writing and correction. The students were given face
to face to practice their role-play. Apart from whole class practice, there was face-to-face
practice in pairs with direct feedback from the teacher. The teacher got the opportunity to work
with students in pairs while the other pairs were practicing on their own. It was done one by one
until all the pairs got the chance to do so. The same as what had been done in the previous
section, the students then had to record their role-play with their partner. They got a week to do
the recording and submitted their work. In the next meeting, all recorded role-play were played
in the class and it was followed by discussion on how they had worked on the role play. Having
discussed their work, the students were then given a questionnaire that they had to fill in
consisting of three open-ended questions. The questions were about students’ opinion on the
method – recorded role-play-, the aspect of the method that they like most, and what could be
improved in the coming implementation.
From the questionnaire given, most of the students felt that recorded role play was very helpful
to them in practicing speaking. One student said “I do not need to feel the pressure of performing
in front of the class with my whole classmates judging my English” (Student 25). Similar
opinion was written by another students saying that he felt less tense because he did not need to
perform in front of their friends. Most of the students’ opinion mention positive thing about the
implemented method. This reflects what has been explained by Wallace et al (2005) that teachers
should help students to reduce their fears in speaking. It has been proven that students feel less
tense or fear about the task they have to complete.
The next information obtained from the questionnaire was what students like most from the
activity and what their reasons are. Several students say that they really love the time when they
had to record their role play. It was not as easy and simple as they thought. Most of them said
that they wanted to do their best that was why the students spent at least 2-3 hours to record
because they had to redo the recording when they found a mistake in the intonation or
pronunciation. In addition, students explained that they were free to express their creativity in the
role play, in a sense that they could explore their ability in mixing sound or music for their work.
They also love the fact that the situations given for the role play was something that was familiar
to them. Furthermore, they were paired in pairs and their partner was their own choice. It added
the positive point that students worked in an environment that was close to them (Louma, 2004)
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 6
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
The last information was about how the method could be improved in the next implementation.
Most students said that it would be much better if they did not only record their voice but
sometimes put their acting along with the voice in a video. Some students mention that actually
the method was good for reducing their fear and a good way of expressing their creativity. It
shows that students were really engaged in the activity, not only were enthusiastic in recording
their role play but also they wanted the method to improve. One interesting fact was that students
who were usually passive or often ignore class activity in the class became active and did a good
work of recording. The performance factor of the students in this method was proven (Louma,
2004). They got more time to practice and rehearse resulted in a good quality of work seen from
the recording and the creativity put into it.
The potential that has been maximized in this study was students’ ability in speaking. They got
more time and guidance on their pronunciation, language item use, word choice and intonation.
It gave them learning experience which was different from the usual task they had in the
classroom. Not only their ability to speak but it also explores their creativity side. When students
carried out the work to result in a recorded role play, they were free to add or mix sound and
music background to make their role play into a more vivid and live one. In addition, students
got an interesting media to deliver their idea expressed in the target language and combined with
their creativity. What motivates them in doing the recording was also the fact that they would
keep their end product for future reference. Most of them who did their best said that it was just
like their masterpiece during their time learning English apart from their main major which was
not related to English learning.
Conclusion
Recorded role-play is an alternative to get students actively involved in speaking activity as it
gives them more time to get prepared. Students enjoy this activity because they get more time to
rehearse and practice. Apart from that, they also get the opportunity to express their creativity.
Students were very creative in integrating the skills they have learned in other course to support
their language performance. This method has succeeded in exploring students potential to
maximize. The potentials that could be maximized through the recorded role play are speaking
ability covering pronunciation, the use of word, the appropriate language item use and intonation
when students have conversation. Besides, it explores students creativity in producing the
recording using what they have learned in other courses.
References
Burns, A (2009) Doing Action Research in English Language Teaching. New York: Routledge
Company
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 7
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
Bailey, K (2006) Issues in Teaching Speaking Skills to Adult ESOL Learners
http://www.ncsall.net/fileadmin/resources/ann_rev/comings_ch5.pdf Retieved August, 26 , 2014
Bailey, K, M (2005) Practical English Language Teaching Speaking. Singapore: Mc Graw Hill
Harmer, J (2007) The Practice of English Language Teaching, England: Pearson Education
Limited.
Luoma, S (2004), Assesing Speaking, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Nunan, D (2003) Practical English Language Teaching, New York: McGrawhill Company
Richard, J, C (2008) Teaching Listening and Speaking. New York : Cambridge University
Press.
Thornbury,S (2006) .How to teach speaking England: Pearson Education Limited
Wallace, T, Stariha, W. E , Walberg, H., J (2005) Teaching Speaking, Listening, and Writing.
Educational Practices Series 1-14 Curtin: International Bureau of Education
Walliman, Nicholas (2001). Your Research Project. London: Sage Publication
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 8
Recorded-Role Play in EFL Classroom: A Way of Maximizing Students’ Potential in
Speaking
Krismiyati
Faculty of Information Technology, Satya Wacana Christian University
krismi@staff.uksw.edu
Abstract
Teaching English for non English Department students will be quite a challenge as the students
have various background and interest. Handling those students in a big number in a class that
requires them to speak is another impending challenge. This is an action research on role-play
in English classroom for Information Technology students. This study tries to see whether
recorded-role play could maximize students’ potential in speaking. This study involved 30
students taking English course in Information Technology Faculty. The students were given a
situation in which they had to act the role play. They drafted the role -play before they recorded
it. The result shows that students felt less tense in acting the role. They also got more time to
practice their pronunciation before recording. It even gave students who felt reluctant and shy in
the class to actively participate. In addition, students could play around with the supporting
background sound to show their creativity. Surprisingly, most students do their best to show their
effort in their speaking as the end-product would be played in the classroom, even the most quiet
students performed really well. Finally, this recorded-role play proved to be an effective way to
maximize students’ potential in speaking.
Key Words : recorded-role play, speaking, pronunciation, potential
Introduction
Teaching speaking in a class consisting of 30 students in university level with various levels of
English is quite challenging as most of the time Indonesian and English are used to
communicate. It needs a careful consideration in delivering the material and activities since it has
to accommodate students’ various ability and learning styles. Harmer (2007,p.123) states that
“one of the main reasons for getting students to speak is that speaking activities provide
rehearsal opportunities – chance to practice real-life speaking in the safety of the classroom”. It
explains the fact that speaking activity is often the only situation where students have to practice
their English especially when it functions as a Foreign Language situation (EFL hereafter).
However, it is not an easy thing to get the students actively participate in speaking activity like
what happens in this context. If the teacher is faced with difficulty of getting students to speak,
the students actually also get a problem of learning to speak in English. It is in line with Nunan
(2003,) saying that it is a challenge for students in foreign language context to learn speaking
skills as they usually get few opportunities to use the target language outside classroom situation.
It happens in the class in which this study takes place, students usually prefer using Indonesian to
English as they feel more comfortable with it. They tend to keep quiet rather than having
themselves speaking in English. Most of the time when asked about why they tend not to speak
in English, they will come up with their argumentation that they are afraid of making mistake
especially grammar and pronunciation. For them, being asked to speak in English is a really big
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 1
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
fear that they want to avoid if it is possible. Hearing themselves pronouncing wrong English
words will create another shame for them. Whenever they are given chance to speak then what
comes into their mind is thinking of good and accurate grammar to utter. They consider being
silent as a safe way to avoid the shame they might get. It is pretty clear that students in this
context of study are reluctant to participate in English speaking class due to their preference of
using their first language and their fear of making mistakes in their oral practice. In order to cope
with the situation faced in the teaching learning process, this study tries to implement recordedrole play, an alternative way to get students to speak. Besides, it also a way to see whether it
could maximize students’ potential in speaking.
Teaching Speaking
Mastering speaking skills for foreign language learners will likely be their priority in learning
(Richard, 2008). Therefore, it is important to make all the students actively participate in a
speaking class so that they could improve their speaking skills. This could be able achieved when
there is a synergy between the teacher and the students. Wallace, Stariha, & Walberg (2005)
mention that there are some things those teachers should do to improve students’ speaking skills.
Some of them are, providing opportunities for the students to practice their speaking skills. They
could also sharpen their adaptability in various speaking circumstances, as normally certain
circumstance will differ from the other in term of form of speech that they could use. In addition,
Wallace et al. (2005) explain that it is also important for the teachers to help the students
reducing their speaking fears. It is quite common that for EFL students, speaking the target
language is not an easy thing to do. Students have many considerations on whether they have to
speak the language. The teachers could provide the opportunity for the students to overcome
their fear by assigning them to speak in a larger group. The more the students are given this kind
of opportunity, the more likely the students will be able to improve themselves in handling larger
audiences.
Other aspects that need to consider in teaching speaking is style of speaking and function of
speaking (Richard, 2008). Style of speaking is different from one to other circumstances. It also
reflects role, age, and status of participants in interactions (Richard, 2008, Wallace, et al , 2005).
Style of speaking will also create politeness in social interaction which is important in creating
harmonious social relations (Richard, 2008). Further he mentions that speaking function is
another important aspect that establish and maintain social interactions. Students need to
understand each function to be able to address any situation appropriately. In short, teachers
should always bear in the mind with the focus of the activity that they want their students to
master in order to perform their communication appropriately.
In order to provide students with opportunity for practicing their skills, teachers could carry out
various activities. This also could be one way of exposing the students to variety learning
experiences (Wallace, et al, 2005). The varied activity in speaking could be ranging from
interaction talk to transactional talk such as role plays (Richard, 2008). Bailey (2005,p. 101)
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 2
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
mentions that “role plays are the ideal vehicle for practicing speech acts with intermediate
learners. Role-plays allow students to try out appropriate English utterances in potentially
difficult situations, before they must use them in real life”. It suggest that role play could carry
out the interaction function students could explore in practicing their speaking skills. It could be
the safest way that students perform repeatedly before they immerse in real life situation they
may encounter. Assigning role play to students will demand the students to effectively use their
linguistics and discourse strategies (Bailey, 2005). It means that students will have to apply their
competences appropriately as the situation in the role play required.
Apart from those competences, students will also apply their extra linguistics knowledge when
they perform the role play. The extra linguistics knowledge may consist of topic, cultural
knowledge, knowledge of the context, and familiarity with the other speakers (Thornbury, 2006).
It is clear that the students will use this extra linguistics knowledge in their role play. The more
familiar the students with the topic, the easier the role play will be. It is usually easy for the
students to talk about something that is close to them or that they have been exposed in their
daily life (Thornbury, 2006 &Louma, 2004). It also applies with the familiarity with other
speakers, the more familiar they are, and the less tense they feel. When the students are assigned
to work with someone they know well, they will feel more secure affectively.
Elements of Role Play
The students will be able to communicate effectively once their linguistic competence has been
developed (Bailey, 2006). Therefore, it is important for the teacher to help students in developing
this competence such by providing them with phoneme, morpheme, words and grammar. Louma
(2004 p.96)) explains that “speaking activities involving a drama element, in which learners take
an imaginative leap out of the confines of the classroom, provide a useful springboard for reallife language use”. One of speaking activity that involves drama element is role play. Role play
needs situation or context and it does need to be performed by the students. In this case, students
are assigned with particular situation and they need to act out as if they are in the real life
situation. It is a way of simulating a situation that students may encounter in the real world
(Louma, 2004). She then explains that context usually refers to anything in the speaking
situation. The situation normally describes the time, place, or setting of the play and it usually
replicates the situation in real life. Besides, it may cover other aspects such as cognitive and
experiential like the language use experiences that the speaker may bring into the situation and
the goal that the conversation has to achieve (ibid). Further she mentions that it provides a
greater range of vocabularies compared to those normally available in classroom talk (ibid).
The next important element is role for the play. Louma (2004) says that there is an “adoption of
another persona” such as pretending to be a barber and customer in a barber shop, a bank clerk
with the customer, a hotel receptionist and a hotel guest, etc. With the role, students could get the
opportunity to try out appropriate utterances, which is sometimes takes place in difficult
situation, before the actually use them in real life situation (Bailey, 2005). Once students get the
role to play, they then could act it out. When students perform the role play, it is usually affective
Krismiyati | ISBN 978‐602‐19638 3
3rd ELTLT CONFERENCE PROCEEDING SEPTEMBER 2014
by several factors such as cognitive, affective, and performance (Louma, 2004). The cognitive
factors cover the familiarity with the topic and participant or partner. Meanwhile, the affective
factor includes the feeling towards the topic, such as whether the students are interested to the
topic. For the performance factor, it usually relates to the planning and rehearsal time for the role
play (Louma, 2004). The more time that students allocate for planning and rehearsing their role
play, the easier the role play will be.
Method
This section discusses the method implemented in the study. It starts with explanation on the
context of the study. It then continue with how the recorded –role play works. Finally it describes
how the study will see the response of the students regarding the implemented recorded role
play.
This study involves 30 students taking English course with different level of English ability.
They also have different major such as informatics engineering, visual communication design,
information system, ICT teacher education, and public relations. All of them have passed Basic
English course offered at faculty level.
This study follows Burns (2009) action research consisting of plan – act- observe- and reflect.
The planning phase covers what will be the focus of the research. In this case, what things to be
done to overcome the reluctance of the students in speaking class. It then comes to the point of
planning of activity that students have to carry out in relation to role-play. Further step is
determining which language item will be covered as the basis of the role-play. The acting phases
is the implementation of the planned activity and see how it goes. The final step is reflecting on
the implementation, identifying which one goes well and which part does not work as it is
supposed to be.
The students were assigned to work in pairs. In organizing this pair work, the students were
paired based on friendship principle. This was to make sure that students were put friends with
friends to avoid that they may work with somebody that was unpleasant (Harmer, 2007). Each
pair was given a situation of role-play to work. They were assigned to draft the role-play. Then
the draft was checked to see the grammar and word choice. Done with checking the draft,
students then were given the chance to practice their role-play script. This was also the time for
the students to get their pronunciation checked. After the students felt that their role-play was
fixed then they had to record themselves acting the role-play. Once their role-play recorder, it
was played to the whole class so that each student could hear and comment on their recorded
role-play.
There was also informal discussion in the classroom after the recorded role-play was played.
Besides, they were given open-ended questions to answer related to the process of their recorded
role-play. The purpose of the open-ended questions was to get students opinion on the
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implementation of recorded role-play. The main reason of using questionnaires is its
impersonality. It means that the questions are the same for every participant. It does not change
according to the way the replies develop (Walliman, 2001).
Discussion
This section will discuss the implementation of recorded -role play method and how the students
respond to it.
The first step done for the recorded role play was pairing the students in the classroom. After
explaining the language item needed for the role play, students were given chance to practice the
language item explained before through exercises in group or in pairs. The students were then
paired to work on a given situation later on. After all students were paired, they were given the
situation. There were two situations for the whole class. Once each pair got their situation, they
had to work with their partner to script the role-play.
Before doing their role-play scripting, they were explained that they needed to use the language
item had been discussed. It was also the time for the students to have discussion for the pairs to
explore of how their role play should look like and what things needed to include. Once they
were done with the script, the teacher then check for the diction and grammar. After being
corrected by the teacher, the scripts of role play were returned to the students. The students then
got the chance to practice their pronunciation. It was the time for the students to get feedback on
their speaking performance such as pronunciation and intonation.
Having finished their practice, the students could carry on to their next step, which was recording
the role-play. The recording itself was done by the students at home. It was done so to give the
students more time to rehearse and edit their record before finalizing and submit them in class.
The students were given a whole week to worked on the recording and editing. Before they
recorded the role-play, they were informed that apart from pronunciation and the content of the
role-play, their creativity would be part of the assessment. Surprisingly, most of the pair
submitting the role-play, they put any necessary music, sound or noise as the background to
make their role play sound naturally as if it happens in real life situation.
After the students submit the recorded role-play, it was played in the class. Every body got the
chance to listen to what their friends had done and there was an informal session afterwards
discussing on how they did the role-play. It was also the time to get the idea on their opinion
about the role-play informally. From the informal discussion, most students mention that it was a
great idea to get the students record the role-play rather than having them performed directly in
front of their friends. They mentioned that it reduced their tense. In addition, it gave them more
time to rehearse and correct their mistake whenever possible. Lastly, it gave them time to explore
as much as possible to perform their best because there was no time limit. This first cycle of
action research had some downside. Firstly, there were still some students who just read the
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script with less care of the pronunciation and intonation. It might be caused by the limited
practice in the classroom. Besides, it there was still lack of organization here and there as this
was something new for the students. Apart from these unexpected results, most of the students
were satisfied with the result. From the recorded role-play, it could also tell that students, who
usually were less active in the class, showed their effort and involved in the role-play.
In order to address the lack of the first cycle, the second cycle of action research was carried out.
The next cycle followed the same phase of the first cycle. The only difference was that the time
allocated for in class practice after the script writing and correction. The students were given face
to face to practice their role-play. Apart from whole class practice, there was face-to-face
practice in pairs with direct feedback from the teacher. The teacher got the opportunity to work
with students in pairs while the other pairs were practicing on their own. It was done one by one
until all the pairs got the chance to do so. The same as what had been done in the previous
section, the students then had to record their role-play with their partner. They got a week to do
the recording and submitted their work. In the next meeting, all recorded role-play were played
in the class and it was followed by discussion on how they had worked on the role play. Having
discussed their work, the students were then given a questionnaire that they had to fill in
consisting of three open-ended questions. The questions were about students’ opinion on the
method – recorded role-play-, the aspect of the method that they like most, and what could be
improved in the coming implementation.
From the questionnaire given, most of the students felt that recorded role play was very helpful
to them in practicing speaking. One student said “I do not need to feel the pressure of performing
in front of the class with my whole classmates judging my English” (Student 25). Similar
opinion was written by another students saying that he felt less tense because he did not need to
perform in front of their friends. Most of the students’ opinion mention positive thing about the
implemented method. This reflects what has been explained by Wallace et al (2005) that teachers
should help students to reduce their fears in speaking. It has been proven that students feel less
tense or fear about the task they have to complete.
The next information obtained from the questionnaire was what students like most from the
activity and what their reasons are. Several students say that they really love the time when they
had to record their role play. It was not as easy and simple as they thought. Most of them said
that they wanted to do their best that was why the students spent at least 2-3 hours to record
because they had to redo the recording when they found a mistake in the intonation or
pronunciation. In addition, students explained that they were free to express their creativity in the
role play, in a sense that they could explore their ability in mixing sound or music for their work.
They also love the fact that the situations given for the role play was something that was familiar
to them. Furthermore, they were paired in pairs and their partner was their own choice. It added
the positive point that students worked in an environment that was close to them (Louma, 2004)
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The last information was about how the method could be improved in the next implementation.
Most students said that it would be much better if they did not only record their voice but
sometimes put their acting along with the voice in a video. Some students mention that actually
the method was good for reducing their fear and a good way of expressing their creativity. It
shows that students were really engaged in the activity, not only were enthusiastic in recording
their role play but also they wanted the method to improve. One interesting fact was that students
who were usually passive or often ignore class activity in the class became active and did a good
work of recording. The performance factor of the students in this method was proven (Louma,
2004). They got more time to practice and rehearse resulted in a good quality of work seen from
the recording and the creativity put into it.
The potential that has been maximized in this study was students’ ability in speaking. They got
more time and guidance on their pronunciation, language item use, word choice and intonation.
It gave them learning experience which was different from the usual task they had in the
classroom. Not only their ability to speak but it also explores their creativity side. When students
carried out the work to result in a recorded role play, they were free to add or mix sound and
music background to make their role play into a more vivid and live one. In addition, students
got an interesting media to deliver their idea expressed in the target language and combined with
their creativity. What motivates them in doing the recording was also the fact that they would
keep their end product for future reference. Most of them who did their best said that it was just
like their masterpiece during their time learning English apart from their main major which was
not related to English learning.
Conclusion
Recorded role-play is an alternative to get students actively involved in speaking activity as it
gives them more time to get prepared. Students enjoy this activity because they get more time to
rehearse and practice. Apart from that, they also get the opportunity to express their creativity.
Students were very creative in integrating the skills they have learned in other course to support
their language performance. This method has succeeded in exploring students potential to
maximize. The potentials that could be maximized through the recorded role play are speaking
ability covering pronunciation, the use of word, the appropriate language item use and intonation
when students have conversation. Besides, it explores students creativity in producing the
recording using what they have learned in other courses.
References
Burns, A (2009) Doing Action Research in English Language Teaching. New York: Routledge
Company
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Bailey, K (2006) Issues in Teaching Speaking Skills to Adult ESOL Learners
http://www.ncsall.net/fileadmin/resources/ann_rev/comings_ch5.pdf Retieved August, 26 , 2014
Bailey, K, M (2005) Practical English Language Teaching Speaking. Singapore: Mc Graw Hill
Harmer, J (2007) The Practice of English Language Teaching, England: Pearson Education
Limited.
Luoma, S (2004), Assesing Speaking, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Nunan, D (2003) Practical English Language Teaching, New York: McGrawhill Company
Richard, J, C (2008) Teaching Listening and Speaking. New York : Cambridge University
Press.
Thornbury,S (2006) .How to teach speaking England: Pearson Education Limited
Wallace, T, Stariha, W. E , Walberg, H., J (2005) Teaching Speaking, Listening, and Writing.
Educational Practices Series 1-14 Curtin: International Bureau of Education
Walliman, Nicholas (2001). Your Research Project. London: Sage Publication
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