Institutional Repository | Satya Wacana Christian University: Attributions on Students’ Speaking Fluency Problems in An EFL Speaking Classroom
ATTRIBUTIONS ON STUDENTS’ SPEAKING FLUENCY PROBLEMS IN AN EFL SPEAKING CLASSROOM THESIS Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Pendidikan Mutiara Putri Pratiwi 112014075 ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION PROGRAM FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS UNIVERSITAS KRISTEN SATYA WACANA SALATIGA 2018
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This thesis contains no such material as has been submitted for examination in any course or accepted for the fulfillment of any degree or diploma in any university. To the best of my knowledge and my belief, this contains no material previously published or written by any other person except where due reference is made in the text.
Copyright@ 2018. Mutiara Putri Pratiwi and Yustinus Calvin Gai Mali, M. Hum.
All rights reserved. No part of this thesis may be reproduced by any means withous the permission of at least one of the copyright owners or the English Language Education Program, Faculty of Language and Arts, Universitas Kristen Satya Wacana, Salatiga.
Mutiara Putri Pratiwi.
ATTRIBUTIONS ON STUDENTS’ SPEAKING FLUENCY
PROBLEMS IN AN EFL SPEAKING CLASSROOM
THESIS
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan
Mutiara Putri Pratiwi
112014075
ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION PROGRAM
FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS
UNIVERSITAS KRISTEN SATYA WACANA
SALATIGA
2018
TABLE OF CONTENT
LIST OF TABLE
Table 1 The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Interact with Friends Using English During Potluck Cocktail Party........................................................................25 Table 2 The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Ask Questions Using English.........................................................................................................................28 Table 3 The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Answer Questions Using English.........................................................................................................................30
ATTRIBUTIONS ON STUDENTS’ SPEAKING FLUENCY
PROBLEMS IN EFL SPEAKING CLASSROOM
Mutiara Putri Pratiwi
ABSTRACT
This study explores students’ attributions for their English-speaking fluency problems in their English as a Foreign Language (EFL) speaking classroom. The participants of the study were 34 freshmen at the Speaking for Social Purposes classes at the English Language Education Program, Satya Wacana Christian University (ELEP, UKSW), academic year 2017/2018. An open-ended questionnaire and semi-structured interview were used as the instruments of the data collection. On the questionnaire, three questions were presented in which the participants were asked to write their responses concerning their speaking fluency problems. Meanwhile a semi-structured interview was conducted with three participants to clarify their written responses on the questionnaire. The data analysis appeared to prove that anxiety, lack of vocabulary, and problems in grammatical aspects were primary factors influencing the students’ difficulties to speak English fluently. Eventually, this study hopes to provide insights for teachers and students in avoiding the speaking problems and improving English-speaking fluency among EFL learners.
Keywords: attribution, fluency
INTRODUCTION
English language learners learn four skills, namely listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Among those skills, speaking is the most difficult skill to master by students in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) contexts (Urrutia & Vega, 2006). One of the possible difficulties is related to speaking fluency. For example, Bailoor, John, and Laxman (2015) reported that Indian learners presented many filled pauses such “uh” and “um”. In Kuwait, a similar result was also found in Al-Nouh, Abdul- Kareem, and Taqi (2015) study. Kuwaiti college students indicated unfilled pauses or silence because they tend to forget what they want to say in English. From other studies, learners in China and Turkey also showed significant English-speaking fluency problems such as stuttering because of their anxiety (Na, 2007; Elaldi, 2016).
Similarly, Roberts (2002) reported that learners in French showed a slower speech in speaking English.
Many students at English Language Education Program, Universitas Kristen
Satya Wacana (ELEP, UKSW) also experienced similar fluency problems.
Understanding materials and doing tests could be easy for them, but they found it
difficult to communicate in English. Not all students were confident enough to voice their
ideas in English because they were worried about making mistakes.Having problems in speaking fluency is one of the several critical obstacles which gives negative influence for students’ performance in the oral or practical use of languages (Yang, 2014). For those reasons, all courses at ELEP, UKSW require speaking fluency to accomplish the goals of the course. Also, they need to keep their speaking improvement on records and attempt to overcome their speaking fluency problems because ELEP students will potentially be English teachers. This means, they need to have a strong competence in speaking English.
In this research, I was interested in exploring the attributions of the EFL students’ who have problems in speaking fluency, particularly in Speaking for Social Purposes course at ELEP, UKSW. This research seeks to address the following question:
What are EFL students’ attributions to their English-speaking fluency problems in Speaking for Social Purposes classes?
The study is expected to offer some impor tant insights into teachers’ and students’ strategies to retrieve speaking fluency in EFL contexts, specifically Indonesia. The study could also serve as a reference for teachers to support students in avoiding the speaking problems and improving the condition of English-speaking fluency from the students’ experiences.
This section provides a review of the literature which is relevant to the research objectives. This includes the definitions of attribution and fluency, advantages of knowing learners’ attributions, and a review of the attribution studies for speaking fluency problems.
Definitions of Attribution
Briefly , ‘attribution’ is a term referring to the causes for why students experienced success and failure in the learning process. However, there are various definitions of the term itself that needs to consider. Weiner (1985) explained that the attributions tend to answer “why” questions which are obtained from individuals after their experiences happened, such as “Why didn’t I have enough motivations?”, “Why did I do that?”, “Why didn’t I study hard?”, or “Why couldn’t I pass the exam?”
Attributions also refer to people’s causal explanations of their successes and failures in their language learning (Mali, 2015; Banks & Woolfson, 2008; Gobel & Mori, 2007). Meanwhile, Shcunk and Zimmerman (2006) defined the term as a theory which clarifies the causes of students’ competence and incompetence in their academic performances. In this research, attribution refers to ELEP students’ explanations towards their prior experiences of their reasons behind their speaking fluency problems on their performance in Speaking for Social Purposes classes.
Definition of Fluency
Speaking fluency is one of the most important factors which reflects the successful learning. As seen in Fillmore (1979, p.93) study, fluency is characterized in four different ways. First, he defined fluency as “the ability to talk at length with few pauses”. Second, a fluent speaker is able to express his/her ideas with understandable, reasonable and “semantically dense” sentences. Third, a person can be considered as a fluent speaker if s/he is capable of stating the ideas appropriately within the contexts. Lastly, Fillmore argued that fluent speakers are creative with the language use. Meanwhile, according to Hedge (2000), speaking fluency refers to an understandable response in a communication, appropriate use of connecting words in a speech, well-pronounced words, and sentences which are accompanied by proper intonation.
Additionally, Lennon (2000) defined fluency as the ability to speak in a certain language related to the speed and the smoothness in delivering the messages.
In the same way, fluency is also seen as speakers’ production of language which performs “smooth and rapid production of utterances, without undue hesitations and pauses, that results from constant use and repetitive practice” (Gatbonton & Segalowitz, 2005, p.326). Considering some definitions mentioned above, fluency in this study can be seen as E FL students’ oral production which significantly avoids the occurrence of any speech hindrance such as hesitations that trigger pauses.
Advantages of Knowing Learners’ Attributions
Highlighting the advantages of explor ing students’ attributions, Schunk and Zimmerman (2006) considered the explanations and reasons of success and failure in the learning process as important conditions because they can motivate students and influence their potential to be successful learners. Besides, knowing the students’ attributions in their learning process can create a positive impact on their future behavior towards their study and may affect the expectancy of their achievements (Banks & Woolfson, 2008; Lei & Qin, 2009). With a similar view, Lei (2009) believed that causal explanations which learners attribute towards their successful or unsuccessful experiences in learning will result in changes in expectations and emotions, which can affect the learners’ motivation to gain academic achievement as the result. Further, Demetriou (2011) stated that attributions for students’ success or failure may help them to develop their role as learners. Also, those causal explanations can help disappointed students with low self-esteem to discover their strength of learning in order to fight against their weaknesses.
Previous Attribution Studies for Speaking Fluency Problems
The ability to be fluent in oral communication may be influenced by other language skills that learners’ master. However, some students still cannot speak English fluently while they are able to read, write, and do the exams well in English. There seems to be an evidence to indicate that students have problems in speaking English fluently. Those speaking fluency problems may occur due to different attributions in several studies. For example, in Japan, Gobel and Mori (2007) attempted to investigate learners
’ attributions for success and failure in EFL oral and reading tasks. In this qualitative study, open-ended questionnaires were used for the data collection. The participants of the study included 233 Japanese university students in the reading and speaking classes. The findings of the study showed that the students in the classes attributed internal factors for their failure which were lack of ability and lack of effort.
Meanwhile, another study on Chinese tertiary-level EFL students conducted by Lei and
Qin (2009) attempted to explore the attributions towards the learners’
English language achievement. To collect the data, they administrated an open-ended questionnaire on 949 undergraduates at Huazhong University of Science and Technology. The result of analysis revealed that 594 students were considered as unsuccessful learners and the rests showed the opposite result. Due to the higher number of students who attributed EFL failure, the study found that lack of confidence and lack of practical use were reasons why the students experienced difficulties to be fluent in speaking English.
In Malaysia, a related study was undertaken by Thang, Gobel, Nor, and Suppiah (2011). They conducted a study that involved six public universities in the country which use English as a Second Language (ESL). The researchers attempted to analyze the relationship between the students’ performance attributions and different university settings within the context. The results reported reasons for the students’ success and failure. Then from five cited attributions, lack of effort, ability, and interest become the main attributions for experiencing difficulties during their English learning especially in doing speaking and writing activities.
Similarly, Basic (2011) investigated Swedish students’ reasons on why some of them cannot speak English fluently. Significantly, the study revealed that students who experienced anxiety when performed their oral skill inhibited them to speak fluently in English. On the other hand, lack of support from English language teachers was also an attribution of the students’ problems in their oral performance. In that case, Basic and the teachers believed that it was important to create an encouraging environment and activities to motivate the students to communicate fluently.
Another related study was conducted by Jimenez (2015). In this case, the researcher surveyed 14 Spanish students to prove their oral fluency difficulties in English. The findings in the study revealed that the highest level of negative impact in English speaking fluency came from the interfer ence of students’ mother tongue. While low-esteem and anxiety in EFL learning motivation and learning environment with a low level of support can be the next obstacles to be fluent speakers.
In India, Bailoor et al. (2015) sought to assess the common speech disfluencies in ten adults in the age range 18-20 years. The data were collected from spontaneous speech tests such as conversation, story narration, and monologue. The results indicated that adults presented a large number of disfluencies, such as pauses, repetitions, interjections, and revision. Besides, Indian percentage of speaking disfluency in doing monologue has increased. For this reason, doing a certain individual oral task such as a spontaneous speech without having sufficient preparation is the main factor affecting learner s’ problems in speaking English fluently.
Another study by Shteiwi and Hamuda (2016) concerned with the forty
English major students’ factors behind their difficulties to have successful oral communication in English. The researchers conducted the study at the Education
Faculty, Misrata University, Libya. Administering questionnaire was used as a method to collect the data. As a result, the data which was analyzed qualitatively indicated that lack of English exposure and practice inside and outside the classroom, lack of vocabulary mastery, lack of grammatical and pronunciation components, and self-confidence problems were the main reasons why they performed a certain degree of difficulty in speaking English fluently.
Attributions on success and failure towards ESL and EFL learning is a topic that has been thoroughly studied by many researchers. So far, however, there had been few studies about students’ attributions towards their difficulty or failure in EFL learning, in this case, speaking fluency problems experienced by Indonesian EFL students in a university context. Therefore, it is significant enough to investigate the attributions on students’ speaking fluency problems as “lack of speaking fluency and practice, sometimes, is not sufficient to maintain a communicative task in EFL class” (Yang, 2014, p.2).
This research was conducted to explore students’ attributions for English- speaking fluency problems on their EFL learning process at ELEP, UKSW. To achieve this objective, the researcher approached the study qualitatively. By employing the qualitative modes of inquiry, I attempted to illuminate the understanding point and evidence of experiences in groups of a certain context (Mack, Woodsong, MacQueen, Guest, & Namey, 2011). The findings of the data were expressed from the participants’ statements in form of narrative (Norum, 2008).
Then the data was obtained by seeking the answer about “why people behave the way they do?”, “how opinions and attitudes are formed?” (Hancock, Ockleford, & Windridge, 2009).
This study was in line with the characteristics mentioned above. First, the researcher explored evidence of groups’ experiences within a context. Therefore, it was expected that data from the study was not collected from inaccurate opinions. The researcher attempted to gain the responses from the participants’ real statements from their experiences. Second, from the data I collected, I developed it into a narrative text. Lastly, data was obtained by seeking the answer to why and how questions related to EFL students’ attributions to their English-speaking fluency problems in Speaking for Social Purposes classes.
Context of the Study
Data was collected in semester 2 of academic year 2017/2018 in which participants joined the course of Speaking for Social Purposes at ELEP of UKSW.
This course was designed as a part of the compulsory course that aims to enhance the students’ skill in speaking English (Sinanu, 2017). In this course, students were
expected to be able to improve their speaking skill using various language functions and vocabulary in social contexts. Furthermore, this course was their first course of speaking. There is a possibility that before taking this course, students have different speaking proficiency and learning background. Therefore, as they enrolled the course and did the spoken activities, their excitement and challenges towards the speaking fluency appear to be different. In particular, for those who have fluency problems, the challenges and difficulties appear during their first time in learning and improving their speaking skill.
Research Participants
The study involved 34 EFL students from Speaking for Social Purposes classes at ELEP, UKSW who experienced speaking fluency problems in the course.
The students who participated in this study were in their first year on the field. The researcher employed purposive sampling as it is a method for identification and selection information-rich situations (Patton, 2002). This kind of sampling involves selecting individuals based on their knowledge and experience of the population that are of interest which enables to answer the research question (Mackey & Gass, 2005). In this case, the sampling requires extreme judgments on students’ low fluency performance in their English speaking. For this reason, this proposed study used “extreme cases” sampling to select a sample of the subjects in this study. Extreme case sampling is a data collection process in which samples are selected based on the special or unusual performance of interest ( Ary, Cheser & Sorensen, 2010). Commonly, the cases highlighted above or below accomplishments such as failures or successes (Lærd Dissertation, 2012). To conduct this study, students of ELEP, UKSW who had difficulties and problems in speaking English fluently were selected as the participants. Due to this, the researcher asked the teachers in the class of the Speaking for Social Purposes course about the students’ performance and grades which appeared during the teaching and learning process in the classrooms.
Instruments of Data Collection
To collect the data, the study implemented open-ended questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Mackey and Gass (2005) explain open-ended questionnaires as an instrument of the data collection which allows research participants to express their ideas based on their willingness to share in form of written statements. The aim of the open-ended questionnaire is to identify the attributions for students who experience speaking fluency problems during the class of Speaking for Social Purposes. By administering this kind of questionnaire, it is possible to obtain new issues from the responses because each participant may answer the questions in their own manner (Dawson, 2009).
Meanwhile, semi-structured interview is a data collection method which the interviewer has a list of questions order to be asked and probes that are provided to clarify more information (Mackey & Gass, 2005). The aim of the semi-structured interview is to give participants an opportunity to elaborate their statements and their way of thinking towards difficulties and problems they encountered to speak English fluently. According to Dawson (2009), flexibility in the semi-structured interview helps to gain more information. With this data collection method, the researcher could go into details because asking probing questions as the interview goes was allowed. In short, by using semi-structured interview, the researcher could come up with new questions for new findings. Questions for the instruments were adapted from Adibba (2004); Mali (2015); Tuan and Mai (2015); Mali (2016) with several modifications as it has a similar case to the present research context. The questions are as follows: What problems do you encounter in learning speaking skill? 1.
Tell me your reasons why you found it difficult to speak English fluently in front of your friends when having the Potluck Cocktail Party!
2. Tell me your reasons why you found it difficult to ask questions to your friends in English!
3. Tell me your reasons why you found it difficult to answer questions proposed by your friends in English!
Data Collection Procedures
Before administering the two research instruments, the researcher piloted the data instruments to demonstrate the statements on the questionnaire and interview questions. The pilot study was conducted with 15 participants. This aimed to find the weaknesses and ensure the validity of the instruments. After making some revisions, the questionnaire was distributed to 34 participants without including the piloting participants. Questionnaire sheets were administered to the participants of the study in the class time. At first, the researcher distributed the questionnaires in Speaking for Social Purposes classes by asking the teachers’ permission. Then the researcher informed the participants about the purpose of the study, gave the instruction to answer the questions in the instrument, and explained the statements on the questionnaire. The purpose of doing this step was that to clarify the participants’ confusion about the statements written on the questionnaire. Statements of the questionnaire were delivered in English, but they were allowed to answer the questions either in English or Bahasa Indonesia to help the participants to go into details in explaining the ideas and prevent misconception of the statements.
The interview section was conducted with three participants after administering the questionnaire. It was done in an individual face-to-face meeting with the participants. During the interview, the researcher recorded the data by using a voice recorder and took notes about the important points of the participants’ responses. There were several questions which led to students’ attribution on their speaking fluency problems. The questions that were asked are the same for each research participant. There were follow up questions to clarify the participants’ written statements on the questionnaire. The interview was conducted in Bahasa
Indonesia .
Data Analysis Procedures After obtaining the data needed, the researcher transcribed the interview data.
Similar responses were collected into groups. In this phase, thematic analysis was used to analyze the data collected from the open-ended questionnaires and interviews.
Holliday (2002) suggests using thematic analysis to organize the data. In this approach, data needs to be analyzed by interpreting broadly and rearranging under themes according to the interest. The unique characteristic of thematic analysis is the flexibility on the theoretical frameworks (Guest, MacQueen, & Namey, 2012). It is applicable for the study as it suits questions related to people’s experience and the understanding. All in all, the analyzed findings were drawn into a conclusion.
This section presents the findings on the students’ attributions to their EFL speaking fluency problems in Speaking for Social Purposes classes. The researcher aimed to display the attributions by classifying the results into three main indicators which were adapted and developed from Mali (2015). The indicators are the students’ problems [1] in interacting with friends using English during Potluck Cocktail Party; [2] in asking questions to their friends using English; and [3] in answering questions proposed by their friends using English. In this section, the researcher discussed three primary attributions categories for each indicator, including the students’ excerpts of the results obtained from questionnaire and interview data. Below were the details of the findings and discussion.
The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Interact with Friends Using English During Potluck Cocktail Party
It was necessary to assure that the research participants were aware of the research problem before they determined their attributions concerning their speaking fluency problems. Therefore, to make sure that they have actually experienced speaking in English in Speaking for Social Purposes course, the researcher briefly asked the participants about their experience when having the Potluck Cocktail Party.
The current study revealed ten attributions for the students’ English speaking fluency problems that they experienced during their speaking assessment at the Potluck Cocktail Party. Table 1 described the result.
5
4% 1.4%
6.7% 5.3%
8% 8%
14.8% 13.3% 13.3%
1 25.3%
3
4
6
Table 1
6
10
10
11
19
Anxiety Lack of self-confidence Peer influence Lack of vocabulary Cannot initiate interaction Unsupportive environment Lack of background knowledge Grammatical aspects Lack of practical use Unfamiliar with the language
The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Interact with Friends Using English During Potluck Cocktail Party Attributions Number Percentage
Total Number 75 100% Horwitz (2001) mentioned that anxiety is a feeling that is commonly described by nervousness, dread, and worry. She believes that anxiety can interfere with language learning, including speaking. Interestingly, anxiety (25.3%) was the most frequent problem that the students encountered during the assessment. As they experienced fear of being evaluated by teachers, negative comments from others, making mistakes, new social context, and worried to manage their first assessment, a participant reported that:
Excerpt 1 “I always have sudden panic attack when I speak in public, for example in front of the class. I often see that I am a failure in speaking English. Maybe, it is because I experienced something bad in the past. It was when my friends mocked me because I could not pronounce the words properly or say something out of the topic. So, I feel like I am afraid of getting the same experience. I did not want to get negative responses from my surroundings.” (S23/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)
Lack of self-confidence (14.7%) became the next attribution that was frequently mentioned by the participants. Significantly, the theme covered some statements, such as
“I do not have native-like pronunciation and I feel awkward in front of my friends when I speak in English. (S13/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)
” Moreover, “I think my friends speak much better than me because I cannot speak that well. (S9/questionnaire/translated by the researcher) ” Dealing with these problems to interacting with friends in the Potluck Cocktail Party, some participants conveyed:
Excerpt 2 “When I speak English, I often could not pronounce the words well. That makes me not confident to communicate with my friends. They are great in speaking English.
” (S34/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)
In Table 1, the students also attribute their problem in interacting with their friends because of the hindrance from others. The researcher classified this attribution as peer influence (13.3%). Additionally, the research participants conveyed that they had problems in speaking English when their partner did not speak clearly, speaks too fast, and seems reluctant to communicate. Concerning those, in the questionnaire, some students stated that:
Excerpt 3 “It was hard for me to make a conversation ongoing if the person I talked with did not understand the topic. For example, I talked with someone, but he did not answer the question that I gave. He just stayed quiet
. It made me confused as well.” (S17/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)
The present findings seem to be in line with the views that a student who had one bad experience from speaking often becomes a reminder (Basic, 2011). In that case, that student who was mocked will have speaking anxiety that may make him or her does not dare to speak English again. More importantly, such failure may be the factor that decreased the students’ motivation. It is also in harmony that lack of self- confidence is a factor that leads the EFL learning failure, significantly the fluency in speaking English (Lei & Qin, 2009).
The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Ask Questions Using English
Initially, the researcher would like to inform that the asking questions in this case was not limited to the Potluck Cocktail Party as stated in the previous part.
Rather, it was related to the students’ speaking activities in their classroom. As the results of the data analysis, the researcher found nine different themes that showed the reasons why they found it difficult to ask questions in English. Table 2 showed the complete results of the attributions.
Table 2
3
The next attribution influencing their problems in communicating with their friends using English is because sometimes they cannot present questions (17.7%).
Excerpt 4 “I don’t have much vocabulary mastery, so sometimes I am confused about how to convey what I want to say. I do not know the English term of the words that I want to ask.” (S13/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)
Total Number 51 100% It is apparent from this table that lack of vocabulary (19.6%) was the major attribution for their problems to ask questions in English. Additionally, the research participants declared that they tend to find difficulties in speaking when they know a little vocabulary, cannot find suitable words easily, and forgot or even do not know the English terms that they want to say. These problems seemingly appear as a student wrote in the questionnaire:
7.8% 5.9% 3.9% 3.9%
2 19.6% 17.7% 15.7% 13.7% 11.8%
2
4
The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Ask Questions Using
English Attributions Number Percentage6
7
8
9
10
Lack of vocabulary Cannot present questions Anxiety Grammatical aspects Lack of background knowledge Peer influence Lack of practical use L1 interference Unfamiliar with the language
They reported that they ran of topics after asking several questions, had no topic to discuss, and could not initiate the conversation with a question. Those problems obstructed their language production and speaking skill improvement. Concerning those, the results in the questionnaire corresponded to what a participant conveyed in the interview:
Excerpt 5 “When I met new friends, I did not know how to start the conversation. I did not know what I should ask. Sometimes, it was hard for me to understand the topic that they were talking about. I took too much time thinking about a question to ask. In the end, I did not ask any further questions and our con versation was far from smooth.” (S10/interview/translated by the researcher)
Furthermore, they found difficulties in asking questions using English because they experienced anxiety (15.7%). Within this attribution, the students declared that they were nervous, worried, and afraid of making mistakes, particularly fear of making grammatical mistakes and unclear questions. In the interview, a participant clarified similar statement to this attribution:
Excerpt 6
“I met new people. I talked with different friends. Facing, greeting, and having conversations with unfamiliar friends was a challenge. I was very worried that I made grammatical mistakes when I talked to them. I felt that I arranged the sentenced poorly.” (S9/interview/translated by the researcher)
The present finding seems to be consistent with Shteiwi and Hamuda’s (2016) findings which showed that the students’ problems in speaking English occur because of their limitations in mastering the vocabulary. The finding also supports the ideas of
Basic (2011), who found that that attitudes that reflect language learners’ anxiety such as fear of making mistakes is a hindrance for the students to have a successful practical use of the language.
The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Answer Questions Using English
7
2% TOTAL 51 100%
5.9% 3.9%
1 17.6% 15.7% 15.7% 13.7% 13.7% 11.8%
2
3
6
Regarding the communication among the EFL students in the classroom, Table 3 shows students’ main attributions to their English speaking fluency problems, particularly when answering questions proposed by their friends. From the table, the most obvious challenge that the participants had was the students experienced difficulty in grammatical aspect (17.6%). Some students often find problems in arranging the words and get confused by tenses. Talking about this issue, an interviewee said:
Excerpt 7 “I get difficulties not only in word choice, but also in English grammar. I find it hard in arranging words and sometimes get confused about the grammatical categories. I am n ot aware of using some tenses.” (S9/interview/translated by the researcher)
8
8
9
Grammatical aspects Lack of background knowledge Lack of vocabulary Unfamiliar with the language Anxiety Peer influence Lack of self-confidence Unsupportive environment L1 interference
The Students’ Attributions for Their Problems to Answer Questions Using English Attributions Number Percentage
Table 3
7 Understanding the context of a discussion has an important point in answering questions. Within this indicator, the participants declared that one of their problems in answering questions proposed by their friends was due to their lack of background knowledge (15.7%).
Statements included in this attribution were “I do not understand the topic of the question. (S7/questionnaire/translated by the researcher) ” Besides,
“The topic is unfamiliar to me. (S17/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)” Additionally, “I’d never heard of the roles they played; I do not know who they are in real life. (S1/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)
” These statements seemingly appear as a participant stated:
Excerpt 8 “When I pretended to be someone else in a certain speaking activity, honestly I did not exactly know about the character I was supposed to be. My character was a politician, but I did not know anything about politics. Then I usually ended the conversation if my friends brought up politics.” (S3/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)
Additionally, the participants admitted that they were lack of vocabulary (15.7%). It became a reason why they had low performance in speaking English when they answered questions. Some EFL students only know a little vocabulary. They cannot find the suitable words in spoken language production to express their opinion about particular topics. This problem hinders the participants in speaking English actively, as one of them mentioned:
Excerpt 9 “The problem that I encounter in speaking English is due to my lack of vocabulary. I know a little vocabulary, I find it hard to express anything in English, and it makes me think that I’d better not speak.” (S18/questionnaire/translated by the researcher)
In accordance with the present results, a previous study by Shteiwi and Hamuda (2016) found that with the learners’ limited knowledge of vocabulary, the learners would prefer to keep silent because they were unable to express their ideas in English. The findings of Shteiwi and Hamuda also seem to be in line with the current study with the views that lack of knowledge about tenses and words arrangement in grammar can also be the EFL students’ problems which prevent them from communicating in the target language.
Furthermore, the findings showed other less frequent attributions. They were the unsupportive environment (3.9%) and L1 interference (2%) for the students’ problems in answering their friends’ questions using English. This finding is consistent with the ideas of Jimenez (2015) who explained that the negative environment may not be supportive for students to speak English fluently. Jimenez also stated that L1 interference such as students’ language switching and mixing are the causes for the students’ speaking difficulties in an EFL context.
CONCLUSION
The present study aims to explore the EFL students’ attributions who have
problems in speaking fluency, particularly in the class of Speaking for Social Purposes at ELEP, UKSW. The researcher summarized major findings which match those observed in earlier studies. First, Indonesian tertiary-level EFL learners attribute anxiety as their factor on speaking fluency problem. This was in agreement with Basic ’s (2011) argumentation that anxiety can hinder the students’ ability to speak as they will not be able to focus on the speaking process. Besides, their lack of vocabulary and having difficulties in grammatical aspects seemed to be other frequent factors that influenced their problems in oral communication. This finding corroborated the ideas of Shteiwi and Hamuda (2016), who stated that lack of grammatical components and difficulty in retrieving suitable vocabulary during oral communication were problems causing the students’ inhibition to speak in English fluently.
Regarding the findings of the current study, it is possible for teachers to encourage the students to have the confidence and not to worry about making mistakes in the message that they are trying to communicate in front of their friends. In addition, language teachers should encourage the students to prepare themselves before coming to the classroom. The researcher also suggests that the students need not be too worried whenever they make mistakes in language learning. Besides, to improve their vocabulary knowledge, they should develop proper learning strategies that focus on vocabulary. It can be done, for instance, by doing cooperative learning activities such as playing challenging vocabulary games with their peers that may be effective and fun for their vocabulary mastery. English learners can also improve their grammar skills through writing and reading practices. Moreover, for the teachers, it is important to provide support and more opportunities to the students for practicing the target language in both inside and outside classrooms.
This study, however, was limited in the area of data collection process. Only 34 students in Speaking for Social Purposes course participated in the study. They may not represent all tertiary-level EFL learners. The context of the study was also solely limited to a course which was Speaking for Social Purposes as the main setting to collect the data. Thus, further studies should be conducted with a more diverse and broader context. It would be interesting if further study can compare the students’ attributions that appear on the context of present study and other speaking courses such as Academic Speaking as the settings of the study in order to investigate the EFL students’ attributions to their speaking fluency problems.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT My deepest respect and gratitude go to Yustinus Calvin Gai Mali, M. Hum
for his invaluable guidance, support, suggestions, patience, and all of the time he gave to me during the completion of this study. Also, I owe many thanks to Dra. Martha Nandari, M.A., my examiner who gave me many advices and suggestions to improve this study substantially. My thanks also go to all my teachers and staff in the Faculty of Language and Arts, especially Ms. Yustina Priska, M.Hum. I have been extremely lucky to have a teacher who provided experiences, encouragement, and advices throughout my time as a student.
To Ibu SAS Sulistyorini, Bapak Heni Pudjowasana, and Mas Sandy Anwar, words cannot express how grateful I am for having you as my family. Your prayers, considerations, and strength are the greatest fuel to finish this thesis.
Completing this study would have been more difficult if there is not support and friendship from Nadzifa, Salma, Hari, Rindang, and the members of TESP family, I really am grateful to have you all around. As well, thank you to all of my wonderful friends and relatives that I could not mention one by one.
Above all, I would like to give my biggest gratitude to Allah SWT for all the blessings.
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