Introduction
One of the English language skills a learner must master is the ability to speak. A common question for anyone who wants to know a person’s ability in a foreign language is whether he speaks English or not. In line with this, mastering the skill of speaking is the most important aspect of learning a second or foreign language, success is measured in terms of being able to have a conversation in the language, and asking people to interact with each other.
It is not just about what is spoken and the language used, also, a good speaker must pay attention to what the subject speaks and the language he uses so that the listener can easily understand it, and who is talking to him. Hence, speaking is a tool for communicating ideas that are arranged and developed.
This means that the speaker must strive to communicate his ideas clearly so that these ideas can be well accepted, consistent with what the audience wants. For most English language learners, speaking the target language is not easy because learning to speak English requires more than knowledge of grammar and its implications.
Borncart (1998) explains that language learners need to have three areas of knowledge to speak which are elements of language (pronunciation, vocabulary) that emphasize the use of correct vocabulary in the correct order with the correct pronunciation, language functions that deal with speaking performance ( For example knowing how to change information and clarifying the basic message), social and cultural criteria (such as session – speech taking, speech rate, length of pauses between speakers, the relative roles of participants, and in what circumstances).
Moreover, English language learners must also acquire knowledge about how native speakers use the language in the context of organized personal exchange as effective oral communication is required for speakers to use the language appropriately in various social interactions.
In general, a variety of reports and research findings show that speaking is difficult. In dealing with this, the results of their research have shown that the competence of English language graduates is still far from sufficient. Although the communicative language teaching method that focuses on the use of language in real-life situations and social interactions has been introduced from high school to the university level, the result is far from satisfactory.
Besides, the speaking abilities of some high school teachers are still low because some of them only graduate from diploma programs for two or three years. He demonstrated that teachers ’proficiency in English is still low, which means that difficulties in learning to speak are not only perceived by school learners, but also English teachers with the same problem.
Statement of the Problem
The ability to make ourselves confident and to direct the self-confidence that we must speak in English is a difficult effort. To be able to gain this confidence, individuals need to make sure they are proficient in the language. We view the English proficiency as a major contributor to the teacher’s contribution to student oral communication in the classroom and during the English language teaching and learning session.
The first problem that leads to the silence of the sample group during interaction and teaching in the classroom is because the level of teacher proficiency for the student in the English language, compared to senior teachers and lecturers, is relatively different. The sample group had differences among them in terms of proficiency in the English language.
This means that their level of competence, especially in oral English, differs from one another. Therefore, with this problem, they become more afraid of making mistakes if they speak, thus resorting to silence and avoiding any oral contact in the classroom with the teacher or the lecturer. Does this problem apply to the focus group of the research?
Based on practical experience in teaching, he also discovered that the same problem applies to students in class during lecture sessions, many remain reluctant to express opinions or provide individual answers during lectures. Therefore, I decided to look into this problem and come up with the necessary solutions to this problem.
Based on the problems described above, this topic interests me a lot as I will benefit from the results of this research as I can use it to overcome any difficulties related to this problem to improve my education and my education as a teacher in the classroom.
The Research Questions
The present study follows this knowing the problems of students studying the English language and how to overcome them, and knowing how they interact in the classroom to overcome the difficulties they face with an emphasis on how different types of grammatical errors.
Five questions are addressed in this study:
- Why do students studying English have problems?
- How does the student overcome the problems he faces when learning English?
- How do trained teachers teach English in the classroom, and how do they behave and interact during lecture hours at the Teacher Training Institute?
- What are the difficulties in speaking English during training and class hours?
- What methods can encourage trained teachers to speak English frequently in the classroom?
Objectives of the Study
The purpose of this research is to study students, problems, and experiences in speaking English in the classroom. By identifying these three components; students’ perception, difficulties, and ways to overcome this issue, this study generally focuses on how to help students overcome the existing barrier. So, I hope this study helps them speak English during teaching periods and in the classroom.
Specifically, research is conducted to achieve the following goals:
To know the perceptions of the trained teacher speaking in the English language during the practice of training and the lecture hours in the classroom.
To know the difficulties experienced by the trained teacher in speaking the English language during the practice of training and the lecture hours in the semester.
Suggest suggestions on how to reduce or remove barriers and difficulties in speaking English in the classroom.
The Significance of the Study
This study was conducted to find out why students in higher education institutions do not know how to speak English. It was discovered that most students studying in higher education institutions, especially Majmaah University, lack the desire to speak English, especially outside of the classroom.
Since English is an important language nowadays, it is also necessary for teacher trainees like us to master the language. The best way to master this language is to use it in our daily conversations. By using English in our daily communications, students can improve their speaking skills during training as well as during lecture hours.
Thus this study can be used to help students speak English as well as to help them be more confident in using the second language. Aside from that, this study is also able to help lecturers tackle this issue. Therefore, some measures will be taken in terms of the contents of the lesson and education used in the classroom. For example, the lesson implemented is more interesting which requires students to speak and contribute more to the classroom. Also, the teacher should organize workshops focused on building the student’s self-confidence to speak English. This will encourage students to use English as a medium of communication.
Methodology
This study was conducted in the Department of English at Majmaah University. The subjects of this study were all third-semester students in the English language section who had the lowest scores in the speaking class. Many students in these groups performed poorly in the speaking class. They were taking the third word.
The study focused on 10 students, chosen from 25 students. The choice was made using students with a C score (lowest passing score) in the second speaking, and also based on information about students with low performance according to the lecturer. The said that students are considered to be low performers with some indications:
- fear of speaking,
- lack of mastery of grammar,
- ack of vocabulary.
There were ten vulnerable students in this class. The author chose the ten students because they were performing poorly in the speaking class. It was also based on the researcher’s initial research when he taught them in the second conversation. To collect data, this observational and observational study was used as the main tool conducted by the researcher himself. Interviewed to obtain key data. The researcher reviewed ten out of 25 students. Each student was asked with three questions, namely:
- What difficulties did you encounter or feel in speaking?
- What are the causes of difficulties?
- What is efforts have you made to overcome the difficulties?
Additionally, the researcher also noticed the speaking category. The observation was to check the problems students encountered in speaking in class. The observation was made using the observation guide.
Perform the data analysis as follows. After the interviews were conducted, the data was collected and translated into English. Data were collected into problems, causes, and solutions. Next, the data was analyzed based on the student’s difficulties in speaking, the reasons for the difficulty, and the student’s efforts to improve speaking to find the relationship of problems, causes, and efforts to solve problems.
Two procedures were used to validate data in this study. The first is the researcher’s participation in research, including study preparation, data collection, data analysis, and data interpretation. The second is triangulation. In this case, the researcher compared the data from the interview with the direct observation. Trinity was performed to verify the data or information that the writer obtained from the respondents by looking at the data source repeatedly to obtain the same result.
In this sense, Hopkins (1993) asserts that the triangulation technique can increase the validity of a category in data validation. To support the data to be more correct, the author clarified the answer of each student by asking them again about every question the author asked them, and to obtain reliable data, the author wrote the result of the interview as soon as possible, and not more than one day after the interview. The researcher did not use the tape recorder to avoid the impression of an official interview with the respondents.
Finding and Discussions
Types of Student Difficulties in Speaking Among the ten respondents interviewed, it was found that there are twelve types of difficulties encountered by students in speaking. The most common problems felt by respondents were: lack of vocabulary, distrust of speaking, non-use of speaking in class, and difficulty expressing words or sentences. The difficulties students feel or feel in speaking can be divided into two types of problems: language problems and no-language problems. There were three difficulties related to language problems.
It was ’ lack of knowledge of grammar’, ‘ lack of vocabulary,’ and ’poor pronunciation’, while the nine difficulties that dealt with non-linguistic language problems were ‘ lack of confidence in speaking ‘ and ‘ lack of courage to speak ‘, ’fear’ From speaking ‘,’ fear of making mistakes ‘,’ fear of ridicule from friends ‘,’ not using words in class ‘,’ anxiety from speaking ‘, ‘confusing how words are used ‘, and ’ difficult to express words or sentences ‘ Occasion. ‘
2. Types of reasons for difficulty in speaking It was found that there are 9 reasons for the difficulty faced by students with language problems. They were ‘lack of vocabulary’, ’rarely memorized words,’ words that have more than one meaning ‘,’ confused about how to use appropriate words ’,’ lack of grammatical knowledge ‘,’ rarely read grammatical books ‘,’ bad pronunciation. ‘
Robin and Thompson (1982, mentioned in Brown, 2001) note that there are 14 characteristics for successful language learners in learning a second or foreign language. The 14 characteristics of successful language learners suggested by Robin and Thompson are all unique characteristics of successful language learners.
From 22 kinds of the efforts that were used by the students to solve their problems, they only used 3 out of the 14 characteristics namely ‘they make their opportunity for practice in using language inside and outside the classroom’, ‘they learn certain production strategies to fill in gaps in their own competence’, and ‘they are creative, developing a ‘feel’ for the language by experimenting with grammar and words’. Based on the results of the interviews, many students said that their efforts did not fully meet their expectations.
Four difficulties that Taiqin found were ‘being afraid of making errors’, ‘losing confident to speak’, ‘feeling uncomfortable to make mistakes’ and ‘not having ideas about what to say.’ In this study, the researcher found two problems addressed in Taiqin’s discovery, namely ‘fear of making mistakes’ and ‘distrust of speaking or loss of confidence in speech. There’re some phrases that the students started to describe their fear in speaking such as ‘being afraid of speaking’, ‘being afraid of making errors, and ‘being afraid of being mocked by friends’. It needs to be explored furthermore because these deal with non-linguistic problems. Other researchers should think about the factors that make students afraid to speak to find the best solutions to deal with problems.
Conclusio
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The results of this study are that the problems associated with teaching speaking skills can be addressed through different approaches. The ultimate goal for teachers is to develop students’ speaking skills and language proficiency that includes: competence in social linguistics, grammatical competence, strategic competence, and speaking skills.
Teachers should always apply a combination of these methods simultaneously as problems are likely to arise when teachers rely solely on a single teaching technique or strategy. It can be important because it may enable classroom teachers to identify students with problems with speaking skills.
Treatment Recommendations
Referring to the study results, the teachers indicated that there are no established methods that can be adopted when teaching speaking skills. Based on the results and discussion of this study, some treatment recommendations were suggested that are believed to help avoid such problems from recurrence in the future.
- There may be a need to design a comprehensive curriculum to encourage conversation between student activities.
- Teachers may need training continuously.
- At the university level, some additional classes may be required to mitigate linguistic weaknesses among students. More focus is needed on sentence structure, grammar, and spelling.
- Students may need to be more active in improving academic conversation.
- Class size may need to be reduced to at least 25 students.
