Factors Affecting the Speaking Proficiency of Prospective Teachers of

English

Christine Joy C. Evangelista

President Ramon Magsaysay State University – Castillejos
cjcepinkytwinkle@gmail.com

Abstract

Speaking is the ability to express one’s self well especially in needed

situations. However, there are factors that hinder the second language learners or

even the English major students to speak well in English. The purpose of this

descriptive research is to determine the factors affecting the speaking proficiency

of prospective teachers of English at President Ramon Magsaysay State

University – Castilejos Campus. The data were collected using a researcher-made

survey questionnaire. The first part of the instrument sought to determine the

background profile of the respondents including their age, sex, mother’s

educational attainment, father’s educational attainment, family monthly income,

parents’ occupation, and the languages spoken at home, while the second part

consisted of a 4 likert-scale survey questionnaire. This study found out that the

motivation factor had the highest degree of influence affecting the speaking ability

of the respondents, followed by the shyness factor wherein the learners were afraid

to commit mistakes and to be laughed at when speaking, linguistic factor wherein

they tend to worry about their pronunciation and grammar, topical knowledge factor

wherein it was emphasized that their interest, adequate knowledge, and

preparation for a certain topic influenced their ability to speak in English, the good

kind of classroom environment positively affected their speaking performance

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wherein they were more encouraged to speak if the professors were kind and

considerate. The study recommends that in order to address the speaking

problems and enhance the speaking ability of the learners, incorporating helpful

speaking activities in the lessons should be done, and creating a friendly and

encouraging classroom environment should be fostered.

Keywords: speaking skill, prospective teachers of English, factors affecting the

speaking proficiency, speaking problems

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