CES2313 TEACHING OF READING SKILLS

LECTURER: Madam. Rita Wong

PREPARED BY:

NAME MATRIC NUMBER

1. Kunavathani Arumugam 4192000921

2. Brendan Sanjay Sivaraja 4192002271

1.0 Section A

1.1 Introduction
Aural is defined as something that is related to the ear or hearing whereby oral is related to

speaking or something spoken. There is a difference between hearing and listening. Hearing is

the act of perceiving the sound by the ear but listening is more than that. When someone is

listening to something, it could be a speech or a song, that person actually comprehends what

they are listening to. Their brain processes the content of it to have an understanding. Therefore,

listening requires one's focus. On the other hand, a good oral skill is achieved when someone

could communicate well, by exchanging thoughts and information well and participate verbally

in discussions. These are the criteria for a successful aural-oral skill achievement.

It should be known that aural-oral approach is fundamental to language learning, no matter what

language it is. So, when you’re learning a language through “hearing-speaking”, it means you are

or you will be able to understand the meaning of the sounds of a language uttered by a native

speaker. Therefore, teaching and learning of our second language which is English should be

done through effective aural-oral approach. Here, a teacher plays his or her major part in

teaching the second language in the best way, so that the students get good in it. A teacher should

have a thorough knowledge of the teaching language. Once they are good at it, they need to think

of the ways to approach their students that would implement or improvise the aural-oral skills in

them.

In this paper, we are going to look at a teacher whom we interviewed about her experience of

working as a secondary school teacher. We asked her few questions about the aural-oral

approach, in general as well as what do they mean to her personally as an English teacher. She

truly enlightened us with her answers. Her answers were mostly based on her experience.
We started off our interview with the question what are the teaching techniques and strategies a

teacher can use to improve a student’s aural-oral skills in learning second language. She

answered with five types of techniques that she usually uses. First is, encouraging a lot of

conversation. She also highlighted that if the students are in smaller group, it would make the

lesson more effective. Secondly, she also encourages the students to speak aloud to know their

proficiency level. Encouraging the students to articulate clearly is also one of her ways when

they are speaking aloud and if they mispronounce any of the words, she would not say no to

them. Instead, she still appreciates their effort and makes them to try in a better way. This can be

related Krashen’s theory of second language acquisition (1982) which is linked to second

language learning, with optimism, self-confidence, and anxiety. It is good to tackle them to try

more and not to make them feel offended or passive. She mostly makes the lesson student-

oriented as she lets the students to talk more. Here, she is emphasizing two types of principles

which are take account of the student as a person and reduce anxiety by moving from easy

to more difficult. Our respondent also utilizes technology at times during her lesson to make it

more interesting, such as listening to audios before giving out comprehension questions.

Secondly, we asked her why students find it hard to learn aural-oral skills in the second

language. For that she responded that students do not take the subject seriously. They just take it

as a supporting subject to pursue their higher studies. Moreover, as English is not their native

language, they find it less familiar and less important to put their interest in. For this question we

could understand that students’ readiness and interest play vital role in learning second

language as they are shy to converse in English, fearing that they would make mistakes.

Followed by the question, is it important for the students to know the purpose of learning second

language’s aural-oral skills and why. The respond was yes and she further explained on why. It is
because only when students get to know the purpose, they would invest more time for an in-

depth acquisition of the aural-oral skills instead of just learning the language by merely listening

and memorizing. She also explained that we might not see the purpose now but surely the skills

are much needed when we pursue our tertiary education and step into our career life. From this,

we can conclude that knowing the purpose of learning second language is important for a

successful learning outcome. We also questioned the teacher on how to improvise students’

aural-oral skills. The one way she implemented before and still planning on doing in the future is

to approach the students in fun ways. For example, asking them to memorize songs and play

them in the class for them to sing together. Once the songs are well versed by them, she gives

exercises such as filling in the blanks of the song. Other activities that she asks them to do are to

watch English movies and give them vocabularies to be remembered in the following lessons.

As for aural-oral approach, when we asked her what are the approaches she implement during

her lesson, she replied that they focus more on phonetics and syntax and most of the time they

would play audios to the students.

As a conclusion, teachers or the teachers-to-be should give extra attention to aural-oral approach

as it is the base for learning the second language and has a wider scope to be focused on.

Teachers should be aware about delivering proper lessons to the students.

1.2 Personal Information of Respondent

 Name : Miss. Kuang Geik Ching

School : JIT SIN INDEPENDENT HIGHSCHOOL

Classes Taken: Form 1 up to Form 6

Years of teaching Experience : 9 years

2.0 Section B

2.1 Interview Video Link

https://youtu.be/9JQnFSGPWzE

3.0 Section C
3.1 Recommendations

According to a hoary adage, “We are given two ears and one mouth so we can listen twice as

much as we talk.” This is a maxim to remember when we future teachers plan our lessons

especially when we are dealing with a classroom of new learners. Although listening should be

the first skill that should be taught, in practice most teachers get their students talking on the first

day of class, and many make speech the major focus of their lessons. According to our

respondent, she has stated that both Aural and Oral skills are equally important and the future

teachers should implement both Aural and Oral skills in their lesson plans. The teachers should

be aware of how good are their students in both Aural and Oral skills so that they can use proper

method and approaches to get their students improve in both their skills.

Listening requires the fundamental skill of focusing attention on the speaker to be able to hear

and understand what the speaker is saying. Speaking skills require students to take turns, speak

confidently, stay on topic, and speak with clarity. Students are more likely to master speaking

and listening skills when they can actively engage in learning them. Interactive Modeling gives

students a clear picture of these skills and an immediate opportunity to both practice them and

receive feedback.

Besides that, the respondent stated that any students come to school with limited skills in the

language of instruction. Teaching must help them overcome their fears by making talk a positive

and interesting experience. In our opinion, success must be celebrated and the learning of new

vocabulary and phrases should be a planned and a satisfying experience for the student. Then,

the teacher or parents should speak slowly and clearly to facilitate pronunciation and

understanding. New words need to be repeated frequently until the students are con dent to use
them for themselves. Ultimately, most students should be able to speak clearly and express their

ideas using appropriate vocabulary.

Next, the future teachers probably could encourage conversation among the students. Every

social interaction gives students a new opportunity to practice language. Some of your students

might need a little guidance from you to engage in conversations, so spark interactions whenever

you can. Ask questions, rephrase the student’s answers, and give prompts that encourage oral

conversations to continue. Other than that, the teachers can maintain eye contact with the

students during the lesson in the class. Engage in eye contact with students during instruction and

encourage them to do the same. Maintaining eye contact will help learners gauge their audi-

ence’s attention and adjust their language, their volume, or the organization of their speech. This

will help them be better understood, communicate more clearly, and successfully interpret

nonverbal cues about their clarity.

Other than that, the listening sound that teachers choose should be something which includes to

one’s earlier information and includes a connect to the student’s life schedules such as, public

announcements, weather figures and news. This is often to assist students recognize the essential

details to carry out different tasks. Teachers might utilize fill within the spaces action with data

said from the sound. The spaces ought to not require students to fill up with sentences as

listening and writing at the same time may be troublesome and time expending for a few

students. Instead, a teacher may attempt this activity with words or expressions. This activity can

be done when the sound is being played. This will allow the students to be mindful and listen for

data.
In a conclusion, listening requires the fundamental skill of focusing attention on the speaker to be

able to hear and understand what the speaker is saying whereas speaking skills require students

to take turns, speak confidently, stay on topic, and speak with clarity. Students are more likely to

master speaking and listening skills when they can actively engage in learning them. To have

productive discussions in all subjects, students need to be able to express ideas clearly, concisely,

and confidently. Having successful communication skills leads to better social relationships. For

any conversation, knowing when to speak and when to listen is essential.

4.0 Conclusion

The Aural-Oral Approach in English Language Teaching

In English language teaching there are several approaches that can be applied in a classroom.

Each one has purpose and gives concern to certain skills (listening, speaking, reading and

writing) development. One of these approaches is Aural-Oral Approach. The Aural-Oral

Approach is based on developing two language skills: listening and after that speaking which is

the earlier stage of learning a language (Geri, 1990). Aural means related to sense of hearing and

oral related to verbal communication. Surely when the student is getting better in both listening

and speaking they will reach communicative competence. Communicative competence refers to

the level of language learning that enables language users to convey their message to others and

to understand others’ messages within specific context (Hymes, 1972). Of course to reach this

competence, both listening and speaking improvement is really needed. The Aural-Oral approach

is very effective to be implemented in English Language Teaching in case to build

communicative competence of student. It enhances listening and speaking also it increases new
vocabulary for student. The aim of this essay is to give real imagine about how the Aural-Oral

approach can be taught in or during English learning and give good improvement in both

listening and speaking in order to reach student’s communicative competence.

In addition to regular classroom activities, teachers should set aside 10 to 15 minutes of their

class time focusing on improving students listening and speaking skills. The activities could be

aiming at developing conversational skills for interaction and transaction (Richards, 2009). Such

activities could be introducing connected speech (Brown & Hilferty, 2006; Brown, forthcoming),

also known as reduced forms (Cahill, 2006), to students to enhance their speaking and listening

skills. Connected speech. Kelly stated (2000) that simple awareness of sentence stress and

intonation could help in enabling students to better understand the language they hear. According

to Brown (forthcoming), connected speech or reduced forms are not signs of sloppy or careless

English, but rather the very real part the English language.

Lastly, we personally feel that dramatization via a drama workshop is effective in improving the

aural-oral skills. A drama workshop would be a remedy to help the learners speak English in

order besides can also help them improve their oral test scores. During the drama workshop, they

could learn to speak and communicate in English using puppets and other props. By conducting

this kind of activities/workshop would help the students to boost their confidence level as they

don’t really feel afraid of speaking out as they are more concentrated on the way of acting.

Teacher plays a big role to help students when dealing with the difficulties. Both teachers and

students have to play their roles in order to develop a good learning outcome from the lessons.
Appendix A (Biodata)
Appendix B (Qualifications)
Appendix C (Interview Dialogue)

Miss Kuang : Okay, already recorded.

Kuna : Okay, thank you teacher. Okay, first of all, good day to teacher and also thank

you so much for joining us today ang giving us your time. Okay. So we are, we are from

UniSEL, TESL students currently doing our final year in TESL and then myself, Kuna and my

friends here, Sharon, Brendan, and Manjula here whom will be interviewing teacher regarding

our Aural-oral skills. Okay. So, beginning with my first question, what are the teaching

techniques and also the strategies that teacher can use to improve student’s Aural-oral skills in

learning second language specifically the second language.

Miss Kuang : Okay. Before I explain what we do in the school, when I was doing my

bachelor’s degree, we didn’t have Aural-oral skills, we call it listening and speaking. I think they

changed the name it from listening and speaking right but in the school we still use the term

listening and speaking. Okay. In my school, to be frank with you, to be very, very frank with

you, in my school, we do not emphasize listening and speaking a lot to the students okay. I have

to be frank with you. We only have listening and speaking every alternate week and it is only for

two periods okay. Two periods meaning that it is only for 1 hour and 10 minutes okay. Alright.

So why do we. I am just explaining to you what we do because its about listening and speaking.

So, what do we usually do for listening and speaking okay are two things. For example, let’s say

for this week, we have alternate week meaning that one month we only have two times of

listening and speaking okay. So, the first week, we will teach them listening and speaking which

means that we will play some audio for them to listen. Some phonetics where they will need to

listen and they need to write down okay and need to jot down whatever they hear. And then the
other week, we have the ICT session so what I’m going to tell is one month only one time there

is listening and speaking. So, I’m going to tell you what do we do in that one week okay. But

don’t worry, I will, I will explain to you what we usually do in the listening and speaking session

okay so you just can just jot down whatever notes you need to jot down or whatever is it. If let’s

say my information is not enough okay, maybe you can just go and search for extra information

and just put it into your assignment okay? Alright. The first question that you asked me was what

are the teaching techniques and strategies a teacher can use to improve a student's aural-oral

skills in learning second language okay. So, what do we do techniques that we use. Firstly, the

techniques that we use is we encourage a lot of conversations okay, as you understand let's say in

the future you are being posted to a government school. OK let's say in the future you are being

posted to a government school, you will have a lot of students off none English speaking

background okay. So, in order for them to talk is to encourage them to talk. Like my school, all

the students are Chinese okay so their mother tongue is definitely not English. So, the first thing

the technique. The first technique we need to use is we need to encourage conversations and

another thing in my school we have, for example, for English we only have maximum of 28 or

29 students in one class. So, the smaller the class actually it's easier for us to conduct a lesson but

I'm not very sure about government schools but I don't think government schools will exceed 35

okay. I think the maximum is only 35 which is still the same alright. So basically, we encourage

conversations. Number two we remind them to speak loudly. Speaking loudly is a chilly one of

the techniques to know the student's proficiency background. And then we encourage them to

articulate clearly. If let's say the student pronounce something wrongly, we should avoid using

the word 'no'. The word no is actually quite sensitive. Once you use the word no to students there

will never open their mouth to you. In order besides saying no maybe you can say that's right,
that's ok but the correct pronunciation is bla bla bla. The first technique is actually to tackle

students. A teacher's first impression is very, very important. Is the first lesson itself you. They

will be very, very passive. So, what do we do is we encourage conversations. If their sentence

formation or word pronunciation is wrong then it is fine and it is ok but as teachers we should

correct them but do not say that it is wrong. We can say that is right but maybe if you say this

way it sounds better. So, the student does not feel hurt. If you are correcting students then the

next lesson the students will feel offended and they don't feel like the teacher has corrected me in

a very bad way so I will not be opening my mouth ever again. So, you have to say in a proper

way, you need to know how to tackle students. Some students when you say something negative,

they won't join your class lively again. That is our technique. And then the strategies that we use

is utilize the technology. For example, for speaking and listening. Especially for listening, the

teacher doesn't really talk. We will just play the audio for them to listen and then they apply

whatever they have listened into the book and after that they will go through the questions. Why

do we do this? Actually, the teacher, I myself, can read the passage, pronounce the words but if I

do so maybe they will feel boring like this teacher is always talking why should I listen to her

again. They might as well like listen to any audio session whatever is it. So that is what we do in

school. We usually play some audio for them to listen and we actually have it on recording

following their syllabus so we'll just let them listen and then they will just apply that into

whatever notes whatever exercises that they are given to. And then the next strategy is teachers

need to talk less. we need to let them convey, let them talk, let them express their feelings, let

them share their ideas. So that is one way you can listen to what the students are saying. So, I

think that's all for the first question. Is there anything else that you would like to ask.

Kuna : No teacher, it's a very very complete answer. It's more than what we expected.
Miss Kuang : If I'm giving a very long lecture, you let me know. I will shorten it for you.

Kuna : We don't mind actually.

Miss Kuang : Okay, next.

Kuna : Okay next is why do students actually find it difficult to learn aural-oral skills in

the second language because currently students are finding it difficult.

Miss Kuang : To learn and speak English is it? According to my experience the first thing, the

first difficulty that we face is English is not an important subject especially in my school. They

feel that English is just supporting subject like supporting marks in order to help them to enter a

university. Because my school follow University syllabus, we also have SPM and Cambridge

and that is for the first class. For the rest of the students, the first thing they feel is that English is

not that very important. Secondly it is not their mother tongue. They don't speak English at

home. That's the first thing. The do not communicate with their friends, with their family. And

the third thing, the third thing that I notice why it's difficult for them to listen and speak is

because it is seem as if we are not familiar with a particular language or a particular dialect, you

have no interest in learning that. When something is really not important to you, you turn that

thing into something least important things. So, what I think is first thing is not their mother

tongue and they don't give much importance to them okay. According to my experience that is

what I told you. Alright can we proceed to the third question or do you have anything else to

ask?

Kuna : No, no teacher, we will proceed to the third question okay. What are the factors

that are affecting aural-oral skills in learning second language?

Miss Kuang : When you say factors can you give me an example? Because some of the

questions when I go through, I think I have to ask you back what are the information that you

actually want me to say. So here you say factors, can you give me an example?

Kuna : Factors like. How do you say? Okay like.

Miss Kuang : Is it like what I said just now. I feel like this two questions are quite similar, isn't

it?

Kuna : Yeah, because the second and third are like quite similar. That one it's like they

find it difficult why but. It's kind of actually the same because is the same thing actually

Miss Kuang : Because when I go through the questions, I think factor maybe you can put in

very less conversation or very less usage of English during the conversation okay. And then

another thing, you can see that they are very shy to use the language okay. When you don't use

this particular language it's very difficult for you to talk. Maybe you are shy or maybe you think

what if I made a mistake or what if I didn't use the word properly, how if I pronounce the word

wrongly or how if I form the sentence wrongly. Ok maybe this is one of the factors. Shy and

another one can be they do not practice it regularly at home. So, if you ask me factor, I would

say they don't practice at home and if feel very shy to talk. For example, my students especially

for this speaking class, they actually don't like speaking class. Even though, we have it one

month once they don't like coming for speaking class you know. Why? Because I will ask them

to talk okay. I will give them a topic, just randomly call a name and ask them to talk so the

always tell me "Miss Kuang, can we do speaking next week? This week we do compute." The

first thing I noticed because they are very shy and another thing let's say we put them aside. The

set up and they start to talk. Let's say they make a mistake. Their peers will laugh. They will
make fun of them and that is also one of the factors. They are afraid of people who laugh at them

if they use the language wrongly. So the factors only you can put in miss conversations, shy or

they don't practice and another thing they are afraid to be laughed by their peers. I think that is all

from factors.

Kuna : Yeah, that's all from me and I'll pass it to my friend, Sharon.

Miss Kuang : Ok alright Sharon.

Sharon : Hi Miss. First of all, thank you for sparing us your time. So let us proceed to the

question. So, my question is do you think it is important for the students especially the current

students to know the purpose of learning second language aural and oral skills and why?

Miss Kuang : If you ask me, I think it is actually very, very important for them to learn

listening and speaking. Listening and speaking can say I can learn things by listening. I can

speak just by listening something just by memorising words but that's actually not true. We

should have more pivots in listening and speaking in school so that students will utilise this

particular time for them to speak to their peers or speak to their teachers or share their ideas or

whatsoever is it. During other lessons if you are doing reading comprehension, speaking is

actually very, very less. So, if you have this specific period for listening and speaking, I think it

will improve student's communication skills and they will listen carefully do what you are going

to ask them. Okay because it is not applicable to only schools. It is also for college. I think it is

very important for you. You will have presentations so you must know how to speak confidently.

You must know how to speak correctly. You must know how to pronounce words properly. So,

do you think listening and speaking is important? I am asking you back. You learn English in
school for 11 years so do you think now so much of assignments, a lot of group work. Do you

think listening and speaking is it important to you? Yes or no.

Sharon : Yes, it is very important

Miss Kuang : So yeah, that is one of the reasons. Alright in order for you to apply what you

learnt into your higher education and also once you have join the working life. Okay and then

what else did you ask me? Why is it important and why right? I think I have already explained.

Sharon : So, I asked what is the purpose and why. So, the next question is as a teacher

how would you develop your students aural- oral skills in acquiring a second language? Have

you tried anything before or do you have any idea into implementing this into the future?

Miss Kuang : I think I tried this with my form 5 students last year. My school has 16 classes

41 level. Form 1, 16 classes. Form 2, 16 classes and form 3, 16 classes. And last year I taught

class number 16. They gave me the last class for form 5. And this particular class has a lot of

returning students. So that particular class, I'm supposed to have 17 year olds but in that

particular class I have students who are actually 18 and 19 years old meaning that they got

retained for two years. Actually, they are very good. Most of them are boys. I can say 70% of

them are boys. They are actually very kind and very good but they get very, very shy to speak to

me. They said they prefer speaking to me in Mandarin rather than in English. But I told them you

should only speak to me in English. They have to learn to speak. They have to speak English to

me. I asked them if this spoke English at home. I even asked if they watched English movies.

And they told me some times. Then I asked them if they listen to English songs and they said

yes. So, they actually listen 2 English songs a lot but then they do not know how to communicate

and speak properly. So, there was one particular activity that I did with them for all the speaking
lessons. I told him to sing their favourite English song and then I tell them that their homework

for this week is to memorise this song and then the next lesson I am going to play the song in the

class and we are going to sing together. And they looked very happy I told them that the just

have to go back and memorise the song. The first song I asked them to remember is actually my

daughter's favourite song which is Girls Like You. I just told them to go back and memorise this

and you are going to sing that next week. All of them were so excited. So they went back and

memorise to whole song. The next week when they came back to the class, my class was so loud

and noisy until the next class teacher came and asked me what was I doing. After that I printed

out the lyrics. And then after that I started giving them reading comprehension. I started asking

them to watch a lot of English movies and then I give them a lot of vocabularies. This is what I

did in the glass end not all of them passed. Out of 35 students in the class only 15 students

passed. The rest they were in the average. Saw the next year they do not have to retain. They can

continue their studies to form 6. So, what I think that we can do is we need to think of something

that students will like and we need to do that. If they do something that they like they would put

100% interest in it.

Sharon : Such as approaching them in a fun way right?

Miss Kuang : Yeah, yeah approaching them in a fun way. Yes, of course that’s right.

Sharon : Okay thank you Miss. That is all from me

Miss Kuang : That is all from you? Ok next.

Manjula : Ok so I will be continuing the other three questions. Ok so my first question is

that do you think that future teachers should have a professional development training in

teaching second language aural-oral skills and why?

Miss Kuang : Yes, if you ask me, I will say yes. During my teaching, I don't remember going

for any specific course are there any specific training regarding this thing. I have one particular

subject about listening in speaking. Do you have it? One particular paper. I remember taking one

particular paper or you don't have any idea?

Manjula : No.

Miss Kuang : I remember taking that particular paper. So,I feel that yes it would be better for

future teachers to attend this type of courses in order for them to go to school and teach. If you

have no experience and if you have no knowledge on how to teach then how are you going to

survive teaching schools. Before this I was teaching in a primary school and in that school I used

to teach Science and not English. I taught Science for 7 years my bachelor's degree is about

language literature. When I first got posted I actually faced a lot of difficulties when it comes to

listening and speaking because they do not like listening and speaking. So, we, teachers, have to

come up with our own idea to what to teach them. Sometimes I need to I need to search for ideas

in what I can do. So for me they should have a very in detail course for listening and speaking

for teachers. If you asked me, my answer is yes, I would attend a listening and speaking class or

course.

Manjula : Okay teacher. Thank you. So my next question is based on your own experience,

what are the barriers the present students in assessing Aural- oral skills

Miss Kuang : The first barrier is the language barrier. That means they don't understand what I

am saying, they do not know. Sometimes they do not understand simple words. So the first

barrier we'll say is language barrier. I teach in a Chinese school so I know a little bit of Chinese

so it's a bit easy for me because I can translate to them in Chinese but how about the teacher that
does not know Chinese, how are they going to explain to the students. I have some Indian

teachers who do not know Chinese at all so what they will do is they will Google translate and

translate whatever they want to say and show to the students. It will just come out in Chinese and

the students understand it. So, language barrier is what I feel was my first challenge which was

very challenging for me

Manjula : Ok teacher, so my last question is what is the "Aural-Oral" approach in teaching

of English as a second language? Like what is your very own approaches that you will use in

your classroom.

Miss Kuang : In my class, I think approaches we have quite a few. In our own class and

syllabus, we have phonetics and also, we have syntax. These two things we have to do it in the

class. So, before we start to teach them, there is a lot of explanation about phonetics and audio on

how to pronounce this works correctly at how to pronounce that words correctly. After that they

need to apply it on their work. So, we actually have like my school we have proper plan on how

to deliver the knowledge that we have. Did I answer your question?

Manjula : Yes, yes, yes you did. And that is all from me. Now my friend Brendan will ask

you the remaining questions. Thank you, Miss

Miss Kuang : Okay, you’re welcome.

Brendan : Hi teacher, can you hear me?

Miss Kuang : Ya, ya. I can hear you, Brendan.

Brendan : So my first question is what are the ways that you can do if you have a student

that has listening problems in your classroom

Miss Kuang : Has listening problems?

Brendan : Ya.

Miss Kuang : In my classroom. What are the ways I can do? So far I have never come across

this before. Ok listening problems. You mean that he was born with listening disorders or what?

Brendan : Yeah, he can’t hear properly.

Miss Kuang : Okay if he can’t hear properly so what are the things I can do. I will put him in

front of the class so that he can listen to what I am saying clearly because we are not trained

special teachers. Let's say there are some children with learning disabilities then they should be

in a special school. I'm not very sure about it. But I have never come across this before. But let's

just say in future I have a student I will just ask him to sit in the front and I will talk loudly to

him I am also I will speak clearly or articulate properly to him

Brendan : Okay, thank you. So, the second question. As a teacher, what are the challenges

do you face while implementing Aural-Oral via online classes?

Miss Kuang : Ugh online classes. Actually, there is a lot of challenges that I am facing. The

first thing is I couldn't play the audio which we used to play in the school. Somehow the online

system does not support it. So ever since online less than started, I don't have any listening

sessions with them. I only have speaking sessions with them. During the speaking sessions I

would put them in groups of 4 and I will just arrange them according to the alphabetical order

and give them a topic and ask them to talk about the topic. But do you think that this will be a

successful lesson if I do it through online?

Brendan : No
Miss Kuang : Exactly. You know they will not even open their in class so do you expect them

to say something online? They don't. And also another thing is they do not switch on their

webcam. I need to tell them many times that I need to see their face and he will never answer me.

I need to call out the name 10 times to figure out who is the one that is talking in the class. o

dead is the challenges that I face. Another challenge that I face is that they give a lot of excuses

saying that I am lagging, or they cannot hear me and they will just keep on saying that. One day

the monitor messaged me everyone can listen to what she is saying but there was one particular

student is the only one that cannot hear. He told me that the particular student was lying to me.

So, they like to lie. Another thing it is never an easy thing for us to teach online. It would be

better someone is in front of you where you can touch them, talk to them directly rather than see

their face on the computer screen. Sometimes I feel like I'm talking to myself because they do

not even switch on their webcams. I keep talking and talking but nobody will ever answer so not

only listening and speaking but every subject will not be successful if it is through online classes.

So that's my opinion. Did I answer your question?

Brendan : Ya, ya okay and the next question. What is the effect of gender on the learners'

Aural-Oral performances?

Miss Kuang : Meaning?

Brendan : Do you think like there's a difference between the two genders in learning Aural-

oral skills?

Miss Kuang : Okay. What does gender have to do with listening and speaking?

Kuna : Maybe like girls are much more attentive and boys are usually like playful right?

So maybe in a sense of that.

Miss Kuang : Okay. I cannot say that boys are very playful. I have a lot of boys who are

actually more attentive than girls. But one thing usually girls are attentive and they will listen to

you but they are very shy when it comes to speaking. They feel very shy to stand up and talk in

front of the class but compared to boys even though they can't speak well and if their

pronunciation is all wrong or they can't form a proper sentence but if you ask him a question he

will confidently stand up and talk. Maybe because one of the gender-related things that I can say

but yes, what Kuna said, some boys are playful compared to girls but not all of them because I

have to be fair to Brendan. Then he will feel offended.

Brendan : It’s fine. I know guys not that smart. And my last question is what is your

philosophy as a teacher?

Miss Kuang : My philosophy as a teacher. This is my 10th year teaching. My philosophy is

only one thing. My students must enjoy coming to my class. I don't want them to hate my class

and say I do not want to enter Miss Huang's class. I do not want my students to hope that I am

absent. They must like the particular subject. No, they must like the subject. How do you make

students like that particular subject? We, as teachers, we, as educators, how to create a very

interesting platform for the students so that they will come to the class and learn. For example,

yes you don't like the subject such as History. What do we usually say about History? We

usually say that all history teachers are boring. And that they keep reading and talking about the

text. Do you like history? No! Do you really go and study history? What did you get for History?

C or fail. What is the main reason for it? Maybe it's the teacher are you already set up in your

mind that you do not like this subject. So, you have to make students the throw that particular

thing and say I like English and be happy when the next lesson is English. Maybe the teacher

will be interesting. I am very excited for English. Maybe the teacher will create a very interesting
topic. So, my philosophy is students will love to come for my lesson and in the future maybe in

10 years or 5 years time when they see me they will appreciate me like how Kuna did. So that is

my philosophy.

Brendan : Okay teacher. That is all from me

Miss Kuang : Okay alright

Kuna : Thank you teacher for this beautiful session and very good explanation

Miss Kuang : No problem! I hope I answered your questions. Because when you sent me the

list I actually sat down for nearly an hour to think about what am I going to explain to you guys.

I need to say something that is useful for you guys. I just cannot simply say something that is not

related to the topic. So, if let's say that there is anything not relevant to the topic, you can just

adjust it here and there.

Kuna : No worries teacher

Miss Kuang : I hope that you guys will be very successful.

Brendan : Thank you, teacher

Sharon : Thank you, teacher

Kuna : Thank you, teacher

Manjula : Thank you, teacher

Miss Kuang : You are welcome

Kuna : Thank you so much teacher for this session and thank you so much once again
Miss Kuang : No problem! No problem! So, I will just email you the recording of this and

Kuna can you please give me your email address. Alright, good luck to you guys in becoming

future teachers. Okay goodbye.

References

Malaysia. Ministry of Education & Malaysia. Ministry of Education. (2015). Malaysia education

blueprint 2015–2025. Ministry of Education Malaysia.

Maycock, K. W. (2018). Chalk and talk versus flipped learning: A case study. Journal of

Computer Assisted Learning, 35(1), 121–126. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcal.12317

Noon-ura, S. (2008). Teaching listening speaking skills to Thai students with low English

proficiency. Asian EFL Journal. 10(4). 173-192. Retrieved from http://www.asian-efl-

journal.com/December_08_sna.php

Barkhuizen, G. P. (1998). Discovering learners’ perceptions of ESL classroom teaching/learning

activities in a South African context. TESOL Quarterly, 31(1), 85-107.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/3587903?origin=crossref&seq=1

Brash, B., & Warnecke, S. (2009). Shedding the ego: Drama-based role-play and identity in

distance language tuition. Language Learning Journal, 37(1), 99-109.

http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.1080/09571730902717661