An Investigation of the Practice of Teaching and Assessing Speaking Skills in Spoken English Classes: Dilla University in Focus

Abstract

The objective of this study was to investigate the practice of teaching and assessing speaking skills in spoken English classes at Dilla University. Specifically the study aimed at identifying the activities of teaching speaking skills used by the teachers, the aspects of speaking skills emphasized in the teaching and assessment process, the techniques of assessment employed by the teachers and the problems that impeded the classroom teaching and learning process. The required data for the study were collected using questionnaire, interview and classroom observation from 90 randomly selected students and 3 teachers. Then the data were analyzed using percentages, frequency and mean of the frequency distribution. The analysis of the course material was also used to supplement the data obtained in the other tools. The findings of the study revealed that the teaching of speaking skills mainly relied on activities like discussions, debate, brainstorming, presentation, dialogue and occasionally on role play. The finding of the study also indicated that there is imbalance between the accuracy and fluency aspects of speaking skills. Most of the classroom activities are accuracy oriented. The same is true for the assessment of speaking skills done. The analysis also revealed that there has been a mismatch between the practices of teaching implemented by the teachers and the pedagogical procedures favored in the assessment of learners’ speaking skills. The study also identified the students’ poor language background and fear of making mistakes and lack of encouragement from the teacher as challenges to the teaching and learning of speaking skills.

Keywords: CLT: Communicative Language Teaching,   EFL: English as a Foreign Language, ESA: Engage, Study and Activate, MoE: Ministry of Education, SNNPR: Southern Nations and Nationalities Peoples Region, SPSS:  Statistical Package for Social Science, TEFL: Teaching English as a Foreign Language