DEVELOPING ENGLISH SPEAKING SKILLS OF THE STUDENTS OF BRAC UNIVERSITY: PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS

INTRODUCTION

English is considered as a global language and thus both the west and the east have become equally busy promoting this language (Imam, 2005). As the major portion of the GDP comes from the exporting goods (Board of Investment) in other countries, naturally urges the people of Bangladesh to learn English. From this understanding, BRAC University has set its goal “to provide an excellent broad based education with a focus on professional development for students, in order to equip them with the knowledge and skill necessary for leading the country in its quest for development” (BRAC University, 2011). To achieve the goal “BRAC University put special emphasis on English and specially spoken English, remembering that jobs will go to those who have achieved fluency in spoken and written English” (Jabeen, 2013). The objective of this paper is to explore students’ understanding on their problems while speaking in English and their understanding of the ways which help them to develop this skill. According to BIL it says that the students of BRAC University are using less English in their daily conversation (BRAC University, 2014). This is creating a bad impact on their fluency thus, creating obstacles for reaching the goal of the university. To overcome the problem BRAC University has set up an English committee aiming to develop the student’s English spoken skills. According to a committee member, “the committee is recently formed and is not succeeded to bring out much more and real students those who needs to develop their spoken skills…the reason can be shyness, shortage of time and many more which we do not know” (Mohiuddin, personal communication April, 06, 2014). This gap urges the committee to ask the students to be engaged and explore the new possible ideas that can help the students for their further development in spoken English. The goal of this study is to help the students to overcome the obstacles that they face while try to speak in English. Along with this, it will also try to explore the causes and the effects of the problems in their learning. This is a five chapter research where chapter I will start by a brief introductory paragraph focusing on the basic importance of English language learning in Bangladesh. Along with this the chapter will also include the purpose and the significance of the study. Chapter II will contain the literature review of the previous works done on the same topic.

In chapter III, the methodology of the data collection process, instruments that will be used for the research and the time frame will be mentioned. In addition this chapter will also include the scope and the limitations of the research. Next, chapter VI will analyze the survey result and discuss the findings based on the collected data. Finally, in chapter V the research will conclude by offering some solutions to solve the identified problems. The identification of the problems will be helpful for the committee and the university authority as well to come up with some solutions that can discover a new way of teaching and learning of spoken English. Thus it will help the students to enhance their English speaking skills and fulfill the requirement of the current job market.

LITERATURE REVIEW

The globalization of English and a growing demand for good English-speaking skills in the job market in particular have been placing a greater emphasis on the learning of English speaking skills in Bangladesh. The private universities emphasize developing English skills much as many of the secondary and higher secondary education institutes do not offer quality English speaking class. In spite of their contribution, private universities have to face some challenges which seem to be global. Many studies highlight the principal problems of learning communicative English in countries like Bangladesh, China, Japan and Korea where English is taught as a foreign language and where the grammar translation method is the prevalent teaching and in these countries, especially in Bangladesh learning English language means learning grammar, reading and translation (Farooqui, 2007). For which, students do not like to become engaged in conversation or play communication games. “They refuse to speak English to each other. There is a long tradition of unconditional obedience to authority in these countries. They expect teachers to be authority figures and the teaching method to conform to the traditional teacher-centered approach” (Farooqui, 2007). Since people are monolingual in Bangladesh, students do not need to use English outside the class (Paul, 2012). To illustrate the idea Paul quoted “Mayeesha talked about one of her students who had said: “Outside the classroom, whom will we practice with? With other friends? They will laugh. It’s not possible to practice speaking English with family members either” (p.29). Because of this social viewpoint the practice of English language speaking among young Bangladeshi students are decreasing (Jabeen, 2013).One survey found that the average English language spoken skill level of university students is equivalent to the Grade 7 standard (The Daily Star, 2002). “[Another] problem for spoken English is that, in the minds of most people, national identity and learning English are positioned as antagonistic, not complementary” (Imam, 2005).

According to Jabeen (2013), “the first cause that makes the students difficult in speaking English is that the environment does not support the students to speak English frequently” (p.34). The environment here means “the people outside the class” by the author. She also added that those people may think that the students just want to show off when they speak English for daily conversation. The response that the students get makes them loose their self-confidence to improve their speaking. Since the students do not want to be rejected by the people around them, so they use their native language in daily conversation. That makes the students unable to communicate in English fluently outside the class. The second cause mentioned by Jabeen, includes the problem with grammar. In English, there are singular and plural forms that the students have to distinguish and still many forms that have to be learned (Kuzenesof, 2014). Most students in Bangladesh are very easy to get confused with English grammar, while grammar is very needed to form a right sentence (Jabeen 2013). If the students do not have mastery over grammar, they will not be able to produce sentences that are grammatically right. Realizing their own weak point in grammar the students feel embarrassed when they want to produce English sentences orally (Farooqui, 2007). To ensure better spoken skill at the university level, the researchers mentioned the following point. Firstly, “the Ministry of Education of Bangladesh should recruit trained teachers and take the initiative of testing speaking skills in both the Senior Secondary Certificate and the Higher Secondary Certificate examinations so that the learners are forced to practice speaking in English in their schools and in universities as well” (Farooqui, 2007). Along with this “if language teachers seek to achieve the goal in a different way, they can apply Service Learning concept as an effective tool to use” (Paul, 2012).

METHODOLOGY

This study focused on finding the speaking problems of BRAC University students and the way to encourage them to speak English. As the students and teachers opinion was required, the data collection process from the teachers and the students started on March 8, 2014 and finished in April 10, 2014. In this research, data were collected through structured questions for the students (Appendix A), semi-structured for interview of the faculties (Appendix B), observation on the students and BIL report analysis. Since I am a student of BRAC University and have a good contact with some BIL faculties, it was easy to get time for interview with the faculties. The interviews followed a semi structured format because the study started with a fairly clear focus. The number of the interviewing faculty is four and among them Mrs. Farah Jabeen and Mrs. Liza Reshmin are directly involve in English course designing for BRAC University. The rest of the faculties are Mr. Sarmad Karim and Mrs. Evita Umama Amin. On the other hand, the number of the students participated in the survey is 26 and are from different department. The ratio of the male and female participate is 50:50 and the background means urban and rural is 50:45. Each of the survey required 5 minutes and the interview required 10 minutes and in university campus. While most questions focused on the problems of the students in spoken English, there were a number of questions for the faculties that asked students’ level of expertise, university policies and course structures which were thought to be important for this research to find out the reasons behind the problem. Analyzing the data and reviewing the existing solution of the problems some recommendation has been given in chapter V.
The research however, is not beyond its limitations. Firstly, the time frame of this research was not satisfactory for which different scope of this study has been omitted and only focused on a particular point. Secondly, as the students are appearing in their semester finals, often it was hard to find the right person to set for the survey which is another limitation of this research. Finally, as the study is only on BRAC University students it may not be compared to a study that has been done on other university students.

FINDINGS

From the interview of the faculties and survey on the students, the frequent problems that the students are facing now a day have been identified that are interconnected. Firstly, the major problem that the students face while speaking is “out of vocabulary”. According to the survey 38% of the students said that they face obstacle to speak in English because they do not know much vocabulary (Appendix C). To illustrate the importance of learning/knowing vocabulary Jabeen said that, whenever any student forget or do not know any English word s/he try to switch code and pick his/her native language to fill the gap. This idea often leads him/her to continue the sentence with the native language. So, the student immediately loses the track of speaking in English. Realizing the importance, BIL faculties recommend the students to have a note book in which they can note the newly learned words. In spite of keeping note books the question arises that why the students are feeling that they do not know much vocabulary? To give the answer one participants of the survey said, “..the vocabulary books are workless. We sometimes note the words, sometimes not and trash that after the semester. We do not have enough time to re-open the note book next time” (Rashed, personnal communication, 28, March, 2014).

Secondly, 57% of the students comment in the survey that, the faculties of the university do not speak much in English during class which is another cause of the problem. Where the BIL coordinator Reshmin said that the faculties are instructed to speak in English during the class by the dean so the comment that came from the student may not be correct (personal communication, 28 March, 2014). Finally, the social viewpoint and the lack of English speaker are identified as another problem for the students to speak in English. Almost 29% of the students have mentioned that they feel shy to speak in English in front of a person who does not practice English (Appendix C). The reason of this shyness is often related to the language movement history. Amin gives an example to describe this, “..in Bangladesh people do care about what others are saying about them. If anyone speaks in English or Hindi other than Bangla, some people may ridicule him/her saying that s/he is Western influenced or Indian. Do you think after having this experience one will show the courage to speak in English in a society where there is possibility to be humiliated every time you try to speak?” (Personal communication, 28, March, 2014). Because of the social viewpoint the people do not practices English influence the English speaker to speak in Native language thus demotivate the students to speak in English.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

The initiatives that taken by BRAC University have so far been successful in helping students to develop their speaking skills but still there are some problems which should be taken in account to resolve. First, as the students are not capable to acquire much vocabulary with the current note book method, alternative and modified vocabulary learning system should be introduced. Keeping “word card” in which they can learn a new word every day, introducing word board in every department by which a new word can be appeared in front of them etc can be a part of the vocabulary learning process. Second, every course should serve 5–10 marks for oral presentation or individual class discussion. As the faculties are superior and have the authority to shape the course, it will be easier for the faculties to set the course outline and the students to be inspired as there will be marks. By this, the faculty will be able to enforce the strict guideline for speaking English on the students. Third, the number of the English speakers in the University campus should be increased. The students often directed by the security guard and the floor in-charge for assistance. If it is possible to make them speak in English and give direction in the same language, the students will automatically start interacting with them in English, thus their spoken skill will develop and put them on step forward to BRAC University’s goal of professional development of the students.