The Impact of Group Work and Pair Work Teaching Techniques on the Development of Speech in English Language

Abstract

Peer interactions play a dominant and inherent role in developing learners’ speaking skills in the context of English as a second language. The effects of peer interactions have been widely studied by several researchers and the results have shown that the group work and the pair work teaching techniques provide more chances for developing spoken interactions which contribute to the development of speech in English. In light of that, the purpose of this study was to examine which of the two teaching techniques develops more spoken interactions and contributes more in speech development in the English language focusing on the development of spoken interactions in response to the publication of the Common European Framework of Reference for English Language (CEFR, Council of Europe). The setting for this study was the Department of English Language Teaching at the University of Kelaniya. The study was conducted as an experimental mixed method research. The sample of 25 was selected from 620 undergraduates following the compulsory course “English for Humanities” from the first year using convenient, purposive and random sampling methods. Two classes of the same lecturer were selected using the above sampling methods where a pre-test and a University Test for English Language (UTEL) band mark were given to each undergraduate using the UTEL bench marking scheme. In order to identify and remove potential outliers, a thorough inspection of histograms and boxplots was made. Accordingly, 12 and 13 undergraduates were selected from the pair work class and the group work class respectively. In order to keep the number of participants equal in both the classes, one participant was removed randomly from the group work class. Data was collected through non- participatory observations covering 16 activities with 32 observation sessions in the two classes using a checklist adapted from the CEFR scale. A descriptive analysis was performed using SPSS to analyze the data and Excel was also used to represent the data. As the average number of interactions achieved in pair work class were more than the group work class and the distribution of the differences in the number of interactions achieved in the first and the last activity in the pair work class were more than the group work class; it can be concluded that the pair work class contributes in developing more spoken interactions in response to the CEFR scale and contributes more in developing speech in the English Language.