The impact of group dynamics on the success of language learning

502 THE IMPACT OF GROUP DYNAMICS ON THE SUCCESS OF LANGUAGE LEARNING Do Manh Cuong, Do Thi Song Tuyen Faculty of English, HUTECH University, Vietnam ABSTRACT The research paper aims to explore the role of group dynamics in language learning. Some principles for teachers to take the most advantage of group dynamics in language pedagogy are then suggested. Last but not least, from these principles, some strategies were applied to real language classrooms of English- majored students at HUTECH to help them keep up with the current level of the class, motivate them to learn and make the lessons more interesting and more useful. Keywords: English-majored students, group dynamics, principles, strategies. 1. INTRODUCTION Passive learning has been occurring in Vietnam for years. Minh (2009) states that at universities, the common work method in the classroom is still ‗teacher talk and student write‘ (p. 6). Minh goes on to claim that students are not given opportunities to update current socioeconomic information. Observations in 2005 by teams of the National Academies of the United States identified problems of teaching and learning at selected Vietnamese universities and concluded that: – Ineffective teaching methods, which have too high a dependence on lectures and little use of active learning techniques were used; – There was a lack of emphasis on conceptual learning or higher order learning; – Students‘ learning is passive; – Students spend too much time in classes each day [and there was] no deep learning and comprehension. (Stephen, Doughty, et al, 2006 p.16). This is the result of traditional teaching methods which affect the teaching and learning in Vietnam, in general, and language teaching and learning, in particular. Students silently listen to teacher‘s explanation and copy everything on the board without any participation during the class. In fact, the students sometimes open their mouths to say something. Even in that case, they just answer the teacher‘s questions. So students passively receive knowledge from the teacher. This means that there is only interaction between teacher and students, not between students and students. This passive learning brings students only few achievements in language classes. With communicative language teaching (CLT) approach applied in most language schools in Vietnam today, active learning is being raised in language classrooms. In these classrooms, students are required to take part in a number of meaningful activities with different tasks which are to improve their communicative competence. This approach appears to be efficient in a way that it gives students chances to join activities and show their real abilities. From these activities, students can learn a lot not only from the teacher but also from their friends and themselves. Unlike passive learning, active learning provides students with a variety of activities to get more success in their language learning. 503 Group dynamics soon appear in these active learning classrooms. This is due to the fact that students are free to interact with one another in such classrooms. Then, student-student interaction produces the issue about the way students behave in small groups and in the whole class and their reactions to one another. As a result, group dynamics play a particular role in second language acquisition (SLA). The purpose of this research is to explore the role of group dynamics in language learning. Then some principles for teachers to make good use of group dynamics in language teaching are provided. Also, some strategies applied to real classes of the authors were described in details. 2. LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1. Definition of group dynamics Group dynamics are behavior of individuals within groups: the interpersonal processes, conscious and unconscious, that take place in the course of interactions among a group of people (Encarta Dictionary Tools, 2006). So the question is whether individual students‘ behavior within groups and their reaction to one another affects the success of learning language. There have been several points of view about this issue. 2.2. The role of group dynamics in SLA The issue about the role of group dynamics in SLA has been argued for a long time by linguists. One of these linguists, McDonough (1978) pinpoints group dynamics as an important set of personal variables. He notes that rivalries can serve as a stimulus for learning while group cohesiveness may depress performance. This means that if members in a group or in the whole class try to overcome the others, their language learning will improve and that if these members get along well with one another, little improvement in language learning will be obtained. Figure 1. Competitiveness and the second language learner Unsuccessful Self-image Successful Self-image Positive rewards associated with success of L2 learning 2LL continues to participate in milieu of success L2 learning enhanced Anxiety (State/Trait) Debilitating Anxiety 2LL (temporarily or permanently) avoids contact w/ source of perceived failure L2 learning is impaired or abandoned Learner increases efforts to improve L2 (w/ improvement measured by comparison w/ other LL‘s) – i.e., learner becomes more competitive Facilitating Anxiety L2 learning is enhanced Learner perceives self on a continuum of success when compared to other 2LL‘s Competitive Second Language Learner (2LL) 504 Bailey (1983) records that some classroom learners make overt comparisons of themselves with other learners and these result in emotive responses to the language-learning experience. This means that learners tend to compare their own learning ability with that of the others and that this comparison affects SLA. To make her analysis clearer, Bailey (1983) proposes a model of how the learner‘s self-image in comparison with other L2 learners (Figure 1) can either impair or enhance SLA. The figure shows that there are two opposite possibilities. One possibility is that a learner may have a successful self-image or consider himself or herself as a good and successful language learner in comparison with the others. This may be because he/she performs well in language learning, gets good marks and receives positive rewards from teachers, parents, friends And these rewards, in return, encourage him/her to be more active in classroom activities. As a result, L2 learning is enhanced. Another possibility is that the learner may have unsuccessful self-image or thinks himself or herself as a worse learner than the others. It may be created from bad marks, criticism from teachers, parents, friendsThis produces anxiety when he/she takes part in classroom activities. He/She is reluctant to express his/her opinions outwardly in classroom activities for fear of being laughed at by the others. This anxiety leads to two possible types of anxiety: facilitating anxiety and debilitating anxiety. The former refers to the kind of anxiety that helps a person to try harder and consequently perform better (Tsui, 1995). Facilitating anxiety makes the learning process easier in a way that the student increases his/her efforts to improve L2 knowledge. This well-prepared position makes the learner become more competitive in classroom activities in order to overcome his/her opponents. L2 learning is enhanced thus. And enhanced L2 learning produces successful self-image in return. The latter refers to the kind of anxiety that hinders good performance (Tsui, 1995). Debilitating anxiety soon makes the learner‘s mind weaker and he/she, as a consequence, avoids joining classroom activities temporarily or permanently. Therefore, L2 learning is impaired or abandoned. And impaired L2 learning produces unsuccessful self-image in return. In summary, group dynamics affect the success of SLA positively. Specifically, a learner compares himself/herself with the other learners in class and form either successful self-image or unsuccessful self- image in his mind. Successful self-image enhances L2 learning. Unsuccessful self-image produces debilitating anxiety and facilitating anxiety. Debilitating anxiety impairs L2 learning while facilitating anxiety enhances L2 learning. In return, enhanced L2 learning produces successful self-image and impaired L2 learning produces unsuccessful self-image. This is a two-way effect. 3. STRATEGIES APPLIED TO REAL LANGUAGE CLASSROOMS From these above principles, the authors would like to present some strategies applied to real language classrooms with the desire to make the most of group dynamics to help the students keep up with the current level of the class, motivate them to learn and make the lessons more interesting and more useful. 3.1. Sampling Four of the authors‘ listening and speaking classes were chosen. There were about forty-five English- majored freshmen in each class. They had to learn English listening and speaking 1 as a mandatory subject in the first semester. The objective of the class was to develop speaking and listening skills. We met together twice a week. The students were from all the provinces of the country. Some students came from poor families, so they had to get part-time jobs to pay the school fees and even the living expenses. They were quite tired in class after a hard working night. Other students who did not have to work all night appeared to be active because they had more energy to learn than the ones with part-time jobs. However, after two weeks, most of them showed tiredness in class. Some said that they could not keep up with the current level of the class 505 while the others said the lessons were not interesting and useful. Accordingly, some strategies were developed to motivate them to learn and help them solve these problems. 3.2. Strategies to exploit group dynamics Any teacher has his/her own teaching strategies to suit his/her real class. These following strategies relying on the above principles were applied to take advantage of group dynamics in our classes. Firstly, for comparisons among learners, a test every two months was held during the course. They are called Progress Tests. The Vietnamese grading system was applied, i.e. 1-10 marks with 1 mark as the lowest mark and 10 marks as the highest mark. Moreover, the classes were familiar with the rule: 1 bonus for 1 opinion, 2 bonuses for 1 correct answer. This rule was often applied to most of the lessons to encourage learners‘ participation. At the end of the course, there will be the sum of all bonuses. Each 10 bonuses takes an extra 0.5 mark in the test result. The learner with full marks is awarded a small present in front of the class whenever the result is announced. With our observation, tests and bonuses worked well in these classes. The students looked forward to hearing the result after the test and showed their interest in comparing the result with one another. So, it can be said that our aim to make comparisons was achieved. Secondly, for promoting successful self-image, compliments and awards for good students in front of class also worked well. These students believed in their own abilities to learn second language. Furthermore, in the tests, we often spared one difficult question for good students. When correcting the test, we mentioned the name of the student with the correct answer and showed our appreciation to him/her. This made the student feel pleased. In addition, games which are often used to bring a relaxing atmosphere and friendly competition were highly enjoyable to these students. For instance, the students especially liked ―Hangman‖ (guessing words relating to specific topics). The winners of the games got the class‘s applause, and they felt satisfied with that. Through these compliments, awards, challenging questions and games, the students had opportunities to recognize their own strengths. Therefore, successful self-image was formed. Thirdly, for promoting facilitating anxiety, encouraging words such as ―You will do it better next time.‖ were necessary for slow students. Together with the mark for the test, necessary comments and encouragements are provided to help the students learn from mistakes and reproduce their energy. Also, games, as mentioned above, were supplemented at least once during the classes with the hope that they helped the students get and use new words and structures more easily and interestingly. These games may occur at any stage of the lesson, especially warm-up, review and practice. The students, though they are adults already, appeared to be interested in the games and were anxious about winning and losing, so anxiety to win the games was formed. Moreover, good preparation was necessary. Before each game or activity, we spared at least five minutes to explain the rule, elicit necessary vocabulary and structures as well as give enough time to the students to finish their work. Thus, facilitating anxiety was promoted. With our observation, anxiety was easily formed in our students who got little time for learning. Most of them were busy with their work and family, so learning was their real effort. Therefore, encouragement, games and good preparation before class activities gave conditions for facilitating anxiety to develop. Fourthly, for decreasing debilitating anxiety, good relationship between the teacher and learners is important. We tried to remember all of the students‘ names on the first days of the course. When the students gave answers, we showed interest in the answer by looking at him/her attentively. For a correct answer, we deeply showed our appreciation and say: ―Excellent!‖, ‗Well-done!‖ ―Good!‖. For an incorrect answer, we said: ―Sorry, it may be right, but there is some problem with this‖ and asked for some other suggestions. Right-away disagreement can make learners feel ashamed and we tried to avoid this. 506 Furthermore, any individual work was given about two minutes to compare the answers in pairs before several students were chosen to give answers. Besides, group-work helps weaken debilitating anxiety. Groups were formed from the beginning of the course, including five learners in a group. There was a limit to the number of students in a group to avoid the possibility of a too small or big group. There were six groups in a class. The students could join into another group but the number of members in a group had to be five. Good students can help weak students in the same group. With our observation, the above strategies helped decrease debilitating anxiety because the collaborative environment was set up in the classroom and this shrank the gap between good and weak students. Through the strategies applied to our classes, we noticed that our roles as controllers, assessors, organizers and observers worked well in these classes. First of all, we worked as controllers in class activities. Through our clear explanations of the activities, most of the students understood what to do during the lesson and took part in all the activities actively and efficiently. Next, we worked as assessors in giving assessment, grading and giving correction. Through the tests and contributions of the students, we used a suitable grading system to assess the results as well as the contributions and encourage the students to learn hard to get good marks. Then, we worked as organizers in organizing activities, games and pair work or group work. It was the role that created the relaxing atmosphere in class. Besides, through pair work or group work, the good students helped the weak students learn as aforementioned. Finally, we acted as observers. When the students worked in pairs or groups as well as played games, we observed them to see whether the activities and games were suitable or not and then made changes if necessary. After a few weeks, our students attended class regularly, showed their interest in the lessons and then worked hard to get high marks. Another important point is that the students were well-treated in a friendly and encouraging learning environment. The good students could help the weak students in their groups to keep up with the current level of the class. In summary, these strategies appeared to be efficient in our class. Some of them were optional to suit a particular class but others were compulsory (e.g. marks, compliments, words of encouragement, clear instructions). It was these strategies that helped our classes benefit from group dynamics. 4. CONCLUSION Group dynamics have positive effects on the success of language learning. Due to the fact that group dynamics are learners‘ self-evaluation in comparison with other learners, there are two opposite possibilities: successful self-image and unsuccessful self-image. It is certain that successful self-image enhances L2 learning, but it is not certain that unsuccessful self-image impairs L2 learning. There are two possible outcomes of unsuccessful self-image: debilitating anxiety and facilitating anxiety. The former impairs or abandons L2 learning; however, the latter enhances L2 learning. So unsuccessful self-image may enhance or impair L2 learning. It is important in figuring out principles to take advantage of the positive effect and limit the negative effect of group dynamics in language pedagogy. Specifically, teachers need to promote comparisons among learners, successful self-image, and facilitating anxiety and limit debilitating anxiety. These are key factors of group dynamics which affect the success of L2 learning. The strategies applied in the research are based on the principles of group dynamics and they only worked well with some specific language classes. More strategies and more classes need to be considered to benefit from the positive effect of group dynamics, though. 507 REFERENCES [1] Bailey, K. (1983). Competitiveness and anxiety in adult second language learning: looking at and through the diary studies in Seliger and Long (eds.) 1983. [2] Encarta Dictionary Tools 2006 [3] McDonough, S. (1978). The foreign language learning process: introspection and generalization in Pickett 1978. [4] Minh, T. T. (2009). University or high school level?, Tuan Vietnam.net. [5] Stephen, W. D., P. Doughty, et al. (2006). Observations on undergraduate education in computer science, electrical engineering, and physics at selected universities in Vietnam. Vietnam Education Foundation. Hanoi, Vietnam. [6] Tsui, A. (1995). Introducing classroom interaction (pp.87-89). Penguin English