HANAN CHANTRUPANTH, M.A., PAUL DALE ROREX, PH.D.
ABSTRACT
This study investigated the oral responses of Thai university learners of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) to spoken questions. Also, the study explores whether or not the students’ abilities are related to their level of English proficiency. Finally, this study attempts to isolate the students’ problems with understanding and answering spoken questions, including the types of questions the students think are difficult.
The participants were 12 first-year nursing students in the 2002 academic year, from the Faculty of Nursing, Mahidol University. The research instruments employed in data collection comprised: (1) the Quick Placement Test Version II (paper and pen); (2) 48 questions generated by the researcher; (3) informal group interviews. The statistical devices employed to analyze the data were frequency, percentage, arithmetic mean and standard deviation (SD). All the statistical devices were generated using SPSS for Windows release 10.0.
The major findings of this study reveal that, first, all the participants could answer a variety of question types. Second, of the researcher’s 48 questions, the participants found eight difficult to understand and sixteen difficult to answer orally. Third, the participants said that long questions, translation, different accents and speed of the speaker caused difficulty in understanding spoken questions. Fourth, the low, middle and high levels made different numbers of errors. Fifth, similarities and dissimilarities include areas of errors, words in responses, interjections, irrelevant words, repeated words, no response, irrelevant answers, correct answers in Thai, wait- time (in seconds) after asking a question and time consumed (in seconds) when answering a question. Sixth, each proficiency level improved over time in terms of the number of words in replies and wait-time after asking a question. Last, significant correlations were indicated between the participants’ oral responses to spoken questions and levels of proficiency.
KEY WORDS: LISTENING / SPEAKING / SPOKEN LANGUAGE / ERRORS / TEACHER QUESTIONS
199 P. ISBN 974-04-3749-4