Fostering Learners' Willingness to Communicate and Their Oral Performance through an Action Research: Focusing on Low-Proficient Learners

Abstract

　　This study reports an action research aimed at alleviating learners' unwillingness to communicate in English and at enhancing their oral performance in the same. Targeting seven low-proficient learners, two cycles of action research were conducted. In each cycle, two communicative activities were carried out using a variety of scaffolding based on the framework of task-based language teaching. Learners' affective changes were examined both qualitatively and quantitatively, and the changes in their oral performance were measured quantitatively. The result revealed that learners' unwillingness to communicate reduced slightly and their oral performance improved in terms of fluency and syntactic complexity. Apart from the product of the action research, this study also shows the details of the events that occurred in each research cycle and the teacher's interpretation of these events. Based on the product and process of this action research, the study reflects on how the teacher's perspective of teaching English underwent a change.