PROSPECTS, Jurnal Humaniora, Sains. Pendidikan dan Pengajaran, Volume 1, Nomor 1, November 2012:1-8
ISSN 2302-6278
THE USE OF ROLE-PLAY TO MOTIVATE STUDENTS TO SPEAK:
A CLASSROM EXPERIENCE
Achmad
Speaking Lecturer, STIBA Satya Widya Surabaya
ABSTRACT
English is very important language in this world. With English everybody can
communicate with other people in other countries. To make them communicate each other,
speaking is indispensable. However, teaching speaking is very challenging for English
teachers in non English speaking countries. It is because : (a) their native languages do not
support to speak English, (b) the students feel shy and awkward , (c) their environment
discourages them to speak, and (d) the method of teaching can be monotonous so that the
students do not have motivation to speak. One method of teaching speaking that can motivate
students to speak is role-play.
This article explains the use of role-play to motivate students to speak. It covers what is
teaching speaking, how to teach speaking, teaching techniques and the use of role-play in our
speaking class. This role-play consists of three major steps – before, during and after the
session. The implementation of role-play shows that the students are very happy and
enthusiastic to speak even the quieter ones. They are not only motivated to speak, but they
can also learn from this lesson.
Key words: role-play, teaching speaking, motivate students.
I. INTRODUCTION
As an international language , English
plays a very important role in human’s life.
With English every body can communicate
with other people in other countries. Every
body can share their usefull ideas about the
world for other people in this earth. The
importance of English is described by Kitao
(1996). He said: ...”English is the most
widespread language in the world. It is
difficult to estimate exactly how many English
speakers there are, but according to one
estimate there are more than 350,000,000 native
English speakers and more than 400,000,000
speakers of English as a second language (a
language used in everyday life, even though it
is not the native language) or foreign language
(a language studied but not used much in
everyday life)...The importance of English is
not just in how many people speak it but in
what it is used for. English is the major
language of news and information in the
world. It is the language of business and
government even in some countries where it is
a minority language”.
Therefore to be able to communicate with
other people, speaking skills is indispensable.
However
teaching
speaking
is
very
challenging for English teachers in non English
speaking countries. It is because: (a) their
native languages do not support to speak
English, (b) the students feel shy and awkward
, (c) their environment discourages them to
speak, and (d) the method of teaching can be
monotonous so that the students are not
motivated to speak.
One method of teaching English that can
be used to motivate students to speak is roleplay. This article explains the use of role-play
to motivate students to speak. It is based o the
writer’s experience when teaching speaking in
the classroom.
II. THEORITICAL BACKGORUND
1. Speaking
Speaking according to Hornby (1995) is “
to express or communicate opinions, feelings,
ideas, etc. by or as talking and it involves the
activities in the part of the speaker as
psychological, physiological (articulator) and
physical (accoustic) stage”. Kayi (2006) stated:
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Achmad, The Use of Role-Play to Motivate Students to Speak: A Classroom Experience
“speaking is a crucial part of second language
learning and teaching”. Speaking is key to
communication (Florez, 1999). Brown as
quoted by Florez (1999) said: “ speaking is an
interactive process of constructing meaning
that involves producing and receiving and
processing information. Whereas Shumin
(1997) stated: “speaking is one of the central
elements of communication”.
The language experts above believe that
speaking is a way to communicate with others.
As social human being, communication plays
important role to get response from the others.
– they will get tremendous satisfaction from it.
Many speaking tasks (role-playing, discussion,
problem-solving
etc.)
are
intrinsically
enjoyable in themselves”.
b. How to teach speaking
Now many linguistics and EFL teachers
agree on that students learn to speak in the
second
language
by
“interacting”.
Communicative language teaching and
collaborative learning serve best for this aim.
Communicative language teaching is based on
real-life situation that require communication.
By using this method in ESL classes, students
will have the opportunity of communicating
with each other in the target language. In
brief, ESL teachers should create a classroom
environment where students have real-life
communication, authentic activities, and
meaningful tasks that promote oral language.
This can occur when students collaborate in
group to achieve a goal or to complete a task
(Kayi, 2006).
The above statements emphasize on using
communicative approach to teach speaking.
He also stresses on having real-life
communication and group collaboration
among the students. To conclude, teaching
speaking needs powerful strategies or
techniques to encourage students to speak.
2. Teaching speaking
Teaching speaking is an important part of
second language learning. The ability to
communicate in a second language clearly and
efficiently contributes to the success of the
learner in school and success later in every
phase of life ( Kayi, 2006).
a.
What is teaching speaking?
According to Nunan as quoted by Kayi
(2006) teaching speaking is to teach English
learners to:
. produce the English speech sounds and
sound patterns.
. use word and sentence stress, intonation
pattern and the rhythm of the second
language .
. select appropriate words and sentences
according to the proper social setting,
audience, situational subject matter.
. organise their thoughts in a meaningful and
logical sequence.
. use language as a means of expressing values
and judgments.
. use the language quickly and confidently
with few unneutral pauses, which is called
fluency.
c. Teaching Techniques
Kayi (2006) further gave activities to promote
speaking. There are thirteen techniques that
can be fruitfull to improve speaking activites.
They are :
. Discussions
After a content-based lesson, a discussion can
be held for various reasons. The students
may aim to arrive at a conclusion, share ideas
about an event, or find solutions in their
discussion groups. Before the discussion, it is
essential that the purpose of the discussion
activity is set by the teacher. In this way, the
discussion points are relevant to this
purpose, so that students do not spend their
time chatting with each other about
irrelevant things. For example, students can
become
involved
in
agree/disagree
discussions. In this type of discussions, the
teacher can form groups of students,
preferably 4 or 5 in each group, and provide
controversial sentences like “people learn
The above statements show that teaching
speaking needs great effort as speaking
English explores the learners’ skills. These
skills cover grammar, pronunciation, choice of
words, and organising their thoughts to use
the language. In addition, teaching speaking
needs strategies to motivate students to speak.
Harmer (1998) said: “...good speaking
activities can and should be highly motivating.
If all the students are participating fully- and if
the teacher has set up the activity properly and
can then give sympathetic and useful feedback
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PROSPECTS, Jurnal Humaniora, Sains. Pendidikan dan Pengajaran, Volume 1, Nomor 1, November 2012:1-8
ISSN 2302-6278
best when they read vs. people learn best
when they travel”. Then each group works
on their topic for a given time period, and
presents their opinions to the class. It is
essential that the speaking should be equally
divided among group members. At the end,
the class decides on the winning group who
defended the idea in the best way. This
activity fosters critical thinking and quick
decision making, and students learn how to
express and justify themselves in polite ways
while disagreeing with the others. For
efficient group discussions, it is always better
not to form large groups, because quiet
students may avoid contributing in large
groups. The group members can be either
assigned by the teacher or the students may
determine it by themselves, but groups
should be rearranged in every discussion
activity so that students can work with
various people and learn to be open to
different ideas. Lastly, in class or group
discussions, whatever the aim is, the students
should always be encouraged to ask
questions, paraphrase ideas, express support,
check for clarification, and so on.
speak for themselves, which means they do
not have to take the same responsibility.
. Information Gap
In this activity, students are supposed to be
working in pairs. One student will have the
information that other partner does not have
and the partners will share their information.
Information gap activities serve many
purposes such as solving a problem or
collecting information. Also, each partner
plays an important role because the task
cannot be completed if the partners do not
provide the information the others need.
These activities are effective because
everybody has the opportunity to talk
extensively in the target language.
. Brainstorming
On a given topic, students can produce ideas
in a limited time. Depending on the context,
either individual or group brainstorming is
effective and learners generate ideas quickly
and freely. The good characteristics of
brainstorming is that the students are not
criticized for their ideas so students will be
open to sharing new ideas.
. Role-Play
He quoted Harmer: “One other way of
getting students to speak is role-playing.
Students pretend they are in various social
contexts and have a variety of social roles. In
role-play activities, the teacher gives
information to the learners such as who they
are and what they think or feel. Thus, the
teacher can tell the student that "You are
David, you go to the doctor and tell him
what happened last night, and…" .
. Storytelling
Students can briefly summarize a tale or
story they heard from somebody beforehand,
or they may create their own stories to tell
their classmates. Story telling fosters creative
thinking. It also helps students express ideas
in the format of beginning, development, and
ending, including the characters and setting a
story has to have. Students also can tell
riddles or jokes. For instance, at the very
beginning of each class session, the teacher
may call a few students to tell short riddles
or jokes as an opening. In this way, not only
will the teacher address students’ speaking
ability, but also get the attention of the class.
. Simulations
Simulations are very similar to role-plays but
what makes simulations different than roleplays is that they are more elaborate. In
simulations, students can bring items to the
class to create a realistic environment. For
instance, if a student is acting as a singer, she
brings a microphone to sing and so on. Roleplays
and
simulations
have
many
advantages. First, since they are entertaining,
they motivate the students. Second, as
Harmer suggests, they increase the selfconfidence of hesitant students, because in
role-play and simulation activities, they will
have a different role and do not have to
. Interviews
Students can conduct interviews on selected
topics with various people. It is a good idea
that the teacher provides a rubric to students
so that they know what type of questions
they can ask or what path to follow, but
students should prepare their own interview
questions. Conducting interviews with
people gives students a chance to practice
their speaking ability not only in class but
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Achmad, The Use of Role-Play to Motivate Students to Speak: A Classroom Experience
. Picture Narrating
This activity is based on several sequential
pictures. Students are asked to tell the story
taking place in the sequential pictures by
paying attention to the criteria provided by the
teacher as a rubric. Rubrics can include the
vocabulary or structures they need to use
while narrating.
also outside and helps them becoming
socialized. After interviews, each student can
present his or her study to the class.
Moreover, students can interview each other
and "introduce" his or her partner to the
class.
. Story Completion
This is a very enjoyable, whole-class, freespeaking activity for which students sit in a
circle. For this activity, a teacher starts to tell
a story, but after a few sentences he or she
stops narrating. Then, each student starts to
narrate from the point where the previous
one stopped. Each student is supposed to
add from four to ten sentences. Students can
add new characters, events, descriptions and
so on.
. Picture Describing
Another way to make use of pictures in a
speaking activity is to give students just one
picture and having them describe what it is in
the picture. For this activity students can form
groups and each group is given a different
picture. Students discuss the picture with their
groups, then a spokesperson for each group
describes the picture to the whole class. This
activity fosters the creativity and imagination
of the learners as well as their public
speaking skills.
. Reporting
Before coming to class, students are asked to
read a newspaper or magazine and, in class,
they report to their friends what they find as
the most interesting news. Students can also
talk about whether they have experienced
anything worth telling their friends in their
daily lives before class.
. Find the Difference
For this activity students can work in pairs and
each couple is given two different pictures, for
example, picture of boys playing football and
another picture of girls playing tennis.
Students in pairs discuss the similarities
and/or differences in the pictures.
Based on his experience Kayi (2006) gave usefull
suggestions. Here are some suggestions for
English language teachers while teaching oral
language:
Provide maximum opportunity to students
to speak the target language by providing
a rich environment that contains
collaborative work, authentic materials
and tasks, and shared knowledge.
Try to involve each student in every
speaking activity; for this aim, practice
different ways of student participation.
Reduce teacher speaking time in class
while increasing student speaking time.
Step back and observe students.
Indicate positive signs when commenting
on a student's response.
Ask eliciting questions such as "What do
you mean? How did you reach that
conclusion?" in order to prompt students
to speak more.
Provide written feedback like "Your
presentation was really great. It was a
good job. I really appreciated your efforts
. Playing Cards
In this game, students should form groups of
four. Each suit will represent a topic. For
instance:
Diamonds: Earning money
Hearts: Love and relationships
Spades: An unforgettable memory
Clubs: Best teacher
Each student in a group will choose a card.
Then, each student will write 4-5 questions
about that topic to ask the other people in the
group. For example:
If the topic "Diamonds: Earning Money" is
selected, here are some possible questions:
Is money important in your life? Why?
What is the easiest way of earning money?
What do you think about lottery? Etc.
However, the teacher should state at the very
beginning of the activity that students are not
allowed to prepare yes-no questions, because
by saying yes or no students get little practice
in spoken language production.
Rather,
students ask open-ended questions to each
other so that they reply in complete sentences.
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PROSPECTS, Jurnal Humaniora, Sains. Pendidikan dan Pengajaran, Volume 1, Nomor 1, November 2012:1-8
ISSN 2302-6278
-
-
-
-
in preparing the materials and efficient use
of your voice…"
Do not correct students' pronunciation
mistakes very often while they are
speaking. Correction should not distract
student from his or her speech.
Involve speaking activities not only in
class but also out of class; contact parents
and other people who can help.
Circulate around classroom to ensure that
students are on the right track and see
whether they need your help while they
work in groups or pairs.
Provide the vocabulary beforehand that
students need in speaking activities.
Diagnose problems faced by students who
have difficulty in expressing themselves in
the target language and provide more
opportunities to practice the spoken
language.
purpose that participants must accomplish .
Brown suggested role-play can be conducted
with a single person, in pairs or in groups,
with each person assigned a role to accomplish
an objective. Budden (2004) described : “Roleplay in any speaking activity when you either
put yourself into somebody else’s shoes, or
when you stay in your own shoes but put
yourself into an imaginary situation”. Kumar
(2001) said that role-play is a valuable teaching
and training tool that delivers immense
amount of imprinted learning. This learning is
retained and recalled better through the roleplay experience.
Aforementioned statements describe that
role-play is a powerful teaching technique to
actively involve the language learners to take
part in teaching-learning process. Role-play
emotionally forces the learners to speak as it
can touch their deep feelings. They are so
enthusiastic as it can encourage them to
express their ideas. Kumar (2011) further said:
“role-play is a simulation exercise where
persons take on assumed roles in order to act
out a scenario in contrieved setting. The
learners or participants can act out the
assigned roles in order to explore the scenario,
apply
skills
(maybe
communication,
negotiation, debate etc.), experience the
scenario from another view point, evoke and
understand emotions that maybe alien to
them. It helps to make sense of theory and
gathers together the concepts into a practical
experience”.
Role-play is practicing doing their
knowledge to interact with others. They
express their ideas to get response from others.
They are not only speak to get across their
opinions, but they are also explore their body
languages such as mimics, gestures, eyecontact etc. According to learning pyramid,
learning by practicing allows the learners to
get 75% of the teaching-learning process, and
teaching others have greater impact of 90% of
it. 75% is a great quantity of getting
information from what the learners learn.
Therefore role-play is a good teaching method
to be applied. Below is the learning pyramid as
quoted by Kumar ( 2011).
Sasson (2007) gave additional tips for improving
speaking skills. They are :
 Allot a time limit for each and every
speaking activity. Take into consideration
those activities that involve either group
or pair work.
 Keep the activity fun and simple. Make
sure the instructions are also crystal clear.
 Don’t overdo speaking activities in one
lesson.
 Make sure you aim for a balance between
speaking and listening.
 Have a back-up plan for the entire class
and for individual students who are
withdrawn.
 Always reflect on what can you do as a
teacher to help students improve their
speaking skills.
3. Role-play
Role-play or role-playing is an activity in
which people act a situation. It is used
especially in training people to develop
communication
skills...(Hornby,
1995).
According to Brown as quoted by Huang
(2008) said that role-play minimally involves
(a) giving a role to one or more members of a
group and (b) assigning an objective or
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Achmad, The Use of Role-Play to Motivate Students to Speak: A Classroom Experience
Unfortunately, your factory is in a finacial problem
and you do not take any response quickly.
Therefore, one day they
hold strike and production stops consequently. So,
hold an office meeting with your staff to accomplish
the problem and convey the result to all of your
employees as they refuse to give their
representatives”.
Instructions :
a. Divide your class into 4 groups
consists of 3-5 students ( Group A, B,
C, and D)
b. Choose your manager.
c. The manager should give the result of
the meeting to the employees.
d. If group A becomes manager and
staff, groups B, C, and D become
employees who hold a strike. If group
B becomes manager and staff, the
other groups become employees, and
so on.
Kumar (2011) gave advantages of role-play in
teaching-learning process : (a) energising activity
and fun to do, (b) allows participants to contribute
actively ( even the quieter ones), (c) It is time
efficient , (d) experiential learning is more
powerful than instructions, (e) It delivers complex
concepts in a simple manner and, (b) needs little
preparation for the teacher/facilitator (unless you
want to print out role descriptors). Harmer as
quoted by Budden (2004) advicated the use of
role-play for the following reasons :
It is fun and motivating.
Quieter students get the chance to express
themselves in a more forthright way.
The world of the classroom is broadened
to include the outside world – thus
offering a much wider range of language
opportunity.
Having realised the advantages, the usefulness,
the power of role-play to motivate students to
speak, the writer is trying to apply this
technique in his teaching speaking.
2. During the session
a. We divide the class into 4 groups. We
usually make the clever students stay in
different groups. We must make the group
in balance so that the role-play can run in a
good condition.
b. We write some new vocabularies in the
white board such as : labour union, work
dismissal, low demand, hunger strike, corrupt,
bangkrupt, fake data, step down, undermine,
demonstration, decent life, irresponsible
person, to afford the family, bread winner,
monetary crisis etc.
III.ROLE-PLAY IN OUR SPEAKING CLASS
There are three major steps of role-play in
our classrom, namely before, during and after
the role-play is conducted in teaching-learning
process.
1. Before the session, giving unscripted text
The text is given a week before the role-play
takes place. The text is :
“ You are a manager of a big shoes factory. As the
price of nine basic commodities has been soaring up,
your 2000 employees are asking for salary increase.
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PROSPECTS, Jurnal Humaniora, Sains. Pendidikan dan Pengajaran, Volume 1, Nomor 1, November 2012:1-8
ISSN 2302-6278
c.
We give 5 minutes to make a meeting to
decide what information must be given to
the employees.
d. Then we can start randomly from group B
or D that has been really prepared for the
session.
e. We give each group 15 minutes to deliver
the result of the meeting and manage the
strike.
f. During the role-play;
The manager delivers a speech and is
directly responded by the employees.
Debate occurs automatically between the
manager and staff
and employees.
Sometimes the employees are shouting
(like real demonstrators whose rights are
lost). They never believe what the manager
is saying. The employees also make a small
banner stating : “We are hungry”, “We need
money”, We are starving”, “Step down the
manager”, “The Management is corrupt”, etc.
The employees are speaking emotionally,
and sometimes in bahasa Indonesia. In this
case we give proper English words.
As most of the employees are
shouting emotionally, this session can
disturb the other classes.
We, the lecturer must watch
attentively and must be able to control the
situation. We sometimes make correction
for their pronunciation, and suggest them
to clarify their ideas if the other part do not
understand. We also encourage the
quieters to speak so that every body is
speaking during the session.
c.
what he says. Image building needs a
great struggle).
. The employees in fact have unlucky
position. If the manager finally closes
the factory, they will loose their jobs.
They become unemployments.
How to manage the employees?
- The manager must be wise. He must care
and be honest.
IV.CONCLUSION
Role-play is very interesting to be
applied. It can encourage the students to speak
even the quieter ones. They can feel as they are
manager and staff or employees. When they
become manager and staff, they feel so
challenging to handle the angry employees
who launch strike. They feel sometimes
powerless and hopeless as what they say never
succeed. They are so nervous and do not know
what to do. On the other hand, they are happy
to be employees. They are able to emotionally
express their demand for the salary increase.
They are shouting and screaming while
showing the banners. They point their
forefinger to the manager as they never trust to
their boss.
This role-play can be usefull to encourage
the quieters. If they still do not want to speak,
the lecturer can assign promptly or ask them to
raise questions to the manager and staff. The
role of lecturer can be so motivating too, as the
students are so happy and enthusiastic to
conduct role-play.
3. After the role-play
After the role-play, we usually ask some
questions to the students :
a. Do you like this session?
- Most of them like it and are happy with
role-play.
b. What lesson can you learn from this
session?
- Their answers are :
. It is challenging to be a manager.
. It is challenging to manage the angry
crowd.
. It is easy to be employees as they can
shout and even threaten the manager.
. It is challenging to build a good
image. (When the employees know the
manager is corrupt, they never believe
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