Pan-Pacific Association of Applied Linguistics 12(1), 47-60

47 © 2008 PAAL 1345-8353/00

Student Presentation as a Means of Learning English for Upper

Intermediate to Advanced Level Students

Eunpyo Lee and Mira Park

∗

Eulji University

Key Words: one-topic-for-each student presentation, Power Point, UCC

1 Introduction

Being financially hit hard during the IMF era, the Korean government lead by

former president Kim Dae-jung emphasized importance of the language. A decade

later, the incumbent president Lee Myung-bak and his cabinet members seemed to be

∗

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driven by reformative measures of accelerating the speed of the Korean people’s

language competence, thus poured out plans like immersion program, more support

for the native and bilingual teachers into teaching, and utilizing the military service

period of the men, educated in the English speaking countries, as substitution for

English teaching. Such measures have caused a national ripple and resistance from the

people due to lack of thorough preparation by the experts and professionals in the field.

edge in the language.

At the upper level of education, English for Specific Purposes (ESP) has

become a popular theme for the people who learn and teach majors other than English.

purpose of medical college English. As pointed out in Kim’s (2008) study, English

ability is no longer a choice but a tool for survival. This seems so true especially for

these professionals because of their Science Citation Index (SCI) research paper

publication in English.

This paper observes and examines an English reading and writing course of

second year medical students. All students were asked to prepare a presentation on

different topics similar to a research paper and present it in class. It was also intended

to induce students’ participation in the English class. The student presentation turned

out very interesting as each student created a praiseworthy one with unique Power

Point materials and intriguing audio-visual clips relevant to his/her topic. The students

2.1 Effective ways of English teaching

As the demand and emphasis on communicative competence grew, fluency has

become the objective of the English education. Once prevalent grammar-translation

method, in some cases still used in classroom, was replaced with learner-centered way

of communicative method partly because of the change in the national curriculum

policies and fulfilling the demand from the language users. Such communicative

method included audio-lingual method in which students were exposed to the

listening materials to improve listening and speaking skills.

Kern (2000) stated that since computer technology helps students to generate their

own discourse in the target language, such as in English, with much more freedom

than ever before, computer assisted English language instruction could be more

learner-centered, allowing students to have multiple opportunities to participate in

real-life communication in English. In recent years, many instructors rely on the visual

materials as educational technology is highly desirable because it can help improve

Kim, 2003; Hong, 2003), especially by comparing two delivery modes: computer-

mediated communication (CMC) and face-to-face instruction. Lee & Chang (2001)

presented a model of CMC-based English teaching materials intended to improve

teaching English through English (TETE) has become popular mode of teaching.

Although TETE has been verified as effective, some Korean students’ affective

barriers have not been overlooked. There are also some studies on TETE conducted in

higher education setting (Jong-Bai Hwang, 2002; Eun-Ju Kim, 2002, 2003; Yo-An

Lee, 2006). Jong-Bai Hwang (2002) looked into anxiety and achievement motivation

of Korean college students enrolled in a content-based course for a period of semester.

Hwang’s (2002) study examined how the students’ anxiety and motivation would

change over time by using anxiety and motivation questionnaires (FLCAS & AMQ,

respectively). The study found that the students’ anxiety decreased and that their

utilitarian goal orientation increased over time.

1999; Heckhausen, 1991; Heckhausen & Kuhl, 1985; Husman & Lens, 1999; Karniol

& Ross, 1996) has incorporated time elements into the motivational research

paradigm.

There are numerous factors involved in the second (foreign) language

acquisition. The effective methods that take affective barriers of the EFL learners into

account may be desirable for language teaching.

As a measure for improving English competence of Korean teachers of English

so that they can be fluent English teachers with all four skills, the Ministry of

Education plans to include an intensive oral interview and writing test as part of the

teacher certification exam beginning in 2009.

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Even though efficient ways of teaching the language are adopted in the classroom,

learners still need to produce their language (Swain, 1985, 1995; Swain & Lapkin,

1995). It obviously means that learners ought to use the language in the target form.

Once they do, as pointed out in Izumi & Bigelow (2000), Pica, Holliday, Lewis, &

Morgenthaler’s (1989) study, they become more observant not only in meaning of

language but also in forms.

to advanced level learners.

As shown in Choi et al’s (2008) study that was done on developing English

discourse competence through self-directed practices, the results showed the subjects

knowledge as a result of incidental learning in the process of preparing

for the weekly presentation session. (p. 41)

They continue listing the merits of presentation as:

Apart from these linguistic aspects, the teachers seem to have earned

social and cultural knowledge, as well as developed some practical skills

for strategic preparation and critical thinking through this collaborative

project. The analysis of the participants’ speech data proved their self-

perceived improvement was not simply subjective estimation. Their

class presentation and learn on their own in terms of new vocabulary, expressions, and

knowledge in English as well as practice pronouncing unfamiliar words, where to

pause, and even memorize the content of their presentation.

3 Method

3.1 Participants

For the study a second-year English reading and writing class was observed. The total

of 49 medical students were given a single topic for each at least two weeks prior to

be ready for the class presentation. To encourage the students’ active participation, the

presentation was given 15 percent of the grade as medical students tended to perform

better when points or credit were given. Grading was based on creativity, content

information and interesting presentation to attract the class members’ attention. Also

as for an incentive, excellent presenters were awarded at the end of each month,

March through May, as well as the ones with outstanding content.

minutes. But in a couple of weeks, the students seemed more absorbed in showing

various visual materials from the Internet, UCC, and the Power Point, thus presenting

in a more interesting way. Consequently, the presentation time gradually became

3.2 Data Analysis Procedure

The topics were selected by the instructor based on the reading materials and current

issues. Eighteen topics were given in March and the lists are as follows: Picasso,

Taean oil spillage, great CEOs, earthquake, pets, global warming, newspaper,

broadcasting, psychology, Sigmund Freud, Louvre Museum, Da Vinci Code, real

estate speculation, credit card, Oprah Winfrey, Nobel prize, autism and great

American anchors. In April, 16 topics were given such as materialism, Socrates,

cross-over music, Ecstasy (drug), foreign legendary musician, hip-hop music and

young generation, recycling, Korean legendary musician, famous Korean anchor,

reviewed. Several noticeable things were the marks indicating where to pause, stress,

and how to pronounce certain words on the paper. It showed that the students did

research, wrote papers in accordance with a format, and practiced to present it in class.

During the month of March, 18 students presented their papers, and 16 in April

and 15 in May, respectively. They were also given a questionnaire on the presentation

at the end of the semester. Based on the content of the presentation and how well they

presented it, two presenters were selected each month to be praised with an award

written in English. Each presentation paper was then reviewed and counted how many

words and sentences were used. The results of the questionnaire were also analyzed.

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There were 20(40%) female and 29(60%) male students. They took the TOEIC by the

end of the first year and their results showed that they were categorized as upper

intermediate to advanced students with the mean score of 793 (806 for female and 780

for male students). The lowest was 715 and the highest 990. Table 1 shows the range

of the TOEIC scores.

The next table showed how many words and sentences the subjects used for

the presentation and how many students used the Power Point and user created

content (UCC).

Table 2. Number of students, average sentences and words used, Power Point & UCC

Table 3 and Table 4 show the results of the questionnaire on what the students

felt about the presentation.

Table 3. Is the presentation interesting and useful?

Answers to the questionnaire on whether the presentation was interesting and

useful and whether the presentation on different topic rather than the same-topic-for-

Upon asked whether preparing for the presentation helps acquiring new vocabulary,

expressions and knowledge in English, 30 students (69%) answered favorably.

Table 5. Is the presentation helpful to acquire new vocabulary, expressions and

knowledge in English?

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