The purpose of the study is to investigate the effect of role-play module using metacognition on English communicative ability and affective factors of primary school students. Nowadays, there have been a number of studies on utilizing metacognition. As a broader concept of cognition, it has been applied in many academic fields as a key concept which facilitates reflection and feedback by inclusive observation. At the same time, the role of English is growing not just as an academic subject but as a global language and as a means of communication. It shows that the focus of English teaching and learning is changing to communication ability. And having utilized metacognition for role-play modules, students are expected to become more active to participate in the activity.
In this study, four hypotheses are constructed to facilitate the verification of the effect of role-play modules using metacognition in English class.
1. The performance of general English ability (listening, speaking, reading, writing) will be different between a treatment group (TG) where the treatment is given and a control group (CG) where the regular instruction without treatment is provided.
2. The performance of general English ability will be different depending on the English level (upper, middle, lower level) of students.
3. The interest level, participation degree, self-confidence will be different between the TG and the CG.
4. The interest level, participation degree, self-confidence will be different depending on the English level of students.
A hundred sixth graders in the primary school took part in this study. They were divided into two groups: a TG (N=50) and a CG (N=50). All participants in both groups were found to be a homogeneous group as they were pretested using The 2011 NAEA (see Appendix 1). Additional English classes with role-play activity lasting two hours per week were carried out for five months. For TG, role-play module in metacognition approach was applied. For CG, on the other hand, the typical role-play module was performed. The participants in each group were divided again into upper, middle, lower level students based on results from the pretest. In this way, the difference between the students with various English levels in regards to the effect of treatment instruction was compared. Finally, an interview was followed up with the participants, which captured their overall opinions and feedbacks. And they were posttested using The 2012 NAEA (see Appendix 2). In addition, the foundation of complex analysis (the quantitative analysis and the qualitative analysis) has been prepared by implementing the survey questionnaire of prior basic information and after interview which captured their overall opinions and feedbacks to students of 2 groups.
The main conclusions are as follows:
Above all, general English ability in TG have been significantly improved more than in CG. Students acted leadingly rather than the activity of previous role-play. And they decide the important matter, and were able to take part in as the evaluator. This active and leading tendency seems to be led to the improvement of general English ability. To sum up, role-play module utilizing metacognition verified the improvement of English communicative ability.
Secondly, the degree of improvement in English ability has been found that there is a difference depending on students with various English levels. In cases of middle and lower levels students, there were significant differences in English ability between TG and CG. Significant improvement was detected in general English ability. It was noteworthy that the finding in upper level students did not make significant improvement between the groups. Not a single English ability was improved. The reason may be analyzed to four kinds mainly. first, there has been a ceiling effect in the treatment. Upper levels scored high enough in the pretest already, thus improvement was hardly found in the posttest after the treatment. Second, there is the difficulty in measuring the minute change of English ability because the evaluation method was the paper examination. Third, the improvement of all English ability cannot be verified sufficiently as the evaluation tool is composed of 34 questions. Fourth, it is hard to measure upper levels since the evaluation of scholastic accomplishment of sixth grade primary school of whole country.
Thirdly, general affective factors were affirmatively changed by role-play module associated with metacognition. Students felt more interest than before in the activity module of role-play utilizing the metacognition has been applied, engaged in the activity positively without noticing the eye of peer group and replied that they became confident as well for English as the content they didn''t know is known. Also, the overall perception of students for the role-play has been changed positively by implementing the activity module of role-play utilizing the metacognition.
Fourth, the extent of change in affective factors was sensitive to the level of English ability. As for middle and lower levels, general affective factors were affirmatively changed in TG. Interestingly, the findings in upper levels did not make partial affirmatively change in affective factors. There was a significant difference in interest level and self-confidence. Nevertheless, the difference in participation degree was not determined significantly. The results from the interview, the middle and lower levels seemed to be satisfied with the improvement of English ability and therefore psychological barriers have been controlled. On the other hand, higher levels could not be content with the English ability improvement, and it led them to explicit psychological traits as they were. That is to say, the students with higher level strongly tended to avoid participating in the activity as they were much conscious of what other people thought.
To conclude, the present thesis is carried out to find the way for returning the ownership to students in role-play, an effective method to learn English as a global language. Metacognition is therefore applied in the role-play module. In this way, students are able to be agents of the role-play activity. The continued empirical research related to this module would lead to improve not only interest, participation, and self-confidence level, but also English communicative ability at least in the imaginary situation. Finally, it will enhance the communicative ability in the actual situation.