https://oxfordonlineenglish.

com/ielts-speaking-exam-part-one-video visited on March 19 2017

https://oupeltglobalblog.com/2012/01/24/designing-good-tests-principles-into-
practice/#more-3655 visited on March 19 2017
https://creactiveteaching.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/lit-review-sample.pdf visited on
March 19 2017

English has become a world-wide language, with numerous countries adopting it as an official language
or second language. English is the dominant international language in almost all fields such as science,
business, aviation, entertainment, and diplomacy, and also on the Internet. In most fields of work your
ability to speak English can help you advance your career; helping you get the job you want and earn
more money. No matter what your area of expertise, the skill in speaking English will contribute
substantially to your success .Therefore, there are more and more studies on the topic of speaking skills
present results concerning students improvement of language skills.

Some students learning English say that the speaking tests probably allow them to present their
speaking ability as well as their English proficiency. For example, in the First Certificate in English
speaking tests, the structure of the tests primarily aim is to focus on fundamental conversation
management concepts such as overall structural organization, turn-taking, sequencing, and topic
organization. This means that students can get opportunities to improve their English speaking skills The
tests highlight global patterns of interaction, termed Collaborative, Parallel and Asymmetric, and
salient features of interaction characteristic to each pattern. The test scores of students will be judged
through the ability of peer-peer interaction and interactive Communication. The results often show a
close relationship between the ability of speaking English and test scores, thus providing validity
evidence for the test scores. In short, The test scores of students through assessment criteria for
speaking tests will show their English speaking ability

However, many students come up against a lot of challenges and difficulties in speaking tests. In
Urrutia & Vega (2006) research study, the data collected suggest that speaking is the most difficult skill
to develop, students usually present lack of vocabulary, shyness and fear of being humiliated; besides,
the authors explain that students show evidence about the importance of implementing speaking
presentation in classroom for improving the speaking skills. In Rama, Ying, lee & Luei Lueis (2007) study,
the participants expressed that speaking activities allow more than a half of students to improve
communication in a second language; there were involved an experimental group and a control group,
in the first one 21% of the students considered that they were not able to speak better, but in the
second group only 11% although in experimental group learners enjoyed more speaking activities.
Finally, Hamzah & Ting (2009) present findings on teaching speaking skills through group work activities
saying that the results of the project were the preferred inasmuch as students showed participation in
speaking group activities highlighting motivation, interest, and they demonstrate contributions in team
work as well as improvement in individual speaking activities. According to the findings in Urrutia &
Vega (2006) study, the majority of students considered that speaking is the most complicated ability to
work out; also, the researchers noticed that students sometimes spoke English, but the majority of the
did not speak during the English class. As a result, they have difficulties in peer-peer conversation,
interactive skills with partners, ideas development and organization and also in pronunciation, etc.

All in all, besides opportunities given to the students, there are still challenges and difficulties faced by
them. From their different points of view in speaking tests, it is probably considered as the most
important skill among four skills (listening, speaking, reading, and writing). Therefore, it is important to
find out the difficulties and challenges to help them get high score in speaking tests.

I. Factors affecting the speaking test results of university English-

majored students.
http://www.multidisciplinaryjournals.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/FACTORS-
AFFECTING-STUDENTS%E2%80%99-SPEAKING.pdf.
http://123doc.org/document/895082-the-major-factors-affecting-speaking-skill-of-first-year-
english-major-students-at-vinh-university-and-some-suggested-solutions-tions-improve-their-
co.htm
https://www.academia.edu/9423968/PROBLEM_FACED_BY_THAI_STUDENT_IN_SPEAKI
NG_ENGLISH

http://rceiu.miyakyo-u.ac.jp/img-nenpou2013_9gou/2-
4%20ronbun%20leis.pdf
Many language learners find it difficult to express themselves in spoken
language in the target language. Each student has their own problems.
A research shows that it is generally divided the factors that affect
students English l and speaking ability into objective and subjective
factors. To be more specific, objective factors include gender, region,
family, social environment, courses, teachers, textbooks, learning
resources or etc., whereas, subjective factors include learning interest,
learning motivation, learning attitude, learning methods or strategies,
autonomous learning ability, etc. These factors can lead to the speaking
problems of the students and affect their speaking performance in
speaking tests.
In general, in order to help students overcome problems in learning
speaking, it is necessary to figure out factors that affect their speaking
performance. Students speaking performance can be affected by the
factors that come from performance conditions (time pressure,
planning, standard of performance and amount of support), affective
factors (such as motivation, confidence and anxiety), listening ability
and feedback during speaking activities.
For Performance conditions: Students perform a speaking task under a
variety of conditions. Nation & Newton (2009) believe that
performance conditions can affect speaking performance. The four
types of performance conditions that Nation & Newton (2009) suggest
include time pressure, planning, the standard of performance and the
amount of support. For Affective factors: One of the most important
influences on language learning success or failure is probably the
affective side of the learner (Oxford, 1990). Krashen (1982) states that a
variety of affective variables has been confirmed to be related to
success in second language acquisition in research over the last decade
but most of those studies examined the three categories: motivation,
self-confidence and anxiety. For Listening ability: Speaking skills cannot
be developed unless we develop listening skills (Doff, 1998). Students
must understand what is said to them to have a successful
conversation. Shumin (1997) shares the ideas of Doff (1998) by stating
that when one person speaks, the other responds through attending by
means of the listening process. In fact, every speaker plays the role of
both a listener and a speaker. Therefore, one is certainly unable to
respond if he/ she cannot understand what is said. It means speaking is
closely related to listening. For Topical knowledge: Topical knowledge
is defined as knowledge structures in long-term memory (Bachman &
Palmer, 1996). In other words, topical knowledge is the speakers
knowledge of relevant topical information. The information that topical
knowledge provides enables learners to use language with reference to
the world in which they live. Bachman & Palmer (1996) state certain
test tasks may be easier for those who possess the relevant topical
knowledge and more difficult for those who do not. Bachman & Palmer
(1996) believe that topical knowledge has effects on speaking
performance.
In addition, Psychological factors that can also hinder students from
speaking well in the speaking tests. In other references, Juhana (2012)
explained that fear of mistakes, anxious, shyness, lack of confidence,
and lack of motivation are included into psychological factors. Those
become the main factor which affect the students condition because it
comes from the individual. Each of them is probably explained:
Culturally, it is easy for Thai students become afraid of making mistakes
during the teaching and learning process. Different from the culture in
other countries which the students are confident enough in asking
question, giving opinion/suggestion or even refuting in classroom
teaching. This human weakness of making mistakes has result in failure
for Thais in speaking English. Leaning language means learning how to
communicate through oral not only from text and translate into target
language. Most of students are afraid to be laughed and do not want to
be criticized or even look silly in front of their peers. They keep silence
and listen rather than expressing what in their mind is; The students are
afraid to speak due to the feeling of incapable in English. They are
unwilling to intimidate by their friends of the teacher. It creates the
sentiment of shyness. Students think a lot when they are faced to
explore their ideas in speaking performance. The feeling of worst,
incompetent, and less-skilled, that all have been built if students could
not uncover their shyness by confidence. Those could block the process
of students ability in oral communication; Anxiety is the feeling of
nervousness correlated to the specific situation. When the students are
dominated by this tension during practicing English, it must obstruct
students from speaking fluently. Thai students feel uncomfortable or
even being confused and panicky every so often when they are faced in
training oral language production. As the consequence, they get
difficulty to catch the smoothness in speaking; There are many reasons
that lead the students lacking of confidence. It can be caused by
insufficient encouragement by the teacher. Teachers might be seemed
as giving support to their students but they do that way based on the
teachers perception only. Most the teachers in Thailand is still applying
their teaching with physical reward. Moreover, before starting the
lesson teachers usually rely on the rattan to force the students include
in the classroom. It could be an image of how Thai students learn.
Unconsciously, its habit increases the fear of trying new things for
students. For that reason, Thais are often not confident to try to speak
English. Motivation can derive from both the students and the teacher.
In English language classroom, teachers mainly handle the success of
communication apprehension. The method and strategy play the
important roles on how extent the students exploring and applying the
target language as well. As we know that native have more places in
oral communication teaching in Thailand because the local English
teachers have inadequately creativity to make a deal with.
In conclusion, There are so many problems that remain in students English speaking

tests. As explained above, those originates from objective and subjective factors.
Additionally, the affective factors still have a great deal of with the psychological factor of
students attitudes including, anxiety, feeling of uneasiness, frustration, self-doubt, apprehension,
fear of mistakes, shyness, lack of confidence, and lack of motivation.
II. Solutions to improve the speaking test results of university English-
majored students.
http://www.wikihow.com/Improve-English-Communication-Skills
http://www.fluentu.com/english/blog/how-to-improve-spoken-
english/
https://www.academia.edu/9655185/The_problems_international_stu
dents_faced_in_English_speaking_universities_and_the_solutions_to
_these
 While reading and listening are considered to be the two receptive
skills in language learning and use, writing and speaking are the other
two productive skills necessary to be integrated in the development of
effective communication. Of all the four macro English skills,
speaking seems to be the most important skill required for
communication. Therefore, getting a good result in speaking test is
very important to English learners as well as English -majored
students. From the exploring the problems students encounter while
speaking English and the factors affecting their speaking tests results. Several
pieces of advice, methods, solutions and so on have been given.

To eliminate these problems which students confronted in English

speaking language universities, there are three main methods are
assisted, which are improving English skills, share academic study
methods and control stress. For Improvement language skills, there are
many useful schemes which can improve English level. The first method
is English course. According to Andrade (2006 p. 146), English course
may improvement English level, academic performance. Student joined
into English course which have offer better performance on final exam,
writing exam, pass rate in the first year. Blakely (cited in Andrade 2006
p. 147) reported that peer tutoring programs have adopted by many
universities, which is international student and domestic student paired
study. The domestic helped improve English level of international
student. Data showed that both study partners get higher marks than
class average; especially the international student got higher GPAs than
those have not attended this program student (Blakely 1995 cited in
Andrade 2006 p. 147). For Academic study support, To solve study
problem that affected the English speaking of students, several beneficial
methods can be adopted by international students. Firstly, it is the
responsibility for students to adjust the new educational environment,
but some students suggest that teacher can change their teaching style
such as require lecture write key words in the blackboard, reduce speaks
speed, introduce background and use example to make student easy to
understand (Andrade 2006 p.140). Secondly, mentoring scheme is a
useful way to help study problems. For example, seeking help from
lecturer can assist student to solve plenty of study problems, the
suggestion from tutors and mentors is important when international
students begin to write an assignment (Khawaja & Stallman 2011 p. 13).
Thirdly, seeking help from the International Student Services which can
offer a series aids such as editing and proof reading assignment and other
academic aspect support (Khawaja & Stallman 2011 p. 214). Thus, these
suggestions can effective support study problem of learning speaking. For
Reduce stress, different stresses need to adopt different solutions to
overcome. For example, establish international scholarship is a way
which can reduce financial stress of international students. For instance,
Portland State University (PSU) has established the International
Student Retention Scholarship which can help those have financial
problem students (Bista & Foster 2011 p. 8). In addition, sharing some
useful learning methods can help international students decrease study
stress. Khawaja & Stallman (2011 P. 214) stated that being organized and
systematic is an effective way to reduce academic pressure. According
time management and prioritizing are important to make a study plan
which can decrease stress. Therefore, it is clear that scholarship and
valuable schemes can help international students overcome stress
condition.
In addition, practicing speaking English yourself is also essential. Some
suggestions are finding native English speakers to practice your English,
listening to the music of English to improve English intonation, Slowing
down your speed of speaking because the more clearly you speak, the
better chance your listener has of understanding you, recording yourself
because you can easily recognize your errors when speaking and so on.

In conclusion, students have faced many problems in English speaking

tests. The problem have affected confidence of international students,
study efficiency as well as their results of speaking tests. Therefore, the
solutions and methods which are improving English skills, sharing
academic study methods and controlling stress or practicing speaking
English by yourself will help them a lot in English speakings
improvements.