Contents

Contents

Page

PARTI:Rationale
ContextoftheEvaluation
o LearnerCharacteristics
o OrganizationCharacteristics
PARTII:ProgramObjectives

34

o PerformanceOutcomesofProgram
PARTIII:FormativeEvaluation

56

o FrameworkoftheOngoingEvaluation
PARTIV:SummativeEvaluation

79

o FrameworkoftheFinalEvaluation
PARTV:Summary

PARTI:Rationale
ContextofEvaluation
Learner Characteristics
Speaking is one of the most important skills in language learning as it does not
only enable learners to communicate in the target language, it also allow them to
express their feelings and share ideas (Rajendra, Mehar, Lim, 2015). Unfortunately
this is only made possible if learners have sufficient vocabulary. Based from a
research conducted by (Naginder, 2012) he concluded that the proficiency level of
Form 1 students in Malaysia is still below par. In his study, he has identified that their
poor performance is closely linked to their limited vocabulary knowledge.
This is also reflected in the 27 (N = 27) Form 1 students who are selected as
the target group of this program evaluation. Based from the data obtained from the
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form teacher, majority of the students come from working class family residing in
Kota Kinabalu area. They are able to read and write in English and are motivated in
the language.
In terms of their level of proficiency, they are of low to intermediate
proficiency level. Generally, they are able to ask and answer basic questions about
personal information, give and follow basic instructions as well as identify numbers
for routine task. These responses are often made up of short replies with a word-byword delivery.
Unfortunately, when it comes to social interaction, particularly within the
classroom setting, they are unable to participate actively as they find it difficult to find
the right words to express their thoughts and feelings. Their replies are often limited
to one word and yes or no, which in turn discourages communication.

Organization Characteristics
SMKA Tun Ahmadshah is a religious instruction school located in the area of
Inanam, Kota Kinabalu. It is a coed boarding school with 440 enrollments of students
from all over Sabah. This includes students from the area of Kota Kinabalu itself as
well as rural areas of the state. It is only recently that the school has implemented the
streaming system in terms of selecting its Form 1 intake. The selection is done based
from the results of their UPSR examination.
Among the subjects offered in this school are the eight compulsory subjects
and elective subjects that are related to Islamic studies. There are three languages
taught in this school and they are Bahasa Malaysia, English and Arabic language.
Although it is a religious instruction school, the school does not solely focus on
producing competent Arabic language speakers, it also aims to produce more
proficient English speakers. This can be seen through the continuous efforts made by
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the English Language Panel in organizing activities and camps to help increase
students interests in communicating in English.
A part from that, great emphasis has also been given to the OPS English
Program in which teachers constantly participate in courses in order to enhance their
understanding of this program. Furthermore, in house trainings and panel discussions
are also done in order to come up with ways to conduct effective OPS English lessons
and the kinds of activities that are effective in meeting the goals of the program.

PARTII:ProgramObjectives
Oral Proficiency in English for Secondary Schools or OPS-English was
introduced by the Ministry of Education to enhance the aural and oral skills of
Malaysian students. This program involves the lower secondary classes, Form 1 and 2
in which students are taught English through speaking and listening based activities.
Based from the findings gained from a research conducted by Fauziah (2012),
our teaching and learning of English is too focused on reading and writing. The most
frequent activity conducted in the classroom are writing exercises, grammar and
reading comprehension. As a result, speaking and listening skills are often neglected
and are least effectively developed.

Therefore, the OPS-English Program is designed to help enhance students

speaking and listening skills through fun and innovative method. Unlike the
conventional classroom instruction, OPS-English employs a more interactive teaching
and learning process. It incorporates a lot of learner centered listening and speaking
activities by using videos, voice recordings and pictures as stimuli. This approach
does not only opens up opportunities for students to use the language, it is also
believed to help build learners interest and confidence to develop their listening and
speaking skills.
One of the components focused in this program is to build students
vocabulary and help them use these words meaningfully. Learners are expected to
make use of the vocabulary learned to form accurate sentences in lessons as well as
use them appropriately when genuinely communicating outside of the classroom
(Larsen-Freeman, 2011). In order to help learners to achieve the objectives
mentioned, OPS-English lessons involves planning for repeated use of the targeted
vocabulary items through the activities conducted during OPS-English lessons.
Therefore, this program is aimed to produce proficient English language
speakers who are able to communicate effectively within the classroom as well as in
real life setting. This aim is achieved through planned listening and speaking activities
that also incorporates vocabulary-based activities in each lesson. The table below
summarizes how the program is

PARTIII:FormativeEvaluation

3.1

OPSEnglishModule
TheOPSEnglishmoduleismadeupof10unitsandeachunitisaccompanied

withavocabularybasedactivity.Thereisalistoftargetwordsprovidedandthese
targetwordswillberepeatedlyutilizedthroughoutthesixlessonsineachunit.Since
eachunithasitsowntheme,thetargetwordslistedarealsocloselyrelatedtothe
unitstheme.Thisistoprovidecontexttostudentstohelpthemlearnwordsbetter.A
partfromthat,learningnewwordsincontextwillalsoaidindeeperunderstandingon
themeaningandwordusageaccordingtotheappropriatenessofsituations.
3.2

FormativeEvaluationFramework

Table1:FormativeEvaluationFramework
Thisevaluationisconductedwithinthespanof4weeksinwhich6lesson
plans are executed. The framework in Table 1 above depicts how the formative
evaluationiscarriedout.TheevaluationfirstbeginswithaPreTestthatisaimedto
determinethelevelofstudentsvocabularyknowledgebeforetheintervention.This
testisintheformoforaltestandstudentsspeakingskillsareassessedusingthe
Speaking Assessment Scale provided by the Ministry of Education. The scores
gatheredfromthetestarethenrecordedfordatacollectionpurposes.

Oncethepretesthasbeenconducted,studentswillgothroughtheintervention

stage,whichinvolves6lessons.Eachlessonisaccompaniedwithavocabularybased
activityinwhichhas itsownlistoftargetwords.Thesewords areintroducedto
studentsthroughvariedactivitiesnamelyroleplay,groupdiscussion,videoclipsand
voice recording. In addition, these vocabularybased activities do not use the
linguistic based strategies in a sense that new words are introduced to students
without putting too much emphasis on the linguistic area such as syntax and
morphology.Inaddition,studentsarealsointroducedtotheprefixesandsuffixesofa
wordimplicitlyasthelessonprogresses.
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The post test is then administered after the 6 intervention lessons are
completed.ThesameSpeakingAssessmentScalewillbeusedtogaugestudents
vocabularygrowth.Althoughstudentsareassessedbasedonthefourcriteriainthe
assessment scale, emphasis is given on their language accuracy that focuses on
vocabulary.
Thefinalpartoftheformativeevaluationframeworkistheanalysisofscores
gatheredfromthepreandposttestadministered.Anindependentsamplettestwillbe
conductedtocomparethepreandposttestscores.Thisisdonetoprovidestatistical
evidence whether or not the intervention conducted was able to contribute in
improvingstudentsspeakingskills.
3.2.1 VocabularybasedActivities
Studentsarebeingintroducedtonewwordsthroughavarietyofvocabulary
based activities. These activities are aligned with the principle of the program in
whichactivitiesconductedhavetopromotegroupworkandareintaskbasedform.
Anexampleoftheactivityusedtoteachnewwordstostudentsisthroughvideoclips.
StudentslearnUnit3GoingPlacesbywatchingavideoclipofatravellingshow.This
iswheretheyareintroducedtonewwordsthatarecommonlyusedtodescribeplaces,
modesoftransportationandmanymore.
3.2.2

PreandPostTestQuestions
Intermsofthequestionstestedinthepreandposttest,thereare5items

altogether in each test and students are given 10 minutes to respond to these
questions.Bothpreandposttestsquestionsareidenticalexceptforthecontentofthe
questions.Apartfromthat,theyalsomeasurethesamevariablewithequaldifficulty.
ThecontentofbothtestsaretakenfromtheOPSEnglishtextbookaccordingtothe
unittaughtintheinterventionstage.Studentsareexpectedtobeabletomakeuseof
thetargetwordstaughtthroughouttheunitintheiroralresponsescorrectly.

3.2.3

SpeakingAssessmentScale

Theassessmentusedtoevaluatestudentsspeakingskillsistakenfromthe
actualPT3OralTest(Appendix1.1).Itismadeupof5bandsinwhichthehighestis
bandAandthelowestisbandE.Eachbandisprovidedwithdescriptorstoassist
invigilatorsingivingscores.Thefourcriteriathatareassessedinthismarkingscheme
arepersonalresponse,fluency,languageaccuracy(vocabularyandgrammar),and
pronunciation.

PARTIV:SummativeEvaluation

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