The setting of this study was King Mongkut’s University of Technology North Bangkok (KMUTNB) in Thailand. KMUTNB was originally established in 1959 by co-operation between the Thai Government and the Federal Republic of Germany as the “Thai German Technical School”. In 1964, the school was upgraded to be “Thai- German College” and then became the North Bangkok Campus of “King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology” in 1971. At present, there are two campuses; the main one is in Bangkok and the second one is in Prachinburi Province. In general, KMUTNB aims to develop human resources in the fields of sciences and technology at both the basic and advanced levels with 17,496 students and 117 courses from vocational certificates (Pre-Engineering) to doctoral degrees. Currently, the academic units include the
Faculty of Engineering, the Faculty of Technical Education, the Faculty of Applied Sciences, the Faculty of Industrial Technology and Management, the Faculty of Information Technology, the College of Industrial Technology, the Faculty of Applied Arts, the Faculty of Agro-Industry, Graduate College and the Sirindhorn International Thai-German Graduate School of Engineering.
In the present study, the participants were one intact group of the fourth year students at the Faculty of Engineering, KMUTNB. Since the entire population of the fourth year engineering students at KMUTNB could not be investigated because of the time constraints and the extensive nature of the research methodology, the researcher obtained a sample size sufficient to serve the purpose of the study. According to Cohen et al (2005), the correct sample size depends on the purpose of the study and the nature of the population under scrutiny (p.93). The sample size might be also constrained by cost, in terms of time, money, stress etc. (Cohen et al, ibid: 93). Moreover, the researcher has to keep in mind that the sample size should not be too big to be manageable (Intaraprasert, 2000). Therefore, a total of 62 participants aged between 19 and 24 years were chosen as a sample group in this study. At the time of the data collection, all participants enrolled in an English Conversation 1 course which was taught by the researcher. As a requirement of the Faculty of Engineering, these students had to enrol one English Conversation course. Before taking this course, they were required to take at least two English foundation courses, namely, English I and English II. Table 3.2 provides an overview of their background information.
Table 3.2 Background of the students who participated in this study
All participants’ background (N=62)
12 participants’ background (N=12)
Sex Male =51; Female=11 Male =9; Female=3
Age 19-24 years old
(Mean=21.35)
20-23 years old (Mean=21.33) English 1 Grade A =3 B =28 C=25 D=6 B=9 C=3 English 2 Grade A=4
B=24 C=25 D=5 B=8 C=4
All participants’ background (N=62)
12 participants’ background (N=12)
Length of English
study 10-16 years (Mean=11.76)
11-13 years (Mean=11.58) Overall English proficiency Poor=32 Fair=30 Poor=6 Fair =6 Speaking Poor=25 Fair=37 Poor=1 Fair =11 Listening Poor=38 Fair=24 Poor =9 Fair = 3 Reading Poor=11 Fair=43 Good=8 Poor =1 Fair =11 Writing Poor=29 Fair=33 Poor =6 Fair =6
Been abroad Yes=11
No=51
No =12
Study abroad Yes=5
No=57 No=12 Speak English at university Never=23 Rarely=39 Never = 5 Rarely =7 Speak English outside university Never=25 Rarely=32 Sometimes=5 Never =5 Rarely = 6 Sometimes =1
As seen in the Table, all 62 participants had roughly the same background
characteristics. All of them received the 12-week communication strategy (CS)-based instruction and a group of 12 students among them were randomly selected to
complete speaking tasks and retrospective protocols. The reasons the researcher of the present study chose the fourth year engineering students as the participants were that; first, they might be active to learn and practise CSs that they have never experienced. Second, they might use English for their further study or future career. This means that they could improve their speaking skill before they finished their study from the university. Third, the researcher taught these subjects so it was more convenient to make an arrangement with them.
As mentioned earlier, 12 out of 62 participants completed the speaking tasks and retrospective protocols. The reason for having 12 students as participants is that a small sample permitted easier access to recording equipment. In addition, this small sample helped the current study gain a more in-depth investigation into the students’ actual use of CSs. Of 12 participants, there were only 3 female participants. It should
be noted that one typical characteristic of engineering students is that male students often outnumber female students. Moreover, all 12 participants have approximately the same level of English ability, based on their previous English grades. They have studied English for 11 to 13 years. When self-rating their English proficiency in four skills-speaking, listening, reading and writing, the majority of the participants rated themselves as poor to fair at all these skills. All of them have never been or studied abroad. They reported that they never (N=5) or rarely (N=7) speak English at
university and never (N=5), rarely (N=6), or sometimes (N=1) speak English outside university. From these data, it can be concluded that these 12 participants have
approximately the same background and English ability and they might be considered to be a representative group of engineering students.
This section has presented the research setting and participants in the present study. The next section will address the pilot study of this study.