UNIVERSITE D’ANTANANARIVO ECOLE NORMALE SUPERIEURE DEPARTEMENT DE FORMATION INITIALE LITTERAIRE CER LANGUE ET LETTRES ANGLAISES Adapting the musical “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying” to improve speaking skills among vocational training students. Directed by: Mireille RABENORO, agrégée de l’Université, Maitre de Conférences Written by: Fara Mirado Andriamamonjisoa Academic year: 2015 – 2016 Presented on December 2nd 2016 Adapting the musical “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying” to improve speaking skills among vocational training students. TABLE OF CONTENTS GENERAL INTRODUCTION Reasons for the choice of the topic............................................................................................5 The chosen research methodology.............................................................................................6 Scope and limitations.................................................................................................................7 Structure of the work.................................................................................................................7 1 Part I : The context of “ How to succeed in Business Without Really Trying”: the business world in post-WWII America. .................................................................................... 8 1.1 How to succeed in Business Without Really Trying”: the book and its authors ......... 8 1.1.1 The authors ........................................................................................................... 8 1.1.1.1 The source material .......................................................................................... 8 1.1.1.2 The musical ....................................................................................................... 9 1.1.2 How to Succeed: Its creation .............................................................................. 11 1.2 Historical background of the 50s and the 60s ............................................................ 12 1.2.1 The U.S. history from the lens of Politics .......................................................... 12 1.2.1.1 Some features of Eisenhower’s administration .............................................. 12 1.2.1.2 John Kennedy’s presidency ............................................................................ 14 1.2.2 The U.S. economy .............................................................................................. 16 1.2.3 Social aspects of the 1950s and the 1960s ......................................................... 17 1.2.3.1 The 1950s ....................................................................................................... 17 1.2.3.1.1 The post war boom .................................................................................... 17 1.2.3.1.2 The 50s civil rights issue ........................................................................... 19 1.2.3.2 The 1960s ....................................................................................................... 20 1.2.3.2.1 The Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s ................................................. 20 1.2.3.2.2 The debilitating Vietnam War .................................................................. 21 1.3 The 50s' and the 60s' and the American Dream ........................................................ 21 1.4 The Women’s Liberation Movement of the 60s ........................................................ 23 1.4.1 Women at work .................................................................................................. 24 1 1.4.2 Women having a say in the government ............................................................ 26 2 Part II Using How to Succeed to address the challenges of learning and teaching speaking skills among vocational training schools ................................................................................ 28 2.1 A brief overview of the E.L.T. in the tertiary stream ................................................ 28 2.2 A S-W-O-T analysis of speaking sessions in vocational schools .............................. 29 2.2.1 Strengths ............................................................................................................. 30 2.2.2 Weaknesses ........................................................................................................ 31 2.2.3 Opportunities ...................................................................................................... 39 2.2.4 Threats ................................................................................................................ 40 2.3 Using musicals to teach speaking skills .................................................................... 40 2.3.1 Defining Speaking skills .................................................................................... 43 2.3.2 Understanding the process of speaking .............................................................. 44 2.3.3 Speaking skills to be developed ......................................................................... 44 2.3.3.1 The need for oral fluency ................................................................................ 44 2.3.3.2 Pronunciation .................................................................................................. 45 2.3.3.2.1 The English language sound ..................................................................... 45 2.3.3.2.2 The English Language Stress .................................................................... 45 2.3.3.2.3 The English Language Intonation ............................................................. 46 2.3.3.3 Non-verbal communicative skills ................................................................... 50 2.3.4 Drama in teaching speaking skills ...................................................................... 51 2.3.4.1 Drama reduces the affective filter .................................................................. 51 2.3.4.2 The concept of Action Control and Self-Motivating Strategies ..................... 52 3 PART III An opportunity to act out ................................................................................. 55 3.1 Using the musical to stimulate students’ willingness to speak .................................. 55 3.2 A humorous script to work on ................................................................................... 56 3.3 Addressing the issue of vocabulary ........................................................................... 56 3.4 Preliminary preparations: The need for restructuring ................................................ 56 3.4.1 Choice of the scenes ........................................................................................... 57 3.4.2 The need for contextual adaptation .................................................................... 59 3.4.2.1 Adapting the script to the level of the students .............................................. 59 3.4.2.2 Modernizing the songs in the musical ............................................................ 62 3.5 Organizing the activity .............................................................................................. 63 3.5.1 Some suggestions on organizing speaking activities ......................................... 63 3.5.1.1 Before ............................................................................................................. 63 2 3.5.1.2 During ............................................................................................................. 68 3.5.1.3 After ................................................................................................................ 71 3.5.2 The actual performance ...................................................................................... 73 3.6 Suggestions on ways of dealing with the musical ..................................................... 74 3.6.1 Some technical procedural strategies ................................................................. 74 3.6.2 A report on the experimentation ......................................................................... 76 3.7 Some suggested activities to teach the components of speaking skills ..................... 78 3.7.1 Teaching sounds ................................................................................................. 79 3.7.2 Teaching word stress and sentence stress via the Names / Suburbs game ......... 81 3.7.3 Teaching intonation ............................................................................................ 82 3.7.3.1 Using the hot seat game .................................................................................. 82 3.7.3.2 Via the attitude game ...................................................................................... 83 GENERAL CONCLUSION................................................................................84 3 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 Years of Teaching Experience ................................................................................... 31 Figure 2 Teachers’ Academic Studies ...................................................................................... 33 Figure 3 Learners’ attitudes to speaking ................................................................................. 34 Figure 4 Speaking Sessions ...................................................................................................... 37 Figure 5 Speaking Sessions Frequency ...................................................................................