Self-Regulation to Enhance Oral Interaction

Abstract

This action research project focused on the use of self-regulation supported by mobile devices to improve oral interaction. It was conducted in a public university in Guayaquil. The sample was 27 students of first semester with A2 English level. This investigation was conducted with qualitative and quantitative instruments that were the pre and post-test, field notes, interview and, reflections. The assessing speaking rubric instrument was used by students and by the researcher for evaluating speaking. The results reported that the influence of the innovation was Cohen´s d= 2.52, which demonstrated a significant impact on oral interaction speaking skills. After implementing the innovation, 79% of the students demonstrated progress in speaking, which can be confirmed in the pre-test and post-test results. Further, reflections permitted students to analyze using different strategies that helped them to improve their communication skills. Also, interviews revealed that students´ pronunciation was the most difficult to improve, but the researcher field notes showed an advance in students´ pronunciation by using some applications like Duolingo, Google translator, or dictionaries. These findings indicated that teachers could develop students´ L2 oral skills by implementing the use of the self-regulation strategy