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Action research

Development of friendly environment during

English lessons

Mariia Balanda
Maxym Drozd
Yevgenia Maruschak
Khrystyna Schevchuk
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Success [ in language teaching] depends less on materials,

techniques and linguistic analyses and more on what goes on inside
and between the people in the classroom.
Earl W. Stevick
LEAD-IN

The topic of our action research is “Development of friendly environment

during English classes”. It was conducted by 4 students in Gymnasium №4 (only
one student had practice there) and Gymnasium №7 (3 students worked there) in
Chernivtsi, which are specialized in English language. These Gymnasiums provide
very strong knowledge of English, particularly Gymnasium №4 is the first best
school in the Chernivtsi region and it is also ranked to be on the 20 th place in
Ukraine. What concerns Gymnasium №7, it also ensures good expertise of English
and competes with other schools in the city. Experience from private tutoring was
also used in the study.
The classes, which were taken for the experiment are 1, 3, 6, 9 and 10. Every
form is divided into groups of 8-12 students. Not all the students take part in the
research as the possibility of students absence on the lesson should be taken into
account. Research environment is created in the process of a common school
lessons or some parts of them. The activities are chosen in regard to the topic of
the lesson. This study does not pay attention to the gender of students, status, their
religious views but only their abilities and expertise.
As the research is conducted in the primary, secondary and high school, we
would like to give short descriptions of the participants. So, we can say that in an
elementary school children are eager to learn English. Observing lessons in the
first and third grades make it clear that involuntary attention is overwhelming in
children of this age, they are very active, often noisy, restless, and exuberant, they
like to participate in activities and perform small tasks, though they still may be
difficult to do. The eight year old children are more coordinated. They have
nervous habits, play organized games that require physical skill, have a good
attention span , they want to be included.
According to the observation the students in secondary school, aged from
11-14 years old, sometimes lack confidence, they even fear to speak and interact
with each other, they are nervous and unattentive. Some students feel unimportant
and that nobody cares about their personality. Not so often but the teacher starts
lessons, being nervous, depressed and in bad mood.
Students in the high school (15-16 years old) are seen as self-confident and
make decisions base on knowledge of options and their consequences. They are
self-disciplined and have a sense of responsibility. We can observe lower grades in
their studying and increased stress.
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RATIONALE
The problem of our research concerns students, who feel unmotivated,
bored, passive during English lessons, due to the fact that there is no positive
environment in the classroom. It is very important for students to learn and study
in such an environment, which promotes friendly and supportive atmosphere, this
can be attributable to the fact that it fosters learning process and makes it engaging
and effective. A classroom climate that is positive, stimulating and energizing is a
powerful way of maintaining both students and teachers motivation – and
monitoring learner engagement is crucial in this sense. 
The importance of this research is reasonable as it aims at the creating
different ways of promoting an effective rapport in classes. This study is
considered to be very necessary as it has considerable contributions to many
institutions, psychologists as well as to the participants of the experiment. All the
above-mentioned information rises 3 research questions:
- What is rapport?
- What are the main factors that influence students’ behavior?
- How to develop friendly environment in classes?
In this research we can hypothesize that relationship between teacher and
student will be more successful if teacher takes into consideration personal likes
and interests of students, calls out their names but not surnames, has healthy
emotional well-being and uses different strategies for creating rapport, especially
songs, pictures, games and communicative activities.
Firstly, Harmer (1998) defines rapport as the essence, the relationship that
the students have with their teacher and vice verse. This definition is strengthen by
Pinata (1999) who says that positive student-teacher relationships are characterized
by open communication, as well as emotional and academic support that exist
between students and teachers.
Brown (2001) defines rapport as ‶. . . the relationship or connection
you establish with your students, a relationship built on trust and respect
that leads to students' feeling capable, competent, and creative" (p. 202).
This relationship or connection has physiological implications for learning.
By generating rapport, teachers strengthen the emotional connection
students have to a concept, thus promoting and enhancing learning.
According to Tiberius (as cited in Fleming, 2003), rapport helps establish a
context that positively influences learning.
The risk factors that influence students’ behavior are:
- bright psychomotor inhibition, difficulties in developing inherent inhibitory
reactions and inhibitions; complexity in organizing behavior (even in game
situations);
- the child's tendency to "cosmic" lies - to decorate the situations in which
she is, as well as to the primitive inventions. It uses them as a means of getting out
of a difficult situation or conflict. The child is prone to suggesting to him wrong
behaviors, imitates deviations in behavior of peers, adults;
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- infantile emotional manifestations with motor discharges, loud persistent

crying and screaming;
- impulsive behavior, a tendency to emotional infection, inflammation,
which causes quarrels and fights, even for minor reasons;
- direct disobedience and negativism with resentment, aggression in
response to punishment, remarks, bans, escapes as a reaction of protest.
Dealing with the importance of rapport, Harmer (2007) devotes several
pages to rapport and lists four core capacities that make it up: recognizing students
including knowing their names; listening to students; respecting to students; and
the last is being even-handed. Harmer suggests that the quality of ‘respect’ cuts
both way: not only does rapport entail the teacher respecting the learners, but
‘successful rapport derives from students’ perception of the teacher as a good
leader and successful professional’ (p.113).
Secondly, Marzano (2003) emphasizes that developing teacher students’
rapport have many benefit such as can lead to increased learning and it can
minimize the student problem in the class. Marzano (2003) maintains that teachers
who develop good relationships with their students will have fewer discipline
problems (p.48). This is due to the fact that students who have respect for their
teachers will be more willing to accept the rules and procedures of those teachers.
To sum up what have been discussed in the importance of the integration of
rapport, the researcher will draw a general conclusion that learning required
motivation, and motivation stems from positive teacher-student relationships.
Students are motivated when they believe that teachers treat them like people and
care about them personally and educationally. Students should be treated with
respect, given fun and interesting learning opportunities, allowed to make valuable
choices, and should be able to foster relationships with their teachers that help
students see teachers as people and not dictators or enemies.

METHODOLOGY AND PROCEDURE

We started with dividing age groups between ourselves . In general, we took

1-3 classes, 6 class, 9th-10thclasses. The procedure of experiment consists of several
steps: to observe each class separately and see whether there is friendly
environment between teacher and student or not. The next step was reviewing the
literature. Then the third step is clarifying the problem. Each of us led
questionnaires in the form of income test. By the way, we define terms and
concepts, we pay attention to these items as they need to be specifically defined
because they are applied to the study.
Also we develop an instrumentation plan that serves as the road map for the
entire specification about the participants.
Data collection is gathered through the different ways. The needed
information is presented in the forms of:
- Students’ worksamples;
- Students’ questionnaires;
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- Students’ interviews;
- Pictures;
- Worksheets;
- Students’ feedback;
- Our own reflections.
Let’s have a look at particular examples of using different rapport strategies
in primary, secondary and high school.
What concerns young learners, we take a lesson that is different from the
traditional one. We start the lesson of the first form with a song - greetings, using
movements: waving handles, stomping, clapping and others. We come out full-
fledged physical minutes with the repetition of words of greeting. We use the toy
to get to know the children, at the same time we repeated the phrases: ‘ What is
your name?- My name is …’ allowing children to change roles. After that, you had
to go to the color repeat. We use the pictures to replicate them and then offered to
paint the balls to the children in the color they would hear. When working with
young children, it becomes clear that they cannot sit still all the time, so our next
step is to warm up. After the children move, next step is a video through which
they study the pets. After learning the new material, the children are asked to find a
hidden picture of the animals they have just learned in the classroom. At the end of
the lesson, the children sing a farewell song.
Speaking about middle school, the 6th form in the Gymnasium №7 is more
stressful, because they were more closed in themselves and was at the beginning it
was difficult to find the correct approach to them. I provided some group work,
practiced with them new vocabulary and did a “Taboo” card game. After 2 or 3
rounds they become involved in activity and they started to feel themselves more
freely. At the end of my time I noticed, that students become more talkative and
their general mood changed in better way.
Next I began to work with 9th form. When they saw new person, they show
some caution and tried to keep silence, because of new person in role of teacher. I
provided an activity, main aim of which was to involve students in communication.
This lesson was with a reading focus, so I choose “3-2-1” and changed it according
to the lesson plan. Students did reading exercises, and then they coped this task and
in addition discussed text. By the end of my time, I noticed, that students felt
themselves more freely and they didn’t feel shy. I tried to be polite and friendly
with them, just in case to make children feel confident and calm.
The other part of action research is connected with my tutoring at the
English school. Since the beginning of September I’m leading 13-14 y.o. group of
students (they are studying in the 8 form). This experience is totally different from
my school practice, because here I’m acting as their supreme teacher, who
provided lessons from the beginning till the end, with my own lesson plans and my
own approaches. My group is small, there are only 8 students. Our first class was a
bit tense, because it was my first real teaching practice and in addition I didn’t
know the students. I started the first lesson with familiarity, after which I pointed
that we gathered here to study English and I would do my best to deliver
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everything clearly and as simple as possible. Then I worked according to my plan.

During the lessons we did a lot of different exercises and I tried to make them
speak themselves and represent their hobbies, likes and dislikes. At first they were
shy, but there were one student, who was trying to speak and it encourages others.
From the other side I was trying to speak about me, my interests and just about
some facts about me. That was done on a porpoise to develop some friendly
relationships between me and my pupils. Then the following classes picked up the
trend of rising the trust between me and my students: they asked me some
questions every time when they don’t understand something; I noticed, that they
become more and more active and even silent children started to speak (but in my
opinion an important role in this playing native speakers, which are attending our
classes and provide conversations or other activities).
The research on the issue was conducted in the 9th grades at Gymnasium №4
in Chernivtsi. The participants are the students from 9A and 9B grades. The
income test was provided for students to discover their personal well-being. Many
of them understood that the knowledge of English would help them in the future
(13 students out of 13 from both classes). Most of the students approved, that if
their teacher is not right, he/she always apologizes (9A – 5/7; 9B - 6/7).
At the next stage, according to the lesson, which objective was to
describe pictures using descriptive phrases and Present Continuous tense. The
sequence of activities in 9B was as follows:
1) matching activity - true sentences in Present Continuous about photo;
2) completing descriptive phrases while listening;
3) game “Picture dictation”.
During the last activity students were given different pictures, which they
are asked to describe, draw or write. There was a case when one student refused to
draw the story, which was described. Evaluating the purpose of “Picture dictation”,
which was oriented to increase collaboration by working in groups and at the same
time create a positive environment among students.
Then we decided to apply the same sequence of activities to the 9A grade,
but slightly modified the last activity, and instead of my pictures, students were
asked to present the photos of their friends, relatives or parents on their
smartphones. I was impressed by the results of my observation. The students from
9A grade were more confident and talkative than the previous ones. I’ve noticed
that students of 9B grade just did the last task “for the sake of task”, while the
students from 9A showed a great enthusiasm. That’s why it is important to pay
attention to students needs and interests while creating a supportive environment.
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The other activity we were focusing on in the 10 th form in Gymnasium №7

is called "Shared Writing". This activity involves the entire class as they write a
story together. Shared writing is taught to small groups or a whole class in briskly
paced, 5- to 20-minute lessons. Plan lessons for types of writing that present
particular challenges to students. First of all, we developed and extended
children’s background and language knowledge on a topic or experience of
interest. Next, we established a purpose for the writing and an intellectually
engaging opportunity for students to apply new learning. Students were writing
a letter to a local newspaper or directions for a new game they have developed.
It was very important that I wrote the entire text myself in front of students
(using chart paper or a document viewer) while requesting input from students
regarding aspects of the writing where they most need to expand their expertise.
Although, we considered, for example, whether my students needed to focus
attention on paragraph structure, word choice, or sentence expansion.
During the writing, we modeled processes needed by my students. We took
a few minutes to have students orally summarize what has been learned
about writing during our lessons and finally, posted the text in an accessible spot in
the classroom, and provided opportunities for students to read or use the
text multiple times over the next several days or weeks.

FINDINGS

The results of this analysis were viewed and summarized in a manner

directly related to the research questions.
After such a lesson in primary school, the test was repeated, which we
provided in the first lesson with the same questions, and it was found that the
format of the second lesson, the children perceived faster because they were
interested, they played, they danced and sang. This also applies to third grade
children. Although they have interesting tutorials, they want to work in teams,
pairs, individually they want to create and develop.
At the end of each class we provided an anonymous questionnaire in
Gymnasium №7 for students, in order to evaluate the environment in the class
(relationships between teacher and students). The result was pretty interesting,
because after checking it, I found that:
 students of 6th showed almost the same result. I found
interesting, that they don’t afraid to ask their teacher if they don’t understand
something (9 out of 12), and 8 out of 12 said, that they usually stayed
satisfied with marks, which they are get at the end of their lessons. 9 out of
12 students also pointed that they don’t feel tired after their English lessons,
what means that teacher provides right time management and paying enough
attention for time for relaxing and working time.
 students of 9th form are interested in their English lessons,
because 7 out of 11 respondents answer that they are listening teacher
attentively; concentrate their attention only on the subject, but not in their
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own thoughts; only 1 out of 11 pointed, that during the last tests he was
trying to cheat; 2 out of 11 pointed, that it’s sometimes difficult to them to
do their homework. According to this answers (we paid our attention only
for those, which was interesting for us in teacher prospective) students of 9 th
form like their subject, and one of the essential part of their love belongs to
teacher and his approach.
About our observation in school: after our first appearing in classes and
acting as a teacher, students changed their perception of us. Students from the 9 th
form were taking part in some exchange competition with which we was familiar
and they asked us some questions about it. That fact showed that they started
accepting us as an authority, and my opinion beginning to be authoritative among
them. During the Teachers’ day we was able to spend the whole lesson with both
classes. Teacher gave us the lesson plan and we lead the lesson. We noticed that
students of both (6th and 9th) grade don’t afraid of working together (as pairs or
groups) and even peer checking wasn’t difficult for them.
At the last day of our research we gave to students of the school test and
asked them to examine my work. This test was quite similar to the one, which we
gave at the beginning. The results of the 9th form (11 respondents) showed that:
Test question Students pointed Students pointed
+ -
Listened teacher 9/11 1/11
carefully
Was interested in 10/11 0/11
the lesson
Noticed that 0/11 11/11
teacher paid more
attention for other
rather than to him
The lesson with 0/11 11/11
the new teacher was not
interesting to me
I like the 9/11 2/11
discussions which we
led
Tasks provided 9/11 1/11
by new teacher was
interesting for me
 *some students avoided some questions, that why some
numbers doesn’t calculate right
According to the answers, we made a decision that friendly environment
depends on teachers behavior, his attitude to students and ability to provide
different tasks, approaches and methods of leading the lesson. Lesson plan should
involve not only working with book and worksheets, but the elements of
discussion and communication, in which teacher should take part by means of
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sharing his opinion and letting the students agree or disagree with it; comment it
and even provide discussions if they find your point opposite to their. Teacher
should provide environment in which student feels free to express himself and
don’t afraid to speak.

At the end of the research we provided the same questionnaire for 9A th (6

students) and 9Bth (7 students) in Gymnasium №4, dealing with assessment of
teacher’s activity.
Table 1
Comparison of students from 9Ath and 9Bth grades
Some questionnaire questions 9Ath 9Bth
grade grade
I listen teacher attentively. 6/6 6/7
I concentrate my attention only on the subject, 6/6 5/7
but not on my own thoughts.
I try to cheat during the test. 3/6 2/7
It is difficult for me to do homework. 1/6 0/7
I am not afraid to ask my teacher if I don’t 5/6 5/7
understand something.
I am satisfied with a mark, which I get at the end 6/7 4/7
of the lesson.
I don’t feel tired after the English lessons. 7/7 2/7

The results evidently show that the better rapport was created in the
th
9A grade. That means that teacher was really approachable, open for students,
humanistic and creative.
To sum it up, a productive work on the lesson extremely depends on
the emotional well-being of the student, which is created in part by the teacher,
who has to ensure a positive learning environment. The development of rapport
involves using games by the teacher, calling students by their names not surnames,
the positive teacher’s behavior.

INTERPRETATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS

To summarize our research, we would like to say, that the greatest part in
forming the friendly environment during English classes plays teacher. He should
carefully choose correct approaches, methods and activities. During the class
teacher has to play active role during discussions, encourage students to participate
on the lessons and help them feel comfortable and free. Except of correct lesson
planning, teacher must examine the psychological aspects of his class, keep
friendly relationships between students, and prevent any destructive things like
bullying, misbehavior which can negatively affect the relationships in the
classroom. As a teachers we have to use cooperative learning strategies.
Small-group configurations are essential for developing student-to-student
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relationships, engaging ELs in communicating about the subject matters that they
are learning and providing practice opportunities to develop the academic
knowledge and skills that are needed for learning. A helpful strategy for engaging
in cooperative learning is to assign all students with roles that they can accomplish
successfully (such as timekeeper, ‘ask the teacher’, illustrator- note taker, etc).  It’s
helpful, as it is with all that we do, to match the language proficiency levels of
newcomers with the tasks that we assign; assign students to peers and small groups
that they will work successfully; engage students in paired followed with group
work; vary the role of students so they can have practice communicating in a
variety of ways.
Teacher should familiarize himself with the culture of his students. That
means that there should be no cultural or other discrimination or disrespect either
from the teacher side or from students. Teacher has to act as a friend or colleague,
in order to build respectful relationships. And the most important thing – don’t
forget that we are all the human beings with different points of view, wishes and
emotions.

REFERENCES

1. Brown, H. D. (2001). Teaching by principles; An

interactive approach to language pedagogy. (2nd ed.). San Francisco.
Addison Wesley Longman Inc.
2. Fleming, N. (2003). Establishing rapport: personal
interaction and learning. Idea Center (39). Retrieved May 1,
2014, from
http://www.idea.ksu.edu/papers/Idea_Paper_39.pdf.
3. Marzano, R. (2003). Classroom Management that Works.
Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
4. Piñata, C. R. (1999). Enhancing Relationships between
Children and Teacher. American Psychological Association.
Washington, DC
5. URL:http://elt-connect.com/using-pictures-in-class/
6. Hello! | Super Simple Songs-https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=tVlcKp3bWH8
7. Baby Shark Dance | Sing and Dance! | Animal Songs |
PINKFONG Songs for Children-https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=XqZsoesa55w
8. Farm Animals Song - Animals Sounds Song - Walk Around the
Farm - ELF Learning-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwIOkOibTgM
9. Goodbye Song for kids | The Singing Walrus-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LDArAJf7-c
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Appendices
Income test for young learners

1. 2.
Do you listen to your teacher? Do you work together/ in team ?

3. 4.
Do you dance in the lesson? Do you sing songs in the lesson?

5. 6.
Do you ask your teacher if you need? Do you ask your partner (cheat)?

7. 8.
Do you use toys in the lesson?
Does the teacher raise the voice in the lesson?
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Pictures:
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Questionnaire "Assessment of teacher's activity"

Each question must be answered with a yes or no answer (for students).
1. I listen to the teacher’s explanations in the lesson attentively.
2. In the lesson I concentrate my attention only on the subject but not on my own
thoughts.
3. In the lesson I often do things that don’t concern the subject.
4. The teacher gives a lot of additional information in the lesson, which is omitted
in the textbook.
5. I often have a desire to skip a lesson from this subject.
6. I like to answer orally at the blackboard.
7. I like to answer from a place.
8. In the lesson we often write off the textbook material.
9. Among the survey forms, I prefer:
a) individual classification;
b) written work;
c) joint work in small groups.
10. On the tests I show high results.
11. I try to cheat during the test.
12. What I have time to write in the lesson is useful in homework.
13. I am very worried when I answer my homework on this subject.
14. There are students in the classroom with whom the teacher is better than me.
15. I am always looking forward to this lesson.
16. I wait all the time for this lesson to end and often look at the clock.
17. The pace of the lesson is too fast for me.
18. It is difficult for me to do homework on this subject.
19. I often in this subject:
a) make messages;
b) write articles;
c) do teaching aids;
d) speak at conferences;
e) participate in contests;
e) attend a club.
20. I like to ask the teacher questions.
21. I am satisfied with a mark, which I get at the end of the lesson.
22. I am not afraid to ask my teacher if I don’t understand something.
23. I am interested in reading additional literature on this subject.
24. Teacher's explanation is close to the textbook.
25. The teacher knows how and loves to joke, he never degrades my human dignity.
26. I would love to do this subject myself, instead of doing homework.
27. I don’t feel tired after the English lessons.
28. I know that if our teacher is wrong, he will certainly apologize.
29. I like to read fiction discreetly in a lesson.
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30. Usually the teacher conducts a lesson, constantly looking at the notes.
31. The information that I receive in the lesson will be needed in the future.

Handouts

Taboo game
Students pick up a card with word and he has to describe this
word, avoiding words, which are “taboo” (pointed on the same
card). The main aim of this game is to improve students’ speaking
skills.

3-2-1
This quick way to help students process reading or lesson material
when you’re pressed for time. First, have your students write three
facts they learned from something they read or learned in class that
day. Next, have students write two questions they still have about
the book or topic that wasn't covered or discussed in class. Finally,
have your students write one opinion they have about the reading
material or lesson. This activity can also help you with your lesson
planning for the next lesson on the topic or book.

“Picture dictation”

Student A – The Describer

Student B – The Artist
Student C – The Scribe
A fun and engaging task for groups of three students.  Source a picture that has enough
detail for students to describe, draw and write about!   Assign your strongest student in each
group the role of ‘Describer’ – This student is the only one who will see the picture; the other
students, the ‘Artist’ will draw what student A describes and the ‘Scribe’ will write the
description.
When finished, the three students compare their picture, drawing and written description and
together discuss the similarities and differences.  Drawings and pictures could be posted on the
classroom walls afterwards for other groups to decide which representation is the best and wh
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