Exploring For Action, Acting For Change Stories of Exploratory Action Research in Nepal 2 PDF

Exploring for action, acting for change:
stories of exploratory action research in Nepal
Edited by Janak Singh Negi
2 Contents
Exploring for action, acting for change:
stories of exploratory action research in
Nepal
Edited by Janak Singh Negi
https://www.supportsocietynepal.org.np/publication/
ISBN: 978-9937-0-6634-1
© Support Society Nepal 2019
Melauli-01, Baitadi
Nepal
Contents
Richard Smith - Foreword…………………………………………..................... 2
Janak Singh Negi - Introduction………………………………………………… 3
1. Devisara R.C. - My students do not understand the text in English in

the classroom …………………………………………………………….…..... 12
2. Indu Adhikari - My students do not appear to be interested in writing,

and they have difficulties in writing………………………………………….. 21
3. Purna Prasad Paudel- My students do not take part actively in group

work ………………………………………………………………..………..…. 28
4. Jagat Kumari Giri - My students are not motivated in the class …………... 34
5. Prakash Regmi - My students do not get involved in class work…………… 40
6. Sarita Sharma - I am not satisfied with my students' reading in the

classroom ………………………………………………………….………….... 46
7. Devisara Upadhya - My students do not get involved in speaking activities

in the classroom................................................................................................ 53
8. Kamal Raj Paudel - My students do not speak in the class when I ask them
a question in English …………………………………………..……………… 59
9. Shova Shahi - I have difficulties in managing a large class…………………. 66
1 Contents
Foreword
I’m very happy that Janak Singh Negi Reading through these brief reports, or
has put together this collection of ‘stories’, two or three more things strike
teachers’ stories of Exploratory Action me – firstly, the apparently very
Research. He was one of the mentors in difficult circumstances these teachers
the first year (2017–18) of the British are working in (sometimes with classes
Council’s Action Research Mentoring of more than 80 students), but secondly
Scheme in Nepal, and I worked closely the apparent ‘simplicity’ (in a positive
with him and his fellow mentors Lok sense) of the research they carry out to
Bahadur Khatri and Dhak Pun. We address their problems as well as the
based our work on Exploratory Action large impact this seems to bring.
Research, an approach I originally Clearly, Janak has mentored these
developed with colleagues in Latin teachers very well – their exploratory
America (see Janak’s references to this questions are well-targeted at their areas
work in his Introduction). Once they of concern, and the means they use to
had come to understand this approach collect data hardly interfere at all with
and the difference between it and the their normal teaching. The solutions
kind of Action Research normally they then come up with are very
promoted in Nepal (again, see Janak’s relevant ones, again well-targeted at
Introduction), Janak, Lok and Dhak their concerns and informed by their
adopted the approach enthusiastically research findings. There is much here to
with their teachers. As is clear from the interest teachers around the world – the
stories in this collection, teachers, too, majority! – who are working in public
found great value in exploring education systems in the Global South
problematic situations in their in relatively low-resource contexts but
classrooms before planning a change– it whose concerns are normally quite
was eye-opening to them to learn about neglected. Apart from their specific
students’ or colleagues’ perspectives. findings and solutions, the inquiry-
Indeed, as you will see, one of these oriented approach they adopt to address
teachers’ main conclusions is that they challenges can serve as a good model
had taken too little note of students’ for teachers in similar situations around
perspectives in the past: the exploratory the world, not just in Nepal.
action research experience seems to
have brought about a significant change
in their mindset, then, not just specific
improvements for the class being
Richard Smith, PhD
researched.
University of Warwick
2 Foreword
Introduction
conduct action research actually just
Most teachers attempt to put into practice
‘complete’ it overnight, as a formality,
the methodologies they have learnt during
selecting a problem, thinking about
their professional training. They also try
solutions that they assume would be the
to use methods and techniques of teaching
best and preparing a report which they
that are prescribed, recommended or used
submit for professional credit. In other
by experts. However, teachers are not just
words, they do not see how classroom
implementers of methods, techniques or
problems can be solved through real
policies given to them in training or
action research, because they are not
designed by experts. They also try to
interpret and modify these methods, really familiar or confident with it and its
procedures (Negi, 2016). Lack of training
strategies or policies and design their own
in the procedures of conducting action
context-specific methodologies to start
research in practice, overloaded classes,
teaching from where they know their
and lack of time are underlying reasons
students are.
for this problem. With problems like
Indeed, teachers are the key agents in these in mind, British Council Nepal
improving the quality of teaching and started its Action Research Mentoring
learning. However, they face many Scheme in 2017.
challenges in their classrooms as they
attempt to bring about improvement and
change. This is because teaching is full of
The British Council Action
contingencies and there is often a gap Research Mentoring Scheme,
between how teachers act and students 2017-18
behave in the classroom or between
teachers’ decisions in selecting
Action Research Mentoring Scheme
teaching/learning activities and the
(ARMS) is a teacher-research mentoring
students’ needs and interests.
project which supports teachers to make
One of the best approaches for addressing choices and decisions about their teaching
classroom problems/issues/challenges is in a supportive environment in order to
action research. However, as a teacher bring about change and improvement in
educator observing teachers during their instructional practices and to develop
in-service TPD (Teacher Professional confidence in teaching through teacher-
Development) training in remote and research.
resource-poor areas of Nepal, I found that
large numbers of teachers do not conduct
action research. Those who say they
3 Introduction
‘Some students do not get involved in
speaking activities in the classroom’. In
this model, when a teacher notices the
problem, he or she directly plans for the
action, i.e. immediately thinks how he/she
can involve the students in speaking
activities effectively. During the planning
stage, he/she may talk to other more
experienced teachers or read different
books on teaching speaking and come up
In 2017–2018, I got an opportunity to with new solutions i.e. a new plan. Then,
work with British Council Nepal in this he/she puts the plan into action, collecting
scheme as a teacher-research mentor. I further data to analyze whether the new
supported ten primary and secondary practice (solution) worked well or not by
level teachers and head teachers in observing its effects. Then, the teacher
conducting Exploratory Action Research comes to reflection. In this stage, he/she
(EAR) to bring about improvement and evaluates the effects of the actions to find
change in their teaching practice for the out whether the solutions worked well or
benefit of quality learning. not. If not, he/she thinks about the next
plan or activities for the solution. If yes,
My initial conception of Action he/she practices the solution and tries to
Research solve further problems.
Initially, these were the steps of action Shifting from Action Research to
research in my mind:
Exploratory Action Research
As part of the ARMS Project, I got an
opportunity to attend the All India
Network of English Teachers (AINET)
Teacher Research Conference in
September 2017 in Nagpur, India. The
conference was mainly focused on
Exploratory Action Research (EAR) as an
approach to teacher-research. It was the
first time, I heard the term ‘Exploratory
Action Research’, from Richard Smith of
Figure 1: A model of action research the University of Warwick, UK. Later, he
agreed to support the ARMS teacher-
Figure 1 shows that the first step of action research mentors in Nepal as a ‘super-
research is noticing a problem during mentor’, which gave me the opportunity
daily teaching practices. For example, to interact with him frequently.
4 Introduction
I was highly impressed by this new solution/s, but in EAR, the teacher goes
approach to teacher-research because it back to the problem. Instead of planning
seemed more realistic for Nepali teachers, for action directly and immediately, s/he
and I changed my conception of action plans for exploration i.e. exploration of
research to exploratory action research. the current situation. The researcher
The major difference between the two is designs the exploratory tools and collects
captured in Figures 2 and 3. data for further investigation to identify or
determine the real problem. Then only,
s/he plans for action.
The importance of exploration

Some teachers go through different cycles
of action research but their practice of
action research could not solve their
problem(s). This is because they try out
new plans without identifying the real
problem(s). For example, if a teacher has
a problem: ‘Students do not get involved
in the speaking activities in the
classroom’, then he immediately thinks
that his students will get involved if he
divides them into groups and assigns
some group tasks. He plans to give much
time for group discussion/group tasks.
But what if his students were not involved
in the speaking activities because they did
not have language to express themselves
or the speaking situation/topic was not
interesting or too difficult, or what if they
had not understood what the teacher
wanted them to talk about? Did the
teacher ever ask his students about the
Figures 2 and 3: A comparison of Action
problem(s) that they were really facing
Research and Exploratory Action
before planning for the new action?
Research (Source: 2017 workshop by
Obviously the answer is NO! Will his
Richard Smith: PowerPoint slides)
new plan of dividing the students into
In action research, as soon as the teacher groups and assigning group tasks work in
notices the problem s/he directly goes to this situation? It’s unlikely! This is
the planning stage and designs activities because implementing a new plan without
that s/he thinks would be the best identifying the real problems of the
5 Introduction
students may not solve the problem. So,
to overcome this, EAR starts with
exploration of the current situation and
gradually moves towards planning for
action, as in Figure 3.
Mentoring EAR
I selected ten teachers who were teaching
in government schools in Nepal,
especially in remote and resource-poor
areas of the country in difficult
circumstances, for example in multi-level
large classrooms, teaching English where
the medium of instruction was Nepali
language. Although some schools had
used English as a medium of instruction,
students rarely come from the English as
a medium of instruction background.
Furthermore, these teachers did not have
previous teacher-research background
(only 2/3 of the teachers had written a
master’s thesis to fulfill the course
requirement of their academic degree).
Most of these teachers were overloaded were asked to select a problem that they
with classes, while some had extra were facing in the classroom. Although
responsibilities like being head teachers they had many problems, they were
or assistant head teachers. encouraged to select only one that they
wanted to solve immediately. In this
We worked collaboratively. When the stage, teachers were supported to narrow
mentees needed support they talked to me down the research topic/problem to make
and, whenever I needed support, I talked it more specific, measurable, engaging,
to the super-mentor. We had face to face and relevant.
meetings periodically and regular
interaction via phone calls, emails and After the teachers had selected the
whatsapp during the EAR process. research problem they were supported to
Moreover, we had also webinars and transform the problem into exploratory
workshops before we moved from one questions by the mentor clarifying i.e.
step to another. asking them what they mean by
something (problems) or how they know
We started EAR by talking about areas of about something, probing i.e. asking them
concern for teachers. First, the teachers
6 Introduction
to explain more about particular aspects reviewed training manuals, talked to other
of the situation and inviting i.e. asking teachers and mentors, they surfed on the
them to say more about the situation or web and so on to name only a few of the
about how the situation could be changed things they did, and designed the
(cf. Smith 2019, Unit 8). When the activities for change by themselves.
teachers had problems during the
mentoring process, they were not given They then put their plans into action and
the solution directly; instead they were observed the effects during their
led to find out the solution by themselves. instructional practices. At the end of the
six months, we organized a teacher-
Teachers selected the exploratory research conference where all the teachers
questions that they wanted to explore shared their EAR practices and their
more. Then they were introduced to impacts in short presentations, which they
various tools for data collection for were encouraged to record; so that they
exploring the current situation further to could prepare a written report on their
find out/determine what the real problem EAR later on if needed. This meant that
was or to determine where the students they were not under stress or pressure for
were and what steps needed to be taken in writing a report on EAR.
order to improve the situation. The
teachers selected and designed the
exploratory tool/s for data collection.
Almost all of the teachers collected both
qualitative and quantitative data for the
exploration. During this stage, they were
also introduced to techniques of data
analysis and interpretation which
supported them to explore the actual
problem on the basis of the data collected.
At this point, some of the teachers
realized the difference between the
problems they assumed they had before About this book
the exploration and the real problem that
they had uncovered. This book is the track record of what we
(the teacher-research mentor and the
What next? Teachers started planning for mentees) did during our EAR practices in
action on the basis of their exploration of Nepal. In particular it shows the problems
the current situation. First, they reviewed the teachers were facing during teaching
their own teaching practices. At this in difficult circumstances in remote and
point, they realized the need for resource-poor areas of Nepal and
immediate change in their instructional disseminates the way they explored these
practices. They read books on pedagogy, problems further and planned for action
7 Introduction
on this basis. The book also illustrates the The purpose of the book
practical solutions to these problems that
worked well in these teachers’ teaching The main purpose of the book is to
contexts. There are Nine EAR stories in provide practical examples of the steps
this book. They are all related to teaching and procedures of EAR, which I hope will
English as a subject or teaching other be helpful for other teachers to start their
subjects in English and relate to topics own EAR and bring about
including classroom management, learner change/improvement in their instructional
motivation, learner task assignments and practices.
ICT (Information and Communication
The book also aims to reduce the
Technology).
hegemony of academic research. Most
At the end of the teacher-research teachers think that conducting research is
conference, I gave the questions in Figure a matter of highly scholastic activity
4 to the mentees. All of the mentees which requires a massive literature review
agreed to write their answers to these and many hours of library study.
questions, and nine out of ten did so. However, I do not think that reading even
Then, I compiled and edited the resulting a hundred books or research reports and
reports in this book in a short and simple writing one more book or report based on
EAR report format, which neither took these readings and then adding it to the
much time nor caused stress for teachers, library shelf can contribute as much as
but enabled them to tell their EAR stories teacher-research to change and
in their own words, showing how they improvement in a particular teaching and
improved the quality of teaching and learning context. This is not teacher-
learning in their teaching contexts. research but academic research. Teacher-
research does not require a massive
literature review; instead, it involves
reviewing:
The teacher’s own activities inside

or outside the classroom regarding
teaching and learning practices
The students’ activities and their
reactions to these
teaching/learning practices
What students do/don’t do in the
classroom
Figure 4: Prompt questions given to Why students show/do not show
teachers at the end of the EAR process interest in their studies
8 Introduction
When students understand/do not This book also disseminates the teaching
understand the subject matter, techniques used by the EAR practitioners
What students say about their that worked well in their teaching
learning difficulties contexts, which could be useful for other
What other teachers do/don’t do teachers in similar contexts, to bring out
for making their teaching and change in their own teaching.
learning more effective,
What other teachers say about I hope you will enjoy reading this book
similar issues/challenges. and start your own EAR to bring out
change in your instructional practices.
And so on…
These are only a few of the questions that

teachers need to review. To answer these Janak Singh Negi
questions, teachers do not need to put Far Western University, Nepal
themselves under stress. If the teacher just
becomes a bit more conscious about these
or similar questions during his/her
teaching, the answers can come almost
automatically. Interaction with teachers
and students is more important than
consulting ‘literature’. As the reports in
this book show, only a few questions are
needed for exploring the real problem(s)
teachers face, and it is not necessary for
much time to be taken for data collection,
analysis and interpretation, while just
slight changes in instructional practices
can bring about improvement in both
teaching and learning.
Another important point to note here is

that teacher-research does not have to
involve writing a huge research report.
For this book, teachers did not prepare
reports – instead they just answered
prompts from me (at the end of the EAR
process) regarding what they had done. I
hope this will encourage other mentors to
gather together and disseminate teacher-
researchers’ work.
9 Introduction
Acknowledgements academically, professionally and
personally.
To Dr. Richard Smith, Reader at the
University of Warwick, UK, you not only To Support Society Nepal for providing
gave me insightful guidance and the space for the book on its website.
invaluable feedback as my super-mentor
but also your in-depth, thought provoking
Note on Permission
questions, comments and overall quality All the teachers have seen and approved
control are reflected in this book. the final versions of their exploratory
To the British Council Nepal, in action research stories and are happy for
Particular, Ms. Rhona Brown, Ms. them to be included in this collection.
Vaishali Pradhan and Mr. Bhogendra Written permission was gained from the
Lamichhane for your all-round support students/parents/teachers involved in the
from the very beginning to the end of the research report for the use of the
project photographs. Teachers’ real names have
been used as well as the names of their
To all the teachers, Ms. Devisara RC,Mr. schools, as they are happy to and have
Purna Prasad Paudel, Ms. Devi Adhikari, been authorized to include these.
Ms. Indu Adhikari, Ms. Jagat Giri, Mr.
Kamal Raj Acharya, Mr. Man Bahadur References
BC, Mr. Prakash Regmi, Ms. Sarita
Negi, J.S. (2016). ‘Improving teaching
Sharma, and Ms. Shova Shahi. You all through Action Research: Perceptions,
agreed to conduct exploratory action Practices and Problems (3Ps): Voices
research with me and completed the from secondary level teachers in an
questionnaire at the end. Without your EFL context: ELT Voices:
contribution this book would have been International Journal for Teachers of
impossible! English, 6(4).
To Prof. Dr. Jai Raj Awasthi, for your Rebolledo, P., Smith,R. &Bullock,D.
guidance and support in every step of my (2016).Champion Teachers:Stories of
Exploratory Action Research. London:
professional journey, this is a small piece
British Council.
of evidence of your inspiration in the field
of research to bring about change in the Smith, R. & Rebolledo, P. (2018).A
instructional practices in Nepal for the Handbook for Exploratory Action
better learning output. You are the source Research.London: British Council.
of encouragement forever!
Smith, R. (2019). Mentoring Teachers
To Prof. Dr. Anjana Bhattari, Dr. Prem to Research Their Classrooms: A
Phyak, Mr. Laxmi Ojha, Ms. Madhu Practical Handbook. New Delhi:
Neupane, you all inspired me British Council.
10 Introduction
My students do not understand the
text in English in the classroom
12 Exploring for action, acting for change: stories of exploratory action research in Nepal
My students do not understand the text in
English in the classroom
Devisara R.C.
I teach at Jana Secondary School, Birendranagar-6,

Surkhet, Nepal. The school shifted into EMI (English
as a Medium of Instruction) in 2008. I have
experience of teaching from grade 1 to 12 and
recently, I teach Social Studies in grades 6 to 9. This
research was conducted in grade 6. I had 62
students in the class.
The problem
I believe that reading is not only a Whenever, I asked some questions based
reorganization of the script but also on the reading text, only some couple of
involves the understanding of a text. I students could answer the questions and
wanted my students to read the text in the rest of the class could not. I also
English and answer the question based on encouraged my students to read the text
it either in a written or oral form. So, I by themselves and answer the questions
worked very hard to make my students based on it, but the situation could not
understand the text in English. change. Most of the students seemed
uninterested in reading. So, I was very
I used to explain the text line by line to
worried because if students did not
the students and translate the same into
understand what I teach to them and work
their mother tongue i.e. in Nepali
as per the course requirements, it was
language. However, my students did not
really worthless. At this point, I heard
show any interest to my explanation of
about the ideas of conducting exploratory
each sentence and their translation into
action research from a teacher educator. I
the mother tongue. Instead, they used to
thought it could be useful to solve my
talk to each other or tease their friends
problem. Then I started my EAR.
and laugh or make unnecessary
noise/disturbance in the classroom.
Objectives of the study  What do students say about
reading in English?
 To find out why students do not
Exploration methodology
understand the text in English,
 To identify effective techniques I prepared a questionnaire (See Appendix
for helping students understand 'A') for all of my students studying in
the text in English grade six to find out their opinions and
problems regarding reading in English.
Plan for exploration Moreover, I also talked to the students
At first, I thought it was necessary to look informally to find out their difficulties in
more carefully into the problem in itself reading English. Furthermore, I asked my
and decided to explore more on the colleagues to observe my classes and find
current situation. To be specific, I wanted out when students understand /do not
to know: understand text in English. I used simple
 When do students understand / not mathematical percentages for data
understand the text in English? analysis and interpretation.
 Why do students read / not read
the text in English?
Data collection
Questionnaire Yes No
1. Are you interested in reading English? 93% 7%
2. I can answer the questions in English 29% 71%

based on the reading text.
3. I can read but do not understand the 68% 32%
meaning.
4. Reading is very important for my 97% 3%
success in the future.
5. What do you feel about reading the It is too difficult to understand 23%
texts in English ? [open question] I do not understand word 75%
meanings
I feel it is easy to speak in 2%
English
Informal group discussion with students
I talked to my student informally in the classroom to find out why they could not
complete the reading tasks. Most of the students told me that they had difficulties in
understanding the text because they do not understand the word meanings. Furthermore,
they could not pronounce the words correctly. They also told me that reading shorter
texts in English is easier and more interesting than reading longer ones.
Colleagues’ observation: what did my colleagues say?
After the class observation, my colleagues told me that I could not match the pace of my
students. I was a bit faster, and students were given a lot of reading tasks to do within a
very limited period of time. Sometimes, students were asked to read very lengthy
paragraphs. They also noticed that I was just reading the text very quickly to my
students, explaining each line in their mother tongue. Students were rarely asked to read
the text by themselves. My colleagues suggested to me to break down the lengthy text
into small paragraphs and give enough time to read and understand the text by the
students themselves. They also suggested me to practice some difficult vocabulary
before the students were given the reading tasks.
Data analysis and

interpretation
Exploration of the problem changed my the text. As a result, 71% of the students
attitude to the students. Before the could not answer the questions in English
exploration, I thought my students were based on the reading text.
not interested in reading, but after the So, I came to the conclusion that
exploration, I knew that they (93% of the students were interested in reading, but
students) were interested in reading they could not understand the text in
English. However, the problem was that English due to their poor vocabulary
they (75%) could not understand the text and lack of practice in reading.
in English due to unfamiliar vocabulary in
Plan for action
To improve the reading skills of my board and asked some questions related to
students, I tried to find out better the title such as:
techniques for teaching reading on the  Look at the title
basis of the exploration. I talked to  What do you think are the
other teachers, read again various measures for population
training manuals and surfed the web. management?
From this, I thought the steps of  Do you think family planning
teaching reading as prescribed in the could help in population
NIITE (National Initiative to Improve management?
Teaching in English) training manual,  If so, how? Discuss in your group
by the British Council Nepal would be
useful to solve my problem. So, I
followed the following steps that I
found in the NIITE training manual:
 Prediction on the reading tasks
 Global reading
 Practicing vocabulary
 Reading for detail
 Responding to the text
 Group/pair discussion
 Use of language supportive
approach
Then, group leaders were asked to share
Action for change their ideas to the whole class. Activities
like these helped my students to predict
Prediction and lead in the content on the text.
First of all, I divided my students into
groups and started my lesson in an Reading for main ideas
interactive way i.e. I asked my students After prediction about the title, students
some questions related to the reading text were asked to read the text quickly and
by writing the text title on the board and answer simple questions related to the
sometimes showing the picture related to reading text. These questions were asked
the text. to capture the general idea of the reading
text. For example read the text "Measures
For example: I wrote the title "Measures for Population Management" quickly and
for Population Management" on the answer these questions in your groups:
 Which two measures for
population management are
introduced in this text?
 What does the text says about the your text book which gives you the
family planning? answer:
 Why is it essential to empower
women for population a) Education and skill training are
management? not the long term solutions to the
 Share your ideas with your problems being faced in
partners population management in Nepal.
b) Legal age for marriage in Nepal is
16 years.
Vocabulary
c) Family planning is the violation of
In this stage, I asked my students to select one’s own fundamental right to
the difficult words if they have any. give birth to as many children as
Students made a list of words. I taught one desires.
these words by eliciting the meaning from
the students themselves, giving
synonyms/ antonyms/ drawing pictures on
the board, giving definitions, explaining
the meaning, illustrating, and sometimes
matching English words with their Nepali
equivalent as in the following table.
Detailed reading
Then students were asked to exchange

their answers with their friends in pair. I
just monitored the class.
Summing up and responding to the text
Finally, I divided the students into groups

again and asked some general questions
After teaching the difficult words, I
related to the text for example: "Measures
asked my student to read the text again
for population management"
and assigned some reading tasks
individually. For example, I asked the
a) Did you learn anything new about
students read the text "Measures for
measures for population
Population Management" again and
management?
write True or False in front of each
b) What is your views regarding
statement. Underline the sentences on
population management?
Students worked in the groups and wrote difficulties in explaining some terms in
the answers of these questions. They English in such a case; I myself also used
shared their answers with the whole class. the native language. For example, when I
Then, I had whole class discussion to talk was teaching "Civic consciousness" under
more about the ideas expressed on the “Our constitution” in unit one, I realized
reading text. that students could understand the
Use of LSA (Language Supportive concept better in their mother tongue
Approach) rather than in English, so I used their
mother tongue in the class.
Most of my students came from Nepali
medium schools, so, whenever students Most of the time, I divided my students in
felt difficulties in understanding the text to groups/pairs during the class work. It's
in English, or my explanation in English, because students get opportunity to
I used their mother tongue i.e. Nepali discuss among friends and can find the
language to make them understand the solution of some problems by themselves.
text in English. Sometimes, I felt
After the action: observation
Colleague’s observation: what did they say?
My colleagues noticed that students were less confused than the previous classes.
They were working in groups/pairs actively. This time students were not pretending as
if they were reading as in the previous classes, but actually reading the text and
working on the tasks assigned.
Reflection: Lessons learnt explore the problem in detail, so that we

can identify the real problem and take the
When I started teaching in grade six, my action that addresses the problem.
students could not read in English. I
thought they were not interested in Conclusion
reading. Although I tried various teaching
techniques, the situation could not I used to read the text line by line and
improve. After the exploration, I knew translate the same into Nepali, standing in
that students were really interested in front of the classroom. When I asked my
reading but they had problems with students to read the text, they could not
vocabulary. read and respond to the text by
themselves. At that point, I thought they
Students had difficulties with reading were not interested in their studies. But
lengthy texts – I realized that it is better to after the exploration of the problem, I
breakdown the text into small paragraphs; knew that the actual problem of the
and before assigning the reading tasks students was different from what I had
they should be given enough time to assumed. When I explored the students’
practice the vocabulary that occurs in the problem, I found that lack of English
reading text. vocabulary was the main cause of the
problem. So, I started eliciting vocabulary
Students can learn better when they get an
for the reading text and followed the steps
opportunity to discuss in groups and
of teaching reading. As a result, I
pairs.
improved my teaching.
Use of LSA is quite helpful for both
teachers and students while teaching and Reference
learning difficult words or concepts. Training Manual (The NIITE Project),
I also realized that before making any Version 3. British Council Nepal
plan for change, it is very necessary to
Appendix 'A'
Questionnaire
Section A
Name (optional):---------------------------
Class:------------- Section:-----------
Please go through the statements/questions carefully and tick (√) or write the
answers
1. Are you interested reading in English?
2. I can answer the questions in English based on the

reading text.
3. I can read but do not understand its meaning.
4. Reading is very important for my success in the

future.
Section B
Please express your views on the following question without any hesitation:
5. What do you feel about reading the texts in English ?
My students do not appear to be
interested in writing, and they have
difficulties in writing
My students do not appear to be interested in
writing, and they have difficulties in writing
Indu Adhikari
I have been teaching English at Shree

Krishna Sanskrit and General Secondary
School, Birendranagar, Surkhet, Nepal since
2014. I teach English in multi-level large
classrooms. Normally, I have around 50 to
80 students in a single class. I conducted the
exploratory action research in grade Eight.
There were 58 students.
The problem
My students did not appear to be What problems
interested in writing, and they had are there in
difficulties in writing. students'
writing?
Objectives
 To decide why students were not
What do
interested in writing,
students do when
 To find out the students’ I give them
difficulties in writing writing tasks?
 To improve students’ writing
skills in English.
Plan for exploration What do students

say about
At first, I planned to explore the current different kinds of
situation: These were the questions that I writing tasks?
wanted to explore at first:
Exploration methodology also asked my colleague to observe my
class to find out what do students do
I prepared the questionnaire for the
when I gave them the writing tasks. I
students (see the Appendix ‘A’) to decide
myself also observed the class keeping
why students were not interested in
the exploratory questions in mind.
writing and what their difficulties were. I
Data collection
The above table shows that most of the students (83%) enjoy writing. They (70%) feel
happy when the teacher gives them a writing task and they want to write better in
English. However, the majority (84%) of the students have a negative attitude towards
their own abilities (they thought they were poor in writing).
It (above leafed table) showed that most  Writing a paragraph in English
of the students (73%) did not write in  Use of group/pair work
English due to lack of vocabulary power
and 13% of the students thought that they Action for change
did not have writing skills in English.
First of all, I prepared the activities for
Similarly 5% of the students were worried
practicing vocabulary and generating
about their poor hand writing.
ideas before assigning the writing task to
Colleague’s observation: what the students. The best technique that I
found was using stars to generate an idea,
did my colleague say?
which was found oniSL Collective.Com
Students were interested in writing and
curious in learning, so they asked
questions and also discussed about the
topic in the classroom. However, some of
the students seemed to be confused about
what to write. And few students were
talking unnecessarily.
Data analysis and

interpretation
I came to the conclusion that students
were interested in writing; they wanted to I prepared the separate worksheet for my
practice with it, however they had students and assigned the task. Students
difficulties in writing because they did not filled out the stars in pairs.
have adequate vocabulary power to write.
It means lack of vocabulary power
underlies poor performance and lack of
active participation in writing
Plan for action

 Teaching vocabulary needed for
writing on a topic
 Generating ideas for writing
 Writing sentences in English
 Brainstorming ideas for a
paragraph in English/Nepali
Then, I asked them to write as many
sentences as they could-based on the
worksheet. Finally, I asked them to make
a short paragraph putting those sentences
in any order they like.
Another technique that I used was

clustering which helped my students to
practice vocabulary/generate ideas and
discovering relationships among them. At
the beginning stage, I gave the clues for
clustering as in the following worksheet
and asked students to fill out the
worksheet. As students filled out the To improve my students vocabulary, I
boxes on the worksheet either applied ‘Learn Five Words a Day’
individually or in pairs, I asked them to techniques, where students had to learn
make a short paragraph on the basis of five unfamiliar words from their text
their answers on the boxes book and share their meaning to the
whole class using the words in a sentence.
It also supported them to write sentences
for a paragraph.

I found a drastic change in my students
writing and their behavior in the
classroom. My students who could not
write even a single sentence in English
started writing a paragraph at the end of
the month. Nowadays, when I give them
writing tasks, they complete it with much
devotion.
At the end of the months, I asked my Reflection: Lesson learnt

students to write as many paragraphs as Before assigning the writing task to the
they can on a topic they want using the students, teaching/eliciting vocabulary
techniques that they had practiced (stars related to the writing task is very
or boxes/clustering). essential. It would be very fruitful to
provide opportunities to the students for
generating ideas on a topic before asking
them to write a paragraph or an essay on a
particular topic. Moreover, assigning a
group/pair work is quite beneficial for
students to generate ideas and learn from
each other.
Conclusion
Nowadays my students are more active.

They are practicing writing. It is because I
start teaching writing from where my
students are. Before I explored the
problem, I thought students were not
interested in writing, but after
exploration, I knew that my students were
interested in writing. The problem was
not with my students' interest but it was
with students’ poor language, especially
the vocabulary. This research is very
fruitful for me because I am able to find
out the problem that was in my teaching
learning process, which made it easier for
me to continue my teaching with right
solutions.
Appendix ‘A’
Student's Name (optional):
Class: ………………………………..
Please go through the statements/questions carefully and tick (√) or write the
answers
1. Do you enjoy writing?
a) Yes
b) Little not fully
c) No
2. What do you feel when your teacher asks you to do any writing task?
a) Happy
b) Worried and fear
d) Difficult
3) What do you think your writing skill is?
a) Good
b) Bad
c) Poor
4) Do you want to write better in English?
a) Yes
b) No
5) What do you feel about writing in English? Why?
My students do not take part
actively in group work
Participation of Students in Group Work
My students do not take part actively in
group work
Purna Prasad Paudel
I am head teacher of Shree Shiva

Secondary School, a government aided
school in Birendranagar-11, Surkhet,
Nepal. I have been also teaching English at
secondary level for the last 10 years. The
medium of instruction in my school is
Nepali except in the case of teaching
English as a subject.
The problem
As a part of my professional However, my excitement changed into
development, I often take part in various desperation. When I practically divided
teacher training programs. Although, I the students into groups and assigned
learn the various techniques of teaching some tasks, they did not take part actively
and learning English in the trainings, I in the group work. This led me to explore
often have difficulties to put these more about the problem in depth to find
techniques in practice; this was the case out the solution. I started my study as
with managing large classes. To be more follows:
specific, I had difficulties in managing
Objectives of the study
multi-level large classrooms. By the way,
I learnt that dividing students into small  To detect why the students do not
groups is one of the best techniques for take part actively in the group
managing large classes where students work.
also get the opportunity to interact with  To find out better techniques for
each other and learn by themselves. Then, involving my students into the
I was very eager to use group work in my group activities.
classroom.
Plan for exploration  What do students say about
working in the groups?
I was trying various techniques to involve
my students into groups, but they were Exploration methodology
not working well. So, first of all, I wanted
to explore more about why group work I collected data using questionnaire (see
practices did not work in my class. These appendix A). Questionnaire included both
were the questions in my mind. open and close ended questions on it to
find out the students opinion on the group
 Do my students like to learn in work. I distributed the questionnaire to all
group work? of the students individually, and then the
 When do students like/ not like to common responses were tabulated for the
participate in the group work? data analysis and interpretation purposes.
 Which students do /do not I also observed closely when students
actively participate in the group do/do not work in group and why they do
work? or do not take part actively in the group
activities.
Data collection
Do you like to learn in group? 20 10
If yes, why do you like to learn in  Enjoy and feel fresh
group?  My friends help me to solve the
problems
 Learning becomes easier
 My friends support me
If not why don't you want to learn in  Some of my friends do not listen to me
groups?  I do not get chance to work with my
close friends
 My friends are moved to the another
group during the group division
When do you like to work in the  When I get chance to work with my
group? best friends
 When more able and honest friends
come to my group
 When I get support from my friends
 When my friends do not tease me
Class observation
As I observed my students while dividing them into different groups, they show very
interesting behavior. When dividing them into groups, they had to change their seats,
while changing their seats, some students changed their seats with their bags while
others just hold their books and note copy. It was really interesting, so I asked some
questions informally to both types of students. The students who had changed their
seats holding their bags replied that they wanted to change their seats permanently.
They also seemed very excited; their excitement showed that they wanted to work with
that group (I just guessed it could be the reason that their close friends belonged to that
group). Others replied that they might come back to the same seats again after the task
completion. They hoped that their group will be reformed soon. It gave me some sense
that these students did not want to work with that groups.
Another thing was the task. When the task was easier students did not worked with the
groups. Although they were assigned the group task, they worked individually. They
seemed working in the groups only when the task was a bit more challenging.
Moreover, some students were over smart, they behaved slightly in disruptive manner
e.g. disturbing or teasing other students.
Data analysis and

interpretation
After analyzing the data, I came to the Then I realized that dividing the students
conclusion that my students liked to work into groups by the teacher himself may
in groups. They thought that working in not be always effective for those students,
the group with their friends could solve who want to work with someone special
many problems. It is because they get (close friends) in the classroom
help from their friends .They liked to
work in group only when the task is
challenging and there was their best
friend/s or more able student in their
groups. However, they did not like to
work in the group when their close friend
was moved in to another group/ when
their friends did not support them or make
unnecessarily noise and tease them.
Plan for action After the action: observation
After the exploration on the problem, I After a month of teaching with this new
planned to ask my students to form the strategy of group formation, I found some
groups by themselves. It is because if changes in my class. My students worked
students get the opportunity to select the in their groups. The most interesting thing
group members by themselves, they get was that some students (5/6) remained
chance to select their friends who respects alone during the group division. No
each other, supports each other and works student told them to take part in their
collaboratively without disturbing or group activity. It clearly showed me that
teasing others. they were the unfriendly students in the
classroom; they might have caused some
Action for change disturbance to others. So, it added one
more responsibility on my shoulder i.e. I
According to my plan, I divided the
had to make them friendly.
students into six groups. But, I changed
the way I used to divide students into
groups in the previous days.
As I knew that my students wanted to

work with their close friends, I asked
them to select the group members by
themselves. Then I assigned some roles,
for example, I asked them to select one
group messenger in each group by
themselves. I assigned the role of
messenger: the messenger had to
transform the problems to the other At the beginning of this new practice of
groups and supply the solutions (talking group division, they (a bit less friendly
to the friends in other group/s) to their students) seemed very worried. So, I
own group. I also told them to select the myself assigned them the role of
group leader and the group secretary by observer, they had to report what their
themselves. Group secretary had to friends in the group did. This
prepare the group report in collaboration responsibility kept them busy and reduces
with all the group members and group their disruptive nature. They gradually
leader had to present the group report at stopped disturbing or teasing others and
the end. I also encouraged them to change developed the sense of cooperation and
the roles next day or in some cases with mutual understanding among the friends,
in the same day for the next group task. otherwise they could not get friends to
talk/work or play with in the classroom or
outside the classroom.
Reflection: Lesson learnt
Group work needs collaboration and At the end of the study, I also realized
mutual understanding, which can be that always dividing students into groups
enhanced through respecting/listening may not be effective in some cases. For
others. So, as a teacher, first of all we example, if the task is easier, students did
should give value to others, I mean the not seem interested in the groups rather
students. My students were not active in they worked individually. What I mean is,
the group work; as I learnt they wanted to group work is more effective when the
work with their close friends, I did not students had to deal with a bit more
force them to form the group as per my challenging tasks.
will rather I gave them the chance to form
the group by themselves, I just supported
them to be close friends which led them
to work actively in the group with mutual
understandings latter on.
Appendix ‘A’
My students are not motivated in the
class
My students are not motivated in the class
Jagat Kumari Giri
I teach Health, Population and Environment

Science at secondary level at Amarjyoti Secondary
School, Kalinchowk, Surkhet, Nepal. The medium
of instruction in my school is English. There are
normally 60 or above students in my class. There
were 80 students in class Nine where I conducted
this exploratory action research.
The problem
While teaching Environment Science in I was always worried about this problem.
class Nine, I did not see my students As I got an opportunity to take part in a
interested in learning; they were not workshop on exploratory action research,
motivated in their study. Furthermore, I thought it would be an ideal strategy to
there were 80 students in a single class. solve my problem. So, I started my EAR
They used to talk with their friends and journey as follows:
make unnecessary noise in the classroom,
Objectives
which was very problematic for me to
control the class. Actually, it seemed as if My research objectives were as follows:
they were teasing me, and sometimes it
used to make me very furious. I wanted  To find out why students were not
my students to be serious and pay motivated in the classroom
attention to their studies. I tried my best  To select effective techniques for
to solve this problem but could not get making the class more interesting
success.
Plan for exploration
First of all, I thought that it would be beneficial to determine why my students were not
interested in my class. So, I planned to explore the situation in detail. Actually, I wanted
to know:
What do students say they What are students'

like/do not like in the suggestions for more
class? motivating activities in
class?
I prepared a questionnaire (see Appendix 'A') to find out the answers for these
exploratory questions, including both open and close ended questions in it.
Data collection
Do you have learning opportunities in the classroom that you like the most?
6%
31%
Often
Sometimes
Rarely
63%
List out the activities that you like the most in the classroom
16% 17%
Discussion about subject

playing
13%
watching video
27% singing
7%
reading books
11% Discipline
9%
Extra curricular activities
List out activities that you don't like in the classroom.
10%
4%
Unnecessary noise
30%
Fighting
32%
Using rough word
Not paying attention
Not obeying the teachers

24%
Data analysis and

interpretation
Looking through the data, I came to the activities in the classroom. However, I
conclusion that the cause of my students just used to teach them by explaining text
de-motivation was my teaching style. I from the book standing in front of the
taught the students without understanding classroom.
their interest. So, they were not interested
in my class. According to the response of Plan for action
the students, they wanted to discuss on
the topic, play games, watch videos, and As per the interest of the students, I
maintain discipline. Furthermore they planned to change my teaching strategy.
also wanted some extracurricular-like Instead of explaining the text standing in
front of the students, I planned the
following activities to make my class
more interesting.
 Group/pair discussion about the activities, group/pair discussion,
subject matter discussion about the subject matter and
 Teaching through games playing game on the basis of content were
 Teaching through quizzes better in the classroom and students were
 Teaching through debate motivated toward those activities.
 Teaching through opinion sharing
Action for change Reflection: Lesson learnt

I started to conduct the quiz competitions
Teaching as per the interest of the
in the classroom dividing the students into
students makes the classroom more
groups. Questions for the quiz
interesting.
competitions were based on the content
from the textbook. It encouraged my Asking students’ opinion about their
students reading habit too. interest for planning and; teaching
accordingly can motivate the students in
I also organized debate and opinion
their studies. In my previous classes, I felt
sharing competition in the classroom.
difficulties when students talked to each
Topic for the debate and opinion sharing
other; I had to shout out at them
were also based on the subject matter
frequently- Stop talking! …Stop
from the course book.
talking!... But I never asked them why
Sometimes, I showed the videos to the they were talking, what they really
students, for example: I had an interesting wanted in the classroom.
video about 'Solid Wastes and its
As I asked them, what they really wanted
Management'. As I had to teach about the
in the classroom, I knew the activities that
same subject, I showed the video to the
they liked the best and the activities that
students instead of explaining about it.
they did not liked in the classroom, which
My students enjoyed watching video;
was quite supportive for me to design the
there was no side talking and disturbance
effective activities for my instructional
of any short. All the students were very
practices. Nowadays, I love teaching with
interested in watching the video. As I
noise. When students talk and laugh in the
asked some questions at the end based on
classroom, I do not think as if they are
the video (Solid Wastes and its
teasing me as I used to think in my
Management) students replied with
previous classes.
examples.
Conclusion
Teaching is really an interesting job.
I applied the activities suggested by the
However, it becomes challenging and
students and colleagues. Among these
monotonous if the students are not
interested or lack motivation in their
study. In such a case, we should not be
discouraged, instead we should find out
the right solution. Exploratory action
research is one of the best solutions for
improving both teaching and learning.
My students do not get involved in class
work
My students do not get involved in class work
Prakash Regmi
I teach at Shree Krishna Sanskrit and General

Secondary School, Birendranagar, Surkhet,
Nepal. It is community based school where I
teach computer education at the secondary level.
The medium of instruction in my school is
English.
The problem Objectives

There were 82 students in my class. It  To explore why students did not
was really an overcrowded class. Due to get involved in the class work
the large number of students in a single  To find out effective techniques
class, I had little time for individual for involving students in the class
interaction with students, nor could I use work
group discussion or pair work effectively.
Most of the time, I had to use the lecture Plan for exploration
method i.e. I used to present PowerPoint
First of all, I wanted to explore:
slides standing in front of the students.
Whenever I gave the class work, my  What particular kinds of work do
students did not participate actively in it. students get engaged in/not get
They seemed not to have understood what engaged in?
I taught to them. Most of the time, they  What do students say about
seemed confused. Instead of doing the different kinds of class work?
class work, they used to spend the time
 What do students actually do in
talking about something else and when I
different kinds of class work?
took them in the computer lab for some
practical work, I had to teach the same
subject matter again and again.
I prepared the questionnaire (see Appendix 'A') to find out what students say about
different kinds of class work and I observed the classes to detect what particular kinds of
work do students get engaged in/not get engaged in.
Data collection
Do you understand your teacher's instruction (i.e. what your

teacher wants you to do) in the classroom?
2%
Totally
33%
A little
Confused
65%
Are the classroom assignments interesting?
16%
24%
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
60%
Working in the class is boring?
4%
20%
Yes
Sometimes
Never
76%
I often feel confusion while working in the classroom.
25%
Agree
Disagree
51%
Neither Agree nor Disagree
24%
Some of the tasks from the text book are difficult to understand.
30% Agree
Disagree
52%
Neither Agree nor Disagree
18%
Data analysis and
interpretation
As I studied the responses of my students, theoretical and the practical classes
I learnt that my classroom assignments simultaneously in the computer lab.
were not interesting and my instructions
were not clear, as a result, students felt After the action: observation
confusion. Moreover, they had difficulties
I taught as per my new plan and it
with the tasks from the textbook. So, I
improved my teaching. Nowadays,
realized that students felt bore and did not
Students have started to participate in the
participate actively in the classroom.
class work. I don’t need to take separate
Thinking about the problem classes (theoretical and practical) and
explain the same subject matter twice.
I had both theatrical and practical classes. Students get opportunity learning by
So, I observed both the theoretical and the doing. There is no unnecessary
practical classes seriously to find out what disturbance in the classroom; students are
do students actually do in different kinds busy working with the computers.
of class work? I found that students were
a bit more active in the practical classes
while working with computers in the  Students learn computer better in
computer lab than the theoretical ones in the computer lab when they have
the large classroom. opportunity to practice with it
practically.
I realized that students were not interested
 Taking theoretical classes
in the class work because they did not
separately without computers is
have chance to work with computers
just time consuming; students can
during the theoretical classes. As a result,
not learn as the teacher expects,
they did not understand the subject matter
because they do not have
which caused the difficulties to deal with
opportunity to practice on the
the tasks from the text book.
computer.
 Teaching some practical subjects
Plan for action like computers to the large
number of students is less
I need to stop the way I used to teach
effective and less fruitful.
theoretical classes before. So, I planned to
divide the students into four groups  It is better to divide the students
(around 20 in each) and teach both the into small groups and teach both
the theoretical and the practical
classes simultaneously.
Conclusion
In conclusion, I can say that before teaching any subject, it is necessary to understand the
nature of the subject matter. My students were not interested in the class work because I
was teaching about computers theoretically without computers in the classroom. Later,
in the computer lab, I used to ask them to work with computers without giving them any
instruction (I used to teach/tell the instruction in the theoretical classes to the large
number of students at the same time to save the time) assuming that they had understood
it all. This research opened my eyes that working with computers cannot be learnt by
reading or telling about the computers, there needs to be practice on the computers
indeed.
Appendix 'A'
Name (optional): ---------------------------
Class: ------------- Section: -----------
Please go through the statements carefully and tick (√)
1. Are the classroom assignments interesting?

a. Always
b. Sometimes
c. Rarely
2. Working in the class is boring?
a. Yes
b. Sometime
c. Never
3. I often feel confusion while working in the classroom.
a. Agree
b. Disagree
c. Neither agree nor disagree
4. Some of the tasks from the book are difficult to understand.
a. Agree
b. Disagree
c. Neither agree nor disagree
5. Do you understand your teacher's instruction (i.e. what your teacher
wants you to do) in the classroom?
a. Totally
b. A little
c. Confused
I am not satisfied with my students'
reading in the classroom
I am not Satisfied with my Students Reading in the Classro
I am not satisfied with my students' reading in
the classroom
Sarita Sharma
I have been teaching for the last 25

years. Recently, I teach English at
Shree Saraswoti Basic School, a
government school located at
Ragaspaila, Surkhet, Nepal. As the need
of English language learning is highly
recognized and emphasized by the
parents and community, my school has
shifted into EMI (English as a Medium
of Instruction). I have 25 students in my
class.
The problem
I wish my students could read and
understand the texts in their text book but  To find out effective techniques
I was not satisfied with my students’ for improving students’ reading
reading in the classroom. They were very skills
poor in reading. Some of my students
could neither read nor understand what
they read. Although I worked very hard to First of all, I wanted to know about the
make them understand the text in English, current situation of my students in the
I could not improve their reading skills. classroom. These were the exploratory
My dissatisfaction towards the reading questions on my mind:
skill of my students led the journey of this
classroom based exploratory action  What do students say about
research. reading in English?
 When do / do not students read in
Objectives English?
 To identify why students are not

doing well in reading in English
I collected data using the questionnaire questions to them individually as an
(see appendix A). I used both open and informal talking (so that I could make the
closed ended questions on it to find out questionnaire clear to them) and recorded
the students opinion on reading the simple their opinions in the answer sheet. I also
sentences/text in English. As my students discussed with the students and observed
were in the early grades, I did not ask their activities accompanied with my
them to write their opinions by colleague to point out when they do and
themselves; instead, I asked these do not read in English.
Data collection
Data analysis and tasks. Most of the activities were
designed to involve students into
interpretation
groups/pair work (group/pair learning). I
All students wanted to read in English. also planned to give considerable time for
88% liked reading with pictures in the pre reading activities too.
textbook, some students were even
drawing pictures by themselves and 12% Action for change
of the students preferred reading with I taught vocabulary by using possible real
chants in pairs, moreover, 72% of the objects. For example, in grade two when I
students were interested in reading aloud
was in lesson-5: "What have you got?” I
with their friends. However, 20% of the showed them the real objects which were
students could not read even the capital related to the subject matter, like Pen,
and small letters, 60% of students did not copy, book, door, ruler, window,
understand the concept of the text because
umbrella, radio, chair, chalk, stick, bag,
of the poor vocabulary, some students had pencil, eraser, shoes, doll, glasses, watch
difficulties in pronunciation and 20% of etc. To make them understand the concept
the students forgot what they read. of the words, I used interactive activities
Students were more motivated when they
like these:
were praised by their teacher, and
assigned the group tasks; however, they Teacher :( Showing the pen): This is a
felt hesitation when given the individual pen.
reading task. Teacher: Do you have a pen? Samala!
Samala: Yes, I have.
Plan for action Teacher: (Showing marker): Is it a pen?
Students: No, it isn't.
As I found students had difficulties with
Teacher: So, what do you mean by pen in
vocabulary, first of all I planned to teach
your language?
vocabulary by showing the real objects,
Students: Pen = पेन= कलम
drawing the pictures, translation etc and
pronunciation by chorus drill and chants.
It's because these activities were preferred
by the students. Since students were
interested in drawing pictures, I designed
some activities for drawing and writing
and reading about the pictures. I also
planned to make students' videos and
showing the same to the students to
encourage them to read with excitement.
For rewards and encouragement, I
selected some praising words and various
happy stickers to appreciate students'
I also used students' mother tongue to interest. Sometimes, I made videos on the
teach vocabulary. mobile phone while they were reading
I used different techniques for the and showed them later which helped them
students who were poor learner in the to correct their mistakes by themselves.
class. Instead of assigning the same task
to the whole class, I designed different
tasks as per the difficulty level of the
students. For example, I assigned reading
simple sentences to one group, while I
gave reading words to other groups and
reading/locating alphabets in certain order
to the other group. Then, I rearrange the
groups mixing students from each group
and asked them to share what they had
read in each group. Students enjoyed the
group activities. As I divided the students Another interesting activity was reading
into mixed ability groups, they learnt and drawing pictures. For example as
from each other. The most interesting
students read the word house and
thing was that they did not feel hesitation
sentences about it then, I asked them to
to ask each other whenever they had draw the picture of their own house and
problems. write sentences about it. I told them to
share their picture with other friends.
Students enjoyed reading sentences
written about their friend's house. I also
marked their work with praising words
like: Beautiful, Excellent, well done,
along with happy stickers and posted
them on the wall in the classroom.
Activities like these also reduced the
boredom and laziness of the students.
As students liked singing songs and

chants, I equally encouraged them to
After discussing in English about a topic, practice chants reading from the textbook
I also discussed it in Nepali afterwards to like:
minimize the confusion.
1. Billy, boy Billy, boy,
I organized group reading competition as
well which helped them to learn faster. Have you got a pen?
Students were awarded for better reading 2. Seven day's song (Sunday, Monday,
which encouraged them to read with Tuesday, Wednesday etc.)
Reflections: Lesson learnt
The use of group and pair work was observation etc.) before making the plan
found to be effective to increase reading for change.
skill in the classroom.
Real objects, pictures, videos, songs and
Whenever we have problem in teaching, awards are most important teaching
the main problem and activities that the materials for early graders and encourage
students like the most must be explored students to improve their reading skills in
by using exploratory tools (e.g. English.
questionnaire, informal discussion,
Conclusion Appendix 'A'
Name (Optional) ………………
My students were not interested in
reading, and I tried various techniques to
improve their reading skills; however, I 1. Do you like to read in
could not get success. It is because I was English?
trying the techniques that I thought were a. Yes
the best instead of following what the real b. No
need was. For example, I was using
different interesting reading materials to
motivate the students in reading but they
2. Can you read capital and
were not interested in reading. When I
small letters?
explored the situation, I found that the
a. Yes
problem was not with the reading
b. No
materials but it with the language i.e.
students had difficulties with word
meaning and pronunciation. As I planned
as per the need and interest of the 3. What makes the reading
students, I got success. Now I realized task difficult in English?
that the techniques that we think the best
may not improve our teaching, because
the real problem or the need and interest
of the students may be different; as a 4. What do you feel about
result, our best techniques may not work reading in English?
in that particular situation. So, I suggest,
before we plan for change, the
exploration of the current situation to find
out the real problem is really essential for
the right action later on. 5. Which reading activities do
you like the most?
My students do not get involved in
speaking activities in the classroom
My students do not get involved in speaking
activities in the classroom
Devisara Upadhyay
I have been involved in teaching since 1993. I

teach at Shree Saraswati Adharvut School
Ragaspaila, Surkhet, Nepal. Specially, I teach in
early grades. My school has shifted into EMI
(Using English as a Medium of Instruction) in
2013.
The problem Plan for exploration

My students were not interested in
These were the exploratory questions in
speaking English. Whenever I asked them
my mind:
to talk in English, either they remained
silent or talked in their mother tongue but  What do students say about
not in English. speaking activities in the
classroom?
Objectives:  What do students do when I
 To identify why students do not involve them in speaking activities
get involved in speaking activities, in the classroom?
 To find out effective techniques
for involving students in speaking
activities, To find out the answer of the first
 To involve students actively in question, I prepared questionnaire for my
speaking activities in the students (see appendix 'A') and for the
classroom second question, I asked my colleagues to
observe my class. Since my students were
small (early graders) I did not give the
questionnaire to them, instead I asked
these questions in the classroom and
recorded their answers on the basis of of the hands raised. It is just something
'Raise your hand' technique. For example, like informal talking. I asked some more
I asked the question "Do you like to speak questions, but only some questions were
in English? If yes, Please raise your hand, helpful for exploring the problem.
and I calculated the responses on the basis
Data collection
1. Do you like to speak in English? 31% 79%
2. What do you feel at the time of speaking Diff. Easy

in English? 100% 0%
3. If not, why don't you speak or try to English is difficult to speak
speak in English? We don’t know English vocabulary
We have difficulties in pronunciation
Colleague’s observation: what did they say?
Teacher encouraged her students to speak in English, but they were not interested
speaking in English rather they were talking in their mother tongue. Some
students were eating while others were drawing some pictures and playing with
their friends. Only few students were paying attention to the teacher.
Data analysis and  Using pair/group work

interpretation  Giving praise/prize to the
students
Almost all of the students of the class felt
difficulties in speaking English. I came to Action for change
the conclusion that the reason behind this
Since my students were at the beginning
weakness is difficulties in pronunciation
stage of learning English, they were
and word meaning.
unfamiliar with English vocabulary. So,
Plan for action first of all, I taught them vocabulary
related to the each speaking context. Then
 Giving much time for I moved to speaking practices, for
learning/practicing example, I asked my students to draw any
vocabulary/pronunciation using picture that they like the most and name
different techniques what they see on the picture and
 Teaching through language encouraged them to describe it.
games
 Using role play
I supported them to describe the picture piece of paper, but I did not show it to
using the simple sentences e.g. them. They must guess what was written
on a piece of paper by asking questions
This is my house such as:
This is a window
This is a door Is that a banana?
This is my kitchen Is that an orange? etc. unless they
This is a roof etc. guess the correct name.
I used the same picture for ' Find the Next time, they practiced the guessing
Difference' activities. For example, there games by themselves. I just gave them
were two pictures of houses drawn by two some clues for different games. For
different students. I put the pictures in Example:
front of the students and asked them to
find out the differences that they see on A student went to somewhere yesterday;
the pictures. other students had to guess where he went
by asking questions such as:
Then I stitched the pictures on the wall.
Next time, I used the same pictures to ask S1: Did you go to the market?
and answer the questions. For example: S2: Did you go to zoo? etc.
Teacher: (Pointing to the bird on the I also designed some activities for
picture): What's this? exchanging personal information. But, I
had to demonstrate the each activity and
Student/s: That's a bird. give some clues before assigning them the
speaking tasks. For Example:
Then I told my students to ask and answer
the similar questions with their partner. I wrote a structure for a particular
They really enjoyed the activities. speaking activity on the board:
Students also shared and described each S1: When do you get up?
other's pictures using very simple
sentences. I just helped them whenever S2: I get up at 5 o'clock.
they needed the support. The most S1: When do ………..?
important thing to note here is that I did
not have to prepare materials by myself. I S2: I …………………..
just used the pictures drawn by the
(I gave clues one by one such as: When
students themselves which also kept my
do you….. have your breakfast? Go to
students busy in the classroom.
Next, I used the guessing game to involve

my students in speaking activities. For
Example: I wrote a name of a fruit on a
school? Play football? Listen music? etc. objects/places/people in 3/4 sentences. I
and students ask and answer in pairs. realized that it was the good sign for
learning.
I also asked my students to describe their
favorite objects or people. Most of the
students could describe their favorite

After I put my plan into action, I just asked two questions. The following columns show
the result.
Reflection: Lesson learnt this or that’, and so on. Teachers may

have several problems during teaching
The main reason why students did not get which can be solved through classroom
involved in speaking was difficulties in based research.
pronunciation and word meaning.
Students, especially in early grades, Conclusion
cannot develop vocabulary for speaking
in English at once; they need time and Teaching is a continuous process of
frequent practice even on the same words. learning i.e. learning how to improve
I used to teach certain lessons and ourselves and then learning how to
immediately move to the next ones. Now, improve others. During these six months,
I realized that giving opportunity to the I realized that whenever students have
students for practice is more important problems in learning, it’s not due to their
than just teaching i.e. telling students inability, rather we as a teacher may have
‘This is …’, ‘That is…’, ‘You should do missed some stages of teaching. To be
very specific, we go ahead a bit too fast, learning. We can understand where the
missing some important steps/ leaving students are by talking with them and
parts behind. So, keeping the pace of the observing their behavior in the classroom.
students is very important in teaching and
Appendix ‘A’
Questionnaire प्रश्नावली
Name नाम (optional):---------------------
Class कक्षा :------------- Section:--------
Please go through the statements carefully and tick (√)/ or write the answers
1. Do you like to speak in English?

तिमीहरु लाई अङ्ग्रेजी बोल्न मन लाग्छ?
a) Yes लाग्छ
b) No लाग्दै न
2. What do you feel at the time of speaking in English? तिमीहरु लाई अङ्ग्रेजी
बोल्दा कस्िो लाग्छ?
a) Easy सजजलो लाग्छ
b) Difficult गाह्रो लाग्छ
c) If others please write down… अरुकुनै भए लेख्नु होस
3. If not, why don't you speak or try to speak English? यदद होइन भने, तिमीहरु
ककन अङ्ग्रेजी बोल्दै नौ वा कोससस गदै नौ?
My students do not speak in the class
when I ask them questions in English
My students do not speak in the class when I ask them a question in English
My students do not speak in the class when I
ask them questions in English
Kamal Raj Acharya
I teach English as a subject in

Secondary Level at Jana Jyoti
Secondary School, Baddichaur,
Surkhet, Nepal. It is a government
aided school where I have been
teaching since 2009. Generally, there
are around 50 students in each class. I
conducted the exploratory action
research in class Nine. There were 41
students in the class.
The problem Objective

My school is located in a village area My objectives of this research were:
where most of the students come from
indigenous and Dalit community.
Teaching English in rural area itself is a  To find out why students do not
challenging job. Actually, I wanted to answer questions in English
develop my students' communication  To find out effective techniques
skills by involving them into various for improving students' speaking
interactive activities. However, they could skills
not speak in English, especially when I
asked them some questions based on the
subject matter.
First of all, I realized that it was necessary to find out:
What do students do
What do students say
when I ask them
about speaking in the
questions in English?
classroom?
I prepared a questionnaire (see Appendix 'A') for the students to find out their opinion on
speaking in English and to find out the answer of the second question, I planned to
observe my students during the speaking activities in the classroom.
Data collection
Questionnaire Always Sometimes Rarely
1. Do you like to speak in English? 12% 83% 5%
2. Do you understand what your teachers 32% 63% 5%
say/ask?
3. Can you pronounce the words 20% 51% 29%
correctly?
4. Your teacher's questions are very easy 12% 76% 12%
to answer.
5. What do you feel at the time of Hesitation Shy Do not know
speaking in English? answer
29% 12% 59%
6. What difficulties do you feel when you Do not know the answers
speak in English? [open question] I feel shy
I am afraid of making mistakes
I have difficulties in pronunciation
I am weak in English
I do not have time to learn English
My friends laugh at my English
My friends do not speak in English
I can not understand the text on the
book.
Colleagues observation: what did my colleague say?
'You seemed very energetic in the classroom and spend much time in explaining the
content from the textbook. When you asked the questions, most of the students seemed
confused. Actually, they seemed as if they did not have any ideas to speak. You seemed
a bit strict with the students regarding the time limitation and behaved as an
administrator.
If I were you, I could give enough time to the students for discussion before asking them
any questions. I would not ask any questions until I became sure that students had
something to say.'
Data analysis and  Eliciting/teaching vocabulary

related to the speaking activities.
interpretation
 Giving enough time to the
From the above data, I came to the students to discuss among
conclusion that most (88%) of the themselves in pair or in group
students did not want to speak in English using either English or their
because they (68%) did not understand mother tongue to understand the
the questions in English. Moreover, 80% content/concept before asking the
of the students could not pronounce the questions
words and they did not know the word  Asking CCQ (Concept Checking
meaning either; and 59% of the students Questions)
did not know what to say, actually they  Asking ICQ (Instruction Checking
(75%) felt weak in English and hesitate to Questions)
speak. As per my colleague's observation,
I realized that I should be sure my Action for change
students had something to say before I
I changed my teaching activities and
asked them some questions.
started my lesson with some rapport
Plan for action building activities e.g. asking students
about their health, family and their study
As per my colleague's suggestion, it was so that they would not feel hesitation to
necessary to change my administrative speak later on. Then I elicited the
behavior, so I planned to behave vocabulary needed for speaking activities
friendlily with my students. Then, before and gave enough time for discussion on
asking questions to my students, I the speaking topic from the textbook. I
planned to follow the activities like these: allowed students to use their mother
tongue while discussing on the subject
matter. Some students had ideas in their
mother tongue but did not have English with some rapport building activities e.g.
vocabulary to express in English, in such asking students about their health, family
a case; I supported students with English and their studies can encourage students
vocabulary. to interact with their teacher and friends
When students seemed confident then Before asking the questions, it is

only I asked them to speak in English. necessary to discuss more on content so
Sometimes, I asked my students to read that students can have something in their
the text book and asked them very simple mind to say.
questions based on it.
Teaching vocabulary and practicing
After the action: observation pronunciation increase the chances of
interaction in English
After the implementation of my new plan,
my students started to speak in English. Some students do not understand the
Although they produce erroneous questions while others do not have
sentences, they were less hesitant in content to communicate. So, it is
speaking. The most interesting thing was necessary to ask CCQ (Concept Checking
that they did not feel shy while speaking Questions) and ICQ (Instruction
in English with me. The students who Checking Questions) before asking
questions based on the particular content.
Conclusion
Teachers may have many problems in
their teaching practice. Most of these are
caused by some sort of misunderstanding,
e.g. I thought my students could
understand everything that I taught to
them and asked questions based on it. As
students did not answer my questions, I
thought they were not interested in
speaking or they could not speak in
never asked me any questions started to English. So, I tried to clarify the problem
ask questions even on the way to school. and found that it was my problem rather
than the students’. To be more specific, I
asked the questions before students had
Entering into the classroom with happy developed ideas to express. I did not
mood and smiling face and starting lesson
check whether students had even some of the students did not understand
understood the questions or not. Later I the questions themselves. As I addressed
knew that students could not speak in these problems, students started to speak
English because they did not have in English.
content/language to communicate and
Appendix ‘A’
Section ' A'
Name (Optional):
Class :… Section……..
Please go through the statements/questions carefully and tick (√) or write the answers
1. Do you like to speak in English?
Always sometimes rarely
If other please specify,
……………………………………………………………………………..
2. Do you understand what your teachers say/ask?
3. Can you pronounce the words correctly?
4. Your teacher's questions are very easy to answer
5. What do you feel at the time of speaking in English?
Hesitation shy don't know answer
if other please specify …………………………………………
6. What difficulty do you feel when you speak in English in the classroom
classroom?
िपाइँलाई कक्षा कोठामा अङ्ग्रेजी बोल्दा कस्िो अप्ठ्यारो महशुस हुन्छ?
………………………………………………………………………………………
…………………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………..
I have difficulties in managing a large
class
I have difficulties in managing a large class
Shova Shahi
My school's name is Shree Krishna Sanskrit

and General Secondary School,Itram-
7,Birendranagar Surkhet, Nepal. I am
teaching in this school since 2014. The
medium of instruction in my school is
English. I teach in class 6, 7, 8 and 9.
The problem
Almost all of my classes were
overcrowded with a very large number of  What particular difficulties do I
students. For example in class Seven, I have in the class?
had 89 students, so, it was very difficult  What causes the disturbance in the
to manage such a large classroom. classroom?
Students used to make disturbance talking
unnecessarily in the classroom. I tried Exploration methodology
various techniques such as changing the
To find out the answer of these questions,
seats of the students every day, giving
I requested my colleague to observe my
authority to the class monitors, dividing
classes and I myself also observed the
them into different groups to name only a
behavior of the students in the class
few, but I could not get success.
seriously to find out who was causing the
Objectives disturbance.
 To manage the disturbance in the Data collection

large classroom
Colleague’s observation report: what did
my colleague say?
Although most of the students were

paying attention to their studies, some of
the students seated near the windows
were looking outside, and they were
talking to others about what they saw
outside the class, while a few others were
talking unnecessarily. Yes, my colleague
was right; moreover, I also found that
some other students were talking about
those friends who were looking outside
the windows.
So, I came to the conclusion that students

looking outside through the windows and
side talking were the main causes of the
disturbance in the classroom
Plan for action

 Giving more responsibilities to the
students sitting nearby the
windows and to the side talkers
 Keeping close proximity to the
students talking unnecessarily
with their friends. After the action: observation
Action for change Nowadays, the situation has changed

drastically. Students do not talk
As per my plan, I gave more unnecessarily. Instead they concentrate
responsibilities to the students sitting more on their study and do the assigned
nearby the windows / side talkers. For tasks. Although they have not stopped
example, I assigned some extra tasks to side talking completely, they do not talk
them, such as making the notes and unnecessarily. They have started talking
summarizing the lesson, writing the about the subject matter, which is a
answers to the questions by discussing positive sign of learning.
with their friends. In some cases, they had
to complete the task individually too. Reflection: Lesson learnt
Sometimes, I assigned them the role of
Giving more responsibilities to the
group leader. When I noticed students
students sitting nearby the windows and
talking unnecessarily, I moved near to
side talkers, and keeping close proximity
those students who were talking
to the students talking unnecessarily with
unnecessarily. I did not speak with them
their friends is one of the best techniques
individually but just made frequent eye
to manage disturbance in a large and
contact with them.
overcrowded classroom.
https://www.supportsocietynepal.org.np/publication/
ISBN: 978-9937-0-6634-1
© Support Society Nepal 2019
Melauli-01, Baitadi
Nepal
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Exploring for action, acting for change:

stories of exploratory action research in Nepal

Edited by Janak Singh Negi

Edited by Janak Singh Negi

Richard Smith - Foreword…………………………………………..................... 2

Janak Singh Negi - Introduction………………………………………………… 3

1. Devisara R.C. - My students do not understand the text in English in

2. Indu Adhikari - My students do not appear to be interested in writing,

3. Purna Prasad Paudel- My students do not take part actively in group

5. Prakash Regmi - My students do not get involved in class work…………… 40

6. Sarita Sharma - I am not satisfied with my students' reading in the

7. Devisara Upadhya - My students do not get involved in speaking activities

9. Shova Shahi - I have difficulties in managing a large class…………………. 66

The importance of exploration

The teacher’s own activities inside

These are only a few of the questions that

Another important point to note here is

I teach at Jana Secondary School, Birendranagar-6,

2. I can answer the questions in English 29% 71%

Colleagues’ observation: what did my colleagues say?

Data analysis and

Then students were asked to exchange

Summing up and responding to the text

Finally, I divided the students into groups

After the action: observation

Reflection: Lessons learnt explore the problem in detail, so that we

2. I can answer the questions in English based on the

4. Reading is very important for my success in the

5. What do you feel about reading the texts in English ?

I have been teaching English at Shree

Plan for exploration What do students

Data analysis and

Plan for action

Another technique that I used was

After the action: observation

At the end of the months, I asked my Reflection: Lesson learnt

Nowadays my students are more active.

1. Do you enjoy writing?

b) Little not fully

b) Worried and fear

3) What do you think your writing skill is?

4) Do you want to write better in English?

5) What do you feel about writing in English? Why?

Participation of Students in Group Work

I am head teacher of Shree Shiva

Data analysis and

As I knew that my students wanted to

Jagat Kumari Giri

I teach Health, Population and Environment

What do students say they What are students'

Discussion about subject

List out activities that you don't like in the classroom.

Not paying attention

Not obeying the teachers

Data analysis and

Action for change Reflection: Lesson learnt

I teach at Shree Krishna Sanskrit and General

The problem Objectives

Do you understand your teacher's instruction (i.e. what your