Teachers’ and Students’ Attitudes towards the Use of Educational Games to Teach EFL Students Speaking Skills

Abstract

The current research aimed at exploring the attitude of both students and teachers about the use of educational games in teaching speaking skills. In this study, it is assumed that educational games will have a positive effect on students' speaking performance. The study resorted to the use of mixed methods by merging between qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques. The latter were selected through random sampling believing that they possess some desired criteria in order to be suitable for the study. Two questionnaires were administered to 50 first year EFL students and 6 oral expression teachers at the department of English at the university of Mohammed Seddik Ben Yahia, to measure not only the teachers' but also the students' views towards the use of educational games and their effect on EFL learners' speaking skills. Based on the analysis of the results, the findings elucidated that the use of such games can have a positive impact on learners' speaking performance. Games as minimal pairs, word chain, tongue twisters, and alphabetical race are examples that most respondents hold that they boost speaking skills of students.