Articles
The
use of role-play to improve speaking competence
El
uso del juego de roles para mejorar la competencia oral
María Belén Valle Fiallos 1
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2448-0101
José Ignacio Andrade Morán 2
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4294-2736
Universidad Técnica de Cotopaxi.
Latacunga-Ecuador 1
Corresponding
autor
belenvalle658@gmail.com
Received: 03-06-2026
Accepted: 04-09-2026
Available online: 15-09-2026
Abstract
This study determined the effectiveness of role-play in developing
students’ speaking competence in English as a foreign language at an Ecuadorian
primary school. A quantitative approach and a pre-experimental one-group
pre-test and post-test design were used. The population consisted of 200
students, and 41 third-grade students were selected through convenience
sampling. Oral performance was assessed using the Cambridge Pre-A1 Starters
Speaking Assessment Rubric, which evaluated vocabulary, pronunciation, and
interaction. Descriptive statistics were calculated, and the Shapiro-Wilk test
indicated that the differences between pre-test and post-test scores were not
normally distributed. Therefore, the Wilcoxon signed-rank test was applied. The
results showed a statistically significant improvement in students’ speaking
competence after the three-week role-play intervention (Z = 5.61, p < 0.001,
r = 0.90), indicating a large effect. The findings suggested that structured
role-play had potential as a communicative pedagogical approach for supporting
speaking competence in primary school learners by providing opportunities to
use English in meaningful and familiar contexts.
Keywords: role-play, speaking competence, English as a foreign language,
primary education
Resumen
Este estudio determinó la eficacia del juego de roles en el desarrollo
de la competencia oral de estudiantes de inglés como lengua extranjera en una
escuela primaria ecuatoriana. Se empleó un enfoque cuantitativo y un diseño
preexperimental de un solo grupo con pretest y post-test. La población estuvo
conformada por 200 estudiantes, de los cuales 41 estudiantes de tercer grado
fueron seleccionados mediante muestreo por conveniencia. El desempeño oral se
evaluó mediante la rúbrica de expresión oral Cambridge Pre-A1 Starters, que
consideró vocabulario, pronunciación e interacción. Se calcularon estadísticas
descriptivas y, después de verificar mediante la prueba de Shapiro-Wilk que las
diferencias entre el pretest y el post-test no presentaban una distribución
normal, se aplicó la prueba de rangos con signo de Wilcoxon. Los resultados
mostraron una mejora estadísticamente significativa en la competencia oral
después de la intervención de tres semanas (Z = 5,61; p < 0,001; r = 0,90),
lo que indicó un efecto grande. Los hallazgos sugirieron que el juego de roles
estructurado tenía potencial como enfoque pedagógico comunicativo para apoyar
el desarrollo de la competencia oral mediante oportunidades de uso
significativo y contextualizado del inglés.
Palabras clave: juego de roles, competencia
oral, inglés como lengua extranjera, educación primaria
Introduction
The development of speaking competence is recognized
as the most critical yet challenging component of English as a Foreign Language
(EFL) instruction. Oral proficiency is viewed as the main means of social and
professional integration in a globalized society, according to Chen et al.
(2025). However, traditional pedagogy often focuses on grammar exercises and
correct sentences produced by students rather than meaningful communication and
there is a gap between what students know about English and what happens when
they want to communicate spontaneously. Research also shows that role-play
which is an interactive learning method is effective in solving the problem,
because it is a learning method that is very similar to the way people interact
in the real world (Ikhsan & Akhsan, 2022). Therefore, the use of
communicative approaches that promote active participation and meaningful
language use remains relevant in EFL instruction.
In many Latin America countries, English language
programs have no authentic contexts for the students to develop oral
communication skills. The Education First (2024) report shows that the region's
proficiency levels are still relatively low, primarily due to the absence of
innovative pedagogical tools in classroom activities. According to scholars
like Moosa et al. (2024), it is essential to include ludic and communicative
tasks to overcome the cultural and linguistic barriers in the classroom. These
approaches may provide learners with opportunities to use English more actively
and meaningfully, particularly in contexts where opportunities for authentic
language use are limited.
In the Ecuadorian educational scenario, there have
been several changes to the national English curriculum, with the focus being
on communicative competence and not only the teaching of grammatical structures
(Quinteros & Fajardo, 2022). The curriculum fosters the development of the
four communicative skills that include Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing
in authentic language use as stated by Zapata et al. (2025). Nevertheless,
despite these guidelines of the curriculum, communicative language teaching has
been limitedly applied in many classrooms. Quinteros
and Fajardo (2022) found that role-playing can promote oral expression among
elementary school students, supporting the use of communicative and
student-centered strategies in the Ecuadorian educational context. Similarly, Jiménez and Cabanilla (2023) examined the
use of role-play to improve speaking skills among students in a public school
in Loja, highlighting its potential to enhance oral communication in Ecuadorian
EFL settings.
While the Ecuadorian curriculum aims to be
communicative, problems in speaking in English still exist in the classroom
with the young EFL learners. From (Pinatih, 2021), students are found to
experience high level of speaking anxiety in producing language in a formal
class environment. The challenge indicates that the current approach does not
adequately support students to freely express themselves in the English language
(Tegler et al., 2025). However, if students are able to get into role-play,
their motivation will rise and their anxiety of making mistakes will also go
down considerably. According to the study carried out by Katemba and Grace
(2023), role-play can be an interactive method and be used to develop students'
self-confidence and motivation, especially in public schools where students are
taught using the traditional grammar-translation method. Sarifudin and Setyawan
(2025) used role-play as one of the major teaching methods in the improvement
of English learners' communicative skills. This technique enables learners to
employ the target language in a supportive setting in which mistakes are of
negligible concern. Moreover, this safe space provides opportunities for
learners to handle language in different contexts, scripts, roles and
situations and environments, depending on their level of learning.
Previous studies have underscored the significance and
potential benefits of role-play in second-language learning (Ishak & Abdul,
2022; Moosa et al., 2024). However, the impact of role-play on young EFL
learners’ speaking competence in Ecuadorian primary schools has received
limited empirical attention, particularly regarding its effectiveness based on
defined criteria for assessing speaking ability. Thus, the present study was
conducted to determine the effectiveness of role-play as a teaching method for
enhancing the speaking competence of third-grade EFL students in an Ecuadorian
primary school. A quantitative approach and a pre-experimental one-group
pre-test and post-test design were used for this purpose.
Methodology
The research in this study is
based on the positivist paradigm, as this paradigm enables the study to be
generalizable and statistically reliable and obtain universal findings and laws
(Park et al., 2020). In
particular, quantitative approach was used as this approach is suitable to
identify trends and investigate the relationship between the variables using
numerical data (Ghanad, 2023). The study used
one-group pre-test/post-test pre-experimental design based on Cambridge Pre A1
Starters model. Mohajan (2020) defines this
design as a single-group intervention to see how things change over time. The
design was therefore utilized to assess the effect of role-play to compare
students' speaking performance in pre and post-test.
The population consisted of 200 students,
from which 41 third-grade students were selected through convenience sampling,
a non-probability sampling technique based on the accessibility and
availability of participants (Golzar et al., 2022). The 41 participants
belonged to an accessible third-grade class in which the intervention could be
implemented consistently. The class was selected based on its accessibility and
the feasibility of implementing the intervention within the available
institutional conditions, including a consistent schedule that provided
sufficient instructional time without disrupting regular classroom activities.
The inclusion criteria were enrollment in third grade, an age between 7 and 8
years, consistent attendance, and parental consent to participate in the study.
No specific exclusion criteria were applied; students who met the inclusion
criteria and whose parents provided consent were eligible to participate. The
participants shared broadly similar educational and English-learning
backgrounds, as they were enrolled in the same third-grade class at the same
public educational institution, were within the same age range, received
English instruction within the same institutional and curricular context, and
followed the same class schedule during the intervention. These shared
characteristics supported their comparability within the target population.
The study was carried out in a
public primary school in Ecuador where English is taught as a foreign language
(EFL). Socio-educational context whereby learners have limited contact with
English outside the classroom and where teaching of English is based on
real-life tasks, speaking and student interaction. In particular, the study was
carried out in the participants’ classroom, where the intervention was
implemented in its natural context. This setting provided ecological validity
by enabling the role-play intervention to take place during the students' daily
school activities (Steube et al., 2024).
The
instrument used to assess students’ speaking competence was the Cambridge Pre
A1 Starters Speaking Assessment Rubric. The rubric evaluates speaking
performance according to three assessment criteria: vocabulary, pronunciation,
and interaction. Each criterion is rated on a six-point scale ranging from 0 to
5, based on performance descriptors for each level. Therefore, each dimension
has a possible score ranging from 0 to 5, and the maximum total speaking score
is 15 points. Specifically, vocabulary, pronunciation, and interaction were
each scored from 0 to 5, and the total speaking score was obtained by summing
the scores across the three components, resulting in a possible total score
ranging from 0 to 15. The same rubric and scoring criteria were used in both
the pre-test and post-test. The speaking assessments were administered
individually by the teacher-researcher and took approximately five minutes per
student. The same teacher-researcher also scored both assessments, following
the same procedure and applying the same scoring criteria in order to maintain
consistency between the pre-test and post-test. The assessment criteria and
scoring descriptors were based on the official Cambridge Pre A1 Starters
speaking assessment framework (Cambridge Assessment English, 2024).
Data were collected through three
stages: pre-test, role-play intervention, and post-test. The pre-test was
administered on June 3, 2026, before the intervention. The intervention lasted
three weeks, from June 5 to June 19, and consisted of three role-play sessions,
with one role-play conducted each week. Role-play #1, “My First Day of School,”
was conducted on June 5 and focused on greetings, introductions, and exchanging
basic personal information through activities such as “Find a New Friend” and
“School Adventure Mission.” Role-play #2, “At the Store – School Supplies,” was
conducted on June 12 and involved students acting as shopkeepers and customers
while practicing requests, prices, and polite expressions. Role-play #3, “In
the Park,” was conducted on June 19 and involved interactions related to games,
weather, and park activities through speaking missions and short improvised
conversations. Each role-play session lasted 90 minutes, from 12:40 p.m. to
2:10 p.m., corresponding to two consecutive English class periods. Students
were organized mainly in pairs during the first role-play and mainly in groups
during the second and third role-plays. The same teacher-researcher conducted
the intervention sessions in the participants’ regular classroom, maintaining
consistent classroom procedures and providing clear instructions while using
visual and hands-on materials appropriate to each scenario. The post-test was
administered individually on June 24, 2026, after the intervention had been
completed.
SPSS Statistics version 25 (IBM
Corporation) software was used to perform statistical analyses. The study used
descriptive statistical techniques, namely mean scores, and standard
deviations, in processing the data obtained from the Cambridge Pre A1 Starters
Speaking Assessment Rubric. Specifically, descriptive statistics were used to
summarize and present the data to represent the speaking performance of the
participants in the pre-test and post-test in accordance with Ghanad (2023). Furthermore, descriptive
statistics described the initial level of performance and analyzed improvements
of the students in their competence in speaking after the intervention.
Further, graphical (histogram and normal Q-Q plot) and Shapiro–Wilk tests were
used to check the normality of the data. Because of the graphical assessment
and the Shapiro–Wilk test, the data showed that it does not conform to the
normal distribution, the research was carried out using Wilcoxon signed rank
test to estimate the difference in competence of students in speaking before
and after the study was carried out. Finally, the effect size (r) for the Wilcoxon
signed-rank test was calculated using the formula r = Z / √N, where Z
represents the standardized Wilcoxon test statistic and N represents the number
of paired observations included in the analysis. In this study, N = 41,
corresponding to the 41 students who completed both the pre-test and post-test.
The magnitude of r was interpreted according to Cohen’s (2013) conventional
criteria, with values of 0.10, 0.30, and 0.50 representing small, moderate, and
large effects, respectively.
Ethical considerations were
considered and consent for conducting the research was obtained from the
principal of the educational institution. Further, consent forms were used to
ensure that the parent(s)/legal guardian(s) were informed that the children
would be participating in a voluntary study, and that they could withdraw at
any time and for any reason, with no consequences, after receiving all
information (Dahal, 2024; Mumford et al., 2021). Furthermore, in order to keep students anonymous, the
study did not use the students' names but instead used identification numbers:
S1, S2,…, S41, which ensure that the specific students cannot be identified
from the data collected. Besides, the study planned role-play activities that
aimed at reducing stress and increasing opportunities for learning for young
learners to preserve beneficence (Medvetska, 2025). These ethical practices safeguarded the dignity, privacy
and rights of all involved in this study.
Results
Descriptive Statistics
To address the research question,
this study calculated the means (M) and standard deviation (S.D.) of the
speaking skills pre- and post-test of the participants including vocabulary,
pronunciation and interaction. Table 1 shows the results of this calculation.
Table 1
Means and Standard Deviation of Pre- Test
Speaking Scores
|
Speaking Skills
|
N
|
Mean
(M)
|
Std. Deviation
(S.D)
|
|
Vocabulary
|
41
|
2.24
|
.943
|
|
Pronunciation
|
41
|
2.71
|
.750
|
|
Interaction
|
41
|
2.80
|
1.188
|
|
Total
|
41
|
7.76
|
2.538
|
The pre-test results are shown in
table 1, which indicates students' performance at an initial stage in the
interaction, vocabulary and pronunciation. The pre-test results showed that the
mean scores were 2.24 for vocabulary, 2.71 for pronunciation, and 2.80 for
interaction, with a total mean score of 7.76 (S.D. = 2.538). Vocabulary had the
lowest mean score, whereas interaction had the highest mean score among the
three assessed components.
Table 2
Means and Standard Deviation of Post-Test
Speaking Scores
|
Speaking Skills
|
N
|
Mean
(M)
|
Std. Deviation
(S.D)
|
|
Vocabulary
|
41
|
3.78
|
.690
|
|
Pronunciation
|
41
|
3.32
|
.471
|
|
Interaction
|
41
|
4.07
|
.648
|
|
Total
|
41
|
11.17
|
1.482
|
Table 2 presents the post-test
results, displaying the speaking competence of the students after the intervention.
The mean vocabulary score increased from 2.24 in the pre-test to 3.78 in the
post-test, while the mean pronunciation score increased from 2.71 to 3.32 and
the mean interaction score increased from 2.80 to 4.07. The total mean speaking
score increased from 7.76 in the pre-test to 11.17 in the post-test.
Interaction showed the highest post-test mean, followed by vocabulary and
pronunciation.
Assessment of Normality
Normal distribution of Difference
scores (Post-Pre) was checked using graphical methods (histograms and a normal
Q-Q plot) as well as the Shapiro–Wilk test before conducting the inferential
analyses. Figure 1 shows a Normal Q-Q plot for the results to check for their
significance. Most of the observations are approximately close to the reference
line.
Figure
1
Normal Q-Q Plot
It is also seen from figure 1 that
most observations are in good agreement with the reference line, with some
minor deviations at the upper tail. The histogram in figure 2 shows the
distribution of Diff_Total scores.
Figure 2
Histogram
Examining Figure 2 it can be seen
that the data is slightly positively (right) skewed. This means that there are
many values near 2 and 4, but not as many near 5 - 7. Overall, the conclusion
drawn is that the distribution of diff_total is not perfectly normal, but there
do not appear to be extreme outliers. In addition to these illustrations, the
study also ran the Shapiro-Wilk test to determine normality, or whether the
observed deviations from normality are statistically significant. It was used
to determine the appropriateness of parametric and non-parametric inferential
tests and the criterion was that if p< 0.05 (5%), then the null hypothesis of
normality was rejected.
Table 3
Shapiro–Wilk Test
|
|
Statistic
|
df
|
Sig.
|
|
Diff_Total
|
0.888
|
41
|
0.001
|
The results showed diff_total was
not normally distributed (0.001 < 0.05). Hence, the non-parametric Wilcoxon
signed-rank test was used for the analysis of the differences in speaking
competence of students in pre-test and post-test.
Component-wise Analysis
Due to the non-normal distribution
of data, this study used a Wilcoxon signed-rank test. This test also assisted
in determining which aspects of speaking competence (vocabulary, pronunciation,
and interaction) improved post-intervention. Table 4 shows that the positive
ranks (n) are the number of research participants (students) whose pre-test
results are lower than the post-test results, while the negative ranks (n) are
the number of research participants (students) whose pre-test results are
higher than the post-test results (Mohajan, 2020).
Table 4
Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test
Result
|
Component
|
Positive Ranks (n)
|
Negative Ranks (n)
|
Ties (n)
|
Z
|
p
|
Effect Size r
|
Interpretation
|
|
Vocabulary
|
41
|
0
|
0
|
-5.741
|
< .001
|
0.90
|
Large effect
|
|
Pronunciation
|
21
|
0
|
20
|
-4.291
|
< .001
|
0.67
|
Large effect
|
|
Interaction
|
33
|
0
|
8
|
-5.136
|
< .001
|
0.80
|
Large effect
|
|
Total speaking score
|
—
|
—
|
—
|
-5.617
|
< .001
|
0.88
|
Large effect
|
Results in Table 4 indicated
statistically significant differences between pre-test and post-test scores for
vocabulary, pronunciation, interaction, and the total speaking score (all p < .001). Vocabulary showed the largest effect size (r = 0.90),
followed by the total speaking score (r = 0.88), interaction (r = 0.80), and
pronunciation (r = 0.67), all indicating large effects. In addition, no
negative ranks were observed for any of the assessed components. All 41
students showed higher post-test scores in vocabulary, while 21 students showed
higher scores in pronunciation and 33 students showed higher scores in
interaction. The remaining 20 students in pronunciation and 8 students in
interaction had tied scores between the pre-test and post-test. These results
indicate that participants who showed a change had higher post-test scores than
pre-test scores, while some participants maintained the same scores in
pronunciation and interaction. Overall, the results indicate that the
three-week role-play intervention was associated with statistically significant
differences in all dimensions of speaking performance assessed.
Discussion
This study focused on the research
problem of whether role-play was effective for enhancing the speaking skill of
young EFL learners based on the criteria provided by standard assessments of
speaking in an Ecuadorian primary school. The study provided evidence that the
three-week role-play intervention had a significant effect on the speaking
ability of the young EFL learners. The results of the Wilcoxon signed-rank test
supported the statistically significant improvement of the students'
interaction, pronunciation and vocabulary as shown by the total mean score that
increased from 7.76 to 11.17 (p =
0.001). The findings are in
alignment with the previous study conducted by Salsabila et al. (2026) that showed the effectiveness of
the role-play game “Catch a thief” for enhancing speaking skills of EFL
students. The students reported that being engaged in such games helped them to
be courageous in speaking English and asking questions and answering. Likewise,
Sánchez and Cango (2024) noted that after the
eight-week implementation of the cooperative learning strategies such as
Jigsaw, Roleplay, and Think-Pair-Share, the students' interactive
communication, pronunciation, grammatical knowledge and vocabulary improved
significantly. The present study focused on the primary education of young EFL
learners as compared to the previous studies, most of which were on older
learners. Likewise, the flexibility of cooperative learning to enhance English
competence in higher education is not denied by Aporbo (2023), but the above study expands the field of cooperative
learning with younger EFL students.
The improvement in students’
language skills in speaking can be traced to the communicative type of
role-play activities used. The findings are consistent with Luo (2024), who showed that role-play provides
more choices for students to assume different roles and to operate in realistic
situations compared with the teacher-centered teaching approach. The activities
allow students to use English rather than be continually presented with lists
of grammatical structures or vocabulary items. Similar results obtained by
Sarifudin and Setyawan (2025) who emphasized
that the authentic use of language will help the students to build their
confidence, fluency and communicative competence gradually and minimize errors.
Thus, the incredible improvement in the current study certainly substantiates
the importance of meaningful interaction in effective language learning in the
second language.
The Wilcoxon signed-rank test
showed statistically significant differences between the pre-test and post-test
scores (p < .001). The large effect sizes observed across the assessed
speaking components suggest that structured role-play may be a promising
communicative intervention for supporting young learners' oral language skills.
The results of the descriptive
analysis of speaking skills showed that the learners' speaking skills improved
most when it came to vocabulary. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test also found a
significant effect size, indicating that the intervention made significant
improvements in vocabulary. This can be due to the fact that role-play
activities, where students can acquire knowledge in the context of meaningful
and natural ways (Zhiyenbayeva et al., 2026). The target words were heard and repeated by the learners
in their role-play as in the school, grocery shop and in daily conversation.
Students used words to complete communicative acts rather than just memorize
single words, making words more meaningful and memorable. Continued encounters
with real communicative contexts reinforce the learning of vocabulary, as new
words were related to real experiences, thereby enabling the students to use
suitable words in oral communication.
Furthermore, there were
significant improvement scores for pre- and post-intervention data for
interaction. The results confirm those obtained by Lahbibi and Farhane (2023) who found that the role-play
technique helps the learners to be able to conduct a conversation, respond to
their interlocutors appropriately, and maintain the conversation. Turn taking,
Question and Answer, starting conversations and spontaneous responses were
practiced all the time in role-play as students were working together. Such
communicative behaviors are seldom used in most traditional classrooms where
classroom instruction is mostly grammars. The observed improvement in
interaction may be related to the opportunities provided by role-play for
students to practice turn-taking, question-and-answer exchanges, initiating
conversations, and spontaneous responses. However, students’ confidence was not
directly measured in this study. This finding supports the view that a language
competence is not only a component of a person's speech competence, but it is
also an interactional negotiation of meaning.
Moreover, the study found a
statistically significant improvement in pronunciation after the three-week
role-play intervention (p < .001). Although the effect size for
pronunciation (r = 0.67) was smaller than that observed for vocabulary (r =
0.90) and interaction (r = 0.80), it still represented a large effect. This is
consistent with Sayow and Marsevani (2024) who stressed that pronunciation is a
natural phenomenon and is expected with time, through exposure, listening and
repeated oral production. The smaller effect size observed for pronunciation
may be related to factors that were not examined in the present study. One
possibility that could be explored in future research is whether the duration
or intensity of the intervention influences pronunciation outcomes,
particularly because pronunciation development may require sustained exposure,
listening, and repeated oral production. The statistically significant
difference indicates that students' pronunciation scores were higher after the
intervention; however, the present design does not allow the specific
mechanisms underlying this change to be determined. In communicative
activities, students had opportunities to use familiar words repeatedly and
practice their pronunciation in meaningful contexts.
Overall, the findings suggest that
role-play can reinforce multiple components of the speaking skill. There was no
single skill that was addressed in the intervention but rather vocabulary and
pronunciation, and interaction were integrated into it. The improvement is
multidimensional, which shows that communicative language teaching is a whole
and holistic approach because language skills are learnt and acquired by using
it communicatively for meaningful purposes. It is more likely that activities
requiring learners to use all of these skills will produce broader learning
outcomes as speaking is an integrated skill. The findings, thus, validate the
application of integrated communicative tasks in primary English classrooms
empirically.
The role-play situations used in
the intervention represented familiar contexts, including school, shopping, and
play. These contexts provided opportunities for students to use English in
meaningful communicative situations related to everyday experiences. However,
factors such as cognitive load, anxiety, and classroom environment were not
directly measured in this study; therefore, their potential contribution to the
observed improvement cannot be determined from the present data. Future
research could examine these variables directly to determine whether they
contribute to the effectiveness of role-play activities.
From the pedagogical point of
view, the findings are significant to the English teachers in primary schools.
The result of this study suggests that language learning should be conducted in
a different way from the conventional approach, by adding communicative
activities so that the language learners can participate actively in the
learning process. Students are able to practice using English in realistic
scenarios, build their vocabulary and pronunciation and interact with others
about language through role-play. On this point, it is believed that structured
role-play activities may be regarded as a pragmatic approach to the use of oral
communication in regular lessons that may be taken into account during lesson
planning by teachers. In addition, role-play is also a learning method that can
be transferred to other learning environments without using sophisticated
technology and preparing a lot of learning materials.
Conclusions
In accordance with the findings of this study, it can
be concluded that structured role-play has potential to support the development
of speaking competence among third-grade young EFL learners in the Ecuadorian
primary school context examined. By providing opportunities to use English in
familiar and meaningful situations, role-play may facilitate the development of
oral communication as an integrated skill, particularly when learners engage in
structured interactions with their peers. Thus, the contribution of this study
lies in providing context-specific evidence that structured communicative
role-play can be a practical approach for supporting young learners' oral
performance in primary EFL classrooms.
The component-wise analysis also showed considerable
improvements in vocabulary, pronunciation, and interaction, with large effect
sizes across all three speaking components. Specifically, vocabulary showed the
largest effect size (r = 0.90) among the three assessed components.
Furthermore, the selected scenarios, such as The First Day of School, At the
Store: School Supplies, and In the Park, provided opportunities for students to
use English in contexts related to their everyday experiences. Overall, these
findings suggest that structured role-play may be a useful communicative
approach for supporting oral performance among young EFL learners in primary
school contexts similar to that of the present study.
The findings of this study suggest that structured
role-play has potential as a communicative approach for supporting the
development of vocabulary, pronunciation, and interaction in EFL learners in
contexts with characteristics similar to those of the present study. Teachers
working in comparable primary EFL settings may consider incorporating
structured role-play activities that provide opportunities for learners to use
English in familiar and meaningful situations. However, the findings should not
be generalized beyond similar contexts without further evidence. Larger
samples, participants from multiple institutions, and experimental or
quasi-experimental designs with comparison groups are needed to determine the
extent to which the observed differences can be replicated and generalized to
other EFL contexts.
However, some limitations need to be noted in
interpreting the findings of this study. The intervention was implemented in a
public educational institution with 41 third-grade students using a
pre-experimental, one-group pre-test/post-test design. Institutional changes
and time constraints affected the intervention schedule during implementation.
Also, because of the limited English proficiency of the participants, more
facilitation was needed and more time was used during the activities.
Considering these challenges, the findings should be interpreted within the
particular context of the study and should not be generalized to other settings
without further research.
Overall, this study provides empirical evidence
regarding the use of structured role-play to support speaking competence among
young EFL learners in a primary school in Ecuador. The findings suggest that incorporating
communicative activities into English instruction can provide opportunities for
students to use English in meaningful contexts rather than relying primarily on
memorization-based learning. The study may also serve as a practical reference
for teachers working in similar contexts who wish to incorporate structured
role-play into their English lessons. Further research is needed to examine the
effectiveness of role-play with larger samples, multiple institutions, and
comparison groups, as well as to investigate other factors that may contribute
to students' speaking development.
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Funding
The authors received no funding for the development of the research.
Conflict of Interest
The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.
Author Contributions
The authors contributed to the development of the manuscript.
