Topic avoidance

Topic avoidance is the strategy that the students avoid talking about particular topics because they may require vocabulary or structures which they do not know (e.g., “I can’t talk about this” or “Let’s change the topic”). In using this strategy, specific topics or words are avoided to the best of the learners’ ability (Bialystok, 1990: 40). The following are the examples elicited from the recordings of the pre-and post- speaking tasks.

Students’ use of topic avoidance prior to the CS instruction

In the pre-speaking tasks, the data showed that the students rarely used “topic

avoidance”. There were only 7 instances of “topic avoidance” used by the students in the pre-speaking task recordings. In order to better understand students’ language performance, the following are some examples of students’ use of “topic avoidance” in the pre-speaking tasks.

Example 1 (Task 1: Oral Interview) 69 R: How about your mother? 70 D: Teacher.

71 R: In what subject?

72 D: Uh….. (pause: 5 seconds). I don’t know……. (pause: 5 seconds) (Pre-speaking task 1, p.12)

As seen in Example 1, Student D tried not to talk in more specific detail about her mother’s job because she did not know any vocabulary or structure to use in that topic. Therefore, she decided to stop talking about it by stating “I don’t know” (line 72). In her retrospective verbal report, D also revealed that she avoided talking about her mother’s job because she was unsure about the question and she did not know the English word for the courses taught by her mother.

Topic avoidance was also found in Task 3 when the students were asked to describe a given abstract topic.

Example 2 (Task 3: Topic Description)

8 G: Nuts…um… (pause: 9 seconds)…uh….have (pause: 12) have…uh… 9 vegetarians have have have a calcium…uh…vitamin (pause: 15 seconds 10 and give up talking).

(Pre-speaking task 3, p.21)

From the above example, Student G was unable to continue his speaking since he did not know how to express his ideas and explain abstract topic “vegetarianism” (lines 9 and 10). In his retrospection, G revealed that he mentioned about vitamin because he did not know how to call some kinds of vegetables in English. Finally, he kept silent for a long time, decided to stop talking and ended the conversation.

In summary, the data showed that “topic avoidance” was used less frequently by the students in the pre-speaking task recordings. In using this strategy, the students simply did not respond at all by stating “I don’t know”, changed the topic and abandoned a message when they could not express their ideas in English. However, it should be noted that the students seemed to be unfamiliar with “topic avoidance” since sometimes they still kept silent and paused for a long time.

Students’ use of topic avoidance after the CS instruction

This section presents the results of students’ use of “topic avoidance” in the post- speaking tasks. The data showed that the students increased their use of “topic avoidance” after the 12-week CS instruction. There was a total increase of 52

instances of “topic avoidance” use in the post-speaking task recordings in comparison to “topic avoidance” use in the pre-speaking task recordings. The students tended to be more aware of using this strategy when they wanted to maintain a conversation with their interlocutors. The following are examples of “topic avoidance” used by the students after the CS instruction.

In Example 1, H employed “topic avoidance” in his talk when he could not explain what he wanted in Task 1.

Example 1 (Task 1: Oral Interview)

23 H: I I I don’t like…uh…environment. 24 R: Environment?

25 H: Yeah. Uh….because…um…it’s…it’s…uh…because

26 it’s…uh…I…uh…I…uh… (laugh) (pause: 3 seconds) I nothing.

27 R: OK. You have no idea, right? Where do you like going on the campus or 28 where do you like to go to?

(Post-speaking task 1, p.29)

From the above example, H was asked what he did not like about his university. He then tried to answer this question by mentioning about “environment”. Even though he tried to express his ideas in more detail, he still could not complete his message. However, he decided to give up talking by saying “I nothing” (line 26). This attempt signalled the listener to shift to a new question or issue and helped both of them to maintain their conversation.

Apart from H’s utterances, the analysis of the speaking tasks revealed that the use of “topic avoidance” proved to be useful when the students felt they lacked vocabulary to get their message across, as seen in Example 2.

Example 2 (Task 2: Cartoon Description)

15 P: …van hospital is coming to help him. And I can see the picture4…um…the 16 hospital man. I don’t know he’s a doctor, I don’t know…uh…I can call him 17 the hospital man?

(Post-speaking task 2, p.4)

As can be seen from Example 2, Student P attempted to describe the cartoon pictures as much as she could. However, she could not complete her message because she was unsure about the vocabulary to use. Therefore, she avoided talking about that word and stated “I don’t know” twice in line 16. She, then, gained more time to think. Finally, the interlocutor understood and waited for her answer.

There was also some evidence of students’ use of “topic avoidance” in Task 3 when the students were asked to describe an abstract topic.

Example 3 (Task 3: Topic Description)

5 C: … Ur-ie! They will…um…move close to the God. Um...(pause: 3 seconds) 6 I don’t know how to explain it because I not knowledge I don’t have

7 knowledge about them…Um…but I know some sometime he can eat 8 the one of animal. They eat..um…about the crab. I don’t know how 9 to call that kind. Um…I know it’s only…I I don’t know for it more 10 than that. Um…I finish this topic now.

(Post-speaking task 3, p.12)

In this task, Student C was asked to talk about the given topic “vegetarianism”. Since this topic was difficult to explain, C tried to gain more time to think about what he wanted to say by avoiding talking about the topic in his first utterances (lines 6 and 7). Finally he continued his talk and ended his conversation after he had nothing to say more about the topic (lines 9and 10). Although he could not finish his messages, his use of “topic avoidance” made the interlocutor understand him. Thus, the use of “topic avoidance” proved to be useful for students’ lack of linguistic knowledge and gave them more time to think.

To summarise, the results of the post-speaking tasks showed that students’ use of “topic avoidance” increased after the 12-week CS instruction. The students attempted not to keep silent or give up talking when they did not know how to express their ideas in English. They seemed to be more familiar with “topic avoidance” and tried to use it to gain more time to think and maintain their conversation. For example, they

sometimes said “I don’t know”, changed the topic, and abandoned the message when it was difficult to express the ideas in English for something. They sometimes

pretended not to understand what the interlocutor said and asked the interlocutor back. It is possible that using “topic avoidance” might provide students with more time to think and they could remain in the conversation. This view conforms to Dornyei’s (1995) remarks that the teaching of CSs like “topic avoidance” may provide the students with “a sense of security in the L2 by allowing them room to manoeuvre in times of difficulty” (p.80). At least, using “topic avoidance” may encourage the students to try and remain in the conversation and achieve their communication goal (Dornyei, ibid: 80).