The Efficacy of Transcription and Impersonation on Students’ Public Speaking Performance

Abstract

The constant and repetitive implementation of conventional public speaking training in teaching English as a foreign language has resulted in predictability, determinism, and lack of innovations in students' public speaking performance. The notable explanation for this pattern is students' reading-oriented English speech presentation. Previous studies had primarily focused on promoting anxiety-free performance through instructional rehearsal methods and thus had yet to be able to uncover students' potential through independent rehearsals. This study highlights an experiment that investigated the self-rehearsal process using the Transcription and Impersonation technique to influence students' public speaking performance in English. Data from 10 student-participants from an Islamic school in Indonesia were used to test the influence threshold of the technique on their public speaking performance via pre- and post-test cycles. The data analysis technique incorporated an N-Gain score of 73.79%, implying that the technique was compelling enough to boost students' public speaking performance. The findings indicate that with the correct method, granting access to independent training, students could tackle the stiffness they experienced in English speech rehearsals and improve their ability in public speaking.