Abstract:
The purpose of this study was to investigate EFL teachers' awareness and use of teaching strategies to teach speaking skills, focusing on Grade 10 teachers in three public high schools in Ambo. To achieve this objective descriptive research design which involve both qualitative and quantitative was used. Accordingly three public school, Ambo Preparatory, Liban Macha, and Ambo Secondary School were selected as research settings based on simple random sampling, and 28 English language teachers were selected based on comprehensive sampling. Besides, semi- structured interviews, non-participate classroom observations, a questionnaire, and document analysis to analyze the suggested strategies in the grade 10 teachers' guide were employed to gather the data required for the study. To analyze the collected data, qualitative and quantitative methods of data analysis were employed. That is, data collected through questionnaires was analyzed employing statistical tools such as frequency and percentage using SPSS version 26, while responses obtained from interviews were described and discussed. In addition, data obtained via document analysis and classroom observation were tallied, converted to numbers, and analyzed to validate and substantiate the data obtained from the interview and questionnaire. The data analysis provided a variety of results. According to the study, teachers are unaware of the strategies that can be used to develop speaking skills. Additionally, EFL teachers are unaware of their roles in teaching speaking skills and what is expected of their students. They did not use speaking-skill strategies accordingly. The study's conclusions show that all useful methods are suggested in the teachers' guide, and almost all English language teachers are unaware of the speaking skill strategies suggested in the teacher' guide and don't use a variety of strategies while teaching speaking skills. The findings of the study also showed the various challenges of using strategies for teaching speaking skills. These challenges are grouped into three categories. The study found that most teachers lack prior training on speaking skill strategies, making them more difficult to apply. The administration education office of Ambo town should provide training for English language teachers. It is also recommended that teachers properly use the speaking skill strategies suggested in the teacher‟s guide for grade 10.
