Language skills are generally comprised of reading, listening, speaking, and writing. While reading and listening belongs to receptive skills, speaking and writing are productive skills (Harmer, 2007). The use of integrated language skills in teaching and learning started to emerge into practice along with the communicative movement. Subsequently, studies utilizing effective integrated methods and approaches for teaching and learning a foreign language have become common practice. These studies, which merged various skills, such as reading, listening, writing, and speaking, reported importance and effects of integrated approaches (Harmer, 2007; Hinkel, 2010; Klimova, 2012; Nunan, 2015; Oxford, 2001, Sadiku, 2015). Thus, much greater synergy can be expected, such as increased motivation and learning outcomes, development of possessed knowledge, and the ability to use the language in real communication, when guided with the integration methods (Hinkel, 2010; Klimova, 2012; Oxford, 2001).

Oxford (2001) stated that a teaching approach that integrates language skills can lead EFL students to naturally use the acquired language skills naturally in actual communication situations. The integrated approach not only exposes EFL students to a target language and motivates students with various experiences to learn the target language learning, but also allows teachers to monitor students’ development process in different language skills. In addition, she suggested that a variety of integrated language teaching and learning methods can be developed by any teacher, but careful reflection and planning for instruction should be preceded. In the words of Hinkel (2010), as the importance of communication skills increases, various methods and developments for acquiring language skills should be considered and taught for communication in real situations. Hinkel also claimed that an integrated approach is necessary to broaden foreign language learners’ opportunities for having meaningful communication, interaction, and real language use; thus, such an approach of the integrated language skills is in harmony with the process of using target language skills in actual communication. Sadiku (2015) indicated that students need opportunities to integrate their English skills in class because language skills are separate yet bound together. For the EFL learning to be successful, language skills, such as reading, listing, speaking and writing, should be integrated in an effective way.

Many researchers have conducted integrating methods to improve students’ various language skills in EFL contexts (Borhany, Tahriri, & Tous, 2015; Córdoba Zúñiga, 2016; Klimova, 2012). Borhany et al. (2015) performed an integrated approach on lower-intermediate EFL Students and their overall listening comprehension and strategy use were improved. Córdoba Zúñiga (2016) also implemented an integrated approach with task-based teaching to help students improve their English communication skills in Colombia and reported that the integration approach could facilitate four language skills of EFL students. In addition, Klimova (2012) tried to integrate curricular subjects in Czech EFL context and stated some benefits related to content, culture, and language learning.

Some studies overviewed English education policies and programs of the Korean EFL teaching and learning (Chong, 2021b; Chung & Choi, 2016; Joh, 2002; Moodie & Nam, 2016). Among them, Joh (2002) analyzed about 40 colleges in Korea (60%) that have made their students take mandatory classes in English skills, such as listening, reading comprehension, conversation, and writing as part of general education, and observed that speaking and writing skills remained the most demanding and difficult. Thus, researchers in Korea have focused on developing effective class activities for speaking and writing skills (Joe, 2003; Kim, 2014; Kim & Kim, 2005; Lee & Yoon, 2010; Park & Park, 2018; Song, 2006); however, relatively little attention has been paid to the integrated approach using reading aloud (Chong, 2019b, 2021a; Heo, 2017; Kim, 2018; Yu, 2015).

While reading aloud has been a traditional language reading method, numerous researchers have started re-evaluating reading aloud as an important learning skill and a learning process for EFL learners; moreover, they have further studied the relationship between reading aloud and other language skills (Bygate, 2001; Celce-Murcia, Brinton, Goodwin, & Griner 2010; Chol & Lewis, 2018; Fountas & Pinnell, 2012; Gabrielatos, 2002; Gibson, 2008; Griffin, 1992; Huang, 2010; Jacobs, 2016; Johnston, 2015; Lane & Wright, 2007; Nation, 2013; Senawati, Suwastini, Jayantini, Adnyani, & Artini, 2021; Trelease, 1995). Gabrielatos (2002) valued reading aloud as a skill that can be used to raise awareness of and practice in phonological language aspects. He also presented class activities and guidelines for using reading aloud, such as reading news articles, performing a role-play with a script, and acting as a storyteller. Similarly, Gibson (2008) argued that reading aloud is effective for improving automatic phonological coding, and the speed of vocal and sub-vocal speech. He also claimed that reading aloud played a vital role among many Asian learners for practicing English sounds and pronunciation. Trelease (1995) discussed some benefits and strategies for teachers reading aloud to students in class, and claimed that as teachers read aloud to students, they can share the joy of reading and motivate students to read on their own regardless of their age and reading level. To enhance the effectiveness of reading aloud, Jacobs (2016) suggested guidelines for teachers in terms of how to choose the appropriate text and how to read the text with joy. Using the guidelines of Jacobs (2016), Senawati et al. (2021) developed the guidelines and procedures for reading aloud activities. However, most of these are focused on the importance of undertaking activities where teachers read aloud to their students or on choosing appropriate texts for the reading aloud activity to improve students’ motivation for reading.

Among the few studies focused on reading aloud activities in the Korean EFL context, Kim (2018) and Yu (2015) examined reading aloud activity to analyze the effects of reading aloud mostly on reading comprehension, vocabulary, and syntactic knowledge. Kim (2018) conducted their study on reading aloud task using a mobile phone with a focus on EFL vocabulary and reading skills, and reported some positive changes on the EFL learners’ vocabulary and reading comprehension skills. Similarly, Yu (2015) examined whether reading aloud activity can be helpful for college students to enhance skills of vocabulary, syntactic skills, and comprehension. Her study demonstrated that higher-level students improved in their skills of vocabulary, grammar, and reading, while lower-level students showed improvement only in their vocabulary. Chong (2019b, 2021a) also attempted various classes using reading aloud. Chong (2019b) utilized the repeated reading aloud method in the field of translation and interpretation. The study indicated that repetitive reading aloud activities continuously provided a success experience for EFL learners and helped increase their confidence in target language use. Chong (2021a) then conducted the reading aloud activity using English news articles as a way to provide increased opportunities for EFL college students to improve their confidence in English speaking. She compared the psychological changes in the surveys based on students’ experiences in foreign counties, and reported that students without learning experiences in a foreign country positively reacted to the activity. In particular, most of Chong’s works attempted to develop an EFL learning activity in class using the reading aloud method.

Despite the positive effects of the various activities in class, Levelt (1989) claimed that linguistic factors affecting foreign language fluency, including vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar, could be encoded in largely automatic, efficient, and inflexible processes. In particular, writing has been reported as one of the most demanding and difficult language skills in the process of EFL teaching and learning (Aaron & Joshi, 2006; Chong, 2019b; Joe, 2003; Kara, 2013; Kim, 2014; Kim & Kim, 2005; Lee & Yoon, 2010; Park & Park, 2018; Scott, 1996; Song, 2006). In the context of EFL, Joe (2003) studied the factors causing writing apprehension among EFL college students and found that there were three major factors: linguistic, situational, and psychological. Kara (2013) also investigated students’ attitudes toward academic writing classes to determine whether students experience L2 writing anxiety and the reasons for their anxiety and failure in writing classes. Thus, the study claimed that the students had writing anxiety and might fail as they were not accustomed to expressing themselves in writing.

Moreover, students perceived writing as a complex productive skill, for which they lacked the necessary strategies, such as gathering, organizing, and combining ideas and information to express themselves clearly. Scott (1996) suggested writing strategies for teaching and urged the revising and editing processes of writing, wherein students can have an opportunity to examine their writings closely by focusing on grammatical errors, vocabulary problems, and organizational issues. In the Korean EFL context, Kim and Kim (2005) pointed out problems with writing instructions in Korean EFL classes-emphasizing grammatical forms and final products, lacking genre-based writing curriculums and diverse feedback types-and proposed the need for a balanced curriculum and a genre-based writing approach to address the problems they identified in Korean college writing instructions. Park and Park (2018) further investigated the different effects of the online and offline writing environments on the acquisition of writing skills and reported that online students outperformed the offline group in their writing performance. In addition, studies integrating writing and other language skills have been continuously reported to alleviate and supplement the difficulties of students in learning EFL writing (Chong, 2019b; Hinkel, 2010; Kim, 2014; Lee & Yoon, 2010; Oxford, 2001; Sadiku, 2015).

Along with the studies of effective methods to learn a language, Swain and Lapkin (1995), and Brown (2012) have highlighted the importance of producing output in language learning; thus the opportunity to allow students to practice and receive feedback on their output performance is essential. Many other studies suggested voice recording as one of the output tools which could provide students a chance to observe their performance (Aoki, 2014; Chong, 2021a; Gabrielatos, 2002, Hung, 2019; Jaber, 2021; Kim & Chang, 2010; Lane & Wright, 2007; Yaman, 2016). The self-voice recording activity allowed students to have a self-reflection and self-feedback of their performance by listening to their own recording, and self-assess the aspects that they would have to improve in their future recordings.

The study by Aoki (2014) identified some advantages of voice recording activity along with useful tools and applications (such as cassette tapes, mobile phones, Google Voice, Evernote, etc.) by reviewing the existing literature. While it is unclear whether self-reflection of voice recording activity would directly improve students’ supra-segmental features of pronunciation, voice recording activity may positively contribute to students’ awareness of their own oral output, such as pronunciation, intonation, linking, and stress. Jaber (2021) also studied on the effects of self-voice recording as a technique on oral performance for EFL learners through electronic learning system. The study determined some significant effects of self-voice recording techniques, such as students’ high interest in e-learning, positive perspective in using the self-voice recording technique, and improvement of students’ speaking skills.

Similarly in the Korean EFL context, Kim and Chang (2010) claimed that the voice recording method could help students to improve their English speaking skills and able to enhance their autonomous learning. The study further showed positive results on the perceptions of the voice recording through collaborative learning experience, such as enjoyment, confidence, and self-directed learning. In addition, Chong (2021a) conducted self-voice recording and reading aloud activities in class using English TV news to increase the number of opportunities in making utterance outputs for Korean EFL learners. She further claimed that students without any overseas English learning experience showed significantly positive reactions toward the activities in the study.

The integrated activity class in the study was an elective course from a private college in South Korea, and 62 college students participated in the study as shown in Table 1. At the beginning of the semester, students provided their background information, such as name, sex, school year, English test scores obtained, and overseas experience.

Among the participants, 57 (about 93%) were third- and fourth-year students, and the proportions of women and men were almost equal. According to the background information, their average Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) score was 731 (lowest = 565, highest = 925). Interestingly, many of them were planning to take English speaking tests as potential job applicants. In addition, about 32 students (52%) had overseas experience in English-speaking countries of between 3 months and 31 months as travelers, exchange students, and volunteers.

In the integrated activities of reading aloud and writing followed by self-voice recordings, practical and casual topics such as introducing people, places, schools, majors, classes, hobbies, sports, and vacations were extracted from textbooks and the websites of the English-speaking tests,1 which contained exercises appropriate for an EFL college student. In addition, as mentioned in the student information of Table 1, most participants (93%) were juniors and seniors who planned on taking an English-speaking test as part of their job applications. As Gabrielatos (2002) and Jacobs (2016) emphasized the importance of choosing the appropriate texts of reading aloud for learners to read the texts with the motivation, it was presumed that the topics from actual English-speaking tests could provide a realistic motivation to college students and were covered in the exercises as shown in Table 2.

Topics for the activities were extracted from actual English tests, such as Oral Proficiency Interview-computer (OPIc) and TOEIC Speaking, that contained practical realistic topics, such as friends and family, leisure activities, school life, vacation, etc., while considering EFL college students’ level and realistic motivation, which was to achieve a high score on English speaking tests to secure a job after college graduation.

This study integrated the activities of reading aloud, writing, and assessment through self-voice recording, which may allow students to experience the process of using their English knowledge and activate their English skills. The class for the integrated activities was held for 15 weeks in a computer lab, where students could access the Internet and use computers or mobile phones in 2017. The integrated activities’ procedures are shown in Figure 1.

The main purpose of the writing activity in this study was to assist students to improve their English knowledge and organize their ideas around a certain topic. One topic was given in each class along with some writing models related to the given topic. The teacher highlighted the necessary vocabulary, expression, pronunciation, and flow while reading aloud about four to five distributed writing models to students. It usually took about 20 minutes.

The writing tasks were implemented individually. The students initially brainstormed on what and how to write on the given topic. Subsequently, about 20 minutes of individual writing time was given. During the task, students used a computer or their mobile phone to search for relative grammar and vocabulary information on a given topic, and then typed their written response. Kim and Kim (2005) stated that writing instructions for university students in Korean EFL classes have some problems, such as heavy emphasis on grammar and on final writing product. In this study, grammar and vocabulary requirements for writing tasks were neither emphasized nor directly taught during the class as explicitly mentioning grammar before the writing activity may give students an impression that their grammar skills were being emphasized. This may lead them to take longer to complete the task on account of ensuring grammatical accuracy. Instead, the students were allowed to search online for the grammar and vocabulary needed.

Then, the class was separated into small groups to read their writing aloud. About 20 minutes of practice time was given for this small group activity. During this group exercise, the students had to practice by “acting as if they were not reading their writing” or “pretending not to look and read.” This was to give students the opportunity to practice their tone of speaking and listen to the tone of others speaking.

Instead of submitting their writing, the class went on to conduct another individual task whereby they would practice reading their written stories aloud and voice recording it. To voice record and submit the final oral task, it was important for students to be cognitively prepared for their own story flow. Then, the students had to read and practice speaking aloud until they felt comfortable with the flow of their written stories. It might have been difficult for students to voice record their written stories naturally without stuttering, if they did not repeatedly practice the flow of the story. Finally, when they felt ready, they recorded themselves using the applications, such as Windows Voice Recorder, GOM Recorder, Voice Recorder on Google Play, and so on. The students took the rest of the class time to practice until they felt satisfied with the accent and tone of their voice recordings, and to submit the final oral task with the best voice recording via email.

To explore the students’ reactions to the integrated activities, the surveys and self-evaluations2 were administered twice: at the beginning and at the end of the semester. Comments and feedback were also used to discover the reactions and attitudes of the students toward the integrated activities to expand EFL learning techniques. Finally, to examine students speaking improvements, teacher’s evaluations were conducted during mid-term and final exams.

Data were gathered from survey questions and self-evaluations, which were conducted twice-in the beginning and at the end of the research-to investigate EFL college students’ reactions to the integrated activities. To explore students’ reactions to the integrated activities, mean scores, standard deviations, t-values, and p-values were analyzed. SPSS 25 was used for the statistical analyses.

The data in Table 6 are based on the results of the students’ surveys and show the students’ psychological reactions toward the integrated activities of reading aloud and writing followed by voice recording.

All mean scores on the post-survey were higher than those on the pre-survey in Table 6. However, the results of an SPSS t-test showed different figures. It was observed that the students’ psychological reactions toward the integrated activities were not as positive as presumed. The p-values of confidence in writing (p = .410), confidence in speaking (p = .168), worries (p = .410), and anxiety (p = .463) were not significant at all, suggesting that even though the mean scores on the post-survey were higher than on the pre-survey and the difference was not statistically significant. The attitude toward taking English classes (p = .104) was slightly more positive than the others, but the statistical result was not that significant. For survey questions on willingness to practice English skills and on knowing English output methods showed statistically significant differences, with a p-value of p < .001 for both. Finally, question item #8 for possibility to improve English skills in the Korean EFL context also showed the statistically significant data with a p-value of p < .05. It can be cautiously assumed that the students had a willingness to continue practicing making English outputs and felt that they might improve their English skills by using the integrated activities conducted in the study. Unfortunately, the survey results demonstrate that the integrated method was not as effective as assumed in improving the students’ confidence and anxiety. Thus, it is necessary to investigate how long it would take to increase confidence in using English and reduce anxiety in an EFL class through related future research.

The integrated activities needed to be examined further on the students’ self-evaluations in English competence. Several studies in language education supported the hypothesis that students’ self-evaluation can be valuable and have benefits in all stages of the language learning process (Anderson & Freiberg, 1995; Dochy & McDowell, 1997). Students can gain insight into their language learning progress and be aware of their own language competence while experiencing self-evaluation. When students evaluate themselves, they may become an active participant in their own evaluation. They assess their own English language competence and identify the skills they need to improve from a more practical perspective. The data in Table 7 indicate the effectiveness of the integrated activities based on the self-rated evaluations by the students. Although students’ reactions in the surveys did not show significant improvements on confidence, anxiety, and attitude toward the activities, the students’ self-evaluation results on English competence showed slightly different figures.

As seen in Table 7, the mean scores of all language skills on the post-self-evaluation were higher than in the pre-self-evaluation. The mean scores for English competences improved from 6.15 to 6.67 for listening, 5.77 to 6.37 for reading, 4.87 to 5.22 for writing, 5.11 to 5.57 for speaking, 4.81 to 5.53 for grammar, 4.68 to 5.23 for vocabulary, and 5.74 to 5.78 for pronunciation.. It was observed that the students’ self-evaluations results after the integrated activities were much more positive and significant, despite the students’ psychological reactions in the surveys. The p-values of competence in listening, reading, speaking, grammar, and vocabulary were statistically significant with p < .05, respectively, whereas the p-values for writing (p = .130) and pronunciation (p = .824) were not.

Data obtained from the students’ self-evaluations are interesting. First, Korean EFL students find it difficult to work on writing tasks that had to be created as the final output by using the grammar and vocabulary in the written English. However, students positively self-evaluated that their grammar and vocabulary skills required for writing improved even though they felt that their writing skill had not improved much. This result could partially be supported by previous studies that demonstrate that writing has a function of language expression (Joe, 2003, Kara, 2013; Scott, 1996), and thus, it could activate the students’ previously acquired English knowledge and in organizing their ideas on a given topic. The students self-evaluated that their overall speaking skill had improved despite feeling that their pronunciation skill had not improved much. According to previous studies, the repeated reading aloud activity could help students check their segmental and supra-segmental features, such as pronunciation, stress, tone, and speed, when they speak, and it may eventually help improve their overall speaking skills (Chol & Lewis, 2018; Gabrielatos, 2002; Gibson, 2008; Griffin, 1992; Huang, 2010). It can be assumed that the students placed emphasis on their pronunciation skill while reading aloud rather than on the completeness of their overall speaking skill, which is the final output; thus, they felt that they had not pronounced as perfectly as native speakers.

The evaluations of the teacher in Table 8 and Figure 2 indicate a similar trend for the changes in the frequency of students’ scores from mid-term and final exams. Students were given five topics for each exam, five points per topic, for a total of 25 points. If a student failed to submit a voice recording, a zero point was given for the failed topic, and no student received a perfect score of 25 points.

Table 8 and Figure 2 show that the teacher’s evaluation of the students’ voice recording scores gradually increased between the mid-term and final exams. Excluding the two students who did not take the exams, five (8.1%) students, who earned less than 20 points on the midterm exam, moved to higher score distributions in the final exam. Students who received less than 20 points did not complete one or two of the five topics during the midterm exam because they could not finish the speaking recording within the time allotted.

The aspect that stands out is that the students, who were not able to complete all of the topics in the mid-term, were able to complete them in the final exam. It can be assumed that by the end of the semester, most students had become familiar with the integrated output activities and were able to complete voice recordings for all topics. It is also believed that their reluctance to try to make recording outputs according to the topic had decreased. Apart from the evaluation scores by the teacher, it can be noted that it was a great learning achievement for all students including novice students to complete the process of brainstorming for writing tasks and voice recording for all given topics on the final exam.

Moreover, it seemed that the students felt that their English skills had somewhat improved, and that the improvements in their English competence supported Aaron and Joshi’s (2006) claim that repeated training in written language could improve not only literacy skills, but also comprehension and the quality of spoken language. Furthermore, during the process of self-voice recording on the given topic after the activities of writing and reading aloud, they could have a chance to listen back to their own recorded speaking with a somewhat objective viewpoint. This may allow them to notice their mistakes on pronunciation, fluency, accuracy, and naturalness while listening back to their speaking (Brown, 2012; Dlaska & Krekeler, 2008; Swain & Lapkin, 1995; Venkatagiri & Levis, 2007). For the future study, it is necessary to thoroughly evaluate students’ voice recording in detail, such as the correlations and effects for pronunciation, fluency, accuracy, and naturalness.

Overall, during these integrated activities, the students had to spend time editing and revising the flow of the stories they had written. It might have provided them flexibility in changing their ideas and revising the flow of the written story, while repeatedly practicing reading it aloud fluently before submitting their final output product of voice recording. To some extent, it can be assumed that the students got familiar to these output methods and this led them to feel that it might be possible to level up their English skills through this repetitive integrated activity conducted in the class.

During the integrated activities in the study, the writing exercise was utilized to activate the students’ possessed English knowledge, which could help them practice speaking on a given topic, as they repeatedly read aloud and voice record themselves. During the study, only a few students were familiar with how to start writing or what to say about a certain topic in the EFL class. Some of them may have felt afraid of making many grammatical mistakes while writing, or were ashamed of stuttering while reading aloud and voice recording. The survey results in this study indicated that there were factors that had a negative effect on the students during the integrated activities, some of which were identified through the comments and feedback made by the students in class at the end of the semester. In order to induce students to freely write comments and feedback on the integrated activity class, information about students’ names was not asked. Some honestly expressed difficulties in the integrated activities, especially in the process of writing exercise and were translated into English as follows. They said, for instance:

It can be assumed that the students’ writing fatigue and the mistakes attributed to these negative reactions could have affected their attitudes toward the writing task. This result partially supports the claim of Kara (2013), which showed that many students were not used to writing and expressing themselves in written language, which is a complex productive skill, and that the students considered themselves to lack the necessary skills and strategies, such as gathering necessary information, and organizing and combining ideas and information. Satisfactory results on the reactions to the integrated activities were not achieved, partially because writing in English was difficult and required great time and effort for EFL college students.

As speculated by the students’ reactions and comments that they were uncomfortable with writing in English, the overall response regarding the integrated activities of reading aloud and writing followed by voice recording was not very positive, mainly due to the task of writing. However, self-evaluated skills related to speaking improved with 15 weeks of practice, whereas writing skills required a far longer period of practice, despite the students believing that their grammar and vocabulary skills had improved. Nevertheless, the relatively negative result for confidence in English writing was distinctive, even when the students felt that their grammar and vocabulary skills significantly improved. This result also supported the comments received from the students mentioning that they had some difficulty in expressing their ideas during writing task. Thus, writing tasks should be applied in a class with discretion based on factors, such as students’ English competence, level of writing anxiety, and writing materials. Above all, it might be necessary for teachers to guide and encourage students to use and express their ideas in writing.