Teacher and student opinions on speaking and listening skills in secondary education English lesson

Speaking and listening skills are among the basic skills aimed at teaching languge. Secondary education has been determined to be the most efficient process for acquiring these skills. Students' ability to understand questions and communicate in the target language. This period plays an important role in helping students speak fluently and become academically more successful and equipped. Students who have improved themselves in terms of speaking and understanding the target language in secondary education better understand the courses given in English in undergraduate education. Even if the student wants to continue his education abroad, he will be more successful in his undergraduate life if he focuses on speaking and listening skills during secondary education. Therefore, teachers in secondary education need to focus on these skills in their lessons to ensure that students can speak the target language and communicate adequately in the future. For this purpose, it would be beneficial for students if teachers use relevant theories, methods, techniques and adapt the classroom environment accordingly . This research aimed to examine teacher and student opinions regarding speaking and listening skills in secondary education English classes. In this context, qualitative research method was used as it was aimed to present the reader with a detailed picture of speaking and listening skills by revealing the opinions of teachers and students in a realistic and holistic way. In order to obtain data in the study, 25 English language teachers and 35 secondary education students under the Ministry of National Education in Malatya in the 2024-2025 academic year were included in the study group. In this study, maximum diversity sampling technique, one of the purposeful sampling methods, was used. Data in the study were collected as a result of interviews with teachers through a semi-structured interview form prepared by the researcher. The raw data obtained was transferred to the computer environment, transcribed and analyzed by content analysis.According to results obtained from the qualitative findings, teachers in secondary education stated that drama, educational games techniques and communicative, natural methods are effective in speaking and listening skills. Readiness, class size, speaking mostly English in the lesson, starting language education in primary school, watching English movies, listening to songs and online applications factors alsp emphasized the importance of these skills. They also stated that smart boards are necessary and that using tools and equipment such as phones, tablets, computers and headphones for students to use applications related to the development of speaking and listening skills will maket he lesson more productive. In the study, it was observed that teachers positive and negative opinions about the speaking and listening activities in the English textbook. Teachers who expressed positive opinions stated that activities were up-to-date and their topics were remarkable; teacherswho expressed negative opinions stated that the activities were above the level of the student, the speaker in the audio file was fast and sometimes could not be understood. Teachers who expressed positive opinions about the measurement and evaluation of English speaking and listening skills stated that it motivated the student with points, made the student give importance to speaking and listening, and teachers who expressed negative opinions emphasized that it took a lot of time, caused memorization, grade anxiety, rush to catch up on topics and the shortness of lesson hours. In the study, secondary school students stated that speaking and listening skills were mostly affected by English speaking in class, classroom noise, class size, in-class activities, watching English movies, listening to songs, starting language education from primary school and online applications. They also stated that smart boards were necessary, that using tablets, phones and computers for the development of speaking and listening skills and having English libraries with posters and dictionaries in the classrooms would make the lesson more productive. In the study, it was observed that students had positive and negative views on the speaking and listening activities in the English textbook. Students who expressed positive opinions stated that the activities were up-to-date and fun; students who expressed negative opinions stated that the activities were above their level, the speaker in the audio file was fast and sometimes not understandable, and the texts consisted of difficult words. Students who expressed positive opinions regarding the measurement and evaluation of English speaking and listening skills stated that they saw their level and improved themselves; students who expressed negative opinions stated that it caused stress, they had difficulty in pronunciation, and the exam duration was short.