VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES NGUYỄN THỊ HẰNG A SURVEY ON THE ATTITUDE OF TEACHERS AND STUDENTS TOWARD THE INTEGRATION OF SOME CULTURAL ELEMENTS IN THE TEXTBOOK NEW ENGLISH FILE – ELEMENTARY IN SPEAKING LESSONS AT HANOI AGRICULTURE VOCATIONAL SCHOOL (KHẢO SÁT THÁI ĐỘ CỦA GIÁO VIÊN VÀ HỌC SINH ĐỐI VỚI VIỆC TÍCH HỢP MỘT SỐ YẾU TỐ VĂN HÓA TRONG GIÁO TRÌNH NEW ENGLISH FILE – ELEMENTARY TRONG CÁC GIỜ HỌC NÓI TẠI TRƯỜNG TRUNG CẤP NÔNG NGHIỆP HÀ NỘI) M. Minor Thesis Field : English Language Teaching Methodology Code: 601410 Hanoi, October 2012 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES NGUYỄN THỊ HẰNG A SURVEY ON THE ATTITUDE OF TEACHERS AND STUDENTS TOWARD THE INTEGRATION OF SOME CULTURAL ELEMENTS IN THE TEXTBOOK NEW ENGLISH FILE – ELEMENTARY IN SPEAKING LESSONS AT HANOI AGRICULTURE VOCATIONAL SCHOOL (KHẢO SÁT THÁI ĐỘ CỦA GIÁO VIÊN VÀ HỌC SINH ĐỐI VỚI VIỆC TÍCH HỢP MỘT SỐ YẾU TỐ VĂN HÓA TRONG GIÁO TRÌNH NEW ENGLISH FILE – ELEMENTARY TRONG CÁC GIỜ HỌC NÓI TẠI TRƯỜNG TRUNG CẤP NÔNG NGHIỆP HÀ NỘI) M. Minor Thesis Field : English Language Teaching Methodology Code: 601410 Supervisor: ĐỖ THỊ MAI THANH. Hanoi, October 2012 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABBREVIATIONS CLT Communicative Language Teaching EFL English as a Foreign Language L2 Language 2 iv LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLES OF CONTENTS Declaration………………………………………………………….
II Abstract……………………………………………………………… III Abbreviations………………………………………………. IV Table of Contents…………………………………………………… V PART A: INTRODUCTION I. Rationale for the study …………………………………………. Aims of the study ……………………………………………….
Scope of the study……………………………………………….The research questions…………………………………………. Methods of the study …………………………………………. Design of the study ……………………………………………… 3 PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1. Culture and its role in language teaching ………………………… 4 1.
Definitions of culture …………………………………………… 1. The role of culture in language teaching ………………………… 5 1. Speaking skill and their position in English language teaching (ELT)… 8 1. Definition of speaking skill …………………………………….
The position of speaking skill in ELT ………………………… 9 1. The integration of cultural elements into the teaching and learning of speaking skill in classrooms………………………………………… 10 1. The components of culture……………………………………. v LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.
Cultural factors and English speaking skills …………………. 11 CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY 2. Design and methodology……………………………………….1 Subjects of the study ………………………………………….1 The attitudes of the teachers and learners towards speaking skill 2.2 The attitudes of the teachers and learners towards cultural knowledge in speaking skill …………………………………………………….3 Cultural obstacles to the current teaching and learning of speaking skill in the classroom at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school …… 18 2.4 The attitudes of the teachers and learners towards the importance of culture in ELT………………………………………………….5 The ways to teach culture and the topics in the textbook “New English file – elementary” ………………………………… 27 2. Suggestions to break the cultural barriers for Hanoi Agriculture vocational school‟s teachers and students ………………………… 32 CHAPTER 3: IMPLICATIONS ……………………………….
Summary of the findings………………………………………… 2. Recommendations for further research ………………………. 42 APPENDIX vi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com PART A: INTRODUCTION I. Rationale It cannot be denied that learning English is now a must for youngsters in Vietnam.
English has become a compulsory subject at schools throughout the country. Thanks to the variety of new textbooks, vocational high schools in Vietnam now have a chance to get better access to Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) methods, which bring students a lot of interest in learning English. From teaching experience, I find that many vocational high school students do not find speaking practice interesting. They are not confident enough to converse with English teachers or native speakers.
The facts have shown that a lot of students have to get further English retraining after school. In spite of the improvements of speaking skill in new text books, students have to cope with many difficulties related to both linguistic competence and cultural experiences. Personally, I think that bridging cultural gaps is one of the most important keys to success in the learning and teaching of speaking skill. From my teaching experience, cultural elements in speaking class have become a great source of inspiration for my thesis which deals with the question, “How to develop cultural awareness of students and enrich the students’ cultural knowledge in English speaking classes in the classroom?” This study is, hence, to aim at how to integrate cultural elements in the textbook “New English File”- Elementary in speaking lessons at Hanoi Agriculture High school.
Aims of the study My study is an attempt to: - Investigate the attitudes of the teachers and the students at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school towards the importance of speaking skill. - Study cultural elements in teaching and learning speaking skill in the textbook “New English File” – Elementary and suggest some techniques to teach these cultural elements. 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com - Find out the attitudes of teachers and students at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school towards the importance of the integration cultural factors into learning speaking skill in English Language Teaching (ELT). Scope of the study To develop speaking skill for the first year students at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school, the teachers have made a lot of effort to motivate the students to participate in speaking-class effectively.
However, in the thesis, the researcher wants to find out the attitudes, as well as the cultural awareness in teaching and learning spoken English of the teachers and students of the first year at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school; the cultural obstacles such as different ways of thinking, lack of cultural background knowledge and the learning attitudes, and then to give some recommendations for improvement.The research questions My study aims at answering the following research questions: - Do teachers and students at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school really focus attention to speaking skill? - How do teachers and students at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school access the role of cultural factors in teaching and learning speaking skill through the book “New English file – Elementary”? - How can teachers raise cultural awareness and incorporate cultural factors into foreign language classrooms to enrich the students‟ cultural knowledge in speaking English classes in the classroom? I. Methods of the study To realize the aims of the study, both qualitative and quantitative methods will be used. The data collected for the study will mainly from two sources: 100 students of the second year and 10 teachers of English at Hanoi Agriculture high school. Survey questionnaires are used to collect information and evidence for the study.
All comments, remarks, recommendations, and conclusions provided in the study will be based on the data analysis. 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Design of the study This study is going to be divided into three parts, as follows: Part A, Introduction, deals with the reason for the research and the aims, scope and methodology of the study. The research questions are also raised in this part.
Part B, Development, consists of the three following chapters: * Chapter 1 is intended to give some theoretical background related to culture, language and speaking skill. * Chapter 2 provides an analysis on the attitudes of the teachers and students at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school towards the position of culture and speaking skill in ELT and towards cultural elements in developing speaking skill. Also, the current teaching and learning of speaking skill accompanied by cultural elements in the classroom at Hanoi Agriculture vocational school will be discussed. Information about teachers, current teaching methods, materials and problems is mentioned.
* Chapter 3 focuses on recommendations about using some activities to get over cultural difficulties and improving speaking skills in the classroom. Part C, Conclusion, addresses the key issues in the study, summarizing some shortcomings revealed during the process of completing this research paper and giving suggestions for futher research 3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1. Culture and its role in language teaching 1. Definitions of culture: The term culture has been defined in various ways, which brings different views on cultural aspects.
It is true to say that the number of definitions of culture is the same as the “fields of inquiry into human societies, groups, systems, behaviors and activities. According to Oxford Advanced Learner‟s dictionary (1995: 285), culture is “art, literature, music and other intellectual expressions of a particular society or time”. This concept mentions general culture relating to the exposed parts of culture, which are easily recognized such as language, food, clothes, etc. Besides, culture is considered an “iceberg” which consists of not only visible but also hidden parts.
The hidden parts of culture such as socio-culture beliefs, communication styles, and attitudes, which cause cross-cultural difficulties, have significant influence on the way human behave and interact with each other. According to Ruth Benedict, cited in Brown “Culture is what binds (people) together.” Culture is all the accepted ways of behavior of a given people belonging to some particular group; it is that part of learned behavior shared with others. The concept include a group‟s way of thinking, feeling, and acting, and fixed patterns for doing certain things. According to Thompson (1963:132), “the pattern meaning embodied in symbolic forms, including actions, utterance and meaningful objects of various kinds, by virtue of which individuals communicate with one another and share their experiences, conceptions and beliefs”.
4 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com Culture is a shared, learned, symbolic system of values, beliefs and attitudes that shapes and influences perception and behavior - an abstract "mental blueprint" or "mental code" Culture must be studied "indirectly" by studying behavior, customs, material culture (artifacts, tools, and technology), language, etc. The above definitions seem to mention specific behaviors and beliefs of a general society, which are passed from generation to generation. The various definitions of culture provide culture with different values. In this paper the author would like to emphasize the influence of cultural elements on the teaching and learning of speaking skill in classrooms, so the definition below should be taken to give the foundation for this thesis.
“Culture in language learning is not an expendable fifth skill, tacked on, so to speak, to the teaching of speaking, listening, reading and writing. It is always in the background, right from day one, ready to unsettle the good language learners when they expect it least, making evident the limitations of their hard-won communicative competence, challenging their ability to make sense of the world around them. The role of culture in language teaching To emphasize the importance of culture in learning and teaching foreign languages Eli Hinkel (1999) has said, “Applied linguists and language teachers have become increasingly aware that the second or foreign language can rarely be learnt, or taught, without addressing the culture of the community in which it is used .This can be with the idea that culture plays an important role in teaching and learning language.” (Eli Hinkel, 1999) In fact, language is part of a culture; language is deeply embedded in a culture; language and culture cannot be separated, and we cannot teach a language without teaching a culture. It means that teaching language is teaching culture.
Therefore, teaching culture has been integrated into language teaching programs and teaching materials in one way or another. Many educators have applied these programs into real classroom activities and teaching materials. This has been done, also, with the aim of 5 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com bringing the most effective ways to teach foreign languages. Brooks stated that, “As language teachers we must be interested in the study of culture “the social scientists‟ sense of the word not because we necessarily want to teach the culture of the other country but because we have to teach it.