THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES NGUYEN LAN HUONG USING MIND MAPPING TECHNIQUE TO ENHANCE STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY RETENTION: AN ACTION RESEARCH AT HIEP HOA HIGH SCHOOL NUMBER 1 (Sử dụng bản đồ tư duy để tăng cường khả năng ghi nhớ từ vựng: Nghiên cứu hành động tại trường THPT Hiệp Hoà số 1) M. THESIS Field: English Linguistics Code: 8220201 THAI NGUYEN – 2018 i THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES NGUYEN LAN HUONG USING MIND MAPPING TECHNIQUE TO ENHANCE STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY RETENTION: AN ACTION RESEARCH AT HIEP HOA HIGH SCHOOL NO.A THESIS (APPLICATION ORIENTATION) Field: English Linguistics Code: 8220201 Supervisor: Dr. Pham Lan Anh ii THAI NGUYEN – 2018 iii STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I declare that this research report entitled “Using mind mapping technique to enhance students' vocabulary retention: An action research at Hiep Hoa high school number one” has been composed by myself, and describes my own work, unless otherwise acknowledged in the text. I confirm that this work is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of master at Thai Nguyen University.
This work has not been and will not be submitted for any other degree at any other institution of higher education. Author’s Signature: Nguyễn Lan Hương Approved by SUPERVISOR Phạm Lan Anh, Ph. Date: December 2018 iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude and deep appreciation to my supervisor, Phạm Lan Anh Ph.D, for her helpful and timely encouragement as well as her insightful comments on my work from the beginning to the end of the study. Without these, the thesis could not have been completed.
Secondly, the completion of this thesis would not have been possible without the cooperation from forty students of 11A9 class at Hiep Hoa high school number one who have been willing to participate in the study. I am very grateful to all of them for providing detailed information for the analysis of the study. I would also acknowledge my great gratitude to all the lecturers at School of Foreign Languages - Thai Nguyen University for their valuable lectures, which have contributed to lay the foundation for this thesis. Thirdly, I take this opportunity to show my gratitude to my colleagues and friends for their great help and comments.
Without their help, this study could not have been fulfilled. Last but not least, I must express my gratitude to my beloved family - my parents, my husband and my sons whose support and encouragement have always been a great deal of strength that has helped me to complete this thesis. v ABTRACT The main objective of this action research was to solve the problem of students’ poor memorization of the taught vocabulary by utilizing mind maps. The researcher then evaluated the effectiveness of using mind mapping technique to enhance students' vocabulary retention and explored the student’s attitude toward the teaching and learning vocabulary with this technique.
Based on the aims, forty grade- 11-students studying English in class 11A9 at Hiep Hoa High school number one took part in the study. Pre-tests, post-tests, questionnaires and interviews were chosen to be the data collection instruments to find out the effects of mind mapping technique on students’ memory in vocabulary learning after the intervention. The researcher as the teacher wanted to apply mind mapping technique to increase students’ potentials in retaining the taught vocabulary. In this study, the reseacher adopted Nunan’s action research procedure.
The procedure included 7 steps namely initiation, preliminary investigation, hypotheses, intervention, evaluation, dissemination and follow-up. The results from the pre-tests and post-tests were used to discover the effects of mind mapping technique on students’ vocabulary mastery. The mean scores were determined to compare the differences between the pre-test and post-test. Paired sample t-test was used to verify the statistical difference of the findings and measure students’s long-term retention of the words taught during the intervention.The results from the questionnaires and interviews were used to help the researcher to clarify the students’ attitude towards mind mapping technique in vocabulary learning.