TABLE OF CONTENTS Contents Pages STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP .ii TABLE OF CONTENTS. 1 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS. 5 LIST OF TABLES. 6 LIST OF CHARTS.
Background of the study. Rationale of the study. Aims of the study. Significance of the study.
Structure of the study. 12 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW. Review of previous studies. An overview of vocabulary.
What is a word?. What is vocabulary?. Vocabulary learning in EFL context. Characteristics of young learners.
Young learners‟ attention span. Young learners‟ foreign language teacher. Teaching vocabulary to children. Vocabulary development in the primary classes.
Stages in teaching vocabulary to children. Consolidating and Revising. 31 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY. Instruments and procedures of data collection.
Data Collection Procedure. 40 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION. Data quantitative analysis teachers from questionnaire. The necessity of teaching English vocabulary to children.
Teachers‟ perceptions of teaching English vocabulary. Vocabulary learning process. Teaching selected words. The elements in teaching vocabulary.
Teaching concrete and abstract words. Teaching the meaning of words. Number of words. Techniques that teachers often use.
Presenting new words. Techniques used in teaching vocabulary. Difficulties in teaching. Obstacles coming from children.
Teachers data analysis from interview. The necessity of teaching English vocabulary to children. The elements in vocabulary teaching. Techniques that teachers often use.
Obstacles coming from children. Pupil data analysis from interview. The necessity of teaching English to children. Elements in vocabulary teaching.
Techniques used in teaching vocabulary. 66 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS. Summary of the findings. What are teachers‟ perceptions of teaching English vocabulary to children at some schools in Hue ?.
What techniques are often used to teach English vocabulary by teachers at schools in Hue ?. Limitations of the study. Recommendations for Future Research. 78 APPENDICES 4 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS EFL English as Foreign Language MNE Ministry of National Education MOET Ministry of Education and Training SPSS Statistical Package for the Social Sciences 5 LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS A.
LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1: Summary of instruments Table 3.2: Summary of the questionnaire Table 3.3: The result of the questionnaire Table 4.1: The reliability of the questionnaire Table 4.2: Necessity of teaching English vocabulary Table 4.3: Necessary of teaching English vocabulary Table 4.4: Vocabulary helps children to communicate Table 4.5: Vocabulary affects reading ability Table 4.6: Vocabulary helps children to listen and talk Table 4.7: The elements in vocabulary teaching that should be focused on Table 4.8: Techniques that teachers often use Table 4. LIST OF CHARTS Chart 4.1: Teachers‟ perceptions of teaching English vocabulary Chart 4.2: The process of learning new words Chart 4.3: Teaching selected words Chart 4.5: Teaching the meaning of words Chart 4.6: Amount of words Chart 4.8: Presenting new words Chart 4.9: Vocabulary checking Chart 4.10: Words meanings Chart 4.12: Difficulties in teaching Chart 4.13: Obstacles coming from children 7 ABSTRACT This study focused on the techniques that teachers at some primary schools in Hue used to teach English vocabulary to pupils. The research provides us with the understanding of teachers‟ perceptions regarding teaching English vocabulary to children, and the necessity and the techniques of teaching English vocabulary as well as the difficulties of teachers. In order to obtain reliable results, both qualitative and quantitative methods were used.
Major data collection tools included questionnaires, interview checklist and class observation sheet. The findings from both quantitative and qualitative data showed that most teachers had a positive attitude towards teaching vocabulary to children in the schools and that there were a number of problems that faced EFL teachers , involving teaching methods, classroom facilities or lack of support and time constraints. Another finding is that encouragements from administrators such as facilities and training were suggested by teachers so as to improve teaching conditions. From the findings of this study, it is recommended that teachers should exploit technology to organize activities.
It is recommended that a combination of various techniques should be taken into consideration. In another facet, there are still some certain difficulties that teachers encountered such as the use of too much mother tongue and attention span of young language learners. However, the difficulties can be solved as proposed by teachers. The study then suggests more proper ways in using games and songs to enhance the effectiveness in young learners‟ classroom.
Background of the study In the context of globalization, English, as the currently appointed international language, is an instrument in enhancing economic, political relations and scientific exchanges between many countries. In the scale of nation wide, English has become the first foreign language to be learned for its potential benefits. Therefore, in Vietnam, EFL was actually introduced into Grade-1 curriculum in many major cities‟ primary schools in 1995. It can not be denied that the younger the children are, the better they acquire a language.
It is emphasized that the first language knowledge children learn is vocabulary. Thus, vocabulary knowledge helps reading comprehension and good reading comprehension leads to a natural process of new vocabulary acquisition. Furthermore, vocabulary knowledge helps children in all four language skills. From the certain reasons, vocabulary teaching is considered as an important aspect in young learners‟ classroom.
The prominent role of vocabulary knowledge in second language learning has been recently recognized by researchers. Seal (1991) said that word knowledge is an essential component of communicative competence, and it is important for both production and comprehension in a foreign language. Gower, Phillips and Walters (1995) clearly stated that as the lexical system is “open”, there‟s always something new to learn when students “done” the grammar. And they also added that more advanced students are motivated to add to their vocabulary stock, to understand nuances of meaning, to become more proficient in their own choice of words and expressions.
Pohl (2003) claimed that children learn to listen and to talk long before they learn to read and write. Extra difficulty would be created if one would try to develop English reading and writing skills before children can speak the language. In order to be able to speak the language, students need to know some vocabulary first. 9 Nagy (2006) expressed that words are the tools we use to access our background knowledge, express ideas and learn new concepts.
And the author added that the English language, with its penchant for borrowing and its worldwide use, probably has a stock of words larger than that of any other language. It is not surprising, then, that among speakers of English, a large vocabulary is one of the most important parts of verbal proficiency. Graves (2009) listed some findings of more than 100 years of vocabulary research: - Vocabulary knowledge is one of the best indicators of verbal ability (Sternberg, 1987; Terman, 1916) - Vocabulary knowledge contributes to young children‟s phonological awareness, which in turn contributes to their word recognition (Goswami, 2001; Nagy, 2005 ) - Lack of vocabulary can be a crucial factor underlying the school failure of disadvantaged students (Becker, 1977; Biemiller, 1999) It is clear that vocabulary knowledge is focused on by researchers. Certainly, vocabulary knowledge is necessary for a language learner.
In the case of teaching English vocabulary at primary schools in Hue, it helps children a lot in their future schooling. Rationale of the study The teaching of English to children has become especially important in recent years. Therefore, this research was carried out for the following reasons: First, what we have obtained from the observations of the EFL teaching activities reveals that English vocabulary teaching for children at the early age is very necessary. The process of learning new words begins in infancy and continues throughout one‟s adult life.
English language learning involves four basic skills: reading, writing, listening, and speaking. There are four factors that support four language skills above such as grammar, spelling, pronunciation and vocabulary. To communicate in a foreign language, it is not necessary that the grammar is perfect. Therefore, children can communicate by using words that they have learnt without 10 grammar structures.
The message still can be understood even if errors occur. The researcher does not have any intention about maximize the role of vocabulary and lower the role of grammar. David Wilkins clearly stated that “without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed” (cited in Thornbury, 2002). Second, this research focused on the way of how to teach children English vocabulary.
There are many techniques on teaching English vocabulary. However, this research aimed to investigate the techniques that teachers have been using to teach elementary pupils at some schools. Next, this research investigated the difficulties that teachers have met in their teaching process. It is a fact that many teachers find that they are teaching in primary school even though they have not been trained for this level yet.
The difficulties were collected through classroom observation, questionnaires and interviews. The teaching process depended on the age of acquisition. Some children develop gradually, others in leaps and bounds. In reality, English primary teachers have been challenged by some difficulties in their teaching process.
Last, the researcher had an intention to find out the beliefs of teachers about teaching English vocabulary at primary level. What teachers think about this viewpoint is very important because it reflects what teachers can do to help children learn better. The research focused on how to teach English vocabulary that enables pupils to construct a rich vocabulary bank. Aims of the study This research aimed to investigate the way of teaching English vocabulary to children at some primary schools.
It focused on teaching strategies. Through survey, this research would like to find out some necessary factors that affect teaching English vocabulary as follows: 11 - what vocabulary teaching techniques are used by elementary teachers and what consolidation techniques are employed by the teachers. - what teachers‟ perceptions are of teaching English vocabulary are and what difficulties that they have met in classroom. Research questions This study aims to investigate the perception of teachers at primary level towards the teaching English vocabulary to children.
It also attempts to explore the reality as well as the difficulties that teachers have met in teaching process.What are teachers‟ perceptions of teaching English vocabulary to children at some schools in Hue ? 2.What techniques are often used to teach English vocabulary by teachers at schools in Hue ? 1. Significance of the study This research is carried out with an aim to benefit both teachers and pupils in teaching and learning English vocabulary. The research will provide primary teachers with a point of view about English vocabulary teaching within the aim of enabling children to build up a bank of English vocabulary for their further study. People have already known that vocabulary learning is not a skill and can be ever fully mastered.
The expansion extends across a lifetime of a language learner. Added to this, the pilot process and necessary suggestions will demonstrate ways of teaching English vocabulary to young learners effectively. Structure of the study - Chapter 1: Introduction - Chapter 2: Literature Review - Chapter 3: Research Methodology - Chapter 4: Findings and Discussion - Chapter 5: Conclusion and Implications 12 CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 2. Introduction The purpose of this chapter is to review the theoretical framework on which this study is developed.
Therefore, this study focuses on investigating the perceptions of teachers about teaching English vocabulary to children and techniques of teaching English vocabulary that teachers have used in lessons. There is a need to preview how to teach English vocabulary to children as well as other issues that relate to teaching stages.