VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ---oOo--- NGUYỄN THỊ HOA A STUDY ON 11TH FORM STUDENTS’ ACQUISITION OF ENGLISH RELATIVE CLAUSES (NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ ĐỘ TIẾP THU MỆNH ĐỀ QUAN HỆ TIẾNG ANH CỦA HỌC SINH LỚP 11) M. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 HANOI - 2017 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ---oOo--- NGUYỄN THỊ HOA A STUDY ON 11TH FORM STUDENTS’ ACQUISITION OF ENGLISH RELATIVE CLAUSES (NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ ĐỘ TIẾP THU MỆNH ĐỀ QUAN HỆ TIẾNG ANH CỦA HỌC SINH LỚP 11) M. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 S T T T P , Ph. HANOI - 2017 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com DECLARATION Title: “A STUDY ON 11TH FORM STUDENTS‟ ACQUISITION OF ENGLISH RELATIVE CLAUSES” I certify that no part of the thesis has been copied or reproduced by me from any other works without acknowledgement and that the thesis is originally written by me under strict guidance of my supervisor.
Hanoi, 2017 Student‟s signature Nguyễn Thị Hoa i TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Doctor Tran Thi Thanh Phuc, for her careful guidance, critical feedback, and enormous enthusiasm. Without her support, this thesis cannot be completed. I am grateful to all the lecturers of the Faculty of Post-graduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi for their valuable teaching and assistance during my study at the college. I would like to express my thanks to all my friends who were willing to help me in sharing materials and ideas when this thesis is worked on.
My sincere thanks also go to all my colleagues and students for their assistance during the process of data collection. Particularly, I owe my indebtedness to my husband for his support, encouragement and tolerance when I was in the process of writing this thesis. ii TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com ABSTRACT This study investigated the processing difficulty of relative clauses in two groups of Vietnamese students with high and low level of English proficiency. It also aimed at exploring errors on relative clauses made by 11th form Vietnamese students at a high school in Hanoi.
65 students from two classes were invited to join in the research. They answered a test including 30 questions about different types of English relative clauses, namely, SS, SO, OS, and OO. The results indicate that participants in both two groups faced more processing difficulty in OS and OO type than the others, providing weak evidence for any of the four hypotheses: SOHH (Subject-Object Hierarchy Hypothesis); NPAH (Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy Hypothesis); PFH (Parallel Function Hypothesis; PDH (Perceptual Difficulty Hypothesis). Moreover, although students in the high proficiency group performed better than those in low proficiency group, they all made a number of mistakes in doing relative clause exercises.
iii TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION. iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS. vi LIST OF TABLES. vii CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION.
1 CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW .1 Overview of relative clause .2 Predictor hypotheses of relative clause acquisition .1 The parallel function hypothesis (PFH) .2 The perceptual Difficulty Hypothesis (PDH) .3 Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy (NPAH) .4 Subject - Object Hierarchy Hypothesis (SOHH) .1 Previous studies on the PFH .2 Previous studies on the PDH.3 Previous studies on the NPAH .4 Previous studies on the SOHH. 14 CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY .1 Setting and participants.2 Methods of collecting data .1 Relative Clause test. 17 iv TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail. 17 CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION.
32 CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS.3 Suggestion for further research. I v TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS DO: Direct Object Error: Error correction GEN: Genitive IO: Indirect Object M: Mean score MCQ: Multiple choice questions N: Noun NP: Noun Phrase NPAH: Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy Hypothesis OCOMP: Object of comparison OO: Object – Object OPREP: Object of preposition OS: Object – Subject PDH: Perceptual Difficulty Hypothesis PFH: Parallel Function Hypothesis RCs: Relative clauses S: Subject SO: Subject – Object SOHH: Subject-Object Hierarchy Hypothesis SS: Subject – Subject vi TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Item purpose.16 Table 2: Case Processing Summary .19 Table 3: Results of t-test of difference between high and low proficiency groups .19 Table 4: Results of statistical analyses basing on Test of Homogeneity of Variances .24 Table 5: Results of statistical analyses using ANOVA.25 Table 6: Results of statistical analyses basing on Robust Test of Equality of Means .26 vii TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION Learning English as a foreign language is a dynamic process in which grammar plays an important role. Among different grammatical aspects, relative clauses have been showed to be a great obstacle for students. This study aimed to explore the validity of different hypotheses on the acquisition of relative clauses among Vietnamese high school students.1 Rationale Nowadays, English has become a useful tool to get access to the world‟s knowledge and to achieve success in life.
To master English, students often focus on the learning of four major language skills, namely, listening, speaking, reading and writing. However, grammar is the basis for the development of all these skills. As a teacher of English, I realize that relative clauses (RCs) are one of the most difficult grammar aspects for students of English to master. Many errors associated with relative clauses have been committed by my students, despite the fact that they have spent a significant length of time studying them.
For examples, a great number of students are confused about the forms and functions of the English relative clauses. They often make mistakes in combining sentences containing relative clauses and fail to distinguish between restrictive and non- restrictive relatives. Therefore, I would like to know and understand more about this issue. Research on RCs has been conducted in a number of countries.
The majority of these studies focus on testing the validity of different hypotheses related to the acquisition of RCs. For example, Alotaibi (2016) identifies that the most difficult type of RC for Kuwaiti EFL learners is OO (object-object), while Abdolmanafi and Rahmani (2012) points out that students encounter more difficulty in SO (subject- object). In Vietnam, research following this approach has been quite limited. One study by Lan (2009) does not focus on testing RC hypothesis, but aims to point out typical mistakes committed by Vietnamese students.
She identifies these as the wrong use of relativizers, the misuse of the relative clauses, and the misuse between restrictive and non-restrictive relatives. 1 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com This study aims at investigating Vietnamese high school learners‟ acquisition of RCs. Among the various types of relative clauses, this study only investigate those RCs that the role of the two head nouns and two relativized noun phrases are either subject or object. Basing on four basic types of relative clauses, namely, SO, SS, OS, and OO, this study explored whether four hypotheses (SOHH, PDH, PFH and NPAH) could predict Vietnamese learners‟ acquisition of relative clauses.2 Aims of the study This study is aimed at exploring errors on relative clauses made by 11th form Vietnamese students at a high school in Hanoi.
More specifically, it investigates which hypothesis is the most appropriate and best predicts the hierarchy of difficulty or the acquisition order of English relative clauses by two groups of students: high proficiency and low proficiency. In addition, it identifies whether students of high proficiency group outperformed those of low proficiency group in the RC test.3 Research questions The study addresses the following research questions: 1. Which among the four hypotheses - SOHH, PDH, PFH and NPAH – best predicts Vietnamese high school learner‟s acquisition of relative clauses, regarding high and low proficiency learners? 2. To what extent does the high proficiency group outperform the low proficiency one in the relative clause test? 3.
What are possible reasons for students‟ performance on the relative clause test? 1.4 Methods of the study The study is primarily a quantitative one. A test on RCs is delivered to student participants. The test result is analyzed by SPSS to yield conclusion. Based on the outcome of the test, a number of students are invited to be interviewed on how they completed the test.
2 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.4 Design of the study The study is organized into five chapters. Chapter I – Introduction: This chapter describes the rationale, aims, research questions, methods and design of the study. Chapter II – Literature review: This chapter presents theoretical foundations for the research and summarizes previous studies on the same topic. Chapter III – Methodology: This chapter provides information regarding how the study is conducted.
Chapter IV – Findings and Discussion: This chapter details the findings of the study and compares the findings with previous studies. Chapter V – Conclusion: This chapter concludes the study and suggests further investigation of the topic. 3 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Overview of relative clause 2.1 Definition A relative clause, also called an adjective clause, is a dependent clause that modifies a noun or a pronoun by making it more specific or adding additional information about it. Relative clauses are typically found after a noun phrase and provide some information about the person or thing indicated by that noun phrase.
They are sometimes called „adjective clauses' because, like many adjectives, they often describe and help to identify the person or thing being talked about (Yule, 1998, p. According to Cowan (2008), relative clauses are defined as “one kind of dependent clause introduced by a special set of relative pronouns”. Huddleston and Pullum (2005, p.183) consider a relative clause as “a special kind of subordinate clause whose primary function is as modifier to a noun or nominal” An RC is introduced by either relative pronouns (who-, whom-, which-, that-, whose) or relative adverbs (when-, where-, why-). The omission of relative pronouns can be seen as the zero relative pronouns.
“Where” and “when” replace a prepositional phrase of place and of time respectively, to function as adverbial of the relative clause. In this case, the “preposition + which” can be replaced by particular relative adverbs which are “where” and “when”.2 Classification Restrictive relative clauses McArthur (1992, p.859) considers a restrictive relative clause (also defining relative clause) “a relative clause with the semantic function of defining more closely what the noun modified by the clause is referring to.” As defined by Yule (1998, p.248), restrictive relative clauses are ones that “define” or “restrict” the reference of the antecedent noun. They help to identify or classify the person or thing being talked about. This is an example of a restrictive relative clause: 4 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com The woman whom John is talking to is a teacher.
In this sentence, the relative clause “whom John is talking to” restricts the reference of “the woman” by specifying “John is talking to”. The restrictive modification is necessary to identify “The woman” that the speaker mentions and distinguish the woman from any others in this context. It can be seen from the above definitions that restrictive relative clauses define and identify the antecedent. This helps to limit possible references of the antecedent and the interpretation of the sentence.
Restrictive relative clauses can be introduced by all wh-relative pronouns and adverbs and also “that” or “zero” relative pronoun. Nonrestrictive relative clause A non-restrictive relative clause (also non-defining relative clause) adds information not needed for identifying what a modified noun is referring to (McArthur, 1992).248) defines that “a non-restrictive relative clause gives extra information about an antecedent. It provides additional information, not identifying information.