VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY- HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FALCUTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES -------******-------- NGUYỄN THỊ SINH A STUDY ON TEACHERS’ USE OF VIETNAMESE IN ENGLISH LESSONS AT AN DUONG HIGH SCHOOL, HAI PHONG Nghiên cứu việc sử dụng tiếng Việt của giáo viên trong các giờ dạy tiếng Anh tại trường THPT An Dương, Hải Phòng M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field : English teaching methodology Code : 60.10 Ha noi - 2012 1 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY- HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FALCUTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES -------******-------- NGUYỄN THỊ SINH A STUDY ON TEACHERS’ USE OF VIETNAMESE IN ENGLISH LESSONS AT AN DUONG HIGH SCHOOL, HAI PHONG Nghiên cứu việc sử dụng tiếng Việt của giáo viên trong các giờ dạy tiếng Anh tại trường THPT An Dương, Hải Phòng M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field : English teaching methodology Code : 60. LÊ VĂN CANH Ha noi - 2012 2 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………….ii TABLE OF CONTENT………………………………………………………………….…iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS……………………………………………………………….vi LIST OF TABLES ………………………………………………………….vii PART A- INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………. Background to the study…………………………………………………………. The aim of the study…………………………………………………………….
Scope of the study…………………………………………………………………. The significance of the study………………………………………………………. Design of the study………………………………………………………………. History of language teaching methods focusing on L1 use in L2 teaching………………………………………………………………………………….
Debate surrounding the role of L1 in the L2 classroom……………………….1 Support for the monolingual approach………………………………….2 Support for the bilingual approach………………………………………………. Studies exploring L1 use in L2 teaching………………………………….1 Studies aiming at demonstrating the positive role of L1 in L2 teaching……….2 Studies focusing on teachers and learners‘ attitudes toward L1 use in L2 teaching and specific situations in which L1 should be used in the L2 classroom…………………………………………………………………………….1 The setting of the study……………………………………………………….4 Teaching and learning materials…………………………….4 Data collection instruments…………………………………………….1 Questionnaire for students……………………………………………….2 Quetionnaire for teachers……………………………….20 i TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.5 The detailed results of the survey…………………………………………….1 Teachers‘ frequency of L1 use……………………………………………….2 Teachers‘purposes of L1 use………………………………………………….3 Results of the questionnaires on the use of Vietnamese in the English classroom. Summary of the study………………………………………………………. Suggestions for further research…………………………………………….
Questionnaire for teachers…………………………………………………41 Appendix 2. Questionnaire for students…………………………………………………43 Appendix 3.47 ii TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CLT : Communicative Language Teaching ELT : English Language Teaching L1 : First language L2 : Second language iii TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Teachers’ frequency of using Vietnamese in the lessons…………………. Teachers’ purposes of using Vietnamese in the observed English lessons. Teachers’ purposes of using Vietnamese according to the questionnaire responses………………………………………………………………………………………….
Frequency of teachers’ use of Vietnamese as reported by the students………. Students’ attitudes to the purposes of teachers’ use of Vietnamese………. Teachers’ and Students’ attitudes to the purpose of using Vietnamese……….27 iv TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail. INTRODUCTION As the starting point of the study, this introductory chapter provides the background to the study and identifies the problem that the thesis attempts to solve, states the aim and the significance of the study, as well as research question, and provides an outline of the thesis.
Background to the study Learning a foreign language is found useful in all areas in the modern society. English becomes the main language among many languages that people want to learn. That is the reason why English is the foreign language which is being taught in most schools or Centers in Vietnam. This, in turn, generates a must to equip learners with a good method of learning and teachers should apply appropriate methods to present lessons to the learners in order to get the best results.
Several studies conducted with the aim of improving the quality of teaching and learning English in Vietnam show that ―traditional pedagogy, emphasizing the acquisition of grammar and vocabulary rather than communicative competence‖ (Pham, 2005, p. 2) is one of the causes of the problem. Since the early 1990s, therefore, Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) has quickly become popular in Vietnam (Pham, 2005, p. In accordance with the popularity of CLT in the country, it seems that the only use of English in ELT is widely supported.
However, the English-only view has recently been strongly criticized. Many scholars have argued that the English-only pedagogy is ideological and that the use of the students‘ mother tongue in the second language classroom is both facilitative and motivational. While Vietnamese teachers of English tend to use Vietnamese more than English in the English language classroom (Nguyen, 2006), there has been little research on the issue of teachers‘ opinions of the use of Vietnamese in teaching English. Hence, the issue remains controversial among Vietnamese teachers of English as well as inspectors, teacher educators and school administrators(Nguyen, 2006).
This 1 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com paper is aimed to gain understanding of the attitudes to, and perceptions of, the use of Vietnamese in English language lessons held by a group of ELT teachers working in a Vietnamese high school with a view to clarifying further the issue from the teachers‘ perspectives. The aim of the study Within the framework of a minor thesis, the aim of the study is to investigate the teachers‘ use of Vietnamese as well as their reasoning for the use of Vietnamese in teaching English at An Duong high school. Thus, the objectives of the study are as follows: a. Exploring teacher‘s use of Vietnamese in their English language classes as well as their pedagogical purposes of using Vietnamese in teaching English ; b.
Finding out students‘ and teachers‘ attitudes to the use of Vietnamese in their English classes and the differences between these two groups in their attitudes to the use of Vietnamese. Research questions In order to achieve the above-stated aims and objectives, the study is designed to find answers to the following research questions: 1. How often do teachers use Vietnamese to teach English and what are their pedagogical purposes of using Vietnamese? 2. To what extent do teachers and students differ regarding their attitudes toward the use of Vietnamese in English lessons? 4.
Scope of the study This study is designed to gain understandings about the actual use of Vietnamese in English classrooms by the teachers and their attitudes as well as their students‘ attitudes to the use of Vietnamese in teaching and learning English. The significance of the study The study will be a valuable reference not only for English teachers but also for all language instructors regarding the need to make a better-informed decision about what language to use or how to combine L1 and the new 2 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com language when teaching English to high school students. Also they would benefit from the lessons learnt from the project concerning teaching procedure. As such the study would then be beneficial to the learners.
They would be better guided in comprehending vocabulary and grammar points, better perform in any tasks and hopefully could better use English in real life situations. Design of the study The study is divided into three parts : the Introduction, the Development and the Conclusion. Introduction : deals with the rationale, aims, scope, methods and design of the study. Development : consists of 3 chapters Chapter 1.
Literature Review is intended to give some theoretical background related to using L1 in l2 classes. Chapter 2 : The study presents the situation analysis, participants, data collection instruments, data collection procedures and data analysis. The detailed results of the survey and comprehensive analysis on the data collected are focused. Major findings and implications shows major findings and implications related to the teachers‘ use of L1 in L2 class.
Conclusion : is a review of the study , limitations of the study and suggestions for further research 3 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail. LITERATURE REVIEW Introduction This chapter reviews the literature on the use of students‘ first language or mother tongue in teaching the second or foreign language. The chapter begins with a brief review of the status of the students‘ mother tongue in various second or foreign language teaching methodology. This is to create a theoretical background of the study.
This is followed by a review of the issue of students‘ first language or mother tongue in learning the second or foreign language from a bilingual education perspective. The next point of the review is the debate about the use of the first language in the second language classes. Finally, the literature on teachers‘ and students‘ attitudes to the use of the first language will be reviewed. History of language teaching methods focusing on L1 use in L2 teaching A brief review of the literature related to language teaching methods shows that ―the role of L1 in L2 teaching‖ is ―one of the most long-standing controversies in the history of language pedagogy‖ (Stern, 1992, p.
The following glimpse in the historical sequence of the most-recognized language teaching methods will highlight periodic changes in the role of L1 in L2 teaching. The Grammar Translation Method derived from ―the teaching of the classical languages, Latin and Greek‖ over centuries (Larsen-Freeman, 1986, p. 4) is the first one to be considered here. In the early years of the nineteenth century in Western countries, the Grammar Translation Method dominated the L2 classroom.
During this period, L2 was taught through grammar illustration, bilingual vocabulary lists and translation exercises. This method emphasizes on the literary language since its fundamental goal is to help learners be able to read literature written in L2, not to provide them with the ability to communicate verbally in L2. According to this method, L1 is freely used as ―a reference system‖ in the process of L2 acquisition (Stern, 1983, p. 4 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com In the late of the nineteenth century, the Western world experienced a big change in the need of learning L2 as commercial contact and travel between European nations increased more and more.
People tended to learn L2 with the aim of communicating, not reading literature written in L2 as before. This led to the emergence of the Direct Method, which pays its whole attention to the spoken language. The Direct Method is based on the belief that L2 learning should be an imitation of L1 learning. In this light, learners should be immersed in L2 through the use of L2 ―as a means of instruction and communication in the language classroom‖, and through ―the avoidance of the use of L1 and of translation as a technique‖ (Stern, 1983, p.
After its highest popularity during the period from the late nineteenth century to the first quarter of the twentieth century, the Direct Method began to decline because, as Brown (1994, p. 56) points out, "(it) did not take well in public education where the constraints of budget, classroom size, time, and teacher background made such a method difficult to use." However, the method has laid foundation upon which many of the later methods and approaches expanded and developed. Among them are the Audio-lingual Method and Communicative Approach. The Audio-lingual Method, the origin of which is found in the Army Method developed in response to the need for Americans to learn the languages of their allies and enemies alike during World War II, aims at helping learners ―to be able to use the target language communicatively‖ (Larsen-Freeman, 1986, p.
Like the Direct Method, the Audio-lingual Method focuses on the spoken language and forbids translation at early level and the use of the students‘ native language in the classroom (Finocchiaro & Brumfit, 1983, cited in Ellis, 2003, p. Meanwhile in the Communicative Approach, which has attracted most attention from the language teaching profession during the past five decades, the restricted use of native language is allowed where feasible and translation may be used when learners find it essential or helpful (Finocchiaro & Brumfit, 1983, cited in Ellis, 2003, pp. Recently, there has been an increasing attention to the merits of the L1 use 5 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com in the language classroom among the language teaching profession.