DOAN THI THUY HANG * MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING * HUE - 2013 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HUE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES ------------ DOAN THI THUY HANG THE EFFECT OF EXPLICIT PRAGMATIC INSTRUCTION ON EFL LEARNERS’ ACQUISITION OF THE ACT OF APOLOGIZING IN ENGLISH AT TIEN GIANG UNIVERSITY MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING HUE, 2013 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HUE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES ------------ DOAN THI THUY HANG THE EFFECT OF EXPLICIT PRAGMATIC INSTRUCTION ON EFL LEARNERS’ ACQUISITION OF THE ACT OF APOLOGIZING IN ENGLISH AT TIEN GIANG UNIVERSITY MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING CODE: 60140111 SUPERVISOR: PHAM THI HONG NHUNG, PH. HUE, 2013 BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO ĐẠI HỌC HUẾ TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ -------- ĐOÀN THỊ THÚY HẰNG TÁC ĐỘNG CỦA VIỆC DÙNG LỜI CHỈ DẪN RÕ RÀNG VỀ NGỮ DỤNG HỌC CỦA HÀNH ĐỘNG LỜI NÓI “XIN LỖI” ĐỐI VỚI NGƯỜI HỌC TIẾNG ANH NHƯ LÀ MỘT NGOẠI NGỮ Ở TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC TIỀN GIANG LUẬN VĂN THẠC SĨ LÝ LUẬN VÀ PHƯƠNG PHÁP DẠY HỌC BỘ MÔN TIẾNG ANH MÃ SỐ: 60140111 NGƯỜI HƯỚNG DẪN KHOA HỌC: TS. PHẠM THỊ HỒNG NHUNG HUẾ, 2013 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I do hereby acknowledge that this study is mine. The data and findings discussed in the thesis are true, used with permission from associates and have not been published elsewhere.
Author Doan Thi Thuy Hang i ABSTRACT The aim of this study is to investigate whether explicit instructions of apologetic strategies are effective in helping EFL learners in TGU gain pragmatic knowledge and achieve pragmatic competence in communication. Participants in this study are randomly distributed into an implicit group and an explicit group. Apology strategies and formulae were taught to the two groups in different ways. The explicit group underwent three phases, feeling phase, doing phase and thinking phase.
The implicit group was exposed to the same authentic input as the explicit group was, but the former group experienced meaning-focused tasks before they entered production practice phase. A pre-test and a post-test which were a written discourse completion task (WDCT) were given right before and after the intervention. The results showed that both groups demonstrated improvements in the WDCT after the treatment, but to different degree. The explicit group showed greater progress in the proper use in different situations.
This suggests the necessity of raising awareness activities in the classroom instruction of pragmatics. ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First of all, my deep gratitude goes to my supervisor Dr. Pham Hong Nhung for her guidance and encouragement during the time I conducted my study. Mainly, I honor her for having aroused in myself the desire to enrich and put into research use my knowledge in my specialized field.
I was also given an opportunity to practice the meticulous manner researchers should possess when they conduct a research project. I would also like to extend my special thanks to Ms. Giang Thi Kim Tu and Mr. Nguyen Trung Ngon for their help in my master course.
Indeed, the insights and experiences I obtained from the course and the tutoring sessions have significantly contributed to the shaping, conducting, and writing of my thesis. Also, I cannot forgive myself if I do not appreciate Ms. Annie Priest and Mr. Johnnie Shuck for their useful advice.
I would also like to thank my classmates for their share of practical experiences in doing research. Also, I’m grateful to the TGU non-English major freshmen who took part in my study. Without their willingness and contribution, my research will be not realized. Finally, I am very much indebted to my parents for giving me not only valuable encouragement and support but also mental strength to pursue my research work.
iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Contents Pages SUB COVER PAGE STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS .iv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS. viii LIST OF FIGURES & TABLES.ix CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION. Background to the study.
Rational of the study. 4 CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW. Definitions of Key Terms. Pragmatic competence vs.
Pragmatic competence and language teaching. Theories of teaching pragmatic competence. Explicit pragmatic instruction. The role of explicit instruction.
The stages of explicit pragmatic instruction. Face and Speech acts. Speech Acts Theory. Teaching Speech Acts.
Acquisition of speech acts. The act of apologizing. Nature of apology. Common stages of apology .3 Strategies of an apology.
An expression of apology. An explanation or account. An acknowledgement of responsibility. An offer of repair.
Promise for forbearance. A review of relevant studies. 22 CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY. Pre-test and post-test.
Goals for instruction. Data Collection and Analysis. 27 CHAPTER IV: Findings and Discussion. The Results of WDCT.
The Results of WDCT. Results of Post-Test WDCT of the Implicit Group. Results of Post-Test WCDT of the Explicit Group. A summary of findings.
Direction for future research. 45 Appendix A: Discourse Pre-Test (English version). 45 Appendix B: Discourse Post-Test (English version). 47 Appendix C: Discourse Pre-Test (Vietnamese version).
49 Appendix D: Discourse Post-Test (Vietnamese version). 51 vii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS TGU: Tien Giang University EFL: English as foreign language WDCT: Written completion test SLA: Second language acquisition IG: Implicit group EG: Explicit group viii LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES List of tables Table 4.1 A Comparison of the Mean Scores between the IG and. 29 EG in the Pre-Test WDCT Table 4. A Comparison of the Mean Scores between the IG and.
31 EG in the Pre-test WDCT and Post-test WDCT Table 4. A comparison of strategies of apology used by participants. 33 List of figures Figure 2. Yoshimi‟s stages of explicit pragmatic instruction .2: Rosenshine and Stevens‟ six teaching functions .1: Strategies of apology were listed by participants in.
30 Pre-test WDCT Figure 4.2: Strategies of apology were listed by participants in. 32 Post-test WDCT ix CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION This chapter introduces the background to the current study, the aims and the significance of the research are given. The organization of thesis is also presented. Background to the study Since 1986, there has been an increase in the importance of English language use in Vietnam (Trinh, 2005).
English regained its importance in Vietnam 1990s since there was an influx of foreign investors arriving in the country with the hope of setting up their business due to Vietnam‟s open-door policy. As such, these foreigners and their Vietnamese counterparts or partners needed to use English to communicate. In Vietnam‟s current context (its integration into the wider global economy, and its attractive destination for tourism and business opportunities), more attention is paid to the teaching and learning of the English language across the country. In academic setting alone, a lot of seminars, and workshops related to teaching approaches, contents of curriculum, professional development and so forth have been held at many universities nationwide as well as by provincial departments of education and training (Le, 2008).
Additionally, the communicative approach with its focus on communicative skills has been largely applied in many foreign language classes (Ton, 2007). Students are taught four macro-skills listening comprehension, speaking, reading and writing with equal emphasis. Moreover, language learning has shifted from a grammatical perspective to a communicative perspective that emphasizes understanding and appropriate use of language in communicative contexts. The listener‟s failure to comprehend the speaker‟s intended meaning may cause misunderstandings and lead to conversation breakdowns (Thomas, 1983).
1 Despites these innovations (chances of teaching approach, contents of curriculum professional development, seminars and workshops), the truth is, after 7-year formal English education, most students cannot communicate in English effectively (MOET‟s National Report, 2011) Similarly, a pilot survey involved 100 students of different universities in Ho Chi Minh City has revealed that 50 students say “no” with the question “Do you have enough confidence about your English competence?”. Another 79 students say “no” when the interviewer asked “Do you have enough confidence to use your English communication ability to talk with foreign speakers?” (HCMUP‟s report, 2011). Although a large number of student population of the country may show that they have good knowledge of English grammar, they may not be able to use them in actual communication (MOET‟s National Report, 2011). Rational of the study A lot of cross-cultural research on pragmatics in recent years has showed that in intercultural communication, students not only need to know the form to achieve linguistic accuracy but also need to internalize sociolinguistic rules to use the linguistic forms appropriately.
That is they need to develop their pragmatic competence to be able to use the language they learn to communicate effectively. Research into the pragmatics of second language learners has proved that a student with advanced grammatical development does not necessarily have corresponding levels of pragmatic development (Bardovi-Harlig and Dornyei, 1997). Furthermore, studies addressing the realization of speech acts by second language learners (Olshtain and Blum-Kulka, 1985) have found that even advanced language learners often face difficulties in comprehending a speaker‟s intention and conveying the appropriate politeness values in communicative contexts. Therefore, one of the challenges in language instruction is teaching the culturally appropriate use of language.
Research aims The objective of this research is to examine whether EFL learners‟ pragmatic competence in TGU can be enhanced by explicit instruction on pragmatics or not after the treatment. More specially, it also tries to investigate whether EFL learners‟ use of apology can be improved through explicit pragmatic instruction or not. The reason why apologizing is chosen to be investigated in this study is that this speech act is considered as playing an important role in pragmatics and acquiring this speech act is a necessary part of pragmatic competence. Research has also shown that apologizing is one of the most common speech act across cultures and it is central to politeness behavior and to pragmatic theory (Brown and Levinson 1987; Holmes, 1990).
The ability to apologize and respond appropriately to apologies in the target language is one of the major tasks of foreign and second language learners. Research scope This study investigates the impact of explicit pragmatics instructions on TGU EFL students‟ pragmatic awareness and on their ability to perceive and respond to apology in English. In this paper, the term “learners” refers to the students from course 2010- 2014 and onwards who are studying English as their non-major subject at Tien Giang University. Research questions From a critical review of the relevant literature on pragmatics, pragmatic instruction, two research questions were developed: 1.
Does explicit pragmatic instruction raise EFL students’ awareness of the pragmatic aspects of apologizing in English? 3 2. Does explicit pragmatic instruction help EFL students perceive and produce apologies in English properly? 1. Research significance Within the domain of second language acquisition (SLA), this study will contribute to the understanding of the value of explicit pragmatics instruction, the feasibility of its application into practice, and thus help language teachers figure out effective instruction methods to promote EFL learners‟ pragmatic competence in apologizing. Research organization This present research comprises 5 chapters: Chapter I is the introduction, which first introduces an overview of teaching and learning English in Vietnam since 1986, and then states the background, the rationale, the significance, the aims, the research questions, the scope and the organization of the research.
Chapter II provides a review of the literature. First, it starts with definitions of pragmatics, pragmatic awareness, and pragmatic competence. Then, the differences between pragmatic competence and communicative competence are introduced clearly and interlanguage pragmatics is also provided as well. Next, the theories that explain second language pragmatics competence are highlighted with special attention given to speech act theories and apology theories.
Finally, an overall of literature reviews is included. Chapter III presents research methodology, which includes variables, research questions, participants, instruments and research procedure.