VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES PHẠM THỊ THẢO FACTORS AFFECTING ESP VOCABULARY LEARNING BY THE SECOND-YEAR STUDENTS AT UNIVERSITY OF FIRE FIGHTING AND PREVENTION (Những yếu tố ảnh hưởng đến việc học từ vựng tiếng Anh chuyên ngành của sinh viên năm thứ hai trường Đại học Phòng cháy Chữa cháy) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Hanoi – 2016 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES PHẠM THỊ THẢO FACTORS AFFECTING ESP VOCABULARY LEARNING BY THE SECOND-YEAR STUDENTS AT UNIVERSITY OF FIRE FIGHTING AND PREVENTION (Những yếu tố ảnh hưởng đến việc học từ vựng tiếng Anh chuyên ngành của sinh viên năm thứ hai trường Đại học Phòng cháy Chữa cháy) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Supervisor: Dr. Nguyễn Huy Kỷ Hanoi – 2016 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com DECLARATION This paper is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for The Degree of Master of Arts in English Teaching Methodology. I confirm that this is my own research, and that it has not been published or submitted for any other degrees. Hanoi, 2016 Phạm Thị Thảo i LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, my sincere thanks are due to Dr.
Nguyễn Huy Kỷ, my supervisor for his continual, invaluable support, encouragement, guidance and ideas. I am grateful to all lecturers and the staff of the Faculty of Post-Graduate Studies at University of Languages and International Studies-VNU for their useful lecturers and guidance during my study. I must also express my most sincere appreciation to my colleagues and students at University of Fire Fighting and Prevention, who have assisted me with data analysis and useful advice. Lastly, my heartfelt gratitude goes to my beloved parents and husband whose constant support and patience have encouraged me through the most difficult times.
ii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT Vocabulary plays an important role in learning a foreign language, especially in learning English for Specific Purposes. How to learn vocabulary efficiently is a question to every learner as well as teacher at University of Fire Fighting and Prevention. This research was carried out in order to help our students improve their English for Specific Purposes vocabulary learning. The aims of this study are to identify factors affecting students‟ English for Specific Purposes vocabulary learning at University of Fire Fighting and Prevention and suggest solutions to teach and learn English for Specific Purposes vocabulary more effectively.
The study was undertaken with 100 second-year students and 4 teachers. On the basic of data analysis, the findings show that the major factors affecting students‟ English for Specific Purposes vocabulary learning of fire and rescue are the intralexical factors, factors from students and teaching methods. Some solutions are suggested to deal with these factors including encouraging students to develop their self- study, providing students with different vocabulary learning strategies, and improving teachers‟ techniques in teaching English for Specific Purposes vocabulary. It is hoped that the results of this study will help students and teachers at University of Fire Fighting and Prevention learn and teach vocabulary of fire and rescue better.
iii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ESP: English for Special Purposes EFL: English as a Foreign Language ESL: English as a Second Language GE: General English L1: First Language L2: Second Language UFFP: University of Fire Fighting and Prevention iv LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF CHARTS & TABLES Chart 1: Students‟ attitude towards vocabulary learning Chart 2: Students‟ evaluation on learning of ESP vocabulary Chart 3: The element that students find the most difficult in learning fire and rescue vocabulary Chart 4: Students‟ difficulties in learning fire and rescue vocabulary Table 1: Intralexical factors that affect vocabulary learning Table 2: Students‟ purposes of learning ESP vocabulary Table 3: Students‟ ways of learning a new word Table 4: Students‟ ways of learning ESP vocabulary Table 5: Teachers‟ ways of presenting new words Table 6: Students‟ interest in ways of presenting new words Table 7: Students‟ interest in ways of practicing new words Table 8: Students‟ suggestions for better effects on learning fire and rescue vocabulary v LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION………………………………………………………………….i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ………………………………………………………ii ABSTRACT……………………………………………………………………….iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS…………………………………………………….iv LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES ………………………………………………v TABLE OF CONTENTS…………………………………………………………vi PART I: INTRODUCTION. Scope of the study. Objectives of the study. Methods of the study.
Design of the study .3 PART II: DEVELOPMENT .4 CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW. An overview of ESP. Definition of ESP. The roles of ESP teachers.
Vocabulary and ESP vocabulary. Definition of vocabulary. Classification of vocabulary and ESP vocabulary. Aspects of word knowing.
Definition of terminology. Characteristics of terminology. Some factors affecting vocabulary acquisition. The influence of first and other languages .13 vi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.
Vocabulary learning task. Vocabulary learning strategies. Setting of the study. Students and their background.
Teachers and their teaching methods. Teaching materials and facilities. Data collection instruments. Procedures of data collection and analysis .22 CHAPTER 3: DISCUSSION AND FINDINGS.
Data analysis and discussion of students‟ questionnaires. Data analysis and discussion of teachers‟ interviews .36 PART III: CONCLUSION. Summary of major findings. Limitations of the study.
Suggestions for further study .V vii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com PART I: INTRODUCTION This part provides the background to the study and statement of the problem, the objectives, the research questions, and the scope of the study as well as the methods of the study. It also outlines the organization of the thesis. Rationale It is undeniable that English is a means of international communication in the fields of science, technology, culture, education, economy, etc. It is not only the native language of about 300 million of speakers around the world but also the official language in many countries as well as second/ foreign language in many nations in the world.
In Vietnam, where people are carrying out the modernization and industrialization, English is becoming more and more important. In teaching and learning English as a foreign language in our country, English for Specific Purposes has recently received a great deal of attention. In Vietnam, English seems to be taught and studied in non-English environment hence reading is an important means to get knowledge. As the result, ESP materials used at most of the universities now are often reading materials with topics in the specific areas and ESP textbook of University of Fire Fighting and Prevention (UFFP) is not an exception.
“Vocabulary learning has long had a synergistic association with reading; each activity nourishes the other.” (Coady and Huckin, 1997:2) and “Knowing words is the key to understanding and being understood.” (Vermeer 1992: 147), therefore, if one wants to read ESP materials well he needs to learn ESP vocabulary. Vocabulary, which is considered as the base of a high building, is indispensable in language learning. Teachers who have been teaching English in general and English for Specific Purposes in particular must bear in mind that at the beginning or in the end, vocabulary is always one of the biggest problems. At UFFP, teaching and learning ESP vocabulary are really challenging.
Vocabulary of fire and rescue has long been considered a difficult and boring subject by many students at the university. For ESP teachers, correspondingly, it is a difficult task to 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com get students involved in vocabulary learning even they devoted a plenty of time to vocabulary teaching, the results have been disappointing. The question posed for ESP teachers now is how to meet the needs of ESP learners, especially the needs of improving their vocabulary acquisition. Facing this situation, the teachers of English at UFFP would like to do something new to help students overcome these difficulties.
Being one of the teachers there, I would like to do a study to identify factors that most affect students‟ vocabulary learning of fire and rescue, to claim a more satisfactory standing for ESP vocabulary for the second-year students, as a result, the title of the minor thesis goes as: “Factors affecting ESP vocabulary learning by the second-year students at University of Fire Fighting and Prevention. Scope of the study The study mainly focuses on the investigation of factors most affecting ESP vocabulary learning by the second-year students at University of Fire Fighting and Prevention, and then suggests some techniques to help them improve their ESP vocabulary. Objectives of the study In this study, two objectives were involved as follow: - To investigate the current situation of teaching and learning ESP vocabulary in order to find out the factors affecting students‟ ESP vocabulary learning at UFFP. - To give some recommendations to improve the quality of teaching and learning ESP vocabulary at UFFP.
Research questions The research is carried out in an attempt to answer the following questions: 1. What are the factors affecting students‟ learning of ESP vocabulary at UFFP? 2. What solutions should be suggested to help the students learn ESP vocabulary more effectively? 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Methods of the study The study was conducted using both quantitative and qualitative methods including questionnaires and interviews.
The quantitative data was collected through a survey delivered to 100 second-year students who have already completed their ESP course and qualitative data was obtained through interviews with four ESP teachers. Design of the study The minor thesis consists of three parts: Introduction, Development and Conclusion. The first part includes the rationale, the objectives, the methods, research questions, and the scope of the study as well as the organization of the thesis. The second part consists of three chapters.
Chapter 1 discusses the theoretical background of the research, which is related to the issues relevant to the topic of the research. Chapter 2 investigates the setting of the study, the participants, data collection instruments as well as procedures of data collection and data analysis. Chapter 3 deals with data analysis, discussion and major findings. The last part- Conclusion- restates the findings of the study, the concluding remarks and discusses the implications and limitations of the study as well as proposes some suggestions for further research.
Following this part are References and Appendix. 3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com PART II: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW Since the mid-1980s, various studies of vocabulary acquisition and related areas of lexical research in second language acquisition have been carried out. The role of vocabulary in second language learning and teaching has been given greater interest (Coady and Huckin, 1997). In this chapter, the important role of vocabulary in second language teaching and learning as well as classification of vocabulary learning and factors that affect vocabulary learning are presented and commented upon.
An overview of ESP 1. Definition of ESP According to Hutchinson and Walters (1987), ESP is an approach to language teaching in which all decisions as to content and methods are based on the learners‟ reason for learning. This means that ESP does not involve a particular kind of language teaching material or methodology. He clarifies that ESP is not a matter of teaching „specialized variety of English‟.
Teaching ESP should be based on the first instance on principles of effective and efficient learning. Robinson‟s definition is based on two key defining criteria and a number of characteristics that are generally found to be true of ESP. The key criteria are that ESP is “normally goal-directed” and that ESP courses develop from a needs analysis, which “aims to specify as closely as possible what exactly it is that students have to do through the medium of English” (Robinson: 1991:3).