VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES NGUYỄN THỊ HẢI YẾN FACTORS AFFECTING FIRST-YEAR MEDICAL TECHNOLOGY STUDENTS ON USING ELL SOFTWARE TO IMPROVE THEIR PRONUNCIATION AT A MEDICAL AND PHARMACEUTICAL UNIVERSITY IN VIETNAM (CÁC YẾU TỐ ẢNH HƯỞNG ĐẾN VIỆC SỬ DỤNG PHẦN MỀM ELL ĐỂ CẢI THIỆN KHẢ NĂNG PHÁT ÂM CHO SINH VIÊN KỸ THUẬT Y HỌC NĂM THỨ NHẤT TẠI MỘT TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC Y DƯỢC Ở VIỆT NAM) Master thesis Major: English Language Teaching Code: 60140111 HANOI - 2017 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES NGUYỄN THỊ HẢI YẾN FACTORS AFFECTING FIRST-YEAR MEDICAL TECHNOLOGY STUDENTS ON USING ELL SOFTWARE TO IMPROVE THEIR PRONUNCIATION AT A MEDICAL AND PHARMACEUTICAL UNIVERSITY IN VIETNAM (CÁC YẾU TỐ ẢNH HƯỞNG ĐẾN VIỆC SỬ DỤNG PHẦN MỀM ELL ĐỂ CẢI THIỆN KHẢ NĂNG PHÁT ÂM CHO SINH VIÊN KỸ THUẬT Y HỌC NĂM THỨ NHẤT TẠI MỘT TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC Y DƯỢC Ở VIỆT NAM) Master thesis Major: English Language Teaching Code: 60140111 Superviser: PhD. Hoàng Ngọc Tuệ HANOI - 2017 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com DECLARATION I hereby state that I Nguyen Thi Hai Yen, being an MA candidate of the Faculty of Postgraduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, certify my authorship of the study entitled ―Factors affecting first-year medical technology students on using ELL software to improve their pronunciation at a medical and pharmaceutical university in Vietnam.‖ The thesis is the study of my own research and the substance of the thesis has not, wholly or in part, been submitted for a degree to any other universities or institutions. Supervisor‟s signature Student‟s signature PhD. Hoàng Ngọc Tuệ Nguyễn Thị Hải Yến i LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ACKNOWLEDGMENT I would like to express my special thanks to my supervisor PhD.
Hoang Ngoc Tue for his constant guidance, suggestions, dedication and professionalism through my research. My deep gratitude goes to the lecturers of the Faculty of Postgraduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi for their thoughtful and fruitful lectures which have inspired me to conduct this study. I am also indebted to the staff and students of the Department of Foreign Languages at Haiphong University of Medicine and Pharmacy for their support and participation in my research. I wish to acknowledge, in particular, my family and my best friends who have encouraged me while I was accomplishing this study.
Finally, I would like to thank the readers who have patiently read and given valuable comments on this thesis. ii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT It is crucial for a language learner to have a good pronunciation of the language. CALL accordingly has a great potential to teach and learn pronunciation. Through much research has been undertaken on CALL, there exist a gap in investigating factors affecting the use of CALL to improve English pronunciation in a medical and pharmaceutical university when language students face many medical terminologies, especially in Vietnamese context.
In order to address such a gap, this study examines the use of a software program, students‘ motivation to use the program, the effectiveness of the program. This study seeks to contribute new understandings into using CALL to improve pronunciation and recommendations to use CALL effectively. The qualitative data are collected from students‘ learning sheets, classroom observation and students focus group, and content analysis is employed for the interpretation of the data. The results showed that the students agreed on a number of factors affecting the effective use of the software such as motivation, lack of training and policy climate.
Keywords: CALL, English pronunciation, focus group, learning sheet, classroom observation, content analysis iii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION. iii TABLE OF CONTENT. iv LIST OF FIGURES. vi LIST OF APPENDICES.
vi LIST OF ABBREVIATION. vii CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION. Statement of the problem. Objectives of the study.
Methods of the study. The significance of the study. 4 CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW. Role of pronunciation in language teaching and learning.
Challenges of teaching pronunciation. Benefits of using CALL software in EFL teaching and learning pronunciation. Challenges of using CALL software in EFL teaching and learning pronunciation. 12 CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY.
Context of the study. Description of the software program. 21 iv LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Focus group interview.
DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION. Benefits of ELL. The challenges of ELL. Discussions and recommendations.
Teacher and student training. Motivation for Student Self-Discipline. Limitations of the Study. Suggestions for Further Research .I Appendix 1: The congruence of research questions, literature reviews, conceptual framework, data collection methods, data sources, and data analysis .I Appendix 2: Student Focus Group Interview .IV Appendix 3: Student’s Learning Sheet.
V Appendix 4: Classroom observation .VI v LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Benefits and challenges of CALL. 16 Figure 2: Crotty‘s (1998) model of research design. 19 Figure 3: Data Collection Model. 22 LIST OF APPENDICES Appendix 1: The congruence of research questions, literature reviews, conceptual framework, data collection methods, data sources, and data analysis.
I Appendix 2: Student Focus Group Interview. IV Appendix 3: Student‘s Learning Sheet. V Appendix 4: Classroom observation. VI vi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF ABBREVIATION CALL: Computer Assisted Language Learning CAPT: Computer Assisted Pronunciation-Teaching CAP: Computer Assisted Pronunciation EFL: Learning English as a Foreign ESP: English for Specific Purposes vii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION This first chapter consists of five sections.
It begins with the statement of the research problem (section 1.2 provides the objectives of the study and research questions.4 present the methods of the study and the significance of the study. The last section in this first chapter (section 1.5) presents the thesis outline. Statement of the problem In recent decades, due to the impacts of globalization, English is increasingly used as an international language (Jenkins, 1998). Pronunciation is becoming more and more important for successful communication (Stephens, Silbert, & Hasson, 2010).
The use of spoken language to establish successful communication also becomes the general goals of language teaching (Kelly, 2006). This reality has realized a new level-headed discussion about models, objectives and especially, the techniques used for teaching speaking and pronunciation. Much research has dealt with teaching English pronunciation and problems learners confront in English pronunciation and the research proposed that the teaching and learning of English pronunciation take time (Levis & Grant, 2003; Sifakis & Sougari, 2005). As a matter of fact, communication may break down when individuals pronounce erroneously.
Besides, students with great pronunciation are usually more capable speakers and more fruitful language students than those with poor pronunciation (Kelly, 2006). Understanding the roles of learning and teaching English pronunciation, the researcher has had great effort to help students pronounce English better, however, the job meets with many difficulties. Meanwhile, 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com students, from a medical and pharmaceutical university, have to deal with a large number of terminologies every lesson. Moreover, teaching English pronunciation is not included in the curriculum.
In order to solve these problems, the researcher attempt investigate students‘ use of ELL software program to improve English pronunciation. To validate the problem of this study, the researcher did a pilot study of the previous semester class. The findings showed that besides it was a great software program and students had great motivation to study at first, they did not see significant improvements in their pronunciation. Learning about applying software to improve pronunciation, the researcher found that the successful software application depends on many factors such as the pedagogical requirements (Murray & Barnes, 1998; Pennington, 1999; Price, 1998; Warschauer & Healey, 1998; Watts, 1997), the age, motivation for learning second or foreign language as well as the amount of feedback and the smooth-run of the systems or of technical failures (Piske, MacKay, & Flege, 2001) and so on.
At this point, this research attempts to find out the specific factors that affect the first- year medical technology students on using ELL software and make suggestions for the effective use of the software. The literature review showed that there exists a gap in Vietnamese context to identify benefits and challenges of using CALL to teach and learn English pronunciation. In this sense, the researcher would like to conduct the study ―Factors affecting first- year medical technology students on using ELL software to improve their pronunciation at a medical and pharmaceutical university in Vietnam‖. Objectives of the study Research objectives are the results found by the researcher at the end of the research process, i.
what the researcher will be able to achieve at the end 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com of the research study. In other words, the objectives of a research project summarize what is to be achieved by the study (Clement, 2010). Objectives should be closely related to the statement of the problem. In this study, the objectives are to: - Identify the factors that influence students when they use ELL software to improve their pronunciation.
- Give recommendations in using software to improve students‘ pronunciation more effectively. To achieve these objectives, the researcher observed the class and took notes of the teaching and learning procedures, asked students to write a learning sheet in every lesson, and at the end of the research project, students were divided into four focus group interviews. The research project lasted in 15 weeks in the first semester when the students – participants just entered the university. The participants were 28 first – year medical technology students.
Methods of the study This study is conducted as a qualitative approach. The reasons for the adoption was that qualitative design allows the researcher to obtain the way students use ELL software (Merriam, 2002) and the factors influence the students in using ELL software and give the commendations in order to improve their English pronunciation. Qualitative data were collected via a combination of different instruments namely classroom observation, learning sheet and group focus interview. Besides, the collected data from the research instruments were analyzed in the light of content analysis (O‘Dwyer, 2004).
The significance of the study There has been much research in teaching and learning pronunciation and teaching and learning pronunciation using technology. However, there exists a gap in which this study provides an overview about the factors that 3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com influence medical and pharmaceutical students into the application of software to improve pronunciation to fulfil. The results of the study are beneficial for both institutions and teachers who are wondering whether to use the software to support their teaching more effectively and students who are in use of the software to improve their pronunciation. Thesis outline This thesis is presented in five chapters.
This introductory chapter describes the statement of the problem which explains why the researcher proposed this thesis. It introduces research objectives, the method of the study and the significance of the study. Chapter two reviews the literature focusing on role of pronunciation and teaching pronunciation, challenges of teaching pronunciation, benefits and challenges of using CALL to improve English pronunciation. Chapter three presents a detailed description of the research methodology.
This chapter starts with a description of the context of the study, the research design. Then, the data collection methods and procedure are outlined. Chapter four reports the data analysis and discussions from the findings Chapter five summarizes all the main ideas expressed throughout the research, contributions and limitations of the study as well as suggests further research. 4 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.