Some suggested solutions for ineffective teaching and learning English at Ha Van Mao highschool

Some suggested solutions for ineffective teaching and learning English at Ha Van Mao highschool 1 1 INTRODUCTION 1 1 Rational In Vietnam, English has become a compulsory subject from Primary Three in Vietnam since 2010 and is gradually being introduced even earlier into the curriculum in many schools This highlights the official importance of English in both education and society Nevertheless, students who are generally weak in English language learning were found in many parts of the countries[.]

1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Rational

In Vietnam, English has become a compulsory subject from Primary Three in Vietnam since 2010 and is gradually being introduced even earlier into the curriculum in many schools This highlights the official importance of English in both education and society Nevertheless, students who are generally weak in English language learning were found in many parts of the countries especially in the mountainous areas

Ha Van Mao high school is one of the highschools locating in Ba Thuoc district that is in the poor religion with special difficulties in Thanh Hoa Province It is home of two ethnic groups: the Muong and the Thai According to a survey of result of English in the National Examination, I have conducted in this school for many years, students score very low in English The average mark they get is only under mark 2 In additionally, the most frequently asked question I hear is why many high-school graduates cannot use English in even the most simple daily conversations Students can not remember any English word although they have learnt it for a long time.What are the reasons of this, what can improve their learning process is

my question during teaching English at Ha Van Mao high school

Hence, I have chosen the topic for my thesis namely “Some suggested

solutions for ineffective teaching and learning English at Ha Van Mao highschool” I hope that this research can give a few benefits to teachers,

students and related others

1.2 Objectives of the study

The main objectives of this study are as follows:

 To identify the causes of teaching and learning English ineffectively at Ha Van Mao highschool

 To suggest some solutions which could be useful to raise the result of teaching and learning English at Ha Van Mao highschool

1.3 Scope of the study

For the limitation of time, conditions, and materials, this study only focuses on finding the causes of teaching and learning English ineffectively From that, some solutions are suggested to improve it This thesis is also carried out on some English teachers and 176 students of 4 classes which I was in charge for English in school year 2015-2016

1 Class 11A4 (44 students)

2 Class 11A5 (45 students)

3 Class 12A5 (43 students)

4 Class 12A6 (44 students)

1.4 Methods of the study

Carrying out this research, the following methods have been used:

 Theoretical study

 Survey (questionaire)

 Interview

 Class observation

1.5 New aspect of the study

 This study finds out the real causes of ineffective English teaching and learning at Ha Van Mao highschool that has not been caried out before

 The suggested solutions linking real situation have been applied and have shown its effectiveness

2 CONTENT

2.1 Theoretical background

“Many of us believe that learners have certain characteristics which lead to more or less successful language learning”, (Lightbown, P.M & Spada, N 1999) There are many factors affecting language learning of the learners

Weiner, B (qtd in Williams, M & Burden, R.L 1997: 105) suggested that, on the whole, people tend to refer to four main sets of attributions for their perceived success and failures in life: ability, effort, luck, the perceived difficulty of the task with which they are faced

In other field, Spolsky, B (1998) shows us many other factors: attitude, intelligence, aptitude, learning strategies, personality, material, motivation, memory, training strategies, social context Many other researchers agree that they can be divided into two groups: internal factors and external factors Weiner, B (qtd in Williams, M & Burden, R.L 1997) saw that internal factors arise from inside and external ones are from the outside the learners

2.1.1.Internal factors

Internal factors are those that the individual language learner brings with him or her to the particular learning situation

2.1.1.1.Age

Second language acquisition is influenced by the age of the learner Children, who already have solid literacy skills in their own language, seem to

be in the best position to acquire a new language efficiently Motivated, older learners can be very successful too, but usually struggle to achieve native-speaker-equivalent pronunciation and intonation

2.1.1.2.Personality

Introverted or anxious learners usually make slower progress,

particularly in the development of oral skills They are less likely to take advantage of opportunities to speak, or to seek out such opportunities More outgoing students will not worry about the inevitability of making mistakes They will take risks, and thus will give themselves much more practice

2.1.1.3.Motivation (intrinsic)

Intrinsic motivation has been found to correlate strongly with educational achievement Clearly, students who enjoy language learning and take pride in their progress will do better than those who don't

2.1.1.4.Experiences

Learners who have acquired general knowledge and experience are in

a stronger position to develop a new language than those who haven't The student, for example, who has already lived in 3 different countries and been exposed to various languages and cultures has a stronger base for learning a further language than the student who hasn't had such experiences

2.1.1.5.Cognition

In general, it seems that students with greater cognitive abilities

(intelligence) will make the faster progress Some linguists believe that there

is a specific, innate language learning ability that is stronger in some students than in others

2.1.1.6.Native language

Students who are learning a second language which is from the same language family as their first language have, in general, a much easier task than those who aren't For example, a Dutch child will learn English more quickly than a Japanese child

2.1.2.External factors

External factors are those that characterize the particular language learning situation

2.1.2.1.Curriculum

For students in particular it is important that the totality of their

educational experience is appropriate for their needs Language learning is less likely to place if students are fully submersed into the mainstream

program without any extra assistance or, conversely, not allowed to be part of the mainstream until they have reached a certain level of language

proficiency

2.1.2.2.Instruction

Clearly, some language teachers are better than others at providing appropriate and effective learning experiences for the students in their

classrooms These students will make faster progress

The same applies to mainstream teachers in second language situations The science teacher, for example, who is aware that she too is responsible for the students' English language development, and makes certain accommodations, will contribute to their linguistic development

2.1.2.3.Culture and status

There is some evidence that students in situations where their own culture has a lower status than that of the culture in which they are learning the language make slower progress

2.1.2.4.Motivation (extrinsic)

Students who are given continuing, appropriate encouragment to learn

by their teachers and parents will generally fare better than those who aren't For example, students from families that place little importance on language learning are likely to progress less quickly

2.1.2.5.Access to native speakers

The opportunity to interact with native speakers both within and

outside of the classroom is a significant advantage Native speakers are

linguistic models and can provide appropriate feedback Clearly,

second-language learners who have no extensive access to native speakers are likely

to make slower progress, particularly in the oral/aural aspects of language acquisition

2.2.Practical background

According to a survey of the result of English in school year 2014-2015

I conducted in Ha Van Mao high school, English is the subject that sudent

performed the worst The data used were the English result at the end of

school year matched with information on students’ achievement in the

General Certificate of Secondary Education (schoolyear 2014-2015)

Firstly, according to English level resust of school year 2014-2015 The rate of students got average result is 54% and 26% out of them got bad result, too bad one was 8% None of them got excellent and only 6% of students got good grade

Secondly, none of students gets excellent or good mark in the General Certificate of Secondary Education 267 students (76%) got the mark (from 2 point to 3.5 point) There were only 2 students getting mark 7 The others got below 2point Basing on the data, one can see that the English learning quality among the students in Ha Van Mao highschool was low

Thirdly, there has been none of students getting the prize in the excellent student contest for many years Specialy, the only studen chosen to take exam got only 6.4/20 point

Only 7 students in comparison wih 120 students who took the University entrance examination chose English as special subject to win a place at university in school year 2014-2015

Although students have been learning English since secondary, many students can not eventually read or write any word in English

English is considered as one of the core subjects in curiculumn and in the National Examination However, most students do not like learning English ,even dislike They often find challenges in learning this subject

The given data show the insufficient awareness of the important role of English and ineffective teaching and learning English at Ha Van Mao highschol

2.3 Causes of the problem

2.3.1.Social context

2.3.1.1 The prevention of their mother tongue

Social context reveals to be another main hindrance to ethnic minority students’ English learning Minority students mainly used their mother tongue

to communicate inside their families and communities while at school they have to learn Vietnamese to study and communicate with other people In the English lessons, they comprehended by listening and reading, switching into their native language and then translating or changing into Vietnamese and then English again In addition, the pronunciation of their native language is much different from that of English and Vietnamese Therefore, studying English via Vietnamese is very challenging

There are 1027 students divided into 25 classes at Ha Van Mao higschool The number of minority students accounts for 87% They mainly use Thai and Muong in conversation Some of them even speak Vietnamese unclearly This causes difficulty for teaching and learning English

2.3.1.2.School facilities

The following important affecting factor has been found out is learning condition and school facilities It is a fact that Ha Van Mao high school in the study is poorly facilitated

 Class size is quite crowded (about 40 to 47 students)

 All the teaching facilities the English teachers have is textbook, chalk,board and 3 cassette tapes

 There are not many books, stories, pictures, CDs in school library The only book students can get is text book

In a poor learning condition, the ethnic students cannot acquire a foreign language as well as those who enjoy much better learning conditions

2.3.1.3 Condiion of living

Though most of the students have parental support to go to school (that

is more advantageous than those in some other mountainous areas), their poor living conditions and low economic status still prevent them from spending enough time and concentration on learning all subjects in general and English

in particular What is more, English is considered as “luxury” subject which is not familiar with learners living in mountainous area Community attitudes towards the language being learnt can have a profound impact on learners where the community has a broadly negative view of the target language and its speakers, or a negative view of its relation to them, learning is typically difficult

It is evident that ethnic students fundamentally lack an environment to practice English Almost the students have no English learning equipment, such as records, CDs, or short stories, internet at home Even in the class, where they are taught English, they do not have many chances to

communicate in English either Hence, it is difficult for the ethnic students get success in English

Students can not have other sources to improve their Engish Even do they want to get reference books, they can not find them anywhere Only textbook is often sold at book shop in Ba Thuoc

2.3.1.4 Shortage of teacher

Most English teachers come from the plain areas to the mountain areas

to work Therefore, it happens instability in quantity of teacher

According to Truong Thi Thanh, a student of class 11A5 said that she had begun to learn English at 6th grade However, learning English prosses was interrupted by shortage of English teacher in school year 2010- 2011 At her school – Điền Thượng lower secondary school, there was only one English teacher for 12 classes When the teacher tranferred her work, or she was ill led to discontinualty of students’ English learning Therefore, the qualiy of learning English has been affected since secondary lower school

In real situation, only one teacher out of 6 teachers is native in English group at Ha Van Mao highschool Gradually, it happens the tranferring among the teachers causing lack of concentration on teaching

2.3.2.The textbook

The textbook makes disadvantages for both teachers and students As a result, most of the students and the teachers in the study are not in favored of their textbook All of them find it too difficult for students to learn and for teachers to design and adapt the tasks They state that the content of the book

is remote from the students’ daily lives Furthermore, the students are overwhelmed by a large amount of vocabulary They wish to have a textbook which is somehow easier and less communicative ability required so that both the teachers and the students can accomplish their tasks

2.3.3.For the teachers

2.3.3.1 Teaching strategies

Teaching strategies must be taken into account All the data shown in the study prove that the teachers’ teaching strategies are not interesting enough to draw their students’ attention and interest The techniques and activities employed in their lessons seem to be monotonous For example, the teachers keep delivering the new language items orally and by writing on the board most of the time in Vietnamese or little English while students just look

at the board and take notes Also, students are frequently asked to work individually Pair work and group work are rarely used The interaction among teachers and students is only realized by the teachers’ few questions and students’ answers It may be concluded that the teachers simply follow the framework of the textbook and teach what is required in syllabus Hence, the teaching strategies used by the teachers in certain circumstance are not in

relevance and effectiveness.

Despite all the talk online and among innovative language teachers, the truth is that the grammar syllabus and approach still rules in this world The evaluation to be successful in this kind of examination, only a good grasp of vocabulary, some grammatical points, and reading comprehension are sufficient Therefore, teacher only focuses on teaching grammar

2.3.3.2 Teacher quality

The collected information proves that the Engish teachers of Ha Van Mao highschool are mainly young and not very experienced in their teaching They often have 5- 10 year experience More than a half of English teachers quantity is women who are looking after children Due to that limitation, the teachers may not have enough time to try out on many ways of teaching; they need time to find out the most suitable and effective methods and techniques

to apply in their teaching for ethnic minority students

2.3.3.3 Living condition

These teachers showed that although they loved the job as a teacher, they had not really kept their minds on their work because of their hard lives and poor working and living conditions Almost teachers there lived in the tenement house with a lot of shortage.Those daily disadvantages sometimes made them have not much enthusiasm for their work

2.3.4.For students

2.3.4.1 Study method

In general, it is evident that the students surveyed have the traditional way of learning English Because of their low living standard together with poor learning condition at school, the students do not have many choices of what strategies they should follow to improve their English They just passively acquire it like the way they use with other subjects

They just passively acquire English from what they learn in the class then practice by doing homework, and they have not found or applied any active strategies to improve their target language

2.3.4.2 Motivation

For most learners, learning English is a duty — something that they have to, but they don’t want to do They don’t see pleasure in learning English These students have low motivation to participate in class, and they simply try to get a passing mark to get rid of the course

Another demotivating factor is that English is considered as a general subject compared to special subjects such as physics, chemistry, mathematics and biology Only few students attend the classes to learn some special points

to be successful in examination such as grammar and vocabulary However ,the number of these is not much

2 4 Some suggested solutions

From these findings the researcher would like to give some suggestions, to some extent, may help the teachers and learners in their teaching and learning process

2.4.1.For social context

2.4.1.1.Improving learning and teaching conditions

Improving learning conditions such as school buildings, classroom facilities and learning equipments plays an important role in raising the quality of teaching and learning English In fact, projectors have been equipped for all classes since school year 2015-2016 The English teachers have enough materials such as cassetles, radio, projector to make lesson easier

Morever, a classroom with 20 computers connected internet has been spent for students to search information More fund is used to buy more book ,which helps students to get various sources in school library Both of them bring effective result in learning English

2.4.1.2 Having ethnic minority teachers to teach English for students in their communities

As shown in the survey, 87% students in the study are all ethnic minority students They all use their native language to communicate in their families and communities In a triangular language environment, students face difficulties in both learning English and Vietnamese If the minority teachers

of English are available, these ones can teach minority children more effectively as they can understand students’ strengths and weaknesses in learning a foreign language Furthermore, it is easier for both teachers and learners to exchange ideas The teaching and learning process will be more successful when the teachers and learners can make themselves fully understood Morever, the minority teachers often have no intention of tranferring work location, therefore it may keep stability in teacher staffs

2.4.1.3 Raising the awareness of the importance of English

It is suggested that raising the awareness of the importance of English through parents society meeting or class meeting, linking school-based with family- and society-based education and creating an effective English education environment at Ha Va Mao high school should be done

Creating vocational activities by inviting old students who have got achivements or students of higher eduction They will share their knowledge

of importance of English in choosing career and applying for good job

The suggestion that English shoud be one of the core subjects in National examiation and highschool entrance examination should be given so that the students have better awareness of English since lower grades

2.4.1.4.Raising the quality of students

Raising the quality of students chosen in grade 10 through firmly

evaluating students results

2.4.2 For Engish group

2 4.2.1.English book club

I would like to recommend that the English group should be energetic and enthusiastic to associate with other schools and associations such as the Youth Union in town or even in cities to hold “ English book club” which can collect from students and teachers old stories, CDs, pictures of places or refference books and so on so that the students can make use of them

In school year 2015-2016,with the association of the Youth Union, we create an English book club with 125 participants at Ha Van Mao highschool There are more 470 kinds of English books, magazines mainly asked from teachers and old students Some of them are boughts by fund As a member of club, students can read, borrow or exchange English book It meets the demand of students of English references

2.4.2.2.English club

An English Club should be set up to increase the awareness and skills

of students in the English language through the integration of communication and information technologies, arts and the promotion of the institutional

values

“Ha Van Mao English club” has been established since 2015-2016, which provides an opportunity for English language learners to practise using English in a relaxing and friendly

The “Ha Van Mao English Club” is moderated by English teachers The principles of a club are students of 3 grades who love learning English

Up to now the number of members has risen to 104 The number of students

in 4 classes for which I was in charge joined in the club was different

1 Class 11A4: 5 students

2 Class 11A5: 12 students

3 Class 12A5: 15 students

4 Class 12A6: 7students

English club holders design many different and interesting activities included

 Bio-data writing

 Newspaper reading

 Story telling

 Learning new words

 Joke collection

 Puzzles

 Singing and acting in a play

Up to now, “Ha Van Mao English club” is gradually hold twice a month It has invited the participation of the two clubs from the Ba thuoc 1 and Cam thuy3 Thanks for the frequent holding of the clubs and the visiting

of new friends, students can have better not only social relationship skills but also sharpen their English skills

Through observation, I realize that the students joining in the club participated actively in all the events They become more confident in using English than others They are easier to connect with others and English ability

is improved

Sample topic of march:future job

Activity1: List some jobs through game: facing

Activity 2:Participants can work in pairs, small groups or can talk together as a whole group and discuss about the job he/she likes best

Actvity 3:They prepare a presentation

Activity4: guessing game

I work as…….(a job)

2.4.2.3 Creating some extracurricular activities

Extracurricular activities are student experiences and activities that are not included in the educational curriculum These activities are a significant part of education It has been proved that extracurricular activities are as necessary as regular classes for development of skills (Tenhouse, 2003; Eccles, 2003) Furthermore, extracurricular activities are good opportunities for students to achieve their curricular goals Students discover and develop their skills through these activities for achievement Extracurricular activities are performed at all levels of schools in many different ways such as sports, clubs, debate, music, art, school newspaper

In school year 2015-2016, English group cooperated with other organizations to hold interesting programmes named: English singing contest With the full participation of classes, there were 20 competitors with

25 wonderful shows made students have a good experience with English

2.4.3 For teacher:

2.4.3.1 Using relevant and useful teaching techniques

The easiest way is to give the students more chances to play games, sing songs, take part in plays and competitions in English For students, they are usually active and love to join the games and competition to show their ability In addition, they are in favor of songs and plays It is easier for them

to learn by heart new words through songs and plays When they can sing songs or act as a character in a play, they will be more confident to speak English Games, songs and plays as well can be used both in normal English lessons and everyweek optional lessons Hence, teachers should organize games, plays, songs and even a small competition to encourage the children and warm up the classroom atmosphere After such activities, teachers may give good comments and present the winners or the best ones small gifts which will leave sweet memories in students’ mind

2.4.3.2 Creating English environment