Action research on teaching and assessment for learning service learning for english majors at thu dau mot university

AWARENESS OF SILENCE IN VIETNAMESE CLASSROOM Nguyen Thanh Xuan Faculty of Foreign Languages Thu Dau Mot University Abstract This paper research draws out several ideas and beliefs ab

Service Learning for English Majors

at Thu Dau Mot University

Nguy ễn Hoàng Tuấn

Nguy ễn Kim Hải

Faculty of Foreign Languages Thu Dau Mot University

Introduction

The Service Learning Project for English Majors at Thu Dau Mot University is a

form of experiential education The purpose of this project is to help students see the connections between their service experience and the school curriculum Students will also learn how to transfer knowledge and skills from one setting to another More importantly, this is an opportunity for students to strengthen their character and enrich their emotional life

The project is voluntary in nature At the pilot stage, 28 senior students in the Foreign Language Faculty participated in the project under the supervision of the Student Union leader who is also the faculty lecturer Two teachers of English who have been working in the hospitality and tourism industry are invited to give feedback on the

students’ reflection writing

Preparation and orientation

Classroom based preparation includes a session on the concepts of service learning and the benefits it brings to the students and the community, discussion on the implementation plan and the responsibilities of those who are involved in the project including the faculty members, voluntary teachers from other institutions, and the English majored students who are going to take a six-week internship

Students were also asked to respond to the following questions:

What is service learning?

What are you looking forward to?

What are you nervous about?

What do you think you might learn from this project?

One student defined service learning as “a social activity to help poor children and

some poor workers who are facing with school fee problems and staying in [a] low living condition in Thu Dau Mot city” With this definition in mind, students were

oriented toward teaching the homeless/poor children between the ages of 7 and 15

The participants consider their task as a “mission’ and they find it necessary to equip

themselves with teaching methods and knowledge of the target language and psychology

A survey of the organizations for the homeless children in Thu Dau Mot city (Binh Duong province) is conducted to identify those organizations that need help There are 12 English classes in the following communities in Thu Dau Mot city: Phu Loi, Phu Hoa, Phu My, Phu Tho, Phu Tan, Tan An, Hiep Thanh, Chanh My, Dinh Hoa, Hoa Phu

The training workshop conducted by a faculty member empowered them with confidence The training workshop lasted 3 morning sessions focusing on teaching

children the four language skills using the textbook titled Super Kids

Implementation of the project

The pilot project was carried out in 8 weeks in Thu Dau Mot city Through service learning, students experienced many different states of emotion They felt scared at the idea of delivering their first lessons as reported in their reflection writing

“I was so nervous when I joined this program I will take a chance to a new

position which I never had before I do not know [whether] the children like

me or not I wonder how I am able to cope with if the children do not come to

my class, and how I deal with them if my teaching method does not work”

After the first lesson, they felt a little bit confident and they were able to focus on solving problems in the classroom

“…Spending the first two days teaching the students, I feel so strange and

confused I need to study more about the psychology to keep up with their mind Moreover, I need to use new teaching method to make them enjoy their class Besides, the children [are] sometimes good, but sometimes too naughty, [which] made me confused I do not know what method I can use to control

all of their emotions.”

Classroom observation and feedback

Classroom observations reveal the fact that the internship students are very devoted

to their teaching tasks as it can be seen in the time and energy they spent making teaching aids and hand -made gifts for their children To them, service learning does not mean simply a form of internship It means something more than that It is a wonderful opportunity for sharing and caring

“The special thing today is my teacher, Mrs Hai, spent one hour observing

my class I as well as my children felt so nervous However, we eventually cooperated well, which makes my lesson successful It sounds so good for my

attempts.”

Feedback on students’ reflection writing also indicates progress in their

communicative performance Their final reports are the result of hard work and patience that deserve highest grade

Here are some photos taken from our classroom:

Figure 1 Testing time

Figure 2 Learning time

Figure 3 Break time

Learning outcomes

 Meet a recognized community need: The students were aware that many

children need help Through their personal communication with the project coordinator, they expressed their surprise at the fact that there are too many poor children around them Being excessively protected by their parents, they missed the

chance to observe life It’s fortunate that they joined the project and thus knew more

about the society They felt that it was their responsibility to help the children with love and care

“They hope that I will teach [them] in long time Because some teachers just

taught them [for] two or three weeks and they do not teach anymore They worry about that They make me love them and love this work With this class,

I think I need to teach them [with] love and care They need my love I won’t try to work I will work by my heart.”

 Achieve curricular objectives: The students were required to keep their

teaching journals Through reflection writing, their writing competence was

improved Students also met many writing objectives while completing their internship report

 Reflect through the service-learning experience: The students were

encouraged to reflect on the project through class discussions, journal writing, and social networking

 Develop student responsibility: The students developed responsibility by

choosing the activities that they found relevant to the learners’ needs and by

organizing fund raising activities

 Establish community partnerships: The project coordinator contacted the

local authority to maintain continuity of the project

 Equip students with knowledge and skills needed for their future careers:

Students learned about how to cope with emerging situations:

“I am afraid how many letters they can remember because they not only study but also sell lotteries In fact, they don’t have free time to review what they

have learnt on the previous day Moreover, there are some children [who] are

in grade 1 [….] They only speak out what they think in their mind incorrectly because they can’t remember anything I think this is the most problem I need

to find out another method to help them remember new words easily.”

 Enrich their emotional life:

“It was surprising that we received roses from Cò And at that time, we knew the reason why he was late Actually, we didn’t know what to say, we just

know to give many thanks to him and his parent […] I felt happy not because

of the rose but because of his heart.”

Conclusion

Through this project, students strengthened their communication skills while discovering their personal power to make positive changes in their communities Motivation, communication skills, leadership, and compassion increased through various service-learning activities

Students should be placed in challenging situations so that they can move from observation to experience to leadership The important thing is to help them make

adjustments at various stages in the process As one student remarked, “This is an

experience for me I learned to observe and know how to improvise in many different situations This is really necessary for me later The way I see things around me will make other people more interested and can help [make] my image more beautiful in

the eyes of other people.”

It is also important to maintain on-going faculty-guided reflection to challenge the students to analyze their new experiences

AWARENESS OF SILENCE IN VIETNAMESE

CLASSROOM

Nguyen Thanh Xuan Faculty of Foreign Languages Thu Dau Mot University

Abstract

This paper research draws out several ideas and beliefs about reticence in language learning context which is challenging to teachers during the teaching process Though silence has involved in almost every classroom situation, this aspect

of education has not been significantly exploited Therefore, in this paper, by using the questionnaire, interview and observation methodologies, we would like to

explore several factors influencing language learners’ silence Besides that, two

dimensions of silence, positive and negative sides, are also represented in our overall finding When considering silence as basic drawbacks in learning, we acquire

several suggested solutions that help students break their silence as well as teachers’ classroom activities that encourage students’ talking participation In the theme of

silence in language education, some learning strategies are mentioned and well described to the contrary

Introduction

The economic renovation policy, pursued by our Government, has enhanced the need for English-speaking people who are expected to be able to communicate fluently with the people from other countries in the world and to collect new technology English has been compulsory in school textbooks According to the

Prime Minister’s Decree, issued in 1995, all the Government officers have to be

competent to communicate in English However, English language teaching in our nation, because of its low quality, has not met the need for competent English –

speaking people in the new social context In fact, Vietnamese teachers show their great interest in new methodologies, learner-centered one at the beginning, but later they return to traditional way, teacher-centered one Which factors make teachers head back to their traditional ways? There are a variety of reasons: a load curriculum; over-sized classrooms, lack of technology advances… Especially most of them

attribute their lesson success to their students’ participation In particular, teachers

sometimes try to break the ice, but learners are too passive to accept in English classes What is more, most learners just keep silent in the classes and just learn what

teachers provide, which makes the communicative teaching and learning method fall

in vain

Thus, is silence important? Is it good or bad for teaching and learning language?

In this paper, we discuss to what degree such a communicative approach fits Vietnamese pedagogical contexts on the basic of an analysis of four facts: first, internal and external factors which consist of positive and negative effects; second,

teachers’ and learners’ perspective on silence; third, learning strategies due to learners’ silence; and last, suggested solutions for negative effects of silence The

conclusions we will draw are that the pedagogical contexts in Vietnam are both supportive of and constraining to communicative teaching practices and that to make English teaching responsive to the needs of Vietnamese there should be some macro-changes as well as the methodological mediation in silent classes

Literature review

A great number of linguistic researchers and experts have had various definitions, concepts and viewpoints of silence in language classroom In my opinion, the learners remain silent in class because of internal and external factors

Internal factors

First of all, learners’ intra-personal intelligence, self smart is one of internal

factors that effects on the silence of language learning (Ken Petress, 2001) The learners who are strong in this intelligence need times alone for writing, getting deep into books and thinking much more than giving speech or participating in class activities Intra-personally sharp learners will suffer from socialization and communication, so they always remain silent even they seem to be absentminded, slow or inactive although they have deep knowledge Balas (2000) pointed out, silence does not mean that learners lack of knowledge, so the silence of these learners

is the positive way to learn, to think, to remember and to complete what they want

to access effectively as Picard (1948, 1952) claimed that “silence is nothing merely

negative; it is not the mere absent of speech, it is a positive, a complete world itself” (p.1) Dauenhauer (1980) claimed that “silence in its own right can be seen to make

a positive contribution in the scope of the meaningful” (p.104) Besides, each

individual has different learning styles Intra-personal intelligent learners are interested in silent learning way because they firmly believe that silence as a means

of participation and keeping silent in speaking class is also a learning style Meyer (2007), Meyer & Hunt (2004) suggested that learners find silence is a way of cognitive engagement with course material and some learners prefer to do so rather than participating orally It certainly makes intuitive sense that some learners may learn more by listening to class discussion than by contributing comments orally Similarly, Nakane (1970), Dwyer & Heller-Murphy (1996) highlight the preference

of Japanese learners who remain silent because “silence in the speaking class is also one ways of learning styles” On the other hand, some learners think that the speaking

learners know nothing, but the silence learners know everything as Kalamaras (1994) reiterated Lao-tzu’s observation that “those who know, don’t talk and those who talk don’t know” (p.218) In general, the intra-personal intelligent learners prefer

thinking much more than what they have ever said, they are involved in deep thinking while they just seem totally inactive to us, their teachers, and their peers This personality shapes their silence learning style in language classroom

Next, another internal factor that influence on the silent atmosphere in language

classroom is the learners’ reticent personality These learners have tendency to keep

silent, refuse to participate or talk to their peers, their teachers They especially prefer

self isolate from learning communicative According to the article “The Ethics of

Student Classroom Silence” (Ken Petress, 2001), the reticent learners are less likely

to apply, extend, or transfer what is learned than are non-reticent learners The reticent learners are typically self-absorbed and needs compassionate, but insistent, encouragement and enablement to participate Because of this reticence, they

consider silence as the most powerful learning styles as Picard (1963) “the silence

man seems to be more powerful than the speaking man, silence seems more powerful than the language; but silence has this power only because it is from silence of the

language comes, because it contains language ” (p121)

Last but not least, the learners who remain silent in language classroom by other characteristics as Ken Petress (2001) included : (1) anxiety- the learners feel so nervous or worry so they cannot speak out any word, (2) low self esteem - learners who think of themselves as unworthy or unable tend to remain silent out of shame; (3) fear of being ridiculed should they inappropriately or inaccurately respond - unfortunately, such fears can manifest themselves in self-fulfilling prophesies where

a learner knowingly answers or responds inappropriately thus validating their fears; (4) fear of success - this occurs when a learner interacts successfully; self-attributes their success to luck or accident; (5) to avoid conflict - inexperienced, shy, or less competent communicators rely upon silence in avoiding conflict scenarios Similarly, Hu & Fell-Eisenkraft (2003) break silence in four themes: “silence as a result of being shy”, “silence as a result of not having correct answers”, “silence as

a result of unfamiliarity with talking to learn” and “silence as a result of lack of

confidence in speaking the English language

External factors

Together with the internal factors as mentioned above, the external factors much less have influence on the silence of learners in language classroom First, different culture is one view to interpret silence in classroom as considered cultural approach which points out the culturally different understanding of silence (Hu & Fell-Eisenkraft, 2003) This view point also support by the research of Kato (2001) He reported that cultural differences in learning styles between Australian exchange learners in Japan and their Japanese counterparts in Australia contribute to different styles of participation Japanese learners tend to remain silent in class more than

Australian learners Two opposite points of view while Australian learners are

consider the silence of Japanese learners “immature” since they “do not express their opinions”; Japanese learners consider Australian learners’ verbosity as “immature” because “they always express clearly what they want” Scallon (1985) and Giles et

al., (1992) have shown that silence is associated with the negative values in Western culture (lack of interest; unwillingness to communicate, rejection; interpersonal incompatibility; shyness) Johannesen (1974) noted that the meaning of silence

varies one culture to another “the roles assigned to silence in human communication vary from culture to culture” (p.27) For example, Forestier (1998) quote mainland

Chinese learners as saying that “our culture is very different from western culture,

we are always taught to obey not to invent”, learners just listen, obey and keep

silence, refrain speaking out In Vietnam, many learners remain silence in classroom because they have been deep influenced by cultural tradition as our ancestors ever

claimed the important of silence as “silence is golden” or we just give speech when you know clearly something, if not, keep silent and listen to “the cobbler should stick

to his last” This makes learners become more passive and unconfident in class

participation Besides, the Vietnamese tradition of having a deep gratitude towards

teacher, the important role of teacher “no guide, no realization” or teacher autonomy,

is also a factor that controls the learners’ speaking activities Next, learners are silent

in class because of class organization, inappropriate circumstances and learning strategies Like Pond, Goldstein, Schecter (2003) & Losey (1997) argued that Mexican-American learners keep silent in class because of classroom organization They do a research with Mexican American learners studying in a college in Central California by exploring educational, historical, educational, economical factors and

found out learners’ levels are various such as the level of community, of the college,

of the classroom, and of the individual “focal” learners These varieties are proved

that the silence of Mexican- American learners emerged from the structure of interaction between teachers and learners in both the course of assignments and in

class talks Interactions provide “few opportunities to offer opinions on topics of interest or importance to them” Finally, biological sex, degree level and class size

are some ways that influences participation and classroom interaction as Fassinger (1995, 1996) has been found learner sex is considered a significant component of

learners’ participation He and his colleagues concluded that “chilly classroom climate” existed for female college learners (Fassinger, 1995, 1996 & Jone, 1997)

and some previous studies showed that males in the classroom are also more orally

active However, Howard ad Henney (1998) found little support for the “chilly climate” hypothesis as females and non-traditional learners participated more than

did males and traditional learners To the degree level and class size, Aulls (2004) showed that participation varies by experience, the age of learners, the course level, and the class size Due to the nature of course, instruction methods, and previous classroom experiences common in undergraduate and graduate programs, degree level of class may have connection to the engagement styles Specifically, comparing

to the undergraduate courses, graduate courses often tend to be smaller in size, frequently use discussion-based instructional methods, and require learners to orally

participate The size of a class may directly influence the amount of learners’

participation As the size of the class increases the amount of learner participation decreases (Constantinople, Cornelius & Gray, 1988)

METHODOLOGY

Research participants and locations

Due to L2 learners’ significantly different perspectives, there is a need to

assemble data from numerous environments including high school and language centers in HCM city in order to get accurate appraisal The interviewers include not only 3-5 year experienced teachers but also 15-22 year-old learners in this research All questions for questionnaire, interview, observation and discussion are in the same thread The objective of changing questions for an appropriate format is to be authentic of this research In particular, questionnaire should be designed following

to the norm so that the statistic can be obvious

Questionnaire

In order to collect facts and figures, questionnaire is our top priority It is designed

to get explicit ideas from 6 native teachers (8 questions) and 7 Vietnamese teachers (7 questions) Besides, there are also two more thought-providing questions The items in each question are responded to following four – point – scales:

1 Yes 2 No 3 Other reasons 4 No opinion

Through questionnaire, we are taking a profound interest in the way how teachers observe their silent learners and the workable solutions as well These question papers are delivered and collected within two weeks, each learner and teacher has approximately three minutes to complete the questionnaires

Interview

Apart from this, interview is also extremely taken into consideration There are thirty- one people participating in our two main interviewed groups encompassing

10 Vietnamese teachers and 24 Vietnamese learners Thus, there is highly polarity

by diverse ideas why learners remain silent and what solutions should be deployed

to break silence in the language classroom

We paid attention to interview because we are inclined to believe that Vietnamese teachers prefer oral communication to written form in sharing their own professional

knowledge on learners’ silence Moreover, Vietnamese learners were willing to

express their concern about this special field Approximately seven minutes is used

to interview each teacher and learner so that they can freely express themselves The period of time is three weeks respectively

Teachers’ experience in classroom observation and discussion

It is popularly alleged that it takes a considerable amount of time to discover silent learners and find out solutions in teaching process It is required that teachers observe all learners day by day through their teaching course in order to be profound thinkers

about silent learners Teachers’ classroom observation and discussion will become

an effective element in deep discussion and free sharing directly among teachers Researchers can smoothly note information; keep significant to discussion of

students’ learning – process and record communication which focus on our group

topic Some findings, experiences, suggestions and solutions are gathered by dozen

of teachers’ daily discussion Face-to-face talking and sharing one another are

domination of this research tool

Data presentation and analysis

According to the data collected, learners were categorized into three groups:

A Learners who are silent (do not speak at all or speak a little), but consider silence

as a positive aspect (2 learners out of 26; 8%);

B Learners who are silent (do not speak at all or speak a little), but consider silence

as a negative aspect (17 learners out of 26; 65%);

C Learners who speak (sometimes/often) in class (7 learners out of 26; 27%)

Apart from that, we still study reasons why our learners remain silent in classroom Here are some of them:

Internal reasons:

- Personalities: self-isolation, keeping space, reticence, shyness, anxiety, low

self-confidence

- Language ability: lack of vocabulary and knowledge

- Physical manner: tiring, overwhelming

- Boring topics

- Inappropriate teaching approaches

- Low concentration on lessons`

Teachers’ perspective

In this section we mainly focus on the perspective of English teachers in Viet Nam

about their learner’s silence Actually, when carrying on interviewing thirteen

teachers (both Vietnamese and foreign teachers) we have collected the following various significant opinions:

Question 1: Do you (the teachers) consider some of your students quiet learners? Are they (learners) passive learners? One hundred percent interviewed teachers who always pay attention to their quiet students in their class, point out two points of view such as these quite learners are not passive (62

% interviewed teachers agree this view point), these learner maybe passive or not passive (38 % interviewed teachers express their dilemma- not sure )

Question 2: In your point of view are they quiet by the nature or are they quiet because of class circumstances? What are those circumstances? In this question 31% teachers agree that the learners keep silent because of their nature, 31% teachers believe the learners remain quiet because of circumstances, and 38% teachers affirm the learners are reticent due to both nature and circumstances

Question 3: Is it a good thing to be verbally active during the lesson? Nine teachers (69%) say “yes” express their agreement but four teachers (31%) say “no”-express their disagreement because they believe this still depends on the context

Question 4: Should the teacher encourage all the students to be active in classroom discussion? Why (not)? Almost interviewed teachers (94 %) express their consensus on the encouragement the all students become more aggressive in classroom activities They firmly agree this view point because

of following factors: (1) Learner can learn more through discussion (2) Leaner can check their comprehension and improve their skills (3) Learners have opportunities to express their opinions and reveal their thinking (4) Teachers can create the positive learning environment for learner (5) Teachers help students be confident to speak out and encourage them to take part in activities (6) Teachers have opportunity to work more with learner (7) Teachers’ monologue is no longer existed,

it means that the teachers’ role is not only as an authoritarian but also as a participant, tutor, etc Question 5: How would you describe the rule of classroom participation? When, how and how much should students participate? In this part, each teacher suggests each different opinion like: some teachers believe that students should participate when teacher address Other teachers argue that depend on the topic , the size of class, we may have various participative rate such as teachers participate 60% and learners participate 40% over one period or learners can participate as much as possible Besides, numbers of teachers consider the freedom of learner to talk and share ideas within the class is more necessary

In general, there is a singleness of mind between Vietnamese and foreign teachers

in taking care of silent learners and finding not only originality but also solutions from most of the interviewed teachers in the classroom Although silence is not a

complete sign of failure, it is still neglected in class time by teachers’ reflection In

other words, an active environment should be superior to dead air

Learners’ perspective

According to statistic, majority of interviewed people always keep silent confirm that remaining silent in class is the negative way in foreign language learning process In addition, learners also propose their viewpoints of silence as well as the reasons why they keep reticent concerning: lacking language ability such as shortage

of vocabulary, studying in inappropriate syllabus, losing self-esteem On the other hand, they also assert that giving speeches in class is absolutely useful and necessary Suggested solutions for negative effects

In the remainder of this data presentation, we attempt to propose a variety of responses grounded on the realistic research It is, however, extremely surprising that all of suggestions we received from the interviews are in the negative perspective in term of silence Some solutions are implemented in following ways:

Improving the lesson quality to motivate learners’ learning: it is the most

popularly agreed that teacher should expand the comprehensive input by varying

abundant topics interesting our students’ curiosity The fact, however, is against our expectations due to teacher’s dependence on curriculum or institutional policy

Therefore, there is a must for teachers to adopt, enrich and facilitate the interesting aspects of boring and difficult topics such as adding more games, exploring what the

topic is related to learners’ surroundings To sum up, the desirable goals of these

activities about are just to encourage them to expose themselves

Creating an appropriate and productive learning environment: the classroom

atmosphere plays an essential role in the development of learning target language so the need of improving the atmosphere quality is required There are 3 main elements should be exploited involving: classroom arrangement including choosing appropriate partners or mixing talking and silent learners one another; peer- discussion, group discussion

Conclusion

In this paper, the importance of this topic was analyzed above Our group also spent the period of time studying the reflections of silence on learning and teaching foreign language On one hand, we find out a lot of reasons to response the confusing

of our thinking why learners are silent how to help learners overcome these obstacles

On the other hand, many suggestions and findings are mentioned to respect for raising the effective method for both teachers and learners

References

Aulls, M W (2004) Students’ experiences with good and poor university courses

Education Research and Evaluation, 10, 303-335

Balas, A (2000) Using participation to assess students’ knowledge College

Teaching, 48, 122

Constantinople, A., Cornelius, R., & Gray, J (1988) The chilly climate: Fact or

artefact? Journal of Higher Education, 59, 527-559

Dauenhauer, B P (1980) Silence: The phenomenon and its ontological significance

Bloomington: Indiana University press

Dwyer, E., & Heller-Murphy, A (1996) Japanese learners in speaking classes

Edinburgh Working Paper s Applied Linguistic,7, 46-55

Fassinger, P A (1995) Understand classroom interaction: Students and professor’s

contributions to students’ silence The Journal of Higher Education 66, 82-96

Fassinger, P A (1996) Professors’ and students’ perceptions of why students

participate in class Teaching Sociology, 24,25-33

Forestier, K (1998, August 11th) Asian crisis spurs lesson in learning South China Morning

Giles, H., Coupland, N and Wienmann, J.M (1986) Beliefs about talk and silence

in cultural context Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Meeting of the Speech

Communication Association, Chicago

Howard, J R., & Henney, A.L (1998) Student participation and instructor gender

in the mixed-age college classroom The Journal of Higher Education, 69,

384-405

Hu, Y., & Fell-Eisenkraft, S (2003) Immigrant Chinese students’ use of silence in

the language arts classroom: Perceptions, Reflections, and Actions Teaching and learning, 17(2), 55 -65

Johannesen, R L (1974).The functions of silence: A plea for communication

research Western Speech 38, 25-35

Jones, R S (1997) Do women still feel the chill: Students’ perceptions of gender

bias in the college classroom Doctoral dissertation, University of Oklahoma Kalamaras, G (1994) Reclaiming the tacit dimension: Symbolic form in the rhetoric

of silence Newyork: State University of New York Press

Kato, K (2001) Exploring “Culture of learning”: a case of Japanese and Australian

classrooms Journal of intercultural Studies, 22(1), 51-67

Ken, P (2001) The Ethics of Student Classroom Silence Journal of Instructional Psychology, 41

Losey, M K (1997) Listen to the silences: Mexican American interaction in the composition classroom and community Norwood, NJ: Ablex

Meyer, K R., & Hunt, S K (2004, April) Rethinking evaluation strategies for student participation Central States Communication Association, Cleveland,

Ohio

Meyer, K R (2007) Student engagement in the classroom: An examination of student silence and participation National Communication Association,

Nakane, C (1970) Japanese society California: University of California Press Picard, M (1952) The world of silence Chicago: Henry Regnery Company

Picard, M (1963) Man and language Chicago: Henry Regnery Company

Pond, J., Goldstein, T., & Schecter S A (2003) Interrupted by silences: The contemporary education of Hong Kong In R Bayley ans S R Schecter (Eds.), Language Socialization in Bilingual and Multilingual Societies (p 114-127) Toronto: Multilingual Matters LTD

Scallon, R (1995) The machine stops: Silence in the metaphor of malfunction" In

D Tannen and M Saville-Troike (eds) Perspectives on Silence (pp21-31) Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing Corporation

The Lexical Approach to Second and Foreign Language

Teaching and Learning

Nguy ễn Thu Hồng

PetroVietnam University, Ba Ria City

Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province, Vietnam

Abstract

The lexical approach, a method of teaching foreign languages popularized by Michael Lewis in 1990s, rests on the idea that an important part of language learning

is the ability to understand and produce lexical units as chunks Learners are thought

to be able to perceive language patterns (grammar) as well as acquire meaningful set of words available when they are taught in this way Instruction, therefore, should focus on fixed expressions that occur frequently in spoken and written language This paper aim to provide an overview of the lexical approach, its features, the major debates associat ed with it, and present the author’s viewpoint to

this approach Discussing the features and debates surrounding it, this paper shows that the lexical approach has great potential to improve language pedagogical practice Language teachers should be able to incorporate this approach with other approaches and methods flexibly and creatively in teaching based on their own judgment and modify them to the realities of the classroom; learners should keep their options open in order to benefit from both memory-based and rule-based performance

An overview

The lexical approach is based on the view that “language consists of grammaticalized lexis, not lexicalized grammar” (Lewis, 1993, p.34) This is strengthened by the

statements that language is constituted not of traditional grammar and vocabulary

but often of “multi-word prefabricated chunks” (Lewis, 1997, p.3) Language,

therefore, should be taught in meaningful combinations of words and patterns (Lewis, 2000)

A distinction between grammar, vocabulary and lexis is made by the lexical approach Traditionally, grammar consists of rules and patterns, and vocabulary are understood as individual words with fixed meanings, while lexis includes not only the single words but also the co-occurrence with other words in particular contexts The many-word lexical units have been mentioned in second and foreign language

acquisition research under different labels including “chunks” (Lewis, 1997),

“lexicalized stems” (Pawley & Syder, 1983), “lexical phrases”

(Nattinger&DeCarrico, 1992) and “formulaic language” (Swan, 2006)

The existence and importance of these lexical units have been discussed by a number

of linguists Nattinger (1980) points out that language production is done by piecing together the ready-made language units suitable for a particular context Similarly, Hoey (2005) proposes that learners acquire a word when they encounter it in spoken

or written form and their knowledge of that word includes its co-occurrence with other words in specific contexts Instruction, therefore, should focus on the ready-made chunks appropriate for a particular situation (Nattinger, 1980) According to Sinclair (2004), lexis is a complex and systematic structure, and grammar is an outcome of this structure Up to 80 per cent of the word occurrence is the result of co-selections, and only 20 per cent is allocated to the grammar Hence, grammar can only teach 20 per cent of the language to the learner

Main features

Lexis is considered to play a central role in the lexical approach, (Lewis, 1993) With this in mind, instruction needs to focus on relatively fixed expressions that occur frequently and naturally in spoken language rather than inauthentic sentences created for the purpose of modeling the language (Lewis, 1993) Further, instead of over-concentrating on syntax and tense usage, language teachers should teach the phrases

which co-occur in contexts (Harmer, 2001) Thus, in teaching will for the future,

teachers might have students focus on its use in the utterances such as I’ll give you a ring, I’ll be in touch, I’ll see what I can do, I’ll be back in a minute, etc (Lewis,

1997)

Furthermore, the key to increasing learners’ lexicon is not formal teaching but

exposure to large quantities of comprehensible input, and that vocabulary is mostly acquired rather than taught (Lewis, 1997, 2000) This view is echoed by Thornbury (2006) who recommends that lexical competence comes simply from frequent exposure, consciousness-raising and memorizing, and by Moudraia (2001) who emphasizes the importance of intensive and extensive listening and reading in target language Learners constantly acquire new lexical items whenever they come in contact with the language such as listening to the teacher talk in class, watching a film or using the internet

Consciousness and noticing are crucial to lexis acquisition Unless learners are directed to notice language in a text, there exists a danger that they will fail to achieve intake (Lewis, 2000) Thornbury (2006), Lewis (2000), Moudraia (2001) and Romer (2011) suggest a three-step process: to raise their awareness of the lexical nature of language, then to define the main types of lexical structures (collocations, fixed and semi-fixed expressions) and finally to develop activities that help them notice the lexical chunks in spoken and written texts

Another important strategy to the lexical approach is regularly recycling and reviewing the lexical chunks which have been taught Recycling needs to do more than repeating the same thing twice (Harwood, 2002) Lexis (Nation, 1990, as cited

in Harwood, 2002) should be recycled between 10 or 12 times, and teaching vocabulary without sufficient recycling is a waste of effort

Concerning the teaching and learning materials, researchers suggest the use of language corpora in the classroom or accessible on the Internet to search for word partnerships, style, and so on and to design a lexical syllabus (Sinclair, 1987; Willis

& Willis, 1989; Harwood, 2002; Swan, 2006) In order for the course book writer to avoid distorting the language, it makes sense to let them access the authentic language via corpora (Harwood, 2002) In fact, due to their frequency and authenticity, corpora inform pedagogical materials for the lexical approach

of pedagogic principles which could be combined into a method (Harmer, 2001)

In spite of their benefits, corpora are the focus of criticism from language pedagogy researchers For example, Cook (1998) argues that language learning is impoverished by corpus data which gives excessive prominence to frequently-occurring expressions at the expense of less common but more effective ones Windowson (2000) criticizes that a pedagogical perspective for language teaching is

not provided by corpus linguistics, and he questions if the “reality” findings of corpus linguistics should be the same “reality” that defines what is taught in the classroom McEnergy and Wilson (2001) contend that “the corpus could never be a useful tool

for the linguist, as the linguist should seek for model language competence, rather

than performance” (p.19)

Probably those are among the reasons why Lewis’s ideas have not been eagerly taken

up by the mainstream English Language Teaching (ELT) Further, a quick glance at the available EFL textbook reveals that the main object of Lewis’s attack - a

traditional grammar syllabus -is still alive under this form or the other

typical examples of the short of things I want to focus on This sentence (Swan,

2006) consists of the following patterns: (1) I thought I’d + infinitive; (2) start by

…ing; (3) give you + noun phrase; (4) typical example of + noun phrase; (5) the sort

of thing + that-clause; (6) I want to + infinitive; (7) focus on As can be seen, learners

can not only enrich their vocabulary but also learn the structures and expressions embedded in it simultaneously

As the meaning and functions of the language are made clear in useful and appropriate contexts, learners have high chances of acquiring the language easily Besides, the more collocations and naturally occurring expressions are available for students to use, the less they need to grammaticalize and they are less likely to make incomprehensible utterances (Lewis, 2000) Ultimately, these features of the lexical approach will undoubtedly improve their frequency of using lexical chunks, and conduce to raise their fluency in writing and speaking in target language

With regards to teaching and learning materials, corpus research has revealed the provision of the raw pedagogical materials to the lexical approach Teachers and practitioners can use corpus data to adapt, modify and supplement to the teaching

practice This argument is strengthened by Leech’s (1997) observation that between

teaching and language corpora there is an apparent convergence with three focuses: the indirect use of corpora in teaching (reference publishing, materials development, and language testing), the direct use of corpora in teaching (teaching about, teaching

to exploit, and exploiting to teach), and further teaching-oriented corpus development

After more than twenty years, it is evident that the central role of lexis in ELT has been recognized regardless of debates Collocation boxes and pages with functional language are routinely included in textbooks In addition, there have been more and more reference books aiming at developing spoken and written fluency such as conversation gambits, key words for fluency, spoken grammar etc in the EFL books market

Conclusion

This paper has focused on a general overview of the lexical approach to second and foreign language teaching It has investigated the supporting ideas as well as debates

surrounding this approach in the literature review, and presented the author’s

ideological position towards the lexical approach I hope to have shown that the lexical approach has great potential to improve pedagogical practice and that it can

be used effectively in the language class despite the challenges in many ways Adopting the lexical approach does not necessarily mean abandoning others Rather, language teachers should be able to use different approaches and methods flexibly and creatively based on their own judgment and modify them to the realities of the classroom; learners should be encouraged to keep their options open in order to benefit from both memory-based and rule-based performance

Harwood, N (2002) Taking a lexical approach to teaching: Principles and problems

International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 12(2), 139-155 doi:10.1111/1473-4192.00028

Hoey, M (2005) Lexical priming: A new theory of words and language New York:

Routledge

Leech, G (1997) ‘Teaching and language corpora: a convergence’ in A Wichmann,

S Fligelstone, T McEnery and G Knowles (eds.) Teaching and Language Corpora, pp 1-23 London: Longman

Lewis, M (1993).The lexical approach: The state of ELT and a way forward Hove,

England: Language Teaching Publications

Lewis, M (1997).Implementing the Lexical Approach: Putting Theory into Practice

Hove, England: Language Teaching Publications

Lewis, M (2000).Teaching collocation: Further developments in the lexical

approach Hove: Language Teaching Publications

Moudraia, O (2001) Lexical approach to second language teaching Eric Digest

http://www.cal.org/resources/digest/digest_pdfs/0102-moudraia-lexical.pdf

Nattinger, J (1980) A lexical phrase grammar TESOL Quarterly 14(3), 337-344

Retrieved 1 May from Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3586598

Nattinger, J R., & DeCarrico, J S (1992) Lexical phrases and language teaching

New York: Oxford University Press

Pawley, A & Syder, F (1983) Two puzzles for linguistic theory: native-like

selection and native-like fluency In J Richards & R Schmidt (Eds.),

Language and communication (pp.191-226) London: Longman Retrieved

1 May from http://scholar.google.co.nz.ezproxy.aut.ac.nz

Romer, U (2011).Corpus research applications in second language teaching Annual

review of applied linguistics, 31, 205-225.doi:10.1017/S0267190511000055 Sinclair, J M (2004) Trust the text: Language, corpus and discourse New York,

N.Y: Taylor & Francis

Swan, M (2006, March 20) Chunks in the classroom: let's not go overboard

Teacher trainer - pilgrims language courses Retrieved from

http://www.mikeswan.co.uk/elt-applied-linguistics/chunks-in-the-classroom.htm

Thornbury, S (1998) The Lexical Approach: a journey without maps? Modern

English Teacher, 7(4), 7-14 Retrieved 1 May from http://scholar.google.co.nz.ezproxy.aut.ac.nz

Thornbury, S (2006) How to teach vocabulary Essex, England: Pearson Longman Widdowson, H (2000) On the limitations of linguistics applied Applied Linguistics,

OBJECTIVE AND SUBJECTIVE BARRIERS FOR CLT COURSE FOR STUDENTS OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE DEPARTMENT AT THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY

Objective and subjective barriers

CLT course at Thu Dau Mot University aims at training university students majoring in English Language Teaching to design and demonstrate class activities according to communicative approach in order that they – as future English teacher are able to enhance their learners’ communicative proficiency in English Therefore,

the vast majority of the class time is devoted to hands-on activities instructed by lecturers and performed by students Lecturers provide students with rich resources

of materials for activity ideas and designs, then demonstrate the activities for students

to observe Subsequently, students are assigned with lesson materials and are required to design activities for the target lessons Students in CLT course are primarily assessed based on their teaching performances, demonstrations and participation Due to the large number of practical activities carried out in class, some objective and subjective limitations arise, which needs to be pointed out and suggestions will be mentioned to inhibit the barriers

Classroom organization

To start with, the traditional classroom settings with aligned rows of tables and chairs are the major objective barrier In a course which requires a great deal of communicative activities presented by lectures and students, large space for moving around is considerably essential Like any traditional, formal university classrooms, the ones in Thu Dau Mot University are fully occupied with tables and chairs, which leaves no space for presenters and participants to address or have direct contact with others Consequently, a great deal of activities must be conducted in a large, open area outside the classrooms, which leads to the fact that other classes nearby are disturbed by the noise produced during the CLT course demonstrations and presentations

In order to reach the full effectiveness of CLT course which emphasizes active learning, such as warm-up activities, collaboration learning like pair and group work, speaking tasks, physical act, etc it is necessary that this traditional arrangement be abolished Instead, tables and chairs should be arranged in a U shape to erase the barrier between the students and the teacher, to make it easier for students to move around, and also for presenters to reach or have direct contact with everyone This arrangement is also more conducive to discussion and an open, informal atmosphere and fosters communication

Facilities

CLT courses mostly involve hands-on, interactive activities in which diverse

props and technology are utilized in order to assist students’ exposure to real life

conversations Therefore, it is necessary that visual aids, media technologies such as the internet, projectors, speakers, DVD players, etc be provided and established in each classroom This not only gives students more advantages and more excitement

in studying a language but also helps them broaden their minds to perceive cultures

of the countries in which English is the first language

However, at Thu Dau Mot University, technologies are quite inadequate The Internet is frequently inaccessible to students in the campus area Projectors are set

up in each classroom, but speakers, DVD players are not supplied It is the lecturer

and students’ responsibility to provide their own visual aids such as Powerpoint

slides, flashcards, videos, props and other media devices for their demonstrations and presentations This requires students to be well-prepared with rehearsals beforehand to make sure that the devices are set up properly and technological problems would not occur to disturb their performances

To facilitate the teaching and learning process, it is recommended that a modern classroom equipped with accessible Internet and other media technology be assigned for the course to maximize the efficiency of lesson presenting and demonstrating The assigned classroom needs to be set up similarly to any other

modern ones in English private centers so that lecturers and students can enhance their lessons and performances in an ideal teaching and learning environment

Creativity

The communicative approach has been proved to be the most effective approach in the ESL/EFL classroom, as communication is the ultimate goal for any ESL/EFL learner, and this approach promotes the classroom as a practice ground for the students, where they learn how and when to use the language before they are expected to use it in real life situations and for a real purpose Communicative tasks such as role-plays, conversations, questionnaires, and discussions will help to make English come alive through real usage This requires our students – as future English

teachers to be creative in designing activities and materials which are able to elicit a large number of student responses

Additionally, English learners of all ages in English private centers do not approach learning as much enthusiasm and focus because they are heavily burdened with school work and workload Therefore, creating a comfortable, positive and humorous atmosphere in class through practice activities and providing extra topics for discussion of their interests are necessities When students find interest in a subject, their thoughts become more complex and focused and they will respond more enthusiastically to the lesson Last but not least, activities that can inspire

students’ creativity and get students to think out of the box are preferable They will

find excitement in creative, fun activities and always be ready to make the most of their creative minds This has become a big challenge for university students to

understand their learners’ psychology and they themselves need to brainstorm to

make up motivating activities that can draw and boost their learners’ attention and

interests

Most English language teachers still heavily rely on textbooks to provide the activities they will use in the classroom and most course books do not typically provide activities which foster creativity (Tomlinson and Masuhara, 2013) This is the same case for the students in CLT course in Thu Dau Mot University, which is the major subjective barrier in the course The students strictly and safely follow the tasks and instructions with the lesson, which leads to dull and boring teaching It is

therefore the CLT lecturer’s responsibility to make it clear to their students that it is

crucial to make use of their course book as a resource rather than follow it as a script and that they develop the confidence, awareness and creativity to adapt course book activities in way which can enhance creativity In addition, there is a consensus that lecturers for CLT courses need to act as role models, working with the students, modeling, not simply telling them to do things In order to do this, we, as lecturers,

need to relinquish our excessively “teacher-control” persona, and become part of the

group, not someone who is above it or outside it Last but not least, establishing a relaxed, supportive, constructive, non-judgmental atmosphere where students feel confident enough to not worry that their teaching performances are scrutinized for

errors is encouraged In other words, lecturers should attend to what their students are trying to express and demonstrate through their performances rather than concentrating on the imperfect way they may perform it

Conclusion

It is obvious that active learning is strongly emphasized in ESL/EFL classrooms (Bonwell & Allison, 1991) When students are encouraged to take an active interest in learning, they are more likely to retain the knowledge they have accumulated And CLT course is an effective method which can be considerably exploited for active learning in English However, to facilitate the teaching and learning process of CLT course and to train university students to become future qualified English teachers that can satisfy the high requirements of private English centers, the suggestions mentioned above need to be taken into consideration Erasing the barriers of classroom arrangement and facilities, as well as encouraging students to overcome the rigid syllabus, dull course book and enhancing creativity in lesson planning, we can bring great benefits for English language teaching and learning in a CLT course

References

Bonwell, C.C, & Elison, J.A (1991) Active Learning: Creating Excitement in the

Classroom, ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report No 1 Washington, D.C.:

The George Washington University

Tomlinson, B & Masuhara, H (2013) Adult coursebooks ELT Journal 67/2:

233-249

IMPROVING LEARNER’S SPEAKING COMPETENCE BY

RAISING THEIR AWARENESS OF THE NATURE OF

SPOKEN ENGLISH

Nguyen Thi Phuoc Binh, Luu Thanh Tuu

Faculty of Foreign Languages Thu Dau Mot University

Introduction

Vietnamese learners are always facing the fact that learning English for many years but they cannot make themselves understood when they talk with the native speakers After many years of teaching English, I find out that, there are two main reasons that affect their English speaking abilities The first is their poor awareness of the nature

of spoken English so they speaking English in their own way arbitrarily, as a result, they cannot conduct a successful conversation with foreigners for the reasons: they

do not understand what the native speakers are saying and vice versa My students

in general, particularly my class DBC15AV202 has the same problem They find that spoken English is far too different from what they have been taught in school from the textbooks where the new words are presented in isolation and they cannot recognize that word clearly, strongly (like they have been taught) in daily natural spoken English of native speakers As a result, they feel hopeless with their English like there is no way out, therefore, they are afraid to speak After many years of teaching, spending time to figure out the reasons of that problem, I found out that, our learners does not really understand much about the nature of spoken English, and

to improve the learners’ speaking skills, we should raise their awareness about the

nature of it before we start doing something else

1 The nature of the spoken English

In this paper, we do not mention the academic features of spoken English like the linguists do, we address it as language users, from a very practical view of a teacher

of English

1.1 Stress

Spoken English like any other language has sentence stress, word stress The Vietnamese learners tend to speak every word in the utterance with the same tone, the same volume; as a result, they cannot recognize the spoken English when the native speakers only speak extra volume and prolong the stressed words which convey the main idea of the saying and at the stressed syllable The unstressed syllable normally becomes schwa

e.g This is an important thing

The leaners should be indicated that this happened in their mother tongue, too In Vietnamese, speakers should put the right tone on the right syllable to produce a certain sound If it is put in the wrong place, that sound become meaningless A full awareness of this feature of language in general and particularly in English helps learners be more serious about their learning process and improve their English as well

1.2 Assimilation

Unlike some other languages, spoken English has the feature called assimilation Assimilation is a common phonological process by which one sound becomes more like a nearby sound This can occur either within a word or between words While assimilation most commonly occurs between immediately adjacent sounds, it may occur between sounds separated by others ("assimilation at a distance") https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assimilation_(linguistics)

ten bikes would be /tem batiks/, not /ten baiks/

white pepper /waɪt 'pepə/ → /waɪp 'pepə/

on the house /ɑn ðə 'haʊs/ → /ɑn nə 'haʊs/

raise your glass /'reɪz jɔ: 'glɑ:s/ → /'reɪʒ ʒɔ: 'glɑ:s/

If the Vietnamese learners were told that we do speak Vietnamese in the same way,

it would be easier for them to accept that feature of English and easy to get themselves familiar with that way of speaking For example, in the south of

of “đi về” As a matter of fact, we cannot expect the native speakers speak something exactly the same like it is presented in the dictionary The learners’ job

is try to follow it and adapt it

1.3 Connected speech is more than just a string of individual target segments joined

together in series, since each segment is liable to influence the segments that surround it The precise form that these influences take is determined by the particular language in question, and so the phonology of connected speech is part of the phonology of the language that the child has to master

eg ' I don't w ənnə spend too much today (Susan Boyer, Understanding Spoken

English: A Focus on Everyday Language in Context, Book 1 Boyer Educational

Resources, 2003)

 “Stop it” –> “Sto pit” /STA pit/

 “I need it” –> “I nee dit” /aiy NIY dit/

 “Play a song” –> “Play ya song” /pley yə Sɑŋ/

 “Read a book” — “Rea da book” /RIY də bʊk/

http://grammar.about.com/od/c/g/Connected-Speech.htm

Or

 Get on /geton/

 Not at all /notatall/

 It’s no joke / snow joke/

1.4 Situational ellipsis

When proficient speakers of English have informal conversations, they often leave out certain grammatical words, particularly pronouns and auxiliary verbs

A You coming? (Are you coming?)

B No, staying at home (No, I’m staying at home)

Ellipsis refers to omitting or leaving out certain words so we communicate quickly and economically, using only the words which we think are necessary to convey what

we need to express So the language learners should be aware of this feature to familiarize themselves with this way of saying of the native speakers so that they can

catch the speakers’ idea as well as improve their English

1.5 Idioms and expressions

One of the things that the Vietnamese learners would aware is that, the native speakers tend to use lot of idioms and expressions in the spoken speech This causes more problems to the learners

E.g

It’s a bit tricky

It’s not the easiest in the world

It’s quite tough at time

Or

An arm and a leg means Very expensive or costly; A large amount of money

At the drop of a hat means without any hesitation; instantly

Back to the drawing board means when an attempt fails and it's time to start all over

(http://www.smart-words.org/quotes-sayings/idioms-meaning.html)

So if the learners are more aware of this and spend more time studying about some most used idioms and expressions, they would have better understanding of spoken English and improve their English themselves

1.6 Spoken English would be far more chaotic, far less structured than written

text It contains lots of reformulation, repetition, false starts, incomplete sentences, formulaic phrases, and unfinished questions So the more the learners aware of this and spend time to speak with native speakers, the better their English will be

2 The activities that help learners get themselves familiar with spoken English and improve their English

Along with the awareness of the nature of spoken English, applying some appropriate learning activities is considered a good factor to complete the language learning

circle From the writer’s point of view, a useful learning activity is the activity that

supports the aim of the lesson, and fits the level of the learners (sometimes a little bit higher is strongly recommended) However, no matter what activities we take, they would base on the language learning principle and the sequence LISTENING –

SPEAKING – READING – WRITING The learners should be given the natural

source of target language first like they see and hear in real life, on televisions, videos

or movies …., explanations or formulas come later By this way, the language

learners are easy to accept the target language as it is like Vice versa, they will approach the new language in their mother tongue experience For example, if they

hear the sound student or the sun first and after that they are shown the words in

written form, they will be easily pronoun those words correctly But, if they see those

words before hearing them, they tend to pronoun them like sì – tu – den or the – sun

/sun/ not /sᴧn/ And they would stick themselves with this kind of pronouncing

forever Things would be far worse because it is difficult to change that not so good habit Or if the language learners hear the whole utterance in connected speech many times before they see it, it would be easier for them to imitate the way the native speakers say, as a result, their English would become more natural and they can make themselves understood in real life conversations In the contrast, if the learners read that sentence without hearing it before, they tend to read in their own mother tongue experience in the separately style with the same loud and stress every words

To overcome those things, the learners should be advised to listen and watch as much natural source of English both formal and in formal as possible as very useful language learning activity This activity gives them a clear concept of the target language and gives them the habit of saying something right in English

For many years of teaching English, the writer has applied a lot of activities in an attempt raising the students’ awareness of the nature of spoken English as well as

improving their speaking skill

 The most used activity is that they are usually asked to listen to the tape and repeat the sentence in the same speed, stress and intonation This activity helps students recognize English in real life conversations, and imitate the way the native speakers speak They are also asked to talk with the foreigners and have it filmed the conversation, so that they can watch it at home and realize what spoken English really is, and see how well or not so well they have talked with the foreigners and make it better next time

 Another activity is that they are asked to chat with the foreigners and print it all to have a look again to see if there anything they miss in the talk or what they can improve next time

 Sometimes, my students are required to watch a movie in English and choose

a part that they like most, play the roles like the characters in the movie with the

same scene, same feeling …

 One more useful activity is that they listen to a conversation in a certain topic, work on it carefully to find out the useful expressions using in that context, and finally, make a conversation in the same way with a real context that has happened

to them

93% of the students who were asked about their attitude towards to activities which they have been required to do said that they were excited with those activities By this way, their confidence has been gained a lot and their English improve also Here are some feedbacks from the students of DBC 15AV 202: Em rất thích cách dạy của Cô, em ước gì được học Cô sớm hơn (lethanhthao2008@gmail.com) e da chu dong hon trong viec hoc cua minh va tu tin hon trong giao tiep bang tieng anh va neu nhu khong co co huong dan thi e da khong thay minh tien bo nhu vay du trong thoi gian ngan va e biet minh dang di dung huong Em cam on co vi cach day ( la va doc ).e mong co tiep tuc huong cho tui e di theo nhung huong hoc ngon ngu thuc

te va rat hieu qua nay (tuanoanhdau@gmail.com)

The only difficulty is that sometimes it is difficult to start a conversation with foreigners when they are busy or not willing to talk But, most of the time, the foreigners are very friendly and the Vietnamese learners are welcome to practice English with them

To sum up, people always want to learn something new, especially a new language, but, only those, who seriously, fully aware of the target language that they are learning and have appropriate learning method can succeed However, to have those things, sometimes, our job as a teacher should help them realize this principle and make it work

REFERENCES

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assimilation_(linguistics)

http://grammar.about.com/od/c/g/Connected-Speech.htm

http://www.smart-words.org/quotes-sayings/idioms-meaning.html

Susan Boyer, Understanding Spoken English: A Focus on Everyday Language in

Context, Book 1 Boyer Educational Resources, 2003

A CASE OF NEW TEST MODEL FOR BUSINESS ENGLISH

Nguy ễn Khoa Trường An

Faculty of Foreign Languages Thu Dau Mot University

Abstract

The aim of this article is to discuss the format of final test for Business English

2 paper Business English 2 paper is a compulsory paper for final year Business

English students In order to completely evaluate students’ English competence,

Foreign Languages Department of Thu Dau Mot University is applying the new test format that tests different learning skills of students The article starts with a brief introduction of different test formats, followed by the pros and cons of previous test format Next part is the discussion about the new test format and its results Finally, recommendations are analysed in order to improve this format in the future

Traditional test method vs new test method

The traditional paper structure: there are six units which are taught in sixty lessons There are midterm and final tests for the paper, which account for 30 percent and 70 percent respectively The midterm and final tests are designed in multiple choice question format The final test is a 50 multiple choice question test There are two parts in the test including Vocabulary and Grammar section and Reading section

20 questions are designed for Vocabulary and Grammar section, 30 questions left are for Reading part with the total of three passages

The format of multiple choice question has been used for many years before the introduction of new test form In comparison with the traditional test, the new test is designed with different perspectives The form of multiple choice questions is

still used but case study analysis is added to evaluate students’ English competence

The final test is a combination of 30 multiple choice questions and a case study 30 multiple choice questions cover Grammar and Vocabulary while case study analysis encourages Reading comprehensive and Writing For example, these are two typical multiple choice questions that are used in the final test The first question is one of Vocabulary questions covering significant vocabularies during the paper The second

question is about language review of “IF” clause which is taught in the paper

1 Sales…… are numbers showing how much a company has sold in a period

A figures B budgets C targets D shares

2 If you………… 3,000 or more, we’d give you a discount

A.ordering B order C ordered D have ordered Meanwhile, in terms of case study, a company profile and its issues are fully mentioned Next part is three questions that aim to find out the issues and suggestions for solutions Below is the example of last semester test – a case of Nokia Company

in North America market

QUESTIONS

1 What are problems that Nokia is facing?

2 Why did Nokia fail in North America Market?

3 Please write a brief business plan about improving Nokia's North America Market

Multiple choice question test: pros and cons

The format of multiple choice has been applied for this paper since this paper was taught Multiple choice test is used in order to reduce time consumption of

grading (Kerkman & Johnson, 2014) Teachers can mark their students’ answer

sheets in the least time consuming way and in the most effective way Marking multiple choice answers is always convenient due to quality and quantity First of all, it ensures the completion of marking a great number of answer sheets with the least time consumption Secondly, the quality of grading is also high because of

marking students’ answers with the sample answer Besides that, using multiple

choice test encourages students to think critically According to Kerkman and Johnson (2014), by analysing each question and its multiple choice answers, students can develop their critical thinking The model of critical thinking is clearly explained

in the following part The model shows that thinking is the centrality of action When you get your information by listening, observation, reading, information is processed through thinking and then it gives output by actions of speaking, acting, and writing (Kirby & Goodpaster, 1999)

Observe THINKING Act

Furthermore, with a great number of questions (50 questions), a wide range

of paper content can be fully covered According to Little and Bjok (2014) answering multiple choice test enhances a chance for test takers to retrieve information and their knowledge to choose the correct answer In other words, the multiple choice questions cover different incorrect answers, they need to retrieve previously studied information relating to all of the answers so they can discriminate among them and select the most correct answer

Besides the benefits of the multiple choice questions, there are limitations of the multiple choice questions Regarding Vu (n.d), there are four typical disadvantages when using multiple choice questions

1 Reduction in capability of Neuro-Linguistic skill of learners

2 Quality of multiple choice questions largely depend on an author’s skills

3 Designing of tests account for spending a lot of time and efforts

4 Allow and encourage guessing of answers

Using the only multiple choice questions to evaluate learning process cannot provide reliable results since the students could copy the answers or even they got high scores due to luckiness .The answers may not correctly evaluate student learning process The correctly guessed answers cannot show that students are qualified Moreover, the capability of Neuro-Linguistic skill of learners cannot be improved by the characteristics of multiple choice questions Suggestions of answers are available so the students do not need to think and use English for answers Moreover, ability of the author skills is essential since their ability and skills decide

to design a good test

The introduction of new test format

Testing stimulates learning, especially diversified forms of tests According to (Forsyth, 2016) Testing promotes learning through retrieving information Multiple choice questions focus on details while writing helps test takers focus on general concepts and linking between ideas (Forsyth, 2016) Writing requires students to combine course information and writing skills in the way that students can express their ideas In terms of final year students, using multiple choice questions to evaluate the study progress is not enough due to above disadvantages In order to evaluate

students’ English competency in the most effective way, mixed methods of multiple

choice questions and case study analysis are currently used Thirty multiple questions and three short answer questions in the case study are currently applied in the final test of Business English 2 paper The usage of writing task in the test is to strongly

evaluate students’ business knowledge For example, the questions aims at asking

about their business knowledge and they need to use their writing skill to demonstrate their knowledge Furthermore, writing reduces possibility of cheating when doing test, in other words, test takers are harder to copy long information of writing from distance

When using mixed methods of testing, previous teaching methods need to be changed Besides multiple choice questions, students are required to answer essay questions in sixty minutes, the questions are raised from a case study The case study describes a company profile, problems of its performance Students have to identify problems, reasons of these problems and solutions Since there is analysis of case study, during the course, teachers need to focus on teaching case studies This helps

real test Using case study analysis also promotes critical thinking of students as they need to generate and brainstorm for different ideas Importantly, not only writing skill but also reading skill are also enhanced from case study analysis This format

of test can evaluate different skills of students By focusing on different learning skills, students can identify what their strengths and weaknesses of English are

The new format of test requires English teachers to change their teaching strategy In comparison with previous Business English classes, there are more writing task taught in current Business English class The emphasis of teaching case studies is important as this helps students get used to analysing case studies It is essential for teachers to encourage students to brainstorm ideas so they can solve the problems from the case studies More importantly, case study analysis encourages students to enhance their problem solving skill According to Tidwell (2015) problem solving is an important learning goal that measures school accomplishment

of educational aims Problem solving skill can be considered as one of the core qualities that a student needs for his/her future career Learning how to solve problem

during study time enhances students’ strengths which are beneficial to their future

career Three important stages of problem solving are formulating the problem,

planning the solution and designing the solution (Tidwell, 2015) The domain, general subject knowledge, problem-specific knowledge, and strategic skills are required in these stages The case study of the test also requires students to identify problems, reasons of the problems and solutions In accordance with Tidwell’s

findings about stages of problem solving, general business knowledge, specific knowledge and strategic skills are used to analyse the case study The students need strategic skills to strategically analyse rising issues and suggestions for solution In other words, case studies analysis facilitates students in generating their knowledge of Business English

problem-Test results

This part reports the results of the previous Business English 2 test In general, besides doing the multiple choice questions, most of students can answer three questions of the case study Some of them suggested very good solutions for the case study This means that they knew how to use their knowledge in order to come up with solutions However, a few students could answer two out of three questions, and these answers were not good The bad results can be explained by the fact that these students may not get familiar with the test or the limitation of English competence

Recommendations

It is the first semester that using this test format It is on high expectation that the new test format leads to good results in terms of correctly evaluating the students learning process Because the test format is still new to teachers and students at Thu Dau Mot University Thus, it leads to limitations when changing teaching methods and test format Students who are familiar with multiple choice questions due to its

benefits seem not to be interested in case study analysis Thus, the teachers should acknowledge their important role in transferring the aim of new test format to the students They should explain the necessity of the new test format to the students The aim of the new test format is to encourage students to focus on their learning process and English enhancement Marking writing requires teachers more efforts and concentration and even time consumption However, in this case, writing is considered as a tool to evaluate business knowledge and English skills of students Furthermore, lack of test resources is one of main challenges that the English teachers are facing They need to work really hard in order to contribute to the diversified sources of the test Importantly, the teachers and students need time to adapt to changes It is assumed that they will get used to the new test format in next semester

References

Forsyth, D R (2016) Testing: Strategies and skills for evaluating learning In

, College teaching: Practical insights from the science of teaching and learning (2nd ed.) (pp 137-168) Washington, DC, US: American Psychological

Association doi:10.1037/14777-006

Kerkman, D D., & Johnson, A T (2014) Challenging Multiple-Choice Questions

to Engage Critical Thinking Insight: A Journal Of Scholarly Teaching, 992-97 Kirby, G.R., & Goodpaster, J.R (1999) Critical thinking (2ed) USA: Pearson Custom Publishing

Little, J., & Bjork, E (2015) Optimizing multiple-choice tests as tools for

learning Memory & Cognition, 43(1), 14-26 13p

doi:10.3758/s13421-014-0452-8

Vu, T.A (n.d) Bài 5/5- M ột số ưu điểm và nhược điểm của phương pháp trắc

nghi ệm Retrived from va-nhuoc-diem-cua- phuong-phap-trac-nghiem.html

http://edutech.vn/tin-tuc/6-mot-so-uu-diem-A study of students’ attitudes and opinions of British Culture

classes at Thu Dau Mot University

Nguyen Hoang Minh Duc Faculty of Foreign Languages Thu Dau Mot University

Abstract

This study investigated the students’ attitudes and opinions of British Culture

classes The study was conducted with the participation of 78 students in third-year classes in Thu Dau Mot University in the second semester of the 2015-2016 school year A survey was conducted online at the end of the British Culture course The feedbacks of the survey show that the balance of the activities and the lecture in each class and the rule of bonuses and minuses during the course helped the students most The students also suggested the class should have more extra activities

Introduction

British Culture has long been a compulsory subject in the curriculum for the year English-majored students in Faculty of Foreign Languages, Thu Dau Mot University This subject is supposed to supply the students with basic knowledge of the United Kingdom (the UK), that is, the UK’s geography, people’s attitudes,

third-identity, monarchy, education, economy, welfare, food and drink, sports, holidays and special occasions The writer is in charge of teaching this subject The desire to find out how the students really want to be taught and then find out solutions to improve the teaching effectiveness of British Culture makes the writer conduct this research

The main questions to be answered in this study are:

What are students’ attitudes and opinions about the teaching and learning in British

Culture classes?

How can the writer improve the effectiveness of the teaching of British Culture?

This study is to discover students’ attitudes and opinions about the teaching and

learning of British Culture at Thu Dau Mot University and to collect some students' suggestions to improve the effectiveness This is to help the writer to improve the teaching effectiveness in British Culture classes

This study will help the writer have a clearer overview of the students’ attitudes and

opinions about the teaching of British Culture so that she can find out suitable adjustments to the teaching and learning of British Culture in Thu Dau Mot University

Description of the British Culture class

The writer was teaching British Culture to four classes of third-year students Two

of these were Pedagogy majors while the two others were business-oriented The

number of students in one class ranged from 50 to 60 students The course’s length

was 60 periods, dividing into 12 classes with 5 periods a class The textbook was

Britain for Learners of English Online resources such as Google, Wikipedia,

Youtube were also exploited to search for articles and videos

According to the school rules, the total assessment was based on In-class activities (30%) and Final test (70%) For the in-class assessment, Powerpoint presentations were compulsory Students were required to work in groups, make a presentation and answer the questions of the other groups For the Final Test, students were required to write two paragraphs, i.e., a 100-word paragraph to show their opinions about one aspect of the United Kingdom and another paragraph to compare the UK and Vietnam

Furthermore, the writer applied the rule of bonuses and minuses Bonuses and minuses were applied in Question-Answer part, the Lecture and Review part (See Table 1) Bonuses were for good questions, good answers or good performance in groupwork Minuses were for those with non-preparation for the new lesson: one minus per time Bonuses and minuses would be calculated into the 30% mark

Procedure of one British Culture class

Table 1 Structure of a British Culture lesson

Group

Presentation

Making a presentation of the new lesson

Students in charge 45 minutes

30 minutes

T’s comment Giving comment of the

ppt file and students’

Lecture Reviewing the previous

This section presents an overview of the theoretical background of the study It

begins with the definition of the key term: “culture” Then, theories of how culture should be taught The section ends with the importance of collecting students’

attitudes and opinions

Culture

According to Cambridge Advanced Learners’ Dictionary, “culture” is “the way of

life, especially the customs and beliefs, of a particular group of people at a

particular time” The British Culture class, in this study, is to supply students with

basic knowledge of the United Kingdom and the British people on geography, attitudes, monarchy, education, economy, welfare, food and drink, sports, holidays and special occasions

How culture should be taught

Kramsch (1993) points out the teacher needs to present not only social facts, but also norms and values What is more, Lo Bianco (1999, pp 15-17) summarizes four theories of how language and culture are best taught:

1 The civilization approach: culture is taught as a set of facts separately from second language learning

2 The audio-lingual approach: culture is studied after the achievement

of linguistic competence

3 The communicative approach: culture is only taught where it is

needed for pragmatic communication

4 The intercultural approach: the target culture and the learner’s culture

are contrasted, noting similarities and dissimilarities

In the British Culture class, the writer applied the intercultural approach She helped her students to recognize the similarities and dissimilarities of British Culture and Vietnamese Culture The comparison between the two countries and the people in these countries were mentioned during the Lecture and the Review part

(See Table 1)

The importance of collecting students’ attitudes and opinions

It is important to examine students’ attitudes and opinions for the following reasons Firstly, teachers can plan the lesson relevant to students’ opinions Secondly,

students become self-directed by being involved in decision-making about their own learning Thirdly, students will learn more effectively if programmed content is relevant to their specific area of needs or interests According to Colin (2004, p 85),

a well-constructed study that provides information that can support a teaching innovation or curriculum initiative at the level of a single classroom in ways that enhance the likelihood of its success is, in our view, ecologically responsible Therefore, teachers’ knowledge of their learners’ attitudes and opinions facilitates students’ learning

Methodology

The online questionnaire was conducted at the end of the course It was sent to the emails of the four classes There are nine questions in the questionnaire, five of which are multiple choice questions and four others are short answers Vietnamese is used

in the questionnaire so that the students can express their thoughts specifically and thoroughly

According to Colin (2004, p 110), participants should be assured in writing that their identities will be masked as much as possible in any report of the project outcomes and processes Therefore, no names were required, which made the participants feel safe and comfortable when joining the survey

The content of the questions are about the students’ problems in British Culture class, the time distribution of different parts of the British Culture class and the students’ suggestions to improve the effectiveness of the class (See Questions’ content in the

Findings)

Findings

The writer received 78 responses after two weeks However, there were some responses with fewer participants because the writer did not require any compulsory answers in the online questionnaire Only the students who were really interested in the survey spend time thinking and answering the questionnaire and they only answered the questions they were really interested in This helped the survey get the informative responses

Question No 01: