The effective strategies to learn vocabulary of huflit foreign languages department seniors graduation paper

TRAN NGOC HONG PHUC 5ABSTRACT Vocabulary learning strategies are ways that each student employs to help himself remember words deeply and use them in necessary situations as well as the

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY – (HUFLIT) DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

HO CHI MINH CITY, June, 2019

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INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENT

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NAME: Tran Ngoc Hong Phuc

STUDENT ID: 15DH710050

UNIT NAME: Graduation Paper

EMAIL ADD: hongphuctran147@gmail.com

WORD COUNT: 5325

Declaration

I certify that the attached material is my original work No other person’s work or ideas have been used without acknowledgment Except where I have clearly stated that I have used some

of this material elsewhere, I have not presented this for assessment in another course or unit at

this or any other institution

2019

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Secondly, I greatly appreciate the support of Huflit English major students who willingly took part in and gave their precious time and effort to complete the survey If they had not agreed to participate, the project would have never seen the full fruition

Lastly, I am very thankful to have my beloved family and friends who always encouraged me and gave precious advices which helped me a lot to finish

my research I am particularly grateful for the encouragement given by my mother who gave me the moral support during this tough time Special thanks should be given to my friends who gave me consolation and positive encouragement when I had difficulties in doing the research They wholeheartedly assisted me to complete the survey without any impediment

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ABSTRACT

Vocabulary learning strategies are ways that each student employs to help himself remember words deeply and use them in necessary situations as well as the useful tools which help people to achieve their goal effectively The aim of this research was to find out popular difficulties of Huflit English major students

in learning vocabulary and investigated effective strategies which help students overcome their problems The participants of this survey were 50 seniors who are studying English as their major in Foreign Languages Department at Ho Chi Minh City University of Foreign Languages and Information Technology (HUFLIT) The data was collected through qualitative and quantitative analysis The results showed that almost students believe that the strategies can help them improve vocabulary learning outcome The most effective strategies are using support tools such as dictionaries or applications on telephones or Website and listening to English songs, watching English films or reading English books because of their convenience as well as the low cost Vocabulary learning strategies are really important which help to improve student’s vocabulary size as well as language learning process

Keywords: Vocabulary learning strategies, language learning, effective strategies, HUFLIT seniors

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT 5

1 INTRODUCTION 8-12 1.1 Background 8

1.2 Problem Identification 9

1.3 Research Objectives 11

1.4 Scope of the Study 11

1.5 Research Organization 12

2 LITERATURE REVIEW 13-20 2.1 What is vocabulary? 13

2.2 What is vocabulary learning strategies? 14

2.3 Subjective factors effecting on vocabulary learning process 15

2.4 Objective factors effecting on vocabulary learning process 16

2.5 Classification of vocabulary learning strategies 18

3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 21-22 3.1 Description of the Subjects 21

3.2 Procedures of Data collection 21

3.3 Statistical Treatment 22

4 RESULTS 23-29 4.1 Difficulties in learning vocabulary 23

4.2 Exploring meaning of unfamiliar words 25

4.3 Keeping words in long-term memory 26

4.4 Positive changes when applying these methods 28

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5 DISCUSSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 30-33

5.1 Purpose of the Study 30

5.2 Findings and Explanation 30

5.3 Limitations 32

5.4 Implication 32

5.5 Recommendations 33

REFERENCES 34

APPENDIX A: RESEARCH PROPOSAL 36

APPENDIX B: STUDENT’S QUESTIONNAIRE 42

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to a restaurant, they will see the English menu beside the native one (Crystal, 2003) It is not easy to calculate English proportional use towards the other languages in daily life It is estimated that more than 50% of academic papers which were printed every year are written in English, and it was increasing yearly English is also an unquestioned language of science and technology, and many countries was changing scientific journals from lingos to English According to Noack (2015), English is by far the most common studied foreign language in the world with over 1.5 billion learners Learning English is really important because

it takes a part in helping people to contact with the world’s development and culture Moreover, it is also beneficial in getting jobs and expands more opportunities for leaners in a modern life which requires foreign languages in many jobs (Chơn, 2018) English is not only a global language but also the common language of business over the world Because both communication and business have been globalized, there is a need for a common spoken and written language which can be understood and accepted across borders All the borders of ethnic, race and religion exist because human created them Therefore, cross-

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border learning means breaking all the borders to see the whole world; and English

is one of the weapons for us to break those limits Understanding that situation, Viet Nam has put English into official education program as a compulsory subject

in colleges since March, 2019 (An, 2018) However, Vietnamese students still have many problems when learning and using English In fact, Ánh (2018) said that there were only 10 to 15 percent of students who can reach the English outcome standard in universities in 2016 One of the essential elements which helps English learners to gain the best result is vocabulary size However, most of English learners in Viet Nam have an inadequate size of vocabulary which is not enough for even the basic daily conversations To success, learners have to apply not only one method but also the combination of strategies, methodologies and different practical activities to learn new words effectively

1.2 Problem identification

The main section of language is vocabulary which plays a very essential role in language learning process If people wish to use a language fluently, they need to be excellent in all of four skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing

A learner with an inadequate size of vocabulary will not effectuate language excellently (Susanto, 2017) However, vocabulary has not been appreciated in teaching foreign languages for many years It becomes a serious problem, especially in Asian countries A big dictionary includes about 128.000 word families in it, and it is estimated that average college students know about 58,000 normal basic words, 1,700 rare basic words and 96,000 derivatives and compounds (Zhang, 2011) People tend to attach more special importance to grammar than vocabulary, and it usually becomes a measurement to evaluate a

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person’s English ability However, this is the wrong way to approach English, because vocabulary is a basis step; therefore, it need to be learned carefully before starting learning other parts of English How people understand a strange word immediately when they see it, how they remember a number of vocabulary by their effort or how they use them effectively when communicating in practice is a hard problem for them to achieve (Susanto, 2017)

Similar to the above findings, many Vietnamese students in general as well

as HUFLIT students in particular have problems with vocabulary learning Firstly, students cannot recognize sounds when listening to English This problem proceeds from the lack of the adequate vocabulary and wrong pronunciation, and when foreigners say with a correct pronunciation, they cannot recognize them English is different from Vietnamese; therefore, learners usually have some basic mistakes when pronouncing a word such as sound swallowing, lack of stressed sound and intonation, etc Thus, when listening to a foreigner with their fast pronounce, spirant and ligature, learners cannot recognize the words which leads

to the poor listening ability Secondly, although they have had a long time of studying this foreign language, they cannot speak English naturally It takes them

a long time to response to the opposite person For example, when somebody asks them “How are you?”, they will translate the sentence to Vietnamese, and then they translate again the answer from Vietnamese to English This habit results in the postponed and interrupted conversation because they cannot expose their thoughts smoothly Lastly, students are short of confidence because of the anxiety

of making mistakes and the poor response ability which leads to the unconfident and hesitant state Gradually, it makes learners become negative and think that

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they cannot communicate in English Most of above problems originate in the lack

of basic knowledge, correct pronunciation and especially vocabulary

1.3 Research objectives

Although, there are a lot of ways to learn new words, but people still wonder about their methods and desired effects The purpose of this study is to find out main difficulties in vocabulary learning of Vietnamese students in general and Huflit English major students in particular Thence, the study investigates useful strategies which help students to overcome their problems and complete their language skills as well as what these strategies have effected on learners

1.4 Scope of the study

There are many researchers who wrote about vocabulary learning topic before In the research “Vocabulary teaching and learning principles in classroom practice” by Ismail (2017), he pointed out ten principles which are essential in ensuring the success of vocabulary acquisition and how the teachers implemented these principles to teach vocabulary in classroom The study “The teaching of vocabulary: A perspective” (Susanto, 2017) mentioned the profound knowledge

of vocabulary learning and some issues which are related to the melioration of learner’s vocabulary size, such as what to teach and how to teach Although many studies have been done, there is still some misapprehension about which strategy

is effective for learner self-studying

This study will focus on efficient methods which learners apply to improve their vocabulary size and how these manners have helped them in their learning process The English major seniors at Huflit who have learnt English for few years

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or more and have the experience of studying vocabulary will be examined, and they will also participate in this survey

1.5 Research Organization

This study will be divided into five sections The first part of this research study is the introduction about vocabulary and vocabulary learning strategies Domestic and foreign studies will be reviewed in the second part The third part is the method which the researcher uses to carry out the research In the part 4, the research findings and discussion will be outlined In the terminal part, the report gives a conclusion with recommendations to improve and develop methods of vocabulary learning result for Vietnamese students

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by speakers and which is used to communicate among those speakers and used by the group or individual” Vocabulary is a word or list and the central of language which is the instrument to express feelings and ideas as well as declare thoughts between people Without a sufficient quantity of vocabulary, people may be in trouble with daily activities which require English, such as listening, speaking, reading and writing We can say that vocabulary is: (1) every word which a person knows and utilizes, (2) every word of a specific language, (3) every word that a person utilizes when communicating, (4) a series of words and their meanings, particularly the foreign language learning books

Rohmatillah (2014) also devided words into two forms Firstly, oral vocabulary is the set of words; and people know the meaning when speaking or reading orally Secondly, print vocabulary includes words which the meaning is known when people write or listen quitely Furthermore, the writer defined that the knowledge of words also appears in at least two forms Firsly, productive vocabulary is the set of words which people can use in speaking or writing They are familiar and well-known words Secondly, receptive or recognitive vocabulary

is the form of words that people usually assign their meanings when they are

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reading or listening These words are often unfamiliar and less well-known to students They are words which people do not use naturally; though, when meeting these words, individuals can recognize them, even if incompletely

2.2 What is vocabulary learning strategy?

Vocabulary learning is a sub-category of a language learning process In the learning process, people try to apply as many methods as possible in order to be expert in the target language in an efficient time (Ismail, 2017) Asgari (2011) said that vocabulary learning strategies are ways used by the language learners which help them to acquire new English words In other word, they are methods that learners exert to use in order to improve their language ability They are essential because they help a learner to be active and take responsibility for their learning process (Goundar, 2015) Asgari (2011) believed that there are two main groups

of vocabulary learning strategies They are discovery strategies which are used to discover meaning of words, and consolidation strategies which are used to consolidate the words when they have been encountered Saengpakdeejit (2014) stated that vocabulary learning strategies are known as the knowledge about mechanisms which are used in order to learn new words as well as actions and steps performed by students The purpose of vocabulary learning strategies is to (1) discover meaning of new words, (2) keep them in long-term memory, (3) recall them whenever and (4) apply them in oral and writing mode

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2.3 Subjective factors effecting on vocabulary learning process

The factors that effect on vocabulary learning process are reasons which result in the final outcome and appear during the student’s learning progress When a person is aware of what can effect on his studying, he can think about how

to adjust them to make them become suitable for his situation Most of the previous researchers pointed out two main kinds of factors that affect the learners Those are subjective factors or we can call them as learner individual difference factors and objective factors or we can call them as social and situational factors

Subjective factors or learner individual difference factors are things which based on human beings, personal characters, thoughts and feelings When mentioning about the subjective factors, Linh (2017) stated that they consist of learner’s awareness and their interest of learning vocabulary With an adequate vocabulary size, it will be not difficult for students to be fluent in other skills Therefore, she believed that the awareness of vocabulary learning importance has

a particular role in student learning process Interest is the special attitude of a person towards something which can be meaningful in life and brings the pleasant feeling during his (her) activity When a student is interested in English, he will know and understand how important it is in his life Subsequently, it creates the mentality of attracting a person towards that subject and he really want to discover and find out about it without unwillingness, and he will feel comfortable when acquiring knowledge Meanwhile, Boonkongsaen (2012) believed that there are four things of a person which help him achieve good results in vocabulary learning They are the belief of vocabulary importance and usefulness, positive

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attitude towards what we are doing, high motivation (student’s inherent interest in vocabulary learning) and previous language learning experience

2.4 Objective factors effecting on vocabulary learning process

The last main factors affecting the learner’s use of vocabulary learning strategy are objective factors or we can call them as social and situational factors Objective factors are affecting elements which based on learner’s situation, surrounding background and environment Examining on sixth graders in two middle schools in Hanoi, Linh (2017) found that there are two elements which influence on student’s vocabulary learning They are known as teacher’s teaching methods and studying equipment and materials There are many English teaching methods which have been applied at Vietnamese schools, such as presentation, oral, case study, etc Each of methods has its own strengths as well as weaknesses which effect a lot on student’s learning result generally and vocabulary memorization ability particularly After her survey, she stated that, most of the students are interested in group work activity The second method that students want to be used in English lessons is visual method by showing pictures, video clips, etc Besides, teaching and studying means have a big role in foreign language acquirement They are divided into two different means that are outside and inside means Outside means are machines supporting learner’s language ability improvement, especially listening and speaking improvement, such as projector, television, cassette, etc Inside mean is using studied language in other learning activities According to the modern language teaching perspective, reduction of using native language in foreign language teaching is really necessary Therefore, leaners should apply studied vocabulary in the next learning

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activities It helps the learner remember new word effectively and become confident when communicating in English Beside recommended factors above, Boonkongsaen (2012) suggested five more social and situational factors which comprehend the field of study, course type, class level, gender and language learning environment Students from different majors will have different learning strategies which are suitable for them It is found that students studying English and non-English major employ vocabulary learning strategies severally Course type is a key element influencing on the vocabulary learning strategy use which relates to “regular” or “part-time” programs It is found that the use of vocabulary learning strategies of students from regular program and morning course is greater than part-time and evening-course students Class level is a clear reason effecting

on the way that vocabulary learning strategies are used It is found that the more advanced students are, the more used strategies like skipping a new word are Among these factors, gender receives a great notice from researchers Some researchers believed that female and male students have differences significantly

in employing strategies; meanwhile, other ones stated that there is no difference

in the use of vocabulary learning strategies between male and female students The language learning environment is divided into formal and informal learning environment Formal environment is the teacher’s encouragement to learn a new word; while the informal environment is related to the role of supportive and unsupportive parents Students who live with supportive parents will have great use of vocabulary learning strategies than the ones living with their unsupportive parents

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2.5 Classification of vocabulary learning strategies

During the language acquiring process, learners who wish to master vocabulary have to face many challenges Therefore, they need to know the strategies which help them to acquire the meaning of words Vocabulary strategies were divided into 2 basic types relied on their purposes (Saengpakdeejit, 2014) This more specific division helps us to see the whole of vocabulary learning strategy kinds based on their purposes and choose suitable strategy for each person need and aim They are strategies for exploring meaning of unfamiliar words and strategies for keeping lately studied vocabulary in the long-term memory and using them whenever or we can call these strategies as consolidation strategies (Easterbrook, 2013)

Strategies for exploring the meaning of unfamiliar words are ways that students employ to know the meaning of a new word with or without any help This kind of strategies consists of three sub-categories: discovery strategies, social strategies and support strategies Discovery strategies are carried out to help the learners to get the meaning of words without any support from any one There are eight strategies in this category: (1) Conjecturing the meaning by its context, (2) Conjecturing the word by dissecting its part of speech, (3) Conjecturing the meaning through the sentence’s grammatical structure, (4) Conjecturing the meaning by dissecting the word’s affixes and roots, (5) Conjecturing the meaning through aural characteristics such as pronunciation, stress, etc., (6) Conjecturing the meaning through real conjuncture, (7) Conjecturing the meaning through gestures and attitudes, (8) Conjecturing the meaning through pictures, graphs or figures, etc Social strategies help learners to understand the meaning of word by

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interacting with surrounding people such as teachers, friends, classmates, etc The strategies in this category consist of: (1) inquiring friends or classmates about meaning of word, (2) inquiring teachers about the meaning, (3) inquiring family members or English native speaker about the meaning Support strategies are ways which help learners discover the word’s meaning through assistant devices such

as dictionary The strategies in this category contain: (1) Using the English dictionary, (2) Using the English-Vietnamese dictionary, (3) Using electronic dictionary such as dictionary programs and applications on telephone and Internet, (4) Using website on the Internet

English-Strategies which students employ to remember learned vocabulary and use them whenever include memory strategies, cognitive strategies and metacognitive strategies Memory strategies help learners to keep learned words in their long-term memory through mental process by connecting the word with their knowledge This category includes nine strategies, they are: (1) Connecting the word with a Vietnamese word which has the same sound, (2) Applying learned words into daily dialogue, (3) Thinking about using learned word in fictitious situation, (4) Using the combination of word and concept, (5) Connecting the word with a specific image in mind, (6) Constructing sentences with lately learned words, (7) Connecting the word with another English same-sound word, (8) Connecting the word with another English word which has the same spelling, (9) Connecting the word with a person’s experience The second category known as cognitive strategies which are routines helping the learners to keep the meaning of word in their long-term memory The strategies in this category consist of: (1) Saying the word and its meaning recurrently, (2) Writing down the new words with their meanings on notes and sticking them on wherever easily seen and

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repeating them, (3) Writing down new word list with their meanings and examples

on notebook and reviewing them whenever you can, (4) Using word card The last category is metacognitive strategies which are carefully planned methods helping the learners to remember vocabulary It consists of eight strategies in total: (1) Doing English exercise after class, (2) Classifying learned words into groups based on their resemblance of spelling and pronunciation, (3) Classifying learned words into groups based on their resemblance of synonyms and antonyms, (4) Doing dictations, (5) Playing crossword puzzles and scrabble, (6) Watching English films with subtitles, (7) Reading English books, magazines, newspaper, etc., (8) Listening to English songs

All the detailed strategies above are solutions for learners to deal with their problems during the language learning process generally as well as vocabulary learning process particularly

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CHAPTER III RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 3.1 Description of the Subjects

The participants for this survey were 50 senior students who are studying in Foreign Language Department at Ho Chi Minh City University of Foreign Languages and Information Technology All of these students have experienced learning foreign languages as well as vocabulary for at least four years and take interest in information and news about vocabulary and its learning strategies Choosing experienced students was really necessary because those students would give precise, straightforward and valuable answers

3.2 Procedures of Data collection

The aim of the questionnaire survey was to find out which effective strategies that students have applied during their vocabulary learning process and how they have effected on their learning outcome The questionnaires were delivered to 50 students with 9 questions In there, the first 5 questions were created to gather student’s opinions and habits about their own vocabulary learning process and the last 4 questions were disposed for the purpose to define student’s main difficulties when learning vocabulary, strategies which students think they can be effective to acquire and their positive influence on vocabulary leaning outcome The investigation was carried out during break time when students gathered at Huflit lobby The researcher gave the questionnaires to students; then, the researcher gave particular direction to participants to do the survey The topic is not unfamiliar to English major students; therefore, it was not

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complex for them to accomplish it However, they had to do the survey honestly, completely and carefully Students had 5 to 10 minutes to complete the questionnaires and returned them to researcher After that, the researcher summarized the results from them

3.3 Statistical Treatment

In this paper, after the general survey, the data will be performed within Excel because this tool is widely used for the entry and management of data The processed data are showed in Results