04051001871 tóm tắt an investigation into the teaching of grammar at a secondary school in hanoi = nghiên cứu về việc dạy ngữ pháp trong lớp học tiếng anh Ở một trường cấp hai tại hà nội

04051001871 tóm tắt an investigation into the teaching of grammar at a secondary school in hanoi = nghiên cứu về việc dạy ngữ pháp trong lớp học tiếng anh Ở một trường cấp hai tại hà nội

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES

ĐAN THỊ THÚY ANH

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE TEACHING OF GRAMMAR

AT A SECONDARY SCHOOL IN HANOI (Nghiên cứu về việc dạy ngữ pháp trong lớp học tiếng Anh

ở một trường cấp hai tại Hà Nội)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Major: English Language Teaching Methodology Code: 8140231.01

Supervisor: Dr Nguyễn Thị Hương

HÀ NỘI – 2022

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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Statement of the problem and rationale for the study

Foreign language pedagogy has witnessed an intense debate concerning the role of grammar instruction in the learning process, particularly as a result of a switch from traditional grammar translation teaching method to the communicative approach With growing concern for learners’ communicative ability, the role of grammar teaching has declined Various researchers have proposed the omission of explicit grammar instruction in communicative classroom (e.g Krashen, 1985, 1999; Terrell,

1977, Truscott, 1999), arguing that a native-like learning environment would allow students to absorb the grammar rules naturally similar to the way native speakers learn the language A more recent school of thought, namely the one by Ellis (2006), reexamines the role of grammar instruction in the communicative learning environment Taking into consideration the significance of grammar instruction in the context of communicative language teaching, which is the major teaching approach promoted in the mainstream English curriculum in public schools in Vietnam, this research paper will be conducted to investigate into the practice of grammar teaching and teachers' opinions toward grammar teaching at a secondary school

1.2 Research aims and research questions

This study seeks to investigate the current situation of grammar teaching in a secondary school in Hanoi, and discover the role of grammar instructions in the language classroom, specifically its significance in relation with different language skills In brief, the study attempts to address the following research questions:

1 What are the teachers’ opinions about grammar teaching?

2 What are the actual approaches used to teach grammar in Vietnam's secondary EFL classes?

1.3 Scope of the study

Concerning academic scope, this paper will focus on investigating both the stated beliefs and actual practice of grammar teaching amongst English teachers For the social scope, the researcher will survey the majority of English teachers working in LQD Secondary School in Hanoi and observe a portion of the surveyed and interviewed participants

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1.4 Method of the study

This study follows a mix-method approach to data collection and analysis, including both quantitative and qualitative data as follows First, the survey questionnaire is delivered to the teachers so as to obtain their opinions about different aspects of grammar instruction Seconds, semi-structured interviews are conducted in order to clarify some points made by teachers in the Last but not least, actual grammar lessons will be under the researcher’s close observation for the investigation of teachers’ actual approach(es) to grammar instruction

1.5 Significance of the study

It is anticipated that the findings of this study will provide a closer look at the current approach to grammar teaching and learning in the English classroom of a specific secondary school in Hanoi The study will also attempt to propose relevant recommendations for the teaching of grammar, with a view to improving the effectiveness of grammar section at least in this context

1.6 Research design

Chapter 1: the introduction presenting the rationale, aims, research questions,

significance and the design of the study

Chapter 2: the literature review which includes the definition of grammar,

arguments for and against the role of grammar instruction in language learning, different approaches to grammar instruction as well as related studies concerning the teaching of grammar

Chapter 3: the methodology which presents the participants, data collection

instruments and data analysis

Chapter 4: the findings and discussions which include results from both

qualitative and quantitative data and the possible meanings of such results

Chapter 5: the conclusion which consists of the pedagogical implications and the

limitations of the study

be summarized The first one emphasizes grammar as a knowledge-based system of rules In Burns and Richards’ (2012) perspectives, teachers who adhere to this definition will deliver grammar instruction with exercises and test items aiming to develop learners’ ability to accurately apply the rules at sentence-level Meanwhile, the second viewpoint sees grammar as a skill, which may result in the appreciation of learners’ ability to make appropriate grammatical choices for the achievement of meaningful messages

2.2 The role of grammar instruction

One school of thought is that grammar teaching may have little benefit for learning

a language (Krashen, 1985, 1999; Terrell, 1977, Truscott, 1999) and may even hinder learners’ communicative competence (VanPatten, 1990) Accordingly, in lieu of a focus on linguistic form, the classroom activity which revolves around comprehensible input is supported by various researchers, one notable figure of whom is Krashen (1981, 1985)

However, many other researchers are of the opinion that teaching grammar plays a significant role in facilitating the language acquisition process (Doughty, 1991; Ellis, 2002a, 2006; Fotos, 1996) According to Sharwood-Smith (1981), grammar teaching aided in the development of communicative skills by raising learners’ consciousness This point of view is in accordance with Terrell (1991)’s opinion about the role of grammar instruction as assistance to the acquisition process Likewise, Ellis (2006) emphasizes the central place of grammar in language teaching; and instruction needs

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to ensure that learners are able to connect grammatical forms to the meanings they realize in communication

2.3 Major approaches to grammar instruction

Acknowledgment of the prominence of grammar instruction as well as the need for

communicative competence, Ellis (2006) summarized the concepts of focus-on-form instruction in comparison with the conventional focus-on-forms approach

Types of Form-focused Instruction

1 Focus on forms

2 Planned focus on form

3 Incidental focus on form

Form Meaning Meaning

Intensive Intensive Extensive

2.3.1 Focus on forms

The first approach has the plural forms being emphasized by Long (1991) because

of the primary focus on grammatical forms rather than meaning Specifically, teaching

in accordance with this approach means that classroom activities are directed intensively at a single grammar structure so as to ensure a high level of grammar accuracy (Ellis, 2001) Accordingly, grammar is taught in separate lessons The teacher starts by introducing an input text and drawing students’ attention to the new grammar structures and explain it to the students As the lesson progresses, students are expected to complete written or oral exercises to practice the target form In the follow-up activity, students may need to produce a piece of the target language, using the structure they have learned before This approach can promote an explicit and accurate understanding of grammar, as well as ample opportunities for students to practice the target structures in relevant forms-focused exercises as well as producing the language

2.3.2 Focus on form

With the increasing interest in the implementation of communicative teaching and

learning, the focus-on-form approach has been more favored as it entails a focus on

meaning with attention to form arising out of the context Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) discards the sole concentration of grammar rules and places the

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emphasis on what communicative functions people perform with language (Harmer, 2001) Thompson (1996) points out that learners who are involved in the communicative learning environment can discover the grammar in the new language and understand its function Accordingly, teaching grammar communicatively enables second language learners to both acquire the language forms and put them into real communication This link between form and meaning in CLT environment can be

reflected in the focus on form approach to grammar teaching

2.4 Related studies concerning the teaching and learning of grammar

As the debates over the role of grammar and approach to teaching it continues, there has been a voluminous amount of work concerning the practice of grammar instruction, and specifically, in communicative classrooms With their framework being proposed to promote communicative grammar instruction, Pham & Nguyen (2014)’s research shared some similarities with the findings by Tran (2015) and Khuong (2017) In their study of the same topic, they both highlighted the prominence

of communicative grammar teaching via the report on the application of some ways to teach English grammar for communicative purposes (Tran, 2015), as well as the reflective teaching approach to researching on how four communicative grammar lessons were implemented in a specific high school in Vietnam (Khuong, 2017) The research by Ju (2010) highlights two decisive factors relating to which grammar approach to be applied In particular, the first influence comes from the teaching approaches used in the textbooks, and second is the confidence and ability of the teacher to master English In the investigation into the practice of communicative grammar teaching, Welo (2017) concludes that the teachers’ methods and techniques are textbook dependent and they simply teach grammar at sentence level and wordlist provided in the book

When it comes to the investigation into the actual situation of grammar teaching, many other researchers prioritize the discovery of teachers’ perceptions and attitudes towards the role of grammar and how grammar is taught This can be explained that the underlying beliefs of teacher directly affect their actual practice of grammar teaching (Clark & Peterson, 1986) In the study involving Turkish academics and

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students (Sari, Yagiz & Konca, 2017), it pointed out that the teachers believe that grammar instruction is an important part of language teaching and they prefer it to be taught explicitly In Vietnam, the study by Le & Roger (2009) strongly indicated the teachers surveyed agree that grammar plays the central role in language teaching and learning Concerning the teaching approach, these teachers strongly believe that that grammar should be taught explicitly and relevant practice should be assigned to students Notably, the results also point out that these Vietnamese teachers oppose to the notion that grammar can be learned only by exposing to the target language in natural environment This research could be supported by a number of related studies (Burgess & Etherington, 2002; Barnard & Scampton (2009); Borg & Burn, 2008) Though the results from previous research can be a source of reference for teachers

to base their grammar-teaching decisions on, more investigation into the actual practice of a specific context should be conducted so as to improve the particular teaching and learning situation This research paper will seek to understand teachers’ opinion about similar issues, followed by an investigation of the manifestation of these opinions

3.2 Setting of the research

This study was conducted at LQD Secondary School during the 2021 – 2022 academic year The school’s English curriculum follows that of Ministry of Education and Training, meaning that the approach to second language teaching and learning has been of the communicative one The core books are the New English books, designed and published by the Ministry of Education and Training to achieve the ultimate goal

of foreign language training: the communicative competence

3.3 Research participants

Participants were twelve female EFL teachers of LQD Secondary School in the academic year 2021-2022 Each teacher was responsible for several classes of 40-45 students each, depending on the distribution of tasks and the available personnel of the English Division From the most newly employed teacher at 24 years old to the most experienced one at 55, those teachers had different years of experience in English language teaching

3.4 Data collection instruments and procedure

a Structured questionnaire

Because of the similarity in the purpose, this study consulted the questionnaire used by Van Canh & Barnard (2009), which was employed to investigate the teachers’ opinions about the role of grammar and approach to grammar teaching The questionnaires were delivered to twelve teachers via emails after the researcher had

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contacted them to briefly introduce the study, explain the aim and ask the teachers for their participation In sum, ten questionnaires were returned from the teachers, all of which were valid

b Semi-structured interview

After questionnaires had been collected and synthesized, 4 participants who agreed to take part in the follow-up interview were contacted Semi-structured interviews with 7 questions concerning the necessity of grammar in language teaching, purpose of grammar teaching, and currently used approach to grammar teaching were conducted, each of which lasted for 15 to 20 minutes

c Observation

Observation notes were prepared and utilized to collect data about the actual grammar instruction in the classroom, specifically the teachers’ approaches to teaching and the compatibility between their belief and practice Besides the general information of the teacher and the classroom, details about the classroom activities, teacher and students’ role as well as the researcher’s comments were included in the notes The interviewed teachers were asked for their consent to direct observations of grammar lessons Due to the limits of time, the researcher decided to observe the teaching practice of two teachers, one of whom shared the viewpoints with the majority of the participants in most of the questions in the survey and the other expressed some noteworthy opinions during the interview

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CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 4.1 Teachers’ opinions about different aspects of grammar teaching

4.1.1 Teachers’ conceptualization of grammar

Table 1 Teachers’ perceptions about different definitions of grammar

Q1 Grammar is a description of the structure of the

Q2 Grammar refers to how words and phrases are

Q3 Grammar is more of a skill which speakers use

Q4

Grammar is communication itself, containing

tangible and helpful resources for understanding

and producing language

The table above showed that while teachers generally approved of grammar as a rule-based system, according to which words, phrases and sentences were formed, the participants did not show sharp disagreement towards the seemingly contrasting viewpoint that definition of grammar entailed communication

4.1.2 Teachers’ opinions about the role of grammar and grammar instruction

a The role of grammar knowledge in language learning

Table 2 Teachers’ perceptions about the role of grammar in language learning

Q10

Knowledge of grammar serves as a firm base on

which communication skills are built and

developed

Q11

Learners’ use of the language is unrelated to the

conscious knowledge of the grammar system

and its functions

Q13 Learners need conscious knowledge of

The surveyed teachers expressed a strong approval of the statements advocating the pivotal role of grammar for language learning However, most of the teachers expressed their uncertainty when encountering Q11 (MODE=3), which stated the

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irrelevance of language use and conscious grammar knowledge To a certain extent, the response to this statement seems to conflict with those of Q10 and Q13 On being questioned about the seemingly contrasting ideas about the significance of grammar, T5 explained in the interview that under certain circumstances learners could produce

a piece of language without knowing the underlying grammar rules of the sentence However, this did not necessarily mean concrete knowledge of grammar rules are of little importance for language learning, specifically skill development

b The role of grammar instruction

 The role of grammar instruction in developing language knowledge

Table 3 Teachers’ perceptions about the role of grammar instruction in developing

language knowledge

Q5 Grammar teaching has little benefit for

Q8 Grammar teaching helps raise students’

Q14 Excluding grammar from the language

teaching program is beneficial to the learners 1.6 2 0.52

Q15 The formal study of grammar is essential to the

With keen appreciation of grammar as a firm foundation for language learning, as reported in Table 3, the teachers expressed their advocacy of the benefits derived from formal grammar instruction for foreign language learning According to Table 3, Q5 (MEAN =1.8) and Q14 (MEAN=1.6) which either rejected the beneficial effects of grammar teaching or proposed the abandonment of grammar instruction received relatively low level of agreement

 The role of grammar instruction in developing communicative competence When it comes to the significance of grammar instruction for the establishment of communicative competence, more doubts amongst the teachers were reported the following table

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Table 4 Teachers’ perceptions about the role of grammar instruction in developing

communicative competence

Q6 Grammar teaching may hinder learner’s

Teaching grammar in separate lessons cannot help

students use the language form to create meaning

in natural communication

The majority of the surveyed teachers disagreed that grammar teaching hindered the development of the four skills (Q6, MEAN= 2.4, MODE=2), and responses from Q7 also indicated that grammar could be helpful for communicative competence (MEAN=4) However, it should be noted that most of the participants expressed doubts about the value of teaching grammar separately in helping learners use the language form to create meaning (Q9, Q12, MODE=3) Questions were raised during the interviews about the above responses and the answers followed:

“I agree that grammar teaching is important for the acquisition of grammar knowledge, but when it comes to the development of language skills, the establishment of a meaning-form depends a lot on how grammar is taught Sometimes students master the rules thanks to intensive practice, but fail to apply it

in communicative tasks, such as speaking or writing.” (T2)

4.1.3 Teachers’ opinion about the best approaches to grammar instruction

a Introduction of grammar points

 Implicit and explicit grammar teaching

Table 5 Teachers’ perceptions about implicit and explicit grammar teaching

Q16

Learners study grammar more effectively by

exposure to the environment of using the

language naturally

Q23 Comparison and contrast of individual structures

is beneficial to learners’ grammar learning 3.9 4 0.32 Q28

Grammar is best taught implicitly That is, rules

should not be clearly stated but learners deduce

the rules by exposing to the language