Language skills training in primary schools remains a lot of shortcomings Our primary school curriculum aims at meeting students’ needs of four skills: Listening - speaking - reading - w
Trang 11.1 Language skills training means life skills training for students
Listening - speaking - reading - writing are regular activities in our life However, among
these four activities, listening & speaking appear more frequently Two features characterizethis pair of activities as follows:
- Firstly, it is a pair of spoken language activities - direct communication by sound in
1.2 Good listening & speaking help students well perceive and explore the world
Listening & speaking are a means for students to reason and perceive the surrounding world actively Students use their listening & speaking activities directly addressing some
problem or situation arising in their communication environment
Due to such an important role of listening & speaking in students’ perception andexploration of the world, it is very necessary to study further features of listening & speakingactivities so that appropriate training methods for students’ psychological and perceptivefeatures and feasible for teaching in school can be created
1.3 Language skills training in primary schools remains a lot of shortcomings
Our primary school curriculum aims at meeting students’ needs of four skills: Listening
- speaking - reading - writing However, teachers, in current fact, focus too much on thereading & writing skills, usually pay less attention to listening-speaking skills training and getperplexed to organize studying activities related to practice of these two skills when teachingVietnamese subject
In addition, teachers are not fully aware of the important role of listening and speakingskills in the process of learning Vietnamese subject for primary students System of exercises
is not attractive to students; ways of organizing are monotonous, boring Especially, there aretoo many programming contents taught in primary schools, teachers do not have enoughneeded time to practice this activity as expected so the organization to train listening &speaking skills for students at the beginning of primary levels now also has some difficultproblems
1.4 Requirements of Vietnamese teaching method innovation in general and language skills training for primary students in particular
Facing the requirement of the radical and comprehensive education innovation,Vietnamese subject is also thoroughly well defined innovation according to orientcommunication Therefore, training language skills for primary students is extremelyimportant In order to form and develop these skills, it is necessary to create a specialized,multifarious and diversified curricula and method of formation language skills based on
Trang 2rationale as well as reality; this can help students practice language skills effectively inschools
2 Research purposes and tasks
2.1 Purposes
- Give orientations of reasonable curricula, methods and performance procedures to help teachers overcome difficulties in creating communication-oriented Vietnamese teaching activities.
- Give appropriate procedures of language skills training with some corresponding exercises in order to promote teaching effectiveness as well as help students enhance their language capability, especially know how to use spoken language as a means of communication, learning and other leisure activities.
- Establish curricula and organization methods of the language skills training process
- Propose system of exercises to train language skills for grade 1 students, and designsome sample lesson plans to concretize procedure of language skills formation
- Verify feasibility of the proposals raised in the thesis by making experimentalassessments to finally come to necessary conclusions and recommendations
3 Object and scope of research
Trang 34.4 Pedagogical experiment
5 Scientific hypothesis
If we rely on a basis of solid scientific theory, the actual survey conducted thoughtful andproposed contents as well as the process of training measures through scientific, attractive andsuitable exercise activities for students at the beginning of primary levels It is certainly thatthe quality of training listening & speaking skills for students at the beginning of primarylevels will enhance Students will practice more forcefully and actively that helps themperform speaking & listening activities more effectively, giving them the confidence, calmand active when speaking & listening in learning and communication
6 Contributions of the thesis
Set up the theoretical and practical bases on which the curricula and methods of languageskills training for grade 1 students through Vietnamese subject are established
The thesis proposes not only curricula and methods of language skills training for grade 1students but also its performance procedures as the final proof for the whole process, which
we think the most reasonable Furthermore, the thesis clearly shows orientation of application
in the existing Vietnamese teaching reality
7 Layout of the thesis
- The thesis consists of 148 main pages and 79 appendix ones
- The thesis is composed of preamble, contents, general conclusions, reference materials,and appendices
CHAPTER 1 OVERVIEW OF RESEARCH ON LISTENING – SPEAKING SKILLS TRAINING
FOR STUDENTS IN THE FIRST GRADE CLASSROOM
1.1 Research on listening & speaking activities and listening & speaking teaching for the students in the first grade classroom in some countries in the world
1.1.1 Some researches on listening & speaking skills training
Nowadays, there are variety of researches on capability of using language of primarystudents in general and the formation of listening & speaking skills for the students in the firstgrade classroom in particular all over the world Following are some researches related toformation and development of listening & speaking skills for primary students Firstly, It can
be pointed out Russian scientists’ opinions of teaching mother tongue [1, pages 18-38], inwhich the author Phe-do-ren-co L.L emphasizes the roles of verbal language and the concernabout listening – speaking skills right from the early period of children’s language studying
process The author V.I Ca-pi-nox focuses on opinions of activity theory in the psychological field; his point of view creates basic effects on formation and development of children’s
speech
Besides, there are some researches of British scientists: The work “Toward an analysis
of discourse” provides and describes dialogue models between teachers and students in the class; the document “Teaching Speaking and Listening in the Primary School” - 2000 by the
Trang 4group of authors Elizabeth Grugeon, Lyn Dawers, Carol Smith and Lorraine Hubbard makes
a general introduction to listening – speaking skills; the book “Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage” considers development and language use capability in communication to
be the focal point in children’s study; the book “National Literacy Strategies: Framework for Teaching” mainly focuses on the extremely important role of listening – speaking skills in
language teaching; these two skills are considered an indispensable part of primary students’studying activities although they are not separately defined in the curriculum frame; the
document “Speaking, listening, learning” (2003) highly appreciates information exchange
activities by spoken language and encourages teachers to have such more activities, throughguidance on different kinds of dialogues, to develop children’s reasoning and reflection
abilities; In The “National Curriculum”, asserted that the duration for training speaking &
listening skills occupies one third English curriculum
Especially, the book “Teaching oral language” (Building affirm foundation using ICPALER in the early primary year) by John Munro (Australian Council for Educational Research), the first edition in 2011, is worth paying attention to In this book, the author not
only clearly states persuasive bases showing the importance of listening & speaking skills inthe process of reading & writing skills teaching and knowledge perception but also mentionsfocal points of communication languages during the initial primary education stage with amodel named ICPALER The model aims at equipping teachers with basic contents andmethods to control students’ listening – speaking skills
J.A Foley (2006), New Dimensions in the Teaching of Oral Communication (Anthologyseries 47 Published by Seameo Regional language Centre) is also a good book It comprises
16 issues selected as sample ideas and viewpoints of “New standards in communicationteaching” Such issues divided into 3 groups: Basic theory, real application andcommunication assessment In general, the document has mentioned the roles of speakingskill in studying a language, especially the development of children’s language skills
According to R.J Campbell (2006), “Developing the primary School Curriculum”,documentation helps us have an overview of the development programs in primary education,including issues: the political situation, the theory of program on education development, therole of teachers, providing research experiences in educational programs of some countries.Therefore, we can build up an ideal school model, which emphasizes teachers’ awareness oftheir role, and working environment conditions of the Primary Teachers Thereby, we have anoverall visualization of the role of research problems placed in a common system
What is more, the author Wilson, Julie Anne noted This author, via his book “A Program
to develop the listening and speaking skill of children in a first grade classroom” (1997)
provides us with an overview of the listening- speaking skills development program forchildren in a first grade classroom
1.1.2 Orientation of language skills training for primary students in some countries all over the world
Language use skills include Listening – Speaking – Reading – Writing However,research on methods and procedures to form those skills, each skill’s role as well as their
Trang 5relationship is one of the top concerns in the primary education curriculum in some countriesaround the world Through the researches on listening – speaking skills training for primarystudents as mentioned, some key points of view can be summarized as follows:
- Language skills training on the basis of capability
- Language skills training in and via communication
1.2 Researching and teaching listening & speaking for primary students in Vietnam
1.2.1 Researches on listening & speaking teaching in Vietnam
Followings are some of the documents directly related to the research issue that we wouldlike to repeat again:
+ The book “Some issues in teaching primary students dialogues” by the author Nguyen
Tri provides us with basic insights of dialogues, makes introduction to the dialoguecurriculum based on the Primary Curriculum issued in 2001 and 2006 and various types ofexercises for practicing listening and speaking skills used in Vietnamese language textbooks,
in which there are types of exercises of listening-speaking skills training for students; another
writing of the author “Experience in teaching the native language via communication method
in some countries” also takes written and spoken language teaching program structure for
primary students into consideration According to his opinions, teaching via and forcommunication has made changes in various aspects of the mother tongue teaching curricula
in some countries around the world
+ The author Phan Phuong Dung, in her thesis “Language means represent respect in Vietnamese communication”, systematically lists language means representing respect and
discusses about some samples of exercises to teach cultural speech for primary and secondarystudents In addition, she also elaborately states wording means expressing respect incommunication, application of such means in communication as well as in teaching
Vietnamese language subject for primary students in her writing “Wording means representing respect in communication and capacity of application in teaching Vietnamese for primary students”, The author specifically mentioned the means of word to express
politeness in communication features and the application of words to express politeness incommunication and the application of words to express politeness in teaching Vietnamese inprimary schools These documents are foundations for us to think about listening andspeaking skills teaching methods for students at the beginning of primary levels in order tocorrect mistakes made in communication
+ In the book “Communication and Vietnamese teaching in primary school”, the two
authors Phan Phuong Dung and Dang Kim Nga study such communication issues andactivities as forms of communication, functions of communication, native language andcommunication factors, types of speech and communication activities, the process of speechmaking and perception in communication
+ The author Nguyen Quang Ninh discussed the training speaking & writing skills in
communication method in his two studies “Some issues in communication-oriented written and spoken native language teaching in primary schools” and “Vietnamese language skills
Trang 6training”, refers to communication-oriented speaking skills training In addition, he also
emphasizes communication-oriented dialogues
+ In her thesis “Some methods to promote effectiveness of speaking skills training for primary students via Vietnamese subject”, the author Tran Thi Hien Luong clearly shows the
further practice-oriented teaching method to train speaking skills for students on the basis ofprimary students’ age-group characteristics and the modern teaching theory Within its scope,this thesis has released speaking skills training methods like pronunciation skill training,mono-dialogue skill training, dialogue skill training, in which language use skill training forprimary students is included
It can be seen that the researches of the above-mentioned authors have already referred toobjectives, contents, methods to develop listening and speaking skills or train the skill usingvia listening and speaking skills for students; nonetheless, the things discussed are just generalwithout being given as a big subject Methods to promote effectiveness of training listeningand speaking skills for primary students, on the basis of the existing curriculum andtextbooks, have hot been studied thoroughly Therefore, it is in need of studying contents tofind out relevant methods to promote effectiveness of training listening and speaking skills forstudents in the first grade classroom to assist teachers in the process of teaching Vietnameseaccording to the communication-oriented
1.2.2 Some opinions of skills training via Vietnamese subject in primary school
1.2.2.1 Opinions on training skills via Vietnamese subject in Vietnam primary schools before 2000
The concept of teaching Vietnamese is incomplete, the teaching of Vietnamese is notclear to emphasis on the main purpose that is teaching Vietnamese in communicating.Vietnamese curriculum has not concerned with Vietnamese traditional cultural elements toconduct training cultural behavior in communication
Before 2000, Vietnamese curriculum in primary levels made light of training listeningand speaking skills Most curricula were not interested in teaching Vietnamese inconversations and enhanced communicative capacity in conversations for students Theformation of communication skills only formed spontaneously in the process of the learningVietnamese at home and schools as well as in everyday of students’ life
The teaching methods based on the viewpoint of communication have not been used inteaching and learning Vietnamese The training skills were not proficient and well trainedwhich causes the limitation to the results of learning Vietnamese in general
1.2.2.2 Views of training Vietnamese listening & speaking skills in primary schools in Vietnam in recent years
Curriculum of teaching Vietnamese in the year 2000 was compiled based on the
orientation: Teaching Vietnamese through communication; making full use of students’
experience in using Vietnamese language; applying opinions of integrated Vietnameselanguage teaching; combine Vietnamese language teaching with culture and literatureteaching Based on the above-mentioned orientations, the 2000 Vietnamese program hasdefined objectives of the subjects in terms of three aspects: skill, knowledge and attitude
Trang 7Especially, it considers formation of skills as one of the leading important factors in teachinglanguage in primary school and affirms that teaching Vietnamese means teaching studentshow to use modern Vietnamese for learning and communication in environment which issuitable for their age groups.
1.2.2.3 Vietnamese language curriculum of Research Center for Educational Technology
The curriculum is built on the viewpoint on scientific language selection of modernVietnamese language to premise and express it in the form of a subject based on newprinciples: Development principles, standard principles, minimum principles Based on theseprinciples, Vietnamese language curriculum of Research Center for Educational Technologyhas identified an explicit teaching process Through the learning system, students can obtainscientific knowledge along with the corresponding skills
Conclusion
Formation and development of listening & speaking skills have been taken into much
consideration, and listening & speaking skills teaching programs have been applied as a key
task in schools all over the world Especially, listening & speaking skills are ranked at the
same level with the others and considered as the basic and foundation to help students dealwell with other skills In fact, the educators has put forward purposes of Listening - Speaking
- Reading - Writing skills training for students in the first grade classroom in addition tosupplying knowledge in teaching Vietnamese However, the contents and duration spent onteaching listening-speaking is still much less than on reading and writing within the currentVietnamese teaching program
CHAPTER 2 THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL RATIONALITIES OF LANGUAGE SKILLS
TRAINING FOR GRADE 1 STUDENT
2.1 Some general issues
2.1.1 Language use skills
2.1.1.1 Language skills
People need not only language-related knowledge but also four fundamental skills oflistening, speaking, reading, and writing in order to use any languages Those four skillsclosely interrelate Vietnamese subject at primary education level in general and at Grade 1 inparticular aims to create those four skills for the students, among which listening andspeaking skills need forming right at the beginning of their learning process as a basis for thegood formation and development of the remaining skills
2.1.1.2 Differences between written language and spoken one
Regarding lexicology, ellipsis and terseness are found more often in spoken languagethan in written language; however, spoken language is not so concise and to the point aswritten language In terms of grammar, the grammatical structures of spoken language isoften more complicated and varied than those of written language Regarding extra-linguistic
Trang 8elements, written language does not take advantage of the paralinguistic elements such asintonation, tone, face expression, eye contact, gesture, and posture, etc as spoken languagedoes Thus, there are differences between spoken language and written language in the ways
of producing and receiving of speech
Training spoken language along with communicative language (with teachers and friends
in school, with people who are proficient in language ) provides students experience in thenew syntactic structures, the rites of new words, and develops new ways of expressing andlinking ideas
2.1.1.3 Training of spoken language skills in relation to written language
In language teaching and learning, good language skills would help to prepare forthe process of learning how to write more easily The form of writing, which exits as a way ofrecording oral speech, quickly becomes a special form of language with specific traits ofappearance and semantics The forms of oral communication and written communicationclosely interrelate and interact with each other
2.1.2 Phases of skills formation & development, and language development of Grade 1 students
2.1.2.1 Phases of listening and speaking skills formation
- Phase 1: When a child is newly born (1-2 years old), he has no sense of skills He oftenturns towards the source of the voice, listens to spoken language (start paying attention tospeech sounds
- Phase 2: From 2.5 to 5 years old, children start learning skills on demand of childrenthrough three ways: imitation, role-play and monologues Children know to observe the linkbetween speech sounds and objects, colors (start to understand the meaning of words)
- Phase 3: At primary education level, children form skills consciously They listen to andremember all words / sentences repeated many times daily (Begin engraving upon memory /receiving vocabulary)
- Phase 4: At this stage, children’s’ mature skills become more sophisticated, childrenpractice speaking through simulation of sounds when they listen to (start passive speaking,imitating speaking)
- Phase 5: Communicating in spoken language community (active speaking)
2.1.2.2 Language development of Grade 1 students
- During Grade 1 period, the students’ language increases fast; and the syntax isdeveloped The students can present issues briefly, clearly as the result of not only theirexposure to scientific concepts but also the requirements of study activities and intellectualactivity The primary schools become the best education environment for the children to beguided to develop their vocabularies, to learn the correct structures of their mother tongue, toexpand their knowledge, and to improve their personalities In order to develop the children’slanguage, the teachers must be conscious of training their students in their spoken languagesskills (mainly conversational language) in conversations
In summary, learning Vietnamese language in general and training language skills inparticular at primary education level must be based on the children’s past experience and their
Trang 9experience in using language so that their language ability and ability related to thinking withlanguage continues to be developed It is the educational researchers’ prime duty to find outsuitable measures and organization modes to develop the primary students’ language skills.
2.1.3 Listening and speaking activities
2.1.3.1 The nature of listening and speaking activities
Verbal communication is essential in the human society Listening is about receivinginformation and processing the sounds having effects on the human auditory organs It is also
a human activity, which happens often It is an activity of transferring the speech producers’thoughts and information contents of mental nature into a material form of language code
2.1.3.2 Importance of listening and speaking activities
At schools, listening & speaking activities play a role as a communication tool todevelop thinking power and support study Listening and speaking at schools are twoactivities developed into skills under the guidance of teachers These activities are important
in enabling the students to communicate well in ordinary situations They partly help thestudents to better their Vietnamese language practice skills as well as their thinking powerand cognition ability
2.1.3.3 Several forms of listening and speaking
2.1 Theories applied in research process
2.2.1 Theories on verbal communication
Listening and speaking are verbal communication activities The verbal communication
is, in its nature, first and foremost a social activity Through communication, each individual
shows his or her thoughts, emotions, and ideas Especially, communication not only is a
structured activity with various different levels but also has specific objects In the process of
having effects on the objects, it makes them changed
Each communication includes, in order to bring its functions into play, two types of acts
which are formation (or production) of speech and receipt (or perception) of speech Communication is affected by communication-related elements, which are communication purposes, communication contents, communication modes, and communication contexts
Communication plays a very important role in life People use language for
exchanging daily information, establishing and maintaining relations It also helps people relax and entertain after their hardworking hours Therefore, it is a practical and necessary
approach to train the students in listening and speaking skills attached to communicationimprovement direction Through communication, the students are trained in language skills ingeneral and listening & speaking ones in particular In addition, communication also helps tocreate favorable conditions for them to express themselves in life
Trang 10Applying the theory of communication into practicing listening & speaking skills forstudents in grade 1 is considered from the aspect of pronunciation, vocabulary and syntax.Students practice pronunciation correctly, use vocabulary, create and express sentencescorrectly.
2.2.2 Theories on conversations
Conversation is a verbal communication activity created by the involved people in order
to help them exchange their information or thoughts, emotions etc in accordance with a setforth purpose
Based on the interlocutors in communication, conversation is categorized intomonologue and multi-dialogue Based on the narrow communication context of aconversation, conversation is sorted into ritual normative conversation and non-ritual one.Besides, there are possibly compulsory conversations and arbitrary ones
The communicating activity consists of word exchange activity, word respondingactivity, interactive activity Principles of negotiation in conversation, principle of turn-taking, principle of relevance in conversation; principle of respect of participators’ face, andcooperative principle (CP) in conversation
To apply the theory of conversation in training listening & speaking skills for Grade 1students with good results, teachers need to identify the factors that participate in theconversation; creating students’ demand for engaging in the conversations, creating afavorable communication context, creating objective for students in the process ofcommunication
2.2.3 Theories on activity psychology
Leaning and training in listening and speaking skills is about leaning and training in akind of activity However, listening and speaking is not a muscular activity but an activity ofmentality, perception, and cognition This activity abides by the thinking rules during theprocesses of speech production and perception The psychologist namely A.N Leonchiep’stheories on activity psychology enable us to imagine more clearly the specific language useprocedures like listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills and apply such procedures inanalyzing structure of speech acts and training in listening and speaking skills for students
The content of training listening & speaking skills in Vietnamese language focuses ontypes of conversations: dialogue and monologue, corresponding to the two forms of content
is listening & speaking type in conversation, building up the complete speech
Trang 11Organizational forms of training speaking & listening skills for students in grades 1 isbased on samples, answering questions according to the themes with illustration pictures,students know how to pose and answer questions related to object selection through givensituations and purposes
2.3.2 Exercise system for skills training in current Vietnamese Language textbook for Grade 1 students
2.3.2.1 Purposes, methods, and criteria for exercise system categorization
- Purposes: The research aims to carry out a survey on the fundamental demands,
contents, and standards of language skills through the whole program, especially through thesystem of exercises for students, to improve their language skills in the Vietnamese Languagetextbook for Grade 1 students in order to find out the weakness and strengths of the exercisesystem; based on which, we propose contents and methods of training in language skills forthe Grade 1 students through Vietnamese subject
- Method: In order to survey the exercise system in Vietnamese Language Textbook for
Grade 1 students, we have mapped out a plan of carrying out the survey with the steps asfollows:
Step 1: Building up a criteria for classifying the exercises
Step 2: Creating the foundations for evaluation of the exercises
Step 3: Preparing statistics, processing data and giving correct and unbiased assessmentcomments on the exercise system in the current Vietnamese Language education program
- Criteria:
+ Based on the skills in need of being trained
+ Based on the purposes of the exercises
+ Based on the requirements and contents of the exercises
2.3.2.2 Categorization of the exercises used for language skills training for Grade 1
students in current Vietnamese Language textbook.
- Exercise group served for speaking skill training in syllable learning sections
- Exercise group served for speaking skill training in general practice sections
2.3.2.3 General comment and assessment
a) Strengths: Besides providing them with knowledge, the textbook helps to train the
students in Vietnamese skills The exercise system is arranged in an order with higher andhigher requirement levels The contents of the lessons in the study subjects aims to help thestudents practice and be trained in language skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing,closely attached to the topics; which enables the students find it easier to use words as well as
to express their ideas in sentences
b) Weaknesses: The issues of selecting topics, balancing the number of the exercises, and
organizing suitable modes of training need further discussing It is necessary to specify moreclearly the procedures of language skills training for the students It is also a need toconcretize the activity and to divide it into sub-activities that can be easily carried out.Besides, it is also necessary to show how to apply the listening and speaking skills training
Trang 12methods, which not only is appropriate to the Grade 1 students’ cognitive psychology andawareness but also makes them interest in study.
2.3.3 Real situation of training Grade 1 students in language skills
* Regarding teachers: Most teachers do not pay much attention to training their students
in listening and speaking skills The main reason that make teachers do not like because theamount of time spent on training listening & speaking skills is unreasonable Teachers oftendepend on the suggestion questions in the textbook and request their students to self-prepare
in advance The teachers also hesitate to prepare school things Furthermore, they do not takeinitiative in applying the teaching methods that make the students show their positive roles inactivities, thereby having not drawn the attention of the students in the early years at primaryschools The difficulties that teachers face is still the problem of methods and processes ofteaching organization When discussing about this problem, the teachers express a wish to besupported with teaching methods and skills training contents through practice exercisesystems
* Regarding students: It is shown in the statistics and the surveys conducted through
language portfolios that there is a relatively high rate of students whose language use abilitymeets the requirements Note-worthily, regarding the students’ difficulties in language skillsformation and development, the number of students having difficulties related to vocabulariesaccounts for 27.9% while the number of students who often utter short sentences, use wrongadjuncts as well pronouns, and use wrong order of words in sentences takes an account of41% Moreover, in the process of message reception, the students understand only shortsentences; and they find it difficult to use the sentences with conjunctions and do not realizeungrammatical sentences, etc Also in the reception process, in terms of semantics, somestudents can only utter the sentences describing an event; and they face difficulties as sayingthe sentences describing many events or the ones with complicated meanings On thecontrary, during the period of message reception, the students find it easier to listen simplesentences describing an event; meanwhile, they use much less sentences describing twoevents or more
In summary: The students will be aware of their listening and speaking skills in
communication and practice them to perfect if the importance of listening and speaking skillsare paid attention to during the process of teaching Vietnamese language This means that thelanguage ability must be formed in a way parallel with communication skills training In order
to reach that goal, the work of training Grade 1 and Grade 2 students in listening and speakingskills must be done through language as well as speech acts