Sáng kiến kinh nghiệm tiếng anh

Because managers and learners seemed to understand the hugely important role of English in the future, a large number of schools and students chose English as their compulsory foreign la

I INTRODUCTION

Before 1990, Russian had been a compulsory subject in most secondary and high schools in Vietnam However, in 1990s, many Asian countries, including Vietnam, began to recognise English as a global language Because managers and learners seemed to understand the hugely important role of English in the future, a large number of schools and students chose English as their compulsory foreign language subject in schools At the time of changing foreign language subject from Russian to English, the number of English learners dramatically increased They were not only pupils and students but also the doctors, officers and workers who wanted to study English to improve their knowledge and master the new language Gialai, a mountainous province in Vietnam, was no exception

To meet the diverse needs of those learning English in the whole of the province, Gialai Foreign Languages Centre (now is Gialai Foreign Languages and Informatics Centre - FLIC) was established in 1992 by the Gialai Department of Education and Training At that time, FLIC attracted a vast number of learners and it also established many agencies in many districts in the province to meet the needs of the learners Nevertheless, in the last five to seven years, the number

of learners at this centre has decreased significantly, to approximately one fifth

of the numbers in the 1990s This number continues to fall with time even though the need to study and master this international language in Gialai province does not decrease

By critically analysing and comparing the number of learners each year, the difficulties faced at the present time will be established The traditional teaching methods (teacher-centred approach) there seems one of many main reasons why

the centre faces the difficulties and cannot attract a large number of learners while the learners’ needs are still broad

Hare (2001:123) indicated that “your classroom is a potential old mine for the discovery of a diverse mix of different personalities, interests, insights and contributors” In this writing, learner- centred approach will be introduced Recent analyses of Hadfield (2002) found that group dynamics were an important concern for learners

Furthermore, the way the learners in the class relate to each other is not the teacher’s business; the teacher’s business is to transmit content, and whether the

class get on with each other or not is irrelevant (Klippel, F, 1985)

I hope that when this writing is used at FLIC, the quality of teaching and learning of English will improve greatly Moreover, the activities in this writing collected from terrific books and my skilled native teachers during the time teaching English at a high school and FLIC as well as studying in the UK may create the enthusiasm and positive environment in class for the learners As a result, it will be able to attract the learners to study here and successfully accomplish the mission which the Department of Education and Training has entrusted- to improve remarkably English skills in the 21st century for the learners

II CLASSROOM DYNAMICS

1 Documentary evidence

1.1 The number of learners

1.2 Learners’ feedback

Due to my little fact-finding to discover a bit more about the problems involved

in the learning process, I recognised that group working in a language class is quite important According to my learners’ comments in more general terms, a successful group in language learning terms is where:

- The group is cohesive, and members have a definite sense of themselves as a group

- There is a positive, supportive atmosphere

- Members of the group listen to each other, and take turns

- Members co-operate in the performing of tasks and are able to work together productively

- The members of the group trust each other

- Group members are open-minded, flexible, and receptive to new ideas The group has a sense of fun

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

The number of learners from 1995 to 2013

The number of learners from

1995 to 2013

Selecting suitable activities are depended on teachers: their personality and teaching style, the composition of learners’ group, the rhythm of the lesson, the week, and the term and the constraints of teachers’ syllabus

2 Classroom dynamics

2.1 Warm up activities

An active and effective language class cannot be perfect if there is not a warm

up activity Here, some new ones, together with a few old favourites, in an order

in which they could be used in the first week of term to encourage learners gradually to reveal more about themselves and find out more about the other group members The activities could be used in the first lesson and the remaining three as warm-up activities to begin each of the subsequent days of the first week (Belbin, 1981)

a Guess my name (Cited from Belbin, R M 1981 Management Teams

Oxford: Heinemann)

Level: Elementary and above

Time: 5-10 minutes

Materials: One small piece of paper for everyone in the group

Procedure:

 Give a small piece of paper to everyone in the group and ask them to

write their first name on it, then to fold it up without showing it to anyone,

and to give it to you

 Ask the students to sit in a circle and redistribute the names so that

everyone gets a piece of paper with someone else's name on it

 Ask everyone to unfold their papers and to look around at the other people in the group and try and guess who the name belongs to Give them a minute or so

to do this silently

 Then ask the first student to read out the name on their piece of paper and to say who they think it belongs to, giving a reason if possible, for example, “I think this man is called Nam because he has dark hair and looks …….”

 Then ask the real Nam to identify himself Continue in this way until all names have been guessed

b Shaking hands

Level: All

Time: 5 minutes

Acknowledgement: I first learned this activity on an English class run by Mr Phong- ACET, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Procedure:

 Get all the students walking round the room

 Ask them to shake hands with everyone they meet Ask them to do this formally, though without saying anything, as if at an official occasion Demonstrate

 As they and you continue walking and shaking hands, ask them to say their name, again formally Demonstrate

 As you all continue walking round and shaking hands, ask them to present the person they have just shaken hands with to someone else, again formally:

“Let me introduce you to ”,

“This is ”, “Pleased to meet you”

 Ask them to continue meeting, shaking hands, saying their name, and presenting people they have just met to someone else

2.2 Thinking about language: individual learning styles and group

strategies

Any group of students, brought together for the first time, will have different

expectations of what learning a language involves and what they want out of the course One problem may be that they have not really defined these expectations

to themselves; another problem may be that they have never really questioned received attitudes to language learning; yet another problem may be that they are unaware of alternative attitudes to language learning and learning styles (Goffman, 2003) All these problems have the potential to cause friction even in

an otherwise good-natured group Some members of the group may want to study grammar rules, while others think that the way to learn English is by listening and speaking, and forgetting about boring old grammar Some people are intuitive language learners while others are analytic language learners The questionnaires in this section aim to help the students become aware of different attitudes to learning and different styles within the group

a What kind of person are you? (Cited in The Presentation of Self in

Everyday Life London: Penguin)

Level: Post-elementary

Time: 30 minutes

Material: Give out the questionnaire 'What kind of person are you?' and ask students to complete it individually

Procedure:

 When they have completed it, ask them to discuss it with a partner, giving their reasons for choosing each category

 Then collect comments from the group on what characteristics belong to each category Can they make any generalizations?

Questionnaires:

WHAT KIND OF PERSON ARE YOU?

Are you a tea person or a coffee person?

Are you a morning person or an evening person?

Are you an earth person or a fire person?

Are you a mountain person or a valley person?

Are you a jungle person or a city person?

Are you an indoor person or an outdoor person?

Are you a garden person or a forest person?

Are you a diary person or a knotted handkerchief person?

Are you a straight line person or a loops and curves person?

Are you a sight person or a sound person?

Remarks:

The aim of the exercise is to get students thinking about the ways personal styles, tastes, and preferences are related to character, and are not rational but emotional There may be a variety of theories and generalizations advanced in the group discussion stage I don't think there are any right and wrong answers

in these activities

This activity is designed to prepare students for the following questionnaires

b Elemental passions

Level: Post-elementary

Time: 30 minutes

Acknowledgement: I first learned this activity at a workshop by Dr Tom Hill- University of Reading, UK

Procedure:

 Ask the students to stand up and move around the class until they find all the other people in the class with the same zodiac sign as they have (If students are not sure which sign they belong to they should ask you A chart is provided below for reference.)

 Ask them to get into four groups: Air, Fire, Earth, and Water, according to which sign belongs to which element (see chart)

 Ask them to brainstorm a list of the qualities and characteristics that they associate with their element: for example, warmth, passion, quick temper, or brilliance for fire; solidity, practicality, dependability, and so on for Earth

Then ask them to find as many of these qualities as possible that are shared by all members of the group

2.3 Maintaining fluidity reseating and melee games

Douglas (1983) argued that one symptom of lack of cohesion in a group is

‘territoriality’ Group members show a marked preference for 'their' seats, and they are reluctant to move to sit with other people Cliques may develop where members are selective about who they work with, sometimes actively refusing to work with certain students This does not make for a very pleasant classroom atmosphere, and makes the process of organizing discussions and speaking activities fraught with hazards But good classroom atmosphere is not the only reason for discouraging territoriality It is important to ensure that students do not always work with the same partner or partners for several reasons: always working with the same partner will place limits on the amount of language used-pairs may develop their own ‘restricted code’, always using the same vocabulary and phrases They may also get to know each other too well, and have too few information gaps, thus becoming bored with each other

a Picture sections

Level: Elementary and above

Time: 5-10 minutes

Material: magazine pictures

Collect some magazine pictures and cut them into four quarters You will need

as many quarter-pictures as there are students in the class

Acknowledgement: I first learned this activity on a teaching methods workshop run by Dr Tony- University of Birmingham, UK

Procedure:

 Give out the picture sections at random

 Ask the students to find the three people with the other parts of their picture

To do this, they must describe their pictures to each other without showing them

to anyone

 When they have found each other, they should sit down in a group together

b Invitations (Cited from Ghadfield, J 2002 Classroom dynamics Oxford

Press)

Level: Elementary and above

Time: 5 minutes

Material: Role cards for each student

Make paired role cards, for example:

You are going to a party tonight

Find someone to go with you

You have nothing to do tonight

You’d love to go to a party, but you don't really want to go to a film or a concert

You are going to a rock concert tonight

and have a spare ticket

Find someone to go with you

You are going to a film tonight

Procedure:

 Give out the role cards at random

 Ask students to find someone to spend the evening with them

 When they have found someone, they should sit down together

Remarks: This game obviously practises “I'm going to/ Would you like to/ I'd

love to” as well as dividing students into pairs The game is easily adaptable to dividing students into threes and fours instead of pairs To do this, just write in

three or four people who favour each social event

2.4 I did it your way: empathy activities

Many EFL (English as a foreign langue) activities now invite students to tell each other about their personal tastes, opinions, lifestyle, and background, and this usually has a very positive effect both on individual motivation and on group dynamics, as well as providing excellent language practice But these activities largely focus on the simple transfer of information, rather than on the use of this information to increase understanding of others (Argyle, 1999)

The activities in this section go a little further than the normal personal information transfer activities in inviting the students to complete questionnaires, or write autobiographies not from their own point of view, but as

if they were someone else

a I am you (Cited from Argyle, M 1972 The Social Psychology of

Work London: Penguin)

Level: Lower-intermediate and above

Time: 20-30 minutes

Material: One completion sheet for each student (see below)

Procedure:

 Divide the students into pairs

 Give each a copy of the completion sheet Ask them to fill it in, not for