The use of plashcards in teaching vocabulary for young learner at doan hung informatics and foreign language school a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of master of arts in TESOL

This paper examines whether flashcards can give young children motivation in learning new words and whether they can enhance their vocabulary retention.. 34 young learners who are learni

THE MINISTRY OF EDUCATION

HO CHI MINH CITY OPEN UNIVERSITY

No other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the main text of the thesis

This thesis has not been submitted for the award of any degree or diploma in any other tertiary situation

Ho Chi Minh City, 2016

Vo Kim Tran

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would like to express my deep thanks to the contribution of those who supported and encouraged me during the time I wrote this thesis I cannot finish this research without their help

First and foremost, I would like to send my great gratitude to my supervisor, Dr Nguyen Dinh Thu, Dean of Foreign Language Department of HCMC University of Technology and Education, for all of his support during the time I have done this thesis His enthusiastic instruction and useful advice helped me acquire much more knowledge to accomplish the thesis His sincere encouragement also motivated me to overcome difficulties and finish this paper

I am also extremely thankful to Mr Ha Dang Van, the manager of Doan Hung Informatics Foreign Language School who created the best condition for me to conduct the sample teaching as well as to collect the data His encouragement also raised me up during the thesis writing process

I also thank all of the teacher participants for their open-hearted sharings and the student participants for their enthusiastic participation in all of the activities

Last but not least, I would like to send my gratitude to my family who gave me spiritual encouragement to finish this thesis

Vo Kim Tran

ABSTRACT

Young children mainly learn vocabulary in their English learning Therefore, teachers often invest lots of time to find out useful teaching techniques and teaching aids which can help them be successful in teaching young learners vocabulary This study aims to investigate the effectiveness of using flashcards to teach young learners vocabulary This paper examines whether flashcards can give young children motivation in learning new words and whether they can enhance their vocabulary retention The research also investigates the teachers’ perception of using flashcards to teach young learners vocabulary 34 young learners who are learning English at Doan Hung Informatics & Foreign Language School participated in this study during 3 weeks Both qualitative data, including classroom video recordings, teaching journals, and teachers interviewing, and quantitative data, including pre-test and post-test scores were analysed to answer the two research questions The findings of this research showed that most of the participants in the experimental group were highly motivated to learn the new words Besides, the participants in this group also improved their vocabulary retention Finally, the teacher interviewees expressed their positive attitudes towards using flashcards to teach young learners vocabulary Some suggestions for further research in using flashcards for teaching young learners vocabulary are also suggested

TABLE OF CONTENTS

pages

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

LIST OF TABLES vii

LIST OF ABBREVIATION viii

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Background of the research 1

1.2 Statement of the problem 4

1.3 Aims of the research 7

1.4 Research questions 7

1.5 The significance of the research 7

1.6 Limitations of the research 8

1.7 Overview of the research 9

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 10

2.1 Young learners 10

2.2 Vocabulary in English teaching and learning 12

2.3 Young learners’ learning characteristics 15

2.3.1 Intellectual 16

2.3.2 Vocabulary retention 16

2.3.3 Span of attention 17

2.3.4 Sensory input 18

2.3.5 Motivation 19

2.4 Flashcards 21

2.5 Study on flashcards 25

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY 27

3.1 Pedagogical context 27

3.1.1 Settings 27

3.1.2 Participants 28

3.2 Instruments 28

3.3 Procedures 29

CHAPTER 4 FINDINGS AND RESULTS 38

4.1 Response to research question 1 38

4.2 Response to research question 2 44

4.3 Response to research question 3 49

4.3.1 The first interviewee’s response 49

4.3.2 The second interviewee’s response 51

4.3.3 The third interviewee’s response 52

CHAPTER 5 DISCUSSION THE FINDINGS 54

5.1 Flashcards gave the young learners motivation 54

5.2 Flashcards enhance the young learners’ vocabulary retention 55

5.3 The interviewed teachers’ agreement with using flashcards to teach young learners vocabulary 56

CHAPTER 6 CONCLUSION, IMPLICATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 58

6.1 Conclusion 59

6.2 Pedagogical implications 60

6.3 Recommendations 61

REFERENCES 63

APPENDICES 69

LIST OF TABLES Table 1 Independent Samples Test of the pre-test scores of the control group and the

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

This chapter mentions the general background of the research It also talks about the importance of vocabulary in language teaching and learning In addition, the chapter also raises the problem in teaching vocabulary to young learners at Doan Hung Informatics & Foreign Language school Then it gives some issues such as aims of the research, the research questions, the significance

of the research

1.1 Background of the research

It is the fact that vocabulary itself shows its important position in English language teaching and learning Shen (2003) said that “vocabulary has got its central and essential status in discussion about learning a language” There are many highlighted studies on teaching vocabulary Nation (2001) pointed out the goals of vocabulary in language learning, the use of vocabulary in specific learning skills as well as the strategies for teaching and learning vocabulary Thornbury (2002) introduced the forms of words, how words are learnt and words of classroom and test sources Brand (2004) also integrated word learning

in his literacy workshop in grades 3-6 Lauffer (1997) argued that vocabulary learning is at the heart of any language learning and language use (as cited in Carter & Nunan, 2001) Harmer (1991) also confirmed: “ If language structures make up the skeletons of the language, then it is vocabulary that provides the vital organs and the flesh” In other words, vocabulary plays a vital role on mastering other language learning patterns Richard & Renandya (2002) called vocabulary a key to language proficiency Indeed, vocabulary supports learners

to develop their four skills: speaking, listening, writing and reading For instance, without vocabulary, learners do not understand the meanings of words,

so they cannot make up good communication, which seems to be the main target

of language learning Vocabulary also helps learners themselves find confident

to deal with comprehension reading texts as well

Research declared that vocabulary knowledge is essential for English (L2) development of all ages of learners Whether learners are adults or young children, they need to broaden their own vocabulary Especially, young children who are at the beginning level of learning English, vocabulary is much more important because it plays a role in laying the foundation for their future language development In other words, teaching young learners is similiar to building a house To build a beautiful and high quality house, the background must be stable and firm while to become a good English learners in the future, vocabulary should be good enough

It is clear that teachers and young learners have dealt with a large number

of vocabularies in their long-term process of English language teaching and learning Young children are familiar with learning new words because they have got in touch with lots of new vocabularies during English courses It is clear to see that in most English textbooks of children, vocabulary is introduced first, and then there are some other tasks for further practicing such as sentence samples, conversations Dekeyser (2007) said that learning vocabulary is not just about its meaning but the other collocations, association, the related grammatical rules,etc (as cited in Ur, 2012) In addition to this, children learn vocabulary better than grammar as they may see grammar rules are difficult to remember (Demircioglu, 2010) Although young learners are used to learning simple words, it is such a difficult task for teachers to teach them vocabulary with the purpose of giving them interest and engagement in lessons, and improving their retention of what they have just learned

Firstly, it is hard for teachers to ask children to sit down and learn words seriously because children love action A child will be bored with staying at the same place to learn words The reason for explaining is that children have a short span of concentration in the classroom; only after a short time of the lesson, about fifteen or twenty minutes, they tend to talk in private with friends, draw pictures, even eat or sleep in class Additionally, according to Cameroon (2001), the more active the students are, the easier they may lose their learning attention Moreover, the students are easy to get bored They will show their boredom if teachers give them so many words and force them to learn Therefore, it is essential for teachers to give young children interests in learning new vocabulary It is said that an effective language learning environment is in a free anxiety atmosphere where young learners can show their passion to come to class If people do something with passion, they will get success because they have good encouragement to do

Secondly, helping young learners remember new vocabulary is not a less tougher responsibility for teachers because children have a limited ability to remember words due to their young age In addition, they are easy to remember words but easy to forget if they do not have enough practice Besides, teachers can not give them much vocabulary homework as they have to learn many other subjects, which make them not have enough time to review the old lesson at home The best way to help is that young learners can absorb the language naturally In other words, they are learning through activities and playing games The role of teachers is to design a lesson which is a combination of good teaching strategies to facilitate young learners’ vocabulary learning, according to Nation (2003)

Research pointed out strategies to teach young learners vocabulary effectively Scott & Ytreberg (1990) showed five elements to get success in teaching young learners vocabulary, namely (1) words are not enough; (2) play with the language; (3) variety in the classroom; (4) routines; and (5) cooperation In other words, children cannot sit at one place and learn the language as adults from starting the lesson until the end They tend to learn by the way of playing and practicing words through activities The role of the teacher is to choose appropriate activities, basing on the age of the students and the classroom environment, students’ habits in the class to get better cooperation from the students It can be sure that suitable techniques in teaching vocabulary play vital roles to help teacher fulfill the purpose of motivating and giving students retention on the vocabulary they had learned Cameroon (2001), however, noted another difficulty in noisy classroom that teachers may cope with Therefore, teacher should design funny tasks but must keep the learning potential as well as keep the class being under control

Combination of studying with relaxing is not such an easy duty The younger the learners are, the more interesting activities in class are needed because young children love learning through playing but the activities must be well selected to be directly connected with the content of lesson and serve to get the lesson’s target Research in the fields found out the effectiveness of teaching materials on teaching young learners vocabulary It is very necessary to use a variety of techniques to get better teaching results In specific, flashcards are considered as one of the most effective teaching aids which support teachers in teaching young learners vocabulary effectively in term of using flashcards to design tasks, using flashcards to attract young children’ attention

1.2 Statement of the problem

In Vietnamese teaching context, English has proved its popularity as there

is a tendency that more and more people who have needs of learning English Not only adults working in companies or students studying at universities, colleges, high schools have the need of learning English, but also most parents take their children at the age of primary to foreign language school to prepare them a better English background for future In addition to this, the age to start learning English is lower and lower English is not only taught at primary schools but also be widely taught even in the nursery schools

It is believed that children only learn simple vocabulary in their language learning process As a result, teaching English to them is easier than adult learners Ur (2012), however, pointed out that each individual students have different levels of linguistic knowledge and different ability in English They may acquire English at different speeds and in various ways Besides, according

to her, adult learners who have a higher level of language proficiency can know the words that they need to focus on but young children cannot Ur (2012) emphasized the role of elicitation to teach young learners vocabulary

In fact, it is difficult to be a teacher in young learners’ classrooms as the way they approach knowledge is different from adult learners Some teachers have to admit that their vocabulary teaching to young children sometimes is not interesting enough to motivate them In addition, teachers will get more difficulty if there are lessons in a traditional way with teacher, students and textbook Classrooms for young learners need to be different with teaching materials, activities, etc which support to motivate as well as improve their retention

Indeed, teaching materials have showed their good effects on English

common teaching aids in English teaching and learning, flashcards have been used in many primary schools However, flashcards are only applied in sample teaching lessons only because of different reasons Firstly, teachers do not have a useful, available source of flashcards to use whenever they need Secondly, preparing flashcards takes teachers a great deal of time and money Moreover, when teachers have got available flashcards, they also need to spend much more time on thinking about what activities are suitable for the lessons However, there is a pressure on learning results of students It is noticed that at most of primary schools, each class has over 40 students in common so teachers need to spend time on checking students learning Therefore, teachers do not have enough time to arrange the teaching activities using flashcards

At Doan Hung Informatics & Foreign Language School, a school mainly teaches English for students at primary school level, it is also in the same situation that there are not many teachers who use flashcards in their lessons even though flashcards have showed its effectiveness in research of English language teaching and learning Even some of the teachers who are teaching young children’ classes at the school sometimes use flashcards It is not difficult

to realize young children’ tiredness in classrooms through the camera system of the school They are sometimes lazy to volunteer to answer teachers’ questions They seem to be not motivated well if teachers give lessons in a way with their textbook In detail, teachers just show meanings of new words to students, then ask them to repeat, give them time to remember the words, and ask them to learn

by heart at home, etc After that, students can be checked by asking to write the words in the next class

Therefore, it is time to think about how to give young learners motivation

in their vocabulary learning, how to offer them chance to improve their

vocabulary retention Flashcard has showed their effectiveness on language teaching and learning so it is a question that whether flashcards are suitable for applying to teach young children vocabulary at Doan Hung

1.3 Aims of the research

This research is conducted to investigate that whether the flashcards give any effectiveness on the young learners’ vocabulary learning at Doan Hung Specifically, the study aims to:

(1) find out whether flashcards can motivate young learners in learning vocabulary at Doan Hung

(2) identify any good effects of using visual images to get young learners’ vocabulary retention at Doan Hung

(3) determine the conceptions of teachers at Doan Hung about realizable application of flashcards to teach vocabulary for young learners at Doan Hung

This research is conducted with the aims to investigate the effectiveness

of flashcards on young learners’ vocabulary learning in terms of giving them motivation and vocabulary retention, which are often considered as two main language targets of each child The result of this research can encourage teachers

at Doan Hung to apply flashcards to teach vocabulary for not only young children but also the other ages of learners so that teachers can enhance their teaching results Once teacher realize the use of flashcards in classrooms is not much complex like it has been thought, teachers can use them more often Besides, the study introduces teachers at Doan Hung multi activities which can

be easy and time-saving to design As a result, they can be familiar to use flashcards in teaching more than as usual Additionally, once the young children are learning in a happy and comfortable mood, they may get knowledge easier, which contributes to upgrade their vocabulary retention

1.6 Limitations of the research

Everything has its own limitations and so does this study First, the participants of this research are limited in Doan Hung environment so the result

of the study will be difficult to be valuable in other schools Second, the participant teachers for the teacher interview are limited in the number of three teachers ,who are having experiences in teaching young childrens at Doan Hung

It might be better if all of the teachers were interviewed Moreover, due to the lack of professional equipments, the video recordings, which are used for analysing the young learners motivation during both the experimental teaching and the normal teaching do not have good quality with the existence of some outside noise In addition, as the researcher herself recorded the videos, so the recorder sometimes stopped working in a short time but she did not recognize

1.7 Overview of the research

The study consists of six chapters Chapter 1 gives information as the general background of the study, the statement of the problem, the purpose of the study, and the research questions Additionally, it also mentions the significant of the study and the limitation during the time it was conducted Chapter 2 of the study says about the theoretical concepts which connect to young learners’ vocabulary learning Chapter 3 presents the reseach methodology which describes the pedagogical context of the research including the settings and the participants, the design of research, the data collection instruments and the methods of data analysis, and the procedure of the study Chapter 4 of the research shows the findings of the research after analysing the data Chapter 5 discusses the results of the research to respond to the research questions Lastly, chapter 6 gives the conclusions and implications of the research as well as the recommendations for further research

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

Chapter 2 of the study says about the theoretical concepts which connect

to young learners’ vocabulary learning including theory of young learners, their vocabulary acquisition, as well as their learning characteristics in terms of intellect, span of retention, sensory input , and their motivation Additionally, the

chapter also mentions theory of flashcards in language teaching and learning

2.1 Young learners

According to Scrivener (2011), learners have different personal reasons to join in English classes For instance, communicative courses will be the best suitable for the learner who wants to improve his English speaking ability but he cannot be in writing classes which will help him enhance his writing skill Harmer (2007b) put it that students have various reasons to learn English Some

of them take an English course due to the requirement of the curriculum at their schools Others learn English for specific purposes, especially for communication There is also another group of students who learn English because they think it is useful for their future Harmer (2007b) mentioned that linguists have divided English learners into groups such as young children, adolescences, young adults or adults

At different ages, learners may have very different language learning characteristics Additionally, Harmer (2007a) emphasized that at different ages, learners have different needs in language learning Adult learners usually have a clearer and greater target of learning languages, for instance, the ability of making good communication, improvement in reading comprehension or writing skill In contrast, young learners have a different aim, just being able to learn simple authentic words Therefore, it is beneficial for teachers to enhance the

teaching effect if they can define the learners’ individual learning aims clearly Harmer (2007a) also stated that determining the age of learners is so crucial for teachers to decide what and how to teach them

It’s the most difficult to teach young children languages although it doesn’t require teacher much knowledge but experience (Harmer, 2007a) Since, teachers should find out clearly their young learners’ needs, especially their learning language characteristics, what they want in their classroom, what can attract their attention, etc Understanding clearly young learners will help teachers define appropriate teaching approaches for enhancing the teaching and learning effects (Moon, 2006)

A very essential question is raised that who can be regarded as young learners Meriam dictionary (2013) has a definition about “young”: “in an early stage of life, growth, or development, not yet old and “learner” is a person who

is finding out about a subject or how to do something (Oxford Dictionary, 2011) The two above definitions can come up with a new definition: young learners are the learners at the initial stage of learning a language Harmer (2007a) gave the definition of young children as “ those up to the ages of nine or ten” while in Thornbury’s view (2006) “ young learners” tells about children at pre-primary school and primary school age or even sometimes including adolescents He went on expressing that in some countries, young learners learn English to prepare for their secondary school but there is a trend that young learners are taught English sooner and sooner, even at pre- primary school Scrivener (2011) also showed that in many countries, young learners are students at low ages; otherwise, in some locations, young learners can be students even at kindergarten classes In fact, nowadays, the age to start learning English is lower

have of making the learning successful”, according to Scrivener (2011) Actually, according to him, the sooner a child is taken to a language class, the more chances he will be successful in that language learning Early starting to learn a language will help children acquire the new language better because they have more years to experience and develop the language at school The linguist also gave a very specific example that children who are immigrants to English speaking countries can use English as their mother tongue They are called bilingual children Although many researches in evaluation of the effectiveness

of teaching young learners English at the early age of life, some researchers gave

the concern of the disadvantages of this phenomena (Thornbury, 2006)

2.2 Young children vocabulary acquisition

Researches into vocabulary learning have particularly discussed the vocabulary acquisition Carter (2001) investigated the natural process of how a word can be learned, which would help teachers to have flexible methods to teach vocabulary He pointed out the vocabulary learning acquisition, explicitly and implicitly Explicit or direct process means that teachers present vocabulary

to students by means of translation new words into their mother tongue, by teaching techniques and materials which help to express the meanings of words Implicit or indirect process means that students learn new words through context In other words, students read a text, then, find out what new vocabularies that they do not understand meanings and then students will guess the meanings of new words basing on the reading context or asking the assistance of explanation by the teacher or dictionary Students may learn the new words through some tasks of the reading text, too Then, they can apply these new words afterwards

Hunt and his colleague, Beglar mentioned the three approaches of vocabulary learning in terms of explicit instruction, incidental learning, and independent strategy development (as cited in Richards & Renandya, 2002, p.256) The two researchers called it a “ systematic framework” for developing learners’ vocabulary They appreciated the three approaches and recommended the combination of them in vocabulary instruction to get a better result

In detail, explicit instruction is the process that teachers will determine the vocabulary targets for learners depending upon their own language proficiency For instance, high school students will have aim to know much more numbers of vocabulary than primary students These vocabularies will be presented directly to learners by using technique as translation

Incidental learning is the process of learning vocabulary through another activity of language learning, for example, a student reads to a short text and he does not know some new words, which make him not understand the text; then

he checks the meanings of these words in dictionary or with his teacher to understand more what he has just read It means that he has already learned some new vocabularies through the extensive reading activity and he may use these words later Not only can the extensive reading help learners exposure vocabulary but also the extensive listening Indeed, Elley (1989) identified in his research that both extensive reading and listening contribute to learners’ vocabulary acquisition.The two linguists, Hunt & Beglar called it is a “by product” of learning the other language patterns and skills However, Nation (1990) argued that second language learners may have got difficulties in incidental acquisition due to their limited English vocabulary proficiency and he suggested combining vocabulary instruction in the four skills listening, speaking,

Although extensive reading benefit learners in vocabulary learning, it is considered as a difficult strategy, according to Hunt & Beglar They pointed out that it is more effective to apply this strategy to learners who have high vocabulary prociency rather than the low ones A more simple strategy using context to learn new words is called indendent strategy development In this strategy, the procedure for guessing words’ meanings from context will begin with deciding which words are important throughout the text, and then identifying them from five-step procedure of Nation & Coady model (as cited in Richards & Renandya, 2002)

Ur (2012) showed the difference between children’ and adults’ vocabulary learning acquisition She acknowledged that adults learn vocabulary effectively through explicit process, in contrast, children learn best through implicit process Children tend to be fond of “ imitating, memorizing, acquiring intuititively” through repeated actions and production in enjoyable or interesting activities Ur (2012), however, pointed out that this learning process takes a long time to be effective so adult learners do not like that process She said that “ the older a student gets, the more explicit learning process he or she will use” Adult learners have real needs of understanding reading comprehension, being more fluent in speaking or enhancing the other language skills and proficiency through vocabulary In contrast, children have no clear purpose of learning vocabulary, they just simply learn to know a range of words to speak them out This is the reason why adult learners usually choose explicit learning process while young children learn vocabulary the implicit process Harmer (2007a) shared the ideas that young learners have an implicit learning process In other words, “young learners learn indirectly rather than directly” They learn through

what is around them.Teachers are believed to base on the goals of studying and the age of learners to choose appropriate vocabulary teaching approach

Ur (2012) wrote some common factors in teaching vocabulary She mentioned what aspects of vocabulary that students need to learn She showed that meanings, forms, pronunciation share the same importance Infact, it is nonsense that a student knows how to pronounce a word exactly but he does not know what its meaning is Hence, she cannot practically use that word On the other hand, a person gets the meaning of a word, but she is not able to pronounce

it correctly, so how the others can understand what word she is mentioning, unless it is written down Thus, the three aspects of words share the same vital roles Adult learners are used to focusing on forms of a word first, then on its pronunciation and finally on its meanings, while young learners are in contrast They often pay their first attention to the meanings of the new word; finally its form and pronunciation Additionally, adults learners usually learn more other aspects of a word like its roots, its prefixes, suffixes, or other parts of speech It

is a simple task for young children because they just approach only a word, but not its other aspects It would be useful for teachers to depend on their learners’ aims of language learning to decide the ways as well as what aspects of words they should instruct to their students during the teaching process

2.3 Young learners’ learning characteristics

Thornbury (2006) provided the three special characteristics of young learners which can distinguish them from adult learners, in terms of cognitive, affective and social dimensions The first characteristic links to children’ limitation of their real life knowledge, developing memory, inability to conduct abstract concepts, or difficulty in short span of attention The second

characteristic includes the need of encouragement and support while the rest character is their lack of social skills and dependency on their teacher

Brown (1994) suggested five categories of young children which may offer teachers some good approaches to teach them better Teachers should note the following five items: intellectual development, attention span, sensory input, affective factors, and authentic, meaningful language In general, the five above factors will directly affect young learners’ learning language

2.3.1 Intellectual Young learners are believed to acquire to a language faster and learn better than any other groups of learners The critical period hypothesis (CPH) agreed the idea but they also added that the young children can acquire knowledge “quickly” and “naturally” just at a certain age and this capability may lose gradually (cited in Ur, 2012) However, she pointed out that CPH research was conducted in first language school but in second language learning or foreign language learning, that idea may not be true anymore as there were proofs that the older learners sometimes had better language acquisition than the younger ones, which depends on the concrete learning context and learners’ abilities as well (Harmer, 2007a) Moreover, adult learners may get a better word retention than young ones thanks to their intellect It does not prove that young learners are lack of intelligence but just because of their age limitation They can

be excellent language students but just being compared to children at the same age but never adult learners A question is raised that why some children seem to

be more intelligent in language learning than the others

2.3.2 Vocabulary retention

Nation (2001) identified three general processes involving in vocabulary learning, including noticing, retrieval, and generative use He also explored the two concepts, receptive and productive ability Productive ability is more essential than receptive ability because when you understand a new word, but you do not really know how to use and apply it well, it is such a nonsense Alemi (2010) realized that one of the most difficult aspects of learning a foreign language, particularly in an EFL context, is the retention of vocabulary, which is, especially, more difficult with young learners as they remember new words easily but forget so fast Sharing the same idea, Sasan and her colleague (n.d) pointed out the importance of vocabulary retention, too Learners have studied more and more new words, so they may have problem with remembering them Moreover, younger learners often do not care much about the purposes of their language learning because they are “ effortless learners” (Brown, 1994) They do not define their own learning language aims In fact, there is a proof that a large number of young learners cannot review their English lessons before examinations without helping or reminding from their parents Consequently, this may contribute to reduce their own vocabulary retention Therefore, teachers should have responsibility and need some effective techniques to help them remember and recall the new words they have learned in an efficient way Nunan (1991) also put in the idea that for long term memory teachers should arrange and set up further practice with connection to the vocabulary that students have just been taught If students have more chances to practice the new words, they will remember better than only speaking and listening to them

2.3.3 Span of attention

Brown (1994) also said that “ young learners have spontaneous and peripheral attention to language form” If adult learners have awareness of the language they are learning; they have a very good learning consciousness; they can make a plan for their learning; they know what their actual language aims are; in contrast; young learners have little awareness to learn a language They only pay attention to what makes them excited (Moon, 2006) ,but only in a very short time Harmer (2007) mentioned the limited span of attention of young learners even though they are so excited with the activities, they easily get bored after a very short time and every different ages may have different attention span Brown (1994) also emphasized that there is a difference between adult learners and young learners’ span of attention There is a belief that young learners used to have a very short span of attention (Scott & Lisbeth, 1990) Children are believed to be able to pay their attention to lessons at least about fifteen to twenty minutes But he explained that apart as their own character of always being active It is not young learners’ span of attention which makes them easy to get bored with the lesson in the classroom Actually, children can spend a long period of time on the activities that interest them much, for instance, a child can watch his favorite cartoon on TV for during 2 or 3 hours without complaining tiredness or not agreeing to stop Indeed, young learners’ classroom needs to be accompanied by lots of activities due to their short span of attention (Scott & Lisbeth, 1990)

2.3.4 Sensory input Brown (1994) mentioned in the book “Teaching By Principle” five senses

of interest stimulating young learners in language learning in terms of physical activities, which give them chances to play with language; projects and hand-on

activities which get them learn from practicing words and structures; sensory aids, including visual aids like pictures, tapes, videos, which help students internalize concepts; non-verbal language, which allow students imitate actions and remember words better

Among the five elements, he emphasized visual aids play a vital role in young learners language teaching If adult learners can mainly understand from instruction and explanation, young learners may do too but it is necessary to notice that young learners are crucially interested in seeing, hearing, touching, or interacting with what they hear from teachers (Harmer, 2007b) Moreover, with different ages, children may have their own keen activities The eight or nine years old children tend to keen on games or activities with actions while learners

at the age of eleven or twelve may be interested in games with words (Harmer,2007b) In addition, young learners may have a problem with some abstract concepts so they find it difficult to learn grammar or some abstract vocabularies Ur (2012) also advised teachers to give students tasks which help them learn vocabulary implicitly, with chances to play and practise with the language, and avoid giving them unclear explanation

Teachers should spend time to understand the way children interact with language and then design appropriate activities for them in the classroom If the teacher does it well, students will be successful learners The best way to teach children language is a mix of learning through playing with language (Harmer, 2007a)

2.3.5 Motivation According to Harmer (2007a), motivation, basically, as a type of internal power encouraging people to do something so as to get their aims In most fields

of life, human need motivation as a key to success and if having no motivation, people may have no efforts Ushioda (1996) emphasized the importance of motivation as “ without motivation, success will be hard to come by and the case

of learning a second or foreign language is a little different”

Many studies have mentioned a distinction between two kinds of motivation in term of extrinsic motivation, which is as a result of outside factors and intrinsic motivation, which comes from inside factors of individuals In other words, the first type of motivation is the enjoyment of the learning process while the rest one is the inside desires to be improved of learners themselves (Harmer,2007a) He emphasized the adult learners have better intrinsic motivation as they get clear aims in language learning while young learners often lack of that kind of motivation and tend to get learning encouragement from their teacher (Thornbury, 2006) suggested intrinsic motivation can help to enhance young learners’ interests in language learning So far, experienced teachers believed that it is the interests in their mind whenever they think of giving young learners motivation in language learning (Cook, 2001; as cited in Linse, 2005) So, it is necessary for teachers to find out what gives their young leaners’ interests in classroom in order to offer them better motivation and engagement in lessons However, it is not easy to motivate young children to learn a language, especially at the extra classes This can be explained that after

a hard working day at school, they must be tired to continue to learn (Loc, 2013)

Moon (2006) shared the same idea that children learn language without any needs or reasons They only come to language class for having fun from language lessons In other words, children acquire knowledge through a natural process, learning through playing (Djigunovic, 2005) Therefore, it is highly appreciated to create a positive learning environment for young students She

suggested teachers can create useful activities for children to practice the language and through these activities, children will get involved in the lesson and have a positive attitude in language learning Ur (2012) emphasized it is also much important to focus on good teaching strategies to teach young learners beside the age to learn language of them

Harmer (2007a) stated that teacher will be well awarded with their young learners’ clear progress in learning if the teacher can plan appropriate activities for lessons by combining both playing and studying because the reason young learners learn a language is not in their real needs but their interest in learning Far as than it says, Moon (2006) put an awareness that teacher’s belief also really affects children learning In case teachers think that learners need their support, teachers may give them a hand but in contrast, teachers may believe that children can learn normally with their intrinsic motivation

2.4 Flashcards

2.4.1 Flashcards in language teaching and learning There are many types of materials that teachers can support in language classrooms; however; teachers need to be flexible in using sources of teaching tools basing on different learners Without teaching materials, teachers can conduct many other techniques such as role play, discussion, conversations, etc but Brown (1994) confirmed that “much of the richness of language instruction

is derived from supporting materials” Adult learners can interact with many learning resources, and the text-based materials are considered more effective for them while it is less effective for young learners due to their age (Moon, 2006)

As mention above, there is a notice of the importance of students’ motivation It is not easy to create motivation to young learners It is much more difficult for teacher to sustain it (Harmer, 2007b) Thus, teachers should apply various teaching approaches and experience what is more useful to them Shaaban (2001) agreed that young children need to have a non-anxiety learning environment In fact, young children love to play and they will learn effectively when they are enjoying (Scott & Lisbeth, 1990) So it is suggested flashcards should be used in young learners’ English classrooms, instead of spoken words only with the purposes of creating motivation for young learners

Tuttle (1975) identified the good effect of visual material in language classrooms Students may become more active through using visual material, particularly flashcards He suggested this learning gear can be appropriate with multi activities which may only take a very short time So teachers can arrange lots of learning practice for students

Cross (1991) defined that a flashcard is a simple picture on a piece of card

or paper and it is most widely used in language teaching He also mentioned that wordcards are also a form of flashcards Wordcards have key words or short phrases on them, but have no picture Flashcards are considered as one of the most useful teaching materials for young learners (Brown, 1994) Oxford Advanced Learner Dictionary (2011) defined flashcard as cards which have words or pictures on them A researcher, Fleming (2014) conducted that flashcards as one of the best useful tools to memorize new things With words combined with pictures on them, people can get both meanings of concepts and images in mind She also suggested useful activities to use flashcards to teach vocabulary basing on specific study groups

Flashcards are long time regarded as one of the most effective tools to teach vocabulary, especially, young children, who put their interests in visual images Harmer (2007) mentioned flashcards with pictures on them as an effective tool to facilitate learning Flashcards (the cues) are appropriate for low level students to practice a lot of cue- response drill Teachers can hold up a flashcard and invite students to response Harmer (2007b) also expressed that flashcards are specifically useful for practicing vocabulary According to Joklova (2009), it is also the most appropriate tool for presenting and checking

the meanings of words, for instance, teachers can use a flashcard of an airplane

to show young learners as an explanation of its meanings, without flashcard of the airplane, it is very difficult for teachers to explain what thing it is in case they are low level vocabulary proficiency students Besides, children have difficulties in understanding abstract concepts so it will be difficult to explain these concepts to them Thus, flashcards can help in this case (Pillar & Asuncion, 2007) Anne & Joan (2003) confirmed the help of flashcards in vocabulary learning that “a picture is worth a thousand word.” Instead of explaining the word in learners’ mother tongue, teachers can use an image to show them Aslan (2011) emphasised the value of flashcards as an enjoyable and effective tool in teaching children vocabulary, too

Harmer (2007b) introduced numerous ways to make flashcards Teachers can make flashcards by themselves from taking pictures in magazines and stick them on cards Teachers can also download and printed flashcards from many available resources He also mentioned the three qualities of good flashcards in term of being appropriate, visible and durable Firstly, teachers need design flashcards based on specific learners and lessons If learners are young,

much keen on Secondly, the size of flashcards should be large enough for easily using and looking at Thirdly, teachers cannot prepare the flashcards to use only one time, which will waste finance and time Therefore, flashcards should be considered in being designed and used carefully for their long-term using

Ur (2012) stated that young children may tolerate to sit in silence in a short period of time without anything to listen to but they may neglect the lessons from other things if they are lack of visual Children are really interesting images He shared the idea that “the most obvious type of visual material for children is flashcard” and “flashcards can be used for describing, interpreting, dictating and comparing” They will give further effectiveness with more colorful and clearer ones She emphasized the impact of impressive presentation

of new vocabulary as facilitator of the learning Therefore, teachers are encouraged to show learners flashcards of a new word instead of an explanation

or translation its meanings

Linse (2005) appreciated the good effect of meaningful input in teaching young learners English, for instance, if teachers tell about a dinosaur, teachers should provide the input of this animal like an image of a dinosaur to help students in better understanding

Wright (1989) mentioned that most of words in English are used to be translated into their mother tongue The translation, however, can only give students the emerging concept of words For instance, with the new word

“house”, teachers can translate into learners’ mother tongue and make them

understand what it is but that translation cannot make a clear image in students’ mind as there are hundreds types of houses over the world Additionally, translation can support simply teaching process and help students understand words’ meaning faster as well but it may prevent students from further essential

learning practice which support students to sustain words after they come out of the classroom Flashcards seem to be an appropriate kind of tool providing students such interaction between word and its meaning

2.4.2 Roles of teachers in using flashcards in classrooms Even research have showed the effectiveness of flashcards in language teaching and learning, it cannot deny the important role of teachers in using flashcards Flashcard only show its good effects in teaching if it can be applied with activities It may be boring if teachers hold a flashcard and ask students what it is In the textbook Family and Friends, there are also many pictures which help teachers give students meanings of new words However, using textbook Family and Friend to teacher vocabulary for young learners, teachers cannot see any interests of students in the pictures of the books It may be explained that these pictures seem to be familiar to students because whenever they open the book, they can see them In addition, these pictures are limitted in designing activities They just serve the purpose of supporting meanings of words In short, one of the benefit of flashcard is that teachers can use it to design many activities to give students motivation However, teachers are the ones who identify the various use of flashcards in the classroom

2.5 Study on Flashcards

The three teachers at Sebelas Maret University conducted a research called “Using flashcards to improve students vocabulary mastery” A pre- research was carried out at the SD Negeri II Watuagung school in the year 2011-

2012 with the fourth grade students The former results showed the problems that the participants got problems with low scores in vocabulary tests and they were less motivation to learn vocabulary An action research was implemented

by using flashcards with the aims of improving students’ vocabulary mastery and learning motivation The research passed four procedures: planning, acting, observing and reacting with using qualitative and quantitative methods to collect the data The results of the study indicated that when teachers applied flashcards

to teach vocabulary, students made progress on vocabulary mastery Additionally, they are more active in joining in classroom activities

There are implication for teachers that they should think carefully about a range of suitable activities in classrooms for students to scaffold the difficulties

in language vocabulary learning, as Ur (2012) stated Although the above study can indicate that students made improvement in their vocabulary learning, it fails

to show the learners’ vocabulary retention The problem is raised that the use of flashcards to teach vocabulary can make any help with young learners’ vocabulary retention in Doan Hung In addition, though the result of the study showed that students get interest in learning vocabulary with flashcards, this kind of interest may be different in each specific teaching context basing on what kinds of activities teachers use with flashcards; students’ mood, etc

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY

This chapter presents the reseach methodology which describes the pedagogical context of the research including the settings and the participants, the design of research, the data collection instruments and the methods of data

analysis, and the procedure of the study

3.1 Pedagogical context

3.1.1 Setting The research is conducted at Doan Hung Informatics Foreign Languages Center located on Le Thi Rieng Street, Thoi An Ward, District 12 There are 34 classes 18 classes for young learners and the rests are for secondary school and high school students, counting for the average of 16-22 students per class, at the center Half of the students are almost at the age of 5- 11 years old, who are considered as young learners In other words, they are at primary school (Thornbury, 2006) In addition, the center has experienced in training this age group Lesson time is daily devided into two shifts, the former one is from 4.45

p m to 6.15 p.m, and the later one is from 6.15 p.m to 7.45 p.m There are also seven other classes for young learners on Saturday and Sunday mornings, starting at 8 a.m and ending at 10.15 a.m

In general, learns at Doan Hung are quite studious and obedient The center authorities always try to create the best teaching and learning condition for the teachers and the learners The classrooms are well-equipped with modern technologies serving English as a Foreign Language teaching and studying such

as language laboratory, magnetic white boards, computers, projectors, air conditioners, etc In short, this is a very comfortable environment for teachers and students to work and study The course books for all young learners’ classes

are mainly Family and Friends 1–6, including one student book and one workbook, published by Oxford University Press With Family and Friend 1, counting for 14 Units, there are four review sections after each three units During Family and Friend 1 course, the students take four tests including a laboratory speaking test after the first three units, a midterm test after seven units, a laboratory test after 10 units, and a final test after 14 units Preparation for Young Learners Cambridge Examinations (Starters, Movers, Flyers) are also launched regularly, after learners have finished the two books

3.1.2 Participants The study is conducted with two groups, with seventeen students in each class One group is considered as the experimental group, and the other is the control group The two groups have finished Unit 9 of the same textbook, Family & Friend 1, with the same teacher (the researcher) The participants in the two classes are supposed to share the same Vietnamese background The control group is considered to have a better language understanding than the experimental group due to the fact that the students in the control group are almost in grade four and five at primary school (at the age of 9-11 years old) while the students in the experimental group are in grade 2, and 3 (at the age of 7- 9 years old) However, the two groups are believed to have the approximate level of vocabulary proficiency thanks to the record of their testing results during the process of learning from unit 1 to unit 9

A group of five teachers who are teaching young learners at Doan Hung are invited for an interview to get their opinion of using flashcards to teach young learners’ vocabulary

3.2 Instruments

This research is considered as a case study to investigate into the effectiveness of using flashcards to get young learners’ interest in learning vocabulary and their vocabulary retention at Doan Hung Informatics & Foreign Language School The research uses three main instruments called pre-test & post-test, student observation and teacher interview Pre-test, according to Babbies (2007), is used to measure the dependent variable among subjects while post- test is the measurement again the dependent variables among subjects after they have been exposed to an independent variables In other words, pre-test measures the vocabulary proficiency between the participants in the experimental and the control group Post-test will be used to measure the vocabulary retention between the the two groups after using flashcards for experimental teaching In addition, Babbies (2007) also defined interview as a substitute method of collecting survey data, instead of using questionnaires, in case there is a small scale of participants The teacher interview will be semi-structure interview in which questions are predetermined and the interviewer can ask more questions for clarification (Griffee, 2005) The teacher interview was believed to be objective as the interviewees were asked seperately, one by one in

a closed room

Besides, Nunan (1992) indicated that observation can be conducted to get research data in language teaching Data from pre-test, post- test will be analysed according to quantitative analysis while data from student observation and teacher interview will be analysed as qualitative analysis

3.3 Procedure

Firstly, the students in the two groups will get a pre-test to check their vocabulary proficiency level The students are made to do the test seriously for

minutes including the time for seat arrangement and the time for the researcher

to explain the test requirements as well Secondly, the two groups will get three vocabulary lessons with twenty vocabularies from unit 11 and unit 12 in the textbook Family and Friend 1, counting for 90 minutes for each lesson (in which

60 minutes is used for teaching and learning vocabulary) The researcher will try

to minimize the outside contextual effects on the two groups at the lowest rate during the experimental teaching, for instance, the well-equipped classroom with air conditioner, the same teacher’s mood, etc Additionally, the experimental lessons are well-prepared with flashcards including pictures and cue cards for the twenty new vocabulary teaching The researcher also uses some other teaching vocabulary aids, such as sheet magnets and magnets The control group will learn with the normal instructional methods that they used to learn with their teacher, without using flashcards whereas the experimental group will learn vocabularies with flashcards The teacher (researcher) will use flashcards to implement as much as useful or interesting activities as possible to motivate the learners to join in the learning process During the experimental teaching, the researcher will use a video camera put at a corner of the two classrooms to record the participants’ behaviors during the learning process Depending on the recorded films, the research will check how much the participants’ interest during the lessons In addtion, the researcher also takes a videos of the control group’s learning to observe them

In the first lesson, the teacher teaches six words of animals: elephant, monkey, giraffe, tiger, snake, and parrot First of all, the teacher sticks the

flashcards of the animals on the board and pronounces them loudly for the students to repeat Then, the teacher writes the words of the animals on the

board under the flashcards in a correct order so as for the students to get the written form of the new words The teacher gives the students time to practice the words After that, the teacher invites some students to go to the board and pronoun the words for their friends to listen to Next, the teacher turns the flashcards around very fast and asks the students to guess what it is The students are invited to guess the words one by one, too Then, the students are asked to remember six words and the teacher calls them to say the words The next step is that the teacher puts the flashcards on her table and invites one student to find the right flashcard and stick it on the board Students, then, play the game named slap the board The teacher draws a circle under each picture and divides the class into two teams and invites two students representing for their team When the teacher reads the word, the two students run to the board and slap the circle under the word The faster one gets ten marks for his or her team The students take turns to play this game After that, the teacher delivers the flashcards to the students When the teacher reads the name of a flashcard, the student who is holding that flashcard will give it to the teacher The teacher collects the flashcards and gives them to the other students for the next turn The teacher sticks the flashcards on the board and writes the words in each circle out of order The teacher asks the students to come to the board and match each word with its correct picture The students take turns to do until finishing all six flashcards After that, the teacher delivers some pieces of paper to the students and asks them to write the words down and tries to remember them as well When the students are ready, the teacher invites each member of the two teams

to run to the board and write the word The student who finishes first gets ten marks for his team The teacher, then, prepares two pairs of the alphabet cards

the teacher invites two students of each team to take the cards of the alphabet The teach reads one word of animal and the students find the letter cards to make

up that word, and stick them on the board The faster team will be the winner and gets marks from the teacher The other pairs of each team take turns to play this game

The second lesson starts with a game The teacher divides the students into two teams The teacher invites one member of each team to turn their back

to the board Then, the teacher shows one flashcard of the animals which is taught in the first section to the rest students They use actions and sounds to describe to the players what it is The player who can tell what animal it is will get ten marks for his or her team After that, the teacher teaches the six new words of size and color adjectives by sticking the flashcards on the board after pronouncing them The teacher asks the whole class to look at the pictures and guess the meanings of the new words Most of the students can tell exactly the words’ meanings basing on the pictures The teacher then writes the new words under their flashcards with the aim at noticing the students both images and written forms of the words The teacher gives the students time to practice and remember the words The teacher invites most of the students to tell the words The teacher calls six students, counting for three boys and three girls, to come and turn their back to the board The teacher delivers each of them one flashcard When the teacher reads the word, the student who is taking the flashcard will raise it up The other six students take turns to show the flashcards The teacher puts the flashcards on her table, then, invites the six students one by one to take turn to find and stick the flashcard on the board when the teacher reads it The teacher puts three flashcards on the ground, then invites some students to make two lines, one of which is team A and the another is team B When the teacher