A study of english vocabulary learning strategies of 12th graders at nguyen tat thanh high school in hanoi, vietnam

This study investigated the English vocabulary learning strategy use by 100 students with different levels 50 from talented classes and 50 from other classes enrolled at Nguyen Tat Thanh

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

A study of English vocabulary learning

Thanh high school in Hanoi, Vietnam

(Nghiên c u v nh ng chi n l c h c t ứ ề ữ ế ượ ọ ừ

v ng ti ng Anh c a h c sinh l p 12 tr ng ự ế ủ ọ ớ ườ

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

A study of English vocabulary learning

Thanh high school in Hanoi, Vietnam

(Nghiên c u v nh ng chi n l c h c t ứ ề ữ ế ượ ọ ừ

v ng ti ng Anh c a h c sinh l p 12 tr ng ự ế ủ ọ ớ ườ

A Master Thesis

Field: English Teaching Methodology Supervisor: Assoc.Prof Nguyễn Văn Trào, PhD Code: 60140111

Hanoi, 2017

I declare that the thesis submitted for the Master of English degree at University of Languages and International studies is an undertaken work of my own research and has not been previously submitted at any other universities for any degrees Contributions of other researchers involved is made to indicate this clearly, with due reference to the literature, and acknowledgement of collaborative research and discussion This work was under the supervision and advice of Assoc.Prof Nguyen Van Trao, PhD, at University of Languages and International studies.

Hanoi, November 2016

Phan Diem My

The completion of this undertaking is a great thank to the participation and assistance of numerous people whose names may not all be enumerated, but contributions are sincerely appreciated and gratefully acknowledged.

First of all, I would like to express my deep appreciation and indebtedness particularly to Assoc.Prof Nguyen Van Trao, PhD, my supervisor, whose expertise, endless support, kind and understanding spirit during my dissertation made it possible for me to work on a topic that was of great interest to me, for finding out time to reply to my emails, for being ever so kind to show interest in

my research and for giving his precious advice regarding the topic of my research It is my pleasure working with him.

I also appreciate the authority of University of the Languages and International Studies in general and Faculty of Postgraduate Studies indeed for giving me their permission and required samples to carry out the research in the university library.

I would like to express my gratitude to all my lecturers who put their faith in

me and urged me to do better.

I am thankful to Nguyen Tat Thanh high school‘s teachers and students for their strong kindness and support during my data collection of the research.

I am highly indebted to my mom, to all my relatives, friends and others who

in one way or another shared their support, either morally, financially and physically, and gave me a lot of encouragement for keeping up with this task.

This study investigated the English vocabulary learning strategy use by 100 students with different levels (50 from talented classes and 50 from other classes) enrolled at Nguyen Tat Thanh High School in Hanoi, directly under Vietnam National University of Education The study found a curvilinear relationship between strategy use and English proficiency which means the high achievers (subjects with higher proficiency than the others) prefer using more grouping strategy to consolidate new words and have their own management and planning strategies to work well The remaining gaps between almost subjects‘ strong perception about the usefulness level of several strategies and their factual implementation are due to the common issue from a large number of Vietnamese students called ―verbal passiveness‖ and the ―afraid-of-making- mistakes‖ learning style culture Hence, more vocabulary learning strategies should be introduced to learners and strategy training is essential for learning Choosing their own learning strategies according to their characteristics such as proficiency and learning style may be beneficial for learners It is high time for both learners and teachers to be mindful of the quality or depth of the learned vocabulary for the sake of achieving basic success in EFL learning, and also reach a general consensus on the learning goal during designing the course or curriculum.

TABLE OF CONTENT

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

Abstract iii

TABLE OF CONTENT iv

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

1 RATIONALE OF THE STUDY 1

2 AIMS OF THE STUDY 2

3 THE RESEARCH QUESTIONS 2

4 SCOPE OF THE STUDY 3

5 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY 3

6 DESIGN OF THE STUDY 3

7 DEFINITION OF TERMS (OR KEY CONSTRUCTS) 3

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 6

CHAPTER 1: 6

LITERATURE REVIEW 6

1 Theoretical background 6

1.1 Background of vocabulary learning strategies 6

1.2 Taxonomy of language learning strategies 7

1.2.1 Stern's (1992) Classification of Language Learning Strategies 7

1.2.2 Schmitt’s classification of vocabulary learning strategies 8

2 Practical backgrounds 9

2.1 Students’ understanding and performance in their English vocabulary learning 9

2.2 High achievers’ opinions on vocabulary learning 10

2.3 Teachers’ performance in their English vocabulary teaching 10

3 Review of the previous studies 11

3.1 Carlo’s research (2004) 11

3.2 Francis’s research (2015) 11

3.3 Zheng’s research (2012) 12

3.4 Kim (2014) 12

3.5 According to Decarrico (2001) 12

iv

3.6 Nguyen‘s research (2015) 12

CHAPTER 2: 13

METHODOLOGY 13

1 Research questions restated 13

2 Research method 13

3 Setting of the Study 14

3.1 Teaching and learning condition 14

3.2 Participants of the study 14

3.2.1 Teachers 14

3.2.2 Students 14

4 Data collection instruments and procedures 15

4.1 Vocabulary learning strategies questionnaires 15

4.2 Think-aloud vocabulary task 16

4.3 Semi-structured interview 16

5 Data analysis procedures 16

CHAPTER 3: 17

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 17

1 Students‘ understanding of vocabulary learning 17

2 Students‘ practices in their English vocabulary learning 18

3 Teachers‘ practices in their English vocabulary teaching 19

4 Students‘ vocabulary learning strategies 20

4.1 The most-used discovery strategies by the twelfth-form students (Table 4.1) 20

4.2 The most-used discovery strategies by the high achievers 21

4.3 The most-used consolidation strategies by the twelfth-form students 22

4.4 The most-used consolidation strategies by the high achievers 23

5 Students‘ perceptions of the usefulness of the strategies 24

5.1 The most useful discovery strategies perceived by the twelfth-form students 24

5.2 The most useful discovery strategies perceived by the high achievers 25

5.3 The most useful consolidation strategies perceived by the twelfth-form students 26

5.4 The most useful consolidation strategies perceived by the high achievers 27

6 Think-aloud protocols by the high achievers 28

6.1 Guessing from context 28

6.2 Use of dictionaries 31

7 High achievers‘ opinions about vocabulary learning 32

7.1 Importance of vocabulary learning 32

7.2 What “knowing a word” means to the high achievers 32

7.2.1 Word meaning 32

7.2.2 Spelling and pronunciation 33

7.3 Lack of time on vocabulary learning 33

PART C: CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS 34

1 Summary of major findings 34

2 Concluding remarks and Recommendations 35

3 Limitations of the study 40

4 Suggestions for further researches 40

REFERENCES 42

APPENDICES 44

PART A: INTRODUCTION

Some countries use English as the mother tongue and other countries learn it as secondlanguage in their schools; hence, undoubtedly, English constitutes the language ofcommunication among people from different cultures Moreover, English is also used as thelanguage of science, technology and computers that helps to integrate people around the worldvia Internet technology and emails Therefore, mastering a foreign language especiallyEnglish is becoming strongly needed

In reality, studying a language is inseparable from studying vocabulary because of thefact that the vocabulary as the focus of language is in words that sound and meaning interlock

to help us communicate with one another and arrange together to make sentences,conversations, and discourse of all kinds Obviously, vocabulary is really important in everylanguage skill as well as any language learning

However, to study perfect English vocabulary is not easy In fact, students have difficulty

in memorizing a new word with its meaning, spelling and pronunciation or often beingconfused with knowing how can apply grammar into sentences Moreover, day-by-daytraditional teaching methods and similar activities make students become fed up with learningEnglish; therefore, it is necessary to apply interesting techniques to teach English for the sake

of fostering students to learn English vocabulary better

The meaning variables are regarded as their biggest problem learners encounter inlearning to use new words because each word contains more than one meaning while each oftheir meaning is included in the membership of an inter-related system; hence, it is highlyrequired to reach the thorough knowledge of words for understanding the meaning of wordsand how to use them correctly For instance, if a speaker chooses to use one new word, theneed is assigning the right meaning to the right word in the appropriate context but not in thesurface positioning of the words nor their wide range of meaning

Besides, sometimes negative interference in foreign language learning process is caused

by mother tongue features due to learners accustomed to the rules and the ways of usingmother tongue Moreover, the high influence of large class size and the lack of foreignlanguage environment also generate many obstacles on the teaching method and learningstyle Often, new words in lessons and their related exercises are provided for students as a list

of meanings or mostly but on non-context sentences; as a consequence, no idea of the

subtle social or cultural information that each new word provided conveys can be successfullytransmitted to students.

Learning a second language involves the manipulation of four main skills: listening,speaking, reading and writing One crucial factor embedded in all four skills that helps thesuccess of the second language acquisition is the vocabulary enrichment Very few empiricalresearch have been carried out exclusively to investigate learning strategies which pupils needemploy for dealing with learning foreign language vocabulary An English Vocabulary Listsfor high schools strongly needs to be developed to raise students‘ awareness of how words areformed and related to each other, such as synonyms, antonyms, collocations and idiomaticuses of words; whereas the vocabulary teaching and learning introduction as a discrete topicstill remain rare in Nguyen Tat Thanh High School

From the above reasons, investigating students‘ vocabulary learning strategies and alsopresenting some effective techniques to teach English vocabulary in high schools are myambition in order that students can improve their English vocabulary learning Despite myknowledge limitation and the frame of the graduation paper, the research paper entitled ―Astudy of English vocabulary learning strategies of 12th graders at Nguyen Tat Thanh HighSchool in Hanoi, Vietnam‖ was conducted with my entire best endeavor

2 AIMS OF THE STUDY

The study investigates the Nguyen Tat Thanh High School pupils‘ perceptions and theiractual use of learning English vocabulary strategies in their vocabulary learning Specifically,this study aims to:

- investigate the pupils‘ opinions on learning English vocabulary and their actual

vocabulary learning;

- identify if there is a significant difference between the use of the strategies by the high achievers and other participants in the study; and

- suggest some implications for English vocabulary teaching and learning

The study is conducted to answer the following questions:

(1) Which discovery strategies and consolidation strategies do the twelfth form pupils andthe high achievers use most frequently?

(2) Which discovery strategies and consolidation strategies do the twelfth form pupils andthe high achievers perceive as most useful?

(3) Is there a significant difference between the use of strategies by high achievers and other participants in the study?

(4) How do the high achievers in Nguyen Tat Thanh High School perceive vocabulary learning?

The aim of the study is to investigate Discovery Strategies and Consolidation Strategiesmost frequently used by the English learners as well as the perceptions of these strategies‘usefulness Furthermore, the features and behaviours of high achievers are examined bymeans of a think-aloud task and semi-structured interview Finally, the study would giveteachers the mutual understanding about the vocabulary acquisition among the learners so thatteachers could make adjustments or enhancements to vocabulary teaching as well as strategytraining

5 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

As seen, one of the most difficulties in reading is caused by vocabulary; so the study isformed to fill this gap and undertake a preliminary exploratory investigation designed toexamine types of strategies which pupils employ in order to obtain new vocabulary itemsbased on questionnaires and oral interviews

The Nguyen-Tat-Thanh-high-school pupils‘ perceptions and their actual use of learningEnglish vocabulary strategies are clearly viewed, hence to improve their vocabulary size andenrich words already known

A significant difference between the use of strategies by high achievers and otherparticipants will be seen in the study

6 DESIGN OF THE STUDY

The study includes five chapters:

The introductory chapter: Introduction, represents rationale of the study, aims of the study, scope of the study, significance of the study, research questions and overview of the thesis Chapter 1: Literature review, presents a review of literature, concentrating on the issues relates vocabulary learning strategies and perceptions

Chapter 2: Methodology, describes the methodology employed in the study, the data

collection instruments, the subjects, and the data collection procedures

Chapter 3: Findings and Discussion, presents the results and give some discussions of the results

The conclusion chapter: Conclusion and Implications, summarizes the findings, shows the limitations, gives recommendations and makes suggestions for further research

1 High achievers (n): Students who have high achievements in English study

2 Manipulation (n): Use and handling

3 Language acquisition (n): an asset or object bought or obtained in language learning

4 Vocabulary enrichment (n): Action which helps expand vocabulary size

5 Synonym (n): a word or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word

or phrase in the same language

6 Antonym (n): a word or phrase that means exactly or nearly opposite to another word

or phrase in the same language

7 Collocation (n): the habitual juxtaposition of a particular word with another word or words with a frequency greater than chance

8 Idiom (n): a phrase or a fixed expression that has a figurative or sometimes literal meaning An idiom's figurative meaning is different from the literal meaning.

9 Discovery Strategies (n): methods to discover new words‘ meaning

10 Consolidation Strategies (n): methods to consolidate new words‘ meaning

11 Think-aloud task (n): a method used to gather data in usability testing in productdesign and development, in psychology and a range of social sciences (e.g., reading, writing,translation research, decision making, and process tracing)

12 Semi-structured interview (n): a method of research used in the social sciences While

a structured interview has a rigorous set of questions which does not allow one to divert, a structured interview is open, allowing new ideas to be brought up during the interview as a result

semi-of what the interviewee says

13 Perception (n): the organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory

information in order to represent and understand the environment

14 Comprehension (n): ability to understand—usage

15 Text genres (n): a type of written or spoken discourse

16 First-hand documentation (n): an original document

17 Historical accounts (n): things of or relating to history; concerned with past events

18 Fiction (n): any narrative or descriptive content that is derived from imagination, in addition to, or rather than from, history or fact

19 Semantic (adj): be related to the study of meaning

20 Affixes (n): morphemes attached to a word stem to form a new word

21 Cognates (n): words that have a common etymological origin

22 Morphological relationships (n): relationships relevant to morphology linguistics

23 Efficacy (n): the capacity for beneficial change (or therapeutic effect) of a given intervention, most commonly used in the practice of medicine and pharmacology

24 ELT settings (n): English Language Teaching settings

25 Metaphorical competence (n): A Language Learning Strength of Students with a Holistic Cognitive Style

26 Autonomy (n): Self-government; freedom to act or function independently

27 Follow-through (n): activity to carry through to complete a task; to see a task through

to its completion

28 Taxonomy (n): the practice and science of classification of things or concepts, including the principles that underlie such classification

29 Bilingual (adj): be able to speak two languages with the facility of a native speaker

30 Retrieval (n): 1.The process of accessing information from memory or other storage devices 2 The possibility of being retrieved or restored

PART B: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1:

LITERATURE REVIEW

1 Theoretical background

1.1 Background of vocabulary learning strategies

Besides mind to think, verbal language or speaking differentiates human from animals Achild to first acquire speech is learning new words as well as the adult speaker with largestvocabulary has the best command of English So, what is vocabulary? A vocabulary isdefined as ―all the words known and used by a particular person‖ and ―all the words whichexist in a particular language or subject‖ (Cambridge Advanced Learners Dictionary)

In other words, vocabulary constitutes the knowledge of words and word meanings Morecomplex, words are divided into two forms called oral and print Oral vocabulary helps usrecognize and use in listening and speaking; whereas print vocabulary is relevant to readingand writing Second, there are two forms of word knowledge called receptive and productive.Receptive vocabulary supports us to recognize when we hear or see them; while productivevocabulary is to use when we speak or write Receptive vocabulary, which is typically largerthan productive vocabulary may have some meanings, even sometimes we do not know theirfull definitions and connotations – or ever use them ourselves as we speak and write (Kamil &Hiebert, in press)

Besides, as a component of language, vocabulary maintains all of information aboutmeaning and using word in language (Kridalaksana, 1993, p 27) and also be one of theimportant factors in learning English besides sound system, grammar and culture Serving as auseful and fundamental tool for communication, vocabulary usually grows, evolves with ageand determines one‘s cultural literacy, which all becomes very vital to his/her own success inthe world

The term ―strategy‖ originated from the military field refers to carefully designed plansfor military operations, which has been taken on a new meaning and has been transformedinto learning strategies if applied for a non-military setting like school study Languagelearning strategies are defined as ―…strategies that contribute to the development of thelanguage system which the learner constructs and (which) affect learning directly‖ (Rubin,

1987, p.23) Therefore, learning strategies determine the approach for achieving the learning

objectives and include in the pre-instructional activities, testing and follow-through, help

learners‘ study more efficient and increase their self-directed learning

1.2 Taxonomy of language learning strategies

Table A: Defining language learning strategies (Wenden & Rubin, 1987, p.32)

Authors What are LLS? What are LLS for?

Rubin Techniques or devices To acquire knowledge.Bailystok Methods/ conscious To exploit available

enterprises information to increase the

proficiency of L2

Cohen Mental operations To accomplish learning

tasks

Rubin Set of operations, steps, To facilitate the

plans, routines obtaining, storage, retrieval

& use of information, toregulate learning

Wenden Learning behaviors To learn and regulate

Strategic knowledge learning on L2

Knowledge aboutlearning

O‘Malley & Chamot Special thoughts or To help comprehend,

behaviors learn or retain new

information

Oxford Specific actions To make learning

easier, faster, moreenjoyable, self-directed,effective and transferable tonew situations

1.2.1 Stern's (1992) Classification of Language Learning Strategies

According to Stern (1992, p.262), there are five main language learning strategies whichcan be presented as follows:

A Management and Planning Strategies

The learner's intention to direct his own learning is related A learner helped by a teacherwhose role is an adviser and resource person could manage the development of his ownprogramme The learner must "decide what commitment to make to language learning sethimself reasonable goals decide on an appropriate methodology, select appropriate resources,and monitor progress, evaluate his achievement in the light of previously determined goalsand expectations‖.

B Cognitive Strategies

Steps used in learning or problem solving require direct analysis, transformation, orsynthesis of learning materials, included Clarification/Verification, Guessing/InductiveInferencing, Deductive Reasoning, Practice, Memorization, Monitoring

C Communicative-Experiential Strategies

Circumlocution, gesturing, paraphrase, or asking for repetition and explanation are used

by learners to keep a conversation going They aim to avoid interrupting the flow ofcommunication

1.2.2 Schmitt’s classification of vocabulary learning strategies

Schmitt (1993) separates into two groups which include: (i) Discovery Strategies and (ii)Consolidation Strategies

Learners must discover its meaning by guessing from their structural knowledge of thelanguage, guessing from an L1 cognate, guessing from context, using reference materials, orasking others, in which Determination Strategies facilitate gaining knowledge of a new wordfrom the first four options for learners to be able to discern the new word's part of speech inthe guessing process

Guessing an unknown word's meaning from context has been seen to fit in morecomfortably with the communicative approach; nevertheless, it commonly refers to inferring aword's meaning from the surrounding words in a written text First, it highly requires thelearner to have a certain level of language proficiency in order to use this strategy, includingthe ability to accurately decode the orthographical form of new words and also have adequatebackground knowledge of the subject and the strategic knowledge of how to effectively gothrough the inferencing process In addition, the context itself is considered rich enough withclues to enable guessing, with the most easily utilizable clues being in close proximity to thetarget word.

A second way to discover a new meaning is the Social Strategy of asking someone whoknows, particularly teachers (often in this position), who can be asked to give help in a variety

of ways: giving the L1 translation, a synonym, a definition by paraphrase or using the newword in a sentence, or any combination of these The advantage of L1 translations is beingfast, easily understood by students, and possible to the transfer of all the knowledge(collocations, associations, etc.) onto the L2 equivalent; however, the disadvantages remainthat the teacher must know learners' mother tongue and most translation pairs tend to be notexact equivalents

Grouping plays an important role in recalling, but learners often organize words intogroups naturally without prompting Learners can learn new words by studying them withpictures of their meaning instead of definitions Alternatively, learners can create their ownmental images of a word's meaning which is seen more effective than mere repetition forreading passages

The present study implements the theory given by Schmitt (1993) as the mainstreamingmodel during research and analysis schedules

2 Practical backgrounds

2.1 Students’ understanding and performance in their English vocabulary learning

Most students believe that vocabulary plays a very important role in language learning.The students have the idea to learn vocabulary because they know in order to acquirevocabulary; they have to learn the basics, e.g pronunciation, spelling, and meanings of thewords The traditional methods are favored by most students such as learning vocabulary byreading repeatedly, learning vocabulary by writing automatically, learning vocabulary byanalyzing affixes and roots, learning vocabulary by association, learning vocabulary bykeeping word cards with pictures, photographs, objects, etc Despite those methods being easy

to handle, most of them are considered to be not effective and systematic because of the factthat the students usually learn vocabulary one by one according to the word list Somemethods, such as learning vocabulary by association and keeping word cards seem to be time-

consuming; therefore, better methods are strongly needed to help them learn the vocabularysystematically.

2.2 High achievers’ opinions on vocabulary learning

High achievers recognize the importance of vocabulary learning ‗Knowing a word‘defines as knowing the semantic value of a word and many of the different meaningsassociated with a word Remembering a corresponding Vietnamese equivalent perhaps seems

to be ineffective and unnecessary because of the unequivalence between the first and secondlanguages Most of the learners opt for monolingual dictionary when facing with a new word

or confirmed meaning

2.3 Teachers’ performance in their English vocabulary teaching

The important position of traditional teaching methods is still clearly seen in Englishvocabulary teaching Many teachers are not optimistic about the efficiency in their vocabularyteaching As for the teaching practice, some techniques are applied to help the students tolearn new vocabulary by teachers, such as: guessing from contexts, using word parts, usingword cards, learning vocabulary through reading, listening and speaking, etc Sometimes,word collocations, different meanings of an item, grammar-related words and affixes, etc arealso taught Despite all these helpful techniques, the words are only dealt with in an isolatedmanner; hence, some more effective methods are strongly essential to stimulate the students‘interests in learning the vocabulary The learners definitely feel boring with explaining thewords one by one and learning words by memorizing the word list alone, and hence wouldlose interests in vocabulary learning after a while The efficiency of vocabularyteaching/learning could not be fulfilled without adequate methods and interests So theurgently existing problem is a better teaching method needed to effectively enlarge thelearners‘ vocabulary and enhance the learners‘ understanding of the lexical meanings for thesake of improving the efficiency of English vocabulary teaching and learning in the class.Teachers tend to build up their own curriculum based on the content of the lesson, thestudents‘ level, the grammatical items they want to teach to find a suitable method in order toachieve the best results

Techniques for presentation

 Presenting the new-word structures through contextualization

Either real or simulated situations have been used by teachers to make learning activitymore effective and the students more motivated by means of contextualization in the teaching

of new words; also, the full use of real situations in the classroom is often made and combinedwith the appropriate facial expression and actions to make the lesson more interesting and themeaning of the items clearer

 Presenting the new-word structures through dialogues

Reading and doing role plays in dialogues are usual activities that students prefer owing

to good results these activities can bring about By presenting new words and their equivalentstructures through dialogues, teachers could save much more time creating situations because

of dialogues themselves being very clear in such situations Besides, some new structuresintroduced and clearly presented may be met by students to have knowledge

 Presenting the new words and their equivalent structures through visual aids

According to Adrian Doff, showing directly by using things seen such as objects, the

classroom, the students themselves and pictures constitutes the simplest way and clearest way

to present a structure; particularly, in the class, visual aids could be shown at any stage of thelesson because of good visual aids not just used once but again and again

 Presenting the modal auxiliary verbs and their equivalent structures through examples It

is so effective when using examples in presenting new words and their equivalent

structures Either inductive method or deductive method can be provided to achieve goodresults As illustrated, a series of examples of the structures are given to students to draw outthe rules for themselves On the other hand, the rules with examples will be clearly explained

by teachers so that students study and finally make up sentences with the help of the teachers,which all helps students to have chances to use the language

3.1 Carlo’s research (2004)

Carlo (2004) aimed to establish the vocabulary learning strategies applied during Englishlessons and outcomes in learning English A 15-week intervention was designed to build upbreadth and depth of vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension in 254 bilingual andnative English-speaking pupils from nine 5th-grade classrooms in four schools in California,Virginia and Massachusettes Shared book readings of a variety of text genres, includingnewspaper articles, diaries, first-hand documentation of the immigrant experience, historicalaccounts and fiction are provided for each weekly lesson Words are considered best learnedfrom rich semantic contexts; because of the fact that activities helped children make semanticlinks to other words and concepts and thus to attain a deeper and richer understanding of eachword‘s meaning, to infer meanings from context and to use roots, affixes, cognates,morphological relationships and comprehension monitoring

3.2 Francis’s research (2015)

Francis aimed to examine the efficacy of incorporation instructional practices associatedwith improved outcomes into middle-school social studies instruction in the same centralTexas school districts as a means of improving vocabulary knowledge and comprehension forELLs It includes (a) selecting words to improve students‘ academic language, (b) providingstudents with opportunities to encounter new words in texts and video clips The seventh-

grade students (381) at both middle schools were randomly assigned to 15 sections ofseventh-grade social studies classrooms at their schools.

3.4 Kim (2014)

The study was designed to investigate English vocabulary learning troubles that native speakers have in learning English word systems with roots and standard rules forprefixes and suffixes extending the way these core items are used A total of 54 student intotwo groups took part in the experiment at a private English School in Korea, in which thestudy was carried out over 10 weeks with only 10 minutes out of each 50-minute class usedfor studying the selected words The goal was to determine how affixation patterns of Englishwords are acquired and expanded, hence help students learn English vocabulary much fasterand avoid the need to repeatedly look up words

non-3.5 According to Decarrico (2001).

Guessing meaning from context, mnemonic devices, and vocabulary notebooks areprovided to be several typical vocabulary learning strategies Meanwhile, using mnemonics(using keyword technique or visual element), word cards/ flashcards, guessing from context,coping strategies for production, using dictionaries, spelling rules, keeping records, andmotivation are often used by good vocabulary learners (Thornburry, 2002)

3.6 Nguyen’s research (2015)

The study investigates vocabulary learning strategies

which are employed by the second-year students of different learning styles at at School

of Law, VNU as well as gives several possible ways to help students better their vocabularylearning strategies for fitting their learning styles The data collection tools were surveyquestionnaires and interviews; then the findings were coded and analysed by both quantitativeand qualitative methods The major findings revealed that most of these students preferredvisual learning style, auditory learning style

CHAPTER 2:

METHODOLOGY

1 Research questions restated

The study is conducted to answer the following questions:

(1) Which discovery strategies and consolidation strategies do the twelfth form pupils andthe high achievers use most frequently?

(2) Which discovery strategies and consolidation strategies do the twelfth form pupils andthe high achievers perceive as most useful?

(3) Is there a significant difference between the use of strategies by high achievers and other participants in the study?

(4) How do the high achievers in Nguyen Tat Thanh High School perceive vocabulary learning?

2 Research method

In this study, questionnaires, think-aloud tasks and interviews were adopted to achievethe stated research aims Using questionnaires helps reduce expense and time involved intraining interviewers and sending them to interview The questions are designed to be a highorder, concise, meaningful questions and stated in common language Respondents weregiven the same set of questions phrased in exactly the same way; therefore, data coveringlarge amounts of information can be collected from a large number of people may becollected and analysed more comparably and objectively in a short period of time and in arelatively cost effective way than those obtained via an interview For think-aloud protocols,participants are required to think aloud when performing a set of specified tasks and asked tosay whatever comes into their mind to complete the task (including what they are looking at,thinking, doing, and feeling); hence, researchers have insights into the participant's cognitiveprocesses during task performance

On the other hand, by interviewing, the interviewer can clarify questions and observeverbal and non-verbal behaviors of the respondents as well as the informants tend to respond

in any manner they see fit Indeed, interview is a means of obtaining personal information,attitudes, perceptions, and beliefs First, interviewer gives students open-practical questions;whereas think-aloud protocols are given in writing forms for selected students to follow andanswer Second, the researcher gathered data by using various sources of data was done tobetter understand the scope of happenings in the classroom, then selected the suitable data forthe research issue and organised the data in a logical way to identify trends and themes Next,data was interpreted to analyse and identify major themes throughout using different kinds of

data from classroom data, individual data to subgroup data Finally, by assessing the effects ofthe intervention, the researcher evaluated the results and decided improvements.

3 Setting of the Study

In reality, the interdependent relationship between teachers, educational materials andstudents is clearly seen All of those are the really-essential factors toward lectures‘ success.Due to the time limitation, the questionnaires were only conducted in Nguyen Tat Thanh HighSchool in Hanoi and found their reality The focus is based on the characteristics of theteachers and the students as well as the teaching and learning condition in the target school

3.1 Teaching and learning condition

At Nguyen Tat Thanh High School, the fairly-good teaching and learning condition isequipped with a system of the blackboards, modern equipment and furniture In terms ofinfrastructures, classroom in general, chairs and tables in specific are quite comfortable andlarge enough Each class is facilitated with illustrations English pictures for studying, whichall prompts the English class atmosphere to be relatively pleasant However, the only one poorcondition is about inadequate English reference books and teaching aids which pose thelectures not to attract students‘ attention Despite this good environment provided to teachEnglish, my observations suggest that more and more new techniques should be collected andimplemented to teach English effectively and scientifically

3.2 Participants of the study

3.2.1 Teachers

At Nguyen Tat Thanh High School, quite-young English teachers who all graduated fromcolleges and universities or even post-graduates are enthusiastic and have experience in theirwork Before class, their lessons are always prepared carefully and thoroughly but sometimes

by implementing the traditional teaching methods or just using their book and material relatedwith the lesson Hence, it is strongly needed to apply interesting teaching aids in lessons,especially at high schools

3.2.2 Students

Most of the students performed their activeness and eagerness in English lessons;however, the traditional teaching methods such as teacher lecturing on the board, and studentswriting down words and grammar in their notebook do not work well for students to expresstheir ability of logic and activeness So applying newly-effective techniques for teachingEnglish is definitely necessary

Questionnaire I was distributed to 100 students (50 from talented classes and 50 fromother classes), while Questionnaire II was handed out to the teachers respectively In order tohelp the subjects to understand the questions, every question and choices in student‘squestionnaires was dubbed in its Vietnamese translation The students were required to fulfill

the questionnaire in one class hour, while the teachers were expected to finish it in their sparetime of the day The answer sheets were collected after all subjects had finished them 100copies of student questionnaires and 10 copies of teacher questionnaires were sent out,completed, collected and analyzed.

4.1 Vocabulary learning strategies questionnaires

In this study, questionnaires, which consists of a variety of questions of different typessuch as multiple choice questions, ranking questions, yes/no questions and open-endedquestions, were used (quantitative method) as a data collection instrument because of thefollowing reasons The questionaires on vocabulary learning strategies set up were based onthe referencing process related as well as the overall observation of traditionally and newly-applied learning methods by students First, a large amount of information is obtained from awide range of individuals Then, researchers have a chance to find the appropriate answers tothe needed questions Clearly, questionnaires as one of the most objective means of collectingdata foster students express their own opinions without fear to be embarrassed or punishedand disclose their names when filling in the questionnaires

This present study used a pre-questionnaire (Question 1 to 7) and a post-questionnaire(Question 8 to 11) The pre-questionnaire and post-questionnaire were administered to theteachers and students so as to investigate the teachers and students‘ attitudes towards Englishvocabulary teaching and learning The post-questionnaire has a different format and contentwith the pre-questionnaire, which evaluates different vocabulary learning strategies studentsuse in their study process as well as their perception of effectiveness

These two sets of the survey questionnaires were conducted to get information aboutteaching and learning English vocabulary in Nguyen Tat Thanh High School (one forstudents, one for teachers) Teachers and students were asked to choose the most suitableanswers corresponding with their opinion The questionnaires are designed as below:

For teachers (Questionnaire II): there are 3 questions to find out

Question 1 finds out the techniques or methods are used in teaching vocabulary and theireffectiveness

Question 2 reveals the teachers‘ attitudes towards the vocabulary teaching

Question 3 shows the teachers‘ self-evaluation about their vocabulary teaching

For students (Questionnaire I): there are 11 questions conducted in order to study and the

data collection is separate from talented classes and others

Question 1 aims to find out the students‘ attitudes towards learning English vocabulary in particular

Question 2 investigates the students‘ knowledge relevant to vocabulary learning

Question 3+4 aim to reveal advantages and disadvantages students have when learningvocabulary.

Question 5 finds out the students‘ general ways in learning the meaning of words

Questions 6+7 investigate the students‘ feelings and self-evaluation on vocabulary learningand their effectiveness

Questions 8+9 are designed to examine vocabulary learning strategies the students often use

in their study process

Questions 10+11 search the students‘ opinions on the usefulness of these strategies

4.2 Think-aloud vocabulary task

By applying think-alouds, the researcher could model comprehension processes such asmaking predictions, creating images, linking information in text with prior knowledge,monitoring comprehension, and overcoming problems with word recognition orcomprehension (Gunning, 1996) Students' strengths and weakness can be diagnosed byteachers Eight excerpts in written forms are designed to examine guessing ability of the highachievers in vocabulary learning

4.3 Semi-structured interview

Semi-structured interviews, which are believed to provide a 'deeper' understanding ofsocial phenomena than those obtained from purely quantitative methods, such asquestionnaires, not only comprise several key questions for defining the areas to be exploredbut also help the interviewer or interviewee in order to pursue an idea or response in moredetails In this study, five questions were used to interview the high achievers

Question 1 explores the high achievers‘ general knowledge about the meaning of a word.Questions 2+3 find out the high achievers‘ opinions on the importance of vocabulary learning.Question 4 investigates their study plans

Question 5 examines their outside-classroom learning strategies

5 Data analysis procedures

All the data were collected and analysed using a systematic process of analysis andinterpretation according to the preset criteria So the result of the analysis can be used tocompare the changes in my own teaching and also my students‘ learning

Turning back to the investigated classes, after several weeks, these classes were recordedagain All available information and data were synthesized The outcomes are considered verypositive More complex interactions took place during the lessons There is much greaterinvolvement and interest in vocabulary improvements expressed by the students, and thecomplexity of their language is enhanced

CHAPTER 3:

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

Most of the students believe that vocabulary plays a very important role in languagelearning The students have the idea to learn vocabulary because they know in order to acquirevocabulary; they have to learn the basics: e.g., pronunciation, spelling, and meanings of thewords (see Table 1 below)

Table 1 Students’ understanding of vocabulary learning

Question 1 In your opinion, what is the position of vocabulary in English learning?

Very important 54%

Important 31.3%

Not important 14.7%

Question 2 What contents does vocabulary learning refer to?

Pronunciation and spelling of words 28%

Pronunciation, spelling and the meaning in the word list

36.7% Collocations of words 24%

All the meanings related to the item 11.3%

Question 3 In your opinion, what is the difficulty in your vocabulary learning?

Pronunciation 12%

Spelling 22%

Meaning 41.3%

Word collocations 24.7%

Question 4 In your opinion, what knowledge you have learned is helpful for

your vocabulary learning?

Lexical knowledge (suffix, root, and stem of words) 20

effectively, they recognise that learning new words by contexts (30.4%) and by native culture

(27.2%) help the study process better

The traditional methods are favored by most students such as learning vocabulary by

reading repeatedly, learning vocabulary by writing automatically, learning vocabulary by

analyzing affixes and roots, learning vocabulary by association, learning vocabulary by

keeping word cards with pictures, photographs, objects, etc Despite those methods being easy

to handle, most of them are considered to be not effective and systematic because of the fact

that the students usually learn vocabulary one by one according to the word list Some

methods, such as learning vocabulary by association and keeping word cards seem to be

time-consuming; therefore, better methods are strongly needed to help them learn the vocabulary

systematically

Table 2 Students’ practices in their English vocabulary learning

Question 5 “How do you usually learn vocabulary?”

By reading repeatedly 28.4%

By writing automatically 34.8%

By analyzing affixes and roots 23.6%

By association 10.8%

By keeping word cards with pictures, photographs, objects, etc 2.4%

Question 6 How do you feel learning English vocabulary?

As shown in Table 2, a great number of students feel headache (36%) and boring (45.3%)

with learning English vocabulary As a consequence, their efficiency in vocabulary learning is

marked quite low The feeling in the study also affects the results remarkably

3 Teachers’ practices in their English vocabulary teaching

The important position of traditional teaching methods is still clearly seen in English

vocabulary teaching Many teachers are not optimistic about the efficiency in their vocabulary

teaching As for the teaching practice, some techniques are applied to help the students to

learn new vocabulary by teachers, such as: guessing from contexts, using word parts, using

word cards, learning vocabulary through reading, listening and speaking, etc Sometimes,

word collocations, different meanings of an item, grammar-related words and affixes, etc are

also taught Despite all these helpful techniques, the words are only dealt with in an isolated

manner; hence, some more effective methods are strongly essential to stimulate the students‘

interests in learning the vocabulary The learners definitely feel bored with explaining the

words one by one and learning words by memorizing the word list alone, and hence would

lose interests in vocabulary learning after a while The efficiency of vocabulary

teaching/learning couldn‘t be fulfilled without adequate methods and interests So the

urgently existing problem is a better teaching method needed to effectively enlarge the

learners‘ vocabulary and enhance the learners‘ understanding of the lexical meanings for the

sake of improving the efficiency of English vocabulary teaching and learning in the class

Table 3 Teachers’ practices in their English vocabulary teaching

Question 1 How do you usually teach vocabulary?

Ask students to read after me 20%

Explain the meaning listed in the text and make sentence examples 51.4%

Explain the root, stem, affix etc 15.7%

Explain the collocations of a word 12.9%

Question 2 How do you feel teaching English vocabulary?

4 Students’ vocabulary learning strategies

The results will be presented by Tables organized in the ranking manner from the highest

to the lowest

4.1 The most-used discovery strategies by the twelfth-form students (Table 4.1)

- The most commonly-used Discovery strategy for both the twelfth-form students and high achievers is guessing followed by the use of the dictionary

Table 4.1 Discovery strategies used by the twelfth form pupils

1 Guess its meaning from the context 42 84

2 Look up the word in a Vietnamese/English dictionary 40 81.5

3 Use an electronic or online dictionary 39 79.5

4 Ask my classmates or peers for the meaning 38 77.5

5 Learn words from the mass media 36 73.5

6 Try to think of an English word that is similar 32 64.0

7 Look up the word in an English dictionary 31 63.0

8 Ask my teacher(s) for the meaning 29 59.0

9 Look at the parts of speech 27 54.0

10 Look for the clues in the word itself 23 46.0

11 Learn words from word lists or glossary 19 39.0

13 Learn words through ICQ or chat room communication 13 27.0

14 Interact with native speakers (e.g the NET) 10 20.0

(Total number of respondents: 50)

The five highest-ranking discovery strategies used by the twelfth-form students are Guessits meaning from the context (84%), Look up the word in a Vietnamese/English dictionary(81.5%), Use an electronic or online dictionary (79.5%), Ask my classmates or peers for themeaning (77.5%) and Learn words from the mass media (73.5%) respectively They mostlyguess the meanings of new words throughout contexts; however, the use of dictionary (eitherVietnamese/English dictionary, English dictionary or electronic dictionary) is definitely usualfor them to discover the new ones The two lowest are Learn words through ICQ or chat roomcommunication (27%) and Interact with native speakers (20%)

4.2 The most-used discovery strategies by the high achievers

- To consolidate a word in memory, the twelfth-form students and high achievers favour focusing on the spoken and written form of words

Table 4.2 Discovery strategies used by the high achievers

1 Guess its meaning from the context 45 90

2 Look for the clues in the word itself 37 75

3 Look up the word in an English dictionary 25 50

4 Learn words from the mass media 20 40

5 Look at the parts of speech 17 35

6 Look up the word in a Vietnamese/English dictionary 17 35

7 Learn words from word lists or glossary 17 35

8 Use an electronic or online dictionary 15 30

9 Ask my teacher(s) for the meaning 10 20

10 Interact with native speakers 3 5

11 Try to think of an English word that is similar 0 0

12 Ask my classmates or peers for the meaning 0 0

(Total number of respondents: 50)

Guess its meaning from the context (90%), Look for the clues in the word itself (75%),Look up the word in an English dictionary (50%) and Learn words from the mass media(40%) are the four highest-ranking discovery strategies used by the high achievers The twolowest are Ask my teacher(s) for the meaning (20%), Interact with native speakers (5%);while no students Try to think of an English word that is similar, Ask my classmates or peersfor the meaning, Ignore it (0%)

Generally, both the twelfth-form students and high achievers prefer Guess its meaningfrom the context and Look up the word in a dictionary Based on Stern‘s theory, both thetwelfth-form students and high achievers tend to use Cognitive strategies Whereas thetwelfth-form students tend to ask peers or their classmates (77.5%) or their teachers (59%) forthe meaning of new words frequently (which means they prefer using Interpersonal strategies

or Social strategy in Schmitt‘s theory), the high achievers seldom ask their teachers for themeaning (20%) or even none of them asks their classmates or peers for the meaning of the