3.1.2.1. The teaching and learning of idioms
When students were asked if they have been taught idioms or self-learning idioms at home, some of them said that they have learnt idioms at their high school to get supporting knowledge for university entrance examination or English proficient students competition at their province. Moreover, they also stated that they have been taught idioms at university as well as self-study at home, yet it was not intensive teaching and learning. It can be seen from the
findings that the students’ perceptions of learning and using idioms have changed since they entered the university. As Thuy – a student expressed: “Before I went to university, I used to think idioms were not important. And the teachers rarely taught us about idioms. When I entered the university I started learning something about idioms. And then I changed my mind. I think that learning idioms is very good. I think students should be encouraged to learn idioms more and more to use idioms as well as possible.” Much like the majority of students’
ideas in the interview, all lecturers in the interview confirmed that they have taught idioms at FOE. However, idioms were mainly taught to the third year and the senior students while that for freshmen was restricted.
Meanwhile, Tu and Thuy asserted that they have not been taught idioms at FOE except for the fact that lecturers just introduced some limited idioms appear in the reading texts or some lists of glossaries and they did not see it as the teaching of idioms. This is a slightly contradictory to the opinions of lecturers; however, the use of reading texts containing idioms for teaching and the glossary to check the idioms students have learned were considered as teaching idioms. The reason for the conflict is probably since the desirable of students that idioms will be taught in an intensive way rather than a perfunctory way.
3.1.2.2. The importance of idioms learning and teaching
In addition, almost all students and lecturers in the interview expressed that teaching and learning idioms played a significant role in learning English, especially in developing speaking skill. Most of the participants in the focus groups agreed that idioms were part of the target language. They acknowledged that learning idioms was, moreover, very important, as idioms also contain many cultural values. Oanh expressed “In my opinion, learning a language is learning about its culture, so to learn a language effectively, we should learn about its culture. Idioms are part of the culture so, for me, learning idioms is very important and interesting”. Additionally, Huyen Thanh (a student) claimed that idioms were important in all skills that all certificates were required in-depth English level; therefore, using idioms as much as possible was a tool to receive
high mark, particularly in band 7 or higher band in IELT speaking. Moreover, some of them mentioned that utilizing idioms in speaking skill helped them communicate with native speakers. While they talked with foreigners, they could not only understand what the foreigner means, know more about their culture, but also expressed Vietnamese culture. Likewise, all lecturers asserted that if students desire to be master as well as proficient in speaking skill, it was necessary to utilize many idioms. Indeed, Copper (1998) indicated that an English native speaker uses about 20 million idioms in his or her lifetime of 60 years. This means that each person exchanges 356,720 idioms a year, 980 idioms a day and 4.08 idioms a minute in average with one another in daily conversations. Cornell (1999), in effect, postulated that whether in linguistics or language acquisition, idioms have always been a necessary part of the study of language. Some students (Thanh, Thuy, Oanh, Nhung) in the interview suggested, “it’s necessary to focus more on speaking using idioms rather than explaining the meaning of idioms”. In contrast, Minh Tu (a student) believed that idioms were more important in writing skill of academic English while it was not essential in speaking skill. She explained that using simple words in speaking was sufficient to communicate with the foreigners, thus learning idioms just only aimed to cater for the certification exams such as IELT.
3.1.2.3. Ways of learning and teaching idioms
Moreover, the data revealed that many ways were used to study idioms. Thanh (a student) said that she learnt idioms through contextualization or reading texts by guessing the meaning of idioms. Then, she wrote down all of them in a notebook and learnt two idioms everyday by making sentences. Besides, she tried to use the idioms that she has learnt before when she had conversations with others.
Thus, she realized that her knowledge about idioms as well as speaking skill developed day by day. Thuy stated that her friends and she usually predicted the meaning of fixed phrases in the reading. Based on the context, the sentences before or after it and her common knowledge, she could guess the meaning of the phrases. Beside, other informants indicated some other ways: “We learnt idioms
through newspaper, textbook, and on the internet. We often compare English idioms with Vietnamese idioms to explore the differences, know more about culture, and find them easier to study.” (Oanh and Thuy, informants).
Furthermore, some students claimed: “We need more role plays to put idioms in our communication. Just knowing idioms is not enough. It is much better if we have chance to speak and use the idioms communicatively after understanding of the meaning of idioms in the reading or listening tasks.” The majority of them shared the same ideas that they desire to be taught idioms through mixed- methods such as storytelling, games, context with high interaction between teachers and students. They also believed that idioms teaching and learning was more effective, motivating, and enjoyable when they were the learner center. It means that students do not depend on their teacher all the time, waiting for instructions, words of approval, correction, advice, or praise. They do not ignore each other, but look at each other and communicate with each other. They value each other’s contributions; they cooperate, learn from each other, and help each other. When learning idioms in difficulty or in doubt, they do not ask the teacher for help or advice but only after they have tried to solve the problem among themselves such as searching on the internet or asking their friends. The emphasis is on working together, in pairs, in groups, and as a whole class that their lecturer helps them to develop their language skills. As Leo Jones (2007) stated that a student-centered classroom is the place, where consider the needs of the students, as a group and as individuals, and encourage them to participate in the learning process all the time. The teacher’s role is more that of a facilitator than instructor; the students are active participants in the learning process. The teacher (and the textbook) help to guide the students, manage their activities, and direct their learning. Being a teacher means helping people to learn and, in a student-centered class, the teacher is a member of the class as a participant in the learning process. They can be free to produce idioms and join many related activities to make learning idioms more interesting. Lien (a lecturer) also believed that learner-centeredness makes teaching and learning idioms more effective. She explained: “At the beginning of the lesson, I usually ask students to
work in groups and share the idioms they have learnt in the week with one another. Among all the exchanged idioms, each group selects two idioms, which are useful to learn in their opinion and write on the board to share with other groups. I then use some revision techniques to help them remember these idioms.” Another lecturer, Thao, also emphasized that students were very excited in this sharing. Her students found it easier to remember and used these idioms than other idioms in the book . Mai (a lecturer) states, “I usually adapt the activities in the textbook, so that they fit students’ learning styles and my teaching objectives.” Matching, idioms sharing and role-play with idioms tend to be most frequently used activities. Theatre playing was also of interest. For example, “We at first found it very difficult but then when we can express our ideas and thoughts with idioms, we were strongly motivated in this activities”, said Oanh (a student). Furthermore, “Students can use idioms more naturally.
Students are motivated in making conversations with roles in specific contexts”, commented by Mai (a lecturer). Hoa (a lecturer) also shared a contextual technique, “I sometimes tell the students a story with idioms. The plot of the story is familiar to my students but I use the idioms in the story. My students find it very excited and remember these fixed phrases better. Then, they can use the idioms in the similar context.” Therefore, it can be said that using the idiom- related activities contributed significantly to the effectiveness of teaching idioms.
3.1.2.4. Challenges in teaching and learning idioms
Students and lecturers also mention several challenges for teaching and learning idioms, hence they suggested some solutions to tackle the problem. The students found that idioms were too hard to learn because their meaning were not literally meaning of words. They also admitted that they rarely or never used idioms for several reasons. First, they had difficulty remembering the idioms. As a student – Nhung responded, “I make mistakes when I remember and recall idioms as long phrases to express my ideas.” Another student – Oanh agreed by saying
“Because it is a fixed phrase, so I can’t change it, we have to remember that long phrases. If we change any word in that group, it’s wrong.” Second, the students
are likely not encouraged to use and learn idioms in practice. A student – Thanh said, “In class, we don’t pay much attention to idioms; sometimes we note down some idiomatic phrases in the listening and speaking sessions with its explanation, but we do not fully understand its uses.” Third, they probably did not learn idioms systematically to fully understand the meaning, use, and context of each idiom. Thanh admitted, “Although learning idioms is interesting, we meet difficulties in learning idioms because it’s different in thinking when we use idioms. Some metaphors in idioms are not familiar to our culture. We do not know whether we use this or that idiom in this or that context is appropriate or not.” Due to time-consuming, teaching idioms at class could not be in-depth teaching. They also stated that some constituents were difficult because they were low frequent vocabulary or they were not known for the participant him/herself. Therefore, many students suggest that it would be more effective if lecturers used authentic videos to teach idioms. As a student – Tu noted, “I learn idioms just for fun. Whenever I want to find or learn more idioms, I read them in the books such as novels or newspapers, or watching films.” Also they want to participate in games like board games, quizzes, and word clouds in their process of learning idioms. They think that they “will be more motivated in learning idioms with games”, (Tu, a student). The lecturers also confirmed that time- consuming to prepare lesson, difficulties in choosing suitable idioms, limited idioms in the textbook, and lack of time to teach idioms are the main difficulties of idioms teaching and learning. Lien (a lecturer) claims that she has difficulties in choosing suitable idioms which related to the content of lessons. Besides, limited time using for teaching idioms at class is the reason why lecturers and students spend too much time on explaining new idioms, and do not have enough time for production stage such as speaking skill. The lecturers also understand this constraint as Lien suggested “develop further activities that integrate idioms into speaking skill tasks. Also, they should set clear and achievable goals for the use of idioms at the start of the semester as well as for separate blocks of lessons, modules so that tests can be more relevantly designed to meet the goals set”.
Moreover, Ms. Lien also recommended that idioms should be taught to students
of lower level of English as supplementary tasks so that students are more familiar with idiomatic expressions and collocations. Students then can study on their own and gradually build up their idiomatic expression list. Moreover, Lien also recommended that students should prepare some of their favorite beforehand and bring them to the class and share with their friends. Lecturers then will carry out activities for students to practice idioms and the more they are exposed to idioms, the better. They can show video clips containing idioms, but it is impossible to do this every lesson. Students are expected to be aware of the idioms in use and the awareness is much more influenced than knowing every single idiom.
3.1.2.5. Evaluations on the effectiveness of idioms teaching and learning The majority of the participants in the interview thought that their idioms teaching and learning was moderate effective. Thanh – a student gave more explanations that using reading text and glossary were relatively effective for reviewing idioms in specific context. However, students did not have the opportunity to be trained in many different skills. Sometimes, the activities that repeated in class made boredom. As Mai gave her estimations why she thought idioms teaching was moderate effective: “The most successful feature of the course in my opinion is that it helps my students recognize the presence of idioms and fixed phrases in authentic materials. When they understand and experience the importance of these phrases they can have the focus of idiomatic phrases in their further learning. In the past, we ignore this significant feature of language.” She said that students’ awareness of the importance and comprehension of idioms was a success of the course. Thus, the ways for students practice and using idioms in speaking need a long time to teaching more closely.
3.1.2.6. Shortage in teaching and learning idioms
The students seem to be very limited in their ability to recognize, understand, and use basic idioms in speaking when they said that they are not able to communicate appropriately with idioms as addressors and addressees. Almost all of the students in the interview asserted that the limited knowledge of idioms as
well as the laziness when studying at home that they need more effort to reach automaticity in using idioms. The students have limited knowledge of idioms in their conversations for three main reasons. The first is the underestimation of the importance of idioms in language teaching in Vietnam. Both lecturers and students appear to avoid idioms in the process of teaching and learning. In contemporary textbooks in high schools in Vietnam (English 10, 11, 12), few idioms are presented in reading or listening passages – the input to help students produce in speaking skill. Second, language learners (in particular freshmen at FOE) are unfamiliar with the move from individual words to chunks. Learning vocabulary in Vietnam tends to mean learning individual words and associating each with a Vietnamese equivalent. This appears to prevent students from remembering multi-unit words such as idiomatic phrases. Moreover, students do not have adequate repetition and practice over a period of time to step further toward automaticity (Knowles, 2004). In her research, Tran (2012) found that only 24 idioms are introduced in the three textbooks (six in English 10, six in English 11, and twelve in English 12). Among these, only one idiom is on the list of frequently used idioms by Grant (2007) and Liu (2003). These idioms are sporadically presented without any consolidation or practice. Indeed, there are no idiom-related exercises or practice in the textbooks. If the communication strategies for the negotiation of meaning are integrated into the process of learning idioms, however, language learners become more confident in dealing with not yet known idioms in their interactions.
The data also uncovered the lack of metaphorical uses in teaching and learning idioms activities. None of the lecturers and students showed any evidence in using conceptual metaphors in other part. Komur and Cimen (2009) investigated into the effects of conceptual metaphors in teaching idioms in Turkey, a similar foreign language teaching context. Kevecses & Szabco (1995) also implemented an informal experimental study of the effect of cognitive semantic in learning idioms. The studies showed the success of students in learning idioms with conceptual metaphors. Therefore, metaphor-related activities should be employed for idiom teaching. Lennon (1998) also supported this metaphorical approach. He
guided some pedagogical implications for idioms teaching with metaphorical encoding and decoding. This acts as a barrier to the prevention of creative associations in the learning process.
The data also showed that the lecturers had difficulties in using idioms in speaking skill. As Mai – a lecturer said, "I focused more on grammar instead of learning many idioms in the past, so I have to hone regularly to meet the requirements of the courses. I also try to use more idioms; however, honestly I was not confident when I talk.” Another one - Thao said that idioms were the difficult array of English; thus, they tend to avoid teaching much. However, idioms learning can be integrated creatively and actively in a foreign language- teaching context. Therefore, instead of being avoided in EFL learning, idioms should receive more attention in language teaching to assist students in acquiring English in a foreign language context. This filling may help EFL learners profoundly explore the target language and then purposefully communicate in English.