Rationale
English is one of the most important and powerful languages in the world In Vietnam, it is one of the subjects that is compulsory from primary school level to university level Moreover, “better English, better careers” is one of the students’ purposes of learning this language It cannot be denied that English can help Vietnamese students prepare better for their career in the future because it does not only equip learners with a necessary source of information of social and culture knowledge but also gives them up-to-date information concerning different issues in our society nowadays
Gezim (2008) states that it is the experience of most language teachers that vocabulary teaching is the most important area of foreign language competence No matter how well the students learn grammar, no matter how successfully the sound of language is mastered, without words to express, communication in foreign language cannot happen in any meaningful ways Thus, teaching and learning vocabulary successfully is the concern of all teachers and learners of foreign language
By applying various new approaches, methods, and techniques, English teaching has changed from the traditional grammar translation approach to the communicative approach According to Communicative Language Teaching, the purpose of language teaching and learning is to develop communicative competence in the target language
Together with this trend, teaching English at Vung Cao Viet Bac high school (VCVBHS), Thai Nguyen city is also the strategic duty of all the teachers and the students However, because most students at VCVBHS are from different mountainous areas in the northern of Vietnam, learning English is difficult for them They feel shy when speaking English because of lacking words and they do not have a lot of chances to practice this language in contexts As a teacher of English at VCVBHS, I would like to help my students to master the language and have an ability to communicate confidently in English so I chose the topic A study on teaching English vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at Vung Cao Viet Bac high school through group activities to help my students learn vocabulary better to learn English better.
Aims of the study
The aims of this thesis are to make a contribution to the improvement and innovation of teaching and learning English vocabulary and suggest some group activities to teach vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS
To achieve the aims mentioned above, the objectives are designed as follows:
+ Investigating the opinions of the teachers and the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS about the use of group activities in teaching and learning English vocabulary
+ Suggesting some useful group activities to improve English vocabulary teaching of the teachers and learning of the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS.
Significance of the study
This study can help the teachers to realize the advantages and disadvantages of using group activities in teaching English vocabulary at classrooms Furthermore, this study also gives some suggestions to the teachers of English to develop successfully learning group activities to teach English vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students This will help the teachers have more success in vocabulary teaching and create more chances for the students to use vocabulary in communication with each other in English naturally
Hence, this study is helpful to provide knowledge on ways to develop English vocabulary teaching and learning.
Research questions
The above aims of the study are to answer the following two research questions:
1 What are the opinions of the teachers and the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS about the use of group activities in teaching and learning English vocabulary?
2 Which group activities should be used in teaching English vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS?
Scope of the study
Within the scope of the paper, the study only concentrates on investigation into the current situation, the advantages and disadvantages of using learning group activities to teach English vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS and then suggesting some effective group activities to improve English vocabulary teaching and learning for the teachers and the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS.
Methods of the study
In this study, both qualitative and quantitative research methods were utilized
They are questionnaire, and pre-test/post-test
In order to find out the answers to the research questions, the researcher has used questionnaire for all the teachers and the students at the chosen classes, and identified the result of the learning process through pre-test/post-test
According to Dornyei (2003), a questionnaire will be distributed to students to get information evaluation and reasons for their successful and unsuccessful according to teachers’ instructions By using this instrument, all participants are encoded so that their names and their opinions can be kept secret, that is the reason they can answer honestly to facilitate the study Besides, using questionnaire can arrange time efficiently Knowing all the above theory, 2 sets of questionnaire were used to collect the opinions of the teachers and the students at VCVBHS about using group activities in teaching and learning English vocabulary
6.2 Pre-test and post-test
According to Dimiter M Dimitror and Phillip D Rumirill Jr (2003), pre-test and post-test are measurement of the learning gain during the class as a result of comparing what students knew before the test (in a pre-test) and after the test (in a post-test) to quantify the knowledge attained in a class from a group of students with diverse learning styles and education backgrounds In addition, the tests can indicate how the students have been learning in the course So the data can identify teaching and learning methods that need changing or developing to help students get better results
Strongly agree with the above opinion, the researcher used pre-test and post-test in English vocabulary in both experimental group (classes 10A1, 10A4), and control group (classes 10A2, 10A3) to collect the data to prove the researcher’s opinion.
Design of the study
The thesis has three main parts as follows:
This part presents the rationale, the aims, the significance, the research questions, the scope, the methods, and the design of the study
This part consists of three chapters:
Chapter 1: Literature review Chapter 2: Methodology Chapter 3: Results and discussions
This part concludes four parts:
LITERATURE REVIEW
Vocabulary teaching
Up to now there have been many definitions of vocabulary Some linguists define it according to semantic criterion while others refer to it according to the phonological or potential one
I strongly agree with Swan and Walter (1984) that “Vocabulary acquisition is the largest and most important task facing the language learner”
Michael Lewis (1993) states that vocabulary can be defined as the words of a language, including single items and phrases or chunks of several words which convey a particular meaning, the way individual words do Vocabulary addresses single lexical items words with specific meaning(s) but it also includes lexical phrases or chunks
In addition, Stahl, Steven a (1999), states that a person’s vocabulary is the set of words within a language that are familiar to that person A vocabulary usually develop with age, and serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and acquiring knowledge Acquiring an extensive vocabulary is one of the largest challenges in learning a second language
According to Pyles and Alges (1970: 96), “When most of us think about language, we think first about words It is true that the vocabulary is the focus of language It is words that sounds and meanings interlock to allow us to communicate with each other, and it is words that we arrange together to make sentence, conversation and discourse of all kinds” This means vocabulary is essential for learning a language
In short, it is possible to say that it is hard to give a precise definition about what vocabulary is However, from these above studies we can see that the noun vocabulary refers to the words used in a language
1.1.2 The importance of vocabulary in teaching and learning language
"If language structures make up the skeleton of language, then it is vocabulary that provides the vital organs and the flesh" ( Harmer, 1991:53) Learning vocabulary is one of the first steps in learning a second language, but a learner never finishes vocabulary acquisition Whether in one's native language or a second language, the acquisition of new vocabulary is an ongoing process Vocabulary is central to language teaching because without sufficient vocabulary, students cannot understand others or express their own ideas Wilkins (1972: 111-112) deems that “without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed” Lewis (1993: 89) goes further to argue “lexis is the core or heart of language” From these above opinions we can see that English vocabulary teaching helps students understand and communicate with others in English
In a language, there are many words that are regularly used when speaking or writing These words are part of active vocabulary And then there are many words that can be understood, but are not used in everyday speech These words are part of passive vocabulary So how to make Vietnamese students’ English vocabulary become active?
It’s not easy for the teachers of English in Vietnam
Recently, under the highlight of Communicative Approach, which is the result of the works of anthropological linguistic such as Hymes (1972), and Firthian linguistic such as Halliday (1973), the importance of communicative competence and the communicative fluency are highly appreciated And many methodologists and linguists have increasingly been paid their attention to vocabulary as well as the ways to teach and learn it Now, it is clear that teachers should have the same kind of expertise in the teaching of vocabulary as they do in the teaching of structure
In conclusion, vocabulary is very important in language teaching and learning It is impossible to communicate with no vocabulary However, acquiring an extensive vocabulary is one of the largest challenges in learning a second language.
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)
According to Richards & Rodgers (2001), CLT originated from the changes in the British Situational Language Teaching approach dating from the late 1960s Stemming from the socio-cognitive perspective of the socio-linguistic theory, with an emphasis on meaning and communication, and a goal to develop learners’ “communicative competence”, CLT approach evolves as a prominent language teaching method and gradually replaced the previous grammar-translation method and audio-lingual method (Warschauer & Kern, 2000) Since the concept of “communicative competence” was first introduced by Hymes in the mid-1960s, many researchers have helped develop theories and practices of CLT approach Brown (1994: 227) explicates “communicative competence is the aspect of our competence that enables us to convey and interpret messages and to negotiate meanings interpersonally within specific contexts” Chomsky
(1965) also indicates that underlying the concrete language performance, there is an abstract rule system or knowledge and this underlying knowledge of the grammar of the language by the native speaker is his “linguistic competence” Therefore, speakers of a language have to have more than grammatical competence in order to be able to communicate effectively in a language, they also need to know how language is used by members of a speech community to accomplish their purposes (Hymes, 1972)
“The aim of communicative language teaching, according to Richards and Rodgers (2001:165), is the acquisition of communicative competence via student engagement in meaningful use of language at discourse level To achieve this, the teacher facilitates communicative activities by managing the classroom environment, providing resources and acting as a communicator Classroom activities are often designed to focus on completing tasks that are mediated through language or involve negotiation of information and information sharing” One of the most frequently discussed methods within recent years is task-based language teaching, an essential feature of which is learner-centredness Language is best learned through meaningful and communicative interaction between learners engaged in purposeful tasks Such tasks provide both the input and output processing, and the motivation, needed for language acquisition” (Canh and BarNard, 2009: 21)
In conclusion, there are many researches on CLT Most of them identified that CLT is the key of communicative competence which provides both the input and output processing, and the motivation, needed for language acquisition and I strongly agree them
1.2.2 Teaching and learning English vocabulary through communicative activities
Paul Nation (2008) indicates that deliberately teaching vocabulary is one of the least efficient ways of developing learners’ vocabulary knowledge but nonetheless it is an important part of a well-balanced vocabulary program The main problem with vocabulary teaching is that only a few words and a small part of what is required to know a word can be dealt with at any one time This limitation also applies to incidental learning from listening or reading, but it is much easier to arrange for large amounts of independent listening and reading than it is to arrange for large amounts of teaching
Teaching can effectively deal with only a small amount of information about a word at a time The more complex the information is, the more likely the learners are to misinterpret
There are many ways to teach vocabulary However, from many previous studies, it is clear that teaching vocabulary through communicative activities is one of the most effective ways It can provide learners with opportunities to use language to do things and in particular, to engage in meaningful interactive oral language production No longer being considered as passive, learners are seen as active participants in the negotiation of meaning CLT makes use of real life situations that need communication, so it can make the learners’ vocabulary become active vocabulary
In brief, CLT has been proved as an ideal approach of the twenty-first century
There are many different assumptions, beliefs and even myths about implementation of CLT in practical English classes However, we cannot deny the fact that communicative activities perform a very important role in language teaching and, especially in teaching vocabulary It does help to improve students’ motivation so it is necessary to understand the overwhelming advantages of some communicative activities over the others in terms of motivation and interestingness (Ngo Phuc Duy, 2011)
Group work in vocabulary teaching and learning
Adrian Doff (1988: 137) defines group work as a process that “the teacher divides the class into small groups to work together, all the group work at the same time”
Barkley et al., Cooper et al., (2003,2004), emphasize group work is one pedagogical strategy that promotes participation and interaction It fosters a deeper and more active learning process, and it also provides instructors with valuable demonstrations of the degree to which students understand particular topics or concepts In addition to exposing students to different approaches and ways of thinking, working with other students in groups can promote a sense of belonging that combats the anonymity and isolation that many students experience at a large campus Some students may initially be reluctant to participate in group work, so sharing the reasons for group work with your students can help to convince the reluctant ones It might help them to know that groups frequently devise more and better solutions than the most advanced individual, working together in groups also gives students the opportunity to learn from and teach each other Classroom research has shown that students often learn better from each other than they do from a teacher
It can be seen from the above researches that, learning group is a form of cooperative learning It aims to gather students’ individual knowledge, and experiences to develop students’ knowledge, skills such as collaborative skills, communicative skills, and students’ attitudes
1.3.2 Advantages and disadvantages of group activities 1.3.2.1 Advantages of group activities in teaching vocabulary
“More hands make for lighter work”, “two heads are better than one”, “the more the merrier”….These adages speak to the potential groups that have to be more productive, creative, and motivated than individuals on their own Group work can help students develop a host of skills that are increasingly important in the professional world (Caruso & Woolley, 2008; Mannix & Neale, 2005) Positive group experiences, moreover, have been shown to contribute to students learning, retention and overall college success (Astin, 1997; Tinto, 2006)
Tsui (2001) and Lee (1999) determined that “group work provides more opportunities for learners to initiate and control the interaction, to produce a much larger variety of speech acts and to engage in the negotiation to meaning” and that “being responsible for their peers’ learning in a group makes students more active” In a language teaching study, Norman (1986: 11) finds that “Most people learn a foreign language better with others than on their own” The research also shows that educational experiences that are active, social, contextual, engaging, and student-owned lead to deeper learning The benefits of collaborative learning include:
Development of higher level thinking, oral communication, self-management, and leadership skills
Promotion of student-faculty interaction
Increase in student retention, self-esteem, and responsibility
Exposure to and an increase in understanding of diverse perspectives
Preparation for real life social and employment situations
Though there are many different ideas of group work, in common we can see that group work can give the students far more chances to speak English in the classroom The students can participate in the lesson much more actively because they are involved in talking to their friends to exchange opinions, practise new vocabulary that they have acquired This is important at VCVBHS where English lessons usually take place three times a week, the teachers have to practise, develop all the language skills and it happens that there is no time left for speaking So dividing the class into groups to give the learners opportunity to use the language to communicate with each other is really necessary
1.3.2.2 Disadvantages of group activities in teaching vocabulary
Besides many advantages, group activities have some disadvantages According to Aneta Gorgon-Matera (2008), its main disadvantages are:
* The students can make too much noise
When the whole class is divided into small groups to work at the same time, of course there is a big noise However, If the noise is made during working on task such as discussing things, checking words, or communicating with one another, it is called positive noise and it does not disturb the students They concentrate on the task and they do not hear it If an activity goes on for too long, students, especially the poor ones, make noise because they become bored, they want to get the teacher's attention and they may become disruptive Such noise may become disruptive for the whole activity and class behavior because misbehavior is contagious
To avoid a danger of this fact the teacher should plan their activity very carefully
Assuming that the learners are familiar with the code of conduct discussed at the beginning of the school year, the teacher should give them clear instructions about what to do, when to start and when to stop The task should be clearly defined and not go for too long At first, the students may be confused but once a routine has been set up, they should know what is expected from them This should prevent excessive noise and prevent the class from getting out of control
* Students tend to use the mother tongue
Another disadvantage of group work is students tend to use the mother tongue
When students get excited working in groups, they sometimes use their mother tongue to express something they are not able to express in a foreign language Such a situation is normal because they want to communicate It is teacher’s responsibility to plan activities at the level of the students and to encourage them to use little of the language they know as well as they can because speaking their own language during an oral activity is a waste of time However, the teacher should not be bothered too much if his/her students use their mother tongue while doing vocabulary exercises because the outcome of their discussion will be presented in English It may also be necessary to ask students to translate instructions into their mother tongue to check if they understand what the teachers want them to do because giving instructions of a complicated activity may be a waste of time
To avoid the use of mother tongue during the lesson, the teachers can discuss this problem with the students who should understand that during oral activities the use of the mother tongue is a real problem During the activity, the teacher should encourage the students to use English by going round the classroom, helping and prompting those who do not know how to express some ideas
* Students will not work properly
It may be a problem to put students into groups There is the danger that if the teacher divides the class into mixed ability groups, the best students in the group will have to do the task while the weakest ones switch off and become disruptive
To overcome this problem, the teacher may put them into groups according to their abilities and each group is given a task right for their level of difficulty Then the teacher may monitor the whole class, devote more time to the students who need his/her assistance or even work with individual students
* Teachers may lose control of the class
In Vietnam, there are often about 50 students in each class and all the groups work at the same time, so it’s not easy for a teacher to monitor all the groups When the teacher is explaining something for a group, he/she cannot know what the others are doing and some students can be out of control
However, interactive learning, communicative teaching counter with the importance of meaning, purposeful language and real communication which in turn must allow the students to improve creative possibilities The effective teacher will circulate among the groups, listen to them, offer suggestions and criticism
In conclusion, there are many problems with group work, but there are also many ways to solve them successfully, such as dividing the students into groups in the most convenient way possible, making sure that the students know exactly what they have to do, keeping activities simple, do not let activities go on too long, controlling the noise level as necessary, and providing feedback (adapted from Byrnes and Byrnes, 2009)
1.3.3 The role of the teacher in group work
The role of the teacher will depend to a large extent on the function he performs in different activities Harmer (1995) examines the roles of a teacher as a controller, organiser, assessor, prompter, participant, recourse, tutor and investigator It will be obvious that the teacher’s behavior for various types of activity will be different For communicative output according to him, the role of the teacher should change Group work is often used for communicative activities That is why the role of the teacher very often changes in group work Since the teacher as controller is no longer oppressively present, students can help each other to use and learn language The teacher will still, of course, be able to act as an assessor, prompter or resource With group work, then, students can practise language use and joint learning
Summary
In summary, the previous studies mentioned above considered the use of group work in language teaching These studies show that CLT is one of the most useful methods to teach ESL and group work is one type of CLT In this study, both of benefit and implementing of using group work in teaching are concerned However, the researcher mainly focuses on group work implementation because she would like to investigate the group activities that are used in vocabulary teaching in the hope of finding out the useful ones for both teachers and the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS.
METHODOLOGY
An overview on current situation of teaching and learning English
VCVBHS is one of the biggest and oldest ethnic boarding high school in Vietnam
The students at VCVBHS are ethnic minorities from Northern mountainous provinces of Vietnam Most of them come from farmer families in the remote villages and Vietnamese is not the first language, their mother tongues are ethnic minority languages They only use Vietnamese at the class or in the public so their Vietnamese competence is still limited In addition, the teaching condition, especially for teaching English, in many mountainous areas in Vietnam is poor, so when they come to VCVBHS, their knowledge, first and foremost their English is poor Moreover, they are very shy to speak English
They always think that they are very bad at English and everyone looks at them to find out their mistakes to laugh at them
Coming to VCVBHS to study, they are far from home, so some of them often feel bored, some even suffer from being homesick because this is the first time they have lived far from their families However, the new environment, new teachers and new friends may be positive factors to make them more interested in learning
Most of the teachers of English at VCVBHS are young and interested in teaching career They all graduated from Thai Nguyen University of Education They are always aware of the importance of English in the modern life In addition, the school’s leaders often take care of English teaching They let the teachers have chances to have further studies Nevertheless, only some of them often use the new trend in language teaching: learner–centered approach as well as teaching skills, especially communicative skills to teach the students These teachers often use learning group activities to give their students more chances to use English in communication This makes the students feel less worried about their poor English and more confident in English Some teachers still use the traditional method to teach English (the teacher gives the grammar rules and the students learn by heart) Because of lacking skills of using CLT in teaching, sometimes they do not spend enough time preparing or do not pay enough attention to group activities, so their lessons are not successful
VCVBHS is a big school, however, its equipments for teaching foreign language are not good There are not any language laboratory rooms, there are not many English books, CDs or cassette tapes in the school library The teachers teach English with their own laptops or speakers Besides, the class is large (45-50 students each class) so it is difficult for the teacher to give all the students the chance to communication in one period
(45 minutes) Therefore, group work becomes one of the best ways to give the students opportunities to use English to communicate at the same time and to develop their communicative skills in English.
Restatement of the research questions
As stated in part A, the aims of the study are to find out the points of view of the teachers of English and the 10 th form students at VCVBHS on using learning group activities in teaching and learning vocabulary From the result of the survey, the researcher suggests some types of group activities for teaching vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS For these aims, the two research questions are set up as follows:
1 What are the opinions of the teachers and the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS about the use of group activities in teaching and learning English vocabulary?
2 Which group activities should be used in teaching English vocabulary to the
10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS?
Participants
A total of 181 students of 10 th form (classes 10A1, 10A2, 10A3, 10A4) at VCVBHS participated in this study 93 of them are female and 88 of them are male All the participants are ethnic minority students (Dao, H’Mông, La Hủ, Lự, Mường, Ráy, Thái….) coming from Vietnam’s mountainous areas (from Nghệ An to Điện Biên) All of them are at the age of 16 and they have been studying English from 6 th grade at their local schools Among them, the students at classes 10A1 and 10A4 (the experimental group) were taught English vocabulary through group activities and the students at classes 10A2 and 10A3 (the control group) learnt English vocabulary through traditional method (teachers gave the list of English vocabulary and students learnt it by themselves) As a result, their standard in English is not the same, some are good, many are not good and some even bad at English so their opinions about using group activities in vocabulary learning is quite objective However, how to organize learning group activities that are suitable for all the students is not easy
All the participants took part in pre-test/post-test in English vocabulary, but only
91 students at the experimental group participated in answering the questionnaire
All of 14 teachers of English at VCVBHS took part in answering the research questionnaire All of them are female They graduated from Thai Nguyen University and got BA degree Their ages range from 24 to 40 with at least 3 years of teaching English
They often say that they love their jobs.
Data collection instrument
In order to collect data for this study, 2 sets of questionnaire were used to get information about using group activities in teaching and learning English vocabulary Set
1 is for the students at classes 10A1 and 10A4, set 2 is for 14 teachers of English at VCVBHS The questions for the teachers are written in English but the questions for the students are written in Vietnamese to make sure that all of them can understand and express all their ideas
Set 1 for all 91 students at the experimental group (47 of them are female and 44 of them are male) included 11 questions The aims of the questions are:
To identify the students’ personally experience in learning English (question 1,2, 3)
To explore the students’ opinions about English vocabulary in learning English (question 4)
To identify the students’ attitudes towards learning new words (question 5, 6)
To find out the students’ attitudes towards using group activities in teaching and learning English (question 7, 8, 9)
To identify the students’ opinions about organising group activities (10, 11)
To explore group activities liked more by the students (question 12)
Set 2 for 14 teachers teaching English at VCVBH included 4 parts:
To identify the teachers’ opinions about English vocabulary in English teaching (question 1)
To indicate the ways the teachers often used in teaching English vocabulary (question 2, 3)
To find out the teachers’ frequent use of group activities in teaching English vocabulary (question 4)
To identify teachers’ judgement about group activities in English vocabulary teaching (question 5 ,6)
To indicated teachers’ implementation of using group activities in their current vocabulary teaching (question 7, 8, 9)
2.4.2 Pre-test and post-test
3 pre-tests and 3 post-tests in English vocabulary were carried out at both the experimental group and the control group at VCVBHS The test papers were collected, and item-by-item, the answers were gathered and analysed From the information, the researcher could evaluate the education background of the students and the knowledge of English vocabulary they gained after the two different learning styles, using group activities and using the traditional method The 3 pre-tests were done at the beginning, and the 3 post-tests were carried out at the end of the study.
Summary
This chapter has presented the current research situation where English is one of the compulsory subjects The students at VCVBHS are not so good at English and usually shy to use this language for communication The teachers have quite equal proficiency in English but their methods in teaching English are not the same: some teachers tend to use CLT, but some others still use traditional methods To find out the better ways to teach English vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS, some data collection instruments as questionnaire, classroom observation, and tests were carried out.
RESULT AND DISCUSSION
Presentation of statistical results
From the result of survey questionnaire, 100% of the students did not have any English courses apart from English lessons at their classes and none of them had a plan to do this until May 2014 This figure indicates that the process of learning English vocabulary of all the students of the experimental group at VCVBHS was not affected by any courses except English lessons at class rooms
3.1.1.1.2 The students’ opinions about English vocabulary in learning English (question 4)
Chart 1: The students’ opinions about English vocabulary in learning English
Chart 1 shows that a large number of the students (74%) thought that English vocabulary was very important in learning English The rest (26%) also believed that it was important to learn vocabulary in learning English This means all of the students of the experimental group at VCVBHS are well aware of the importance of vocabulary learning in their English acquisition Their attitudes are very good because they can motivate the students in learning English vocabulary
3.1.1.1.3 The students’ attitudes towards learning new words (questions 5, 6)
7% 21% very difficult difficult not very difficult
Chart 2: The students’ attitudes towards learning new words
From chart 2, it is clearly seen that most of the students (72%) claimed that learning English vocabulary was difficult, 21% of them found it very difficult, only 7% of them said that it was not very difficult and no one found easy to learn English vocabulary These figures indicate that English vocabulary acquisition is really a challenge for 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS
11% really like like dislike hate
Chart 3:The students’ interest in learning English vocabulary
Although all of the students thought that English vocabulary was important or even very important in learning English (considering from chart 3), we can realize that only 2% of them really liked learning English vocabulary, 60% of them liked it 11% of the students did not like doing this work In addition, there were 27% of the students hating learning new words It can be inferred from these figures that many students only learn English vocabulary because they have to do that This is one of the reasons why the English vocabulary proficiency of the 10 th grade students at VCVBHS is not good
3.1.1.1.4 The students’ attitudes towards using group activities in teaching and learning English (questions 7, 8, 9)
11% in group work under teachers’ guiding in group work without teachers’ guiding individually under teachers’ guiding
Chart 4: The students’ attitudes towards using group activities in teaching and learning English
The result in chart 4 shows that a large number of the students, accounting for 82%, liked learning English vocabulary by their learning groups under teachers’ guiding
11% of them liked studying by their learning groups themselves There is only a small number (7%) wanted to learn only under teacher’s control No one had interest in working individually From these figures, we can see that most of the students liked learning English vocabulary through group activities with teachers’ help
96% making students more confident, giving students more chances to practice having no more advantages than other methods
Chart 5: The students’ judgements about advantages of group activities
It can be generally seen from chart 5 that 96% of the students admitted group activities made them more confident, gave them more chances to use vocabulary in communication and made their lessons more interesting The rest, only 4%, thought this method did not have any differences from other methods This means most of the students can recognize the advantages of group activities and are interested in this method
3.1.1.1.5 The students’ opinions on organising group activities (questions 10, 11)
81% students sitting next to each other students of the same proficiency in English students of the same interest students of higher English proficiency but of the same interest
Chart 6: The students’ desire about choosing their partners in group activities
It is interesting to find out from chart 6 that only 5% of the respondents said that they desired to work with partners sitting next to, 7% of them wanted to work with people of the same proficiency in English, the same figure liked working with students having the same interest, and the rest, 81%, wanted to have partners with higher English proficiency but having the same interest It can be said that, the students want to learn much more from their friends and the same interest is one of the important factors affecting their choice
120% oranizing groups reasonably giving clear instruction controlling and helping all the students when necessary commenting, encouraging students during the group activities
Chart 7: The students’ expectation towards teachers’ activities
We can see in chart 7 that 100% of the students thought that teachers should organize groups reasonably, give clear instruction, controll and help all the students when neccessary, provide needed knowledege, and always comment, encourage students during the group activities This number infers that teachers’ role in English vocabulary teaching is very important and their method has great influence on students’ vocabulary acquisition
3.1.1.1.6 The students’ preference towards teachers’ activities in vocabulary lesson (question 12)
120% game role playing projecting. problem solving and decision making interviewing Information gap filling
Chart 8: The students’ preference towards the teachers’ activities in vocabulary lesson
In term of teachers’ activities in vocabulary lesson, chart 8 indicates that all the students liked game and role playing because these activities made them feel more comfortable, more fun in English learning 95% of them liked projects, 84% of them liked problem solving and decision making, interview and information gap filling were liked by 78% and 51% because they were brain storm activities in which the students could find out and express their own decisions Only 16% of them liked opinion exchanging They agreed that this activity is boring
3.1.1.2 Result of questionnaire for the teachers
3.1.1.2.1 Teachers’ opinions of English vocabulary in English teaching (question 1)
Options Number of teachers Percentage (%)
Table 1: Teachers’ opinions of English vocabulary in English teaching
It is not very surprising to see in table 1 that all of the 14 teachers of English at VCVBHS claimed that vocabulary was very important in English teaching This means all of them are aware of the importance of English vocabulary teaching so they may always pay attention in vocabulary teaching
3.1.1.2.2.The methods the teachers often used in teaching English vocabulary (question 2)
Questions Options Number of teachers Percentage
Table 2: The methods often used in teaching English vocabulary
Table 2 shows that only 64.3% of the teachers often used group work, and 35.7% of them often used the mother tongue to teach English vocabulary From these figures we can see that because of many reasons, many teachers still did not find out many new, effective methods in teaching English vocabulary
3.1.1.2.3 Teachers’ frequent use of group work in English vocabulary teaching (question 3)
Options Number of teachers Percentage (%)
Table 3: Teachers’ frequent use of group work in English vocabulary teaching
Table 3 indicates that there was 57.1% of the teachers always teaching English vocabulary through group activities 14.4% of them stated that they often use this method
The same number sometimes used it It is surprising to see that 21.4% of them admitted that they never did this These numbers answer the questions why many students do not like learning English vocabulary
3.1.1.2.4 The teachers’ judgement about group activities in English vocabulary teaching (questions 4, 5)
Questions Options Number of teachers
A It gives students more chances to speak English
B It improves students’ independence and co-operation
C It enhances students’ pronunciation and intonation
D It motivates students to take part in English learning
A It is time-consuming for teachers to prepare the lessons
B It is difficult for teachers to control all the class at the same time
C Students tend to use their mother tongues
D Teachers can find difficult to correct all the mistakes
Table 4: The teachers’ judgement about group activities
For the benefits of group activities, all the teachers (100%) found that using group activities in vocabulary teaching could give students more chances to speak English and it motivated students to take part in English learning 78.6% of the teachers believed that this method could improve students’ independence, co-operation and enhance students’ pronunciation and intonation However, table 4 also shows that group activities have many disadvantages 100% of the teachers stated that it was difficult for the teachers to control all the class at the same time and they found difficult to correct all the students’ mistakes Moreover, 66.6% of them agreed that it was time-consuming for the teachers to prepare the lessons and students tent to use the mother tongue during group learning task
In short, most of the teachers found both benefits and disadvantages of groups activities in teaching English vocabulary That is the reason why some teachers do not use this method
3.1.1.2.5 The teachers’ implementation of using group activities in their current vocabulary teaching (questions 6, 7, 8, 9)
Questions Options Number of teachers
6 A Students of the same age and same sex 0 0%
B Students of the same age, same proficiency in English and have common interest
C Students sits next to each other 2/11 18.2%
D Students of different ages and / or sexes and / or interests
E Students of the same age, higher proficiency in English and have common interest
7 A Designing the tasks by yourself 0 0
B Following exactly the tasks in the textbooks
C Basing on the textbooks and designing the tasks by yourself
D Basing on the textbooks and co-operating with other colleagues to design the tasks
B Using different types of group work activities
C Choosing the tasks appropriate for students
D Going round to control all groups 11/11 100%
G Giving students clear instructions and all tools, language they need to complete the tasks
H Giving strict discipline to control all the students
D Problem solving and decision making
Table 5: The teachers’ implementation of using group activities in their current teaching
As illustrated in table 5, only 11/14 teachers answered questions 6, 7, 8, 9 The 3 teachers who never used group activities in vocabulary teaching had no answer 63.6% of them often grouped the students of the same age, common interest but higher proficiency in English, 18.2% of them grouped the students of the same age, same proficiency in English and have common interest, and the same percentage organized students sitting next to each other in This means most of the teachers want the students to not only feel confident in their groups but also learn more from their friends
Findings and discussions
From the above results of survey questionnaire, and pre/post-tests, main findings of the study are found These findings will help to answer the two research questions of the study that are presented in part A:
1 What are opinions of the teachers and the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS of the use of group activities in teaching English vocabulary?
2 Which group activities should be used in teaching English vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS?
3.2.1 The opinions of the teachers and the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS about the use of group activities in teaching and learning English vocabulary
From the results of the survey, it is clear that 100% of the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS thought that English vocabulary was very important or important in learning English Vocabulary can be seen as bricks to build a wall However, 38% of them did not like learning English vocabulary because they found it difficult, even very difficult so finding out effective ways for the teachers at VCVBHS to teach English vocabulary is very necessary
The above survey also indicates that most of the students liked learning English vocabulary through group activities because of its benefits It can make the students more confident in using English, especially for the ethnic minority students who are very shy in using English, give them more chances to learn from the other group members It also creates the enviroment for them to practise using vocabulary in communication that makes English vocabulary become active and more memorable In addition, all of the students agreed that group activities can make the lesson to be fun and more interesting
For the way of organizing group work in teaching English vocabulary, most of the students desired to work with higher English proficiency lever but having the same interest to learn more from each other However, some teachers often put the students sitting next to others in to a group to save time That’s one of the reason why some students felt bored with group activities
For the teachers, group activities benefit them a lot It is one of the most effective ways to help them in providing their students with skills, knowledge especially in teaching English vocabulary Most of the teachers claimed that group activities can improve their students’ independence, co-operation and enhance students’ pronunciation and intonation that makes their learning better Furthermore, from the result of the pre- tests and the post-tests, within 13 weeks of using group activities, there was a big change in the English vocabulary learning result of the experimental group The number of the students getting good marks increased sharply and there was a rapid decrease in the number of the students getting bad marks Meanwhile, the difference in the result of the control group was very small This means, this method is really appropriate to English vocabulary teaching and learning at VCVBHS
Nevertheless, there were some teachers who did not like teaching English vocabulary through group work because of its disadvantages such as time-consuming, difficulty in controlling all the class, and correct all the mistakes at the same time Hence, finding out the more ways to reduce the advantages of this method to make more teachers like using this method should be concerned
3.2.2 Group activities used in teaching English vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS
As shown in the result of the survey, game, role playing, were liked by all of the students and the teachers Besides, projects, interview and problem solving and decision making were also liked by many of them From this result, we can identify that group activities should be used in teaching English vocabulary to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS are:
3.2.2.1 Game One of the most useful activities for English vocabulary teaching to the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS is game Game has many advantages and effectiveness in teaching and learning vocabulary First, by using game, the students can learn and play at the same time so they will feel relax and fun in learning Second, by using games, the teachers can choose various contexts in which, real world can be brought into classrooms, this encourages the students to practise the language in a natural way Third, through game, the teachers can create friendly competitions that make the students more close-knit and they will try their best to work better, this means they will try their best to learn English (adapted from Nguyen Thi Thanh Huyen, Khuat Thi Thu Nga, 2003) With these benefits, using games to teach English vocabulary is extremely good for the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS because it can help them ignore their shyness, melt their inferiority complex, and heat their enthusiasm in learning English as well as enhance them to use English vocabulary in natural, flexible communication
Besides game, role playing was liked by 100% of the teachers and the students at VCVBHS This activity can give the students more chance to practise vocabulary in different roles Through this activity, the students can play many roles with different characters to express their aims, their wishes, their dreams, which makes them feel interested in the lessons and by learning their saying, their dialogues of their roles, they will learn English vocabulary in a natural way and the difficulty of it can be left
Projects can provide authentic practice This activity can help the students are able to see the relevance to the real world of what they are learning Using this method, the teachers can give their students opportunities to get out of the classroom and go into the environment to make their own plans using English By promoting students autonomy and co-operation, it can provide a sensory rich learning experience, develop the students’ appreciation of sensitivity towards the natural world This means, the students can use not only their senses of listening hearing, but also their senses of touch, of feeling in English learning so they will remember English better
Interview was one of activity chosen by most of the teachers and the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS Interview can help the students more flexible in using the language in communication In an interview, along with the given type of questions, the students can have many unpredictable situations and they will have a lot of surprising questions and answers that enhance their creation in using English in communication Moreover, after an interview, the students can present their study to the class which encourges them to use English to report on their study So it is clear that, through interview, the students can practise English vocabulary in both spoken and written English in creative ways
3.2.2.5 Problem solving and decision making
Problem solving and decision making is a process in which the students take what they know to discover what they don’t know It involves overcoming obstacles by generating hypotheses, testing those predictions, arriving at satisfactory solutions and making decisions Using this type of activity, the teachers can provide their students multiple opportunities to assess their own problem solving skills and the solution they gain from using those skills Of course, the students have to use all their vocabulary - old and new - in a special way, they do not think about English, they only think about their problem and solving, but they have to use English to express their ideas Hence, it is an actual effective way to teach English vocabulary and it is suitable for the 10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS.
A particular example of using group work in teaching English vocabulary
10 th grade ethnic minority students at VCVBHS
Unit 1: A day in the life of
Topic: teaching vocabulary about a student’s daily routine Using activity: game
Dividing the class into groups of five Appointing and briefing the group leaders
Giving the students clear instructions: each group has a small board, and they have to find out all the words relate to a student’s daily routine One by one each group gives one word which is not repeated The group finds out the most right words is the winner
While the students are working, the teacher are going around the class, guiding the students and monitoring all the groups
After the teacher check all the words, one-by-one use all the found words to talk about a student’s daily routine The group talking last is the winner
Suggestions for further research
PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter provides a brief review of the theoretical knowledge relevant to the research including vocabulary teaching, Communicative Language Teaching, group activities in vocabulary teaching and learning
1.1 Vocabulary teaching 1.1.1 What is vocabulary?
Up to now there have been many definitions of vocabulary Some linguists define it according to semantic criterion while others refer to it according to the phonological or potential one
I strongly agree with Swan and Walter (1984) that “Vocabulary acquisition is the largest and most important task facing the language learner”
Michael Lewis (1993) states that vocabulary can be defined as the words of a language, including single items and phrases or chunks of several words which convey a particular meaning, the way individual words do Vocabulary addresses single lexical items words with specific meaning(s) but it also includes lexical phrases or chunks
In addition, Stahl, Steven a (1999), states that a person’s vocabulary is the set of words within a language that are familiar to that person A vocabulary usually develop with age, and serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and acquiring knowledge Acquiring an extensive vocabulary is one of the largest challenges in learning a second language
According to Pyles and Alges (1970: 96), “When most of us think about language, we think first about words It is true that the vocabulary is the focus of language It is words that sounds and meanings interlock to allow us to communicate with each other, and it is words that we arrange together to make sentence, conversation and discourse of all kinds” This means vocabulary is essential for learning a language
In short, it is possible to say that it is hard to give a precise definition about what vocabulary is However, from these above studies we can see that the noun vocabulary refers to the words used in a language
1.1.2 The importance of vocabulary in teaching and learning language
"If language structures make up the skeleton of language, then it is vocabulary that provides the vital organs and the flesh" ( Harmer, 1991:53) Learning vocabulary is one of the first steps in learning a second language, but a learner never finishes vocabulary acquisition Whether in one's native language or a second language, the acquisition of new vocabulary is an ongoing process Vocabulary is central to language teaching because without sufficient vocabulary, students cannot understand others or express their own ideas Wilkins (1972: 111-112) deems that “without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed” Lewis (1993: 89) goes further to argue “lexis is the core or heart of language” From these above opinions we can see that English vocabulary teaching helps students understand and communicate with others in English
In a language, there are many words that are regularly used when speaking or writing These words are part of active vocabulary And then there are many words that can be understood, but are not used in everyday speech These words are part of passive vocabulary So how to make Vietnamese students’ English vocabulary become active?
It’s not easy for the teachers of English in Vietnam
Recently, under the highlight of Communicative Approach, which is the result of the works of anthropological linguistic such as Hymes (1972), and Firthian linguistic such as Halliday (1973), the importance of communicative competence and the communicative fluency are highly appreciated And many methodologists and linguists have increasingly been paid their attention to vocabulary as well as the ways to teach and learn it Now, it is clear that teachers should have the same kind of expertise in the teaching of vocabulary as they do in the teaching of structure
In conclusion, vocabulary is very important in language teaching and learning It is impossible to communicate with no vocabulary However, acquiring an extensive vocabulary is one of the largest challenges in learning a second language
1.2 Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) 1.2.1 Communicative language teaching methods
According to Richards & Rodgers (2001), CLT originated from the changes in the British Situational Language Teaching approach dating from the late 1960s Stemming from the socio-cognitive perspective of the socio-linguistic theory, with an emphasis on meaning and communication, and a goal to develop learners’ “communicative competence”, CLT approach evolves as a prominent language teaching method and gradually replaced the previous grammar-translation method and audio-lingual method (Warschauer & Kern, 2000) Since the concept of “communicative competence” was first introduced by Hymes in the mid-1960s, many researchers have helped develop theories and practices of CLT approach Brown (1994: 227) explicates “communicative competence is the aspect of our competence that enables us to convey and interpret messages and to negotiate meanings interpersonally within specific contexts” Chomsky
(1965) also indicates that underlying the concrete language performance, there is an abstract rule system or knowledge and this underlying knowledge of the grammar of the language by the native speaker is his “linguistic competence” Therefore, speakers of a language have to have more than grammatical competence in order to be able to communicate effectively in a language, they also need to know how language is used by members of a speech community to accomplish their purposes (Hymes, 1972)
“The aim of communicative language teaching, according to Richards and Rodgers (2001:165), is the acquisition of communicative competence via student engagement in meaningful use of language at discourse level To achieve this, the teacher facilitates communicative activities by managing the classroom environment, providing resources and acting as a communicator Classroom activities are often designed to focus on completing tasks that are mediated through language or involve negotiation of information and information sharing” One of the most frequently discussed methods within recent years is task-based language teaching, an essential feature of which is learner-centredness Language is best learned through meaningful and communicative interaction between learners engaged in purposeful tasks Such tasks provide both the input and output processing, and the motivation, needed for language acquisition” (Canh and BarNard, 2009: 21)
In conclusion, there are many researches on CLT Most of them identified that CLT is the key of communicative competence which provides both the input and output processing, and the motivation, needed for language acquisition and I strongly agree them
1.2.2 Teaching and learning English vocabulary through communicative activities
Paul Nation (2008) indicates that deliberately teaching vocabulary is one of the least efficient ways of developing learners’ vocabulary knowledge but nonetheless it is an important part of a well-balanced vocabulary program The main problem with vocabulary teaching is that only a few words and a small part of what is required to know a word can be dealt with at any one time This limitation also applies to incidental learning from listening or reading, but it is much easier to arrange for large amounts of independent listening and reading than it is to arrange for large amounts of teaching
Teaching can effectively deal with only a small amount of information about a word at a time The more complex the information is, the more likely the learners are to misinterpret
There are many ways to teach vocabulary However, from many previous studies, it is clear that teaching vocabulary through communicative activities is one of the most effective ways It can provide learners with opportunities to use language to do things and in particular, to engage in meaningful interactive oral language production No longer being considered as passive, learners are seen as active participants in the negotiation of meaning CLT makes use of real life situations that need communication, so it can make the learners’ vocabulary become active vocabulary
In brief, CLT has been proved as an ideal approach of the twenty-first century