Teaching english articles to vietnamese learners at secondary schools difficulties and implications

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES PHAM THI KIM YEN TEACHING ENGLISH ARTICLES TO VIETNAMESE LEARNERS AT SECONDARY SCHOOLS: DIFFICULTIES AND IMPLICATIONS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF TESOL M.A THESIS IN TESOL Ho Chi Minh City, November 2002 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES PHAM THI KIM YEN TEACHING ENGLISH ARTICLES TO VIETNAMESE LEARNERS AT SECONDARY SCHOOLS: DIFFICULTIES AND IMPLICATIONS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF TESOL MA THESIS IN TESOL Code number: 07 02 Supervisor: NGUYEN VIET THU, M.A Ho Chi Minh City, November 2002 CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I certify my authorship of the thesis submitted today entitled: TEACHING ENGLISH ARTICLES TO VIETNAMESE LEARNERS AT SECONDARY SCHOOLS: DIFFICULTIES AND IMPLICATIONS in terms of the statement of Requirements for Theses in Master’s Programs issued by the Higher Degree Committee The thesis has not previously been submitted for a degree Ho Chi Minh City December 2002 PHAM THI KIM YEN RETENTION AND USE OF THE THESIS I hereby state that I, PHAM THI KIM YEN, being the candidate for the degree of Master of TESOL, accept the requirements of the University relating to the retention and use of Master’s Theses deposited in the University Library In terms of these conditions, I agree that the original of my thesis deposited in the University Library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the Library for the care, loan or reproduction of theses Ho Chi Minh City December 2002 PHAM THI KIM YEN ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The thesis could not have been done and completed without the help and cooperation of those who now deserve my heartfelt thanks First I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my thesis supervisor, Ms Nguyen Viet Thu, M.A who has critically read the thesis and offered valuable comments at various points in its development in an attempt to ensure that I make sense most of the time Her intelligent questions led me to the present direction of the thesis I am grateful to Dr Nguyen Luong Ngoc, Dean of English department of Ton Duc Thang University for his clues to my initial thoughts of the thesis His concerns about Vietnamese learners’ difficulties caused by negative transfers from their native language to English acquisition inspired me to the thesis I am grateful as well to Ms Pho Phuong Dung, M.A for her valuable information and comments on the format of the thesis I would like to express my gratitude to the organizers of this master course and other staff members of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities – HCM, who were in charge of the course and granted me permission to conduct the thesis I would like to thank all those who allowed themselves to be interviewed and polled for the interview sessions, the questionnaire responses and the test performance Last but not least important, thanks must go to my husband for his support and encouragement while I was doing this thesis My affection must also go to my son ABSTRACT Vietnamese learners of English at the pre-intermediate level have difficulties with article use though they have made effort to learn it According to most of them, the article is used to indicate whether a noun is singular or plural, already mentioned or not They rarely choose articles with the treatment of the context The thesis attempts to investigate the current condition of teaching and learning articles at secondary schools in HCMC and to explore difficulties with articles facing learners in order to diagnose these difficulties Accordingly, some solutions will be suggested to help them overcome their difficulties Data were collected through an interview, a control test, a questionnaire and a pilot test The interview was conducted with eight teachers of English at Nguyen Gia Thieu Secondary School (NGTSS) to discover how they taught English articles The control test and the questionnaire were designed to ask 160 randomly selected pupils at this school to investigate how they learnt the article and what difficulties with articles they faced The pilot test was administered to these learners in order to confirm whether they got progressed after they had participated in 30 class-hour experimental article learning The study concludes that Vietnamese learners’ lack of competence in article rules and transfers from their L1 knowledge to English acquisition are the causes of their difficulties with articles Their use of articles out of the context is another cause of their difficulties though the semantic-syntactic context is the most important in article use to achieve communicative purposes since communicative tasks enable learners to apply article rules contextually TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION Page 01 1.1 Theoretical Background 01 1.2 Background to the Study 03 1.3 The purposes of the Study 06 1.4 Overview of the Thesis Chapters 06 Chapter 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 08 2.1 The English Article System 08 2.1.1 The Nature of Articles 08 2.1.2 The Kinds of Articles 09 2.1.3 The Functions of Articles 10 2.1.4 Number and Countability of Common Nouns 11 2.1.5 Semantic Functions of the Article in Expressing Specificity and Genericity of Nouns in Contexts 13 2.1.5.1 The Use of Articles in Relation to Nouns 13 2.1.5.2 The Influence of the Context on Article Choice 13 2.1.5.3 Genericity of Nouns 14 2.1.5.4 Specificity of Nouns 15 2.1.6 The Use of Articles before Proper Nouns 16 2.1.7 Syntactic Aspects in the Use of Articles 17 2.1.8 Teaching English Articles 18 2.1.9 Errors in English Articles Made by EFL Learners 20 2.2 The Vietnamese Classifier System 22 2.2.1 The Term “Classifier” in Vietnamese 22 2.2.2 The Nature of Classifiers 23 2.2.3 The Position of Classifiers 25 2.2.4 The Kinds of Classifiers 25 2.2.5 The Functions of Classifiers 26 2.2.6 Number and Countability of Nouns 27 2.2.7 Semantic Aspects of Classifiers (Genericity and Specificity) 27 2.2.7.1 The Use of Classifiers in Relation to Nouns 27 2.2.7.2 Specificity of Nouns 28 2.2.7.3 Genericity of Nouns 28 2.3 Similarities and Differences between the Use of Articles and Classifiers in Implying Specificity and Genericity of Nouns 29 2.3.1 Similarities 29 2.3.2 Differences 30 2.4 Summary 32 Chapter 3: METHODOLOGY 33 3.1 The Purposes of the Thesis 33 3.2 The Research Question and Hypotheses 33 3.3 The Setting 34 3.4 The Subjects 34 3.5 The Data Collecting Instruments 35 3.5.1 The Interview 36 3.5.2 The Tests 36 3.5.3 The Questionnaire 37 3.6 Procedure 38 3.7 Assumptions 39 Chapter 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 40 4.1 The Interview 40 4.1.1 Teachers’ Remarks on the Article Teaching 40 4.1.2 Teachers’ Ways of Article Teaching 43 4.1.3 Summary and Comments on the Article Teaching 45 4.2 The Control Test 46 4.2.1 Completion 47 4.2.1.1 Sentence Gap-filling 47 4.2.1.2 Text Gap-filling 50 4.2.1.3 Number and Countability of Nouns 50 4.2.2 Vietnamese- English Translation 52 4.2.2.1 Sentence Level 52 4.2.2.2 Text Level 54 4.2.3 Summary and Comments on the CT Performance 55 4.2.3.1 Lack of Competence in Article Rules 55 4.2.3.2 Negative Transfers from L1 to L2 56 4.3 The questionnaire 56 4.3.1 Difficulties with Articles Compared with Other Grammatical Points 57 4.3.2 Learners’ Knowledge of the Article 58 4.3.3 Learning Articles 60 4.3.4 learners’ Use of Articles and Nouns 62 4.3.5 Similarities and Differences between the Use of Articles and Classifiers in Implying Nouns 64 4.3.6 Summary and Comments on the Article Learning 66 4.4 The Pilot Test 67 4.4.1 Countability of Nouns 67 4.4.2 Article Usage 69 4.4.2.1 Identification of Article Use in Given Statements 69 4.4.2.2 Conversation Gap-filling 70 4.4.2.3 Vietnamese – English Translation 70 4.4.3 Summary and Comments on the PL Performance 72 Chapter 5: IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSION 74 5.1 Implications 74 5.2 Conclusion 87 REFERENCES 89 Appendix A: INTERVIEW (English Version) 93 INTERVIEW (Vietnamese Version) 94 Appendix B: CONTROL TEST 95 Appendix C: RESULTS OF THE CONTROL TEST 98 Appendix D: QUESTIONNAIRE (English Version) 102 QUESTIONNAIRE (Vietnamese Version) 105 Appendix E: RESULTS OF THE QUESTIONNAIRE 108 Appendix F: FOCUS GROUP DISCUSSION 110 Appendix G: PILOT TEST 111 Chapter IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSION 5.1 Implications Difficulties facing Vietnamese learners when dealing with English articles prove to be hard to overcome They cannot easily master the English article system that is so complicated and different from their mother tongue They further tend to be in the habit of filling the gap of their L2 knowledge by using familiar patterns in their L1 To help them to overcome these difficulties, teachers must make them aware of how articles work in specific contexts Teaching articles, therefore, will be performed via communicative approaches In the following tasks, pictures and learner–learner interactions are mainly used since they create the interesting atmosphere in classes Task Suppose that you are sellers and buyers at a cafe selling food and drink Look at Figure 5.1 and tell the seller the items in the picture that you want to buy using the pattern: A: What would you like to get? B: I’ like a bowl of soup, please A: What else would you like? B: And a slice of ham, please (In this task, the teacher provides learners with the names of these items as well as counters so that they can choose counters that are appropriate to the items.) 112 Figure 5.1 Task In pairs, look at the picture (see Figure 5.2) showing a room and tell each other about the items in the room using the structure “I can see a cat under a table” or “there are some pictures on the wall” (The teacher gives them the names of these items) 113 Figure 5.2 Task In pairs, suppose that you go to a store to buy some things in a grocer’s (see Figure 5.3) using the structure, “I’d like a bottle of milk.” Make a list of things in the store in this way also with the use of counters or quantifiers Orally practice to the last items in the list to create phrases consisting of containers that are appropriate to food items as follows: A kilo of mushroom A jar of yoghurt A slice of bread 114 Figure 5.3 Task In pairs, suppose you go home and are not satisfied with the things you bought Take turns to complain everything on the list using the structure “The jar of yoghurt I bought is not delicious” 115 Task Work in pairs to tell each other about the names of famous places in their country (This task involves learners in choosing articles preceding proper nouns.) A: There is a park near my house B: What is it? A: It is Gia Ñinh Park Task In pairs, suppose that you not have a watch and want to know the time Ask your partner, using “What is the time?” or “What time is it?” (Figure 5.4) Figure 5.4 90 Task Look at the photograph of a room (Figure 5.1) and describe the place of the items in the room using “end-point of a scale”, for example: The Christmas tree is in the corner of the room Task Suppose that you have to instruct your foreign friend how to cook rice Remember that the use of “zero” articles is required in instructions or recipes, for example, “First, turn on microwave Second, put lid…” (See Figure 5.5) Figure 5.5 Task Look at the photograph (see Figure 5.6) that describes people working and tell your partners about their jobs using the following pattern: A: What is he? (Or what does he do?) B: He is a ballet dancer (In this task, learners should study the photo carefully and consult the teacher about the some words related to jobs of these people.) 91 Figure 5.6 92 Task 10 In pairs, tell each other about differences between men and women, e.g Men make houses; women make home (Source: English Grammar Lessons by Michael Dean; CUP) Task 11 In pairs, tell each other about true facts about natural phenomena, e.g When snow smelts, it becomes water (Source: Michael Dean, CUP) Task 12 Look at the plan (see Figure 5.7) and tell one another about some places in the plan using the pattern: A: Go to the post office to get me a stamp B: The post office? There isn’t a post office A: Yes, there is It is near the bank Figure 5.7 93 Task 13 Work in pairs to tell your partners about your experience using “One day, a man came….” Task 14 Look at these photos (Figure 5.8) and take turns to describe how the people or things in the photos are, using the structure “One … , but the other….” or “One … but the others….”, for example: One person is a child but the others are adults One glass is nearly empty but the others are full Figure 5.8 94 Task 15 In groups, study the photo that you like and one in your group draws on the blackboard according to the description of the photo of the rest in your group (This task does not need learners to be keen on drawing They have to describe exactly the photo.) For example: It is a square living room There is an oval table in the center of the room… Task 16 In pairs, study these statements with errors in articles One of you speaks out the statements one by one and the other correct errors in these statements, e.g A: When she was a child, she almost died of the pneumonia B: When she was a child, she almost died of pneumonia Task 17 Look at the dialogues between A and B (See Figure 5.9) and identify mismatches between the speaker and hearer’s perception of the situations Discuss A’s use of articles and say whether there is an agreement between A and B (Source: B S Azar [1] 95 Figure 5.9 96 Task 18 In groups, study the photo (Figure 5.10) and describe people’s actions using some expressions such as “take a bath”, “have lunch” or “have a look” Figure 5.10 97 Task 19 Look at the picture (Figure 5.11) showing people playing sports and games Take turns to talk about their actions, for example: He is playing tennis (This task is intended to involve learners in using “zero” articles before names of sports and games.) Figure 5.11 Task 20 Look at the picture showing people playing music (Figure 5.11) Take turns to talk about their actions, using the pattern: She is playing the guitar 5.2 Conclusion 98 Errors in articles made by Vietnamese learners of English at the preintermediate level include those of EFL learners However, some errors made by EFL learners are different from those of Vietnamese learners who have difficulties with the choice of counters, countability of nouns The count/non-count contrast of English nouns is still influenced by their L1 knowledge In addition, they have difficulties with determining whether a noun indicates specific or generic meaning Communicative approaches to teaching articles are effective and appropriate to Vietnamese learners since they can apply article rules contextually and improve their oral communication in the target language The translation tasks may facilitate their article learning if the teacher involves them in interpretation of the context A comparison between the results of the CT with those of the PT demonstrates that the subjects have progressed much after the experimental article teaching Although they have been aware of similarities and differences between the use of articles and classifiers in indicating specific and generic meanings of nouns, they have still been influenced by negative transfers from their L1 to L2 This study may be a convincing appeal to those who used to think that articles were form words that indicated no meaning, optionally used and were not required for communicative purposes Teaching articles with the aid of facilities helps to dispel learners’ belief that article rules are too complicated for them to understand and apply Communicative tasks of articles can help learners to produce accurate interpretation and expression of specificity and genericity of nouns in contexts The study suggests that no single available theory can account for learners’ errors, but a combination of contrastive analysis and an analysis of errors might be 99 illuminating The study further offers both linguistic and pedagogical implications In the linguistic aspect, the contrast between the use of articles and classifiers in implying specificity and genericity of nouns is bewildering yet interesting; it particularly helps to predict errors and causes of errors in order to facilitate article learning at the pre-intermediate level in HCMC In the pedagogical aspect, the study reveals that the present article teaching and learning at this level have been only exposed to the theoretical aspect of the article system and depend on tasks in textbooks written by foreigners In addition, the study directs teachers’ attention to their learners’ difficulties with articles so that they may design or supplement tasks appropriately to learners’ needs Limitation The study has only investigated the teaching and learning English articles at secondary schools in HCMC (the pre-intermediate level) The study, therefore, may not include all difficulties with articles of Vietnamese learners since there are more factors that affect learners’ L2 output such as linguistic (article placement) and social factors (rural vs urban background, gender) Further research The use of articles preceding nouns is still a big problem to Vietnamese learners If possible, a future study may focus on “The expression of specific and generic meanings of nouns in the use of English articles and Vietnamese classifiers” This topic is hoped to be an interesting subject 100