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THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY BATANGAS STATE UNIVERSITY Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the PhilippinesENGLISH LANGUAGE GRAMMATICAL AND DISCOURSE COMPETENCIES OF 3 rd YEAR COLLEGE ST

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY BATANGAS STATE UNIVERSITY Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines

ENGLISH LANGUAGE GRAMMATICAL AND DISCOURSE

COMPETENCIES OF 3 rd YEAR COLLEGE STUDENTS

OF THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY : BASES FOR

INTERVENTION EXERCISES

A Dissertation Proposal Presented to The Faculty of Graduate School Batangas State University Batangas City, Philippines

In Partial Fulfillment

Of the Requirements for the Degree

Of Doctor of Philosophy Major in English

By:

NGUYEN THI HONG CHUYEN

June 2015

APPROVAL SHEET

AND DISCOURSE COMPETENCIES OF 3rd YEAR COLLEGE STUDENTS

OF THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY: BASES FOR INTERVENTION EXERCISES” prepared and submitted by NGUYEN THI HONG CHUYEN in

partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy major in English has been examined and is recommended for Oral Examination

Accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree

of Doctor of Philosophy major in English

Comprehensive Examination: PASSED

College of Arts and Sciences

ABSTRACT

of 3rd Year College Students of Thai Nguyen University: Bases for Intervention Exercises

Further, the study also dealt with the assessments of the English language teachers on the same mentioned competencies and the comparison

as well as the significant differences to the student respondents’ grammatical and discourse competencies with intervention exercises as output of the study

to enhance students’ language competencies

The study made use of the descriptive method of research and utilized a survey questionnaire and teacher- made test as the main data gathering instrument Statistical tools used are frequency distribution and percentage, weighted mean, standard- deviation, and independent t-test

Findings of the study showed that in the grammatical competence of the 3rd year College students as to parts of speech the % correct items of the students are above 50 percent in all five items which implies that the students’ performance in this grammatical area is high average and that the students’ demonstrated a reasonable degree of competence In morphology the total rating obtained by the students is 83.07 percent or good where the students showed the best performance and demonstrates mastery of this grammatical skill component For syntax the total rating obtained by student respondents is 74.74 percent which falls under the high average level of classification which reflects on the advanced level of proficiency In the case of vocabulary the total performance rating under this grammatical area is 82.53 percent or good performance which implies their high level of competency

For discourse competencies of the 3rd year College students in terms of cohesive devices results showed that students’ performance is heterogeneous with the ratings distributed in the extreme ends of the spectrum while in

transitional phrases findings showed that student performance is 73.73 percent

or its equivalent of high average which implies that the student performance is heterogeneous In coherence, results showed that the total rating of % correct items is 54.74 percent or average which implies inferior student performance relative to cohesive devices and transitional phrases and further implies that only approximately half of the students developed and demonstrated the advanced skill of coherence

For connectors, findings indicated that the total rating of the students’ performance under this component is 69.95 percent or high average which indicates that the student performance in connectors is equally superior relative to cohesive devices and transitional phrases Moreover in choice of words results showed that the total rating of the students’ performance under this component is 57.57 percent or average which implies that students have not developed mastery

In relation to teachers’ assessment of the grammatical and discourse competencies of 3rd year college students, results of the study showed that seven of nine items obtained an “agree” score of 100 percent These items pertain to the grammatical skills involving parts of speech and vocabulary; and the discourse skills involving cohesive devices, transitional phrases,

coherence, connectors and choice of words

According to the frequency by which the students apply these skills in their various encounters in class, results showed students practice and use these skills more often in the class as observed by teachers while according to their degree of importance results showed that six out of nine items had mean scores close to 5.0 or equivalent to very important which mean that the teachers had high regards and valuation for the nine items as important skills

to be developed by the students

As to relationship of teacher’s assessment and students’ grammatical and discourse competencies findings revealed that only seven out of nine items showed a p-value that is below 0.05 which means that the teacher’s assessment and students’ grammatical and discourse competencies along these areas are significantly different and further indicates that no relationship exist between the means being compared and are independent of each other Only two items showed a p-value of greater than 0.05 which indicates that the teacher’s assessment and students’ grammatical competencies along these two areas such as morphology and syntax are not significantly different

Based on the findings of the study, an English intervention exercises, the output of the study focused on the low-scoring items that are below 70 percent

From the findings, the study recommended that the proposed English intervention exercises may be reviewed by administrators and suggestions maybe adopted before utilization; that teachers must be given seminar and trainings along discourse competence to enhance students’ writing skills; and that a similar study may be conducted in other higher educational institutions

Dr Matilda H Dimaano, dissertation adviser, for her guidance, scholarly inputs, and consistent encouragement Her expertise in the field of research work contributed much in the completion of this academic work Thank you so much for being my adviser The precious time shared in reading patiently the manuscript, all the help and support make me a better researcher;

The panel Members from Batangas State University Philippines: Dr Felix M Panopio, Dr Myrna G Sulit, Dr Corazon B Cabrera, Dr Amada G Banaag, and Dr Maria Luisa A Valdez for their valuable comments and suggestions;

Dr Remedios P Magnaye, Recording Secretary for her dedication in preparing and encoding the final defense minutes;

Ms Le Quynh Anh, Staff of International Training Center, TNU Colege of Agriculture and Forestry for the support; and

Her parents, husband, son, and daughter for their love, and

understanding and support in the completion of this academic endeavor

Nguyen Thi Hong Chuyen

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

TITLE PAGE i

APPROVAL SHEET ii

ABSTRACT iii

ACKNOWLEDGMENT viii

DEDICATION x

TABLE OF CONTENTS xi

LIST OF TABLES xiv

LIST OF FIGURES xvi

CHAPTER I THE PROBLEM Introduction 1

Statement of the Problem 7

Scope, Delimitation and Limitation of the Study 8

Significance of the Study 10

II REVIEW OF LITERATURE Conceptual Literature 12

Research Literature 41

Synthesis 48

Theoretical Framework 51

Conceptual Framework 54

Hypothesis 57

Definition of Terms 57

III RESEARCH METHOD AND PROCEDURE Research Environment 60

Research Design 62

Subjects of the Study 63

Data Gathering Instrument 64

Data Gathering Procedure 67

Statistical Treatment of Data 68

IV PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF DATA 70

V SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION Summary of Findings 126

Conclusions 137

Recommendation 138

BIBLIOGRAPHY 139

APPENDICES……… 146

A Questionnaires 147

B Letters of Request 159

C Documentations 165

D Psychrometric Conversion Table 171

CURRICULUM VITAE ……… 174

LIST OF TABLES Table Title Page

1 Distribution of the Respondents of the Study……… 63

2 Levels of Grammatical Competence of Students

9 Levels of Discourse Competence of Students

in Connectors 84

10 Levels of Discourse Competence of Students in Choice of Words 85

11 Students’ Assessment on Skills in Teaching the Basic English Course 87

12 Students’ Skills and their Frequency of Use 89

13 Students’ Skills and their Degree of Importance 91

14 Correlation Between Students’ Level of Competencies and their Performance as Assessed by English Teachers 93

15 Bases in the Design of English Language Teaching Intervention Exercises on Morpho-Syntactic Competencies 96

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Title Page

1 Conceptual Paradigm of the Study ……… 56

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY BATANGAS STATE UNIVERSITY

Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines

CHAPTER I THE PROBLEM

Introduction

In Vietnam, students are required to learn English through compulsory programs and as a requirement in school and universities and in most countries in the world Many students take English course because of its utility value as lingua franca or a world language Most of them fail to learn the language successfully This situation also applies to students in other countries where learning a foreign language is also compulsory Students enrolled in the English courses have either high dropped out rates or failed students at the end of the term This situation is true to countries like the United States and Australia where students literally drop out in their foreign language studies, while in countries like China, Japan and Vietnam students either mentally withdraw or look for strategies that will help them to learn the English language

In the last decade, the use of English as the main foreign language taught and employed in communication with foreigners, has dramatically increased in Vietnam According to the Ministry of Education, the number of off

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-shore students exceeds 60,000 in Vietnam nowadays and Vietnamese students who want to work and study abroad are increasing

However, English language teaching in Vietnam still utilizes the traditional teaching model where students are taught English just for passing examination purposes only and teachers just give lecture mainly to help students achieve this goal The result is that students do not have the ability to communicate effectively with others in English This is referred to as dumb English or deaf English in Vietnam Obviously students’ overall skills are not enhanced, especially for students at the college and university level

In order to improve the situation based on need analysis, Vietnam Ministry of Education states that the aims of Vietnam English Language Teaching (ELT) at general educational level expressed in the new curriculum are that at the end of the upper secondary level, students will be able to use English as means of communication at a certain level of proficiency in four macro skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing and to be able to read materials at the same level of their textbook, using a dictionary, to have a mastery of basic English phonetics and grammar, to have acquire the minimum of around 2,500 vocabulary items of English; to attain a certain level

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of understanding of English and American cultures, to become aware of cross cultural differences in order to become better communicators, to better inform

the world of the Vietnamese people, their history and culture and to take pride

in Vietnam, its language and culture (MOET 2007)

To promote the English language teaching and learning at tertiary level

in recent years, Vietnamese government has encouraged the private tertiary institutions to carry out advanced programs in which English is required to be the medium of instruction They have also encouraged tertiary institutions to teach in English in fundamental science subjects such as mathematics, physics, chemistry and some specialized subjects in the senior years

It is suggested that work start at the two national universities namely; Hanoi National University and Vietnam National University; three regional universities such as Thai Nguyen University, Hue University and Danang University and other pivotal universities in Vietnam with twenty percent of the students being involved in these advanced programs This percentage will be increased and expanded so that finally all advanced programs will be applied throughout the tertiary educational system

In Vietnam, English is the most important foreign language since the implementation of the reform and opening up policy One of the major goals

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for English teaching is to develop communicative competencies of the learners It is the initial and ultimate goal of English teaching Communication

on the other hand is considered the essence of English teaching

In language teaching, the ability to communicate should be cultivated Students should learn how to use a language in their daily communication in order to demonstrate their mastery of a language

Different language skills included under communicative competence are linguistic, socio-linguistic, discourse, strategic and pragmatic competencies The expression, interpretation and negotiation of meaning between two interlocutors or between a text and its readers is referred to as language learning

As a component of communicative competence, discourse competence

is the ability to understand and produce the range of spoken, written and visual texts that are characteristics of a language and includes the ability to convey information appropriately and coherently to those who are listening to, or viewing one’s texts (Schroeder, 2009) Covered also in discourse competence are the knowledge of interpreting the larger content and constructing longer stretches of language for putting together the parts that would make up a whole coherent unit

Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines Grammatical competence on the other hand is the mastery of the

linguistic code: the ability to recognize the lexical, morphological, syntactic and

phonological features of a language and to manipulate these features to form words and sentences (Canale and Swain, 1980) This competency is demonstrated not to state a rule but to use a rule Both grammatical and discourse competence are related to linguistic skills at the word, phrase, clause, sentence and discourse levels Correct usage or accuracy is the focus

of these two components

One of the main goals of both English language teaching and communicative English teaching in Vietnam nowadays is to develop students’ communicative competence, as more students will regard English as a communicating tool after graduation If students can use the English knowledge, skills and cultural aspects they have learned to communicate with people of different cultural backgrounds in real language contexts, they are then using English as a communication tool

The Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) has set a target of boosting foreign language teaching in high schools At the start of Academic Year 2011-2012, students at specific schools will have to study mathematics and information technology in English Despite the significance of English

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language, majority of the Vietnamese students remain handicapped in the use

of English It was even reported by the MOET in 2011 that English language

competence of Vietnamese students was rapidly deteriorating

This implies that the government, in particular the education sector can hardly address such perceived deterioration of English It was also reported

by the MOET of Vietnam and the AETS or the American Educational Testing Service that fifty one point seven percent (51.7%) of Vietnamese students who graduated from college in 2009 had substandard English skills

There are several reasons cited why English language teaching in Vietnam becomes a problem Reasons include the deterioration in students’ English competence and less opportunities for students to practice English in the classroom Most of the English classes are still adopting the traditional teaching in which teachers do the talking while students are merely listening and note taking so that the chance to speak diminished

Most college graduates in Vietnam have deteriorating English because during their college days, they spend only at least one and half year of English language studies So that when they embark on a more complex academic work which demands the use of English as well as the language skills, they fail

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because of lack of knowledge Another reason cited is the incompetency of Vietnamese students in the use of English This problem leads to losing the most useful assets of Vietnamese people in contributing to national

development and international communication

Many of the students in Thai Nguyen University (TNU) system struggle

to keep up with the expectations of the school for them to communicate in good English For decades the university system in Thai Nguyen worked to address the need of all students But somehow, the expected outcome has a very slow progress

With this scenario, as college teacher teaching English subject in this institution, the researcher is interested to determine the English language grammatical and discourse competence of the Third year college students of Thai Nguyen with the end view of proposing intervention exercises that will enhance further their knowledge along the said competencies

Statement of the Problem

This study focused on determining English language grammatical

Nguyen system

Specifically, it sought answers to the following questions

Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines 1 How may the grammatical competence of student respondents be

described in terms of:

3 How do English teachers assess the grammatical and discourse

4 How do the respondents’ grammatical and discourse competencies compare with English teachers’ assessments? Are there significant differences?

5 What innovative English language teaching intervention exercises may

be proposed to enhance students’ grammatical and discourse competencies?

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Scope, Delimitation and Limitation of the Study

The study determined the English language grammatical and discourse

This included the grammatical competence of student respondents in parts of speech, morphology and syntax, and vocabulary Included also in the study was the discourse competence of student respondents relative to cohesive devices, transitional phrases, coherence, connectors and choice of words

Further, the study covered the assessment of the English teacher on the

comparison of the respondents’ grammatical and discourse competencies and English teachers’ responses, the significant differences on students’ grammatical and discourse competencies and teachers’ responses with English intervention exercises as the output of the study to enhance students’ grammatical and discourse competencies

The study covered the three (3) Thai Nguyen Universities in Thai

Year College students who were enrolled in the Academic Year 2013-2014

as respondents of the study

Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines This study is limited from the data gathered from the above mentioned

respondents Third year college students and English teachers from other Thai Nguyen University systems are excluded in the study

Significance of the Study

The study is deemed beneficial to the administrators of Thai Nguyen University, English teachers, Third Year College students, parents, present researcher and future researchers

Administrators of Thai Nguyen University This study can guide them

in the Curriculum development through evaluation of students’ English language grammatical and discourse competence This study will serve as a guide for the realignment of the existing English curriculum to meet the institutional goals and objectives

English Teachers This study will serve as a guide to the faculty

teaching English as they may be aware of the student’s grammatical and discourse competencies This study will provide them insights on what classroom learning activities will be appropriate to enhance the language proficiency of their students Likewise, the teachers may propose some

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enrichment activities to improve the student’s grammar and discourse competencies

Third Year College Students The findings of this study will make them

aware of their present grammatical and discourse competencies This would give them a challenge to improve their weak points and enhance their overall

performance in English

Parents Through this study, parents of the third year college students

will become aware of the English performance of their children which will make them more supportive and cooperative in school activities specifically on the improvement of the English skills of their children

Present Researcher Results of the study will serve as basis for English

teachers to design other instructional materials that will help students improve their grammatical and discourse competence

Future Researchers This study will serve as reference for other

researchers

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CHAPTER II REVIEW OF LITERATURE

This chapter presents the relevant conceptual and research literature which have bearing to the present study The literatures included are found substantial to the study and gives the necessary background to understand the present research Further, this chapter also includes synthesis, theoretical and conceptual framework of the study, and definition of terms

Conceptual Literature

The following concepts which focused on English language competencies, grammatical competence, discourse competence and intervention exercises were reviewed to substantiate the study

English Language Competencies It is a broad term which includes

linguistic or grammatical competence, discourse competence, socio linguistic

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or socio cultural competence and what might be called textual competence The specific learning outcomes under language competence deal with knowledge of the language and the ability to use that knowledge to interpret and produce meaningful texts appropriate to the situation in which they are used Language competence is best developed in the context of activities or tasks where the language is used for real purposes or in practical applications

(www.educ.gov.nb.ca/ K12cur/ language)

The basis for developing language competence should be the classroom activities which focus on meaningful uses of the language and on language in context As for choosing tasks, students’ needs, interests, and experience should serve as bases Vocabulary, grammatical structure, text forms and social conventions necessary to carry out this task will be taught, practiced and assessed as students are involved in various aspect of the task itself not in isolation

The system of linguistic knowledge possessed by native speakers of a language is called linguistic competence The concept was first introduced by Chomsky (1965) as part of the foundation for his generative grammar Linguists who are working in the generativist tradition adopted and developed generative grammar Competence in the generativist tradition is the only level

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of language study that is studied because this level gives insights into the universal grammar Underlying all human language system is universal grammar Competence or skill is referred to as the ideal language system that makes it possible for speakers to produce and understand an infinite number

of sentences in their language and to distinguish grammatical sentences from ungrammatical sentences Competence is unaffected by grammatically

irrelevant conditions like errors in speech

Competence as an idealized capacity is the ideal speaker-hearer

for all those aspects of language use which can be characterized as linguistic

It was argued that only under an idealized situation, whereby the hearer is unaffected by grammatically irrelevant conditions such as memory limitation and distractions will performance be a direct reflections of competence

speaker-According to Evans et al., (2006) competence is defined as grammar or set of language rules represented mentally and manifested based on a person’s own understanding of acceptable usage in a given linguistic idiom Therefore, grammatical competence defines an innate knowledge of rules rather than knowledge of items or relation Phillips (2010) stated that competence is regarded as innate knowledge because one does not have to

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be trained to develop it and will still be able to apply it in an infinite number of unheard examples

The following are included in the speakers linguistic competence namely: phonetics which deals with the physical production and perception of the inventory of sounds used in producing language; phonology which refers to the mental organization of physical sounds, the patterns formed by way sounds are combined in a language and the restrictions or permissible social

combinations as well as morphology which deals with identification, analysis and description of units of meaning in a language Knowledge in inflectional or derivational morphology which is present in the language consists of affixes of words

Syntax on the other hand, which pertains to structure and formation of sentences, enables a person to distinguish between grammatical sentences from ungrammatical sentences while in semantics, this refers to the understanding of the meaning of sentences A user of the language is able to understand and interpret the non-literal meaning in a given utterance through these three distinctions namely; meaningful and non- meaningful sentences, some structure but different meanings, and different structure and still is able

to relate the meanings

Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines Belinchon et al., (1994) explained that competence as the main goal in

language learning is also referred to as linguistic competence, a set of organized knowledge which consists of several sub-competencies, the phonological, morphological, syntactic, semantic and lexical components Hymes (1972) on the other hand introduces the concept of communicative competence as the knowledge which enables us to use language as a communication device in a given social context It is a dynamic concept based

on the negotiation of meaning among interlocutors, which can be applied to written or spoken modes of communication

The four distinct elements identified in the model of communicative competence according to Munby (1978) include linguistic encoding, socio cultural orientation, socio semantic basis of linguistic knowledge and discourse level of operation In addition, there are four aspects of competence These are grammatical or linguistic which include knowledge of the lexicon, syntax and semantic; sociolinguistic competence concerned with the appropriateness

of communication depending on the context including the participants and the rules of interaction, strategic competence which pertains to a set of strategies devised for effective communication and put into use when communication

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breaks down; and discourse competence which is concerned with cohesion and coherence of utterances or sentences

Six components of communicative competence were introduced by Van

Ek (1977) Apart from linguistic, discourse, sociolinguistic and strategic competence, social and the socio-cultural competence were added Bachman

et al., (1996) analyze the communicative ability into three components: language competence, strategic competence and psychological mechanism Language competence is divided into organizational competence which

include grammatical and textual competence and pragmatic competence which includes illocutionary and sociolinguistic competence

Socio linguistic competence is the ability to interpret the social meaning

of the choice of linguistic varieties and to use language with the appropriate social meaning for the communication situation (www.o1/silang.lingulink) There are several possible relationships between language and society and one is social structure which may either influence or determine linguistic structure of behavior according to Wardlaugh (2005) A second possible relationship is directly opposed to the first Linguistic structure, a third possible relationship viewed influence as bi-directional; that is language and society may influence each other

Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines Every language as Hudson (2000) stated accommodates such

differences as a non-discrete scale or continuum of recognizably different linguistic levels or style termed as registers and every socially native speaker,

as part of learning the language, has learned to distinguished and choose among the plans on the scale of the register Chun (1998) on the other hand pointed out that language and culture was closely tied up to one another and had a profound influence on verbal and non- verbal communication as well as

in the significance of the length of pause or a change in tone

Other components of communication such as the degree of formality in one’s speech or one’s body language also hold different meanings depending

on the culture with which a person identifies himself Cohen et al., (1981) According to the American Immigration Law Foundation (2000) developing an understanding of general cultural context and their implication will enable someone who was not raised in a particular culture to fully comprehend speech or text in that cultures’ language and to use the language more easily

Celce et al., (1995) pointed out that there are four components of

appropriateness factors, cultural factors and non- verbal communication

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factors Some of these components are often neglected in ESL education, thereby causing confusion or comprehension difficulties

Language and culture as Alptekin (1993) emphasized is interrelated and studying language needs to be aware of the culture of that language In addition, Guest (2002) explained that in culture, whether the language is for interactive or instrumental purposes, it is better to be accompanied with the detailed characteristics of its spoken community

Strategic competence on the other hand is one of the three components necessary for successful communication through language It refers to the

speaker’s ability to adapt their use of verbal and non- verbal language to compensate for communication problems caused by the speaker’s lack of understanding of proper grammar use and insufficient knowledge of social behavioral and communication norms Strategic competence along with

competence constitute a framework for determining a language learner’s proficiency in communication Together with the other competencies, they are considered mainstays of modern theory on second language acquisition (Diaz, Rico and Weed, 2006)

Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines Essentially, any speaker using techniques intended to preserve

miscommunication can be considered to be demonstrating strategic competence Some behaviors demonstrating strategic competence include using synonyms to substitute for words the speaker cannot recall or has not yet learned, resorting to physical gestures to convey meaning, asking for clarification from the listener, raising one’s voice in order to be heard and feigning comprehension in order to listen for context clues

Maleki (2010) asserted that communication strategies help in conveying unknown language between communication partners and assist in maintaining

conversational flow The teaching of communication strategies is beneficial and leads to strategic competence in language learning Strategic competence is best gained through the use of games focusing on communication with or without visual support, jigsaws, monologues, and other activities that allow for language interaction

Moreover, the four aspects of language learning consist of listening, speaking, writing and reading It is in this order that constitutes the traditional top-to-bottom approach to language learning, however, it was suggested that a bottom-up approach to language learning, which gives emphasis to writing is

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best suited for teaching strategic competence This provides learners with time to process their ideas and language use, before being asked to use it orally This is thought to increase learner’s motivation

Pragmatic competence on the other hand is concerned with the users, learners knowledge of the principles according to which messages are organized, structured and arranged Discourse competence on the other hand

is used to perform communicative functions or functional competence and sequenced according to interactive and transactional schemata or design competence

Grammatical Competence It is the ability to recognize and produce the

distinctive grammatical structures of a language and to use them effectively in communication It promotes accuracy and fluency in second language production Grammatical competence focuses on command of the language code including such things as the rules of word and sentence formation, meanings, spelling, and pronunciation Its goal is to acquire knowledge of, and ability to use forms of expression that are grammatically correct and accurate

It is one of the four areas of the communicative competence theory (Gao, 2001)

Socialist Republic of Vietnam Republic of the Philippines According to Diaz et al., (2010) communicative competence is a feature

of a language user’s knowledge that allows the user to know when, where, and how to use language appropriately Grammatical competence increases in importance as the learner advances in proficiency Richard and Schmidt (1983) stated that since communicative competence focuses directly on the knowledge and skill required to understand and express accurately the literal meaning of utterances it becomes an important concern for any second language program

Further, features and rules of language, vocabulary, word formation, pronunciation, sentence formation to understand and express accurately the literal meaning of utterances comprised grammatical competence It also

referred to as the ability to recognize and produce the distinctive grammatical structure of a language and to use them (www o1sil Orglingualinks/ what grammatical competence html) It focuses on the necessary skills and knowledge in speaking and writing accurately In more advanced stages of language proficiency grammatical competence becomes important to the English learner

Grammatical competence calls for curriculum and instruction that prepares students to incorporate and apply the language code (Herrera et al.,

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2005) English language and grammar are bounded together As students travel through the stages of language proficiency, grammatical competence becomes more important that Freeman et al., (2004) suggested that since grammar is a set of prescriptive rules taught to students in school, it will serve

as glue that binds the English language together

Grammar as explained by Cruz et al., (2001) deals with words, forms of words, word combination and the relationship between words In order for students to reach higher levels of academic language proficiency, teachers need to realize that grammatical forms need to be explicitly taught In the case

of grammar, it should be taught in context Larsen et al., (2001) pointed out that there is a need to pay attention to the three dimensions of grammar: form,

meaning and use and that simply teaching grammar rules or having student memorize verb conjugations will not help students acquire grammatical competence

The skills and knowledge necessary to speak and write accurately and input to English learner in more advanced stages of proficiency are the focused of grammatical competence Kilfoil and Walt (1997) explained that grammatical competence is the correct application of rules of grammar but not explicit knowledge of rules It is also referred to as linguistic competence, a

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term used to describe how language is defined within a community of speaker and covers the mastering of the combination of sounds, syntax and semantics Fernandez et al., (2011) pointed out that linguistic competence constitute knowledge but that knowledge is tacit and implicit and that people do not have conscious access to the principles and rules that govern the combination of sounds, words, and sentences, however, they do recognize when these rules and principles have been violated

According to Kac (1992) the grammatical or linguistic competence of a human being should be identified with that individual’s internalized program for production and recognition of performance It delved on the unconscious knowledge of grammar that allows speaker to use and understand a language

as well as the innate linguistic knowledge that allows a person to match sound and meaning

Moreover, Aguilar (2007) pointed out that the ability to understand and produce meaningful sentence that is designed on the rules of a specific language to convey meaning in a way that the native speakers of that language would use such sentences to express in the same meaningful way is grammatical or linguistic competence It is also referred to as the potential ability of the speaker based on the knowledge of his language as well as the