Introducing some activities for teaching cultural knowledge to motivate students’ interest in speaking class in high school

THANH HOA DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HA TRUNG HIGH SCHOOL EXPERIENCE INITIATIVE INTRODUCING SOME ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE TO MOTIVATE STUDENTS’ INTEREST IN SPEAKING CLASS IN HIGH SCHOOL The author: NGUYEN THI THANH HUYEN Job position: Teacher Experience initiative about: English THANH HOA 2018 TABLE OF CONTENTS Contents Page INTRODUCTION 1.1 REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC 1.2 AIMS OF THE STUDY 1.3 OBJECTS OF THE STUDY 1.4 METHOD OF THE STUDY 2 PROCEDURE 2.1 THEORITICAL BASIC OF THE STUDY 2.2 REALITY BEFORE APPLYING THE STUDY 2.3 SOME ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE 2.3.1.ACTIVITY 2.3.2 ACTIVITY 2.3.3 ACTIVITY 2.3.4 ACTIVITY 2.3.5 ACTIVITY 2.3.6 ACTIVITY 2.3.7 ACTIVITY 2.3.8 ACTIVITY 2.3.9 ACTIVITY 10 2.3.10 ACTIVITY 10 11 2.4 APPLYING ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE IN TEACHING UNIT 3, SPEAKING SKILL, OLD ENGLISH TEXTBOOK 11 AND UNIT READING SKILL ENGLISH TEXTBOOK 12 2.4.1 Applying activities for teaching cultural knowledge in unit 3, speaking skill (Page 35), English 11 2.4.2 Applying activities for teaching cultural knowledge in unit 2-ways of socializing, reading skill (Page 31), English 12 2.5 EDUCATIONAL EFFECT OF THE STUDY 12 12 13 14 CONCLUSION AND SUGESTION 15 3.1 CONCLUSION 15 3.2 SUGGESTION 16 REFERENCES BOOKS 17 INTRODUCTION English, the most popular foreign language in Vietnam, has been taught from the early age (at the age of six or even younger) in most of schools throughout the country as a compulsory subject Nowadays, in teaching and learning English as a foreign language in Vietnam, speaking has received a great deal of attention Nonetheless, English is learnt and taught in a non-native environment, students usually not have close contact with native speakers of English and have little opportunity to discover how these speakers think, feel, and interact with others Moreover, not many of them have intelligible cultural knowledge That is the reason why they not feel confident enough to converse with English teachers or native speakers It proves everything clear that culture and language can not be separated and the teaching and learning of a foreign language should always be a culture- based course Personally, I think that cultural gaps are one of the most important keys lead us to success in communicating genuinely and understanding the real world outside the classroom In order to use the language effectively, language learners should realize that knowledge of the world's language and culture is increasingly important They need to have mastery of not only the language itself but also the culture in which the language is used Therefore, So as to improve student's communicative competence, teacher should teach cultural knowledge into the learning of speaking skills From my teaching experience, cultural challenges in speaking-class have become a great source of inspiration for my study, which deals with the problem: “Introducing some activities for teaching cultural knowledge to motivate students’ interest in speaking class in high school” 1.1 REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC If language is a social practice of meaning-making and interpretation, then it is not enough for language learners just to know grammar and vocabulary They also need to know how that language is used to create and represent meanings and how to communicate with others and to engage with the communication of others This requires the development of awareness of the nature of language and its impact on the world Students are taught the culture in foreign language, which means that they begin to understand the relationship between their own languages and the languages of their learning If the teacher can get the students interested in the culture of the Language, then they will hopefully end up with more successful students Thus, Teachers must find out the effective ways of teaching crosscultural characteristics, which certainly develop students ‘speaking skills 1.2 AIMS OF THE STUDY - Contributing in renovation of teaching methods, improving the effectiveness of teaching and learning, adding knowledge and skills for teachers - Making and using various and flexible teaching methods to help students learn and exploit knowledge actively - Creating excitement for students, and deepening knowledge, promoting selfdiscipline, independence and creativity of students - Equipping students the knowledge, values, attitudes, behavior and healthy habits, eliminating negative habits, to solve the social issues that are of concern 1.3 OBJECT OF THE STUDY To develop speaking skill and the communicative competence for students at HA TRUNG high school, I have made a lot of efforts to motivate the students to participate in speaking class effectively The objects of the study are grade11, 12 students of English at HA TRUNG high school in THANH HOA province 1.4 METHOD OF THE STUDY Three main methods have been applied: - Reference document Method - Observation Method - Experimental Methods PROCEDURE 2.1 THEORITICAL BASIC OF THE STUDY Understanding the nature of the relationship between language and culture is central to the process of learning another language In actual language use, it is not the case that it is only the forms of language that convey meaning It is language in its cultural context that creates meaning: creating and interpreting meaning is done within a cultural framework In language learning classrooms, learners need to engage with the ways in which context affects what is communicated and how Both the learner’s culture and the culture in which meaning is created or communicated have an influence on the ways in which possible meanings are understood This context is not a single culture as both the target language and culture and the learner’s own language and culture are simultaneously present and can be simultaneously engaged Learning to communicate in an additional language involves developing an awareness of the ways in which culture interrelates with language whenever it is used (Liddicoat, Papademetre, Scarino, & Kohler, 2003) When students learn a foreign language, their ultimate aim should be directed towards the understanding of the ways people things and why they them At the same time language teachers also feel that while this goal is the most ideal, it is not very easy to handle, due partly to our imbalanced knowledge of more than one discipline, partly also to time limitation in the classrooms Students also have to face a unique problem of not being able to get themselves exposed to the natural environment while pursuing their language study Therefore, they have to be equipped with cultural knowledge to learn foreign language more effectively 2.2 REALITY BEFORE APPLYING THE STUDY The study is carried out with the participation of grade 12A, 12B, 11E, 11G students at HA TRUNG high school, most of whom are 17-18 years of age I designed a survey questionnaire as main tool to collect necessary data for study There are 10 questions and all the questions and tests are clear and short to make sure students fully understand them before answering The students were asked to answer the questionnaires in fifteen minutes The questionnaire concentrates on students’ understanding about difference some cultural characteristics between American and Vietnamese: Questions American Vietnamese How many generations live in home? Where old-aged parents often live? Is it polite or impolite to ask questions about age, marriage and income? Who you greet in the family first? How often are groceries bought? How is preparation for meals? Where is wedding ceremony held? Which holidays are the most important? How about kissing each other in public? 10 Where children sleep? This survey was aimed to clarify some information gained from the questionnaire responses We can see the result in the table below.( indentified point depended on the number of questions students answered: 9-10 questions: Good; 6-8 questions: Quite good ; 4-5 questions: normal ; 0-4 questions: weak) GOOD NUMBER CLASS QUANTITY 12A QUITE GOOD NORMAL WEAK SL % SL % SL % SL % 36 8.4 22.2 18 50 19.4 12B 31 6.5 22.5 15 48.5 22.5 11E 29 13 8 27.6 12 42.4 16.2 11G 30 16 10 33.3 10 33.3 16.7 126 14 11.1 33 26.2 55 43.7 24 19 SUM From the table, we can see that most of the students have no cultural knowledge of a language in learning that language, even their own language’s culture It is easily understandable that in English learning process in secondary school, communication and language usage are being ignored and when students not care the relationships between culture and communication, they are almost beginners in English speaking because they were only exposed to the language in classroom before They had no chances to learn listening and speaking skills and the only knowledge they have is structures and theories of grammar Therefore, along with their difficulties in acquiring any effective language skills, a majority of the students did not have chances to know about what we call "culture" and how to use culture knowledge into speaking skill The English teachers need to stimulate their curiosity about English -speaking cultures 2.3 SOME ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE In the speaking skill, encouraging all the students in class to speak English and create a competitive atmosphere are very important The teachers should insert interesting cultural activities into lessons to attract students to take part in Gradually, students will overcome their shyness when speaking English and feel more confident to give their own opinions on any issues Although nowadays, students play the centered role and the learner have a great role in the management of their learning, it does not mean that the students can decide everything, the teachers have to be good leaders to find out the suitable teaching methods and combine different approaches in a context Furthermore, a teacher who teaches a foreign language well should not only have good knowledge but also the ability to master the teaching method Teaching the foreign language is very difficult, but inserting culture into language to motivate student' interest in learning this language is more difficult Therefore, in order to help teacher to orient the culture teaching, I would like to suggest activities to improve our teaching method 2.3.1 ACTIVITY Name of activity: GREETING Type of activity: warming up, greeting Topic: Hi … Goal: - Getting used to greeting habits - getting to know the fellow students Possible challenges: In the beginning shy students may need help and speak at a very low voice It may be difficult for them to understand the question – they need a minute or two to collect an answer Preparation: Think about the question that follows the introduction Procedure: Note at the blackboard: + Hi … (e.g Anna) How are you? * Hi… (E.g Roman) Fine, thanks And how are you? + Fine, thanks Then throw the ball to a student and start the dialogue He or she will answer, and then ask the follow-up question After the answer the student throws the ball towards another student and the dialogue starts again Follow up: Ask a question that leads into your item today: e.g + “When you go to bed normally?” * “I go to bed at 11 o’clock.” 2.3.2 ACTIVITY Name of activity: LET’S CELEBRATE … (my birthday, a wedding, New Year…) Type of activity: presentation Topic: How I celebrate in my country Goal: - At the end of the activity, the learners will be able to talk about the organization and aim of the various festivities, - Know the necessary vocabulary, - Train talking in front of groups - Show appreciated parts of their own culture and increase knowledge and understanding of the other cultures - The group will draw profit from this exercise Possible challenges: In case the occasion talked about is celebrated rather differently in various cultures (like weddings) there might arouse fierce discussions that confront the students with stereotypes and prejudices concerning the own culture Preparation: Worksheet for each student with the exact task I prefer a mindmap, asking: - ‘Who is invited?’ - ‘Who talks to whom?’ - ‘Where will the party take place?’ - ‘When and how long?’ - ‘Food’, ‘Drinks’, ‘Preparations’ - ‘What to wear’? Procedure: As a starter we talk about the students’ favorite dishes and note them on the blackboard This way we gather the vocabulary Then I give out the worksheet that serves as an example – students can copy it and get their work done that way Then each student presents her/his flipchart-paper, fastens it on the wall and explains There may be questions / short discussions Follow up: Role play: - Invitation to a festivity in another culture - Using role cards: you are invited and turn up dramatically underdressed 2.3.3 ACTIVITY Name of activity: HOW DO YOU SAY ? Type of activity: role playing Topic: intercultural communication Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will be able to know the typical coffee, slice of fried dough “tapa”, etc Possible challenges: The students don’t know how to ask what they want to have Preparation: Cards with sentences where it is written several situations such as “waiter, please”, “thank you, very much”… Procedure: The students represent a scene in a bar, restaurant…in groups of two or three persons The other students have to look for a card with a sentence that actors had to say or write themselves a sentence Follow up: Go to a bar, restaurant … and observe the behavior of the people in the local 2.3.4 ACTIVITY Name of activity: CALL OUT-QUESTION Type of activity: Warming up, checking knowledge about the topic, (revision of vocabulary) Topic: “Daily life”, habitudes, jobs, how often we things, compared to English or American habitudes Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will have a collection of relevant Vocabularies to talk about daily life and a survey about daily habitudes or typical daily life Possible challenges: Students might not have much information about life or might not be as communicative as they should be (for ensuring that this activity works well) Preparation: The call out question, white cards, tape Procedure: - Introduce the new topic (Daily life, habitudes, jobs, how often we things) by writing the question on the black- or whiteboard: “What you know about daily life in England and The USA?” - Explain the procedure: students should tell their associations, their experiences, their knowledge, everything this question evokes one after another and that you’re going to write everything on the cards and that every answer will be fixed onto the black- or whiteboard - Brainstorming, writing down, fixing Help eventually with some vocabulary if students sometimes don’t know a word for telling their associations - Check all the answers together with the learner-group: Is anything missing? - Do a clustering: students tell the headlines and you cluster - Check headlines and clustering as a whole (together with students): Is anything missing? Is a re-clustering necessary? Follow up: As this topic is the one of a whole lesson in our textbook, we are going to need the vocabulary found for the call out-question throughout this unit 2.3.5 ACTIVITY Name of activity: CAN YOU CALL ANY WORD WHAT I MEAN? Type of activity: roll play Topic: non-verbal communication, cultural awareness 10 Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will be able to realize how people from other cultures behave when meeting other people, especially when talking about things they don’t want to What topics they talk about in public Possible challenges: for the teachers are that all students will go along with this role play and will play the role they have got according to the plan Preparation: cards where the students will find there instructions and blank cards for the follow up (max per student) enough pens of course, and some material to fasten the cards on the black board Procedure: All students are supposed to be participants in an international conference and mingle around while waiting for dinner to be served Every student gets a card with instructions how to behave (e.g keep distance to people or stand close by, look people in the eyes while talking to them or don’t look into peoples faces) and what topics to talk about (e.g ask about peoples families, their salaries, political situation in their countries, the weather, cultural events and so on) According to the rules/habits in their own culture the students will experience situation where they feel comfortable or not Follow up: To follow up the role play all students shall write max cards about positive and max cards about negative experience Then everyone will put their cards on the black board All students will see how the others felt and why and discuss it By the end of the discussion the group should have found out that people behave different in different cultures and you can’t discuss any topic in any culture openly Be aware of your own and other cultures 2.3.6 ACTIVITY Name of activity: WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT X- COUNTRY? Type of activity: Warming up, mind mapping before starting lectures about a certain country Topic: Facts about culture (history, geography, society) Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will be able to see what they already know about a country and what they want to know Possible challenges: To make students realize that’s not enough to know the language It’s also important to know facts about a country and people living there Preparation: whiteboard and pen Procedure: The teacher writes the name of the country in the middle of the whiteboard and asks the students to come forward and write what they already know about this country and its people This way it is easier for the teacher to avoid talking about facts the students already 11 Follow up: In a second step you can ask the students what more they want to know about the country Focusing on that you will get students who are interested in your lessons 2.3.7 ACTIVITY Name of activity: EATING ON THE CHAIR Type of activity: warming up Goal: At the end of the activity, the learners will be able to remember the vocabulary about food Possible challenges: The teacher has to make sure that only answers in the foreign language are accepted If necessary he has to decide who gave the first two answers Preparation: Prepare the chairs: chairs with blue chair cushions Procedure: - The teacher explains the activity in the mother tongue and tells the students the sentence the person in the middle of the chair has to say in the foreign language Then the teacher sits down in the middle of the “chair” and the students stand in a semicircle around - The teacher starts saying e.g “I am an apple” and waits for the associations of the students – the first two persons who give an answer sit down beside the teacher and the teacher choose one of them to return to the circle and leaves the other on the “chair” saying: “I take the … and leave the ” The person who is left on the chair takes place in the middle and starts the game again repeating the name of the food he associated with the “apple” Follow up: After this warming up the students should write a shopping list and then work in pairs for a play role in a shop 2.3.8 ACTIVITY Name of activity: I SEE WHAT YOU ARE SPEAKING Type of activity: Field work documenting Topic: non-verbal communication Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will be able to inform about nonverbal communication after they have carried out observation exercises in a foreign culture Possible challenges: It might be difficult for the students to find or interpret more than one or two gestures Preparation: The teacher will explain the activity involving fieldwork to the students in class Together all brainstorm the plan of action for the fieldwork, the documentation and the reporting back (Each group will show the documents 12 (photos, paintings, videos …) and comment and compare with the foreign culture with their own Procedure: - We will brainstorm where they can go to observe the special gestures that they think are typical from Vietnam culture (visiting bars, shops, parks, streets…) - And how they prepare the documentation (They could use video, photos, where they act out the gestures or drawings, notes They should work in teams of three or four students - The reporting, they should represent at least one situation, without words, only with gestures and mime what they have seen on the in the city (even on TV, video) The other students who are looking to the representation must guess the meaning And all will comment how it is represented in their own cultures Follow up: They can see films, TV programmers… where they can see typical foreign situations and gestures 2.3.9 ACTIVITY Name of activity: PICTURE THIS! Type of activity: Discussion and production of pictures Topic: What pictures say about cultural values? Goal: At the end of the activity participants should be able to recognise the multiple interpretations one picture can have depending on one’s cultural perspective Possible challenges: It is difficult for participants to know what is distinctive about their own culture (apart from stereotypes) Therefore it might be easier for participants to prepare pictures of other cultures with which they have some familiarity Preparation: A set of 6-10 pictures representing aspects of the trainer’s culture These should avoid stereotypes and reflect commonly held values or commonly observed events (This might require a computer projector or similar) Procedure: - The trainer presents a selection of 4-8 pictures representing their culture and - Asks participants to discuss why they think each picture has been chosen (Can be done in small groups, pairs or even as a written exercise) 13 - The pairs or groups are then asked to discuss which pictures they would choose to represent their cultures This is then presented to the main group - The whole group can then explore the differences in perceptions revealed by the small group choices Follow up: It would no doubt be interesting to the whole group for the participants to find actual pictures to represent their ideas, most likely from the internet Further discussions could include: How many of the chosen pictures are well known stereotypes and why? 2.3.10 ACTIVITY 10 Name of activity: LEARN CULTURE THROUGH DANCE Type of activity: warming up Topic: Dances and names of movements Goal: - At the end of the activity, the learners will learn new words, - Know the necessary vocabulary, - Improve on-line learning possibilities, - Show appreciated parts of their own culture and increase their knowledge and understanding of the other cultures - The group will draw profit from this exercise Possible challenges: People not want or can't dance in pairs Preparation: Teacher supposes to learn dance steps and to be able to show them, to explain them - At the beginning let's learn some waltz step Always right leg goes forward and left backwards One two three - Second part of dancing class: to teach to turn around waltz When you want to turn around, you must a smaller step and turn your left shoulder to the right And keep thinking: rights goes forward, left goes afterwards One, two, three - This is beginning of the dance but you will teach it afterwards students already tried to dance waltz and already tried to turn around it I mean when students already can dance second part of the dance, then you teach first part of the dance So, in this clip you can see what man does in a first part of dance Woman is standing in front of him - This is again first part of the dance You can see what both partners and also hear some music 14 - Part one is danced twice Afterward dancers dance waltz and makes some turns around Also this part is repeated twice 2.4 APPLYING ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL NOWLEDGE IN TEACHING UNIT 3, SPEAKING SKILL, OLD ENGLISH TEXTBOOK 11 AND UNIT READING SKILL ENGLISH TEXTBOOK 12 The kinds of activities for teaching cultural knowledge can be varied, depending on the real situation in terms of students’ ability and the content of each unit By my experience in learning and teaching English, I have successfully applied some kinds of activities for teaching cultural knowledge in teaching many units Below are some cultural knowledge -applied activities extracted in two units to illustrate the way I experienced in school year 20172018 2.4.1 Applying activities for teaching cultural knowledge in unit 3, speaking skill (Page 35) English 11 In Unit 3, English 11, speaking skill (Page 35), activity has been used as an effective means in the part - before you speak, is designed to help students have vocabularies, information and organizing way for their talks To illustrate the way I applied the techniques, I extract activities implemented in the lesson plan TEACHER’S ACTIVITIES STUDENTS’ ACTIVITIES UNIT 3: A PARTY BEFORE YOU SPEAK: - Prepare a worksheet for each student with the exact task asking Ss to make a mindmap: - Work in pairs to think of the questions + ‘Who is invited?’ + ‘Who talks to whom?’ + ‘Where will the party take place?’ + ‘When and how long?’ + ‘Food’, ‘Drinks’, ‘Preparations’ +‘What to wear’ - Tell Ss to work in class to talk about their favorite dishes and note them on the blackboard - Do the task in class - Copy it information and 15 as an example for them * What to eat / drink (soft drinks, mineral water…/ chicken soup, green salad, steak, fired chicken, fish, beef, hamburger, cake…) get the work done that way - Each student presents her/his flipchart-paper and then fastens it on the wall and explains - Get Ss to the task individually T encourages Ss to take notes while doing so - Go around the class to check and offer Example: help * Where (home cozy, not expensive, not spending a lot of time to prepare, not have to clean up… * What time * How many guests * What to wear (dress, jeans, shirts, T-shirt, pullover, skirt…) * Which activities (singing, playing games, taking photographs, give gifts… - Tell other Ss to walk round and have questions and short discussions - Tell Ss to imagine preparations for a party - Work in pairs 2.4.2 Applying activities for teaching cultural knowledge in unit 2- ways of socializing, reading skill (Page 31), English 12 In Unit 2, English 12, reading skill (Page 31), activity has been used as an effective means in the part - before you read, is designed to help students be able to realize how people from other cultures behave when meeting other people, especially when talking about things they don’t want to The students will be easy to understand the content of text To illustrate the way I applied the techniques, I extract activities implemented in the lesson plan TEACHER’S ACTIVITIES STUDENTS’ ACTIVITIES UNIT 3: WAYS OF SOCIALISING BEFORE YOU READ: 16 - Prepare cards where the students will find there instructions and blank cards for the follow up (max per student) and fasten the cards on the walls or blackboard - Tell Ss to be participants in an international conference and mingle around while waiting for dinner to be served - Hand a card over to each student with instructions how to behave and what topics to talk about - Tell Ss to work in pairs or groups to follow up the things in cards - Tell Ss to write max3 cards about positive (they feel comfortable) and max cards about negative experience (they don’t feel comfortable) - Tell Ss to see how the others felt and why and discuss it - Show Ss that people behave different in different cultures and they can’t discuss any topic in any culture openly That is topic of unit 3: WAYS OF SOCIALISING - Listen teacher’s instruction - Get a card for each with instructions: + E.g Keep distance to people or stand close by, look people in the eyes while talking to them or don’t look into peoples faces + E.g Ask about people’s families, their salaries, political situation in their countries, the weather, cultural events and so on - Work in pairs or group - Write on the cards and put - Them on the blackboard - Be aware of their own and other culture 2.5 EDUCATIONAL EFFECT OF THE STUDY My study was achieved and even went beyond my expectation These activities were very motivating to student and they themselves were really excited about their learning These ones provided my students with a feeling of physical and emotional self confidence that enable them to communicate 17 naturally in English By introducing to my colleagues and collaborating with them, we organized successfully speaking English clubs and festivals in which students took part in very enthusiastically As evidence by for the effect of this study, I conducted a survey on the students We can see the result in the table below: Questions Agree Disagree No idea (%) (%) (%) Do you think that Learning a foreign language cannot be separated from learning that target culture? 90% 10% Cannot You use English effectively unless you have good knowledge of English-speaking cultures? 80% 15% 5% Do The differences between Vietnamese and English culture influence on your learning spoken English in class rooms? 85% 12% 3% Do you feel very highly enthusiastic in these actives? 95% 5% Through the assessment in classes with 126 students of my charge, I achieved the following result: NUMBER CLASS QUANTITY QUITE GOOD NORMAL WEAK % SL SL SL GOOD SL % % % 12A 36 22.2 15 41.7 10 27.8 8.3 12B 31 19.4 15 48.4 25.8 6.4 11E 29 20.7 17 58.7 10.3 10.3 11G 30 26.7 15 50 13.3 10 126 28 22.2 62 49.2 25 19.8 11 8.8 SUM From the table, we can see that the majority of the students appreciate highly the importance of cultural knowledge to effective English usage Especially, the activities in motivating negative attitudes toward practicing speaking skill were very effective 18 CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION 3.1 CONCLUSION From the study as above it can be seen that teaching culture is very important in improving the language Most of teachers and students believed that culture plays an important role in teaching and learning speaking skill The students understand that culture and language have inseparable relationship and learning language is learning culture Therefore, raising cultural knowledge and awareness has been considered to be great help to the learning of speaking skill For the teachers, the attitudes towards cultures in the teaching of speaking skill are very important And then, we must upgrade cultural knowledge by ourselves and try to make a cultural environment in the classroom In addition, the teacher always creates a comfortable speaking English environment so that students can speak out 3.2 SUGGESTION In this study, the author finds it interesting and essential to study more into the issue of teaching culture as an integration of foreign language teaching and learning To this study is able to become a feasible scheme, I would like to give some following suggestions: Firstly, this study has just focused on inserting cultural knowledge into speaking skill We should also teach to raise the students' cross-cultural awareness and improve communicative competence It should be done in other lessons such as: reading, listening, and writing Secondly, together with innovating teachers’ and students’ awareness and habits in teaching and learning of the foreign language The school board of directors should concentrate on upgrading the facilities (radio, cassette, CD record, projector, the Internet ) to meet well for teaching and learning of the skills Lastly, due to the lesson’s limitation of time, many activities are not executed We hope that the teacher can self adjust the lesson plan to be compatible with the content In the process of implementation of the study is certainly not free from shortcomings and limitations, I hope to receive the contributions from colleagues and those are interested in this content to complete my subject Thanks for your reading! The confirmation of The Headmaster Thanh Hoa, May25th, 2018 I assure this is my idea report, not copy other people's content (Signature and name) 19 NGUYEN THI THANH HUYEN REFERENCES BOOKS Phương pháp dạy tiếng Anh Trung học phổ thông (Nguyễn Hạnh Dung) Sách giáo khoa Tiếng Anh 10, 11, 12 Brooks, Nelson, Teaching Culture in the Foreign Language Classroom, Foreign Language Annals, Volume 16, NewYork:ACTFL, Inc (1983) Eli Hinkel, Culture in second language teaching and learning, Cambridge University Press (1999) Nguyen Van Do, Language culture and society, Teacher's Edition (2007) Dobson, M.J, Effective Techniques for English Conversation Groups Bureau of Educational and cultural Affair, USIA (1992) Buttjes, Teaching foreign language and culture : social impact and political significance, Language learning Journal (1990) Barry Tomalin & Susan Stempleski, Cultural Awareness, Oxford University Press (1993) 20 ... with the problem: Introducing some activities for teaching cultural knowledge to motivate students’ interest in speaking class in high school 1.1 REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC If language is... APPLYING ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE IN TEACHING UNIT 3, SPEAKING SKILL, OLD ENGLISH TEXTBOOK 11 AND UNIT READING SKILL ENGLISH TEXTBOOK 12 2.4.1 Applying activities for teaching cultural. .. good knowledge but also the ability to master the teaching method Teaching the foreign language is very difficult, but inserting culture into language to motivate student' interest in learning