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VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES -*** - HOÀNG THÙY LINH A CASE STUDY ON VIETNAMESE PRIMARY SCHOOL TEACHER’S GRAMMAR TEACHING (MỘT ĐIỂN CỨU VỀ VIỆC DẠY NGŨ PHÁP CỦA GIÁO VIÊN TIẾNG ANH TIỂU HỌC TẠI VIỆT NAM) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Hanoi, 2014 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES -*** - HOÀNG THÙY LINH A CASE STUDY ON VIETNAMESE PRIMARY SCHOOL TEACHER’S GRAMMAR TEACHING (MỘT ĐIỂN CỨU VỀ VIỆC DẠY NGŨ PHÁP CỦA GIÁO VIÊN TIẾNG ANH TIỂU HỌC TẠI VIỆT NAM) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Supervisor: Dr Dương Thị Nụ Hanoi, 2014 DECLARATION I declare that the thesis entitled “A case study on Vietnamese primary school teachers’ grammar teaching” is the result of my own research and the substance of this thesis has not, wholly or in part, been submitted for a degree to any universities or institutions Hanoi, August 2014 Hoàng Thùy Linh i ACKNOWLEDGEMENT First of all, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Dr Duong Thi Nu for her supervision and guidance during the time I carried out my study Second, I am also grateful to the Administration Board of Anh Dung primary school, who gives me an opportunity and the best conditions to this study Besides, I wish to show my sincere thanks to the students in class 4A, 4B, 5A, 5B and English as Foreign Language teachers at Anh Dung primary school for their help and co-operation Last but not least, my special gratitude is for my family and my friends from whom I have received a lot of spiritual and material support ii ABSTRACT This paper deals with English grammar teaching of teachers at Vietnamese primary schools In Vietnam, English language in general and grammar in particular are no longer taught in traditional method because that did not give learners ability to communicate in real life situations Moreover, teaching grammar to young learners, who owns special psychological and perceptional characteristics, requires much more effort from teachers in seeking new attractive teaching activities However, the application of modern method, which is known as Communicative language teaching (CLT) in real grammar teaching in primary schools showed some shortcomings when teachers not understand what CLT actually means As the result, majority of students found it difficult to remember and use sentence patterns they had introduced in class Within the scope of this paper, only two teachers and a small number of students of Anh Dung primary school participated in the study Through different instruments such as teacher interview, class observation, and questionnaire for students, the underlying reasons for the above problem have been revealed Finally, this paper suggested some suitable techniques that teachers can apply in their English classroom in order to improve the quality of grammar teaching in Vietnamese primary schools iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Declaration i Acknowledgement ii Abstract iii Table of contents iv Part A: Introduction 1 Rationale Aims of the study Research questions Scope of the study Research methods Design of the study Part B: Development Chapter 1: Literature review 1.1 An overview of grammar and grammar teaching 1.1.1 Definition of grammar 1.1.2 Teaching grammar using communicative approach a Communicative language learning b Grammar in CLT classroom c Teaching grammar in CLT classroom 1.1.3 The implementation of CLT in teaching grammar in Vietnam 1.2 Teaching English grammar to young learners 1.2.1 Characteristics of young learners 1.2.2 Techniques to teach grammar to young learners 1.3 Previous study on teaching grammar to young learners 10 Chapter 2: Methodology 13 iv 2.1 Participants and setting of the study 13 2.1.1 Participants 13 2.1.2 Setting of the study 14 2.2 Data collection 15 2.2.1 Data collection 15 2.2.2 Data collection procedure 16 2.2.3 Data analysis procedure 17 Chapter 3: Findings, discussion and suggestions 19 3.1 Findings and discussion 19 3.1.1 The results of teacher interview and questionnaire for students 19 3.1.2 The results of class observation 21 3.2 Suggestions on improving teachers‟ grammar teaching in Anh Dung Primary school 27 3.2.1 Raising teachers‟ awareness of teaching grammar in CLT 27 3.2.2 Improving teachers‟ teaching methods 28 Part C: Conclusion 37 Recapitulation 37 Conclusions 37 Limitations of the study and suggestions for further study 39 References 41 Appendices I v PART A: INTRODUCTION Rationale English is spoken today on all five continents as a result of colonial expansion in the last four centuries or so The colonial era is now definitely over but its consequences are only too clear to be seen in the presence of English as an official and often native language in many of the former colonies Even in other countries which were not English colonies, people are using this language widely in every aspects of life because it is considered an indispensably communicative tool in the era of globalization Going with the social development, learning English is obviously not only the increasing desire but also the immense demand of people in over the world To meet the demand of industrialization and modernization, Vietnam education has made great efforts to train high quality human resources who have enough ability to survive in international environment That means the workers must be able to use English well enough to work successfully with foreigners Therefore, English became an obligated subject taught in almost schools from primary level to higher education in the S-shaped country In the past, English is taught with grammar-translation approach in which grammatical knowledge is considered most important Its prime position however changed when communicative approach was approved by linguistics and educators English textbooks in Vietnam nowadays mainly focus on developing the four skills: Listening, Speaking, Reading, and Writing It seems that students‟ learning becomes more pleasant Nevertheless, it is not believed that grammar is neglected Through interesting themes, students also learn to use practical sentence patterns which serve particular functions in particular contexts Without grammar knowledge, students cannot communicate successfully One problem raised in reality is that many teachers feel it difficult to teach grammar to young learners and preferred to teach older ones Although the target structures introduced in children‟s books are much simpler than those in high school textbooks, primary school teachers said they often get confused when trying to find a good way to explain a grammatical phenomenon to their students While there are abundant researches studying vocabulary and the four skill teaching, how to teach grammar effectively and attractively to young learners is definitely a big question whose answer needs to be found as soon as possible Like many other primary school, Anh Dung primary school requires students to learn English from grade to grade Using the new textbook provided by Ministry of Education and training, students really like this subject because of its less stressfulness and fun activities However, grammar is still the challenge that teachers of English in the school often meet in their classroom Teachers‟ grammar teaching is problematic, and, as the result, students‟ learning is not effective Rooted from that issue, we need to carry out a study entitled as “A case study on Vietnamese primary school teachers’ grammar teaching with practical aims and sensible solutions Aims of the study The study is implemented with the specific aims as follows: - To understand teachers‟ awareness of teaching English grammar to primary students - To investigate the real situation of teachers‟ English grammar teaching at Anh Dung primary school, find out the positive factors and problems that affect the quality of teaching and learning English grammar at Anh Dung primary school - To suggest some doable solutions to improve the quality of teaching and learning English grammar at Anh Dung primary school Research questions With clear aims listed above, the study is carried out in order to find out the answers to the following questions: - What the teachers at Anh Dung primary school think about English grammar teaching in primary school? - How are the teachers at Anh Dung primary school teaching English grammar? - What are suggestions to improve English grammar teaching and learning at Anh Dung primary school? Scope of the study: Because of limitations of time and other research conditions, the study is only carried out among teachers and 40 students at one primary school Also, the study mainly focuses on investigating grammar teaching Other matters of English teaching would be beyond the scope of this thesis Research methods: Case study – Qualitative In order to conduct a deep investigation into the situation, the thesis is conducted with qualitative method which consists of the following tasks: - Analyzing the context of grammar teaching of teachers at Anh Dung primary school and then determining research questions - Choosing the case and research techniques - Collecting data and information from the students and the teachers at Anh Dung primary school - Assessing the real situation of learning and teaching English grammar in grade and grade at Anh Dung primary school - Evaluating the techniques that best fit the teachers and students at Anh Dung primary school Besides, this thesis is also carried out through a variety of instruments such as class observation, informal interview with the teachers and questionnaire for students at Anh Dung primary school Design of the study The thesis is divided into three parts: Part A introduces the reason for the choice of the study, aims of the study as well as the scope and methodology of the study Part B comprises four chapters Chapter I presents an overview of the theoretical background of the research It is concerned with various linguistic concepts most relevant to the research topic Also it provides a brief summary of the previous studies of the same topic pictures in their book - T teaches vocabulary in the - Listen and repeat - Listen to teacher - Ss conversation - T reads the conversation twice, and then asks students to repeat 8m Look and say - T introduces the structure: “Today, I am going to teach you a new structure To ask for the place you traveled to, we use the question: Where‟s did you go? I went to + „places‟ - T reads the model sentences and asks Ss to repeat repeat the sentences - T explains the meaning - T asks Ss to study the pictures - T asks Ss to practice asking and - Listen to teacher - Practice in pairs - Pairs answering questions in pairs - T calls on each pairs to make up sentences - present their work in turn T corrects mistakes and asks Ss to - Listen and repeat - Ss repeat 9m Talk - T instructs Ss how to the tasks - T asks Ss to work in pairs or groups - T asks the whole class to repeat the Work in pairs or groups - Repeat the sentences VIII to instruction - the model sentences listen model CLASS OBSERVATION Teacher: Nguyen Thi T Date of observation: 21/5/2014 Class: 5B Unit 16: What‟s the matter with you? Size: 35 Lesson 1: Asking about health problems Teacher’s activities Time 5m Students’ activities - T greets Ss - Ss greet T - Warm-up: T holds a small game - Ss play the game and named „Hangman‟ with the key find the key word word „Health‟ 7m15 Look, listen and repeat - T asks questions about the picture - Answer questions - T reads the conversation twice, - Listen and repeat and then asks students to repeat IX - T introduces new question: “The question today is: What‟s the matter with you?” - T asks Ss to repeat the questions - T explains the meaning of the - Listen and repeat questions and how to answer it I‟ve got + (illnesses) S V - T gives example 19m15 Look and say - T teaches vocabulary of illnesses - Listen to teacher - T chants and asks students to - Listen and repeat - Play the game - Listen to teacher - Practice in pairs - Answer questions - Listen to teacher repeat - T holds a game named Mime to practice vocabulary - T represents the structure and its use - T asks Ss to practice asking and answering questions in pairs - T asks questions - T corrects mistakes and asks Ss to repeat 5m Listen and tick - T explains the requirements of task - T asks Ss to study the pictures - Study the pictures - T lets Ss listen twice and the - Listen and tick - Give the answers task - T asks for the answers and checks X - T gives comments CLASS OBSERVATION Teacher: Pham Thi H Date of observation: 23/5/2014 Class: 4B Unit 16: Zoo animals Size: 35 Lesson 1: Asking and answering about zoo animals Teacher’s activities Time 3m30 Students’ activities - T greets Ss - Ss greet T - T hold a game: T asks Ss to tell - Ss tell the name of the names of animals they know - T introduces the title of the lesson and asks Ss to repeat 6m30 Look, listen and repeat XI animals they know - Listen and repeat - T asks questions about the - Answer questions T reads the conversation twice, - Listen and repeat - Practice in pairs - Listen and repeat pictures - and then asks students to repeat - T asks Ss to practice in pairs - T introduces new question: “The question today is: What animal is that?” - T asks Ss to repeat the questions - T explains the meaning of the questions and how to answer it It is + (animal) S V(to be) 16m - T gives examples Look and say - T teaches vocabulary of animals - Listen to teacher - T asks Ss to read the words using - Read the words - Listen and repeat - Play the game - Listen to teacher - Practice in pairs - Listen and repeat flashcards - T chants and asks students to repeat - T holds a game named Whisper to practice vocabulary - T gives an example with new structures - T asks Ss to practice asking and answering questions in pairs - T calls on each pairs to make up sentences - T corrects mistakes and asks Ss to XII repeat - When all the pairs have presented, - Play the game - Ss T holds a game named Mime to review vocabulary again 10m Talk - T instructs Ss how to the tasks - T asks Ss to work in pairs or groups to the instruction - - T asks the whole class to repeat the model sentences listen Work in pairs or groups - Repeat the model sentences LESSON PLAN This is a modeling lesson plan for a grammar lesson which is suggested in Teacher book of Tieng Anh English Unit 20: Finding the way Objectives: By the end of the lesson, students will be able to ask for and giving directions Teaching aids: maps, CD, cassette, flashcard, paper, worksheets, magnets Anticipated problems: Students may have difficulty in giving direction using different prepositions, so that teacher should teach them how to give direction carefully before their practice XIII Procedure: Teachers’ activities Time 2m Students’ activities Warm-up - Teacher greets students - Students greet teacher - Ask the whole class to read aloud - Read aloud the chant - Listen and guess the the chant in page 70 New lesson 10m a Look, listen, and repeat (Presentation) - Introduce the name of new lesson and asks students for its meaning meaning of the lesson - Ask Ss to look at pictures in part and answer some questions about - the Look at part and answer questions pictures How many people are there? Who are they? What are they doing? - Summary main ideas about the picture - Listen - Play the tape and let Ss listen two - Listen and repeat - Find out the question times - Ask the whole class to repeat, and then students to repeat in groups and its answer - Ask Ss to find out new question and its answers in the conversation - Guess the use and of the - Play the tape twice for students to meaning focus on the target sentence pattern question and how to - Asks Ss to discuss the use and meaning answer it of the question and how to answer it - Give comment and present the XIV - Listen carefully knowledge: Where‟s + (a place)? Giving direction ( go straight ahead, go along the street, turn left, turn right, - Listen and repeat - Give examples - Retell the use, meaning ….It‟s on your…/between/ next to/ on the corner….) - Ask students repeat the sentence pattern and phrases - Give them some examples - Asks them to give their own examples 10m - Correct mistakes if necessary and give and comment sentence patterns - Ask Ss to repeat the use, meaning, and form of the - Look and listen - Answer questions - Listen and repeat - Listen and repeat - Work in pairs - Play the role and make form of the sentence pattern b Point, ask and answer (Practice) - Ask Ss to focus on part and explain the requirement of the task - Ask Ss some questions about the pictures in this part - Recall vocabulary of places: Opera house, Bookshop, Cinema, History museum - Reinforce the phrases used to give direction - Ask Ss to work in pairs practicing the sentence pattern with pictures in their books - Go around to observe and provide help if necessary up sentences XV - Take notes common mistakes - Asks some student to make up - Listen carefully - Listen and repeat activities - Answer questions - Recall the new language of the lesson - Play the game using sentences with the role of passengers and policemen 10m - Correct mistakes and comments - Remind the whole class of common mistakes when using this sentence pattern c Talk or Other (Production) today target language - Ask Ss some questions for places which are close to the schools - Ask Ss to participated in a small game: My city Divide class into teams Show maps with only streets and roads One is stuck on the board; one is at the end of the class The players of each group will stand back to the board and asks questions (Where‟s) Teacher sticks a flashcard of a place on the map on the board The other members of groups will give the players directions The players will listen and find the right position to stick the flashcard on the XVI map at the end of the class Which team finishes first will get points - Finally, call on some students to play the role of a tour guide to introduce about some places in their own city 3m Summary and homework - Reinforce the sentence pattern - Listen carefully - Give comment of students‟ work - Give Ss a worksheet of the lesson Transcript of teacher interview Interviewee: Ms Pham Thi Hoa L: How is English taught in Vietnamese primary school? What are the aims of teaching English for primary school students? H: Primary school students learn English to get to know new language and then a different culture This provides them chances to integrate into the world L: What are the psychological matters that teachers should take into consideration while teaching English to primary school students? H: The children are really active They like participating in different activities to explore new things To help students master the knowledge more easily, teacher XVII should provide variety of learning activities in class However, children can quickly forget what they have learnt L: What is teachers‟ role? What are students supposed to perform in class? H: Because students are young, teacher should give careful instructions for students to know exactly what to and how to In class, students are supposed to form and use the target language L: Should teachers teach English for primary school students in such the way teaching for adult beginners? H: No That will make them feel difficult to understand They need a different method which is simple and easy to acquire L: What skills should teachers pay more attention while teaching English for primary school students? H: Teacher should pay more to communicate skills such as speaking and listening Besides, reading and writing skills are need to be taken into consideration because they are also important in learning and forming language Moreover, they need to read and write well in English in order to their exercises and tests L: How should grammar be taught for primary school students? (In presentation stage, practice stage, and production stage) H: In presentation stage, teacher should introduce the new structure and get students to focus on it Students will learn new structures through repetition because the young children cannot remember as quickly as high school students Teacher should not analyze sentence elements such as S,V, O… because it is difficult to understand Teacher only give a model sentence for students to repeat and then provide new words for substitution However, teacher should give a clear presentation of the use, form and meaning of the target structures In practice stage, I often ask them to work and interact in pairs by asking and answering questions so that they can support each other Before students‟ practice, teacher gives instruction While students are working, teacher goes around XVIII observing and taking notes mistakes After that, teacher can correct the popular mistakes In production stage, students are still asks to communicate in pairs or groups However, teacher can raise the level of difficulty of the task and provide them more freedom in using target language Students are encouraged to talk about favorite topics using all the learnt structures Sometimes, teacher can make up a simple play for students to join In this stage, teacher‟s interference and controlling are reduced while students can create their own conversation freely L: What methods and techniques are you applying in teaching grammar in your classes? H: I often use interactive communicative method in teaching grammar In class, I provide students chances to practice speaking and listening L: Do you think your students understand well and remember all sentence patterns you have taught them? Can they use the learnt sentence patterns well? H: No Students usually forget the learnt sentence patterns They sometimes misuse them or miss some elements of the sentence L: What difficulties you have encountered while teaching English grammar to your students? H: Because of limited time in class, students not have enough time to practice When the amount of knowledge increases after lessons, students can easily forget or misuse the structures L: What you need to support your grammar teaching? H: I want to have an English classroom which is well equipped and large enough to hold games This will give me more chances to ask students to participate in group activities so that they can practice speaking more Besides, I also need to join in more training course in which grammar teaching methods are provided XIX Transcript of teacher interview Interviewee: Ms Nguyen Thi T L: How is English taught in Vietnamese primary school? What are the aims of teaching English for primary school students? T: English is taught in primary school to get students familiar with a new language and also a culture that they never know before L: What are the psychological matters that teachers should take into consideration while teaching English to primary school students? T: Students are very energetic, active and creative They can quickly remember new things but quickly forget them Therefore, teacher needs to have a suitable method which makes students feel comfortable when learning English XX L: What is teachers‟ role? What are students supposed to perform in class? T: In class, teacher has to set activities and instruct and control student doing required tasks Students need to participate actively in the lesson so that they can learn and use the target language L: Should teachers teach English for primary school students in such the way teaching for adult beginners? T: Teacher should not apply methods for adult beginners to primary school students Because limitation of perception, they cannot understand the knowledge as well as adults Young students first learn language through listening, then they repeat simple sentence patterns, finally produce sentences using given vocabulary L: What skills should teachers pay more attention while teaching English for primary school students? T: Teacher should pay more attention to teaching communicative skills such as speaking and listening Especially, teacher should care about phonics because it is very important to young children L: How should grammar be taught for primary school students? (In presentation stage, practice stage, and production stage) T: In presentation stage, it is not necessary for teacher to always initiate in introducing new structure However, I often that because it will save much time After giving new structure, I point out simple elements of the sentence to help students realize and distinguish them When students know those elements, they will be able to make questions and answer correctly Moreover, some matters such as use, meaning, form, sounds and intonation are essential to mention In practice stage, teacher should provide activities for students to communicate in English I often ask my students to work in pairs practicing speaking with a partner from whom they can learn a lot Also, teacher can use games in this stage because students love exciting atmosphere They may pay more attention to their favorite games While students practice the structures, teachers should go around observing and taking notes mistakes XXI In production stage, I continue to ask students to work in groups, pairs or individually Because students have just practice the target sentence thoroughly, teacher now not need to control them tightly Instead, teacher should give them freedom to enjoy their favorite activities L: What methods and techniques are you applying in teaching grammar in your classes? T: T should provide context in which students can realize new sentence pattern Then teacher can elicit the meaning and use of the sentence from the students Through listening and speaking activities, students learn and use the target language L: Do you think your students understand well and remember all sentence patterns you have taught them? Can they use the learnt sentence patterns well? T: No I found my students are too young to systematize the knowledge of grammar together so that they often misuse or forget them Moreover, the material conditions stills have many limitations which lead to difficulties in teaching grammar in the school L: What difficulties you have encountered while teaching English grammar to your students? T: Time is a big problem in teaching English in primary school Each class only has two English lessons per week Therefore, teacher has to provide many activities for them to practice and remember the structures they not use everyday However, the period of 35 minutes is too short to complete all the activities in textbook Another problem is students‟ short span of attention To overcome this difficulty, teacher has to design interesting activities to attract them Although I have tried my best in teaching job, I think I still lack experiences in real teaching L: What you need to support your grammar teaching? T: I really need training courses of grammar teaching methods I want to be taught songs, games, chants which can be used to practice grammatical structures XXII ... Definition of grammar 1.1.2 Teaching grammar using communicative approach a Communicative language learning b Grammar in CLT classroom c Teaching grammar in CLT classroom... Sekeji Ana, Rigo Irene ( 2 011 ), Teaching English Grammar in primary school, Tabula 17 Shuib Munir (2009), Grammatical awareness among primary school English language teachers, GEMA Online Journal... ABSTRACT This paper deals with English grammar teaching of teachers at Vietnamese primary schools In Vietnam, English language in general and grammar in particular are no longer taught in traditional
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