Preliminary investigation: Data presentation of t- 123docz.net

CHAPTER TWO: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 2.1 Background of the study

3.1 Preliminary investigation: Data presentation of the interview and observation .1 Intervievv.1 Intervievv

To answer the íìrst research question, intervievvs were conducted with some guided questions. The students were asked in Vietnamese and they answered the interview questions also in Vietnamese. This was to guarantee the truthfulness o f the infoimation in case the students were not coníìdent enough in answering in English or they might get coníused in understanding the questions and in giving ansvvers to these questions {The f u l l transcript o f the interview ìs given in Âppendìx 4).

•Students ’ attitude towards ỉearnỉng Engỉish grammar.

The íìrst question asked the respondents whether they like English grammar or not.

The results showed a mạịority o f the students responded íavorably to the leaming English grammar (60%), still many o f them did not like (35% ), and one answered neither liked nor đisliked. Most o f the students were aware o f the beneíĩts o f leaming grammar. Typical reasons they gave for their interest in leaming grammar included: Grammar is a key to successful communication, more easily and more accurately- good understanding of grammar helps a lot in reading and translating books, in vvidening the knowledge;

Grammar also helps students much in doing their homework and tests; and English grammar is simpler, clearer and more logical than Vietnamese grammar.

With regard to their negative attitudes tovvards leaming grammar, some students explained that they did not And grammar interesting, sometimes because of the methods the teacher employed to teach them. For them, English grammar was too diffícult, too complex, and not easy to remember and apply in doing exercises or in real Iife.

Interestingly, One among them did not like English grammar but he could see the active side of the Language Focus lesson; he said he liked this period because it helped him understand more the structures. The student who neither liked nor disliked gave the reason that the grammar lesson didn’t motivate him, many lessons he couldn’ t understand. The one who answered didn’t like grammar very much because he had not got much grammar knovvledge since primary and secondary school.

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• S tu d en ts ’ difficu ỉties in ỉearning English gram m ar

A ll students stated that they íầced a lot o f difficulties in leaming grammar. Many of them complained that English words were too difficult to pronounce, and because of their lack of vocabulary knovvledge, they met a lot of diffìculties in understanding and changing English word forms. This supported the “ strong relationship that exists betvveen grammar and vocabulary” (Hedge 2000, p. 145). For them, the English structures were difficuỉt to use, to apply in doing exercises; diffícult to remember, easy to forget. Also, they had a few opportunities to apply the leamed structures to communicate because the exercises were not easy; they often had not enough time to practice the structures they had leamed, and those were the reasons why they knew the structures and words but failed to express them.

Moreover, many of them said that the way o f expressing ideas in English was different from Vietnamese; thereíore they were afraid o f making mistakes when using English. Furthermore, the way their teacher presented grammar structures was not really interesting, so it was not attractive enough for students to concentrate- their teacher mainly took examples in the text book, gave the structures or íòrms, explained in Vietnamese and then asked students to do the exercise; sometimes they let them play a game but only in left time and in fear o f affecting neighbored classes. Large class size also caused difficulty for their study, so they did not have much chance to practice or get teacher’s attention. Finally, teaching aids were not available and the leaming facilities were poor, vvhich made more difficult to study effectively.

• Students ’ contributed ỉdeas to have an effective English g ra m m a r period.

When responding the suggestion of giving ideas for a better English grammar period, all o f the students expressed their motivation and actively vvanted to make some contributions to it. Exams was paid attention to, so they expected their teacher to explain the structures carefully, gave more examples, especially in communicative situations and revised the leamed knowledge as well as practiced the new ones; many o f them suggested the teacher giving them more grammar exercises as well as provided them key words.

As they mentioned above, they had a few communicative opportunities to use English, many o f them expected their teacher to create more communicative situations and encouraged them to join. Some of them found grammar lessons stressful, sometimes boring with ineffective activities which were repeated day by day. Some wished their teacher more comfortable, more easy-going, and more Creative in methodology such as using

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pictures, visưal teaching aids, more games and outdoor activities which imitated T V game- shows. They expressed their preoccupation with teacher’s mood: 'W e do not like learning.

One reason is that we fear the teacher because the teacher som etim es enters the cỉassroom bringing with her tenseness and frustration. We aỉl fe e l stressful

Not surprisingly, unless the teacher created a relaxing atmosphere in the classroom, the students could not motivate in leaming. Although they expected some eíĩorts from their teacher, they themselves realized that they had to make effort too, and they highly appreciated self -studying. One student did not take care how their teacher taught, because he thought that it depended on the students themselves; if they worked hard, they would have better results and vice verse. Another student expressed his satisfaction vvith the present method of his teacher. A student, may be a good one, wished to leam more other structures in a period but another wished to have reduced knovvledge. Therefore one student bravely suggested that teachers shouid have suitable methods for diíTerent levels of students. Generally, they íound the teaching materials authentic and suitable to them. Only several students vvished the teaching materials less diffìcult and more interesting.

From the students’ response, we can see that most of the students recognized the importance of grammatical knowledge not only to their study in the classroom but also to their use o f the language for communication outside the classroom. A focus on grammar is obviously a necessary or a desirable part of classroom language leaming.

3.1.2 Class observations

To have more authentic data from what the students said, three classroom observations were carried out to provide second data. During two weeks, the researcher visited three grammar lesson taught by three different teachers at TNDUSS. Due to technical constraints, the researcher did not videotape or audiotape the lessons she observed. Instead, she took notes of the classroom procedures and activities in the most possible đetailed manner to co mpare to field notes of the interviews. After analyzing three class observation notes, she pointed out some following results:

3.1.2.1 R esults/rom observations o f classes I0A 2 and Ỉ0A4

Similar to the data gained from questionnaire, the data from class observations revealed that the teachers presented grammar in different vvays but still mainly traditional methods, used a lot of Vietnamese to explain the use and meaning of grammar structures, then tried to explain the use and form of the grammar items illustrates this phenomenon.

Students could master the structures rather well, might apply in doing exercises quickly but thc lessons were not different much from a natural Science subject. The class observations also shovved that the teachers did not have enough time to go through all the stages, from presentation to focused practice to communicative practice. A1I of the two teachers observed just concentrated on the íìrst two stages as they engaged in only presentation and controlled practice. The teachers did not have chances to organize any communicative activities because they were in a repeated cycle of explanation and exercise. There were no instances o f free production. Most o f the class time, the students were asked to do the written exercises to remember the forms o f the target grammar structures rather than to use the language for Communications.

3.1.2.2 Result /r o m observation o f class 10B4

In this period, the teacher used visual teaching aids, used questions to elicit the students’ knovvledge in her teaching, and delivered handouts to make something different from the text book. She also organized pair work, group work, games or role playing for the students to take part in. The teacher gave comments when the students did something good which encourage them to participate in the class activities. The students đid exercises orally and actively joined the pair vvork, group work or role playing....The teacher created exciting, relaxing, supporting and ửiendly atmosphere in the class but the students seemed to have some vague knovvledge and thereíore could not do the exercises well.

After collecting data from interviews and observations, the researcher could identify the problems more clearly and she strongly wanted to make intervention for these problems.

Preliminary investigation: Data presentation of the interview and observation .1 Intervievv.1 Intervievv

Data presentation of the quizzes and the test