Using oral activities to teach grammar communicatively to first year non English major students at Vietnam University of Commerce Trần Thị Thu Hiền Trường Đại học Ngoại ngữ Luận văn ThS. Chuyên ngành: Theory and methodology of English teaching Mã số: 60 14 10 Người hướng dẫn: Nguyễn Thu Lê Hằng, MA. Năm bảo vệ: 2011 Abstract: It is clear to say that the development of language teaching and learning according to the communicative approach has brought about great changes in teaching English in Vietnamese Universities in general, and in Vietnam University of Commerce in particular. Applying the communicative approach to teaching and learning grammar can be seen as an important element which helps learners reach their new goal in learning English: for communicative competence. Therefore, grammar is considered to be an indispensable factor which helps people use its language to communicate successfully. The existing situation demands a real and positive outlook and appreciation to work out suitable ways to teach and learn grammar. Accordingly, the study attempts to find out the current situation, the problems and some suggested solutions of applying oral activities in teaching grammar communicatively for first year English non-major students at VCU through survey questionnaires and interview questions. Seeing the difficulties many teachers encountered and unexplained doubts about the approaches they have been following, the author decided to do the research on the theme “Using oral activities to teach grammar communicatively to first year English non-major students at Vietnam University of Commerce. Basing on her own knowledge and experience, the author would like to carry out the study on this topic in order to find out how to teach and learn grammar according to the communicative approach effectively and successfully. Keywords: Tiếng Anh; Ngữ pháp; Kỹ năng giao tiếp; Phương pháp giảng dạy Content PART ONE: INTRODUCTION 1. Rationale of the study The use of English has been gradually increasing in Vietnam. Also, it has a stable ground in the Vietnamese education system. English is introduced to the educational curriculum from primary education (optional) to tertiary education (compulsory). Like many other universities, teachers and students at Vietnam University of Commerce (VCU) were affected by the traditional philosophy of teaching and learning. As a result, many students lack the ability to communicate in oral English after graduation from the university. This fact gives rise to the need of a more effective method that creates opportunities for the learners, the subject and the centre of the teaching and learning process to bring full play their intelligence and creativeness. Over the past few years, the application of the Communicative Language Teaching method has been widely adopted. This marked the beginning of a major change in the language teaching and learning at VCU. And students’ grammar as well as communicative ability has been improved remarkably. VCU Faculty of English has been newly established for 4 years. Almost all of the teachers were trained about CLT approach at the University and they fully understood the importance of communicative grammar lessons among students. Therefore, they made all their effort to apply many kinds of activities in grammar lessons to encourage students to communicate in studying grammar in classroom. As a teacher in the Faculty of English at VCU, from my own observations and experience, I have noticed that there are many ways to motivate the first year non-major students in grammar lessons. Among them, the use of oral or speaking activities has been received more emphasis. Nevertheless, both teachers and students have faced a lot of challenges in implementing and managing oral activities in grammar lessons. For example, the classroom is too noisy, teachers sometimes lose control of the class or students tend to switch to use their mother tongue when not under the teacher’s eyes and so on. Moreover, the teachers’ procedure in organizing speaking activities in grammar lessons is not very effective. The above mentioned situation has urged me to conduct a study to investigate teachers’ and students’ difficulties in implementing oral activities, teachers’ oral activities organization procedure, and teachers’ strategies to foster students’ English grammar. As a result, I have decided to carry out the research into “Using oral activities to teach grammar communicatively for first year non English major students in Vietnam University of Commerce”. This study is intended to make a modest contribution to an increased understanding of using oral activities in the grammar lesson at VCU. 2. Aims of the study The purpose of this study is to explore the reality of the use of speaking activities in the grammar lesson of 1 st year students of Economics, Finance and Banking at VCU where the researcher is serving. More specifically, this study attempts to clarify the procedures of organizing speaking activities in the grammar lesson of 1 st year non English major students and to identify strategies used by teachers to stimulate students’ communicative competence in grammar learning and the factors bringing about difficulties for the teachers and students in their application of oral activities. One additional aim is to compare teachers’ practice with students’ expectation. Based on the findings, the research further seeks to suggest practical recommendations for the possibility of using speaking activities in grammar lessons of 1 st year non English major students at VCU. 3. Scope of the study Though oral activities are usually applied in the speaking skill, I have chosen to focus on grammar lessons for the fact that grammar is the first thing that learners learn on the first day of an English lesson for non English major departments. Moreover, the purpose of studying English of English non English major students at VCU is to gain an international certificate in communication, for instance, the TOEIC test. Therefore, this research tends to investigate the use of oral activities in the grammar lesson. Also, due to the time constraints, this study only involves a small number of VCU teachers and Economics, Finance and Banking students in their first year. 4. Research questions In order to achieve the set goals, the research seeks to answer the following research questions: - To what degree have oral activities been applied in teaching grammar communicatively to first year non English majors in Vietnam University of Commerce? - What problems do teachers meet when using oral activities to teach grammar communicatively to first year non English major in VCU? - What are the possible solutions to these problems as suggested by the teachers atVCU? 5. Method of the study The main method of the study was survey questionnaire, in which two types of questionnaire are designed and distributed to the learners and the teachers. Furthermore, in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the suggested approach, the writer collected some information based on her informal interviews to make sure that the data is more accurate and reliable. A combination of different methods above will provide reliable data, based on which the conclusions and suggestions will be made in the next parts. 6. Design of the study The study consists of three main parts: The first part, Introduction, provides an overview of the study in which the reasons for choosing the study will be focused. It also includes the aim, research questions, research methods, scope and design of the study. The second part, Development, consists of two chapters: Chapter one, Literature Review, provides the theoretical background for the thesis. This chapter includes three main points. The first point deals with the general view on grammar and grammar teaching approaches. The second point discusses the problems. Finally, the third point discusses the need for applying oral activities to grammar teaching. Chapter two, The Study, aims to describe background information about the current teaching and learning of grammar at VCU and presents the methodology underlying the research including data collection instruments, procedures. A detailed data analysis and discussions are also given. The last part, Conclusion, gives a summary and a recommendation for further study. REFERENCES 1. Allright, R. (1977). Language Learning Through Communication Practice. ELT Documents. 76 (3). (pp. 2 – 14). 2. Celce – Murcia, M. (1991). Grammar Pedagogy in Second and Foreign Language Teaching. TESOL Quarterly. 3 (25). (pp. 459 – 480). 3. Celce – Murcia, M. (1988). Techniques and Resources in Teaching Grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 4. Chung, Siaw-Fong. (2005). A Communicative Approach to Teaching Grammar. Theory and Practice. The English Teacher. 34. Selangor: Malaysian English Language Teaching Association (MELTA). (pp. 33 – 50). 5. Finocchiaro, Mary and Christopher Brumfit. (1983). The Functional – Notational Approach, Oxford: Oxford University Press. 6. Friederike Klippel. (1984). Keep Talking – Communicative Fluency Activities for Language Teaching. Cambridge University Press. 7. Fuyuko Kato (1998). Second Language Acquisition & Pedagogic Grammar. Retrieved from the World Wide Web: http://www.cel.bham.ac.uk/resouces/essays/fuyuko2.pdf 8. Hammerly, H. (1987). The immersion approach: Limos Test of Second Communication. The Modern Language Journal. 71. (pp. 395 – 401). 9. Hammer, J. (1987). Teaching and Learning Grammar. Longman Group UK Limited. 10. Hughes, R. & McCathy, M. (1998). From Sentence to Discourse Grammar and English. 11. Hopkins, D. & Nettle, M. (1994). Second Language Acquisition Research: A Response to Rod Ellis. ELT Journal Volume 48/2. Oxford University Press (pp. 157 – 160). 12. Howatt, A.P.R. (1984). A history of English language teaching, Oxford. Oxford University Press. 13. Jacob, R.A (1993). 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England: Longman. 21. Ur, P. (1996). A Course in Language Teaching. Cambridge University Press. 22. Widdowson. H. G. (1990). Aspects of Language Teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 23. Watcyn-Jones, P. (1995). Grammar Games and Activities for Teachers. Penguin Books. Websites http://www.bogglesworldesl.com http://www.esl-library.com http://www.onestopenglish.com . the author decided to do the research on the theme Using oral activities to teach grammar communicatively to first year English non- major students at Vietnam University of Commerce. Basing on. to carry out the research into Using oral activities to teach grammar communicatively for first year non English major students in Vietnam University of Commerce . This study is intended to. Using oral activities to teach grammar communicatively to first year non English major students at Vietnam University of Commerce Trần Thị Thu Hiền Trường