THE FREQUENCY AND FUNCTIONS OF TEACHERS’ USE OF MOTHER TONGUE IN EFL CLASSROOMS

Whether mother tongue should be used in EFL classroom or not is a controversial issue and has not yet reached a consensus among teachers and researchers. While some argue that the use of mother tongue inhibits language learning, others claim that it saves time and energy for both language teachers and students and enhances mutual understanding between them. Although a number of studies explore the use of mother tongue in EFL classrooms, few have been conducted to investigate how often teachers in non-English major classes code-switch, that is, change from English to mother tongue and why they do that. In such a context, the current study examined the use of code-switching by teachers in EFL classroom in a medical college in Vietnam by means of classroom observations and voice recording analysis. The findings revealed that in teaching English to nursing students in this medical college, the teachers did code-switch to a great extent for the main purpose of enhancing their students’ English comprehension and competence. Suggestions are proposed to raise EFL teachers’ awareness on how and when to code-switch so that their teaching can be optimized.  Article visualizations

THE IMPACT OF USING INFOGRAPHICS TO TEACH GRAMMAR ON EFL STUDENTS’ LEARNING MOTIVATION

Infographics have increasingly been used in English language teaching. However, few studies have been conducted to explore the use of infographics in improving students’ motivation in learning grammar. The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact of Infographics-based learning on students’ motivation on an English language grammar course. The study employed an experimental research design and the participation of sixty grade-11 students studying in a high school in Mekong Delta, Vietnam. There are two groups including one experimental group (n = 30) that used the Infographics-based learning; and the other a controlled group (n = 30) which was instructed using non- Infographics-based learning technique. A questionnaire was designed to measure students’ motivation after the treatment. Article visualizations

THE IMPACTS OF IMPLEMENTING THE FLIPPED MODEL ON EFL HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION

The flipped classroom is gaining more attention than ever before due to the pandemic of the COVID-19, by which online learning becomes a must in many countries and territories all over the world. The flipped model is a combination of online and face-to-face learning in which students watch instructional videos and do certain comprehension tasks at home prior to in-class lessons. To our knowledge, few studies have been conducted to explore the impact of flipped classrooms for teaching English reading skills in the high school context. The current experimental study has been conducted in a high school in the Mekong Delta with 52 students at Grade 11 in a high school in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam. Students were assigned to watch videos of instructions for 6 reading lessons in the English Grade 11 Textbook for 10 weeks. Learners’ reading comprehension performance and attitudes are compared between the control group and the experimental group. The findings reveal some interesting implications for Vietnamese teachers teaching English at high school. Article visualizations

THE IMPACT OF QUESTIONING AND SEMANTIC MAP IN PRE-READING STAGE ON STUDENTS' READING COMPREHENSION: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

Pre-reading activities play an important role in language reading classrooms since they help to activate students’ background knowledge of the topics being taught, which results in improving students’ reading comprehension. Most studies in the literature focus on exploring the effects of individual pre-reading activities such as brainstorming, pre-teaching vocabulary, questioning on students’ performance in doing comprehension tasks. Few studies have been conducted to explore whether one technique is better than the others in activating students’ schemata in reading lessons. The current study investigates the impact of Questioning and Semantic map in Pre-reading stage on EFL gifted high school students’ reading comprehension. The participants were 52 gifted students from two science classes for twelfth graders (they were non gifted English students). They shared the same culture, native language, educational background and age. The data were collected through two reading proficiency tests (pre-test and post-test) and individual interviews. The findings revealed that both Questioning and Semantic map had positive impacts on gifted students’ reading comprehension. Especially, the students who received Semantic treatment had significantly better improvement in their reading skill. The findings shed lights on what can be done to improve EFL students’ reading performance.  Article visualizations

Students’ learning autonomy, involvement and motivation towards their English proficiency

Different factors are involved in the process of learners’ learning English as a second or foreign language. Among them, learning autonomy, involvement and motivation and attitude toward English language learning have been claimed to positively correlate with learners’ English proficiency. In the current study, 229 English-majored final-year students at a university in Vietnam were invited to participate in a survey to explore their English proficiency level and factors that may have impacted that level. Findings revealed that students’ learning autonomy and their active participation in classroom activities are the most influential on their English proficiency level after four years of learning. As a result, the study suggests that measures should be taken to improve students’ learning autonomy and classroom involvement

TEACHERS’ PERCEPTIONS TOWARD BLENDED TEACHING APPLIED IN EFL CLASSROOM

Blended teaching has recently attracted a lot of attention from educators and researchers worldwide. In Vietnam, blended teaching has been applied at various universities in different forms. However, few studies have been conducted to explore EFL teachers’ perceptions of the use of blended teaching in Vietnam. The current study used a questionnaire to explore the perceptions of thirty EFL teachers from a large university in Vietnam. Findings reveal that EFL teachers gain various benefits and encounter different challenges when applying blended teaching in their classrooms.  Article visualizations

EFL UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS’ PERCEPTIONS TOWARD BLENDED TEACHING

While blended teaching is increasingly becoming popular in higher education all over the world, the concept has recently been paid attention to in Vietnam’s context. However, under the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic online teaching and blended teaching suddenly become a popular trend in Vietnamese higher education. Few studies have been conducted to explore topics related to blended learning in Vietnam and the current study was conducted to fill such a gap. This study focuses on exploring English-majored students’ perceptions toward the benefits and challenges of blended leaching in EFL classes. Participants included 440 English-majored students ranging from 18 to 22 years old coming from three study majors namely English Teacher Education, English Language Studies and English Interpretation and Translation in a multi-disciplinary university of 56 years old in Vietnam. Findings reveal that students perceived that blended learning offers them various benefits as well as some challenges. Suggestions are proposed to enhance blended learning for English-majored students in Vietnam and elsewhere.  Article visualizations