Việc sử dụng ngôn ngữ thứ nhất khi dạy tiếng Anh trên lớp học của giáo viên Trung học Phổ thông

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY

SCHOOL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

NGUYEN THI THU HIEN

HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS’ EMPLOYMENT OF FIRST

LANGUAGE IN THEIR ENGLISH CLASSROOM INSTRUCTION

(Việc sử dụng ngôn ngữ thứ nhất khi dạy tiếng Anh trên lớp học của

giáo viên Trung Học Phổ Thông)

M.A THESIS

Field: English Linguistics

Code: 8220201

THAI NGUYEN – 2019

THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY

SCHOOL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

NGUYEN THI THU HIEN

HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS’ EMPLOYMENT OF FIRST

LANGUAGE IN THEIR ENGLISH CLASSROOM INSTRUCTION

(Việc sử dụng ngôn ngữ thứ nhất khi dạy tiếng Anh trên lớp học của

giáo viên Trung Học Phổ Thông)

M.A. THESIS

(APPLICATION ORIENTATION)

Field: English Linguistics

Code: 8220201

Supervisor: Nguyen Thi Hang, Ph.D.

THAI NGUYEN – 2019

i

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

The thesis entitled “High school teachers’ employment of first language in their

English classroom instruction” has been submitted to School of foreign languages,

Thai Nguyen University for the Master of English language.

I hereby declare that this thesis and the work presented in it are my own and

have been generated by me as the result of my own original research. All references

and all sources of information used in it have been specifically acknowledged.

My thesis does not contain work extracted from a thesis, dissertation or research

paper previously presented for another degree or diploma at this or any other

universities.

Signature: ..................................

Name: Nguyen Thi Thu Hien

Date: ........./............/2019

Approved by

Signature:

Dr. Nguyen Thi Hang

ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would like to acknowledge my indebtedness and render my warmest thanks

to my supervisor, Dr. Nguyen Thi Hang, who made this work possible. I am grateful

to her for her patience, her encouragement and insightful suggestions.

My special thanks are definitely to high school teachers in Quang Ninh

province who agree to participate in my study. During my Data collection, they

always provide me with great help.

I would like to extend my thanks to my family: my mother, my husband and

my daughter, who are always by my side and encourage me to accomplish this thesis.

iii

ABSTRACT

This study investigates the practice of code switching among English language

teachers at high school in Vietnam with practical experience in English as a foreign

language. It places a focus on the situations in which teachers use their first language

within their English instruction in their English classroom, and the reasons why

teachers utter Vietnamese when giving instruction of English in their classes.

An ethnographic research design is applied in the study. The research is based

on the data analysis of four typical high school teachers’ code switching from three

sources of information: class observations, class recordings, and interviews with

teachers.

It was found that the teachers practiced code-switching very commonly in their

English instruction in different situations such as presenting vocabulary, presenting

pronunciation, presenting grammar rules, correcting mistakes and keeping class

management. Specific examples were illustrated and interpreted in each situation to

provide the context where the teachers practised code switching.

At the same time, the reasons why they code switched were revealed. These

ranged from the teachers’ personal reasons to those for students’ sake: students’

English proficiency, time saving strategy and teachers’ habits. Among which,

students’ low level of English was the most popular factor that teachers took into

consideration when deciding to use their first language frequently.

Based on the findings of the study, recommendations are provided for English

teachers for situations where teachers’ code-switching could be encouraged and many

other situations, their code-switching should generally be avoided.