NGÔN NGỮ GIẢNG dạy của GIÁO VIÊN bản NGỮ nói TIẾNG ANH ở một TRƯỜNG tư THỤC tại hà nội)

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STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

This work contains no material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree in
any university or other tertiary institution and, to the best of my knowledge and belief, the
work contains no material previously published or written by other person, except where due
to references has been made in the text.

Hanoi – 2007


Phm Th Thu Trang




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ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study is to investigate the English language that native English teachers
use to conduct their lesson. It focuses on the presence of lesson phases, the language for
presenting in each lesson phases; the speech acts as well as the grammatical expressions
realizing those acts that they perform in instructing the lessons. Also, the comparison is made
between the grammatical expressions and the acts they perform to identify the most
preferable language expressions in performing a speech act in a language class.
The data consist of 14 lessons collected with audio-recorder in Lomonosov Private School,

Hanoi, Vietnam for analysis. The elements comprising lessons phases and the patterns
making up the act of explaining tasks, significant speech acts and their equivalent
grammatical structures are examined.
It is indicated in the study that the lesson phases such as opening, instructional and closing
phases were made up of various elements and can be applied in any order of appearance in
the suggestion of possible paradigm for each of the phase. Moreover, the four speech acts are
detected and analysis in terms of the language used; the polite strategies in performing the
acts; the frequency and preference of use.
This study can firstly be uses as reference for teachers of English at Lomonosov Private
School, and for any teachers who are concerned about this matter.
It is hoped that this study can help language teachers to improve and better their use of
English as language of instructions in their own classes in order to provide a more and more
natural interactions and communications to the students in Vietnam.





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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I wish, first of all, to express my deepest gratitude to Assoc. Prof. Dr. Vo Dai Quang, my
supervisor, who has enthusiastically and generously given me invaluable assistance and
guidance during the process of carrying out the thesis. The success of my study would have
been almost impossible without his support and encouragement.
My profound thanks are also to all other teachers at Vietnam National University, Hanoi –
College of Foreign Languages for their useful lectures which have laid the foundation for this
research paper.
My special thanks are due to all the volunteer teachers who willingly and nicely participated
in my study with their great help in letting me record their teaching process. My sincere

thanks are also to all the Vietnamese teachers at Lomonosov Private School who generously
offered their help and support during the time of my teaching at Lomonosov Private School.
I would also thank all of my friends and classmates at Vietnam National University, Hanoi –
College of Foreign Languages, Postgraduate Studies as well as my old friends who have been
studying in England for their great support in sharing experience and providing me with
invaluable reference books, which was of great help in the completion of this study.
Last but not least, my heartfelt thanks go to my parents, who have always been by my side,
supporting and encouraging me for the whole course of my study, to whom I have never
found enough words to express my gratitude.






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TABLE OF CONTENT

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1
1.1 RATIONALE 1
1.2 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES 2
1.3 SCOPE OF THE RESEARCH 2
1.4 THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY 3
1.5 METHODOLOGY 3
1.5.1. Approach 3
1.5.2. Techniques 3
1.6 STRUCTURES OF THE STUDY 5

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 6

2.1 THE LANGUAGE OF CLASSROOM INSTRUCTIONS 6
2.1.1. Classroom interaction 6
2.1.2. Language of opening – closing the lessons 10
2.1.3. Language of introducing vocabulary – introducing and transiting
activities 14
2.1.4. Language of managing class 15
2.1.5. Language of instruction 15
2.2 SPEECH ACTS 18
2.2.1. Definition 18
2.2.2. Classification and grammatical expressions 20
2.3 CLASSROOM INSTRUCTIONS AS SPEECH ACTS 22
2.4 STATEMENTS ON PREVIOUS STUDY ON LANGUAGE OF INSTRUCTION
IN LANGUAGE CLASSROOMS 24

CHAPTER 3: FEATURES OF THE LANGUAGE OF NATIVE ENGLISH
TEACHERS USED IN EACH PHASE OF THE LESSON 26
3.1 THE LANGUAGE OF OPENING AND CLOSING THE LESSONS 26
3.1.1. Greetings 26




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3.1.2. Social English 28
3.1.3. Signals to start 28
3.1.4. Procedural English 28
3.1.5. Statements of lesson plan 28
3.1.6. Links to previous lessons 30
3.1.7. Transitional signals 30

3.1.8. Transitional stage 30
3.1.9. Summary 30
3.2 THE LANGUAGE OF INSTRUCTIONS 32
3.2.1. Signals to engage class’s attention 33
3.2.2. Statements of task or topic 34
3.2.3. Organizing seating/ groups 36
3.2.4. Main instructions 38
3.2.5. Monitoring understanding; repeat/ rephrase 43
3.2.6. Signals to start 44
3.2.7. Summary 45
3.3 SUMMARY 46

CHAPTER 4: AN INVESTIGATION INTO SPEECH ACTS IN LANGUAGE
LESSONS PERFORMED BY NATIVE ENGLISH TEACHERS 47
4.1 THE ACT OF REQUESTS AND MANAGING CLASS 47
4.1.1. Classification of grammatical forms 47
4.1.1.1. Modals 47
4.1.1.2. Infinitives 49
4.1.1.3. Gerunds 50
4.1.1.4. Questions 50
4.1.1.5. Others 51
4.1.2. Possible functions of requests in language classroom 52
4.1.2.1. Modals 52
4.1.2.2. Infinitives 56
4.1.2.3. Gerunds (V-ing) 57
4.1.2.4. Interrogatives 58

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4.1.2.5. Nouns – Adjectives and Others (mainly for managing class) 60
4.1.3. The comparison of the frequency in using each grammatical form to
perform the acts of requests in language classroom 61
4.2 THE ACT OF ENCOURAGING 62
4.3 THE ACT OF EXPLAINING TASKS 64
4.3.1. Identification of patterns of the act for explaining tasks 64
4.3.2. Classification of grammatical structures 67
4.3.3. Summary 69
4.4 THE ACT OF GUIDING AND ASSISTING 70
4.4.1. Repeat and rephrase the instructions 70
4.4.2. Define or suggest the meaning of the new vocabulary 71
4.5 SUMMARY 73

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONS 74
5.1 SUMMARY OF THE STUDY 74
5.2 FINDINGS 74
5.3 CONCLUSIONS 75
5.4 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY 76
5.5 SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY 77

APPENDICES 78
APPENDIX 1 I
APPENDIX 2 VIII
APPENDIX 3 XXIX
APPENDIX 4 XXXVII

REFERENCES 79

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LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES AND FLOW CHARTS

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 3.1 Types of classroom interactions
Figure 3.2 Le Cong Tien’s proposed elements for transitional phase
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Examples for greetings from data 1-14 27
Table 2: Examples for procedural English in the data 1-14 28
Table 3: Summary of elements of the opening phase found in data 1-14 31
Table 4: Signals to engage class’ attentions found in Data 1-14 34
Table 5: Requestive/ Politeness strategies used in the statement of tasks in Data 1-14 . 36
Table 6: Language of organizing seating/ groups of data 1-14 37
Table 7: Strategies for giving instructions 42
Table 8: Summary of the language for monitoring understanding; repeat/ rephrase 44
Table 9: Summary of signals found in 21 instructions in data 1-14 45
Table 10: Examples of requests realized by Modals in data 1-14 48
Table 11: Examples of requests realized by Infinitives in data 1-14 49
Table 12: Examples of requests realized by Gerunds in data 1-14 50
Table 13: Examples of requests realized by Interrogatives in data 1-14 51
Table 14: Examples for other types of requests expressions 51
Table 15: Possible strategies to perform requests using MODALS in language
classrooms 55

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Table 16: Summary of the frequency of using syntactic classes (Declaratives and
Interrogatives) in performing the act of request by Modals 55
Table 17: Possible strategies to perform requests using INFINITIVES in language
classrooms 57
Table 18: Possible strategies to perform requests using GERUNDS in language
classrooms 58
Table 19: Possible strategies to perform requests using INTERROGATIVES in language
classrooms 60
Table 20: Possible strategies to perform requests using NOUNS, ADJECTIVES,
PREPOSTIONS and OTHER FORMS in language classrooms 61
Table 21: Summary of frequency of grammatical forms used to convey requests in
language classrooms 62
Table 22: Classification of linguistic forms used to perform the act of encouraging
students in language classrooms 63
Table 23: Identification of patterns for the act of explaining found in 14 data 66
Table 24: Examples of defining and suggesting the new vocabulary 72

LIST OF FLOW-CHARTS
Flow-chart 1: Sequence and paradigm for the Opening Phase 32
Flow-chart 2: Proposed sequence and paradigm for instruction-giving 45
Flow-chart 3: Paradigm of task – explanation – giving 66

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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 RATIONALE
Nowadays, English has become an international language. Learning English is not only
fashion as over ten years ago, but also a must for anyone to want to access the world. More
and more Vietnamese learn English to attain knowledge and achieve communicative
competence. In fact, the weakest point of Vietnamese learners is that they are not able to
produce meaningful utterances and communicate in real situations.
This fact raises the awareness of teaching and learning English communicatively to both
teachers and learners. The new textbooks in Vietnam are formed, edited in this way. In
addition, language teachers at high school now are trying to apply new methods to teach
English communicatively. The aim is to prepare students with authentic sources of
language, real situations, and practical use of language.
Lomonosov Private School (My Dinh – Tu Liem – Hanoi) is specialized in foreign
languages such as English, French, Chinese, and Japanese. In here, most language teachers
try to maximize the use of the target language and the talking time of the students in class.
Furthermore, the school has many exchange programs with some voluntary organizations
in Europe, Australia and America. Every year, there are many volunteer teachers from the
USA, Switzerland, Belgium, Australia, England… coming to this school and teaching the
children for about one period a week in each class, they have created a good language
environment for the students. During those lessons, the native teachers deal with the
children without the help of Vietnamese teachers in class. Most students like those lessons
much; they usually become more active, interested, motivated, and confident in speaking
English, especially to foreigners.
As a teacher, I always try to make full use of my English to familiarize the students with
real communication. Sometimes I failed and had to come back to our mother tongue,
Vietnamese. This fact raises a question to me: “How can English teachers get our
secondary students understand the lessons, get involved, actively participate and freely

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express their own ideas, despite incorrectness, misunderstanding or wrong word uses?”,
and “What makes the students understand the teachers’ instructions and motivates them
better after each lesson with the native teachers?”.
So as to answer such difficult questions, I decided to do a research on the language used by
those native teachers in my school for a semester.
1.2 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
The research aims at investigating the language used by those native speakers in
Vietnamese settings to know what kinds of language are used to have a successful English
lesson.
The main aims of this study, first of all, are to see what English language expressions used
by native teachers of English to conduct English language lessons.
Secondly, comparison is made to identify the equivalence and the variants of the
grammatical structures and the acts that they perform. Based on the findings, the question
of why native teachers of English are successful in conducting the lessons in a high school
in Vietnam will be answered.
Finally, the study has some implications for English teachers in that school in respect of
what English language can be used in language classroom for the effectiveness of
conducting the lessons communicatively in English, the target language.
1.3 SCOPE OF THE RESEARCH
The study focuses on the instructional language used by native English teachers in a
specific secondary school in Hanoi. The school is specialized in English and the students
are young learners who are of between 11 and 13.
The study focuses on the structures of the language, the acts performed by those structures
respectively, and the teachers’ intentions when they use those expressions to achieve their

aims of the language activities inside a language classroom. The analysis takes a closer
look at the opening, closing and transiting the activities, introducing new topics or new
vocabulary, and instructing students how to do the task assigned.




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1.4 THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The study first examines the procedure of a language lesson to see whether the three-phase
theory is applied or not. Secondly, it looks at grammatical structures and the application of
speech acts in a language teaching environment to find out the possible acts, the most used
acts as well as the applicable politeness strategies if any. Thirdly, the study examines and
then proposes some paradigms for the sequences of steps in each phase of a language
lesson.
From the result of the study, the most preferable structures of language used in each phase
as well as the language used to perform the speech acts will be drawn out. Furthermore, the
study may be used for reference for the language teachers in the use of specific language
for instructions. It would be useful to have a closer look at the language used to introduce
new items, new topics or new vocabulary to the students.
It is believed that the study would provide the teachers with good reference for their real
teaching in terms of successful language used.
1.5 METHODOLOGY
1.5.1. Approach
The study will be carried out as an ethnographic and applicative research. It will be carried
out at a school with a group of teachers for a certain period of time for some groups of
students. The data come from real teaching and it is hoped to provide an applicative view
in the study of instructional language.
1.5.2. Techniques

1.5.2.1. Procedures
To achieve the aim of the study, data from two native teachers of English was collected in
a private school in Hanoi, Vietnam, for analysis.
All the lessons were recorded with a digital recorder so as to get the best and the most
natural quality of the teachers’ voice.




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After being transcribed, all the data would be put in categorized in terms of lessons phases,
the language realization as well as speech acts.
In addition, a small comparison is made between the use of grammatical expressions and
the speech acts that they convey to see the equivalence between the two.
Basing on the result of the study, it is hoped to propose some applications for language
teachers and suggestions for further study as well.
For limited time, the comparison in this matter between native teachers and non-native
teachers of English has not yet been carried out; it is a suggestion for further study.
1.5.2.2. Data types and analysis
1.5.2.2.1. Collection of the data
1.5.2.2.1.1. Nature of the lessons
These lessons were conducted in English by native teachers of English in Vietnamese
language classrooms in a high school in Hanoi. They were collected by audio recording of
classes in Lomonosov Private School, Hanoi. Two teachers (one from England and one
from Australia) were asked for permission to record their lessons without prior preparation
or formality so that they were as natural as possible. The lessons were for secondary
students who were from 11 to 13 years old, respectively of grade 6 to grade 8.
1.5.2.2.1.2. Selection and quantity of the lessons
Fourteen lessons were collected in the data for the long period of about five months, from

the late December 2006 until early May 2007. Each lesson lasted for about forty-five
minutes with different activities, skills and tasks involved. Each teacher was asked for the
recording of around three or four lessons. Therefore, the quantity of the lessons in the data
was not equal for certain activity or lesson, as at a certain time there could not be two
classes with the same lesson under observation and recording. All the lessons were skills
integrated. The lessons were at a specific high school in Hanoi, therefore, the suggestions
and implications are also first for the teachers of English in that school, later on, are for all
the teachers who are interested in this matter as reference.




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1.5.2.2.2. Data analysis
Analysis of the data is chiefly based on the concepts of lesson phases for teaching English
as foreign language and the concepts of instructional language as speech acts, discussed by
different applied linguists and methodologists. As a result, it will focus on each phase, for
example, opening phase, instructional phase, closing phase and transitional phase. For the
instructional phase, three main activities (introductions to new activities, or vocabulary
items, management of class, and instructions) will be analyzed instead of investigating all
activities. Moreover, all the grammatical forms of the language expressions and the acts of
requests performed by those expressions will be analyzed and compared. Each item of
analysis is presented separately, and the analyses can mostly be found in the appendices.
1.5.2.2.3. Comparison
To find out the equivalence between the speech acts and the grammatical language
structures perform those acts, comparison will be made for each grammatical structure that
realizes the speech acts performed by teachers in a language classroom. It will also take a
closer look at the speech acts performed in each phase, introductions to new topics,
activities, or vocabulary items, management of class, and instructions.

1.6 STRUCTURES OF THE STUDY
The study has seven chapters. The first chapter is the introduction, which covers the
rationale for choosing the topic, aims and objectives of the study, scope of the study,
theoretical and practical significance of the study, and the methods of carrying out the
study. The next chapter presents the theoretical background and review of previous study
with the same concerns and interests. Chapter 3 and 4 report the study and the analysis of
the data, which comprises of the two main sections: features of the language used by native
English teachers and an investigation into speech acts in language lessons performed by
native English teachers. Chapter 5 concludes the study with the summary of the main aims
achieved through the study, the findings and the results of data analysis and some
implications for teaching English in high schools in Hanoi, Vietnam. It at the same time
gives out the limitations of the study and proposes some suggestions for further study.





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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 THE LANGUAGE OF CLASSROOM INSTRUCTIONS
2.1.1. Classroom interaction
Some linguists believe that the classroom creates a communication context in which the
teachers and their students interact by means of writing or speech to achieve the goal of the
lessons. In the classroom, the teachers play different roles to communicate with their
students from the time they come into the room until they leave the class. The roles can be
organizers, managers of the class, facilitators of the language items, actors, or resource
etc.). Students accordingly play various roles to communicate; sometimes they are asked or
assigned to communicate something.
Brown (1994:159) defines interaction as “the collaborative exchange of thoughts, feelings,

or ideas between two or more people resulting in a reciprocal effect on each other”. It is
believed that interaction is an important factor for communicative achievement, as
according to Rivers (1987: 4), he writes:
Part of the teacher art is to create, or stimulate student creation of, the types
of situation in which interaction naturally blossoms and in which students
can use for actual communication what they have been learning in a more
formal fashion. In this way, they are already engaging in the central activity
for which language is used in human relations.
Many linguists propose the mainly found patterns for classroom interactions as I-R-F,
which is Initiating – Responding – Follow up. However, Sinclair and Coulthard (1975)
suggest another pattern as I-R-E, which are Initiating – Responding – Evaluation.
However, in real classroom observations recently, it can be seen that the patterns of
interaction now is I-R-F, which are Initiating – Responding – Feedback. And this pattern is
the combination of the above two. Here the Feedback consists of assessment (evaluation),
correction, or comment and then the next initiation occurs.
The interactions can be between the teacher and an individual student, between the teacher
and the whole class, between a student and a student, between a student and the whole




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class, or among students in a group. The types of classroom interaction can be generalized
as in the following chart:

Recently, it is believed that the teachers should reduce their talking time in classroom, act
as facilitators, not only teachers. It means that the teachers give their students more
opportunity to talk and to interact in real-like situations which are created by the teachers.
There is one question about the importance of meaningful communications or meaningful
interactions to the achievement of the students.
The interactions are mainly prompted or created or assigned by the teacher. The teacher
keeps the first and foremost power to initiate any kinds of interactions in a classroom
context. Most of those interactions are carefully planned beforehand to serve the aims of
the lessons. The interactions that come from the teachers can be in forms of questions, such
as WH-questions, Yes-No questions, Tag-questions or Alternative questions. Sometimes, it
is in form of a short informal talk like chatting, so that they can create a friendly or less
threatening atmosphere before starting the lessons. They can be used as warm-up activities.
Aziz (1987: 59) concludes on classroom interaction after his study:
“…most interactions in classroom were rigid; the teacher initiated and
closed episodes. Pupils’ tasks were to make appropriate responses,
whether in terms of activity or giving information.”
Teacher
Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
Student 4
Student n
Figure 3.1 Types of classroom interactions

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And he believes that “verbal interactions had to be limited”, which is far more different
from recent views in this field.
In addition, those interactions serve different purposes in each stage of the teaching
procedure, which will be discussed more in detailed in the next part. By interacting with
the students, the teachers can lead them to new language input or new activities; organize
the class settings and the students; check if the students understand the lessons; help the
students with difficult items in the language; control the class, manage the activities; and
get the students work This kind of language is known as meta-language (Wajnryb,
1992:43), the language that is “not related to the language being presented”.
More commonly, the teachers try to create the real need for the students to interact, to
communicate, that is to give meaningful interactions. This kind of interactions seems to
seek for “genuine information” (Le Cong Tien, 1997:7) from the teacher or from the
students. For example:
(1) What’s the date today, children?
Today is Wednesday, September 4, 2007, Miss Trang.
Ok, thanks. Sit down, please.
(2) Miss Trang, what’s your date of birth?
My date of birth? It’s on 17th February.
Really? My birthday is in February, too.
(3) I like reading books, especially in my free time. What about you, Linh?
I don’t like reading at all, it’s so tiring. I like listening to music.
(4) What’s the date today?
Miss, Wednesday September 4, 2007.
Oh, I forgot my cousin’s birthday. It was yesterday.

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Here in example (1), as usual, the teacher wants to know the exact date so that she can
write it on the board before starting the lesson. She asks to get the information which she
doesn’t know; she used a genuine question to her students, a real question. And in example
(2), the purpose is the same, which is exchanging information. It is also a real
conversation, a real question in an informal context, even though the question is from the
student, not from teacher as usual in all classroom contexts. In the example (3, 4), they are
meaningful talks between a teacher and a student, it isn’t necessary to serve any teaching
purposes.
However, in most cases, the teacher asks the questions that she already knows the answer
in advance or as planned (in reading/ listening comprehension check), or she seeks for the
answers that can be used for the teaching purposes. For instance:
(5) My birthday is in February. It’s on 17th February. Linh, when’s your birthday?
Well, my birthday is on 15th October.
Good! Her birthday is on 15th October. (So when we say the exact or certain date
with month, we use the preposition on.)
In this example, the teacher is not really interested in the information about the student’s
birthday; she just asks to refocus on the use of the preposition of time on. That is a typical
interaction can be found in classroom setting. The interaction is used for teaching purpose
to draw the students’ attention to the use of the preposition “on” in a fairly meaningful
context. That is also one aspect in communicative teaching.
Following is one more example for teacher’s meta-language:
What does the teacher say? What is the communication
purpose? (functions or acts)
How might this be said to a
native speaker?
“Look at the map. Can you
see the bank?”

- Giving
instructions
- Checking
comprehension
“Can you see where the
bank is (on the map)?”




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Furthermore, it is the teacher who decides what kind of interactions should occur in the
classroom, for what purpose, for how long and about what topics, what kinds of language
should be used during those interactions.
In addition, it is also proved that the classroom interactions are also typical for checking
students’ understanding. The teachers often check their students’ understanding of the
structures, instructions, or requirements of the activities. The teachers want to make sure if
the students understand what they are supposed to do in each activity of the lessons, and if
they need any further explanation or sampling.
Moreover, it is believed that the teacher is always aware of her students’ level of English.
She “usually closely adapts” her language to her students’ level (Le, 1997:8). Sometimes,
when the teachers can not make the students understand in the target language, they have
to change to the students’ mother tongue, in other words, they translate the instructions into
the students’ first language if it is available to all of them.
In short, we can find special kinds of communication inside the classroom context. That is
the typical setting where its interactions can serve not only the meaningful communications
but also the study of the language in forms and in use. In addition, classroom interactions
also mark the significant roles of the teachers in terms of handling the activities during the
lessons, managing classes, giving instructions about the language and its use inside and

outside the classroom, and checking for students’ comprehension for the language and the
instructions of the activities.
2.1.2. Language of opening – closing the lessons
The lesson usually consists of three main phases: opening, instructional, and closing
phases. In this part, the model or frame of each phase will be presented basing on many
previous studies. They will give a better and clearer view on the patterns of each phase in
classroom interaction.
Following is the chart adapted from Le Cong Tien’s study (1997: 18) summarizing those
phases, the chart also shows that each phase can comprise different activities serving the
teaching aim of the lessons.




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In the opening phase of the lesson, as can be seen from almost all the classroom, the
teachers tend to create a comfortable atmosphere in their class, so that the students can
easily change from the “non-working state to the working state” (Le, 1997:20). By
organizing several kinds of warm-up activities, the teachers want to prepare and direct their
students to the content of the lesson. From my own teaching experience, the teachers do
not always reveal their teaching aims in this stage, most of them tend to keep it as a secret

in order to motivate and get the students more involved in the activities to find out the
language or the teaching aims themselves.
Le (1997) also states that the opening phase of the lessons help the students to “link the
previous lesson with the present one or even the forthcoming one”. However, they also aim
at create a link in the students’ mind between what the students already know and may use
in the lesson and what they might learn to use during and after the lesson. By doing that,
the teachers aim at providing the students with general view or knowledge about what
language abilities, language patterns or the topic of the lessons that may be required during
class activities. In his study, Le (1997) once more suggests that:
“…the chief purpose is to define the aims of the lesson, to state what the main
work is and how it is expected to be done within class time…”
(Le, 1997: 20)
LESSON

OPENING PHASE

INSTRUCTIONAL PHAS
E

CLOSING PHASE

ACTIVITY 1

ACTIVITY 2

ACTIVITY 3

TRANSITIONAL PHASE

ACTIVITY 1

ACTIVITY 2

ACTIVITY 3

ACTIVITY 1

ACTIVITY 2

ACTIVITY 3

Figure 3.2 The transitional phase




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In my opinion, this stage tends to belong to the instructional phase, where the students are
told what to do and how to do it.
The instructional phase may take the most working time of both teachers and students. It is
where all the main activities of the lesson take place. The teachers, in this phase, give the
students the instructions for each necessary activity; give explanations for new items such
as new vocabulary, new grammar, etc. Moreover, in this phase, the teachers also perform
the roles of organizer, instructors or helper and so on. Sometimes, the teachers can create a
link from one activity to another or a transition from this phase to the closing phase (it
means the transitional phase is mixed with the instructional phase). It is possible to mix
those two phases because the transitional phase often takes only a minute and normally it is
only in form of a sentence or two.
The last phase of the lesson is the closing one, in this phase the teachers often signal for the

end of previous activity, summarize the main or important points of the activity, review the
results of the activities or comment on the students’ performance. Sometimes, this phase is
also the time for the teachers to give their students homework or further exercises, even
short tests to check how well their students acquire after the lessons. If there is more
activity, this phase is only to end the previous activity and set the transition to the next
activity. In addition, in this phase, the teachers usually try to create a pleasant and
comfortable even funny atmosphere for the students so that they will feel happy and good
when ending the lessons, and they will feel eager to the next meeting.
Normally, the activities in a language classroom are often very active and noisy; they are
usually at high speed and require much energy and concentration from the students. It is
not easy to end up an activity with only one word or one signal.
As stated in the introduction, this study aims at the language used in each phase of the
lessons, so in the next part, the patterns of interactions in each phase will be on the focus.
There is also a question about the language patterns that are used to serve the aims of each
phase, the answer will be given during the analysis process of the data. However, some
patterns proposed by some linguists will also be mentioned in the following part as
reference.




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
Willis (1981: 8-9;34-36) proposes some constituents of the opening phases such as
greetings, beginning a chat, beginning a revision, talking about the lesson, defining aims,
introducing a new stage in a lesson. Following is the chart showing the patterns of the
opening phase proposed by Le (1997: 22):

The instructional phase as stated in some previous part consists of the instructions,
introductions or explanations for the main activities in the lessons. The following chart is
also adapted from Le’s summary in his study (1997: 23) describe the elements which can
be found in this phase.







FORMAL/ INFORMAL
GREETINGS

SOCIAL
ENGLISH
SIGNAL TO
START

PROCEDURAL
ENGLISH
STATEMENT OF LESSON PLAN
(AIMS, MAIN CONTENTS)

LINKS TO

PREVIOUS
TRANSITIONAL SIGNAL
TRANSITIONAL STAGE
Figure III.3 The opening phase
E
X
C
H
A
N
G
E
D

TRANSITIONAL
SIGNALS

I
N
T
R
O
D
U
C
T
I
O
N
S

I
N
S
T
R
U
C
T
I
O
N
S

E
X
P
L
A
N
A
T
I
O
N
S

I
N
F
O

R
M
A
T
I
O
N

TRANSITIONAL SIGNALS/ STAGES
CLOSING PHASE

Figure III. 4. The instructional phase




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
As regarding the language patterns which can be found in this early stage, Wajnryb
(1992:95) lists several ways for the teachers to elicit:
Open questions: “What do you think of…?”
Close questions: “What’s the word for…?”
Imperative prompts: “Tell me what you know about…”
Directed questions: “Anton, what can you tell me about…?”
In short, the language that the teachers import to serve the teaching aims in language
classroom can be flexible and various. One sentence can serve different purposes in each
situations or teaching phases. More important, the language patterns can also be very
different from all of the patterns that we have discussed in this part. The analysis of my
data will give a sound conclusion whether the proposed patterns are similar to what we can
find in real classroom contexts.

2.1.3. Language of introducing vocabulary – introducing and transiting activities
During the activities in the language lessons, the students may encounter difficulties with
new language lexical items; therefore, teachers come and help in various ways. The
teachers can provide new lexical items for the students by giving the equivalence in the
students’ first language, or by explaining and giving examples then the students come to
the meaning themselves; sometimes, the teachers let their students deal with the new
language items themselves by looking up in the dictionary or discussing in groups.
Sometimes, by putting the new language items in its different contexts, the teachers can
help the students to learn how to use the language items without knowing the equivalent in
their own language.
Transiting from one activity to another is also one important factor in making the lesson go
smoothly and successfully. It creates the link between activities and provides students with
general knowledge about what they are going to do in the next activity. Sometimes,
transiting to the new activity also motivates the students by providing the students with the
information gap, which they will have to bridge during the next activity.






2.1.4. Language of managing class
The first ideas came into my mind when mentioning the language of managing class is that
all the language should be in the form of imperatives. The language of managing class
should be powerful and clear enough so that the students will know what they supposed to
do in each activity.
Managing class comprises of giving the settings, controlling the activities, keeping the
students working and getting the students’ attention back when needed.
Followings are some examples for the language of managing class:
- No Vietnamese, please.

- Linh, sit down, please.
- Nam, what are you doing?
- Alright, ask your friend, I am listening.
- I want to hear your voice, louder please.
- All talking, please.
- You work with Lan…
In the analysis of the data, the language of managing class will be clearer in grammatical
expressions.
2.1.5. Language of instruction
Instructional language is the language employed to draw the attention of the students to the
new activities in the lessons, then lead them participate in the activities comprehensively
and comfortable. It serves the need of the students in terms of vocabulary, grammar points
review (if any), of how to do the tasks and of what the aim must be achieved after the task
is. Language of instruction is one among many aspects that have been studied by many
linguists, educators and language teachers. In this section, some models of the language
used for opening and closing the lesson will be presented.






Gower and Walters comment (1988: 37) on the language of instruction as follows:
The way you give instructions indicates the way you control exercise
and your attitude to the group…generally students, even adults, would
not appreciate you trying to be more polite. It would be time-wasting
and slow things down and would involve you in more complicated
language than they can really understand.
It is believed that the language of instructions should be clear, short and comprehensible to
the students. Widdowson (1990: 67) states:

It has been traditionally supposed that the language presented to
learners should be simplified in some way for easy access and
acquisition. Nowadays there are recommendations that the language
presented should be authentic. How is it to be graded so that it can be
made accessible? Is it simplification as a pedagogic strategy
inconsistent with the principles of a communicative approach to
language teaching?
However, Wajnaryb (1992: 45) argues whether the above ideas are applicable to meta-
language as it is to model language input, and if it is not good to consider language of
instructions also as a meaningful and authentic input to the students, and whether the meta-
language should be easy to fit the students’ level of acquisition. In my opinions, the
teachers’ meta-language is also an important input for the students because it occurs in
meaningful context and it is meaningful interaction between the teachers and the students.
If the students do not understand what their teachers say, they can not follow the lessons,
they can not do what they are required to do.
In “Classroom Observation Tasks” (1992) Wajnryb suggests one possible paradigm for
instruction –giving as follows:
i) Give signal to engage class’s attention
ii) Sate briefly the overall nature of the task
iii) Organize seating/ groups






iv) Give instructions
v) Signal to start
vi) Monitor understanding – repeat/ re-phrase as necessary.
Further more, there is a suggestion for looking at the language of instructions concerning

meaning exchange between the teachers and the students. Doughty and Pica (1986: 313)
suggest some categories for language operations through which meaning may be
negotiated. Followings are the examples adapted from their study:
A confirmation check:
This is where the listener believes they have understood but wishes to make certain,
for example:
A: Mexican food has a lot of ulcers.
B: Mexicans have a lot of ulcers? Because of the food?
A comprehension check
This is where the speaker wants to make certain that the listener has understood, for
example:
A: Do you know what I mean?
A clarification request
This is when one interlocutor does not entirely comprehend the meaning and asks for
clarification, for example:
A: She’s on the welfare.
B: What do you mean by welfare?
A repetition
This is where the speaker repeats (or re-states) their own (or another’s utterance) in order
to repair a real (or perceived) communication breakdown, for example: