NHỮNG KHÓ KHĂN của NGƯỜI dạy TRONG VIỆC dạy từ VỰNG CHO học SINH TRUNG học PHỔ THÔNG dân tộc THIỂU số và GIẢI PHÁP KHẮC PHỤC

Chapter I: introduction
I.1. Rationale
Vietnam is a country that has a combination of 54 ethnic groups namely: Kinh,
Tay, Thai, Muong, Dao, H'mong, Khmu, Lao, Khme. etc. In the past, all of these ethnic
groups took part in protecting and saving the nation together and now they are contributing
their time and efforts to the nation construction. However, in some parts of the country
where these ethnic minorities are living the standard of living is still bellow the wanted
level. In order to help them improve their living conditions a lot of things, especially
investments in education and economy are needed.
Dien Bien is a small, remote and mountainous province but there are 24 ethnic
minorities living here. At Dien Bien's Upper Secondary schools, most pupils belong to
different ethnic minorities. Each ethnic group has its own language, and Vietnamese is
their second, and at the same time, official language. English is really their second foreign
language. We think you can imagine the difficulties the pupils have to face and overcome.
In secondary schools in Vietnam today, English is one of the compulsory subjects.
Many suggested solutions have been put into practice to improve the teaching and learning
of English so far, but there still exist a lot of inappropriate things for ethnic English
learners.
Vietnam is in the open-door period, moreover, from the November 2006, Vietnam
has become a member of WTO, and so, English is getting more and more essential to
Vietnamese people. As for ethnic English learners in Dien Bien, English is also considered
to be an important subject, but because of poor conditions for teaching and learning,
together with extremely weak basic common knowledge of the learners, difficulties seem
to multiply. To facilitate the English learners in Dien Bien Upper - Secondary School, I
have chosen Teachers' Typical Difficulties in Teaching Vocabulary to Upper Secondary
School Students of Ethnic Minority and Suggestions for Solution as the subject matter of
the study.
I.2. Objectives of the study
1. Identify the teachers' typical difficulties in teaching English vocabulary to ethnic
minority students at Upper - Secondary Schools in Dien Bien
2. Suggest some solutions to overcome the identified difficulties.

I.3. Scope of the study
1
The study only concentrates on the teaching and learning English vocabulary from
textbooks “Tiếng Anh 10”, “Tiếng Anh 11” (used in Upper - Secondary Schools
throughout Vietnam).
I.4. Method of the study
The study uses a combination of various methods to achieve its objectives such as
descriptive, comparative and statistical. Various sources of data, including those obtained
from the students and teachers in the Upper – Secondary Schools in Dien Bien, were
collected.
First, survey questionnaires were conducted. Data obtained help to design the final
survey questionnaires to investigate teachers and students’ comments and attitudes towards
teaching and learning English vocabulary in Upper-Secondary Schools in Dien Bien as
well as their perceived challenges.
After that, observing classes were organized to find out how effectively the
students learn English vocabulary.
Next, the researcher visited the students' families in order to get a deeper
understanding about these students' real lives. From this information, the author could
reinforce his understanding about this matter.
Finally, the author interviewed the teachers who are teaching English in Upper -
Secondary Schools in Dien Bien and some ethnic students to get better insights into the
research questions.
2
Chapter II: Literature review
II.1. Vocabulary and its significance in language teaching and learning
II.1.1 what is vocabulary?
Vocabulary is a matter which many linguists and language teachers have been
concerned for a long time. Nevertheless, to provide an exact definition of vocabulary is not
easy. Below some definitions of vocabulary are introduced.
Vocabulary is considered as the synonym of lexis and lexicon. "They refer to the

total stock of words in a language" (from the Greek lexis, 'word', lexikos, 'of/for) (Jackson.
H, and Ze' Amvela. E. 2000: 11). From the definition, we can see that the centre of the
lexis/vocabulary is word. So the study of vocabulary can be understood as the study of
word. Vocabulary is the knowledge of words and word meanings. As Steven Stahl (2005)
puts it, "vocabulary knowledge is knowledge; the knowledge of a word not only implies a
definition, but also implies how that word fits into the world." (Stahl, S.A. 2005).
In the Oxford Advanced learner's Dictionary, “vocabulary” is defined as all the
words that a person knows or uses.
In general, it is possible to say that it is hard to give a precise definition of
vocabulary. For the convenience of implementing the research the following definition is
accepted: “Vocabulary can be defined as the words we teach in a foreign language. A word
is a basic unit of a language denoting concepts, things, and phenomena in society.”
(Cynthia. & Johnson, D)
II.1.2. Classification of vocabulary
Vocabulary can be classified differently according to different criteria basing on
morpheme, meaning, function, frequency or the use of word, etc.
II.1.2.1.Vocabulary classified according to the concept of morpheme
Words can be divided into three kinds: simple, derived, and compound.
- Simple word
A simple word consists of one morpheme only and cannot be broken down into
smaller meaningful unit like boy, dog, book…
3
- Derived word
A derived word is a word that consists of a root and one or more derivational
morphemes. For example: careful, worker, taxation…
- Compound word
A compound word is a word that consists of at least two roots with or without
derivational morphemes. For example: schoolboy, electric fan, washing machine, man
killer…
II.1.2.2. Vocabulary classified according to meanings

A word can possess two kinds of meaning: lexical and grammatical meanings.
Vocabulary, therefore, can be divided into notional and functional words.
- Notional words
Notional words are words with clear lexical meaning. They are objects, actions,
qualities… and they have meaning in themselves. Notional words form a great number of
each speaker's vocabulary. Example: a book, a house, to run…
- Functional words
Functional words are those whose meaning is grammatical and they have meaning
in relation to the other words with which they are used. Functional words are particles,
articles, prepositions, auxiliaries, conjunctions… for example: at, on, and, because…
II.1.2.3. Vocabulary classified according to functions
In sentence, word has many different functions. English words can be classified
basing on functions as different parts of speech such as noun, verb, adjective, adverb,
preposition and pronoun. Each part of speech has to follow particular grammar rules so
that when learning English words we have to be aware of the importance of the parts of
speech of that word in sentence.
For example: Noun: a tree, a lake, a bird…
Verb: to look, to walk, to play…
Adjective: long, short, beautiful…
4
Apart from the meaning, pronunciation and spelling of new words, learners need to
know these words how function in sentences. For example, with the word 'foreigner' some
learners may make sentence like this:
* "she's a foreigner student"
In that case, teacher would need to clarify that "foreigner" is a noun, and the
adjective of it is "foreign". Also, teacher needs to point out that a word can have more
than one grammatical functions, for example, 'farm' can be a noun, a verb, an adjective.
(Paul Davis: 2000: 64)
II.1.2.4. Vocabulary classified according to the frequency of use
To save time, and even more important to reduce possible stress caused by learning

by heart many new words each lesson, learners should be aware of words with high
frequency in use and those with low frequency.
For example: Words used to denote daily activities or routines are often employed.
Such as; to go, to work, to eat… (High frequency)
Many other words are only used in some specific situations such as the words
belong to some specific fields. For instant: word processor, main board, wizard… (Low
frequency)
Active words refer to vocabulary that students have been taught or learnt – and
which they are expected to be able to use, for example: to do, attractive, under… Whilst
the passive words refer to words, which the students will recognize when they meet them
but which they will probably not be able to produce, such as, ISP, IP, URL… (Harmer, J:
1993: 159)
II.1.3. What should be taught in teaching vocabulary?
According to Jeremy Harmer, in teaching vocabulary, the teacher should pay
attention to the word meaning, word use, word formation and word grammar.
II.1.3.1. Word meaning
The first thing to realize about vocabulary items is that they frequently have more
than one meaning. The word 'book' for, example, obviously refers to something we use to
read from, but it can also mean a number of other things.
When we come across a word, then, and try to decipher its meaning, we will have
to look at the context in which it is used. In other words, students need to understand the
importance of meaning in context. For example, if we see a person arguing at the ticket
5
office saying 'But I booked my tickets three weeks ago' we will obviously understand a
meaning of the verb 'book' which is different from a policeman saying to his colleague 'We
booked him for speeding.'
Sometimes words have meanings in relation to other words. Thus, students need to
know the meaning of 'vegetable' as a word to describe any one of other things - e.g.
carrots, cabbages, potatoes, etc. 'Vegetable' has a general meaning whereas 'carrots' is
more specific. Words have the words with similar or opposite meanings (synonyms and

antonyms) - e.g. good - bad, bad - evil. As far as meaning goes, then, students need to
know about meaning in context and they need to know about sense relations. (Jeremy
Harmer: 1993: 156)
II.1.3.2. Word use
The meaning of words can be changed, stretched or limited by how it is used and
our students need to know about this factor.
Word meaning is frequently stretched through the use of metaphor and idiom. For
example, the word 'hiss' describes the noise that snakes make. But we stretch its meaning
to describe the way people talk to each other ('Don't move or you're dead' he hissed).
Word meaning is also governed by collocation - that is which words go with each
other. E.g. strong wins, heavy rain, to do the home work. It would not be normal to say
heavy winds, strong rain or make homework
Students need to recognize metaphorical language use and they need to know how
words collocate. They also need to understand what stylistic and topical contexts words
and expressions occur in.
II.1.3.3. Word formation
In English, different devices are used to form new words from existing ones. Each
word-formation will result in the production of a specific type of word. If the learners
know how complex lexical items are made by the association of different constituent
morphemes, then they can also analyze any complex word into its various constituents.
+ Inflectional affixes
Inflection is a general grammatical process, which combines words and affixes
(always suffixes in English) to produce alternative grammatical forms of words. For
example, the plural morpheme is a flectional morpheme. E.g. book – books, student –
students, boys – boys…
6
Inflectional affixes may be described as 'relational makers' that fit words for use in
syntax. It means that when the inflectional affixes added to a stems, that stem does not
change classes. It only changes its distribution in the syntactic structure. For example, dog
- dogs, cheap - cheaper, speak - spoke.

The inflections may show some variation in spelling and pronunciation so that
inflections often cause difficulties for learners. E.g. Japan → Japanese, child →
children…
+ Derivational affixes
Derivation is a lexical process, which forms a new word out of an existing one with
the help of the addition of a derivational affix. For example, free → freedom, depart →
departure, hope → hopeful.
Derivational affixes can change the word class of the added item and establish
words as members of the various word classes. There are two kinds of derivational affixes
in English: class changing and class maintaining.
Class maintaining derivational affixes do not change the word class of the word but
change the meaning of the derivative, such as, child → childhood, malaria → anti-
malaria, agree → disagree, kind → kindly, green → greenish.
Class changing derivational affixes often determine or govern the word lass of the
stem. Such as, leak → leakage, accurate → accuracy, fright → frighten, season→ -
seasonal, consistent → consistently, home→homeward.
+ Compounding
A compound often consists of more than one root, but different roots need not
belong to the same word class. Compounds can be classified as follows:
- Noun compounds: (The second root must be a noun).
N+N (modifier - head): table-tennis, text-book, ash-tray.
V+N (verb - object): daredevil, pickpocket.
Adj+N (modifier-head): golden-fish, soft-cover.
Adv+V (not syntactic): after-thought, downgrade.
- Verb compounds: (The second root must be a verb).
N+V (objective-verb): baby-sit, brainwash, housekeep.
V+V (co-ordinate) dive-bomb, drop-kick.
Adj+V (not syntactic): Dry-clean, sweat-talk, whitewash.
7
Adv+V (modifier-head): over-do, under-estimate, downgrade.

- Adjective compounds: (The second root must be an adjective).
N+Adj (not syntactic): seasick, carsick, ox-eyed.
Adj+adj (co-ordinate): blue-green, mental-grey, southeast.
Adv+Adj (modifier-head): near-sighted, off-white.
- Adverb compounds:
Adv+Adv(co-ordinate): in-to, through-out.
+ Conversion
Conversion is the process of transferring the word class of one word to another
word class without any concomitant change of form, either in pronunciation or spelling.
Noun-Verb: to bottle, to dialogue.
Verb-Noun: a call, a guess.
Adjective-Verb: to better, to dirty, to empty.
Adjective-Noun: the poor, a double.
+ Blends
A blend is a new lexeme was built from parts of two or more words. For example,
brunch (breakfast + lunch), motel (motorists’ hotel).
+ Shortenings
Shortening is a way of create new words from the long existing words. For
example, lab, aeroplane, phone, flu, car, mob…
II.1.3.4. Word grammar
Just as words change according to their grammatical meaning, so the use of certain
words can trigger the use of certain grammatical patterns. For example, we can say 'one
student' or 'two students' but we cannot say 'two furnitures'. This difference, then, has
certain grammatical implications. 'Student' can collocate with plural verbs whereas
'furniture' never can.
There are many other areas of grammatical behavior that students need to know
about: what are phrasal verbs and how do they behave? How are adjectives ordered? What
position can adverbs be used in?
II.1.4. The role of vocabulary in language teaching and learning
Vocabulary has an important role in each language, because "words are the tools

we use to access our background knowledge, express ideas, and learn about new concepts"
8
(Texas Reading Initiative: 2000: 4). So that the first thing we do in learning a new
language is learning vocabulary of that language. As a child, at first he/she learns his
mother's words after that he makes a full phrases and sentences. When a person comes to a
foreign country, even his/her grammatical structure is not good but he has a certain amount
of vocabulary of that country’s language, he/she can communicate. From the above
evidence, we can say that teaching and learning vocabulary is very important to both
teachers and learners.
According to Ron Forseth, Carol Forseth, (1995)," words are a good place to begin
a course in language teaching methodology. Vocabulary words are simple enough to begin
learning on the first day of a class and they are powerful enough to encourage
communication from the very beginning. Words are small pieces of language, which carry
bits of meaning. Knowing many words does not guarantee a person will be able to speak a
language, but not knowing enough words can prevent a person from effectively speaking
or understanding a language. So, we must teach words from the very star". (Ron Forseth,
Carol Forseth: 23)
Meara (1995) points out that knowing only 500 words is functionally useless.
English learners with such a minimal vocabulary who try to process a text will encounter
too many unfamiliar words, and frequently these are precisely the words that convey the
meaning of the text.
"Vocabulary and lexical units are at the heart of learning and communication. No
amount of grammatical or other type of linguistic knowledge can be employed in
communication or discourse without the mediation of vocabulary. Indeed, vocabulary and
lexical expressions can sustain a great deal of rudimentary communication without much
support from other aspects of the language system. Understanding the nature and
significance of vocabulary knowledge in a second language therefore needs to play a much
more centre role in the knowledge base of the language teachers".
II.2. Traditional approaches and techniques used in the presentation of new
vocabulary items

II.2.1. Visual techniques
Visuals
Visuals are the things such as flash cards, photographs, blackboard drawings, wall
charts and realia. They are extensively used for conveying meaning and are particularly
9
useful for teaching concrete items of vocabulary such as food or furniture, and certain
areas of vocabulary such as places, professions, descriptions of people, actions and
activities (such as sports and verbs of movements). They often lend them selves easily to
practice activities involving students' interaction. For example, a set of pictures illustrating
sporting activities could be used as a mean of presenting items such as skiing, sailing,
climbing, etc. these visual aids can then be used as the basis for a guided pair work
dialogue:
e.g. Have you ever been skiing?
Yes, I went to Italy last year. No, I haven’t. Have you?
Did you enjoy it? etc.
etc. (Gairns, R & Redman, S: 73)
Gesture and mine
These are often used to supplement other ways of conveying meaning. When
teaching an item such as 'to tremble', a teacher might build a situation to illustrate it,
making use of the blackboard and gesture to reinforce the concept.
II.2.2. Verbal techniques
Use of illustrative situations (oral or written)
This is the most helpful when items become more abstract. To ensure that students
understand, teachers often make use of more than one situation or context to check that
learners have grasped the concept. For example, consider the changes in the word “have”,
as it appears in the following sentences. The word “have” can have meaning as “possess”,
“eat”, “do”, “get”…
I have three books. (Tôi có ba quyển sách)
I am having lunch. (Tôi đang ăn trưa)
They are having an argument. (Họ đang tranh luận)

I have no doubt. (Tôi không nghi ngờ gì cả)
He had a letter from her. (Tôi nhận được thư của cô ấy)
Use of synonym, antonym and definition
Students will remember words better when they integrate the new words with the
old ones. This type of active processing occurs when teachers use synonyms and definition
to teach new vocabulary.
10
E.g. miserable = very sad
Examine means to think about, study or describe sb/sth carefully, especially in
order to understand them, form an opinion of them or make a decision about them.
Big - small, tall - short, empty - full
Scales
This technique is useful in teaching contrasting or related gradable items. Adverbs
of frequency are one of the examples.
I never/occasionally/sometimes/often/always go to the cinema on Sundays.
Explain of the type
To illustrate the meaning of superordinates such as 'furniture', 'vegetable', 'meat'
and 'transport', it is common procedure to exemplify them e.g. table, chair, bed and sofa
are furniture. Some of these can of course also be dealt with through visual aids.
II.2.3 Translation
Translation can be a very effective way of conveying meaning of new words, it can
save valuable time of the lesson and it can be a very quick way to dispose of low frequency
items that may worry the students but do not warrant significant attention. Some teachers
support this method while some avoid using it, but to ethnic minority students, this method
seems to be the most effective one among the contemporary methods.
E.g. Sometimes/s
ʌ
mtaimz/(adv) thỉnh thoảng, đôi khi
Never/nev
ə

/(adv) không bao giờ
Teacher/ti:tʃ
ə
/(n) giáo viên
Student/stju:d
ə
nt/ (n) học sinh
11
Chapter iii: research methodology
III.1. Introduction
In this chapter, the research questions, subjects of the study, research methods and
techniques for the data collection will be presented.
III.2. Research questions
1. What kinds of difficulties, do teachers in Upper Secondary Schools in Dien Bien
often meet in teaching vocabulary to ethnic minority students?
2. What are the most effective ways to teach vocabulary to these students?
III.3. subjects of the study
III.3.1. the students' background
The researcher chose 40 ethnic minority students in Upper-Secondary Schools in
Dien Bien for the subjects of this study. They are both male and female students aged from
sixteen to eighteen. All of them are minor ethnic people (the Thai). They have been
learning English for at least four years in junior schools and their knowledge of English
vocabulary is at an acceptable level.
III.3.1.1. the students' living and learning condition
Most of the students in this study come from farmer families in the remote villages.
They live quite far from schools (about 10 kms), so they always have to get up early and
cycle to school in order to get to school on time. Because of long distance from their house
to school, when they arrive at schools they are so tired that they cannot concentrate on their
lessons.
In addition, after finishing school, they spend most their time helping their parents

do farming and house work, so they do not have time to do their homework. Also, Their
parents are too busy to help them with their lessons. Apart from that in their minds,
schooling is their children's responsibility and teachers' charge, so they rarely pay attention
to their children’s schoolings or encourage them to learn hard.
Moreover, the school's equipment is very poor, and out of date. The tapes or
cassette players are not available for teachers and students to use. There are not any clubs
or organizations for students to improve or nourish their language skills.
Besides, the classes are large (often 50 students in each class) so the teachers
cannot control the classes effectively.
III.3.1.2. the students' language competence
12
They are pure ethnic students, and Thai is their first language; they always use it in
everyday conversations and to communicate with their parents and other members of their
communities. They only use Vietnamese only at schools or at public places thus, so they
seem to have to learn two foreign languages at the same time! You are sure to imagine all
sorts of difficulties those ethnic students have to overcome.
III.3.2. Teachers' background and their teaching conditions
Fifteen teachers were chosen for the study. Three of them are at Tran Can School, 2
of them in Muong Luon School, 5 in Dien Bien District School, 2 in Dien Bien Boarding
School, 3 in Thanh Chan School.
Most of the English teachers in Upper-Secondary Schools in Dien Bien are from
other provinces, and most of them are Kinh people. In their teaching, they meet many
difficulties and experience numerous culture shocks.
We developed questionnaires to distribute to twenty English teachers in Dien Bien
Upper-secondary Schools; the teachers in this survey are both male and female aged from
24 to 42 and they have taught English from 1 to 24 years, most of them have to teach 6 to 8
classes. In these classes, the number of pupils who belong to minor ethnic groups are large,
moreover, the teaching materials are not available for all of the students.
III.4.The instruments
The study aims to find out teachers' difficulties in teaching English vocabulary to

minor ethnic students, and ethnic students' difficulties in learning English vocabulary. In
order to have a deep understanding of this issue, the researcher distributes questionnaires
to teachers and students, after that he interviews some of them, visits some of the students'
families and finally observes some English lessons.
III.4.1. The questionnaire
At the beginning of January 2008, the author did a survey on this topic to develop
an appropriate survey instrument for this study. The final questionnaire was administered
to 30 EFL teachers teaching at Dien Bien Upper-Secondary Schools at the end of January
2008. To ensure that the participants fully understood the questions, the researcher
distributed the questionnaires at tea break, so that they can ask for clarification if they
need. All 30 distributed questionnaires were fully answered and handed back. The
questionnaires consist of both open and open-ended questions so that the respondents
could give the answers freely.
13
At the same time, questionnaires were distributed to 40 ethnic students. In order to
make sure that, all the students fully understood the questions, the questionnaires were
written in Vietnamese. All of the distributed questionnaires were returned with answers.
III.4.2. The interview
Following the survey, the researcher conducted in-depth interviews with all the
participants to explore further the teachers' background, their understanding of English
teaching in Dien Bien, and their difficulties in teaching vocabulary to ethnic students.
The interviews with the teachers were conducted in English, even though the
researcher was aware that the poor command of English might limit the provided
information, he made certain that they were able to express their ideas fully by preparing
and sending a number of questions to them ahead of time (15 of them were chose for
interview).
While formulating the interview questions, the interviewer made sure that the
questions were clear, precise and motivating.
The interviews with students were conducted in Vietnamese. In order to get the
faithful information, the interviewees were encouraged to take part in the interviews.

III.4.3. The students' family visiting
The author of this study also visited some of the students' families to get some
information about their real lives. The information got from these visits was used to
strengthening his findings.
III.4.4. The class observation
In order to clarify the information from the questionnaires and interviews about the
difficulties that they are facing, the researcher observed some classes. From these
observations, the researcher got a deep understanding about teaching and learning English
vocabulary to ethnic students at 10th and 11th forms in Dien Bien Upper-Secondary
Schools.
14
Chapter IV: Data analysis and discussion
Data analysis is not a simple description of the data collected but a process by
which the researcher can bring interpretation to the data (Powney &Watts, 1987). In the
following parts, the researcher interprets the results from the feedback of the
questionnaires, interviews and observations. In this process, the researcher identified and
noted recurrent themes and salient comments concerning the constraints that the EFL
teachers at Upper-Secondary Schools in Dien Bien had encountered and might have
encountered in teaching vocabulary to ethnic minority students. The study also mentions
the ethnic students' constraints in learning English vocabulary.
IV.1. Results and discussions from the questionnaires
IV.1.1. Results and discussions from questionnaire for teachers
The following questions from questionnaire will be considered to obtain data for
analysis and discussion.
1. How many years have you been a teacher of English?
Among the 15 teachers, the numbers of teaching year is various (one yeas: 2
teachers, two years: 1 teacher, three years: 2 teachers, four years: 1 teacher, five years: 2
teachers, six years: 5 teachers, twelve years: 1 teacher, twenty years: 1 teacher . It means
that, their experiences in teaching are also different from each other. Two of them are new
teachers (they have been teachers only one year), the most experienced teacher is Ca Van

Hien (he has been a teacher of English for 24 years).
Figure 1: Teachers’ teaching years
2. Which grade(s) are you teaching now?
15
Most of them answered that they have to teach two grades (both 10
th
form and 11
th
form), but some of them only teach one grade. The new teachers teach the grade 10. It is
easy to understand, because English is one of the important subjects in the Upper –
Secondary School, so they are careful in their teacher’s assignment.
3. Do you think vocabulary is important to your students?
It can be seen easily from the chart here, there is a high level of agreement about
the importance of vocabulary. Most of teachers agree that it is important, however, there
exists a small number of teachers who do not think vocabulary plays important role in
learning a foreign language.
Order Teachers' ideas about vocabulary Number of people Percent (%)
1 Important 13 86.6
2 Not very important 1 6.7
3 Not important 1 6.7
Table 1: Teachers’ ideas about the role of vocabulary
4. How well do you know about the ethnic students?
All of the teachers confirmed that they have taught ethnic students for at least a
year, so they know clearly about their students’ strengths and shortcomings.
5. How do you compare between ethnic students and Kinh students?
Most of the teachers stated that, they are different from Kinh students, in terms of
learning and language competence. At some other subjects, they are not different from
Kinh students, but in learning a language, they show many weaknesses.
6. How do you think about teaching vocabulary to ethnic students?
A. Difficult B. Not very difficult C. Easy D. Others

All of them admitted that teaching vocabulary to ethnic students is really difficult.
Order Degree of difficulties Number of people Percent (%)
1 Difficult 15 100
2 Not very difficult 0 0
3 Easy 0 0
4 Others 0 0
Table 2: Teachers' ideas about teaching vocabulary to ethnic minority students
7. How much time do you spend on teaching vocabulary each lesson?
A.15% B.20% C.25% D.30%
A major number of surveyed teachers are aware of the importance of vocabulary
and they often spend about 20% of the lessons on teaching vocabulary. Among the
16
interviewed teachers, only one of them spend 30% of the lesson teaching vocabulary, two
of them spend 25% of the lesson explaining vocabulary. A large number of teachers (11)
spend 20% of the lesson teaching vocabulary and the rest (1) spend between 10% and 15%
of the lesson teaching vocabulary.
Figure 2: Teachers’ ideas about the percent of the lesson for vocabulary
8. Have you met culture shocks when you teach these students?
Most of them answered that they have met culture shock; only one of them did not
meet, because he is Thai.
9. Do your students often have difficulties in understanding new words?
All of the teachers stated that their students sometimes can not understand the
meaning of some new words even when they are explained carefully in Vietnamese. This
is really a big problem to be solved soon.
10. Why cannot they understand the meaning of new words even when being explained
explain carefully in Vietnamese?
The answer is that ethnic students suffer a lack of fundamental knowledge and poor
Vietnamese.
11. Have you ever visited their families?
Most of them said that they have visited their students' families (14 of them), only

one of them has never done it. We can say that the relationships between teachers and
students here are very friendly; all of the teachers want to know about their students’ real
lives.
12. Did you come across these difficulties or do you think they might be difficulties in
teaching vocabulary to ethnic students in Upper-Secondary Schools in Dien Bien? Such as,
17
large class, grammar based examinations, lack of teaching materials, students’ deficiency
of Vietnamese…
Through the answers which researcher got, he found that most of the
correspondents answered “yes”. So that he believed that, these are the common problems,
which teachers in Dien Bien are facing and needed to be solved soon.
IV.1.2. Results and discussions from Questionnaire for the students
1. How long have you learnt English?
In this question, the students are divided into two groups. One group has studied
English for five years (11
th
form students) and the other has studied for four years (10
th
form students).
2. In your opinion, how do you think of learning English vocabulary?
a. Easy b. Difficult c. Very difficult
As in the chart bellow, only one of them said it is easy, fifteen of them said it is
very difficult and the left said it is difficult.
Order Degree of difficulty Number of people Percent (%)
1 Easy 2 5%
2 Difficult 15 37.5%
3 Very difficult 23 57.5%
Table 3: Students’ ideas about learning English vocabulary
3. Do you have time to learn English at home?
Most of them admitted that they do not have time to learn English vocabulary.

They have to support their parents either with farming or with other kinds of housework.
After all these troubles, they are so tired to learn any thing at all.
4. Do you often meet difficulties in learning vocabulary?
The common answer is “yes”. Sometimes they find hard understand meaning(s) of
new words. Other cases, even when the meaning is translated into Vietnamese, it is still
difficult for them to comprehend.
5. How do you think of your Vietnamese competence?
One hundred percent of the students admitted that their Vietnamese is very poor.
They can understand very simple Vietnamese. Their vocabulary is rather small. They
cannot express complicated things in Vietnamese.
6. Do you meet difficulties in pronouncing new vocabulary?
a. No b. Yes c. A few d. So many
18
Among 40 students, only one of them chose “no”, ten of them chose “yes”, nine of
them chose “some words”, and the left ones chose ‘a lot of words”. We can see that their
pronunciation is also another matter added to their pile of difficulties.
Figure 3: Students’ opinions about English vocabulary pronunciation
7. In your opinion, do Kinh students have more advantages of learning English vocabulary
than you do?
The answer is Kinh students learn new vocabulary much easier than the ethnic
students. And they believe if they have better conditions and education environment theior
schooling would be much improved.
8. Do you think that English is important to your job in the future?
They know clearly that, English is very important to their jobs in the future, all of
them chose the answer “yes’. But they still do not pay enough time on learning English,
because of many factors that hinder them from doing so. Firstly, they do not have time to
learn, secondly, some of them think they can learn it later when they have opportunity.
9. Do your parents often encourage you to learn English?
a. No b. Yes c. Sometimes
As shown in the following figure, most of their parents do not care about their

children’s English vocabulary learning or English learning in general. Only 5% (2 parents)
answered “yes”, 25% (10 parents) answered “sometimes”, and 70% (28 parents) gave
answers in “no”.
19
Figure 4: Students’ parents’ attitudes to their English learning
10. How do you spend your time on learning English as compared with other subjects?
Only five of them spend their times on learning English, the left spend most their
time on studying other subjects which are needed for their exams.
11. Do you often meet the following difficulties?
1. Difficulties in pronunciation due to differences in written and spoken forms
2. Difficulties in remembering collocations and multi-word verbs
3. Many subjects to study
4. Inadequate equipment and opportunities for learning vocabulary well.
Most of the students said that they lacked exposure to media namely, TV,
Newspapers, Internet, etc. Besides, they also suffer from poor teaching and learning
facilities such as; Projectors, cassette players, tapes, supplemental books so they meet
many difficulties in their learning.
It is very hard for them to pronounce English words because there is difference
between writing and pronouncing English words, they have to study many subjects at the
same time and their fundamental knowledge is still poor.
IV.2. Results and discussion from the interview
Through the interviews, most of the teachers once again agreed that teaching
vocabulary to ethnic minority pupils is a big problem because these pupils are not at the
same level of fundamental knowledge, such as, Vietnamese competence, English
competence… Most of the teachers are Kinh people who come here from other provinces
so they do not know their students’ customs and traditions, that why they often experience
culture shocks.
All of the interviewed teachers are aware of the importance of the vocabulary in
language teaching and learning, especially to ethnic minority students. They are aware of
20

the fact that the first thing to do is to upgrade the students’ Vietnamese competence. After
that, help the students to improve their English. Through the interviews, I found that
teachers have made much effort to find out the solutions to solve their problems by visiting
students’ families, or trying to discover Thai’s culture.
When I asked the students, they also give the same answers as their teachers’. They
said that some words in Vietnamese are very strange for them so they cannot understand
very well; another reason is that students do not have clear reasons for their learning; some
of them even do not know the reason for learning English. In addition, they are lack of the
basic knowledge so when they learn English they meet many difficulties.
IV.3. Results and discussion from the students' family visiting
From 1
st
of February to 15
th
February, the researcher visited some of the students'
families. All of the students live in remote villages (in Thai language "Ban"), most of their
parents are farmers or one of them is a farmer. They live in a large family, in their families,
there are at least three generations; their grand parents, their parents and themselves. Their
lives are very hard; they have to help their parents do the farming or the housework. Most
of them have four or five siblings. They have no time to do their homework or review their
lessons.
In their families, the infrastructures are very poor. There are only some essential
things, such as, tables, chairs, beds, pots and pans. Some families possess a TV set or radio
and, of course, they cannot imagine about a computer or Internet. They do not have any
other reference books, except for syllabus books.
IV.4. Results and discussion from the observation
During the periods from 15
th
of January to 25
th

of January 2008, the researcher
observed five classes in Dien Bien District Upper-Secondary Schools. The teachers had
been asked for permission.
The teachers’ techniques to teach vocabulary are poor and the materials are not
available so that the teachers’ lectures are often boring. They spend little time teaching
vocabulary; In addition, the students are passive in learning and too reserved. The classes
are too large so the teachers cannot control the whole class; the school is located at the
main street so it is very noisy. Sometimes the street's activities distracted students' attention
from their lesson. In the class, the equipment is too poor and in bad condition.
21
Chapter V: Findings and some solutions for better
teaching and learning English vocabulary to
ethnic minority students in upper-secondary
schools in Dien Bien
V.1. Findings
Through data collection and analysis, the researcher found out that there are four
categories of difficulties in teaching and learning English vocabulary to ethnic students in
Upper-Secondary Schools in Dien Bien: The teachers' difficulties, students' difficulties,
difficulties caused by the English vocabulary itself and the difficulties caused by other
factors.
V.1.1. Teachers' difficulties
In teaching vocabulary to ethnic students, the teachers met many difficulties, such
as culture shocks, teachers’ deficiency of English, lack of teaching equipments, students'
deficiency of Vietnamese, students' passive in learning and Intra-language.
V.1.1.1. Culture shock
In Dien Bien Upper-Secondary Schools' environment is the place where cultures
are mixed. This is a place where many kinds of cultures coexist. As in the above parts of
the study stated, because teachers and students come from different cultural backgrounds
so it is easy to understand when culture shocks happen.
"At my first lesson when I asked an ethnic student 'Em có hiểu bài không?' he

replied 'ừ' it was a great shock to me. I told myself, “Why they were so rude?” After that, I
found out in his language, the two answers to “yes” or “no” questions are 'ừ' (yes) and 'ừ
hư’ (no). (Nguyen Thi Hao, Tran Can School).
"Ethnic students talk with their friends, using 'tao' and 'mày', and this makes me
feel very uncomfortable. In Vietnamese, when using such personal pronouns the speaker
seems to be impolite or insult the hearer, but in Thai language, there are only two personal
pronouns for the first and second person: 'Cù' (I) and 'mưng' (you)." Said Nguyen Ngoc
Bien, Muong Luon School.
"In my lesson, a student of mine was very good at English, when I wanted to
encourage him to learn I touched on his head. He stood up immediately, and became very
angry. When my lesson finished, I asked my colleague he said that in Thai culture, it is a
serious taboo to touch on a person’s head. After that, I had to apologize to him and
22
everything become ok. Since then I have never done it again. It is amusing but this is the
truth."(Tran Thi Lien, Boarding School).
"I am an ethnic minority person myself so I know them clearly. I think teachers
who come from other places should get to know about their students before starting to
teach them. If they can do so, I believe they will be successful in their lessons". (Ca Van
Hien, Dien Bien District School).
V.1.1.2. Deficiency in spoken English
The levels of fluency in English of the teachers in secondary schools in Dien Bien
are different. They have a lot of difficulties in communicating in English, and their
pronunciation is terrible.
"I am pretty good at grammar, reading and writing. Nevertheless, my oral English
is very poor, especially, my pronunciation. I cannot pronounce some difficult words/
sounds correctly. In my teaching it is a long way to be perfect." (Ca Van Hien, Dien Bien
District School).
"In our lessons, most of us use Vietnamese to teach, some of us have tried to use
English to teach but the students did not understand. If the teachers used English more
frequently in their lessons, I believe that the students' vocabulary will be improved. But

how can I do even the teacher meets difficulties in using English."(Nguyen Thi Huong,
Dien Bien District School).
V.1.1.3. Lack of appropriate materials for ethnic minority students
One of the essential things in teaching and learning is text books and related
material, without which, the learning and teaching process will be very difficult. But in
these schools, there is nothing to support learning and teaching except the syllabus books.
"There is nothing to read or study, if there are some newspapers or books in
English, the teaching and learning in this school will be better. Not only the teachers but
also the students are eager to read the materials like that. Through these activities, students
will love English and of course the school results will be improved". (Pham Thi Hoa,
Thanh Chan School).
"I know that there are many kinds of books or stories and newspapers in English,
but in this school's library, none of these exist." (Pham Van Cuong, Dien Bien Boarding
school).
23
V.1.1.4. Lack of teaching equipment
In teaching and learning foreign languages, especially English, teaching
equipments such as, labs, televisions, radios, cassette players and computers are really
necessary. But in these schools, there are no labs, no computers for students. There are
some cassette players but they are in bad condition. Following are some teachers' remakes.
"As you can see we really need the teaching and learning equipment here. There are
no labs or Internet for students to study. There are only four cassette players so we have to
use them in turn, and sometimes they have problems and we have to cancle the listing
lesson." (Tran Thanh Tu, Thanh Chan School).
"If there are some projectors for the teachers and students to use, the teaching and
learning will be very much easier, especially to ethnic students. For example, there are
some things they do not know because they have never seen before so I can get the pictures
from the Internet and show to them."(Hoang Van Truong, Muong Luon School).
V.1.1.5. Students' deficiency of Vietnamese
For ethnic students, Vietnamese is the second language, and for most of them,

Vietnamese is very difficult. When the teacher tells the students the meaning of English
words in Vietnamese, they sometimes do not understand, because their Vietnamese
vocabulary is very limited. Being asked on this topic each of the interviewed teachers gave
his/her own story.
"When teaching the word 'underground' I provided Vietnamese equivalent 'tàu
điện ngầm'. I tried very hard to explain what 'tàu điện ngầm' means but none of my
students seemed to understand. I was very upset, but later I realized that my poor students
had no idea about ‘underground’. They have never seen it in their life. "(Nguyen Duc
Bien, Tran Can School).
"I found it very difficult to teach them the words belong to technology such as, in
unit 5: technology and you. They could not understand the words, which denote the
computer's components. It is understandable, because they have never seen a computer so
how can they understand it." (Ca Van Hien, Dien Bien District Upper - Secondary School).
V.1.1.6. Students' passiveness in learning
In the class, they have become accustomed to the traditional classroom methods.
They always sit motionlessly, take notes while the teachers lecture, and speak only they are
24
spoken to. After many years of schooling in traditional settings, students rely heavily on
teacher’s teaching, now it is extremely different to make them to be active.
"The ethnic students are too deserved, so it is difficult to get them learn new words
or do some class activities."(Tran Thi Lien, Dien Bien Boarding School).
"They are too passive in learning, they only do or react when they are called or
requested. In English lessons, of course, it is not good."(Do Duc Thuong, Dien Bien
District School).
V.1.2. Students' difficulties
V.1.2.1. Lack of fundamental knowledge
Fundamental knowledge is one of the essential conditions to a learner when he
wants to learn a language. Learning a language means learning the culture of the
community which possesses the language.
We know very well that world knowledge is very important for us to master a new

language, but for ethnic students, the fundamental knowledge is really a problem. Most of
them live far from cities or town centers, some of them have never been to cities or town
centers, so it is difficult for them to express themselves when exposing to new things that
often happen only in cities or far at seas.
"In some lessons, such as, the undersea world, music, films and cinema, the
historical places, there are a lot of things or places we have never seen or heard before.
When I study these words it is really hard for me to remember or use". (Lu Van An, Phieng
Ca Village).
"When talking about the world cup, I have nothing to talk about, because I do not
have any information about it. If I have a television, it will be ok. Because I can watch it
on TV, I love football but in my living area, people are still very poor, TV set is a valuable
property". (Lo Van Tan, Huoi Tao Village).
V.1.2.2. Lack of motivation
Most of them admitted that they are lack of motivation from their parents or
teachers in learning vocabulary. Because grammar still plays a decisive role in all English
examinations for secondary schools in Vietnam, so they spend a lot of time studying
grammar.
"I know vocabulary is important but in examinations, the grammar seems to be
more important". (Lu Van An, Phieng Ca Village).
25