the influence of vietnamese learning culture on upper-secondary school students’ attitudes towards communicative activities in learning english

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES





BÙI VĂN HẬU



THE INFLUENCE OF VIETNAMESE LEARNING CULTURE
ON UPPER-SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES
TOWARDS COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES IN LEARNING ENGLISH

(Tác động của văn hóa học tập ở Việt Nam đến thái độ
của học sinh trung học phổ thông đối với các hoạt động học
tiếng Anh theo đường hướng giao tiếp)


M.A. MINOR THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60.140.111




HANOI - 2014

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES





BÙI VĂN HẬU



THE INFLUENCE OF VIETNAMESE LEARNING CULTURE
ON UPPER-SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES
TOWARDS COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES IN LEARNING ENGLISH

(Tác động của văn hóa học tập ở Việt Nam đến thái độ
của học sinh trung học phổ thông đối với các hoạt động học
tiếng Anh theo đường hướng giao tiếp)

M.A. MINOR THESIS


Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60.140.111
Supervisor: Dr. Lê Văn Canh


HANOI - 2014

i

DECLARATION OF AUTHENTICITY

This work is submitted as partial requirements for the Master‟s Degree in English
Language Teaching Methodology by the University of Languages and International Stud-
ies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi. I declare that the work presented is to the best of
my knowledge original, except as acknowledged in the script, and that the material has not
been submitted, either in whole or in part, for a degree at this or other educational institu-
tions.

Signed: _______________________________________________ Date: May 2014

ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to express my gratitude to people who have, in various ways, contrib-
uted to the completion of this thesis. First and foremost, I would like to give my most sin-
cere thanks to Dr. Le Van Canh, my supervisor, for not only his responses to any of my
questions but also for his encouragement at any time of my hardship.
I would like to thank Nguyen Viet Hung, my friend, a PhD student at the University,
for helping me much with advice and encouragement.
I am grateful to the students and teachers at my researched Upper-Secondary School
for their cooperation during my data collection period.
I owe a great debt to my wife, daughter and my families for the patience and encour-
agement I have had from them.
I believe that with all contribution of the people mentioned, I have an improved final
thesis; however, there are unavoidably remaining weaknesses in this thesis, all of which
belong to my responsibility, and all of which I should learn from.

iii

ABSTRACT
The present study explored the influence of Vietnamese learning culture on upper-
secondary school students‟ attitudes towards communicative activities in English learning.
The survey study method was adopted, and the questionnaires were delivered to a system-
atically selected sample of 166 students from one upper-secondary school in a mountain-
ous region in Vietnam. This aimed at collecting necessary data for answering three re-
search questions about the students‟ belief about language learning, the influence of this
belief on the students‟ opinion about the role of teacher and learner and on their prefer-
ences for English learning activities both inside and outside the classroom.
The findings demonstrated influence of the Vietnamese culture of learning on the
students‟ attitudes towards communicative English learning activities, some of which were
favourable for utilisation of communicative activities. These concern their openness in
communication, and a greater responsibility they took for their own learning. They also
indicated the students‟ positive attitudes towards group work activities, which are typical
of CLT techniques. Besides, the study showed evidence of the students‟ negative attitudes
towards communicative activities, which resulted from the incompatibleness of these ac-
tivities to the Vietnamese culture of learning. Basically, this incompatibility is related with
the students‟ perceived drudgery nature of learning, the cultural strategies for effective
learning through memorisation and error avoidance, the necessity for maintaining harmo-
nious relationships, the students‟ passive learning, and their respect for and unequal rela-
tionship with the teacher.
Based on these findings, some suggestions were proposed concerning either adapta-
tion of the CLT approach and its spawn activities to the cultural context of the study, or
adjustment of the students‟ Vietnamese learning culture, or both. All of this aims at suc-
cessful implementation of CLT at the researched school.

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TABLE OF CONTENT

DECLARATION OF AUTHENTICITY I
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS II
ABSTRACT III
TABLE OF CONTENT IV
LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES VI
PART A: INTRODUCTION 1
1. Rationale of Study 1
2. Research Aims and Questions 2
3. Methods of Study 3
4. Scope of Study 3
5. Significance of Study 3
6. Organisation of the Thesis 3
PART B: DEVELOPMENT 4
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 4
1.1. Introduction 4
1.2. Communicative Language Teaching: Principles and Characteristics 4
1.3. Learning Activities in Light of CLT 6
1.4. Communicative Activities 7
1.5. Role of Teacher and Learner in CLT 8
1.6. Culture, Attitude and Behaviour 9

1.7. Vietnamese Learning Culture 11
1.8. Conceptions of Learning in Vietnamese Culture 12
1.9. Learning Culture and CLT 14
CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY 18
2.1. The Research Site 18
2.2. Methodology 18
2.3. Participants and the Ethical Issue 19
2.4. Instrument 19
2.4.1. Rationale for choosing the questionnaire and question type 19
2.4.2. Validity and reliability 20
2.4.3. Questionnaire items 22
2.5. Data Collection and Analysis Procedure 23
2.6. Findings and Discussion 24

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2.6.1. Beliefs about Language Learning 24
2.6.2. Role of Teacher and Learner 29
2.6.3. Preference for Learning Activities 32
2.6.4. Students‟ English Learning Habits 34
2.6.5. The Influence of Vietnamese Learning Culture on the Students‟ Attitudes
towards Communicative Activities in Learning English 36
PART C: CONCLUSION 39
1. Conclusions and Implications 39
2. Limitations and recommendations for further research 41
REFERENCES 43
APPENDICES I
APPENDIX 1: A MODEL FOR SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNING (SPOLSKY, 1989, P.28) I
APPENDIX 2: QUESTIONNAIRE EVALUATION FORM II
APPENDIX 3: QUESTIONNAIRE (ENGLISH VERSION) III

APPENDIX 4: STUDENTS‟ CONCEPTIONS OF HOW LEARNING SHOULD TAKE PLACE VII
APPENDIX 5: STUDENTS‟ BELIEF ABOUT THE ROLE OF TEACHER AND LEARNER VIII
APPENDIX 6: STUDENTS‟ PREFERENCE FOR ENGLISH LEARNING ACTIVITIES IX


vi

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

Figures

Figure 1. Culture – Attitude – Behaviour 10
Figure 2. Respondents’ Gender 24
Figure 3. Respondents’ English Proficiency 24


Tables

Table 1. Questionnaires Delivered and Collected 24
Table 2. Students’ Conceptions of Learning 25
Table 3. Students’ Belief about the Role of Teacher and Learner 30
Table 4. Students’ Preference for English Learning Activities 33
Table 5. Students’ Most Favoured, Most Disfavoured and Home Activities 35

1

PART A: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale of Study
Since the time of Marcus Tullius Cicero, a Roman philosopher, and later in the Ren-
aissance theories, until now all languages have been considered to be of equal status (Pym,

2007). This is because “there is nothing intrinsically limiting, demanding, or handicapping
about any of them” (Crystal, 1987, p.6, cited by Kasaian and Subbakrishna, 2011, p.165).
The English language is not an exception. Although English was said to be a source of
gratification to mankind because it was spoken in two of the greatest powers of the world
(Jesperson, 1905), that is, America and Britain, it has no intrinsic linguistic supremacy
over other languages in the world (Kasaian and Subbakrishna, 2011). Nonetheless, “for
good or ill, the dominance of English as the world‟s preferred second or foreign language
has been increasing in recent years” (Canh, 2004). For this reason, “those who are able to
exploit it, whether to sell goods and services or to sell ideas, wield a very considerable
power”; furthermore, “if you want to resist the exploitive power of English, you have to
use English to do it” (Halliday, 2006, p.362, cited by Van, 2010, p.17). Although the
statement is ideological, it has some truth in it.
Since the utility of English has been perceived as a passport for many desired things
in life, English teaching has consequently been regarded to be able to serve individual, na-
tional, and international needs (Canh, 2004), and “if people are deprived of the chance of
learning it, they are the ones who suffer” (Halliday, 2006, p.362, cited by Van, 2010, p.17).
During the course of teaching and learning English, numerous methods have come and
gone because there is no one-size-fits-all method that can meet the goals and needs of all
learners and programs. As a matter of rule, in the 1970s Communicative Language Teach-
ing (CLT) emerged, in the West, and started being discussed as a fashionable way of teach-
ing languages, and by the turn of the new millennium, CLT had become a real buzzword in
language teaching methodology around the world (Dornyei, 2009). In this context, educa-
tion administrators, English language educators and teachers have navigated their attention
toward CLT, as a response to its irresistible appeal. Accordingly, CLT has widely been ac-
cepted as an effective way of teaching English as a second and foreign language
(ESL/EFL). This is because there is an unspoken assumption that CLT is not only “mod-
ern”, but is in fact the only way to learn a language properly; hence, a country without
CLT is somehow backward; teachers who do not use CLT approach in their teaching are
backward; methodologies which are considered to be traditional and the one based on route

2

learning are said to be behind in comparison with communicative approaches (Bax, 2003,
p.281).
Vietnam is not an exception from the spread of CLT. Although CLT was introduced
into the country rather later than into other countries in the neighbourhood (Canh and Bar-
nard, 2009), it has been rhetorical in the whole school system of the country, especially at
the general education level. However, scholars and researchers have reported the unsatis-
factory implementation of this approach in Vietnam (Canh, 2004; Canh, 2011; Canh and
Barnard, 2009; Barnard and Viet, 2010; Nguyen and Franken, 2010; Thinh, 2006; Phu,
2008; Van, 2010; Son, 2011; Hung, 2011; Vietnamnet, 2012; Toan, 2013; Khang, 2014).
One of the reasons for the failure of CLT implementation in Vietnam is that the ap-
proach is imposed without taking into consideration the students‟ learning culture, which
influences students‟ attitudes towards learning activities, learning behaviours, and learning
habits. However, this issue has often been ignored. I believe that for the success of innova-
tion, the first step to be taken should be the understanding of learners‟ learning culture so
that teachers can decide what aspects of the intended innovation fit the students‟ learning
culture, and what aspects of the students‟ learning culture should be changed to accommo-
date the intended pedagogical innovation. This is the rationale for my study.
2. Research Aims and Questions
Being inspired by all the above mentioned rationales and my preliminary interest,
this survey study aims to explore the influence of Vietnamese learning culture on attitudes
of the upper-secondary school students in a mountainous area toward CLT. Information
gained from this study is aimed to help teachers to make their teaching more learner-
centred by modifying the principles of CLT to the students‟ learning culture for better edu-
cational results. With this aim in mind, the study was designed to seek answers to the fol-
lowing research questions:
1. What is the students‟ belief about language learning?
2. How do their beliefs about language learning affect their opinions of the teacher‟s
role and student‟s role in the English language classroom?

3. How do their beliefs about language learning affect their preferences for language
learning activities both inside and outside the classroom?
It is hoped that answers to the above questions can inform classroom teachers of how
to adapt CLT in their classrooms.

3

3. Methods of Study
In order to achieve the above-stated aims, this research adopts the survey study
framework with the use of a questionnaire as the key instrument for data collection. As the
purpose of this study is to gain insights into students‟ attitudes to, and opinions of, learning
activities, the survey method is appropriate. However, the survey was conducted with a
small group of upper-secondary school students who were chosen purposefully in one
school in a mountainous region of Vietnam. Therefore, no generalization of the findings
was intended. Rather, the findings can be used to inform teachers of English in this and
other similar schools of how to adapt CLT more effectively.
4. Scope of Study
The study limits itself to the exploration and description how the students‟ learning
culture influences their learning of English within the context of an upper-secondary
school in one northern mountainous province.
5. Significance of Study
This study hopes to be significant in pointing out some culturally inappropriate as-
pects of the CLT approach to a group of school students in a mountainous area. This un-
derstanding can lead to some suggestions for how to adapt CLT to the local learning cul-
ture so as to raise the educational effectiveness.
6. Organisation of the Thesis
The thesis is composed of three parts: Introduction, Development and Conclusion.
Part A introduces the rationale, research aims and questions, method, scope and signifi-
cance of the study. Part B – the Development – includes a review of the related literature
(Chapter 1) and issues concerning the methodology, participants, instruments, the proce-

dure of data collection and analysis, findings and discussions of the findings (Chapter 2).
Part C – the Conclusion – presents the concluding remarks drawn from this survey as well
as the recommendations for adapting CLT in the researched school and other similar
schools.


4

PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1. Introduction
First introduced in the 1970s by British applied linguists as a reaction away from
grammar-based language teaching approaches, CLT is a multi-perspectival approach that
builds on several disciplines that include, at least, linguistics, psychology, philosophy, so-
ciology, and educational research (Savignon, 1991, 2002; Hu, 2002; Dornyei, 2009; Asass-
feh et al., 2012). Beside this widely accepted view, there have been many attempts in ac-
counting for the formation of CLT; nevertheless, for personally logical reason, this paper
presents a combined view of these scholars and some others on the background of CLT.
1.2. Communicative Language Teaching: Principles and Characteristics
CLT is resulted from a shift in the way language is viewed. Accordingly, while lan-
guage is still considered as consisting of vocabulary, structures and rules with which,
through learning, learners can make grammatically correct sentences, it is not a static sys-
tem of interconnected units but social behaviour, which is used purposefully, and always in
context (Savignon, 1991, 2002). Its primary function is for interaction and communication:
people communicating with others to accomplish some course of action. Therefore, lan-
guage is said to be instrumental to communicative functions such as making, expressing,
exchanging and negotiating meaning (Ma, 2009; Hu, 2002). The assumption is that there is
always interdependence between form and meaning, or between structural and functional
aspects of language within a language (Hu, 2002). Thus, knowing a language means not

solely knowing how to construct sentences in isolation, but also knowing how to combine
sentences into texts and to put texts in discourse of the speech community in order to fulfil
some task and meet some need. CLT has made this one of its most characteristic features
when “it pays systematic attention to functional as well as structural aspects of language,
combining these into a more fully communicative view” (Littlewood, 1981, p.1, cited by
Dornyei, 2009). Moreover, it also puts more emphases on meaningful use than on the form
with the guiding principle that “accuracy and acquisition of the formal features of the L2
[second language] are less a measure of successful language learning than are fluency and
an ability to get something across comprehensibly to a native speaker” (Sanders, 1987,
p.222, cited by Beale, 2002, p.19).

5

In order to communicate effectively in a language, people need to have the following
four aspects of abilities (Stern, 1983, cited by Ma, 2009):
 The intuitive mastery of the forms of language
 The intuitive mastery of the linguistic, cognitive, affective and social-cultural
meanings expressed by the language forms
 The capacity to use the language with maximum attention to communication and
minimum attention to form
 The creativity of language use
Hymes (1971 cited in Ma, 2009), while reacting to Chomsky‟s conception of compe-
tence and performance, is concerned more with language in the speech communities and in
its integration with communication and culture. To him, linguistic knowledge is a neces-
sary but not sufficient condition for successful communication. People also need to under-
stand about culture, through which they know how to interact in culturally acceptable ways
with others in different situations and relationships. He proposes an influential theory of
communicative competence.
Communicative competence is defined as “the ability to communicate in a personally
effective and socially appropriate manner” (Trenholm and Jensen, 1988, cited by Ma,

2009, p.41). Canale and Swain (1980) conceive it more broadly by relating it with the con-
cept of social behaviour: communicative competence is the ability to interpret and enact
appropriate social behaviours which requires the active involvement of the learner in the
production of the target language. For this reason, communicative competence plays a not
only necessary but very important role in language proficiency. It is even identified as “the
most important linguistic ability”, which helps to “produce or understand utterances which
are not so much grammatical but, more important, appropriate to context in which they are
made” (Campbell and Wales, 1970, p.247, cited by Canale and Swain, 1980, p.4, italics in
original). Communicative competence consists of four components, including grammatical
competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence, and strategic competence
(Ma, 2009; Canale and Swain, 1980; Latha and Rajan, 2012; Beale, 2002; Richards, 2006).
The grammatical (or linguistic) component refers to the knowledge of lexis, syntax,
morphology, phonology and the like. It concerns the language users‟ understanding about
how phonemes are combined into words, how words come together to form phrases,
clauses or sentences, and how sentences are sounded with stresses and with different into-

6

nations. Briefly speaking, grammatical competence is the cognition of linguistic rules,
which enables people to create and understand grammatically correct sentences.
Sociolinguistic competence implies knowing what is expected socially and cultur-
ally by members of the speech community. This element transcends its linguistic counter-
part because with knowledge of language alone, people cannot use language appropriately,
and therefore, effectively. They need to know about sociolinguistic rules, which stipulate,
for example, what to say to people of different statuses and different relationships in dif-
ferent circumstances. This knowledge is also about how to response nonverbally in particu-
lar ways basing on the purpose of the interaction. It enables people to vary their use of lan-
guage according to the setting and the participants.
Discourse competence is related to the logical meaning relationship between sen-
tences, that is to say, in a text or a discourse. It concerns the ways, for instance, how sen-

tences are grouped, with different discourse markers, and rules of cohesion and coherence,
in different discourse structures, in meaningful ways to serve language users‟ purposes.
These discourse principles are also important clues for processing different types of texts,
and perceiving and comprehending the meaning that the conversational partners want to
convey.
Strategic competence is the knowledge of communication strategies that people em-
ploy in interaction. It is, for example, “the ability to know how to keep a conversation go-
ing, how to terminate the conversation, and how to clear up communication breakdown as
well as comprehension problems” (Ma, 2009, p.41). Basically, when people use communi-
cation strategies, they manipulate their language to meet their communicative purpose. For
this reason, it can be said that this kind of understanding is the compensation for the limita-
tion in or reinforcement of people‟s understanding of linguistic, sociolinguistic and dis-
course rules.
From the communicative competence perspective, learning a language is to facilitate
the integration of the four types of knowledge for learners (Canale and Swain, 1980;
Asassfeh et al., 2012; Richards, 2006; Savignon, 2002; Hu, 2002; Ma, 2009; Latha and Ra-
jan, 2012), as dissected above.
1.3. Learning Activities in Light of CLT
CLT emphasizes “activities that involve real communication promote learning”
(Richards and Rogers, 1986, p.72). It requires that the input language for teaching and
learning must be “realistic samples of discourse use surrounding native speaker and non-

7

native speaker accomplishments of targeted tasks” (Doughty and Long, 2003, p.61). On the
other hand, since the language classroom aims at preparing for learners‟ survival in the real
world, the relationship between classroom activities and real life is essential; therefore,
learning and use of language must be contextualised and must utilise authentic materials,
situations, activities, and tasks (Richards, 2006; Hu, 2002), through active participation
into which, learners are better prepared to function in real-world communicative events.

Furthermore, the input language must also be rich, meaning that it is complex in terms of
not only language but also quality, quantity, variety, genuineness, and relevance.
In addition, since CLT activities are required to involve real communication, they
must promote cooperative and collaborative learning. As pointed out by Vygotsky (1978),
teacher‟s assistance and social interactions play a crucial role helping learners reach a po-
tential that exceeds their current level of development; therefore, conversational interaction
must be used as a means of developing communicative competence, which relies on learn-
ers‟ own ability to interactively negotiate meaning with each other.
Norris et al. (1998, p.31) explain that:
the best way to learn and teach a language is through social interactions. [. . . they] al-
low students to work toward a clear goal, share information and opinions, negotiate
meaning, get the interlocutor‟s help in comprehending input, and receive feedback on
their language production. In the process, learners not only use their inter-language,
but also modify it, which in turn promotes acquisition.
Savignon (1991) shares this view and comments that communicative tasks determine
the opportunities for language use, for the interpretation, expression, and negotiation of
meaning.
1.4. Communicative Activities
By definition, communicative activities are those which focus on practice in using
language within a real communicative context, in which real information is exchanged, and
in which the language used is not totally predictable (Richards, 2006). They have some of
the following typical characteristics (Richards, 2006, p.23):
 They seek to develop students‟ communicative competence through linking gram-
matical development to the ability to communicate.
 They create the need for communication, interaction, and negotiation of meaning
through the use of activities such as problem solving, information sharing, and role
play.

8

 They provide opportunities for both inductive as well as deductive learning of gram-
mar.
 They make use of content that connects to students‟ lives and interests.
 They allow students to personalise learning by applying what they have learned to
their own lives.
 Classroom materials typically make use of authentic texts to create interest and to pro-
vide valid models of language.
Examples of activities of this type are information-gap activities, jigsaw activities,
task-completion activities (puzzles, games, map-reading), information-gathering activities
(surveys, interviews, and searches), opinion-sharing activities, information-transfer activi-
ties, reasoning-gap activities, role plays.
1.5. Role of Teacher and Learner in CLT
It is widely accepted that changes in teacher‟s and learner‟s role are one of the big-
gest differences between traditional language teaching approaches and CLT, which results
from the type of classroom activities, i.e. communicative activities, proposed in CLT,
which are in turn led from the emphasis in CLT on the processes of communication, rather
than mastery of language forms. For this reason, CLT is conceived to derive from “a set of
principles about the goals of language teaching, how learners learn a language, the kinds of
classroom activities that best facilitate learning, and the roles of teachers and learners in
the classroom” (Richards, 2006, p.2, italics added). Jacobs and Farrell (2003), cited by
Richards (2006), see the shift toward CLT as marking a paradigm shift in our thinking
about teachers, learning, and teaching.
Accordingly, language education with CLT is no longer a “banking” system with
bank-account-learners into which regular deposits (knowledge and skills) are made to be
drawn later for specific purposes like examination (Choudhury, 2011), but “landscapes of
practices” (Wenger, 2010, p.3), in which learners have greater choice over their own learn-
ing, both in terms of the content of learning as well as processes they might employ (Rich-
ards, 2006). They can develop their own routes to language learning, progress at different
rates, and have different needs and motivations for language learning. They are considered
to be the centre of the learning process in which diversity among learners is paid greater

attention and viewed not as impediments to learning but as resources to be recognized, ca-
tered to, and appreciated. Learning language with CLT, learners have to participate in
classroom activities which are based on a cooperative rather than individualistic approach

9

to learning. They have to become comfortable with listening to their peers in group work
or pair work tasks, rather than relying on the teacher for a model. They are expected to take
on a greater degree of responsibility for their own learning (Richards, 2006).
On the other hand, teachers in CLT classroom no longer play a dominant role in the
classroom; they are not authorities, like the Titans or Atlas of Greek mythology, who bear
the burden of the whole class and learners‟ learning on their shoulders. They are no longer
viewed as the source of all knowledge (and the model or exemplar of morality as in the
case of Vietnam), who fill, through teaching-as-modelling-and-explanation, receptacle
learners with knowledge (and virtue). The role of teachers in the CLT classroom is that of
a facilitator, who creates a classroom climate conducive to language learning and provides
opportunities for students to use and practice the language and to reflect on language use
and language learning. Rather than being models for correct speech and writing and ones
with the primary responsibility of making students produce plenty of error-free sentences,
teachers have to develop a different view of learners‟ errors and of their own role in facili-
tating language learning (Richards, 2006). Besides, teachers can also play the role of an
independent participant within the learning-teaching group, a researcher and learner, or
that of an analyst, a counsellor, and a group process manager (Richards and Rodgers,
1987).
For this reason, CLT has been considered to be a learner-centred approach to lan-
guage teaching; it takes into account learners‟ backgrounds, language needs, and goals and
allows learners some creativity and role in instructional decisions (Canale and Swain,
1980; Beale, 2002).
1.6. Culture, Attitude and Behaviour
It is undeniable that culture is an omnipresent entity (Kramsch, 1993, cited by Jabeen

and Shah, 2011), which pervades and influences all fields of life. It influences people‟s be-
haviours by “establish[ing] for each person a context of cognitive and affective behaviour,
a template for personal and social existence” (Brown, 2007, p.189). On the other hand, atti-
tude and culture are considered as mutually dependant terms, and whenever culture is
reckoned, the concept of attitude is also in one way or another brought up (Jabeen and
Shah, 2011). In Ajzen‟s and Fishbein‟s (1973) view, attitude and overt behaviour are
closely related. Olson and Zanna (1993, p.125), cited by Bakker (1996, p.34), remark that
values, as constituent of culture, can be seen as determinants for attitudes and behavioural
intentions and can be used to predict attitudes towards specific subjects. Although this

10

study does not delve into exploring the connection between culture, attitude and behav-
iours, this section reviews the related literature to make explicit, to some extent, this rela-
tionship as well as to give a theoretical evidence for the cruciality of taking into considera-
tion culture/learning culture in adoption of CLT.
Culture plays a very important role in constituting a person‟s attitude toward an ob-
ject, an act/behaviour or another person, which in turn influence, to a large extent, his/her
behavioural intentions and subsequently overt behaviours. This can be summarised figura-
tively as follows:








Figure 1. Culture – Attitude – Behaviour
(Adapted from Ajzen and Fishbein, 1975, and Bakker, 1996)

As can be seen in figure 1, overt behaviours not only are influenced (the solid ar-
rows) by cultures through the two paths of attitude and subjective norm but also give feed-
back (the dashed arrow) to the actor‟s cultural values and normative beliefs. This may in-
spire some implications for implementation of CLT at the researched school, which will be
discussed later Part 3.
Bearing a similar view to Ajzen‟s and Fishbein‟s but specific to the field of second
and foreign language learning, Spolsky (1989, p.131) proposes that social factors, which
include culture, influence second language learning in two indirect but essential ways (Ap-
pendix 1). Firstly, they play a major role in developing in the learner the set of attitudes
towards the language being learned, its speakers and the language learning situation (in
the case of this study, communicative activities) that are hypothesised to directly influence
motivation. Secondly, they determine the social provision of language learning situations
and opportunity of various kinds.
So far, what has been aroused is that learners‟ attitudes toward communicative activi-
ties in English learning are very much likely to be affected by Vietnamese culture of learn-

Culturally
determined
values

Attitude

Subjective
norm

Behavioural
intentions

Normative

beliefs

Overt
behaviours

11

ing. This influence in turn may lead to learners‟ English learning behaviours and result in
learning effectiveness. For this reason, research into this issue can hopefully, in the one
hand, give an account for the current situation of CLT deployment and, to some extent,
raise some awareness of this issue at the researched site, on the other hand.
1.7. Vietnamese Learning Culture
Being one form of culture, culture of learning is understood as “taken for granted
frameworks of expectations, attitudes, values and beliefs about what constitutes good
learning, about how to teach or learn, whether and how to ask questions, what textbooks
are for, and how language teaching relates to broader issues of the nature and purpose of
education” (Cortazzi and Jin, 1996, p.169). The concept of culture of learning implies that
learning is cultural, and learning or, more broadly, education is deeply rooted in the history
and culture of the community or society in which it is located (Cortazzi and Jin, 1996,
2013). Learning culture is not a matter of different ways of learning but beyond content or
syllabus differences; it includes deeper presuppositions and values, for example, about the
nature of school subjects or the roles of students and teachers in interaction (Cotazzi and
Jin, 2013).
An important aspect in Vietnamese culture of learning is the concept of face; which
is considered to be powerful due to the collectivist nature of the society (Cortazzi and Jin,
1996). This is much reflected in learners‟ behaviours in classroom. They would not inter-
rupt the lesson by questioning because by questioning teachers, it is thought that they are
questioning the teacher‟s authority and challenging his/her knowledge. This is categorised
as showing disrespect to the teacher because if learners pose a question that teacher cannot
answer, the teacher (and the learner questioning) will lose face. Therefore, if learners have

some issue needing explicating, they will simply wait thinking that the teacher will proba-
bly mention it later. In case it is not mentioned, it is because the issue is not worth men-
tioning, and leaners will probably ask questions to the teacher individually after the class
time. Learners‟ respect to teachers can also be seen in other ways learners behave in class-
room. They would all stand up to greet the teacher at the beginning of the lesson and would
remain standing until being allowed to sit. When they want to go out, they are expected to
ask the teacher for permission to do so. This is similar to the case when they have some-
thing to say: they have to raise their hand and wait for the teacher‟s allowing them to
speak.

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1.8. Beliefs of Learning in Vietnamese Culture
It can be said that learning in Vietnam is influenced, firstly, by face-saving and har-
mony-maintaining culture. This features the collectivist nature of Vietnamese culture. In
Vietnam, each member of the community sees themselves as belonging to an in-group;
they do not want to stand out from this collective and do not want to be seen as the “nail
that sticks up” (Anderson, 1993, cited by Littlewood, 2000). For this reason, they are reluc-
tant to participate in discussions, in which people have to challenge each other‟s ideas to
reach agreement on certain issues. By doing so, they can avoid the risk of their ideas being
vetoed by other members or their vetoing others‟ ideas, through which they can save face
for not only themselves but also for others, and maintain a harmonious relationship with
and among members (Littrell, 2005; Kramsch and Sullivan, 1996; Qiao and Tan, n.d.; Lit-
tlewood, 2000; Phuong-Mai et al., 2006; Trang and Baldauf, 2007; McCornac & Chi,
2005; Lee, n.d.; Lewis and McCook, 2002; Huong, 2008). Since losing face inflicts ex-
tremely serious personal damage, and one should try to avoid it at any price (Hofstede and
Hofstede, 2005, cited by Phuong-Mai et al., 2006), there is an intense fear of making mis-
takes among Vietnamese people; these are reflected in common proverbs that serve as
maxims for interpersonal communication. Examples include “twisting your tongue seven
times before speaking out your thought” (Uốn lưỡi bảy lần trước khi nói), or “words cost

no money, so people should speak beautifully to please others” (Lời nói chẳng mất tiền
mua, lựa lời mà nói cho vừa lòng nhau). On this respect, Huong (2008) refers to Duong,
Diller and Sutherland‟s (1975, p.126) comment that:
According to Vietnamese custom, one should remain modest and humble, showing the
extent of knowledge or skills only when asked. In Vietnam, there is the motto of say-
ing less than what one actually knows, often and admirable characteristic. Modesty
and humility for Vietnamese are very important social graces, and deeply ingrained
into their identity.
This norm spontaneously affects the way learners behave in classroom; they dare not
volunteer personal ideas, either for fear of being considered silly or for fear of making oth-
ers feel humiliated (Phuong-Mai et al., 2006). A learner may even think that he/she loses
face only due to he/she did not speak or state an issue clearly and thus was laughed at by
his/her classmate. According to Huong (2008), there is a widely accepted view in Vietnam
that a learner should speak little but correctly rather than verbalise a lot but wrongly. This
view is also recognised by Lewis & McCook (2002, p.147), in their accounting for Asian

13

learners‟ learning style; they state that verbal perfection has been traditionally valued
across many Asian cultures, which contributes to learners‟ quietness in class and their sel-
dom voluntarily expressing ideas or contributing to the lesson. In her study, Phuong-Mai et
al. (2006) also draw a similar conclusion that learners from Confucian heritage cultures
(CHC) are usually quiet, shy, reticent and lacking initiative; they dislike public touching
and overt displays of opinions or emotions, do not talk in class, but instead expect the
teacher to teach them everything they are expected to know. They have little desire to dis-
cover for themselves, wish to be spoon-fed, and, therefore, teacher-dominated classrooms
are common.
Another Confucian belief in education is the “learn-to-use” philosophy. Accordingly,
learning is considered to be an accumulating process of knowledge rather than a practical
process of constructing and using knowledge for immediate use (“learn-by-using” philoso-

phy) (Phu, 2008; Cortazzi and Jin, 1996; Littrell, 2005; An, 2002; Biggs, 1998; Huong,
2008; Lee, n.d.). For this reason, the focus of teaching is not on how teachers and students
can create, construct, and apply knowledge in an experiential approach, but on how extant
authoritative knowledge can be transmitted and internalised in a most effective and effi-
cient way. This conception can also be explained with the respect that people have for
knowledge as well as knowledgeable men. Therefore, the importance is attached to knowl-
edge and memory over creativity as the dominant method of acquiring knowledge (Lee,
n.d.; Kramsch and Sullivan, 1996). This way of learning has been reckoned as “passive
learning”, “rote learning”, “silent learning” or “memorisation”, through which knowledge
is “poured” into the students‟ heads without them having any real opportunity to exercise.
However, an interesting feature of Vietnamese learners is that though they are thought of
learning by rote or memorisation, they are only silent and inactive in the surface. The sur-
vey conducted by Duong Thi Hoang Oanh and Nguyen Thi Hien (2006) showed that both
teachers and students at the tertiary level emphasised memorization as an important strat-
egy for learning grammar and vocabulary.
Vietnamese learners prefer learning through exemplars or models. This leads to the
importance of the textbook and, especially, the teacher as the model of not only knowledge
but also morality, who learners have to strive to become alike. Therefore, Phuoc (1975),
cited by An (2002), comments that the Confucian teaching model is “teacher-centred,
closed, suspicious of creativity, and predicated on an unquestioning obedience from the
students”.

14

Besides, the notion that learning is a process of accumulating knowledge spontane-
ously leads to the belief that learning is a hard and serious undertaking, which requires a
full commitment and painstaking efforts (Phu, 2008; Ha, 2013). Learning is a life-long job;
it involves learners‟ perseverance and patience “to grind an iron bar into a needle” (Hu,
2002) and not concerning to or associated with light-heartedness (Phu, 2008). For this rea-
son, Vietnamese learners are expected to be hard-working and willing to participate in ac-

tivities; however, with all the conceptions of learning, as explicated above, they tend to be
silent and shy in class (Huyen and Ha, 2013).
To sum up, as culture affects cognitive structures and the structure of personality
(Lambert, 1973, p.3), it follows that culture affects the way people learn. At a glance, the
learning philosophy of CLT and that in Vietnamese culture are under different poles
(Hsiao, 2010). This entails that the meeting of these, manifested in the implementation of
CLT in Vietnamese context, to Vietnamese learners, may cause either convergence or di-
vergence. Another point to note is the dynamic nature of culture. Culture is always chang-
ing, and with recent rapid development of Vietnam through modernization and industriali-
zation, Vietnamese cultural values are subject to change, and changing. This may result in
changes in Vietnamese philosophy of learning, and subsequently in the way Vietnamese
people learn, as well as learners‟ attitude towards CLT.
1.9. Learning Culture and CLT
Since its birth, CLT has spread out of its birthplace. It has been widely implemented
in many countries of dissimilar cultural values, beliefs and norms; however, its effective-
ness in these contexts has been widely suspected. The notion that CLT is a Western rooted
language teaching approach, which needs to be both culturally attuned and culturally ac-
cepted in contexts other than the West (Kramsch and Sullivan, 1996; Bax, 2003; Ellis,
1996; McKay, 2003; Barnard and Viet, 2010; Hu, 2002; Lewis and McCook, 2002;
Stroupe, 2012; Hsiao, 2010; McClintock, 2011; Mahmoodzadeh, 2011; Khoi and Iwashita,
2012; An, 2002) has been consuming paper and ink of a lot of scholars.
Kramsch and Sullivan (1996, p.199) state a general rule that “what is appropriate in
an international context may not be appropriate in a local context” and in mentioning CLT,
they are concerned that “the notion of appropriate pedagogy should be a pedagogy of both
global appropriacy and local appropriation.” Therefore, they follow on Berman‟s (1994)
view that educators and teachers need to think globally, but act locally. Bax (2003) classi-
fies approaches to language teaching into two groups, i.e., methodologically-driven and

15

language-driven, and argues that there should be a context-driven approach which can suit
learners of different cultures and in different conditions. On this line, he stresses that the
learning context, including learner variables, is the key factor in successful language learn-
ing, and methodology, such as CLT should only be placed in second place. In assessing the
appropriateness of CLT in Asia, Ellis (1996) maintains that a number of aspects of Canale
and Swain‟s model are unsuitable for Asian learners and teachers. She exemplifies that the
focus of CLT on meaning rather than form ignores the observance of rituals in the “collec-
tivist societies” of Asia and the reverential attitude towards the mastery of individual lin-
guistic forms. McKay (2003) discovers that in many countries, such as Chile, China, Japan,
and Korea, the appropriateness of CLT in light of the local context and learners‟ needs has
been challenged. On this basis, they recommend that when selecting a methodology for a
particular context, it is vital that teachers consider the local needs of the students rather
than assume that a method that is effective in one context is effective in all contexts. Bar-
nard and Viet (2010) review a large amount of literature which shows that in many Asian
contexts, including Hong Kong, China, Korea, Japan, and Thailand, there has been a great
mismatch between the tenets of CLT as well as Task-Based Language Teaching and local
cultures of learning.
Taking a step closer to the issue, Hu (2002) analyses that CLT takes the drudgery out
of the learning process and injects elements of entertainment, such as various language
games, with a view to making learning become a light-hearted, pleasant experience in
learning. However, it is inappropriate for CHC learning context in terms of teacher-learner
relationship, learning methods and learning content. It is because CLT aims to create an
egalitarian communicative learning environment and practices in which the relationship
between teacher and learner is not the one of hierarchy but equality, and learning is not
concerned with hardness and serious-undertaking but with light-heartedness. Besides, CLT
downplays the importance of memorisation as the philosophy of CHC learning, stress ver-
bal interaction (often at the expense of inner activity), and encourage speculation (e.g.
guesswork) and tolerance for ambiguity. Hu (2010) also agrees that one of the main obsta-
cles of CLT implementation in China is the teachers‟ authority and students‟ passive role.
The passivity is generalised to learners of other Asian countries and is said to be a cultural

barrier to successful CLT (Lewis and McCook, 2002; Stroupe, 2012). In their studies,
Hsiao (2010) and McClintock (2011) clarifies some contradictions between CLT approach
and Confucian views of learning. These include the centredness of learning, respect and

16

reverence for teachers and education, nature of learning activities, teachers‟ authority, and
learners‟ autonomy in learning.
Getting closer to the context of the current study, although it is reported that “Viet-
namese teachers of English, by and large, have positive attitudes towards the CA [CLT]”
(Canh, 1999), implementation of CLT in Vietnam has not satisfied teachers, learners and
parents, and educational managers. The underlying reason of this, besides ones concerning
to teachers‟ and learners‟ English proficiency, inefficiency of teaching facility, big-class
size, is cultural. Ellis (1994), cited by Khoi and Iwashita (2012), discerns that CLT in its
original form is not suited to the Vietnamese context and should not be adopted but rather
culturally adapted and culturally redefined. Barnard and Viet (2010) echo this view and
assert that cultural values of Vietnam should be closely and carefully considered in apply-
ing CLT or any other modern teaching methods. It is, for example, explained that because
CLT is socially constructed with Western values such as individualism, whereas collectiv-
ism is greatly valued in Vietnamese society (Mahmoodzadeh, 2011). For this reason, it is
concerned that how Vietnamese teachers cope with conflicts between Western values em-
bedded in CLT and traditional Vietnamese values (Khoi and Iwashita, 2012). Since teach-
ers‟ traditional roles as mentors and imparters of knowledge in the classroom lie at the
heart of the pedagogical practices in Vietnam (Kramsch & Sullivan, 1996), CLT is be-
lieved to be unsuitable in Vietnamese context by downgrading teachers‟ authority in the
classroom to facilitators (An, 2002). This would be uneasy for not only teachers but also
learners to accept. Therefore, in trying to implement CLT, the Vietnamese teachers strug-
gle with conflicts between their two identities. As teachers of English, they need to be a
facilitator rather than a controller. At the same time, in order to be good Vietnamese teach-
ers, they need to perform their traditional duty as behavioural educators or moral guides

(Khoi and Iwashita, 2012). In addition, CLT is unfamiliar to Vietnamese learners in the
sense that too much noise is made during learning activities while it is perceived that the
school should be a place where students keep silent while listening to teachers and copying
from the board (An, 2002). In terms of group learning, Kramsch and Sullivan (1996) ob-
serve that “the associations students form are more akin to Western notions of „family‟
than „classmate‟”, which they maintain close relationship throughout their lives, forming
ties that encompass financial, familial, and social obligations. In this respect, whole class
activities would be preferred, and it would be divisive and detrimental to learning to divide
the class into subgroups.

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So far, this current chapter has presented a review of the extant literature on CLT,
culture, the connection between culture, attitude and behaviour. It has also referred to a
brief about Vietnamese culture of learning as well as implementation of CLT under the in-
fluence of learning culture. This is hoped to be a theoretical basis for the empirical research
into the claimed field.