Using group work in English grammar lessons for first-year students in the College of Technologies and Economics in Trade = Nghiên cứu việc sử dụng phương pháp

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES
DEPARTMENT OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES
======


HONG TH MINH PHƯƠNG



USING GROUP WORK IN ENGLISH GRAMMAR LESSONS
FOR FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS IN THE COLLEGE OF
TECHNOLOGIES AND ECONOMICS IN TRADE

NGHIÊN CƯ
́
U VIÊ
̣
C SƯ
̉
DU
̣
NG PHƯƠNG PHA
́
P HO
̣
C NHO
́

M TRONG VIÊ
̣
C
DY NG PHP TING ANH CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM TH NHT TRƯNG
CAO ĐĂ
̉
NG KINH TÊ
́
-K THUT THƯƠNG MI



M.A. MINOR THESIS

Field : English Teaching Methodology
Code : 601410






HANOI – 2010



VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES
DEPARTMENT OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES
======

HONG TH MINH PHƯƠNG



USING GROUP WORK IN ENGLISH GRAMMAR LESSONS
FOR FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS IN THE COLLEGE OF
TECHNOLOGIES AND ECONOMICS IN TRADE

NGHIÊN CƯ
́
U VIÊ
̣
C SƯ
̉
DU
̣
NG PHƯƠNG PHA
́
P HO
̣
C NHO
́
M TRONG VIÊ
̣
C
DY NG PHP TING ANH CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM TH NHT TRƯNG
CAO ĐĂ
̉

NG KINH TÊ
́
-K THUT THƯƠNG MI



M.A. MINOR THESIS

Field : English Teaching Methodology
Code : 601410
Supervisor : Lê Văn Canh, M.A





HANOI – 2010

iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter I: Introduction 1
1.1. Rationale 1
1.2. Aims of the study 2
1.3. Research questions 2
1.4. Methods of the study 2
1.5. Scope of the study 2
1.6. Design of the study 3
Chapter II: Literature review 4
2.1. The role of grammar in ELT 4
2.2. Definition of group work 5

2.3. Group work in CLT: advantages and limitations of using group work 6
2.3.1. Advantages of using group work 6
2.3.1.1. Group work increases students’ talking time. 6
2.3.1.2. Group work creates a more secure and positive classroom atmosphere 6
2.3.1.3. Group work gives chance for students learning from each other 7
2.3.1.4. Group work motivates learners 7
2.3.1.5. Group work has positive effect on the teachers 7
2.3.2. Limitations of using group work 8
2.3.2.1. Students often speak in their native language. 8
2.3.2.2. Students do not take the same equal responsibilities in the group. 8
2.3.2.3. Using group work can make noise and indiscipline. 8
2.3.2.4. Teacher may lack of time 9
2.4. Studies on the use of group work in foreign language teaching and learning 9
2.5. Reasons of using group work in grammar teaching 10
2.5.1. Challenges in teaching grammar 10
2.5.2. Reasons of using group work in grammar teaching. 11

v
2.6. Design group work activities for grammar lessons 12
2.6.1. The co-operating arrangement 12
2.6.2. The superior inferior arrangement 12
2.6.3. The combining arrangement 12
2.6.4. The individual arrangement 13
2.6.5. The grammar activities for group work. 14
2.6.5.1. Doing grammar exercises 14
2.6.5.2. Reading dialogues 14
2.6.5.3. Practicing using language according to situations 14
2.6.5.4. Playing games 14
2.6.5.5. Discussion 14
2.7. Summary 15

Chapter III: Development of the research 16
3.1 The context of the study 16
3.1.1. The students and the text book 16
3.1.2. Problems and issues in English language teaching at CTET 16
3.2. Methodology 17
3.2.1. The subjects 17
3.2.2. The instruments and procedures 17
3.2.2.1. The questionnaires 17
3.2.2.2. The classroom observation 18
3.3. Data analysis and discussions 18
3.3.1. Questionnaire 18
3.3.1.1. Pre-treatment questionnaire 18
3.3.1.1.1. Students’ awareness of the importance of learning English grammar. 18
3.3.1.1.2. Students’ attitudes towards learning English grammar. 19
3.3.1.1.3. The students’ evaluation of English grammar teaching they have
learnt in the class 20

vi
3.3.1.1.4. The students’ attitude towards using group work for English
grammar lesson 23
3.3.1.2. Post-treatment questionnaire 24
3.3.1.2.1. The personality of students in learning generally 25
3.3.1.2.2. The students’ preference of learning styles 25
3.3.1.2.3. The students’ general attitude towards using group work to
learn English grammar 26
3.3.1.2.4. The students’ evaluation of the effectiveness of using group
work in grammar lessons 29
3.3.1.2.5. The students’ justification of benefits and limitations of using
group work to learn grammar 32
3.3.2. Classroom observation 34

3.4. Summary of the findings 36
Chapter 4: Suggestions and conclusion 37
4.1. Suggestions for grammar teaching for the first-year-student in CTET 37
4.2. Limitations of the study 38
4.3. Recommendations for further research 39
4.4. Conclusion 39
References 40
Appendices I
Appendix 1: Pre-treatment questionnaire I
Appendix 2: Post-treatment questionnaire III

vii
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 1: Factors involved in group work 13
Table 2: The student’s justification of the learning atmosphere in grammar lessons 21
Table 3: The reasons lead to boring learning atmosphere in grammar lessons 21
Table 4: Students’ attitude towards using group work for grammar lessons 23
Table 5: The personality of students in learning generally 25
Table 6: The changes in students’ attitudes towards using group work 27
Table 7: Students’ evaluation of using group work to learn grammar 30
Figure 1: Students’ participation in grammar lesson before and after using group work 30


1
CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION
1.1. Rationale
In the past few years, the trend of globalization has become faster than ever before,
the students’ awareness of learning English has been raised dramatically. However, the
question of how to teach and to learn English well is still in controversy; especially,

teaching grammar is the most controversial one. In Vietnam, English language teaching
often follows grammar-focused method, and for many English language teachers, teaching
English means teaching grammar. In this process, students are supposed to learn whatever
teachers give; therefore, not only knowledge but also learning styles are imposed on
students by their teacher. As a result of this traditional language teaching method, not only
the atmosphere of leaning is affected, the students’ ability of communication is also not
good. As each student has their own interest and habit of learning, the old way of teaching
grammar enhances their creative ability and leads to their neglect of learning. Because of
this reason, I choose the topic “Using group work in English-grammar lessons for first year
students in CTET” for my thesis. I want to make out whether using group work to teach
grammar will make the above situations different.
I choose the topic also because of my own interest as a teacher of English. I am
myself always interested in teaching grammar and I have never stopped finding new ways
of teaching each grammar items. I have observed teachers in my college and in other
places teaching grammar, each of them have different ways of teaching; however, it is so
difficult to make grammar teaching satisfactory to all students. It is not easy to find that if
only follow some unchanged ways to teach grammar, students and teachers themselves
will feel monotonous. That’s why it is always haunted in my mind how to make teaching
and learning English grammar easier and more interesting for myself and my students.
Applying group work in teaching grammar lessons is new ideas and maybe it is the best
answer to my question. By using group work, students are supposed to participate more in
the learning process, so they would be more motivated and successful. Of course, there is
no single method that satisfies all teaching and learning situations but at least, I know that I
am on the way of improving my teaching method.


2
1.2. Aims of the study
The specific aims of the study are:
 To find out the students’ attitudinal changes about grammar and grammar learning.

 To find out the students’ evaluation about the effectiveness of applying group work
in teaching English grammar.
1. 3. Research questions
The aim of the research is to find out students’ attitude and the effectiveness of using
group work to teach English grammar lessons in CTET. In order to achieve this aim, the
researcher intends to find out the information needed to answer the following questions:
1) What are the first-year-students’ attitudes towards grammar?
2) How does grammar practice in groups affect the students’ attitudes towards
grammar?
3) What do students perceive of the benefits and limitations of using group work in
learning grammar?
1.4. Methods of the study
The main methods used in this action research are questionnaires survey and
classroom observation. A survey on the use of group work in teaching English grammar
was conducted for two classes with about 85-first-year non-English major students in
CTET College. Besides using questionnaires, classroom observation is also used to
observe the classroom behavior and students’ performance on the grammar lessons.
1.5. Scope of the study
Using group work in English teaching methodologies is one of the most popular
methods of communicative language teaching and it can be applied widely for all of the
language teaching skills. However, due to the time and length constraint of the study, this
thesis only focuses on the use of group work in English grammar lessons for first year
students in CTET College.


3
1.6. Design of the study
This thesis consists of four main chapters:
Chapter one, the introduction, provide an overview of the study with brief information
about the reasons of choosing the topic, the aims, the scope of the study, the methods as

well as the design of the study.
Chapter two, the literature review, is aimed at giving the theoretical background for
the thesis. In this chapter, an overview on the role of grammar in ELT is first mentioned.
After that, the key factors about group work are presented. I will mention some definitions
about group work activities, the advantages as well as the limitations of using group work
in English grammar lessons. The reasons why I choose using group work in English
grammar lessons and some main group work activities are also highlighted in this part.
Chapter three, the development of the research, is the backbone of the thesis. It
contains the background of teaching and learning grammar in CTET College, the detail
description of data collections, data analysis and the discussions of the findings.
Chapter four proposes some suggestions for using group work effectively when
learning English grammar at CTET College and presents the summary and the suggestions
for further study.
The last part of the study is the appendix and the references.












4
CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter reviews the literature on general aspects of group work in the light of

ELT and the use of group work in grammar practice. First, a review of the role of grammar
in foreign language teaching is presented. This is followed by a discussion of using group
work in teaching grammar.
2.1 The role of grammar in ELT
Over the past few years, whether or not grammar should be taught explicitly or
implicitly has been a controversial issue. Until now two main opposing opinions exist
among many linguistics and researchers. The first view is against teaching grammar.
Extensive grammar research has shown that grammar should be neglected in teaching
English ever since communicative methodology appeared in 1970s. It was claimed that
language should be acquired through natural exposure, not through formal instruction
(Krashen as cited in Nassaji & Fotos). In Natural Approach ( Krashen and Terrell: 1983),
Krashen distinguishes leaning ( explicit knowledge) and acquisition ( implicit knowledge).
He points out that these are cases where leaning has taken place, but some learners are still
unable to use what have learnt in the conversation, because he has not yet acquired them.
So, according to him, teachers should give a lot of communication activities in class so
students can acquire language. Opposing with the views above, recent studies have
demonstrated that grammar instruction enables learners to attain high level of proficiency,
both in accuracy and fluency. Without grammar, learners can communicate effectively
only in limited number of situation (Florez, 1999). Giving strong support to grammar
teaching, Smith (2001) claimed that if we do not pay attention to grammar nor create
opportunities for learners to improve their grammar, they are likely to stand the risk of
fossilization.
As for me, through my experience and observation, poor English grammar hinders the
pace and quality of learning English. Students can obtain English much more easily if they
pay enough attention to grammar right from the beginning. Further more, grammar
teaching can be beneficial to learners in the sense that it raises learner’s consciousness
concerning the differences and similarities of the fist language and the second language.
This will help students to avoid making mistakes when learning English.

5

Among many new teaching methods in the world today, some of researchers think
that it does not need to teach grammar for students as they can draw the grammar
structures for themselves. I totally agree that it will much more effective if students can
have the grammar structures for their own thanks to the special teaching methods, as they
can memorize and use them better than to be taught. However, that method cannot be
applied in every learning context, especial in Vietnam. With the learning environment like
Vietnam, I believe that teaching grammar explicitly for students plays important role for
Vietnamese students understanding and using English language well. There is no single
method to teach grammar that can satisfy all students so the combination of different
methods of grammar teaching may be is the best choice to satisfy different students’ level
at different teaching context.
2.2. Definition of group work.
There are many definitions of group work have been suggested by a number of
researchers.
According to Slavin, (1986, as cited in Dunkin, ed. 1987: 238) group work is “a
division of the class into learning groups of four to six members who are all levels of
ability. These groups also have mix of boys and girls and students of different racial, ethnic
background in about some proportion, they represent in the class as a whole.”
In Beard’s (1978, as cited in Dunkin, ed. 1987: 288) opinion, “Group work is a
discussion of academic work that affords students the opportunity to organize their
thinking by comparing ideas and interpretation with each other and to give expression and
hence form to their understanding of a subject.”
The list of definition of group work is still going on. It also has been suggested by
Bennett and Dunne (1989, as cited in Galton and Williamson, 1992: 10) that “In
collaborative work, all the pupils are expected to work together to produce a single out
come and the group has to debate a social or moral issue and produce agreed solutions or
recommendations,”
To put it briefly, we can see some common factors of group work are: it consists of
several students working together for a common goal and they share recourses and ideas

6
together. Groups can be homogeneous or heterogeneous on the basis of students’ physical
characteristics, gender, race, ethnic origin, individual differences and interests. On the
other hand, teachers plan, organize and supervise them.
2.3. Group work in CLT: advantages and limitations of using group work.
2.3.1: Advantages of using group work
2.3.1.1. Group work increases students’ talking time
The first and foremost benefit of group work is that they increase the amount of
student practice. Long and Porter (1985) estimated that in a 50 minute lesson with 30
students, if the students talked only to the teacher, they would get 30 seconds of talking
time per lesson. They calculate that this equals “just one hour per student per year” (p.208).
This amount of time is not enough for students to practice the new language, which cause
to low achievement by many classroom SL learners. Hubert Skrzyński (2005) proved that
using group work can help to solve this problem. When working in groups, instead of only
one student speaks to the teacher, a lot of other students can talk and exchange ideas to
each other at the same time, and it substantially increases the opportunities the students get
to talk English.
2.3.1.2. Group work creates a more secure and positive classroom atmosphere
According to Yasemin Godek (2004), another extremely important advantage of using
group work is the learner’s confident. With many students, it can be a frightening
experience when being called on by teacher to answer a question in front of the whole class.
Martine, L. (2006) proved that even if students know the answer to the question, they are
often not sure if it is correct and do not want to give their opinion (p. 35). As a result, the
atmosphere of the class is often very boring and stressful, which is counterproductive to
language learning. However, in a small group, there is a sense of security as students feel
much more comfortable to speak in a foreign language to just for some people than to the
whole class and to the teacher. Especially timid students or ones who are not good at
manipulating the language yet, feel more relaxed and self-confident to come up with
answer that reflect their own thinking (Hubert Skrzyński, 2005).

7
2.3.1.3. Group work gives chance for students learning from each other
Working in group, students can help each other a lot. A group usually consists of a
mixture of different ability levels, therefore, when given tasks, students can teach their
friends (Yasemin Godek, 2004). What is more, they give an enormous number of new
items and expressions for their friends. By this way, students are able to share knowledge,
correcting each other mistakes in a very natural way. So they can lean to work
interdependently and not be dependent on their teacher. In group work the importance of
teacher is the planner, supervisor and organizer. The more important point is that students
learn to become active and patient, learn to cooperate with other people. They respect each
other, their ideas and weaknesses. They become social but not individualist. (Yasemin
Godek, 2004: 30).
2.3.1.4. Group work motivates learners
Long and Porter (1985) highlights that group work can help to engage the students
fully in their language acquisition. This is because group work can make the classroom an
entertaining and lively environment. In group, students can use the language freely and
express their opinions and thoughts without any restrictions. It is not difficult to see that
involving in the group gives students the atmosphere of independence and in the state of
relaxation.
Group work usually motivates students also because it is quite simply more fun to
work and talk with their classmates than it is to do the tasks individually (Martine, L. 2006).
By making lessons and activities more fun we can stimulate students not just to come to
class but also enthusiastically contribute to their own learning.
2.3.1.5. Group work has positive effect on the teachers
According to Yasemin Godek (2004), not only the students benefit from group work
in English lessons, but also the teachers. First of all they save time. “The teachers do not
need to teach every student separately but they can make the entire students do the exercise
at the same time by dividing the class into groups. As a result, teachers can use their
teaching time economically and efficiently. This is intended to improve quality of
learning.” (p31). When timed is saves, the teacher can let their students do more exercise

8
and activities. This way of teaching will be for sure appreciated by students and the teacher
will be liked by his students, and he will enjoy their work because it brings him satisfaction,
pleasure, and fulfillment.
2.3.2: Limitations of using group work
Besides mentioned advantages, using group work also brings about a lot of limitations.
These are four main limitations.
2.3.2.1. Students often speak in their native language.
In her study, Martine, L. (2006) shows that it is very common problem that students in
the same group use their mother tongue to speak English, especially when they find the
activities is difficult or boring, or even when they do not understand the instruction from
the teacher. However, it is usually because of the inability of students to express their ideas
in English that leads to the overuse of mother tongue between students. So the solution is
that teacher should choose activities that relevant, interesting and fun for the students. The
teacher should also encourage students to use English to discuss by giving very clear
instructions, moving around the class to control and give help to students when necessary.
Yasemin Godek, (2004) in his research also pointed out some more problems of using
group work as follow:
2.3.2.2. Students do not take the same equal responsibilities in the group.
One of the main disadvantages for the learners is that shy or weak students can be
eliminated from the practice; because of better students who are always tend to dominate.
Subsequently, low achieving students may not have chance to take part in the discussion
and show their opinion so they may feel discourage or less confident. The situation
becomes worse when students in the group do not help each other.
2.3.2.3. Using group work can make noise and indiscipline.
It is usually more troublesome for the teacher than for the students that using group
work can cause noise and indiscipline. Students in group work activities are usually not
aware of noise, and they even do not care about what other group are doing. However, this
can be considered as good noise or productive noise because it means that students

9
participate in learning tasks. One problem of this noise is that it can cause frustration for
the surrounding classes.
2.3.2.4. Teacher may lack of time
It is common that each English lesson last for forty-five minutes and it usually needs a
lot of time for students to do their activities in group. So if the group work takes so much
time, teacher can not finish the lesson or he/ she can teach only some of the lesson plans.
To avoid this, teacher should arrange time for group work suitably with limited number of
students in each group. (Yasemin Godek, 2004: 31)
2.4. Review of previous studies on the use of group work in foreign language
teaching and learning.
There are so many researches have been conducted in the field of teaching English in
general and teaching grammar through group work activities. Below is the review of the
studies already conducted in this field.
Long and Porter (1985) proved that group work allows for a greater quantity and
richer variety of language practice, practice that is better adapted to individual needs and
conducted in a more positive affective climate. Students are individually involved in
lessons more often and at a more personal level. Group work also motivates the classroom
learners. (p. 212).
The study conducted by Long, Adams; Mclea, and Castanos (1976) was designed to
contrast lockstep teaching with group work and the results showed enhanced quality and
variety of student speech in groups, as compared to lockstep instruction. Lockstep here
means predominant mode of instruction from the teachers.
According to Cross (1985), group work activities are frequently used in large classes
because the use of groups minimizes the times and expense that would be needed to
produce materials for large classes.
The list of researches and studies support using group work in English teaching is still
going on. In the field of using group work to teach English grammar lessons, Aisha Bibi
(2002), Ney (1989) and Davidheiser (1996) have valuable researches.

10
The research study conducted by Aisha Bibi (2002) concludes that: teaching of
English grammar through group work activities has positive effect on the academic
achievement of students. By using group work, not only students can significantly improve
the ability of applying the rule of grammar, they can also improve reading, writing,
listening and speaking ability. Moreover, the attitudes of students toward using group work
to learn English grammar are very good.
Ney, James (1989) examined the effectiveness of collaborative learning models for
the teaching of a modern English class at the college level. According to the author, the
collaborative learning resulted in a more adequate mastery of the subject matter and in
better attendance for the class.
Davidheiser (1996) explored a successful student-centred method of grammar
instruction in second language classes. He concludes that by using group work and pair
work, teachers can improve the quality of grammar instructions and the ability of recalling
the grammar structures of the students.
There are so many other valuable studies related to using group work to teach English
in general and English grammar lessons that it is unable to list down in my small research.
Thanks to these researches, I can gain precious knowledge for my own research.
2.5. Reasons of using group work in grammar teaching.
2.5.1. Challenges in teaching grammar
English grammar is considered especially important in Vietnamese school from
secondary to higher education; however, it seems to contain a lot of problems in both
teaching and learning methods. Although grammar is not so difficult to understand,
students find it hard to perceive. More seriously, students could hardly apply grammatical
rules to make real communication. The traditional method of teaching English grammar is
mostly the deductive method, i.e. definition of the aspect of grammar is dictated and its
examples are illustrated (Richards & Rodgers, 1986: 6). This way can help students know
how to label certain sentence elements but cannot produce any English themselves,
illustrate the fact that just teaching grammar in itself is not exactly effective.

11
Normally in Vietnamese schools, grammar is taught based on the textbooks. However,
textbooks often contain very artificial sentences which are hardly used in real life
situations. Teaching grammar according to grammar-translation method is very popular,
where grammar rules are taught in isolation and sufficient practice is not given in the use
of different aspects of grammar in reading, writing, speaking, etc. Language is a skill,
which needs a lot of practice. Only learning the rules of grammar or mere memorizing the
meanings of words and phrases would not help learning the foreign language. Especially,
the attitude of students towards this way of teaching grammar is poor. They often get bored
very quickly with the monotonous grammar items and the boring atmosphere in the class.
This situation calls for a change in the grammar teaching methods and the use of different
techniques in teaching grammar.
2.5.2. Reasons of using group work in grammar teaching.
The aim of this research is to find out whether the problem of teaching English
grammar can be solved by adopting the method of teaching it in communicative way. It is
better if we want to teach structure, we should at least provide a realistic context and relate
it to communicative situations. The best thing to do is probably to integrate all different
aspects of language. By all the advantages mentioned above of group work, it is supposed
that using group work is the good choice for teaching grammar.
According to Gee, (2005) “….the theory of language … is that language has
meaning only in and through social practices” (p.8). Long and Porter (1985) in their
research proved that “group work improves the quality of students talk by creating genuine
communication” (p.209); and by using group work, we can create communicative
situations in the classroom and at the same time make these situations resemble real life
because “face-to-face communication in a small group is a natural setting for conversation”
(p.209). In such case, a certain grammatical language item is practiced in a more realistic
situation and students are much more actively involved in such activities, and therefore,
remember things more easily. That’s why we can suppose that teaching English grammar
through group work has significantly improved the ability of students to apply the rules of

grammar. Above all, because using group work is interesting and effective (Martine, 2006),

12
the attitude of students toward it is positive. They are motivated and can help each other to
make progress in learning through group.
That’s why group work is supposed to be a very suitable way to teach English
grammar.
2.6. Design group work activities for grammar lessons.
According to Nation, Paul (1989), “a useful way of classifying group work activities
is to look at the distribution of the information needed to do the activity.”(p. 20). He
divides group work activities into the four following types:
2.6.1. The co-operating arrangement
In this type of group work activities, learners have equal access to the same material
or information and co-operate to do the task.
This type of activity can have more effective result if it is carried out follows Robert
Slavin (1991) method, called “Student teams-achievement divisions”. In this method,
students are assigned to four or five member in a group, called learning teams. Each team
is a microcosm of the entire class, made up of high, average, and low-performing students.
These students may take turns quizzing each other, discuss problems as a group, or use
whatever means they wish to master the material. By this way, students can help each other
and create exciting learning atmosphere.
2.6.2. The superior-inferior arrangement
In this type of group work activities, one member of the group has information that all
the others need. This student presents this information for the group.
2.6.3. The combining arrangement
In this type, each learner has a different piece of information that all the others need.
This method can be called the Jigsaw method. In this type, students are assigned to four or
five members; academic material is broken into some sections.

13

2.6.4. The individual arrangement
In this activity, each learner has access to the same information but must perform or
deal with a different part of it.
Nation (1989) pointed out that the four different types of group work achieve different
learning goals, are best suited to different kind of tasks; require different kinds of seating
arrangement, and draw on or encourage different kinds of social relationship. Below is the
table that describes the factors involved in group work.

Combining
Cooperating
Superior -Inferior
Individual
Distribution
of
information
Each learner has
unique essential
information.
All learners have equal
access to the same
information and to
each other’s view of it.
One or more
learners have
information that
the others do not
have
All learners
have the same
information but

use a different
part
Sitting
arrangement
Learners site at an
equal distance from
each other, facing
each other
Learners sit beside
each other facing the
information
The knowers face
the seekers
The learners
face each other
Social
relationship
Equality, mutual
dependency
Equality
Inequality, the
knowers are in a
superior position
Equality, but
with focus on
individual
performance
Most suitable
learning
goals

Negotiation of
input, mastering
content fluency
New language items,
fluency
New language
items, mastering
content
Fluency, new
language items
Most suitable
tasks
Completion,
ordering providing
directions,
matching,
classifying,
distinguishing
Ranking, completion,
choosing, finding,
implications, causes,
uses
Data gathering,
completion,
providing
directions
Solving
problems
Completion
A typical

example
A strip story
A ranking exercise
An interview
A chain story or
role play
Table 1: Factors involved in group work (Nation, 1989: 21)

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2.6.5. The grammar activities for group work.
According to Hubicka (1985); Williams (1980), and Braughton (1969) (as cited in
Aisha Bibi, 2002: 17), the following activities can be used for group activities in practicing
grammar:
2.6.5.1 Doing grammar exercises
Teacher can design exercises suitably for each kind of grammar items. These
exercises can be easily found in a lot of grammar textbooks and they can be done either in
the class or at home. Students will do these exercises in group, helping each other and
discussing the answers.
2.6.5.2 Reading dialogues
Students work in small group, practice reading the dialogues, or making the similar
dialogue to the one they have been learnt, dealing with new lexis, problem of
pronunciation, stress and intonation.
2.6.5.3 Practicing using language according to situations
Teachers can give situation suitably for each kind of grammar item and then ask
students to practice, e.g. inviting and responding and using maps for giving directions;
telling a story about the past event, etc.
2.6.5.4 Playing games
Students can play games, using the grammar items they have learnt. These games can
be simple games that can be done for the whole class, or more complex games like “teams-
games-tournament” (Slavin, 1991), where students play academic games to show their

individual mastery of the subject matter. In teams-games-tournament, students play these
games in weekly tournaments in which they compete with members of other teams about
the subject matter.
2.6.5.5 Discussion
According to Penny Ur (1996), discussion is the most natural and effective way for
students to talk freely in English by thinking out some problems or situations together
through verbal interchange of ideas. The word “discussion” here includes anything from

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the simplest questions to the most political and philosophical debates. In English grammar
lesson, discussion can be used to distinguish the different or similarity between different
grammar points or to find out the answer for grammar exercises.
2.7. Summary
This chapter has reviewed the necessary considerations when using group work in
English grammar lessons. Usually, group work is used for speaking, listening, writing or
reading skills, but in this small research, I apply group work for grammar lesson because
when using group, a certain grammatical language item is practiced in a more realistic
situation and students are much more actively involved in such activities, and therefore,
remember things more easily. Further more; group work also helps to motivate learners
when learning grammar.
As other English skills, using group work for grammar lesson also has a lot of
advantages, such as: it increases students’ talking time, creates a more secure and positive
classroom atmosphere, motivates learners, etc. Beside, group work also has some
limitations when being used, such as teacher may lack of time to teach the whole lesson
plan, students may not take the same equal responsibilities in the group. Some will
dominate the group and some will talk too little. To make the groups work well, the
activities for group work must be carefully planed by the teacher.

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CHAPTER III: DEVELOPMENT OF THE RESEARCH

In this chapter, firstly the context of the studies is presented, and then is the research
methodology which describes how to achieve the aims and objectives of the study and the
data collection procedures. Finally are the data analyses as well as the discussion of the
findings.
3.1 The context of the study
3.1.1 The students and the text book
Most of my students follow group A, which means they are supposed to be non-
English major students and they have to take the general English training course during
their first year before studying English for Special Purpose in their second years. As their
major relates to trade and economy, we choose the textbook Power Base by author David
Evans to provide them with basic English for trade and economy. After studying these two
books, students are expected to be fluent in English communication, especially they can
understand and use words relate to their majors. Because of these aims, using group
activities in practicing grammar may be useful to help students to increase the ability of
communicating in English.
The text book I use to teach my students is “powerbase – pre intermediate”, it
includes of 10 lessons written from easy to difficult ones. All the lessons begin with the
introduction part, and then come grammar, working life, and real world. In this text book,
the main grammar items that students have to learn are: the present simple and continuous,
the future simple, and the past simple, modal verb, comparative and superlative, the order

of adjective, the present perfect, and the first and second conditional. Among these
grammar items, the first five grammar items will be chosen to teach during the treatment
time of the research.
3.1.2 Problems and issues in English language teaching at CTET
Like most other schools in Vietnam, English language teaching in CTEC also have
the same problems, such as: there are too much students in one class, desks and chairs are
fixed or difficult to move, there is little space for both teacher and students to move around

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the class during the lesson, etc. These factors may cause some difficulties when organizing
students in group.
A normal class in our College usually has from sixty to eighty students with mixed
level of English learning, which means some are very good at English while the others may
have never learnt English before. As a result, one single teaching method may hardly
satisfy all of the students. Using group work to teach grammar for these students is not
exceptional method and it may also cause dissatisfaction for some students. For example, if
a group consists of both too excellent and too bad students at English, they may feel
frustrated when leaning together.
3.2. Methodology
3.2.1. The subjects
The subjects of this research were two classes of the first-year non-English major
students. Each class has about 40 students, both male and female and they all follow the
same course of English. The class meets two times per week, each week has five periods,
and each period lasts 50 minutes. The students in each class worked in 8 permanent mixed-
ability groups for the whole period of the research.
3.2.2. The instruments and procedures
3.2.2.1. The questionnaires
In order to obtain data for the research, two cycles questionnaires for students were
employed: pre-treatment and post-treatment questionnaires.
The pre-treatment questionnaire was carried out before using group work to teach

English grammar with 8 questions. They were designed to find out the attitudes of students
about English grammar and the use of group work in English grammar lessons. The
questions emphasizes on the following categories:
- The students’ awareness of the importance of English grammar (Q1).
- The students’ general attitude toward leaning English grammar (Q2 and 3).
- The students’ evaluation of English grammar teaching they have learnt in the class
(Q4-6).

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- The students’ attitude toward using group work for English grammar lessons (Q7-8).
The post-treatment questionnaire was carried out after using group work to teach
English grammar with 11 questions. They were designed to find out the differences in
students’ attitude toward learning English grammar before and after using group work as
well as their evaluation about the effectiveness of using group work to learn grammar. The
questionnaire also aims at finding how students perceive the benefits and limitations of
using group work in learning English grammar.
The process of collecting the questionnaires in the class above is also the procedure
of the research.
3.2.2.2. The classroom observation
Along with the survey questionnaires, classroom observation is also used to collect
data for the study. My observation falls on the classroom procedures as well as the
students’ behavior and performance in the grammar lessons. During the research period, I
acted as a non-participant observer and my observation was noted down in my teaching
journals after each lesson.
3.3. Data analysis and discussions
3.3.1. Questionnaire
3.3.1.1 Pre-treatment questionnaire.
3.3.1.1.1 Students’ awareness of the importance of learning English grammar.
Question one in the questionnaire relating to the students’ awareness of the
importance of learning English grammar. The results showed that the majority of students

agreed it is very important to know English grammar. Specifically, among 85 students
were asked, 95.3 % of them said that learning English was important or very important,
4.7 % said it was not important but necessary to learn English grammar. There weren’t any
students who had no idea or said that learning English grammar was not important at all.
As we can see from the result above, nearly all students are aware of the important of
learning English grammar. When being asked why they think learning English grammar is
important, the typical reasons of them are:

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- Mastering of English grammar helps students to do exercises well, so they can get
good marks at their English examinations (15 answers).
- Mastering of English grammar helps students to produce correct sentences, so they
don’t “lose face” when speaking before the crowd (7 answers).
- Knowing grammatical rules is very important to write correct sentences (32
answers).
- English grammar is very important to communicate successfully because using right
English grammar can make other people understand us easily (42 answers).
- Good understanding of grammar helps a lot in academic reading and translating
from English to Vietnamese and vise versa (3 answers).
Beside 95% of students who realize the important of English grammar, there was
4.7% who thought grammar was not important to learn. With them, they learnt grammar
only because it was a must in the school curriculum. Luckily, most of students find
grammar is important to learn English well, which means focusing on grammar is still a
desirable part of language learning.
3.3.1.1.2 Students’ attitudes towards learning English grammar.
The second and the third questions in the survey questionnaire asked the students
whether they liked or disliked learning English grammar and how difficulty they felt when
learning it. The answers among 85 students to the second question: “Do you like to learn
English grammar?” are:
- 17.6 % of students liked learning English grammar very much.

- 70.6 % of students neither liked nor disliked learning English grammar.
- 9.4 % of students didn’t like learning English grammar at all
- 1.2 % of students felt very bored with learning English grammar.
- 1.2 % of students had no idea at all.
To my surprise, although all students were aware of the important role of learning
English grammar, 70.6% of them said they neither liked nor disliked learning English