Primary teachers’ perceptions of teaching vocabulary to young learners

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Tháng 11/2014

BƯỚC ĐẦU TÌM HIỂU NHẬN THỨC CỦA GIÁO VIÊN TIỂU HỌC
TRONG DẠY TỪ VỰNG CHO HỌC SINH
Võ Th Thanh Di p
Trường Đại học Quy Nhơn
Tóm t t: Ngày nay tiếng Anh cho học sinh cấp

successfully introduce a foreign language, mainly

tiểu học ñã trở thành một trong những yêu cầu giáo

English into primary curriculum. This is a challenging

dục ngày càng cao ở các nước thuộc khối ASEAN nói

task as the majority of in-service teachers of English at

chung và ở Việt nam nói riêng. Kể từ năm 2008 ñến

primary schools in Vietnam have not been officially

nay, một trong những trọng ñiểm ñề án ngoại ngữ 2020

trained to teach English to young learners, as reported

hướng ñến là phổ cập thành công chương trình tiếng

by the MOET. The missing link in language teacher

Anh ở cấp tiểu học. Đây là một trọng trách lớn vì hiện

education between universities with schools in Vietnam

nay chương trình ñào tạo giáo viên dạy tiếng Anh ở

lies in the fact that teaching primary English has not

cấp tiểu học chưa ñược phổ biến, phần lớn giáo viên

been present in most university-degree curricula of

phải sử dụng kiến thức và kỹ năng sư phạm dành cho

universities across Vietnam, so elementary teachers

ñối tượng học sinh ở cấp trung học cơ sở và trung học

have had to apply their own learning experience, the

phổ thông ñể giảng dạy cho ñối tượng nhỏ tuổi. Việc

methodological knowledge and teaching practical skills

tìm hiểu những nhận thức của giáo viên trong việc dạy

for secondary or high school adolescents to teach

từ vựng tiếng Anh cho học sinh tiểu học sẽ giúp hiểu rõ

English to young classes. Therefore, through this

hơn, thu hẹp những khoảng cách trong chương trình

quantitative – qualitative research, an inquiry into how

ñào tạo giáo viên ở cấp ñại học và tại các trường tiểu

primary

học ñồng thời nâng cao hơn nữa chất lượng dạy và học

vocabulary teaching and learning in their classroom

tiếng Anh nói chung.

settings aims at shedding light on how in-service

Abstract: Nowadays English to primary pupils
has become one of the increasing educational
demands in ASEAN nations. Vietnam is no exception.
Since 2008, a large-scale project of the Vietnamese
government, directed by the Ministry of Education and
Training (MOET), has aimed at the teaching and
learning of English in the national educational system,
at all levels from primary to tertiary for the 2008-2020
period. One of the prioritized goals of Project 2020 is to

English

teachers

in

Vietnam

perceive

English primary teachers should apply into young
language learners. The findings of the research
hopefully not only creates interactive and dialogic
discussions for reflective teaching but also provides
information to bridge the missing gaps between
university

curricula

and

the

young

learning

communities for quality enhancement, as well as to
facilitate well–informed decisions regarding teacher
training and language policies of Vietnam.

PRIMARY TEACHERS’ PERCEPTIONS
OF TEACHING VOCABULARY TO YOUNG LEARNERS
1. Introduction
English has played a very vital role among
nations as it is the bridge that connects the world
together. The fact that the scope of its users has
been expanded to young learners has brought both
opportunities and challenges for not only learners,

teachers but teacher trainers, researchers and
educational administrators as well. There have
been a great number of studies in primary English
education worldwide (Gewehr, 1998; Mallett,
2008; Menyuk & Brisk, 2005; Moon, 2005;
Moyles & Hargreaves, 2003; Rocca, 2007;
Shintani, 2011; Slattery & Willis, 2014; Troen &
41


Ti u ban 1: Đào t o chuyên ng

Boles, 2009), especially in Asia, where English is
regarded as the common foreign language for
world integration (Chan, Chin, & Suthiwan, 2011;
Feng, 2011; Mallett, 2002; Qiang; Silver, Hu, &
Iino, 2001; Wang, 2008); however, according to
the 2013 databases of research theses in Hanoi,
Hue, Danang and HoChiMinh City Universities,
primary English learning and teaching in Vietnam
seem to be open. It is the recent official

introduction of English as a foreign language into
Vietnamese primary schools that has increased a
crucial need for understanding how to support
Vietnamese young children learning English
effectively.
2. Children learning English
2.1. The characteristics of young English
learners
For an in-depth exploration into primary
English teaching and learning, it is very important
to study the characteristics of the primary English
learner. According to Broughton, Brumfit, Flavell,
Hill, and Pincas (1980), McKay (2008), Willmott
(2003), the nature of the young learner seems not
to differ noticeably from nation to nation. Brown
(1987) made a very thorough comparison between
young learners and adult learners with variables
such as cognition, sensory input, attention span,
abstract thinking ability (p. 87-92). Instead,
children often bring their personalities into their
language classes varying individually across
Howard Gardner’s eight types of intelligence –
linguistic, musical, logical-mathematical, spatial,
bodily kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal
and naturalistic. Furthermore, their differences in
their socioeconomic, cultural and home
background add another layer of complexity in
their foreign language learning. Meanwhile, Moon
(2000) briefly portrayed the profile of the young
language learner with the following seven features

- using language creatively, going for meaning,
using ‘chunks’ of language, having fun, joining in
the action, talking their heads off and feeling at
home. (p. 10). From another psycholinguistic lens,
Gordon (2007) employed the Natural Approach to
42

trace back language instinct - an innate ability for
L1 learning in order to psycho-linguistically
explain children’s natural abilities with a second
or foreign language because at the primary school
age, young pupils are competent users of their
mother tongue. Simultaneously, Gordon pointed
out from the light of the Communicative
Approaches that children who are more
incidentally exposed to close-to-life contexts can
pick up everyday vocabulary better than those
who do not. Scott and Ytreberg (1990), while
grouping children into their two age groups,
mostly shared the above common characteristics
during their growth along with their own
assumption that children are likely to understand
situations more quickly than they understand the
language used so they use language skills long
before they are aware of them in their language
development (p.10). (MacNaughton and Williams
(2004)) showed that young language learners are
motivated, imaginative and curious in learning,
which means that they need assistance,
encouragement and praise from primary teachers.

Similarly, Halliwell (1993) looked at child foreign
language learning in terms of their ability to grasp
meaning indirectly, creative use of limited
language resources, instinct for play and fun,
imagination and interaction and talk. Turnbull and
Dailey-O'Cain (2009) indicated the use of first
language as a mediator for interaction is a must in
young classes; however, the further their L2
learning progresses, the less L1 can be used.
2.2. Children’s foreign language learning
From such characteristics of the young
language learner, several attempts have been made
to provide a theory or model that can explain child
foreign language. For instance, Broughton et al.
(1980) searched for the answers to the questions
about the optimal age and language content for
learning English as a foreign language. Helena
Mitchell and Jenny Monk (Ashcroft & Palacio,
2003) focused upon teaching literacy in the
primary curriculum. Unlike Michell and Monk,
Grugeon, Dawes, Smith, and Hubbard (2005)


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stressed on developing children’s speaking and
listening at Key Stages 1 and 2. In a more detailed
analysis, Moon (2005) offered a guidebook to
teach children learning English in which Moon
took four elements into consideration – contexts

for learning English, children’s typical features,
teachers’ beliefs about children’s learning and
ways of observing children’s language learning.

Tháng 11/2014

Nikolov (2009) explored into the processes of
early learning of modern foreign languages in
which young language learners’ cognitive,
affective, socio-economic and classroom-related
factors interact with one another. In the light of
applied linguistics, Cameron also suggested a
model of the construct language for child foreign
language learning as follows:

Source: (Cameron, 2003)
Child foreign language learning is divided into
two processes – learning oral skills and learning
literacy skills. The former skills initially outdo the
latter ones so listening and speaking usually come
before writing and reading. In oral skills, Cameron
(2003) explained:
Oral skills can best be thought of as ‘vocabulary’
and ‘discourse’, with both of these being
constructs centered on use and meaning, to
reflect children’s learning. Vocabulary skills
involve the understanding and productive use not
just of single words but of phrases and ‘chunks’
of language. Discourse is language as use, and
often, but not always, occurs in stretches longer

than the sentence. In contrast to these extended
stretches of talk, conversational skills involve
understanding and using phrases and sentences in
interaction with other children and with adults.

2.3. Children’s foreign vocabulary learning
One of the milestones of early foreign language
development is the production of children’s first
words which reflect their cognitive skills and
understanding of a new language. Stephanie and
Villiers (1997) defined vocabulary as the most

basic building blocks for learning English. Words
are also basic meaning carriers that young learners
initially employ to express what is going on in
their minds. However, words only do not meet
communicative needs. M. Lewis (2008)
emphasized on chunks of language or stretches of
words in meaningful contexts that enable young
learners to be naturally involved in conversations
and lead them from words to sentences and then
grammar. Cameron (2003) and Pinter (2014)
shared the belief that school-aged children pick up
words before they are aware of grammatical rules
as their limited capacity to generalize or analyze
structures keeps them from grammatical
explanations at the onset of child foreign language
learning, which agrees with the dotted boundary
between vocabulary and grammar in Cameron’s
model of the construct language for child foreign

language learning. Actually, even to adults,
learning a sufficient amount of vocabulary is one
of the biggest challenges because grammar is a
closed system but vocabulary is an open system.
The linguist David Wilkins summed up the
importance of vocabulary learning (Thornbury,
2002, p. 13):
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Ti u ban 1: Đào t o chuyên ng

“Without grammar very little can be conveyed,
without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed.”

2.4. Children’s word learning mechanisms
The status of vocabulary has become
reconsidered in foreign language teaching, backed
by increasing significant research (Bogaards &
Laufer, 2004; Carter, 2002, 2012; McCarthy,
2010; Morgan & Rinvolucri, 2011; P. Nation,
2005; N. Schmitt, 2000; Takac, 2008). For
effective communication in young language
classes, Cameron (2003) reconfirmed that building
up useful vocabulary at primary level is the
principal focus of the learning of a foreign
language (p.72). Then how do children learn
vocabulary? A lot of scientists have been

interested in the area. For example, Grauberg

(1997) suggested when a word is introduced for
the first time, its meaning, pronunciation and
spelling are what primary pupils should be
instructed. As young learners’ experience of
words and lexical knowledge widens and deepens,
their lexical knowledge grows in various ways.
Gil Diesendruck (Hoff & Shatz, 2007) tried to
seek for the answer with his suggested model of
child word learning mechanisms in which children
learn words through six mechanisms: input,
lexical constraints, syntax, conceptual bias,
pragmatics, attention and learning in the two
dimensions
of
specificity-cognition
and
exogenous (external) endogenous (internal) source.

Position of the various word learning mechanisms in relation to the dimensions of specificity and source
Source: (Hoff & Shatz, 2007, p. 258)
The chart shows that the mechanism of
attention and learning lies between the external
and internal source dimension, decided by both
the learner and the teacher. The other four
mechanisms,
lexical
constraints,
syntax,
conceptual bias and pragmatics, process within the
learner during their cognitive development from

concrete to abstract. The only external mechanism
is input. Native or bilingual children acquire
vocabulary input from parents or family members
and develop it naturally without formal instruction,
but second or foreign language learners apparently
do need vocabulary instructions in the necessary
knowledge and the skills required to use it mainly
from their teachers.
44

3. Teaching vocabulary to children
Learning and teaching always go along together.
From the characteristics of young English learners,
their language learning in general and vocabulary
learning as well word learning mechanisms in
particular, to bring vocabulary to life in young
English classes, it is essential to review the
following fundamental teaching principles.


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Tháng 11/2014

3.1. Principles of teaching vocabulary to
children

• Present multiple
vocabulary items.

In tune with Gil Diesendruck’s lens on the
mechanisms of word learning, taking the factors
of the nature of vocabulary into account, Cameron
(2001) analyzed children vocabulary learning in
their conceptual development and suggested the
principles for teaching vocabulary as follows (p. 91):

• Give opportunities for deep processing of
vocabulary items.

- The types of words that children find
possible to learn will shift from concrete to
abstract.

In a more detailed perspective in connection
with young learners’ ages, familiarity with
vocabulary concepts, similarity between L1 and
L2, Stephanie and Villiers (1997) addressed child
vocabulary learning by seeking for answers to
frequently asked questions such as word teaching
load per session, word choice and word learning.
They also convincingly clarified the six stages of
learning a word for the correspondent teaching
implications (p. 6):

- Vocabulary development is not just learning
more words but is also importantly about
expanding and deepening word knowledge.
- Words and word knowledge are linked in
networks of meaning.

- Basic level words are likely to be more
appropriate for younger children while older
learners can benefit from building up
superordinate and subordinate vocabulary linked
to basic level words they already know.
- Children change in how they can learn words.
Meanwhile,
from
another
skill-based
perspective, E. H. Hiebert and M. L. Kamil (2005)
distinguished two sets of word concepts: print/oral
vocabulary and receptive/productive vocabulary.
In the learner’s angle, I. S. P. Nation (1990)
recognized the learning burden pupils encounter
when they learn vocabulary involves meaning,
form and usage along with three challenges – the
learner’s previous experience of English and their
mother tongue, the way in which the word is
learned or taught and the intrinsic difficulty of the
word. With the similar focus on the vocabulary
principles but from the teacher’s views, Linse and
Nunan (2005) suggested (p. 123-127):
• Emphasize both direct and indirect teaching.
• Teaching vocabulary words before a new
activity.
• Teach how
appropriately.

to

use

context

clues

exposures

to

new

• Teach students to use dictionaries.
• Have students keep vocabulary notebooks.
3.2. Vocabulary teaching stages

1)

Recognition

2)

Repetition

3)

Controlled usage

4)

Reading

5)

Write and spell

6)

Independent usage

Grauberg (1997) suggested a four-stage
teaching process for young learners including
discrimination,
understanding
meaning,
remembering and consolidation and extension of
meaning (p. 15). First, discrimination involves
distinctions of sound, letters, sound clustering,
oral vocabulary or print vocabulary. Next comes
understanding meaning. Besides, word learning
depends on learners’ preferences. Instead of
focusing on vocabulary principles or teaching
stages, in order to find how children could find
their ways to learn vocabulary, Takac (2008)
employed a quantitative research in which 675
elementary learners of English as a FL aged
between 11 and 14 with the implication that the
position of the FL in the learning context does
affect the selection and use of the vocabulary

learning strategies. He eventually reached a
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Ti u ban 1: Đào t o chuyên ng

conclusion that to beginning pupils, learning
vocabulary is crucial so teaching vocabulary to
young language learners effectively is of greater
importance
especially
in
FL
learning
environments where Nikolov (2002) considered
teachers of young learners key players (p. 5). It’s
primary teachers’ deep insights of child learning
that will lead to success in young language classes.
3.3. The teacher’s
vocabulary learning

role

in

children’s

Any decisions about classroom practice made
by a language teacher originate from professional
perceptions a language teacher have about the

nature of a target language, language learners and
the context in which the teacher works. Fives and
Gill (2015) highlighted teachers’ beliefs were “at
the very heart of teaching” and explained some
reasons why it is very important to understand
how and what teachers view about learning and
teaching (p. 85):
One reason may be that beliefs held by teachers
influence how and why they may or may not
change their practice to incorporate new
curriculum, adopt new instructional strategies
or take up new initiatives. Understanding the
beliefs that guide teachers’ decision making and
actions in their classrooms could help educators
at all levels adjust how they work with teachers
to provide more targeted feedback to support
teachers’ professional growth and development
throughout their career.

In English language teacher education, Borg
(2006), one of the leading researchers in teacher
cognition in language education, recommended a
wide range of research methods such as
questionnaires, self-report instruments, interviews,
classroom visits, scenario-rating tasks of preservice and in-service teachers because teachers
are active, thinking decision-makers who play a
central role in shaping classroom events with the
convincing assumption that what teachers do in
the conduct of their professional activities is
shaped, though not entirely determined, by what

they believe and know. Barnard and Burns (2012)
46

stressed (page 3):
Although teachers may have strongly held beliefs,
they do not always put these into practice. The
reasons need to be understood by exploring the
specific contexts in which they work, each of
which is itself a complex and dynamic system in
which physical, temporal, cognitive, social and
cultural factors interact to provide affordances for,
or constraints on, the practical application of
beliefs about teaching and learning, which in turn
influence what teachers believe and know.

Cohan and Honigsfeld (2011) stated that
reactivating teachers’ classroom experience
reflectively in connection with the well-grounded
theoretical teaching foundation and the influential
factors of their real teaching settings helps
teachers break the teaching routine for changes
and development. Therefore, the deeper
understanding a primary language teacher has in
vocabulary teaching principles, teaching stages
and teaching techniques, the more insightful he or
she becomes into obstacles or challenges
throughout teaching practice, the more likelihood
the teacher can have to develop tactics and
overcome the challenges, the more effective
vocabulary learning and teaching gets. To expand

the research paths, apart from questionnaires,
interviews, observation, other methods such as
narrative frames, focus groups, think aloud,
stimulated recall, oral reflective journals are the
research instrumentations the leading researchers
in teacher cognition such as Judy Nguyen, Nguyen
Gia Viet, Andrew Gladman, Le Van Canh, Simon
Humphries, Jinrui Li, Jonathon Ryan prolonged
the method list. Listening to primary teachers’
voices or classroom visits for observations and
dialogic enquiries to know about their theoretical
understanding they gain, challenges they
encounter as well as the factors that may affect
their teaching behaviors are to pursue children’s
achievements, to facilitate teachers’ tasks and
promote teaching competencies.


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4. The emergent studies on Asian children’s
English learning
From the theoretical backgrounds and research
methods ignited by the experts in the area, a lot of
studies about child English learning have been
conducted. For example, through a collaborative
effort of an international comparative research of
the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School
of Education, Silver et al. (2001) portrayed a
picture of English language education in China,

Singapore and Japan raising one of the hottest
debated concerns that is elementary English
education in China, Singapore and Japan.
Tılfarlıoğlu and Öztürk (2007), employing a
descriptive research method, explored into the
implementation issues of ELT curricula reflected
by in-service primary teachers in Gaziantep,
Turkey through a 45 item questionnaire,
interviews and self-reports. In Taiwan, Wang
(2008) surveyed the concerns relating to teaching,
teacher education, teaching materials perceived by
teachers of English through a questionnaire and
semi-structured interviews which ended with
video recordings of classroom practices. Fallon
and Rublik (2012) carried out a qualitative study
focusing on the policy implementation, teachers’
perceptions on students’ attitudes toward English
and on the basic literacy skills through recorded
interviews in which the research respondents were
ESL primary teachers, resource teacher trainers
and two school boardbased officials. In Vietnam,
two researchers – Pham and Nguyen, drew their
attention to EFL at the primary level on the macro
scale; however, their research paths were not the
same. Through a questionnaire and in-depth
interviews, Pham (2013) quantitatively and
qualitatively analyzed Hue primary English
teachers’ responses for the influencing obstacles
and factors in implementing - methodological
innovations at schools while H.T.M.Nguyen

(2011) conducted a comparative case study with
the data collected from classroom observations
and interviews with both teachers and school
administrators at two primary schools, public and

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private, for the influential factors in the
implementation of primary English education.
Unlike the above researchers whose interests were
at a high administrative level in the primary
English language education implementation, Le
and Nation (2011) developed their methodological
research in measuring the English vocabulary size
of Vietnamese learners of English. Through
another analysis of the data collected from three
groups of young beginning-level learners in the
experiential approach, Shintani (2012) shifted to a
more specific concern by comparing the linguistic
effect of focus on form and focus on forms
instruction on children’s acquisition of productive
knowledge of L2 vocabulary.
5. Research
The above research studies have opened a new
direction for this research – primary teachers’
perceptions of vocabulary teaching and learning.
Before proceeding to the research scope, it is
necessary to clarify some basic terms of the
research focus. First, in the Dictionary of Applied
Linguistics, perception is defined as the

recognition and understanding of events, objects,
and stimuli through the use of senses (sight,
hearing, etc.) while teachers’ beliefs are thought to
be stable constructs derived from their experience,
observations, training and other sources and
serve as a source of reference in encountering
new ideas. Only when teachers are professionally
well-trained and they can bring their teaching
training into classrooms effectively are their
teaching beliefs are built. Contrarily, when
teachers teach with experience after no or little
formal training, perceptions, not beliefs, are built.
Teachers’ cognition develops from perceptions
through self-reflections upon failure or success in
classroom practices to beliefs for effective
teaching. In the book “Perceptions of teaching and
learning”, Hughes (1994) defined perceptions are
individual mental phenomena, yet the data can be
drawn from linguistic images of these phenomena.
Also Davis (2003) clearly indicated that
perception research investigates stimulus-driven
47


Ti u ban 1: Đào t o chuyên ng

processes influencing behavior. From the lights, in
this research primary teachers’ perception is
defined as primary teachers’ understanding or
recognition of teaching and learning vocabulary

in theory and practice. Their perceptions can be
observable through their linguistic images in the
forms of verbal responses and teaching behaviors
to vocabulary instruction. Their perceptions may
change overtime due to various sociocultural
influencing factors as teaching English to young
learners is not popular in English teacher
education. The next linguistic terms that need
addressing are vocabulary and word. According to
several leading scientists in vocabulary research
such as Carter (2012), Morgan and Rinvolucri
(2011), Bogaards and Laufer (2004), N.Schmitt
(2000), E.H.Hiebert and M.L.Kamil (2005) and
P.Nation (2000), vocabulary learning and teaching
has attracted sophisticated attention for its
complexity. Yet, when English is introduced to
young learners, vocabulary is seen in simpler and
child-friendly approaches. According to Linse and
Nunan (2005), vocabulary is the collection of
words an individual conceptually develop and
knows through formal and informal instruction.
Read (2000) referred the term word to a variety of
lexical units ranging from single words to multiword items such as polywords, institutionalized
expressions, phrasal constraints or sentence
builders (p. 16-24). Hirsh (2012) stated that, to
young learners, vocabulary is the knowledge of
meanings of words that come in at least two
forms: oral and print. Knowledge of words also
comes in at least two forms, receptive—that which
we

can
understand
or
recognize—and
productive—the vocabulary we use when we write
or speak.
5.1. Research scope
In Binhdinh, the fact that primary English
teacher education has not been present in English
language teacher education along with the
officially introduced language policy in primary
classes has created both new learning experience
and pressure. According to the statistics from the
48

Binhdinh Education and Training Department,
there have been 319 primary teachers of English at
237 primary schools where the majority of the
teachers graduated from universities and colleges.
In response to the increasing learning demands
and decreasing learner-age range, MOET and
DOET are very concerned about training quality.
Therefore, short-term training courses in primary
English learning and teaching have been
constantly organized in conjunction with British
Council. The training program includes 540
periods in total in which 360 periods is for English
proficiency and 180 periods for teaching practical
skills.
5.2. Research methods and participants

From the emergent research studies, the
aforementioned rationale and the experience in
teaching at some local primary schools, a survey
of primary English teachers’ competence in
Binhdinh was conducted to probe for teachers’
perceptions as well as difficulties in teaching
vocabulary at primary schools through a
vocabulary-based questionnaire and structured
interviews. The question items were oriented to
three aspects:

Perceptions of the importance of vocabulary
in child foreign language learning.
Perceptions of the nature of vocabulary child
foreign language learning.
Perceptions of vocabulary teaching methods.
6. Findings
6.1. Primary teachers’ perceptions of the
importance of vocabulary in child foreign
language learning
Vocabulary is one of the first aspects
of a foreign language for young learners
to learn for communication.
Strongly
Agree

Agree

Not
Sure

Disagree

Strongly
Disagree

45%

50%

5%

0%

0%

45% of the primary teachers strongly held the


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perception that vocabulary is one of the first
aspects of a foreign language for young learners to
learn for communication. 50% of them were in
favour of the assumption whereas 5% doubted the
key role of vocabulary. As Stephanie and Villiers
(1997) defined vocabulary the most basic building
blocks for learning English and vocabulary cuts

across listening, speaking, reading and writing.
Most of the respondents shared such high
appreciation of vocabulary. Unlike adult learners,
building up early vocabulary offers young learners
not only first new experience in foreign language
learning, initial success in communication but also
motivation to explore foreignness for curiosity and
imagination, which is in line with Vivet’s
assumption, pointing out how foreign languages
can introduce children to a world of sounds,
positive sensations, new discoveries and
stimulating acquisitions (Ellis & McCartney,
2011). In response to the interview questions
about what important roles vocabulary played in
child foreign language learning, the teachers’
responses were not specific as to detail.
Teachers should teach all the words
as they appear in the glossary list
at the end of the textbook.
Strongly
Agree

Agree

Not
Sure

Disagree

Strongly

Disagree

16%

48%

11%

25%

0%

A good understanding of the implications of
textbook structures leads both teachers and
learners to an effective exploitation of the
textbook. In response to the pedagogic values of
glossary, 64% of the respondents thought that the
teacher should instruct the list of words while 25%
of them disagreed and 11% were unsure. Actually,
to meet diverse learners of mixed abilities, any
textbook contains a wide range of vocabulary
which is generally either alphabetized or arranged
in the order of units and frequently found in the
back of a book. Yet, no matter how much a
teacher tries in class, she or he can not deal with
all new words in a textbook. Teaching does not
mean learning though teaching and learning is

closely attached to each other. Then what should
learners do? The term "glossary" originates with

the Latin word "glossarium," which means
"difficult word requiring explanation. In this case,
learners can refer to glossary when they want to
know new words. Glossary in L2 is for proficient
learners and glossary in L1 is for less proficient
learners. According to N. Schmitt (2010) and
Nation (2010), glossing is one way of focusing
explicit attention on lexical items during reading
where otherwise only incidental learning would
occur. Glossing words sets out to offer immediate
support to pupils with accurate information about
unknown words while learners are reading. By
doing it, glossary offers minimal interruption to
reading and keeps learners from making erroneous
guesses about unknown words.
Pupils should learn every new word
whenever they see.
Strongly
Agree

Agree

Not
Sure

Disagree

Strongly
Disagree

0%

5%

11%

66%

18%

11% cast doubt on whether young learners
should learn every new word whenever they see,
84% disagreed while 5% agreed. During the
interviews with the surveyed participants, the
concepts – incidental and intentional vocabulary
learning – seemed to be quite new. Actually,
incidental learning or ‘by-the-way’ learning
occurs in natural exposure to vocabulary while
intentional learning results from systematic and
explicit vocabulary instruction that leads to the
depth of word knowledge and enhances word
learning, word memory, and word recall for later
use. If word learning is understood in the way
Nation pointed out in terms of word learning
burden comprising its meaning, form and use, it is
not an easy task for young learners to take in
every word whenever they see the words. Only
when words are learnt meaningfully, orally in fun
ways with high frequency can words stay in
pupils’ minds for natural use. Richards and

Renandya (2002) said (p.71):
“Processing the meaning of words involves
49


Ti u ban 1: Đào t o chuyên ng

explicit knowledge, whereas recognition and
production of word forms take place through an
unconscious
process,
using
implicit
knowledge.”

Therefore, the data revealed that Binhdinh
primary teachers may not have had to juggle
intentional vocabulary learning with incidental
vocabulary learning in primary classes as various
forms of incidental vocabulary learning may not
have been detected (i.e. vocabulary-oriented
websites for recommended homelinks, classroom
vocabulary posters, photocopiables, projectors,
flashcards, puppets, etc.). Chacón-Beltrán, AbelloContesse, and Torreblanca-López (2010) indicated
that intentional learning enables faster learning
and deeper engagement for vocabulary retention
when young learners notice well or pay good
attention to vocabulary learning burdens and
active vocabulary should be taught before passive
vocabulary (p. 49). On the other hand, incidental

vocabulary
learning
provides
integration
vocabulary in skill practice naturally or creates
recycling for words to be incidentally learnt, for
example, gloss or glossary, words with picture
illustrations, storytelling, puzzles, word plays,
songs, drama, picture description, etc. The fact
that textbooks are designed with glossary,
accompanied imagery flashcards, songs or project
– based activity books provide more vocabulary
retention could learn is a good example of a
combination of intentional and incidental
vocabulary learning.
6.2. Primary teachers’ perceptions of the
nature of vocabulary in children’s foreign
language learning
Pupils benefit
from the spoken production of vocabulary
during vocabulary learning tasks.
Strongly
Agree

Agree

Not
Sure

Disagree

Strongly
Disagree

9%

73%

18%

0%

0%

82% of the teachers believed that spoken
production of vocabulary did help young learners
50

to enhance their lexical ability while 18% were
undecided about children’s benefits from oral
skills. Four fifths of the teachers thought that
spoken production of vocabulary could facilitate
word learning burden. Sylva, Malaguzzi (Reggio
Emilia) and Whitehead (Dunn, 2011) explained
that children acquire and find out about language
‘through doing’, experimenting and imitating
because they are born natural language acquirers
and users. Their oral skills are always developed
before literacy skills. Halliwell (1993) employed
their instinct for play and fun, imagination and

interaction and talk to reconfirm the emphasis on
teaching vocabulary through oral skills. Moon
(2000) pointed out one of the unique features of
young learners is talking off their head and feeling
at home. The more orally they produce a word, the
more they remember, the more they recognize it
when exposed to it later. The above features
highlighted by the leading psycholinguistic and
methodological experts strengthen the findings of
the data that vocabulary learnt by young learners
is more oral in nature, which is quite in line with
what Cameron visualized in the model of child
foreign language learning. Yet, the interviews
with several teachers revealed that the ability to
write words was expected to accompany with oral
skills, however, it painstakingly took young
learners so much time out of a 45-minute class to
get vocabulary copied right in their notebooks that
some classes had vocabulary translated and
computerized on cut-outs. All what pupils did was
reading along and sticking the cut-outs to their
notebooks. Phonetic transcriptions along with
vocabulary was also the respondents’ concern.
Learning English is difficult and learning
phonetics as metalanguage is more difficult so
teaching phonics is a solution to their concerns
instead of phonetic transcriptions.
To young learners, teaching vocabulary
should go along with teaching grammar.
Strongly

Agree

Agree

Not
Sure

Disagree

Strongly
Disagree

0%

23%

18%

39%

20%


Chi n l
c ngo i ng trong xu th h i nh p

Tháng 11/2014

With regard to the integration of vocabulary
and grammar, no teachers strongly approved and
23% of the surveyed teachers supported this idea.

Yet, 18% were still confused and 59% thought
that the integration between vocabulary and
grammar was not appropriate. According to
Cameron (2003) and Pinter (2014), it is not easy
for very young children to understand explicit
grammatical rules. Grammar is a closed system
with a set of structures rules that enables language
users to express their ideas precisely; however,
young children, though eager and receptive to
learn, are not cognitively ready for abstract
concepts. Acquiring grammatical structures is
abstract while mastering vocabulary repertoire an open system - is a huge task. Instead, they pick
up the meaning of chunks in context very quickly
before they are aware of grammatical rules.
Therefore, grammar should be learnt intuitively
through context in which meaning and fun tasks
such as drawing, songs, chants, games, TPR
activities, teamwork etc. can be inferred.
Grammar should be taught in a fun and purposeful
way as G. Lewis and Mol (2007) suggested we
should focus on grammatical performance and
awareness rather than knowledge of grammatical
concepts or rules. The language units that can do
the function from simple input to complex
grammar are what M. Lewis (2008) called chunks.
However, during the interviews with the surveyed
teachers, most of them seemed to be not familiar
with the concept of chunks.
6.3. Primary teachers’ perceptions
vocabulary teaching methods

of

Pupils learn vocabulary
in the same way as adults do.
Strongly
Agree

Agree

Not
Sure

Disagree

Strongly
Disagree

0%

5%

11%

66%

18%

The fact that 84% of the respondents did not
see that pupils learn vocabulary in the same way

as adults do could be explained from their own
learning experience they have had in classroom as
learners and teachers, from the real difficulties the

teachers encountered, and from the recent training
in PELT they have received. Yet, some structured
interviews showed that they recognized that adult
learning is different from child learning; yet, they
may not know how different they are. To clarify
such differences, Brown (1987) made a very
thorough comparison between young learners and
adult learners with variables such as cognition,
sensory input, attention span, abstract thinking
ability (p. 87-92) while Moon (2000) highlighted
learning differences with seven features - using
language creatively, going for meaning, using
‘chunks’ of language, having fun, joining in the
action, talking their heads off and feeling at home.
(p. 10). The more the teacher puts oneself in
learners’ situation, the more aware the teacher gets
of the differences, the more child-friendly his
teaching gets. Meanwhile, 11% of the teachers
were not sure about the differences between child
and adult language learning and 5% did not
perceive the same, which may result from the fact
that primary English teacher education is not
present in the English teacher education in
Binhdinh; therefore, primary teachers are likely to
teach pupils in the way they were taught and
taught to teach.

Vocabulary should be taught
in integration with listening, speaking, reading
and writing.
Strongly
Agree

Agree

Not
Sure

Disagree

Strongly
Disagree

39%

57%

5%

0%

0%

Concerning
vocabulary
in
language

performance, more than a third of the surveyed
instructors held a strong approval of teaching
vocabulary within four basic skills. This
integration was considered as a good idea by 57%
teachers while only 5% of them were hesitant.
Actually, vocabulary cuts across language skills.
Whenever a learner listens, speaks, writes or reads,
he must use vocabulary. E. H. Hiebert and M. L.
Kamil (2005) made very interesting distinctions
between two sets of word concepts – oral or print
vocabulary and receptive or productive
51


Ti u ban 1: Đào t o chuyên ng

vocabulary as follows (p.3):
Productive vocabulary is the set of words that
an individual can use when writing or speaking.
They are words that are well-known, familiar, and
used frequently. Conversely, receptive, or
recognition, vocabulary is that set of words for
which an individual can assign meanings when
listening or reading. These are words that are
often less well known to students and less frequent
in use. Oral vocabulary is the set of words for
which we know the meanings when we speak or
read orally. Print vocabulary consists of those words
for which the meaning is known when we write or
read silently.

Obviously, these distinctions shed light on two
different things. First, when young pupils learn
reading, beginning readers have to recognize print
words and read aloud so they usually can not read
silently – that is, the set of print words that they
read is mainly oral representations. The further
their learning progresses in reading, the
increasingly larger role their print vocabulary
plays in literacy than oral vocabulary and they can
develop silent reading later. Secondly, young
pupils learn reading differently from adults do,
which is one of the above examples to illustrate
the differences between adult and child
vocabulary learning.
Vietnamese should not be used
in English classes.
Strongly
Agree

Agree

Not
Sure

Disagree

Strongly
Disagree

0%

23%

18%

39%

20%

Regarding to L1 use in language classes, 59%
of the participants disagreed whereas 23% had the
opposite opinion while 18 % of them hesitated. As
Nation pointed that child vocabulary learning
usually begins with meaning, then come forms
ended with use. Introducing the meanings of new
words in Vietnamese is the most common way for
teacher-learner interaction as very beginning
learners come to class with no or little English.
Sieh (2008), backed by her experimental research
on the L1 role in young learners’ processing and
52

storage of English vocabulary in the initial stages
of L2 learning, discovered that to the beginning
English Taiwanese young learners whose L1 use
was overwhelmingly dominant, the connection
between their FL lexical and conceptual
representations was relatively weak in comparison
to the connection between the two languages at
the lexical level. There have been many reasons to

explain among which is their pre-existing
vocabulary knowledge through L1. Such
connections may make some L1 impacts upon
child FL acquisition especially in pronunciation,
culture-bound concepts. In the conversations
about their teaching practice with the surveyed
teachers, not few pupils tended to attach
Vietnamese for phonetic transcription with
English vocabulary, i.e. table /thấy bồ/, balloon
/bờ lun/. Or sliding sound clusters in green /gri:n/,
blue /blu:/ or dream /dri:m/ were often negatively
transferred into clear-cut sound clusters
respectively /gờ rin/, /bờ lu:/ or /ñờ rim/ etc. The
conversations with the surveyed teachers led to an
in-depth analysis based on the typical
characteristics of Vietnamese such as consistent
sound
clustering
principles,
one-to-one
correspondences between sounds and spelling and
monosyllabic vocabulary in Vietnamese. Many of
them did recognize the inappropriate oral forms in
their pupils’ vocabulary learning tasks; however,
large sized classes of mixed abilities and
overloading lessons kept them from getting their
children’s errors and mistakes corrected.

7. Conclusion
In a nutshell, the research into Binhdinh

primary teachers’ perceptions of teaching and
learning vocabulary as part of my on-going thesis
has shed light on some initial findings in primary
teachers’ perceptions of the importance of
vocabulary in foreign language learning,
vocabulary in children’s foreign language learning
and vocabulary teaching methods. Regarding the
status of teaching and learning vocabulary in child
foreign language learning, most of the participants
were aware of the importance of vocabulary
learning, however, a deeper penetration into the
specific essential roles vocabulary plays is beyond
their perceptions through their ease in using


Chi n l
c ngo i ng trong xu th h i nh p

glossary for word selection or word choice.
Identifying the role vocabulary at the onset of
learning enables teachers to develop his
vocabulary teaching plans strategically. As for the
nature of vocabulary taught to young learners, the
surveyed teacher seemingly had tendency to
follow the textbooks and step on the paths
textbook designers have paved in glossaries. Apart
from the concepts of productive and receptive
vocabulary or passive and active vocabulary they
have heard in their pre-service teacher education,
the distinctions between oral vocabulary, print
vocabulary, sight words or the vague boundary

between vocabulary and grammar seemed to be
dim in their perceptions, which may result in their
different choices in teaching and learning
techniques. Therefore, the vocabulary-oriented
reflective enquiries initially raise their vocabulary
awareness, reactivate and complement childfriendly teaching knowledge and skills within the
primary teachers for quality teaching and learning.
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