Vcd as a stimulating factor to increase the young learners’ time-on-task

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CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION
I.1 Rationale of the study:
Increasing the students’ participation in language classroom activities is very crucial to the
success in language learning. However, the question of how to increase the young learners’
time-on-task is really complicated. As many researchers and studies on the second language
acquisition point out that the process of acquiring a second language grammar is not
substantially affected by age, but the process of acquiring pronunciation, proficiency and
especially, native accents is acquired better by children. That means young learners have more
advantages when they early start to learn a second language. Nevertheless, young learners
cannot concentrate for very long on monotonous language learning activities. In language
teaching, there is a number of ways to involve the young learners such as games, media…, and
the use of all those facilities is obviously helpful for motivating learners. There are various types
of facilities. Native speakers can be considered as a facility. However, in Vietnamese schools
settings it is not easy to have native speakers for students to engage in the real social interaction
and to be more exposed to native accents. Instead, students can watch native speakers on Videos
or VCDs or DVDs (in the latter parts of this study, the term VCDs will be used to refer to all
three means). Moreover, young learners usually are more visually oriented. Hypothetically, the
use of videos in classroom settings could help to prolong young learners’ span of concentration
and to motivate them during classroom activities. Yet, the issue seems to have been
underexplored. The reality showed that the use of VCDs in schools was a rare and luxurious
thing in the past. Nowadays, the use of VCDs and other means is not yet increased in language
teaching. That is a reason why this study is designed to fill this gap in the literature.
I.2 Aim of the study
This study aims at exploring the possibility of using VCDs to increase the young learners’ timeon-task.
Specifically, the aims of the study are to explore:
•

Teachers and learners’ perception of the advantages of VCDs over audiocassettes.

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•

The extent to which VCDs increase learners’ time-on-task.

• The pupils’ attitudes toward using VCDs in the classroom.
I.3 Scope of the study
Definition: VCD stands for Video CD. Developed in the early 90's by JVC, Matsushita, Philips,
and Sony, VCDs, although having limited success in the U.S., became popular, mostly in Asia,
for the playback of video content.
For this study, the author would conduct a research on 10 English teachers and 50 pupils in
Hanoi. These 50 pupils are in normal classes of a normal school. They are in the labor area their parents all come from the working class - so most of them do not have condition to go to
extra English courses. However, they have enabled to study English at school since grade 3 and
have acquired an average level with about 800 word vocabulary. There are three types of
textbooks used for normal primary schools in Vietnam: Let’s Learn (published with the
assistance of a Singaporean publishing house); the textbook officially published by the Ministry
of Education and Training of Vietnam, and Let’s Go. Every school has the right to choose what
material it likes to teach students. The school under this research has chosen Let’s Go because it
is a publication of the Oxford University, and it has both cassettes and VCDs while the two
other types of textbooks only have cassettes. The students under the research study Let’s Go 2B.
Thus, this research paper only refers to the use of VCDs included with the textbook Let’s Go 2.
For the sake of this research, the author selects 4 lessons. The VCDs is included with the
textbook and is illustrated with the first and second part of every unit. (Let’s talk and Let’s sing).
I.4 Organization of the study
This minor thesis includes five chapters:

- Chapter 1: Introduction, which presents the rationale for choosing the topic, the aims, the
scope, method and organization of the study.

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- Chapter 2: Setting up some theoretical backgrounds, which are relevant to the purpose of
the study

- Chapter 3: Methodology, which provides an overview of participants’ background
information and method of collecting data.

- Chapter 4: This part deals with data collection, findings and discussions
- Chapter 5: Summary of the thesis, limitation and suggestions for further study.


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CHAPTER II: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
II.1 A review of language teaching approaches
Teaching language has received much focus for the past few decades. So many approaches and
methods such as Audiolingual Method, Total Physical Response, Content-based language
teaching, Theme-based language teaching have been advanced, but it must be said that they all
follow three different theoretical views of language and the nature of language proficiency: the
structural view, the functional view, and the interactional view (Richards and Rogers 1996). The
structural view see language as systematically structured segments and language teaching is
aimed at helping learners learn these segments. According to this view, language is seen as an
object and learners as students. The functional view sees language as a medium for expressing
the functional meaning, and language teaching is aimed at helping learners learn language
functions such as requests, commands, greetings, thanking, apology, complaints, compliments,
invitations, and refusals. Like the structural view, however, it is an attempt for implementation
of the structural or synthetic syllabus, which requires learners to resynthesize the discrete pieces

of language to use in communicative situations, and so language is still seen as an object and
learners still as students. In contrast with the two above views, the interactional view sees
language as a tool for the creation and maintenance of interpersonal and social relations between
individuals, and learners are viewed as language users. It is an attempt for implementation of the
analytic syllabus, which aims to immerse learners in real-life communication.
The following section will review three different teaching approaches: the oral-situational
approach, the notional-functional approach, and the communicative approach, which are based
on the three above language theories, respectively.
According to Ellis (2005), the oral-situational approach is based on a behaviorist learning
theory, that is, it assumes that language learning is habit formation and over learning.
Grammatical structures are carefully selected and sequenced from basic to more complex and
then presented inductively. Learners are required to experience much controlled practice with


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manipulative drill types to memorize certain sentence patterns and to minimize errors, which are
seen as bat habits. This description of the oral-situational approach seems similar to the
audiolingual approach because both are based on a structural syllabus. However, the former is
different from the latter in the sense that it focuses on both meaning ad forms of the linguistic
structures. It also emphasizes the importance of creating different situational contexts in the
classroom for learners to practice the structures. The latter version of the oral-situational
approach concerns with skill-building theory (Anderson 1993, cited in Ellis 2005), which
involves the assumption that declarative knowledge or explicit knowledge can be converted into
procedural knowledge or implicit knowledge through practice. It is the fact that the latter version
is related to PPP model, which is based on the Interface Hypothesis fully developed by
Sharwood Smith (1981, cited in Ellis 1994). This hypothesis claims that learners should be
taught some language before they can communicate. They then practice using learnt knowledge
via different types of drill exercises until the learnt knowledge becomes automatic. The learners,
thereby, acquire the learnt language. However, this hypothesis does not take into account the

learners’ cognition problems such as cognitive load and cognitive complexity. It is the fact that
learners’ general cognitive processing capacity is limited, and they are not ready to acquire the
structures being beyond their developmental patterns whatever how much they practice (Ellis
1994).
The notional-functional approach is derived from the functional view of language described
above. It is built on a theory of communicative competence and on functional models of
language. The language functions and language notions are taught to learners at the same time
with the assumption that language learning relates to learning formulaic expressions of language
as well as learning rules of language. Formulaic expressions can be distinguished by routines
and patterns (Krashen and Scarcella 1978, cited in Ellis 1994) when the former refers to
utterances learnt as memorized chunks (e.g. I don’t know) and the latter refers to utterances
learnt as ready-made expressions (e.g. Can I have a _____?). So the notional-functional
approach is useful in that it helps learners develop pragmatic competence and minimize
pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic errors. However, like the oral-situational approach, the


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notional-functional approach is still based on PPP model, that is, it is accuracy rather than
fluency oriented.
According to Kirkpatrick (1985), communicative language teaching is an idea or a set of
principles that owes much to a social view of language and to the concept of communicative
competence described by Hymes (1970). The goal of communicative language teaching is to
produce people who are communicatively, not merely, linguistically competent. That is to say,
the more the language learning in the classroom approaches the real-life communication, the
more successful it is. Communicative language teaching pays much attention to giving students
the opportunity to practice in genuine communication. Furthermore, the emphasis in teaching
language through communication is, therefore, on classroom activities which help learners to
acquire the rules (unconsciously) rather than to learn them (consciously). Such activities must
require the learners to focus on meaning, rather than on form. Linguistic knowledge such as

grammar is learnt in an unconscious ways; that is, students learn it through task-based activities
or communicative tasks.
The task-based teaching and learning, which is derived from the communicative approach, aims
at helping learners learn language through communication. It is built around communicative
tasks and so its primary focus is on meaning, that is, focuses on information exchanges. The
tasks are built on learners’ real communicative demands and this would help learners with
intrinsic motivation because the tasks they are doing in the classroom resemble the real-life
communication outside the classroom. And so learners’ language learning is assessed through
the outcome of the task performance. Linguistic structures are the secondary focus in the taskbased approach. They are embedded in the communicative tasks and taught indirectly. Learners’
attention will focus on forms when their communication is broke down. When so, they have to
utilize different strategies such as negotiation of meaning, recasts, clarification requests, and
conformation requests to make their communication smooth. And they may learn linguistic
forms naturally. Hence, the task-based teaching is useful in that it creates opportunities for
learners to use language as a tool rather than as an object to satisfy communicative needs. It
focuses on fluency rather than accuracy but, as described above, linguistic forms can be also


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learnt as a result of learning to communicate. However, it is necessary to distinguish between
tasks and exercises. According to Ellis (2005, p. 5) ‘the latter requires a primary focus on form
rather than meaning and typically asks learners to manipulate language given to them rather than
to attempt to communicate using their own linguistic and non-linguistic resources.’ In Ellis
(2003, cited in Ellis 2005), he also makes a distinction between task-based teaching and tasksupported teaching. The task-based teaching occurs when the teaching is based exclusively on
meaning-focus tasks, and the task-supported teaching occurs when tasks are incorporated into
either an oral-situational or a notional-functional syllabus and used to practice pre-selected and
presented linguistic forms.
II.2 VCD as a language – teaching aid
VCDs in the classroom offer exciting possibilities for language teaching and learning. The
principles of effective teaching and learning are illustrated with examples from a wide range of

material, at all levels of language learning. Radio and television have made important
contribution to foreign language learning. The widespread use of video recorders has had two
main effects on language - teaching broadcast. The first of these is to free teaching institutions
and learners from the constraints of the broadcasting timetable. Video recorders can be used to
store programmes for showing at any convenient time. The second change concerns with how
television programmes are made. Appreciating the benefits that a video recorder brings into the
classroom, more producers of language - teaching materials are designing video tape materials
with the classroom exploitation in mind. Four or five minutes of video tape material can easily
provide enough stimulating input for one hour’s teaching.
The outstanding feature of video films is their ability to present complete communicative
situations. The combination of sound and vision is dynamic, immediate, and accessible. This
means that communication can be shown in a context, and the many factors in communication
can be perceived easily by viewers - and language learners. The speakers in dialogues can be
seen and heard; other participants in the situation can be seen. The language learner can readily
see the ages of the participants; their sex, perhaps their relationships one to another; their dress,


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social status, and what they are doing; and perhaps their mood or feeling. Further, paralinguistic
information, such as facial expression or hand gestures, is available to accompany aural clues of
intonation. Similarly, the setting of the communication is clear: the language learner can see on
the screen where the action is taking place. This information may help to clarify whether the
situation is very formal, or perhaps informal. Of course, these audio-visual features of video
films are found in cinema films and television broadcasts too. But these other media do not offer
the same facilities for classroom exploitation of the material and content that video recorders do.
A further feature of video recordings – which is shared with other related media – is the use of
electronic tricks to create special effects and images. These are usually quite beyond the
resources of the language teacher to produce, and provide another valuable source of material
for use in language teaching and learning. Video presentations will be intrinsically interesting to

language learners. The learner will want to watch, even if comprehension is limited. The
material should be motivating; the learner should want to see more, to ask question, to follow up
ideas and suggestions. By generating and motivation, the Video films can create a climate for
successful learning. In a language – learning context, there is a need for special action: interaction with the video (Jack Lonergan, 1984).
II.3 The use of VCD in language classroom
This section will discuss some advantages and disadvantages of the use of VCD in language
classrooms.
According to Gallacher there are totally five benefits that video can bring about when used in
classroom. First, children enjoy language learning with video because video creates an attractive
enjoyable learning environment. Second, video is an effective way of studying body language as
younger language learners are still learning about the world around them. Third, children can
obtain confidence through repetition when they watch a video several times and absorb and
imitate what they see and hear. Fourth, video communicates meaning better than other media.
We can see that video presents language in context in ways that a cassette can’t; that is, learners
can see who’s speaking, where the speakers are, what they are doing, etc. Last, video represents


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a positive exploitation of technology. This is because young learners always have positive
attitude towards television and video, which is considered modern compared to books. However,
teachers are also advised to watch out for some shortcomings that video can cause in the
classroom. Video can make children become passive when watching it so teachers should
provide as many stimulating activities as possible where the children can interact with and learn
from the video. Furthermore, children’s parents may get annoyed when hearing their children
spend the class watching the video as they can do it at home. Hence, the time to watch the video
should be kept to a minimum and the children should have something concrete and related to the
video to show to their parents.
Beside the pros and cons of the use of video in language classroom, Gallacher also points out
four possible roles for video: developing listening skill, providing information, presenting or

reinforcing language, and stimulating language production. These roles do not operate
separately but can appear within one lesson. For example, learners may watch a video to find out
information about a famous person, and this may include work on developing listening skill to
enable them to extract the relevant information; it could then be used to develop vocabulary on
the topic of lives.
Gallacher next goes to show criteria for selecting video. He argues that an authentic video for
use in the classroom should be first watchable; that is, the video should be interesting. Next, the
video clip should tell a complete story a section of a story. This is important as young learners’
primary motivation for watching is enjoyment. The length of the clip is important, too. It should
be between 30 seconds and 10 minutes depending on the learning objectives. What is more, the
content of the video clip and children’s level of maturity should be compatible, that is, the
content should be suitable with each age group of children. Related materials that accompany
with the video should be available, too. In addition, Gallacher claims more that when a video is
used for presenting language or comprehension tasks, selecting the video should based on
degree of visual support, which means the more visual a video is, the easier it is to understand;
clarity of picture and sound; density of language, which refers to the amount of language spoken


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in a particular time; speech delivery, which includes clarity of speech, speech rate and accents;
language content, which consists of linguistic items; and language level, which should be
appropriate for the level of the class without the teacher having to explain too much.
* Teaching Foreign Languages to Children through Video
The teaching of foreign languages at the elementary school level has changed immensely over
the past two decades. Growing public awareness of the benefits of early foreign language
learning has led to an increase in both foreign language teaching and professional development
for language teachers at the elementary school level (Rhodes & Branaman, 1999). In 1996, the
release of national standards for foreign language learning had an extremely positive influence
on K–12 foreign language teaching. State education agencies developed standards based on the

national model, and school districts began to implement these standards at the local level.
This positive trend, however, has been jeopardized by a shortage of trained language teachers
(Duncan, 2000) and by budgetary constraints. In addition, parents and educators are increasingly
concerned about a lack of equity in elementary school language programs, which are viewed by
some as special classes for a select group of students. School districts are now looking for ways
to provide language classes for all students (Steele & Johnson, 2000).
Many administrators who are convinced of the importance of early foreign language education
but who don’t have the resources to offer foreign language classes taught by trained language
teachers are looking for affordable alternatives. Video programs that do not require the use of a
certified foreign language teacher offer a unique possibility.
II.4 Time-on-task
All the students of the age group 6-14 have not only enrolled but provided education of
satisfactory quality. It implies that the curriculum objectives for primary and upper primary
classes are achieved during their schooling. However, what students learn in school depends on


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several factors, many of which are school and teacher related factors. These factors affect not
only students’ learning in academic subjects but also personality development and achievement
in various co-curricular areas. Much depends on how teachers and students spend their time on
various teaching-learning activities in school.
Apart from the time spent on active teaching by teachers and how they teach, an important
dimension of the teaching-learning that takes place in school, is what student do and how much
time they spend on different types of learning and other related and unrelated activities in
school. This calls for a ‘time and task’ study of students, which should focus on what they do
individually or in a group while they are in school.
It is very necessary to claim that the more time students spend on tasks, the more knowledge and
more skillful they become. But an important question arisen here is that what the teachers can do
to increase students’ time spent on tasks. Brewster and Fager (2000) argue that there are five

strategies to increase the amount of time students spend on tasks. First, the teachers must be
aware that course materials relate to students’ lives and highlight ways learning can be applied
in real-life situations. That is to say, students should be taught what they need and they can use
what they have learnt in their daily life. Second, in the classroom activities, students should be
allowed to have some degree of control over learning. This means that students can have free
choices between different assignments; or they are let to monitor and evaluate their own
progress; or adult supervision over students’ group projects should be minimized. Third, the
teachers should assign challenging but achievable tasks for all students, including at-risk,
remedial, and learning disabled students. This is because students need to feel successful and
that they have earned success. Fourth, students’ curiosity should be taken into account when
tasks are given to them. This can be best to give students an opportunity to direct inquiry and
discover for themselves. Furthermore, it also builds up students’ needs for competence and
autonomy. Lastly, the teachers should design projects that allow students to share new
knowledge with others. Projects are more engaging when students share what they are learning


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in reciprocal relationship, as collaborative projects where each student’s knowledge is needed by
others in the group to complete an assignment.
Spanjers, Burns, and Wagner (2008) discusses this issue in more details when he gives five
stages in a procedure to increase students’ time-on-task. Each of five stages includes substages,
which are indeed techniques to increase the time students spend on task. These five stages are
(1) determine the average time the child can stay on task for each type of activity of interest, and
this can be done in the following procedure: (a) have the child perform the task 5 to 20 times,
(b) when you have at least 5 recorded times, add them all, (c) divide the total by the number of
recorded times; (2) require that the child stays on task for a slightly longer than his or her
average, and (a) when the child pays attention for the new longer time, reward him or her with
some small reward he or she really likes or (b) each time the child tries hard to meet the criteria
or succeeds, give the child a quick break; (3) repeat stages 1 and 2 daily or every-other-day

sessions until the child attends for half an hour; (4) if the child increases time on task and
performance in training session, but not when you are not there observe the child at school, there
may be two cases: (a) if the teacher’s methods are the problem use them during the training
session so the child learns to pays attention even in uninspiring circumstances, and (b) if the
problem is only the child’s, encourage the child; (5) repeat the procedure with other tasks.
Teaching for transfer and integrating language and content won't solve all the time problems that
teachers of ELLs encounter. For those teaching in all-English programs, the fact remains that
teaching content in English to ELLs takes more time than teaching the same content to native
speakers. Bilingual programs ease the time problem by teaching content in the native language,
but political pressures and the English testing requirements of No Child Left Behind often push
ELLs into all-English instruction before they are ready.
We could do a lot to help ease the time crunch by ensuring that students are engaged in
productive activities during the entire school day. When I started teaching, my students spent a
good part of the day doing unproductive activities or doing nothing, and I found the same thing
happening years later when I did an observational study of a second-grade bilingual classroom


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(Irujo, 1998, pp. 14-20). Almost all teachers can create extra time in their schedules by cutting
down on the time spent on clerical tasks such as attendance, announcements, or collecting and
passing out papers. Effective classroom management techniques can eliminate excess time spent
on disciplining students. Instructional time can be made more efficient through flexible grouping
arrangements that change according to tasks and student needs. Student attention can be
increased through relevant, motivational tasks that are challenging yet achievable.
II. 5 Motivation in language learning
II. 5.1 The concept of motivation
Gardner (1960) claims that to fully understand a student’s motivation to learn a second
language, it is necessary to explain his long-term drive to acquire all aspects of the target
language. However, this should be done first with the examination of the student’s first language

acquisition. Gardner cites many studies to show that children learn their first language by
imitation and the motive they learn the language here is that they want to be identified as a
member of the family. Hence, the children tend to take on many behavioral characteristics of the
parents and their behaviors are modified by that of the parents. That is to say, the family
becomes a reference group, and language learning is consequently one aspect of social learning.
This is called ‘identification motive’. This is also applied to the children’s second language
acquisition because languages are typically learned in the process of becoming a member of a
particular group. The sustaining motivation is usually one of group membership, not of language
acquisition alone. And the willingness to become a member of another language group is
regarded as integrative orientation.
Gardner states more that the desire to integrate with another language group can be motivated in
two ways. First, the learner wants to be a member of another group because he perceives that
group favorably and possibly as having higher status than his own group. The learner then
imitates behavioral characteristics of members of that group so that he will be recognized as a
member himself. This called ‘approach’ dimension. Second, the learner does not necessarily
perceive the other group as having desirable characteristics. Rather, he chooses the other group


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as a ‘reference’ group because of personal dissatisfactions with his own cultural community.
Consequently, this aim in integration could be independent of any favorable evaluation of the
new group. This is called ‘avoidance’ dimension.
The integrative motivation should be differentiated with the instrumental motivation. While the
former is dependent upon the integrative orientation, the later is the learner’s primary aim in
studying the language to be an interest in acquiring sufficient knowledge of the language for its
instrumental values in goal attainment. That is, the learner seeking to learn a language for other
reasons such as for school credits, job opportunities, etc., will not manifest and maintain as high
a degree of motivation over extended periods of language study.
II.5.2 Some review of studies of motivation in language learning

The effect of motivation to learning a foreign or second language is inevitable. Many language
teachers and researchers even view motivation as a key factor in L2 learning and explain their
own sense of failure with reference to the students' lack of motivation. Being aware of the
importance of the students' motivation, many language researchers have devoted their time to
study the relationship between the students' motivation and their achievement in L2 learning.
Some of them such as Gardner and Lambert (1972) or Crookes and Smith (1989) (as cited in
Ellis 1994) try to investigate the consistent correlation between students' internal motivation and
their L2 achievement, that is, they hope to prove a positive relationship that the higher
motivation students have, the more successful in L2 learning they are. However, some others
such as Oller, Baca and Vigil (1977, cited in Ellis 1994) have demonstrated a converse thing.
They report that Mexican women in California are successful in learning English though they
have negative attitudes towards the target language community. Many other studies focus on
students' external motivation and view it as determinant of students' motivational strength. They
claim that when students are provided with some kind of incentives to learn such as a financial
reward, they may be motivated and do better in learning. But the major disadvantage of this kind
motivation is that students may stop extra effort to learning when the reward is eliminated.
Gardner, Day, and MacIntyre (1991) carry out a study which aims to find out the effects of both


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integrative motivation and anxiety on computerized vocabulary acquisition using a laboratory
analog procedure as a microcosm of second language learning. The result of the study shows
that integrative motivation facilitates learning of vocabulary items. This means that integrative
motivation is associated with higher levels of achievement and a willingness to initiate a respond
quickly. Integratively motivated subjects learn the items more quickly and consequently are
willing to risk attempting an answer sooner as trials progress.
The studies mentioned so far suggest that students with greater motivation could get better
learning, but not vice verse. However, some further studies by Strong (1983, 1984) or Savignon
(1972) (as cited in Ellis 1994) claim that students' achievement can affect strongly their

motivation, that is, students' desire to learn would increase with attainment in their language
proficiency. In addition, students' intrinsic interest is also considered to be one of the main
elements of motivation. The studies by Crookes and Smith (1989) and McNamara (1973) (as
cited in Ellis 1994) point out that students' motivation could be activated if they have a chance to
participate actively in learning tasks and it is teachers’ job to motivate students by engaging
their interest in classroom activities. And in his own conclusion, Ellis (1994) sums up four types
of motivation: integrative motivation or internal motivation, instrumental motivation or external
motivation, resultative motivation, and motivation as intrinsic interest. According to him, this is
based on the assumptions that the main determinants of motivation are the learners' attitudes to
the target language community and their need to learn the L2. Motivation can affect the extent to
which individual learners achieve in learning the L2, the kind of learning they employ.
II.5.3 Motivation for young learners
Why should we worry about motivation? After all shouldn’t it be up to the student to make sure
they come to class in the right frame of mind? Can the presence or absence of motivation make
any real difference?
The Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics defines motivation as
follows:


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Motivation is generally considered to be one of the primary causes of success and failure in
second language learning (2002: 344).
So it would seem from this definition that motivation is something we teachers need to take
seriously if we are concerned about creating the best possible acquisition/learning environment
for our students. But what is a good motivator? And how can we ‘rekindle the inner fire’?
According to O. Dunn (1984), after a time of studying, young learners “begin to lose interest in
learning English and thus motivation is vital” (Developing English with young learners. P83)
and among some sources for activities to motivate young learners he suggests using of audiovisual material, especially video.

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CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY
This research is based on the qualitative and quantitative methods with the survey
questionnaires, interviews and classroom observation in order to achieve quantified background
data, which aims to prove how VCDs increase the pupils’ time-on-task. All the data and
information collected present the foundation for my study.
III.1 The subjects of the research
The subjects for this study consist of 60 participants placed in two groups:

- The first group includes 50 pupils at Thinh Hao primary school in Hanoi. They were chosen
at random from 5 classes of 5th grade. All the pupils follow the same three - year course of
English and their textbooks in use are Let’s Go 2. This group of pupils is taught by
Vietnamese teachers of English.

- The second group includes 10 teachers, who were chosen from three primary schools in
Hanoi (Dai Tu primary school, Thinh Hao primary school, Thanh Liet primary school).
They are in charge of teaching English for 5th grade. Five of them are in their early thirties
with 8 years of teaching experience; five others are in their late forties with more than 20
years of teaching experience.
III. 2 Data collection
III.2.1 Questionnaire
We have designed two sets of questionnaire. One is for teachers and the other for primary
pupils. In order that the answerer could be free to express their specific thoughts about the items
raised in the questionnaire, some questions are designed to be open - ended or to allow
interviewees give free answers (these are often the last choice in the suggested group of answer).
Questionnaire No. 1, consisting of 11 questions all written in English, was administered to the
10 English teachers.
Questionnaire No. 2, including 14 questions, was administered to the 50 primary pupils. All

questions were written in Vietnamese in order to make sure that they can be fully understood by


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the pupils before they give their answers. They were also requested to answer in Vietnamese, so
as to fully express their ideas. For easier reference, these questionnaires are included in the
appendixes.
The questions for the teacher focus on the following points:
-

Situation of using VCDs in teaching

-

Purposes of using VCDs in teaching

-

Pupils’ feeling and attitudes towards VCDs used during the classroom hours

-

The differences between using VCDs and cassettes in teaching

-

How can the use of VCDs motivate the pupils?

-

Teachers’ suggestions

The questions for pupils cover some similar points with those for the teacher. Q1 and Q2 is
made to get information about the situation of using VCDs. If pupils say “Yes”, they have to
answer 10 following questions (Q3-Q12). If they choose “No”, they can ignore Q3 to Q12 and
go on to Q13 and 14. The questions for the pupils refer to the following points:
-

Accessing VCDs

-

Advantages of VCDs in learning English

-

Pupils’ feeling and attitudes towards Video, VCD

-

When and for how long are VCDs used in the class

-

Opinions about the use of VCDs in teaching and learning English

Note: The interviewees can choose more than one option in the questionnaire
III.2.2 Classroom observation
We have also applied the classroom observation method in this study to try to prove our research

hypothesis that VCDs can help to increase the pupils’ time-on-task. The observation was carried
out in 4 classes of 5th grade.
Pupils are judged to be on-task, misbehaving, or doing nothing. The observer selects one of
these three descriptions of the pupils' behavior and records either a letter T (on-task), a letter B
(misbehaving), or a letter N - nothing (not on task, not misbehaving). At the end of the
observation session, the data are tallied and a percent time-on-task score is assessed. In order to


19

accurately assess time-on-task, the observer must be able to clearly distinguish between these
three behaviors. In certain learning situations, this may be fairly difficult to ascertain. When a
pupil is sitting quietly, who can really determine whether or not he is on task? If the pupil is
thinking about or processing the subject material, formulating a question or an answer, or simply
listening and absorbing, he may be judged to be doing nothing when he is in fact on-task and
actively learning. The five-second sampling interval requires the observer to make a snap
decision without benefit of careful study.
The calculation of time-on-task is made by dividing the number of on-task observations by the
total number of observations. Should the "nothing" data points be excluded from the total? This
bears careful consideration. The number of these null points, of course, has a bearing on the
decision. A data set with very few null points will not be greatly affected either way, but a large
number of null points can sway the on-task percentage significantly. If the objective of the
evaluation is to determine time spent effectively on learning activities, and the observer
confidently assigns the null value to mean "not on task, not misbehaving", then the points should
be included. Excluding them will give a falsely high on-task rating. If the observer cannot
confidently determine that the pupil is not on task, the points should be excluded.
III.2.3 Informal follow-up interview
To consolidate the results of survey and classroom observations, the researcher contacted
directly with answerers (the teachers and pupils) to ask for further information. Here is the
question used for the follow-up interviews:

-

How can you compare advantages of VCDs over cassettes?

The questionnaires and class observations are represented in Appendix I, II and III,
respectively at the end of the study.

CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS


20

IV.1 Data analysis and discussion
IV.1.1 Result of teachers’ survey
After collecting, summarizing and analyzing the teachers’ answers, the researcher has found
many interesting and significant points that are present here below selectively.
The first question was used to find out whether the teachers used VCDs or cassettes in their
teaching. The result is presented in Table No. 1 and Chart No. 1 below:
Table 1. Q1 What is the type of teaching aid you are using in your English class?

Question
What is the type of teaching
aid you are using in your
English class?

Answers
Cassettes
VCDs

Total (%)

50
30

Both
Others

20
40

Based on this result, we can find out the amount of teacher, who use and don’t use VCDs in
their teaching process. 50% of teacher’s answers indicate that they are using cassette in their
English class, 30% are not using cassette but VCDs and 20% of the teachers sometimes using
cassette, sometimes using VCD. 40% remaining are using another types of teaching aid for
English teaching such as pictures, real objects etc. This result indicates the popularity of cassette
in teaching language in general and teaching English in particular. Because of easy using, cheap
price and fairly useful in English teaching, cassettes are more popular than VCDs, but you can
see lots of limitation than VCDs. The importance of using teaching aids in language teaching in
general and English teaching in particular were proved. The reason why some teachers use or do
not use VCDs during teaching English will be shown in following questions, tables and charts.
* Specific questions for those who say they use cassettes:( from Q 2 to Q5)
Table 2. Q2 Please indicate why you do not choose VCDs for your English class?
Reasons
Don’t like using VCDs

Total (%)
0

Note

21

Don’t have equipment for using VCDs
Don’t know how to use VCDs

100
0

Chart 1. Q2 Please indicate why you do not choose VCDs for your English class?
Please indicate why you do not choose
VCDs for your English class?
100
80
60
40
20
0

Don’t like

Don’t have

Don’t know

As it is shown in the table 2, all the teachers who didn’t use VCDs in their teaching process
blamed for the lack of equipment, as the only reason of their failure to use VCDs in the class.
Some teachers employ even the traditional education methods where teachers typically lecture to
students who take notes and then memorize and recall the material to perform well on
examinations. The principal teaching equipment used at class includes the black board and
chalk. The curriculum also needs a lot of attention. In a world in which technology is changing

rapidly and students are to be able to think creatively, make decisions, and solve problems, it is
clear that we have to find out means to deal with above-mentioned situation and improve the
teaching-learning process quality.
Table 3. Q3 Please indicate roughly how many percents of your pupils actively participate
(voluntarily answering teacher’s questions, pair work, team work, role-play, freeze-frame
control - prediction, freeze-frame control - description, discussion) in the class activities?
Question

Code

Activities

Total(%)


22

Please indicate roughly
how many percents of
your

pupils

actively

participate in the class
activities?

A
B

C
D
E
F
G

Voluntarily answering teacher’s questions
Pair work
Team work
Role-play
Freeze-frame control - Prediction
Freeze-frame control - Description
Discussion

25
65
60
45
0
0
5

When using cassette to teach the “Let’s Talk”, it seems that the students do not pay enough
attention. In the class they may sit quietly to listen to the tape, but when they practice talking,
they do not actively work with their partners. Some pairs do not talk (35%), when they work in
group, the percentage of the students keep silence or have private talk increase. So there is only
60% of the students work in group and only 25% of the students volunteer to answer the
questions of the teachers.
Table 4. Q4 How can you describe the classroom environment?
Classroom environment

Very exciting
Fairly exciting
Boring

Total (%)
20
60
20

Only 20% of teacher reported that their classroom environment was very exciting, 60% of them
thought that the environment was only fairly good and 20% said it was boring. In fact, when
using cassette, students are easy to be neglected or feel sleepy
Table 5. Q5 How many percents of your pupils achieve good English marks, i.e. from 8 to
10 points?
Question
Answers
How many percents of Less than 50% (<50%)
your pupils achieve good
English marks, i.e. from 8
to 10 points?

Total (%)
100

From 50% to less than 90% (≥ 50%; ≤90%)

0

More than 90% (>90%)

0


23

Chart 2. Q5 How many percents of your pupils achieve good English marks, i.e. from 8 to
10 points?

How many percents of your pupils achieve
good English marks, i.e. from 8 to 10 points?
100
50
0

<50%

? 50% ≤ ?90%
≥ 50% 90%

>90%

All data in above tables and charts indicate that using cassettes for teaching English also bring
back a good effect on teaching and learning English. But as it can be seen from the chart, there
is only less than 50 % of the students achieve good marks (from 8 to10)
* Specific questions for those who say they use VCDs:(From Q6 to Q10)
Table 6. Q6 Please indicate why you have chosen VCDs for your English class?
Question
Please indicate why
you
VCDs

have
for

English class?

chosen
your

Code
A

Answers
Make pupils understand easier

Total
100

B

Increase pupils’ activities in English class

100

C

Make an exciting class

100

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This question presents the purpose of using VCDs while teaching. All teachers recognize the
benefit of using VCDs in English class which is to bring the best explanation to the pupils. The
combination between pictures and sound make pupils understand easier and remember longer.
The lively, clear communicative situations make pupils easier to listen, speak, repeat and
participate in a single activity. The advantages of using VCDs in English class are also clearly
understood as shown in the table and chart above.
One of the most appreciated materials applied to language learning and teaching is, of course,
video. A recent large-scale survey by Canning-Wilson (2000) reveals that the students like
learning language through the use of video, which is often used to mean quite different things in
language teaching. For some, it means no more than replaying television programmes on a video
recorder for viewing in class or private study. For others, it implies the use of a video camera in
class to record and play back to learners their activities and achievements in a foreign language
teaching. But our concern here is to present the use of video in language teaching most
effectively as a visual aid presenting the target language naturally. It is a fact that most students
who have taken English courses formally remain insufficient in the ability to use the language
and to understand its use, in normal communication, whether in the spoken or the written mode.
The problem arises not from the methodology itself but from the misuse or incomplete use of it.
That is to say, teachers still evaluate student performance according to the sentence structure and
situational settings. In addition, teachers have to take into consideration their performances in
terms of communicative acts. But this not necessarily means that teachers should pay full
attention to only communicative acts in the preparation and presentation of language teaching
materials.
In recent years, the use of video in English classes has grown rapidly as a result of the increasing
emphasis on communicative techniques. Being a rich and valuable resource, video is well-liked
by both students and teachers (Hemei, 1997:45). Students like it because video presentations are
interesting, challenging, and stimulating to watch. Video shows them how people behave in the
culture whose language they are learning by bringing into the classroom a wide range of

25

communicative situations. Another important factor for teachers that makes it more interesting
and enjoyable is that it helps to promote comprehension. We know that deficiencies in
vocabulary can make even a simple task very difficult for our students. Video makes meaning
clearer by illustrating relationships in a way that is not possible with words, which proves a
well-known saying that a picture is worth thousand words. Two minutes of video can provide an
hour of classroom work, or it can be used to introduce a range of activity for five minutes. A
ten-minute programme can be useful for more advanced students. Less advanced students may
wish something much shorter because their limited command of the language also limits their
attention span.
It is obvious that non-native speakers of a language rely more heavily on visual clues to support
their understanding and there is no doubt that video is an obvious medium for helping learners to
interpret the visual clues effectively. According to a research, language teachers like video
because it motivates learners, brings the real world into the classroom, contextualizes language
naturally and enables learners to experience authentic language in a controlled environment.
Moreover, in this issue Arthur (1999) claims that video can give students realistic models to
imitate for role-play; can increase awareness of other cultures by teaching appropriateness and
suitability.

Table 7. Q7 When you use VCDs, do your pupils like it?
Code
A
B
C

Pupils’ feeling
Yes, they like them very much

Yes, but sometimes they get bored with it
No, they don’t like it at all

Total (%)
100
0
0

This question investigates the teachers’ observation of the pupils’ feeling towards using VCDs
while learning English. The result show that all of the pupils (100%, as perceived by the