Luận Văn A study on techniques to improve English vocabulary for 3th graders at Quang Trung primary school in

Khóa luận tốt nghiệp năm 2012
Đề tài: A study on techniques to improve English vocabulary for 3th graders at Quang Trung primary school in Hai Phong


PART I: INTRODUCTION
1.Rationale
It is can not to denied that English is the international medium of
communication in the fields of science, technology, culture, education,
economy and so on. It is also considered a means to promote mutual
understanding and cooperation between Vietnam and other countries. It is
widely seen as the key language toll in the integrating process in the world.
With the rapid development and expansion of informatics technologies, there
needs to be a common language for people of all countries to exchange
information with each other and it is English that is used as a means of
international communication. Therefore, there has been an explosion in the
need of teaching and learning English all over the world.
It has been, in fact said that language was a house, vocabulary would be
as construction material to build up that house. Therefore when teaching a
new language for learner, vocabulary must be the background to develop like
building a house, if the foundation is strong the house will be firm.
Therefore, studying a language cannot be separated from studying
vocabulary. Yet it is true that the vocabulary is the focus of language. It is in
words that sound and meaning interlock to allow us to communicate with one
another, and it is word that we arrange together to make sentences,
conversation, and discourse of all kinds. Besides, vocabulary really plays an
important role because it appears in every language skills: listening, speaking,
reading, writing . Obviously, vocabulary is really important in any language
learning.
However, it is not easy to study perfect English vocabulary. Almost
students often face up with some problems in learning vocabulary at first,
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especially primary students. In fact, it is difficult to memorize a new word
with its meaning, spelling and pronunciation, many primary students are often
confused with knowing how can apply grammar into sentences, sometimes,
they can not understand when being opposed to video and audio. Moreover,
techniques to teach English in primary schools is traditional teaching methods
and similar activities days by days, which makes students become fed up with
learning English. Therefore, interesting techniques to teach English are
necessary to help 3
th
students learn English vocabulary better, they also
attract students’ interest on English.
From the above reasons, I have the ambition of presenting some
effective techniques to teach English vocabulary for students at Quang Trung
primary school with hope that students will be interesting in learning English.
Due to my English knowledge limitation and the frame of the graduation
paper, I would like to choose the research paper entitle: ―A study on
techniques to improve English vocabulary for 3th graders at Quang
Trung primary school in Hai Phong”
2. Aims of the study
Being a student of English department, I would like to contribute some
idea as well as find out some techniques to improve teaching and learning
English for 3th graders . To summarize the above, my study is aimed at:
 To find out difficulties in teaching and learning English for English
teachers as well as 3th graders at Quang Trung primary school.
 Find out appropriate techniques for teaching vocabulary lesson which draw
student attention in to the lesson. The student will feel int erested,
enjoyable and funny when they come into the lesson. Some effective
techniques will be given out in order to make student study English better.
3. Scope of the study
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In fact, there are lots of various techniques to teach English for pr imary
students, especially 3th graders. It requires much of time and effort.
However, due to the limitation of time, resources and knowledge of mine,
this study can only focus on difficulties that 3th graders encounter when they
learn English vocabulary and study some effective techniques in
teaching vocabulary (meaning, form, use) for 3th graders at Quang Trung
primary school in Hai Phong city.
4. Methods of the study
To complete this graduation paper, the following methods has been adopted:
First, survey questionnaires are conducted on the teaching and learning
English vocabulary for 3th graders at Quang Trung primary school in Hai
Phong.
Besides, observation class is employed
5. Designs of the study
The study is divided into three main parts: Introduction, Development,
and conclusion.
Part I: Introduction shows the reasons to choose the study, the aims, scope,
methods and design of the study.
Part II: Development consists of three chapters:
Chapter 1: ―Theoretical background‖ focuses on the aims to answer the
questions related to vocabulary, and techniques to teaching English
vocabulary for pupils at primary school.
Chapter 2: ―The study on techniques to teach English vocabulary for 3th
graders at Quang Trung primary school in Hai Phong‖ refers to the survey
questionnaire and analyzed findings of questionnaire results.
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Chapter 3: ―Some suggested techniques in teaching vocabulary for 3th
graders at Quang Trung primary school in Hai Phong ‖ that contains some
techniques to teach vocabulary and some more suggested activities to attract
students.
Part III: Conclusion in which all the issued mentioned above are
summarized.
To sum up, Part I has referred to rationale, aims, scope, methods and design
of the graduation paper. In Part II, the study introduces the literature review,
the study on techniques to teach English vocabulary for 3th graders at Quang
Trung primary school in Hai Phong and some suggested techniques in
teaching vocabulary them.


PART II: DEVELOPMENT
“If language structures make up the skeleton of language, then it is
vocabulary that provides the vital organs and the flesh”, (Harmer 1993-153).
Ever since language teaching came into its own as a profession in the
twentieth century, there have been persistent considerations of vocabulary in
whatever approaches and methods are involved in classroom
teaching ,despite the fact that so me approaches or methods do not attach
saliency to the role which vocabulary plays. Recently, however,
methodologists and linguists have increasingly turning their attention to
vocabulary, stressing its importance in language teaching and reassessing
some of the ways in which it is taught and learned.
CHAPTER I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
I. Vocabulary
Firstly, to master the techniques of improving vocabulary, especially for 3th
graders at Quang Trung Primary school in Hai Phong, it is impossible
not to mention the concept of vocabulary.
I.1. Definition
In fact, there are many definitions of vocabulary which can be
found in many various resources. Here are some main definitions of
vocabulary:
According to Steven Stalh (2005), it has been said that ―Vocabulary
knowledge is knowledge, the knowledge of a word not only implies a
definition, but also implies how that word first into the world ‖ Vocabulary
knowledge is not something that can ever be fully mastered, it is
something that expands and deepens over the course of a lifetime.
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Because instruction in vocabulary involves far more than looking up
words in a dictionary and using the words in sentence. Moreover,
vocabulary is acquired incidentally through indirect exposure to words
and intentionally through explicit instruction in specific instruction in
specific words and word-learning strategies.
From the book entitled ―A course in Language Teaching‖
written by Penny Ur (1990:60) vocabulary is defined ―Vocabulary can
be defined, roughly, as the words we teach in the foreign language.
However, a new item of vocabulary may be more than a single word. For
example “foot-path”, “railway station”, “forget-me-not”, which are made
up of more than one word but express a single idea. There are also
multi-word idioms such as ―once in a blue moon‖, where the meaning of
the phrase cannot be deduced from an analysis of the component words. A
useful convention is to cover all such cases by talking about vocabulary
―items‖ rather than ―words‖ .
According to Richard, Platt (1992), vocabulary is ―a set of lexemes,
including single words, compound words and idioms.”(p. 40). Whereas, the
Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (1995:1331) offered its own definition.
Vocabulary here is simply understood as ―the total number of words in a
language.”
Nguyen Bang and Nguyen Ba Hoc (2002) considered their following
definition of vocabulary as ―logical‖. According to them, when the term
―vocabulary‖ of a language was mentioned, it should be mentioned as
consisting of all the words, compounds and idioms used to transmit
information on both ―oral and written communication‖.
In conclusion, it is easy to see that there are many ways to define
vocabulary. The way that linguists choose to define vocabulary depends on
the way he assesses the importance of the components of each language. Of