Nghiên cứu việc sử dụng tiếng Anh của giảng viên trong giảng dạy tại trường Đại học Thương mại

50 KHOA HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ QUÂN SỰSố 13 - 5/2018
v PHƯƠNG PHÁP GIẢNG DẠY 
1. INTRODUCTION 
In the era of communicative language 
teaching, teacher talk plays an important role in 
English classrooms. Teacher talk is generally 
recognized as a valuable source of language 
input for the learner. This is particularly true in 
Vietnam where the teacher’s role is traditionally 
the centre of the class. Moreover, many aspects 
of teacher talk such as elicitation, and explanation 
can significantly affect the quantity and quality 
of student interaction in the lesson. However, 
Vietnamese teachers are believed to be dominating 
English classes with much teacher talking time 
while students, as a consequence, are deprived 
of opportunities of practicing speaking English. 
Moreover, the use of English in teacher talk 
determines the success of EFL classes to some 
TRẦN LAN HƯƠNG *
*Đại học Thương mại, ✉ tranlanhuong17@gmail.com
Ngày nhận bài: 22/01/2018; ngày sửa chữa: 09/02/2018; ngày duyệt đăng: 20/4/2018
NGHIÊN CỨU VIỆC SỬ DỤNG TIẾNG ANH 
CỦA GIẢNG VIÊN TRONG GIẢNG DẠY
TẠI TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC THƯƠNG MẠI
TÓM TẮT
Bài báo tập trung vào nghiên cứu định lượng việc giảng viên sử dụng tiếng Anh trong lớp học 
ngôn ngữ tại Đại học Thương mại. Kết quả cho thấy, thời gian nói và giảng bài của giảng viên 
so với thời gian nói và phát biểu của sinh viên có sự chênh lệch tương đối lớn. Nói cách khác, 
sinh viên chưa thực sự đóng vai trò trung tâm trong lớp học mà vẫn phụ thuộc rất nhiều vào việc 
truyền thụ kiến thức của giảng viên. Nói về việc sử dụng tiếng Anh trong giảng dạy, tần suất sử 
dụng tiếng Anh của giảng viên so với tiếng Việt tương đối cao, đáp ứng được yêu cầu tối đa hóa 
sử dụng tiếng Anh và hạn chế tiếng mẹ đẻ trong lớp học ngôn ngữ.
Từ khóa: giảng viên, giảng dạy, tiếng Anh, tiếng mẹ đẻ
extent because English teacher talk is sometimes 
regarded as a register, with its own pedagogical 
and interactive properties. English teacher talk 
can be used to instruct language knowledge, 
communicate and organize classroom activities. 
Teacher’s use of English can greatly promote the 
communicativeness of the EFL classes as long as 
teacher talk is communicative, too. The importance 
of teacher talk is not only apparent in the whole 
class organization but also in the processes of 
students’ acquisition of the target language. 
Although there have been many studies on the 
use of English as a foreign language in teacher 
verbal behavior in EFL classroom, analyses of 
the use of English in teacher talk in the context 
of Vietnam in general and Hanoi universities in 
particular remain necessary. 
51KHOA HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ QUÂN SỰSố 13 - 5/2018
PHƯƠNG PHÁP GIẢNG DẠY v
2. REVIEW OF LITERATURE
In second language acquisition research, it is 
the ‘linguistic environment’ that serves as the stage 
for second language acquisition. This environment 
– the speakers of the target language and their 
speech to the second language (L2) learners- 
provides linguistic input in the form of listening 
opportunities embedded in social and academic 
situations. In order to acquire the language, 
learners must come to understand the language 
in these situations. This accessibility is made 
possible in part through accommodations made by 
native speakers to make language comprehension 
possible and in part through strategies the learner 
enacts to make the speech comprehensible.
The principle of “Teaching English through 
English” is highly influential in English language 
teaching. Dulay, Burt, and Krashen (1982), 
emphasize that a new language is acquired through 
exposure. The availability of a. desirable language 
environment is of “paramount importance to 
success in learning a new language” (p.13). 
Teaching English through English “is defined 
as speaking and using English as often as you 
possibly can, for example, when organizing 
teaching activities or chatting to students socially” 
(Willis, 1981). It means establishing English as 
the main language of communication between 
students and instructors. 
Cummins and Swain (1986) warn that if the 
mother tongue is used together with the second 
language (L2), students will tend to avoid the one 
which they feel uneasy about and it will be harmful 
to L2 learning. Cook (2000), when elaborating the 
importance of “exposure,” further argues that the 
role of English, in a language class is not only a 
medium of instruction, but teaching content as 
well. The interaction language between teachers 
and students is exactly the objective of English 
language teaching. Therefore, teachers should 
stick to the L2 all the time so as to maximize 
students’ exposure to the target language. 
Willis (1981) emphasizes the teacher’s role in 
maintaining English as the language of instruction 
and communication in a language teacher’s course 
book that includes phrase lists for non-native 
teachers.
However, the question of how to make target 
language instruction understandable to L2 learners, 
especially low-level ones is a thorn in language 
teachers’ flesh. Input adjustments, therefore, are 
often made in teacher talk to boost comprehension. 
Krashen (1982) claimed that ‘comprehensible 
input’ was a necessary condition for language 
learning. Krashen claims that comprehension is 
necessary in order for input to become ‘intake’
This ability to understand new language, Krashen 
maintained, is made possible by speech adjustments 
made to learners, in addition to the learner’s use of 
shared knowledge of the context (Larsen-Freeman 
and Long, 1991). The need to use extra-linguistic 
information is also emphasized. 
The use of the target language for instruction: 
From simpler notions like ‘teaching English 
through English’ (J. Willis et al, 1981), through 
teaching ‘sheltered content’ courses in the 
target language (Briton et al, 1989) to full-scale 
immersion programmes ( Genesee 1984) proves to 
be extremely necessary in non-English speaking 
countries such as Vietnamese context. Unlike 
countries where English is the second language, 
Vietnamese contexts do not provide opportunities 
for the target language exposure outside the 
classrooms. Hence, teacher talk provides the main 
contact with the target language. In many Asian 
countries including China, and Korea, it is suggested 
that English is the medium for communication 
and teaching in the classrooms and the use of 
mother tongue should be kept to the minimum. 
However, the use of English is recommended 
by some scholars to be considered in a particular 
context. In Vietnam, like other non-English 
speaking countries, according to Sandra Lee 
McKay in her book “Principles and Practices for 
Teaching English as an International Language” 
(edited with L. Alsagoff, G. Hu & W. Renandya, 
52 KHOA HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ QUÂN SỰSố 13 - 5/2018
v PHƯƠNG PHÁP GIẢNG DẠY 
2012, Routledge), there are some factors that 
should be taken into consideration before 
implement the principle “teaching English through 
English”: (1) Students’ Proficiency Level; (2) 
Teachers’ Proficiency in English; (3) Grammatical 
Rules; (4) Accuracy versus fluency; (5) Lexical 
development. 
In general then it seems reasonable to consider 
the many variables that can influence English 
learning before requiring all teachers to teach 
English through English. 
3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
The data for this study collected through the 
use of two main instruments: Questionnaires and 
Observation. 
Selection of subjects: 
The groups of teachers are 3 Vietnamese 
females teachers aged from 28 to 50. Most of them 
are regarded as experienced teachers with at least 
4 years teaching. All of them have got Master 
Qualification in teaching English. 
150 first-year-students from the faculty 
of English in Hanoi University of Commerce 
responded to the questionnaires. All are Vietnamese 
aged from 18 to 20. Their levels varying from lower 
intermediate to pre-intermediate are proven by the 
fact that they have studied English for at least 3 
years at high school. The average size of their 
class varies from 30 to 45 students. “The Business 
- Pre-Intermediate” is used as their textbook.
Observation:
Observations were conducted firstly to provide 
a general overview of the EFL teaching situation 
in University of Commerce. Three observations 
focused mainly on the use of English in teacher talk 
there. Observation sheet was adapted as partially 
cited according to Holland and Shortall, in 2001 
and Lightbrown and Spada in 1999. Observations 
were made in February and March, 2017:
- The first observation was conducted on 
February 24th, 2017 in a speaking lesson.
- The second observation was conducted on 
March 17th, 2017 in a writing lesson.
- The third observation was conducted on 
March 17th, 2017 in a listening lesson.
Questionnaires:
In relation with data collected from 
observations, data from questionnaires were 
processed to provide a better understanding of the 
use of English in teacher talk. 
There were two questionnaires: one for 150 
students and the other for 3 teachers. Both of 
them are written in Vietnamese to make sure that 
the participants fully understand all the question 
items. Each questionnaire consists of three parts:
Part 1/Part 4: Participants’ perception of the 
amount of teacher talking time and the use of 
English in teacher talk in EFL classrooms.
Part 2: Participants’ perception of some aspects 
of English teacher talk such as: speech rate, lexical 
and grammatical simplification, pronunciation, 
and extra linguistic behaviors.
 Part 3: Participants’ idea of what are obstacles 
to the use of English in teacher talk in these EFL 
classrooms.
4. RESULT
4.1. Teacher talking time
Results from 3 observations illustrated in 
Table 1 show that the amount of teacher talking 
time for questions, instructions, explanation, 
elicitation, answering questions, and repetition or 
clarification occupied more than 60% of the total 
class time, especially Teacher 1’s talk accounted 
for up to 66%. Obviously, this shows that teachers 
dominated the classes with their talk, which left 
students few opportunities of speaking practice. 
Results from questionnaires for students and 
teachers lead to the same conclusion. Most of the 
students (46%) believed that their teachers talked 
between 60-80%. Teachers themselves gave the 
same percentage of their talking time in EFL classes. 
53KHOA HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ QUÂN SỰSố 13 - 5/2018
PHƯƠNG PHÁP GIẢNG DẠY v
Table 1: Teacher Talking Time
Total TTT 
(min)/a period 
(45 min)
% of total 
TTT 
Teacher 1 30/45 66%
Teacher 2 28/45 62%
Teacher 3 28/45 62%
4.2. The use of English in teacher talk
As can be seen from Table 2, three teachers 
used the target language as a medium to teach 
English with a different quantity. Their English 
talking time was about 60%. The results from 
questionnaires show that the majority of students 
(40%) thought that English teacher talk reached 60-
80%, but a comparatively high number of students 
(31%) agreed that their teachers talked 40-60% 
of total talking time in English. In fact, teachers 
themselves admitted that they spoke English 
less than 60% of the total talking time. A teacher 
shared her experience that she could not speak 
more English than 60% during her teacher talk for 
the sake of a smooth lesson. These figures reveal 
the medium quantity of English use in teacher talk. 
The limited use of English means an excessive use 
of Vietnamese, which may deprive students from 
maximum exposures to the target language. This 
also causes the limited use of English between 
students once the teacher fails to form the habit of 
using English as much as possible in the classroom 
as well as set an example for them at the same time.
Table 2: The use of English in TT
English % of English
Teacher 1 18/30 60%
Teacher 2 17/28 61%
Teacher 3 18/32 60%
4.3. Features of English teacher talk
As can be seen from the Figure 1 and 2, both the 
number of students and teachers who agreed that 
lexical simplification as well as slow speech rate 
exited in English teacher talk made up majority. 
Also, most teachers and students expressed their 
neutral point of view on the statement that teachers 
had a master of native-like pronunciation. In fact, 
that the rest of the teachers and students showed 
their disagreement is reasonable because the 
capacity of native-like pronunciation is hardly 
possible for non-native adult speakers no matter 
how good their command of English can be. 
Concerning the extra linguistic behaviors, most of 
the students (61%) thought that their teachers use 
non-verbal language effectively to go with their 
teacher talk. 
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
A B C D
63
30
106
7067
91
27
61
9
18
6 8
Agree
Neutral
Disagree
Figure 1: Students’ perception of some 
features of English teacher talk
A: Slow speech rate
B: Native-like pronunciation
C: Lexical simplification
D: Effective Extra linguistic behaviors
Figure 2: Teachers’ perception of some 
features of English teacher talk
54 KHOA HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ QUÂN SỰSố 13 - 5/2018
v PHƯƠNG PHÁP GIẢNG DẠY 
4.4. Categories and frequencies of TT in English and Vietnamese
Data for categories and frequencies of English/Vietnamese TT types were collected mainly through 
questionnaires for students and teachers. The questionnaires were distributed to 150 students and 3 
teachers on March 24th, 2017 after first three speaking lessons of the first year’s second term in the 
university. These three speaking lessons were designed at least 60% for students’ speaking and teachers 
were just instructors to help students fulfill their tasks. On the same day, questionnaires were collected. 
In general, each teacher speech type in English appeared to enjoy high frequency. Such teacher talk 
types as questions, instructions, explanation, elicitation, answering questions, and repetition or clarification 
were considered as usually performed in English. Especially, the frequency of error correction, procedural 
talk and compliments in English were thought to be higher by about half of the subjects (see Table 3). 
Interactional and other teacher speech types enjoyed lower frequency.
Vietnamese teacher talk types were believed to occur less frequently than English corresponding ones. 
Most of teacher speech types were sometimes performed in Vietnamese.
Table 3: Frequency of teacher talk in English
 Frequency
Teacher 
speech type
never arely sometimes usually always
1. Questions 0 0 12 58 30
2. Instructions Questions 1 7 24 51 17
3. Explanations 0 4 16 49 31
4. Elicitation 0 10 28 42 20
5. Error correction or negotiation 1 2 12 30 55
6. Answering questions 0 2 21 39 38
7. Repetition or clarification 1 7 24 45 23
8. Interaction 5 10 36 30 19
9. T praises 2 8 22 29 39
10. Procedural 3 4 14 37 42
11. Other 6 27 30 23 14
5. CONCLUSION
The amount of teacher talk in the classrooms under the investigation is still large with teacher talking 
time that occupies more than 60% of the total class time. This is a consequence of traditional teaching 
style which has a deep root in Vietnamese education system. Excessive teacher talk means minimum 
of student talking time. Students, thus, are deprived of opportunities to raise their voice in the class. 
Moreover, there is a limitation to the use of English in teacher talk due to some obstacles such as: students’ 
incapability of understanding, teachers’ limited proficiency, time pressure, heavy syllabus pressure, and 
testing-oriented teaching. Thus, though English has been claimed to be the medium of teaching, the 
average use of English is less than 60% of total teacher talking time. Some teachers also admitted that 
55KHOA HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ QUÂN SỰSố 13 - 5/2018
PHƯƠNG PHÁP GIẢNG DẠY v
they could not speak English more than 50% for 
the sake of students’ understanding. This may 
deprive of students of maximum exposure to the 
target language and leads to students’ hesitation 
to speak English once teachers themselves fail to 
form a habit of speaking this language as much as 
possible in classrooms. 
Secondly, some features such as lexical 
and grammatical simplification as well as slow 
speech rate can be found in English teacher 
talk. Concerning the pronunciation, Vietnamese 
teachers of English hardly reach the standard of 
native-like pronunciation. Regarding the extra 
linguistic information, it seems that English 
teachers do make use of non-verbal language 
but not very effectively as noted by teachers 
themselves. 
Finally, each teacher speech type in English 
appears to enjoy high frequency in general. The 
most common teacher speech types are instruction, 
questions, and explanation are performed in 
English with high quantity./.
References:
1. Cook, V.J. (2000) ‘Linguistics and Second 
Language Acquisition: One Person with Two 
Languages’ Aronoff & Rees-Miller, Blackwell 
Handbook of Linguistics, Blackwell Publishing.
2. Jim Cummins, Merrill Swain (1986), 
Bilingualism in education: aspects of theory, 
research, and practice, London: Longman 
Publishing.
3. Dulay, H., M. Burt and S.Krashen (1982), 
Language two, Oxford, England, Oxford 
University Press.
4. Edwards, C. et al. (1998), Language 
Teaching Methodology, Centre for English 
Language Studies: Birmingham University.
5. Ellis, R. (1994), The Study of Second 
Language Acquisition, Shanghai: Shanghai 
Foreign Language Education Press.
6. Holland, R. and T. Shortall (2000), 
Classroom Research and Research Methods, 
Centre for English Language Studies, Birmingham 
University. 
7. Larsen-Freeman, D. & Long, M. (1991), 
An Introduction to Second Language Acquisition 
Research, London & New York: Longmans.
8. Long, M. (1996), The role of the linguistic 
environment in second language acquisition. In W. C. 
Ritchie & T. K. Bhatia (Eds.), Handbook of language 
acquisition. Vol. 2: Second language acquisition 
(pp. 413 - 468), New York: Academic Press.
9. Willis, J (1981), Teaching English Through 
English. Longman. Hughes, G.S: A Handbook of 
Classroom English, Oxford University Press.
A STUDY OF TEACHERS’ USE OF 
ENGLISH IN CLASSROOMS 
AT VIETNAM UNIVERSITY
OF COMMERCE 
TRAN LAN HUONG
Abstract: This paper focuses on the 
quantitative study of teachers’ use of English 
in the language school at the University of 
Commerce. The results show that lecture 
time of teachers dominates speaking time 
of students. In other words, students do not 
really play a central role in the classroom but 
rely heavily on the knowledge transfer of the 
teacher. With reference to the use of English in 
teaching, the frequency of Vietnamese teachers 
of English use compared to Vietnamese is 
relatively high, meeting the requirement to 
maximize the use of English and limit mother 
tongue in the language classroom. 
Keywords: teacher talk, English, mother 
tongue
Received: 22/01/2018; Revised: 09/2/2018; 
Accepted for publication: 20/4/2018