College of foreign languages department of postgraduate studies

This chapter first summarizes the findings of this study with regard to teachers’ perception of the use of the new English textbook for grade 10. This is followed by some recommendations for both classroom teachers and educational administrators at the central and local levels. The chapter also discusses the limitations of the study and some suggestions for further research.

The findings of the study provide information to answer three questions of the study. This part I am going to present very briefly below.

As can be seen from the findings in the previous chapter, there were several important issues concerning how the teachers implement the new English textbook for grade 10. Those issues evidenced that the classroom behaviors were really teacher-centered, textbook-dominated, and grammatical accuracy-focused.

The reforming of the task-based curriculum in English language teaching for secondary schools is intended to enable the students to communicate in English more effectively, but this goal is remained unachievable. The intended innovation is implemented with the traditional grammar-translation approach.

There appear to be three major reasons for the way they implemented the new textbook. First and fore most, all teachers understand that the new textbook is more communicative, more interesting, and more motivating to their students than the old one. The majority of the teachers made all effort to use up the relevant and realistic topics in the new textbook like recreation, nature, community, and so on to activate their students’ existing knowledge. Most of the teachers tried their best in adapting the activities given in the new textbook to get a vivid lesson. However the teachers based heavily on the textbook and most of the classroom activities were controlled by the teachers themselves because of the class size, the allocated timeframe and the nationally prescribed examination. Secondly, teachers’ perception of their students’ low level of English proficiency is a reason for the teaching remaining largely teacher-fronted and the language of instruction and classroom management was mainly Vietnamese. Thirdly, teachers’ perception of their students’ motivation and attitude towards learning English is also an explanation for their grammar-translation approach. To sum up, the new textbook intended to promote a more leaner-centered communicative and task-based teaching approach, the actual implementation of the new textbook in this study is not really successful. Most of the participants believe that “It is inextricable at present because textbook authors tend to write the book for future use, for 10 years later use.”

The findings of this study pointed out that after the initial years teaching the new English textbook for grade 10 the teaching quality has been raised and many teachers have good professional knowledge to meet the needs of teaching English in the innovation era.

Although the new textbook has encouraged the teachers to develop themselves professionally, to some extent, the new English textbook for grade 10 does not meet the full expectations of teachers and students. Teachers’ actual use of the innovative curriculum and responses have revealed that most of them know students’ needs and preferences, but they are not able to satisfy their needs and preferences for several reasons: the time constraints, lack of freedom to implement the syllabus flexibly, lack of facilities, students’ low level of English, students’ passive motivation and so on, among these difficulties the students’ low level of English and time allocation are the greatest ones. Aside from these, the teachers mentioned some practical problems when allowing their students to work in groups and in pairs such as making trouble to the next-door classes and their classroom management. Furthermore, the way to test school-children seems not to be appropriate to what they have studied. As a result, task-based teaching and communicative approach are not really successful and not as easy as textbook writers have thought. Many schools are poorly equipped and the big class-size hinders the innovative approach of teaching English.

There is much to be done in order to seek a remedy for these problems, especially how to help teachers be more successful in using the new methodology. Not only do physical conditions of the school need upgrading but teachers also need to be provided with a good professional support, and the testing practice and the educational administrators’ awareness need to be changed as well.

In the following section, I would like to discuss detailed recommendations for possible solutions.

As what have been found out from this study, much has to be done to exploit the new English textbook for grade 10 more effectively. Below is a discussion of some recommendations on various aspects that affect the effective use of the new textbook.

More investment should be spent on education and its innovation, on the upgrading of infrastructure and teaching equipment at schools, not merely in urban areas but also in suburban and rural areas. Classes must be better equipped with visual aids or projection devices for students to practice language skills. Both educational administrators and the government should take charge of this issue. Teachers are looking forward to having a set of practical visual aids designed particularly for 10 grade English textbook. Some of the following things should be done immediately

• 
  Encouraging teachers to produce visual aids from durable materials so that they can use for years.
  
• 
  Encouraging students to collect colorful pictures from old magazines, papers, etc. so that teachers can exploit them for various teaching purposes.
  
• 
  Requesting educational authorities to supply visual aids that are difficult for teachers to make.
  

Teachers of English should be delivered regular workshops and training courses on either teaching methodology or language improvement. This is of great help to them because for a more effective exploitation of the new textbook teachers need both knowledge of language teaching methodology and knowledge of English language. Many specialists have agreed that this kind of professional support is really helpful to teachers.

From my classroom observations I have realized some of the problems teachers made when conducting their lessons. The most important one is teachers’ pronunciation. They have problems with the pronunciation of individual sounds, words, stress and intonation. Their poor pronunciation affects negatively the students’ pronunciation, but not many teachers are aware of this. Teachers’ low level of proficiency in the target language has a bad effect on the implementation of the new method, and this is likely to lead to the fact that the new textbook is used from a traditional perspective. “For non-native English teachers, language proficiency will always represent the bedrock of their professional confidence” (Murdoch 1994: 254).

Most importantly, teachers should be helped to understand the underlying methodology of the new textbook, to analyze their teaching situation and to make necessary modifications depending on their particular condition. Only if teachers are aware of the advantages and disadvantages of both teacher-centered and student-centered methods are they sensitive enough to divide their lessons into different sections with some sections more teacher-centered and others more learner-centered.

In parallel with in-service workshops, it is obvious that teachers should be encouraged to observe each other not to evaluate but to share with each other problems and solutions. Peer observation is considered to be one of the most effective approaches to teacher development.

As can be seen from teachers’ classroom practice in this study the teachers tried to apply the new teaching method which makes learning more communicative and comfortable. This becomes a catalyst for methodological change. If supported professionally through peer observations and workshops, teachers will be more committed to change.

The new English textbook for grade 10 has been used officially for some years, and it helps to apply the new approach in teaching English nationwide. In order to use the new textbook more effectively as the underlying communicative methodology, greater efforts should be made on the part of the teachers, the students, the parents, the educational authorities, and the whole society. Following are administrative measures to be taken for a quality improvement:

• 
  It seems very hard to use pair-work and group-work promoted in the new textbook with the current class size of around 50 students with mixed abilities, motivation, and expectation of learning English. This is a reality in all secondary schools throughout the country. The application of group-work and pair-work is likely to lead to chaos if teachers are not experienced enough. One of the main reasons hindering teachers from conducting task-based activities inside the classroom is the large number of students they have to deal with at the same time. Teachers are afraid that their students cannot communicate together and they are likely to make noise, lose motivation and interest. A question raised to the authorities is that “Is it possible to reduce the number of each English class to around 30?” If so, the teaching and learning of English with the new textbook for grade 10 may be more effective.
  
• 
  The new English textbook for grade 10 has been likely welcomed by the teaching staff but the goal to enable learners’ communicative ability of English has not been achievable. As a result, the new textbook was not really successfully used. It would be better if the principals of the schools could be invited to join the projects.
  
• 
  There must be an urgent change in testing in order to help to change the teaching methodology underlying the new textbook. Change must happen in both test format, test focus and test administration. Both teachers and specialists must be given training in new methods of testing. Test writers should remember that they need to test what the students have learnt. The following testing practice should be avoided:
  
  • 
    Copying the commercial tests
    
  • 
    Giving instruction in English
    
  • 
    Testing too many things from one lesson
    
  • 
    Cheating rather than testing by giving too hard items
    
  • 
    Administering the test without having it piloted first
    
  • 
    Writing the test under time pressure
    
  • 
    Using items or tasks that similar to students
    
  • 
    Ignoring textbook content when designing test items
    

The new textbook is a departure from the old, requiring teachers to develop new skills and classroom techniques related to the new methodology. Teachers should be introduced to new skills and classroom techniques related to the new methodology such as drills, pair work, substitution tables, presentation of new language, and using task-based teaching more effectively through various professional development activities, not just “fly-in-fly-out” in-service training workshops. Enhancing awareness of attitudes and perceptions amongst teachers is an important factor in a cognitive approach in order to change their behavior in the classroom. A collaborative, problem-solving approach helping teachers to address the constraints on their teaching using the new textbook will help to build up teachers’ self-confidence and capacity to work with the new methodology under difficult circumstances.

Although the researcher has made every effort to offer some perspicuous findings, like other studies there are some limitations.

To start with, the study, in terms of methodology, is limited to a general reflection of the use of the new textbook in innovation. The classroom observations, in a sense, help to provide empirical information of how the intended innovation embedded in the new textbook was actually implemented in the classroom. Nevertheless, these observations were not frequent and what the researcher saw in the classroom may not true to what was really going on in the classroom as a rule. The observed teachers may teach differently to get convinced demonstration for fear of negative evaluation from the observer. Being aware of these problems during the observations the researcher tried to minimize their impacts though they can not totally eliminated.

What is more, case studies involve only a single individual or just a few and therefore may not be representative of the general group or population. The case of this study is a private senior high school so there is a lack in technology and facilities. Teachers just contract with the school for extra work; they come to have lessons and go immediately just after finishing their lessons. They do not seem to have chance of asking someone else for professional development.

Finally, at the time the study was conducted both 10^th and 11^th graders had used the innovative English textbooks, but the researcher was just able to focus on the implementation of the new English textbook for grade 10.

V.4. Suggestions for further study

On the basis of the findings and limitations of the study, the following suggestions are made for further research.

As indicated in the findings, the new English textbook for grade 10 has been likely welcomed by the teaching staff but the goal to enable learners’ communicative ability of English was not achievable. As a result, the study of the implementation of the new textbook is really a matter of concern and need more in- depth and rigorous examination.

Moreover, the root of the teachers’ perception of how they teach the new textbook the way they are doing may be either in the book itself or in the students’ level of English proficiency or the standardized examinations for high school students in general and 10^th grade students in particular. More in-depth research on students’ perception would be useful.

Finally, the case as well as the scope of the study, as indicated above is a limitation of the study which needs much more attention on in further studies. It would be interesting to conduct a similar study in another single case and the scope would be broadened to all of the new series of innovative textbooks.