Introducing some activites for teaching cultural knowledge to motivate students’ interest in speaking class in high school

THANH HOA DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
HA TRUNG HIGH SCHOOL
 	 EXPERIENCE INITIATIVE
INTRODUCING SOME ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE TO MOTIVATE STUDENTS’ INTEREST IN SPEAKING CLASS IN HIGH SCHOOL
 The author: NGUYEN THI THANH HUYEN
 Job position: Teacher
 Experience initiative about: English
THANH HOA 2018
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
Page
1. INTRODUCTION
1
1.1. REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC
1
1.2. AIMS OF THE STUDY
1
1.3. OBJECTS OF THE STUDY
2
1.4. METHOD OF THE STUDY
2
2. PROCEDURE
2
2.1. THEORITICAL BASIC OF THE STUDY
2
2.2. REALITY BEFORE APPLYING THE STUDY
3
2.3. SOME ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE
4
2.3.1.ACTIVITY 1
5
2.3.2. ACTIVITY 2
5
2.3.3. ACTIVITY 3
6
2.3.4. ACTIVITY 4
6
2.3.5. ACTIVITY 5
7
2.3.6. ACTIVITY 6
8
2.3.7. ACTIVITY 7
9
2.3.8. ACTIVITY 8
9
2.3.9. ACTIVITY 9
10
2.3.10. ACTIVITY 10
11
2.4. APPLYING ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE IN TEACHING UNIT 3, SPEAKING SKILL, OLD ENGLISH TEXTBOOK 11 AND UNIT 2 READING SKILL ENGLISH TEXTBOOK 12.
12
2.4.1 Applying activities for teaching cultural knowledge in unit 3, speaking skill (Page 35), English 11
12
2.4.2 Applying activities for teaching cultural knowledge in unit 2-ways of socializing, reading skill (Page 31), English 12
13
2.5. EDUCATIONAL EFFECT OF THE STUDY
14
3. CONCLUSION AND SUGESTION
15
3.1. CONCLUSION
15
3.2. SUGGESTION
16
REFERENCES BOOKS
17
1. INTRODUCTION
English, the most popular foreign language in Vietnam, has been taught from the early age (at the age of six or even younger) in most of schools throughout the country as a compulsory subject. Nowadays, in teaching and learning English as a foreign language in Vietnam, speaking has received a great deal of attention. Nonetheless, English is learnt and taught in a non-native environment, students usually do not have close contact with native speakers of English and have little opportunity to discover how these speakers think, feel, and interact with others. Moreover, not many of them have intelligible cultural knowledge. That is the reason why they do not feel confident enough to converse with English teachers or native speakers. It proves everything clear that culture and language can not be separated and the teaching and learning of a foreign language should always be a culture- based course.
Personally, I think that cultural gaps are one of the most important keys lead us to success in communicating genuinely and understanding the real world outside the classroom. In order to use the language effectively, language learners should realize that knowledge of the world's language and culture is increasingly important. They need to have mastery of not only the language itself but also the culture in which the language is used. Therefore, So as to improve student's communicative competence, teacher should teach cultural knowledge into the learning of speaking skills. From my teaching experience, cultural challenges in speaking-class have become a great source of inspiration for my study, which deals with the problem: 
“Introducing some activities for teaching cultural knowledge to motivate students’ interest in speaking class in high school”
1.1. REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC
If language is a social practice of meaning-making and interpretation, then it is not enough for language learners just to know grammar and vocabulary. They also need to know how that language is used to create and represent meanings and how to communicate with others and to engage with the communication of others. This requires the development of awareness of the nature of language and its impact on the world.
Students are taught the culture in foreign language, which means that they begin to understand the relationship between their own languages and the languages of their learning. If the teacher can get the students interested in the culture of the Language, then they will hopefully end up with more successful students. Thus, Teachers must find out the effective ways of teaching cross-cultural characteristics, which certainly develop students ‘speaking skills.
1.2. AIMS OF THE STUDY
- Contributing in renovation of teaching methods, improving the effectiveness of teaching and learning, adding knowledge and skills for teachers.
Making and using various and flexible teaching methods to help students learn and exploit knowledge actively.
Creating excitement for students, and deepening knowledge, promoting self-discipline, independence and creativity of students.
Equipping students the knowledge, values, attitudes, behavior and healthy habits, eliminating negative habits, to solve the social issues that are of concern.
1.3. OBJECT OF THE STUDY
To develop speaking skill and the communicative competence for students at HA TRUNG high school, I have made a lot of efforts to motivate the students to participate in speaking class effectively
The objects of the study are grade11, 12 students of English at HA TRUNG high school in THANH HOA province. 
1.4. METHOD OF THE STUDY
Three main methods have been applied:
Reference document Method.
Observation Method.
Experimental Methods
2. PROCEDURE
2.1. THEORITICAL BASIC OF THE STUDY
Understanding the nature of the relationship between language and culture is central to the process of learning another language. In actual language use, it is not the case that it is only the forms of language that convey meaning. It is language in its cultural context that creates meaning: creating and interpreting meaning is done within a cultural framework. In language learning classrooms, learners need to engage with the ways in which context affects what is communicated and how. Both the learner’s culture and the culture in which meaning is created or communicated have an influence on the ways in which possible meanings are understood. This context is not a single culture as both the target language and culture and the learner’s own language and culture are simultaneously present and can be simultaneously engaged. Learning to communicate in an additional language involves developing an awareness of the ways in which culture interrelates with language whenever it is used. (Liddicoat, Papademetre, Scarino, & Kohler, 2003).
When students learn a foreign language, their ultimate aim should be directed towards the understanding of the ways people do things and why they do them. At the same time language teachers also feel that while this goal is the most ideal, it is not very easy to handle, due partly to our imbalanced knowledge of more than one discipline, partly also to time limitation in the classrooms. Students also have to face a unique problem of not being able to get themselves exposed to the natural environment while pursuing their language study. Therefore, they have to be equipped with cultural knowledge to learn foreign language more effectively. 
2.2. REALITY BEFORE APPLYING THE STUDY
The study is carried out with the participation of grade 12A, 12B, 11E, 11G students at HA TRUNG high school, most of whom are 17-18 years of age. I designed a survey questionnaire as main tool to collect necessary data for study. There are 10 questions and all the questions and tests are clear and short to make sure students fully understand them before answering. The students were asked to answer the questionnaires in fifteen minutes. The questionnaire concentrates on students’ understanding about difference some cultural characteristics between American and Vietnamese: 
Questions
American
Vietnamese
How many generations live in home?
Where do old-aged parents often live?
Is it polite or impolite to ask questions about age, marriage and income?
Who do you greet in the family first?
How often are groceries bought?
How is preparation for meals?
Where is wedding ceremony held?
Which holidays are the most important?
How about kissing each other in public?
Where do children sleep?
This survey was aimed to clarify some information gained from the questionnaire responses. We can see the result in the table below.( indentified point depended on the number of questions students answered: 9-10 questions: Good; 6-8 questions: Quite good ; 4-5 questions: normal ; 0-4 questions: weak) 
NUMBER
CLASS
QUANTITY
GOOD
QUITE GOOD
NORMAL
WEAK
SL
%
SL
%
SL
%
SL
%
1
12A
36
3
8.4
8
22.2
18
50
7
19.4
2
12B
31
2
6.5
7
22.5
15
48.5
7
22.5
3
11E
29
4
13.8
8
27.6
12
42.4
5
16.2
4
11G
30
5
16.7
10
33.3
10
33.3
5
16.7
SUM
126
14
11.1
33
26.2
55
43.7
24
19
From the table, we can see that most of the students have no cultural knowledge of a language in learning that language, even their own language’s culture. It is easily understandable that in English learning process in secondary school, communication and language usage are being ignored and when students do not care the relationships between culture and communication, they are almost beginners in English speaking because they were only exposed to the language in classroom before. They had no chances to learn listening and speaking skills and the only knowledge they have is structures and theories of grammar. Therefore, along with their difficulties in acquiring any effective language skills, a majority of the students did not have chances to know about what we call "culture" and how to use culture knowledge into speaking skill. The English teachers need to stimulate their curiosity about English -speaking cultures.
 2.3. SOME ACTIVITES FOR TEACHING CULTURAL KNOWLEDGE
In the speaking skill, encouraging all the students in class to speak English and create a competitive atmosphere are very important. The teachers should insert interesting cultural activities into lessons to attract students to take part in. Gradually, students will overcome their shyness when speaking English and feel more confident to give their own opinions on any issues.
Although nowadays, students play the centered role and the learner have a great role in the management of their learning, it does not mean that the students can decide everything, the teachers have to be good leaders to find out the suitable teaching methods and combine different approaches in a context. Furthermore, a teacher who teaches a foreign language well should not only have good knowledge but also the ability to master the teaching method. Teaching the foreign language is very difficult, but inserting culture into language to motivate student' interest in learning this language is more difficult. Therefore, in order to help teacher to orient the culture teaching, I would like to suggest activities to improve our teaching method. 
2.3.1. ACTIVITY 1
Name of activity: GREETING
Type of activity: warming up, greeting 
Topic: Hi  
Goal: - Getting used to greeting habits - getting to know the fellow students
Possible challenges: In the beginning shy students may need help and speak at a very low voice. It may be difficult for them to understand the question – they need a minute or two to collect an answer. 
Preparation: Think about the question that follows the introduction Procedure: Note at the blackboard: + Hi  (e.g. Anna). How are you? * Hi (E.g. Roman) Fine, thanks. And how are you? + Fine, thanks. Then throw the ball to a student and start the dialogue. He or she will answer, and then ask the follow-up question. After the answer the student throws the ball towards another student and the dialogue starts again. 
Follow up: Ask a question that leads into your item today: 
e.g. + “When do you go to bed normally?” * “I go to bed at 11 o’clock.”
2.3.2. ACTIVITY 2
Name of activity: LET’S CELEBRATE  (my birthday, a wedding, New Year) 
Type of activity: presentation 
Topic: How I celebrate in my country 
Goal: 
At the end of the activity, the learners will be able to talk about the organization and aim of the various festivities, 
Know the necessary vocabulary, 
Train talking in front of groups 
Show appreciated parts of their own culture and increase knowledge and understanding of the other cultures 
The group will draw profit from this exercise 
Possible challenges: In case the occasion talked about is celebrated rather differently in various cultures (like weddings) there might arouse fierce discussions that confront the students with stereotypes and prejudices concerning the own culture. 
Preparation: Worksheet for each student with the exact task. I prefer a mind-map, asking:
‘Who is invited?’
‘Who talks to whom?’ 
‘Where will the party take place?’
‘When and how long?’
‘Food’, ‘Drinks’, ‘Preparations’
‘What to wear’?
Procedure: As a starter we talk about the students’ favorite dishes and note them on the blackboard. This way we gather the vocabulary. Then I give out the worksheet that serves as an example – students can copy it and get their work done that way. Then each student presents her/his flipchart-paper, fastens it on the wall and explains. There may be questions / short discussions. 
Follow up: Role play: 
Invitation to a festivity in another culture 
Using role cards: you are invited and turn up dramatically underdressed.
2.3.3. ACTIVITY 3
Name of activity: HOW DO YOU SAY....?
Type of activity: role playing 
Topic: intercultural communication 
Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will be able to know the typical coffee, slice of fried dough “tapa”, etc. 
Possible challenges: The students don’t know how to ask what they want to have. 
Preparation: Cards with sentences where it is written several situations such as “waiter, please”, “thank you, very much” 
Procedure: The students represent a scene in a bar, restaurantin groups of two or three persons. The other students have to look for a card with a sentence that actors had to say or write themselves a sentence. 
Follow up: Go to a bar, restaurant  and observe the behavior of the people in the local.
2.3.4. ACTIVITY 4
Name of activity: CALL OUT-QUESTION 
Type of activity: Warming up, checking knowledge about the topic, (revision of vocabulary) 
Topic: “Daily life”, habitudes, jobs, how often we do things, compared to English or American habitudes 
Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will have a collection of relevant 
Vocabularies to talk about daily life and a survey about daily habitudes or typical daily life 
Possible challenges: Students might not have much information about life or might not be as communicative as they should be (for ensuring that this activity works well) 
Preparation: The call out question, white cards, tape 
Procedure:
Introduce the new topic (Daily life, habitudes, jobs, how often we do things) by writing the question on the black- or whiteboard: “What do you know about daily life in England and The USA?” 
Explain the procedure: students should tell their associations, their experiences, their knowledge, everything this question evokes one after another and that you’re going to write everything on the cards and that every answer will be fixed onto the black- or whiteboard. 
Brainstorming, writing down, fixing. Help eventually with some vocabulary if students sometimes don’t know a word for telling their associations 
Check all the answers together with the learner-group: Is anything missing? 
Do a clustering: students tell the headlines and you cluster 
Check headlines and clustering as a whole (together with students): Is anything missing? Is a re-clustering necessary? 
Follow up: As this topic is the one of a whole lesson in our textbook, we are going to need the vocabulary found for the call out-question throughout this unit
2.3.5. ACTIVITY 5
Name of activity: CAN YOU CALL ANY WORD WHAT I MEAN?
Type of activity: roll play 
Topic: non-verbal communication, cultural awareness 
Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will be able to realize how people from other cultures behave when meeting other people, especially when talking about things they don’t want to. What topics they talk about in public. 
Possible challenges: for the teachers are that all students will go along with this role play and will play the role they have got according to the plan. 
Preparation: cards where the students will find there instructions and blank cards for the follow up (max 6 per student) enough pens of course, and some material to fasten the cards on the black board. 
Procedure: All students are supposed to be participants in an international conference and mingle around while waiting for dinner to be served. Every student gets a card with instructions how to behave (e.g. keep distance to people or stand close by, look people in the eyes while talking to them or don’t look into peoples faces) and what topics to talk about (e.g. ask about peoples families, their salaries, political situation in their countries, the weather, cultural events and so on). According to the rules/habits in their own culture the students will experience situation where they feel comfortable or not. 
Follow up: To follow up the role play all students shall write max 3 cards about positive and max 3 cards about negative experience. Then everyone will put their cards on the black board. All students will see how the others felt and why and discuss it. By the end of the discussion the group should have found out that people behave different in different cultures and you can’t discuss any topic in any culture openly. Be aware of your own and other cultures.
2.3.6. ACTIVITY 6
Name of activity: WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT X- COUNTRY? 
Type of activity: Warming up, mind mapping before starting lectures about a certain country. 
Topic: Facts about culture (history, geography, society) 
Goal: At the end of the activity, the students will be able to see what they already know about a country and what they want to know 
Possible challenges: To make students realize that’s not enough to know the language. It’s also important to know facts about a country and people living there. 
Preparation: whiteboard and pen 
Procedure: The teacher writes the name of the country in the middle of the whiteboard and asks the students to come forward and write what they already know about this country and its people. This way it is easier for the teacher to avoid talking about facts the students already. 
Follow up: In a second step you can ask the students what more they want to know about the country. Focusing on that you will get students who are interested in your lessons.
2.3.7. ACTIVITY 7
Name of activity: EATING ON THE CHAIR
Type of activity: warming up 
Goal: At the end of the activity, the learners will be able to remember the vocabulary about food 
Possible challenges: The teacher has to make sure that only answers in the foreign language are accepted. If necessary he has to decide who gave the first two answers. 
Preparation: Prepare the chairs: 3 chairs with 3 blue chair cushions. 
Procedure: 
The teacher explains the activity in the mother tongue and tells the students the sentence the person in the middle of the chair has to say in the foreign language .Then the teacher sits down in the middle of the “chair” and the students stand in a semicircle around. 
The teacher starts saying e.g. “I am an apple” and waits for the associations of the students – the first two persons who give an answer sit down beside the teacher and the teacher choose one of them to return to the circle and leaves the other on the “chair” saying: “I take the  and leave the .”. The person who is left on the chair takes place in the middle and starts the game again repeating the name of the food he associated with the “apple”. 
Follow up: After this warming up the students should write a shopping list and then work in pairs for a play role in a shop.
2.3.8. ACTIVITY 8
Name of activity: I SEE WHAT YOU ARE SPEAKING
Type of activity: Field work documenting
Topic: non-verbal communication 
Goal: At the end of the activity, the stude