The Cultural Appropriateness of Communicative Language Teaching: A Case Study of the EFL Program Implementation at a Vietnamese Tertiary Institution by Thi Nguyet Minh Nguyen Submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy School of Humanities and Communication Arts Western Sydney University September 2016 Acknowledgements I would like to express my deep gratitude to all the people and organizations that provided invaluable support and funding for the conduct of this research work and the completion of this thesis. My treasured dream of doctoral study would not have come true without them. My appreciation goes to my supervisors who have wholeheartedly supported my study. They are Dr. Ping Yang, my principal supervisor for the past four years, and as co-supervisors, Dr. Jinghe Han for the past two and a half years and Dr. Bruno Di Biase and Dr. Satomi Kawaguchi in the earlier stage of this project. I am very grateful to them for their providing me with insightful feedback on my literature review, research design, data collection and writing up of this thesis. Especially, I am most deeply indebted to Dr. Yang for his indispensable role. Dr. Yang has always been there for me to seek advice at every single step of this research work in terms of both academic expertise as well as administrative tasks, even when he was overseas for international conferences. Particularly in the lead-up to the submission of this thesis, Dr. Yang’s Christmas and New Year holiday was squeezed terribly as he always promptly responded to my queries and untiringly gave comments on my thesis chapters. I am grateful to the president of the university as well as the management of the education department where this case study was conducted as well as several other people who helped me gain access to the university. I would also like to thank the students, lecturers, program administrator, alumni and their employers for participating in this study. I owe these people tremendously for their time and their answers to my numerous questions. I would like to name and thank them individually, but for confidentiality reasons, they must remain anonymous. Also, my thanks are extended to the support staff at the School of Humanities and Communication Arts, the Higher Degree Research Office and the librarians at Western Sydney University who have been very helpful throughout my study for and completion of this research work. Particularly, I would like to thank the University’s Ethics Review Committee for their insightful comments on my ethics clearance application. I would like to acknowledge that my study was financially supported by the Australian Endeavour Scholarship. I am grateful to the organizers of this scholarship, which provided me with generous monthly living stipends on top of payments for tuition fees, health care premiums and relocation costs, and the case managers who showed great concern about my study and health. From my host institution, Western Sydney University, I received funding for the data collection, analysis and storage (e.g. purchase of equipment and registration fee for the NVivo training course), and for the thesis editing, printing and binding services. It is also acknowledged that I employed professional editorial support for the thesis. I am grateful for Ms. Marie-Louise Taylor’s careful editing and helpful feedback; many thanks for working hard with me even in the festive season. In addition, I am thankful to my family members and friends, both in Sydney and at home, who would always extended a helping hand in times of need. Mums and Dads gave tremendous assistance by looking after my daughter when I was busy with my data collection in Vietnam. Also, I am grateful to my landlord and landlady for their help with transport of my older daughter to and from school when my husband was away on business and we were unable to make alternative arrangements. Further back, I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the referees for my application for the Australian Endeavour Scholarship and the institution I used to work at for creating favourable conditions for my overseas study. Finally, I am grateful to my husband and my daughters, whose presence in my life away from my home country has always been an invaluable support for my academic pursuits. Particularly, my husband would always ‘fight’ for a much bigger share of housework duties (and he always won) so that I could concentrate on my study. Statement of Authentication The work presented in this thesis is, to the best of my knowledge and belief, original except as acknowledged in the text. I hereby declare that I have not submitted this material, either in full or in part, for a degree at this or any other institution. Thi Nguyet Minh Nguyen September 2016 Table of Contents Table of contents ........................................................................................................... i List of tables ............................................................................................................... viii List of figures ................................................................................................................ ix List of abbreviations ...................................................................................................... x List of appendices ........................................................................................................ xii Abstract ...................................................................................................................... xiii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ............................................................................. 1 1.0 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................. 1 1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY ...................................................................... 1 1.1.1 The status of CLT.......................................................................................... 1 1.1.2 CLT in Vietnam ............................................................................................ 4 1.1.3 Rationale of study ......................................................................................... 6 1.2 SCOPE OF THE RESEARCH ............................................................................. 9 1.2.1 Factors for examination................................................................................. 9 1.2.2 Perspectives for investigation ..................................................................... 11 1.3 AIMS AND SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY ......................................................... 12 1.3.1 Aims of study .............................................................................................. 12 1.3.2 Significance of study ................................................................................... 13 1.4 ORGANIZATION OF THESIS CHAPTERS ..................................................... 15 1.5 SUMMARY ......................................................................................................... 17 i CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................... 18 2.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................... 18 2.1 COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE TEACHING ............................................... 18 2.1.1 The creation of CLT .................................................................................... 18 2.1.2 The development of CLT ............................................................................ 22 2.1.2.1 The concept of ‘communicative competence’ ................................... 22 2.1.2.2 CLT principles ................................................................................... 26 2.2 POTENTIAL PROBLEMS TO CLT IMPLEMENTATION .............................. 29 2.2.1 CLT as a rational approach ......................................................................... 30 2.2.2 The apparent volatility of CLT concepts .................................................... 31 2.2.3 CLT for EFL contexts ................................................................................. 34 2.3 STUDIES OF CLT IMPLEMENTATION IN VIETNAM ................................. 36 2.3.1 Cultural awareness-oriented study .............................................................. 37 2.3.2 CLT implementation in tertiary education .................................................. 39 2.3.3 Other previous research............................................................................... 41 2.4 INTERPRETATION FRAMEWORK ................................................................. 43 2.4.1 Culturally calibrated investigation .............................................................. 43 2.4.2 Hofstedian cultural dimensions ................................................................... 44 2.5 SUMMARY ......................................................................................................... 48 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH DESIGN .................................................................... 50 3.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................... 50 3.1 NATURE OF RESEARCH ................................................................................. 50 3.1.1 Case study ................................................................................................... 50 3.1.2 Pros and cons of case study ......................................................................... 53 3.2 RESEARCH CRITERIA ..................................................................................... 54 3.3 RESEARCH SITE AND POSITION OF THE RESEARCHER ......................... 58 3.3.1 Selection of research site ............................................................................. 58 3.3.2 Position of the researcher ............................................................................ 60 3.4 DATA COLLECTION......................................................................................... 62 3.4.1 Ethics ........................................................................................................... 63 3.4.2 Procedure..................................................................................................... 64 3.4.3 Instruments .................................................................................................. 66 3.4.3.1 Questionnaires .................................................................................... 66 ii 3.4.3.2 Observation protocols ........................................................................ 68 3.4.3.3 Interview questions ............................................................................ 69 3.5 RESEARCH PARTICIPANTS ............................................................................ 71 3.5.1 ‘Internal’ research participants .................................................................... 72 3.5.1.1 Lecturers ............................................................................................. 73 3.5.1.2 Students .............................................................................................. 73 3.5.1.3 Program administrator ........................................................................ 74 3.5.2 ‘External’ research participants................................................................... 75 3.6 DATA ANALYSIS .............................................................................................. 76 3.7 SUMMARY ......................................................................................................... 79 CHAPTER 4: CONTEXTUAL FACTORS .......................................................... 80 4.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................... 80 4.1 THE RISE OF ENGLISH AND THE ELT INDUSTRY .................................... 80 4.1.1 The resurrection .......................................................................................... 81 4.1.2 The acceleration .......................................................................................... 83 4.2 THE ADOPTION OF CLT .................................................................................. 86 4.3 CHALLENGES TO CLT IMPLEMENTATION ................................................ 90 4.3.1 Societal factors ............................................................................................ 90 4.3.1.1 Exam-oriented study .......................................................................... 90 4.3.1.2 Limited authentic English use ............................................................ 92 4.3.1.3 Absence of a need for communicative competence ........................... 94 4.3.2 Cultural factors ............................................................................................ 96 4.3.2.1 Tradition of knowledge accumulation ............................................... 96 4.3.2.2 Teacher–student power distance ........................................................ 98 4.3.3 Inadequacies of logistics ........................................................................... 100 4.4 CONTEXT OF STUDY ..................................................................................... 101 4.4.1 ELT and CLT at the tertiary level ............................................................. 102 4.4.2 Context of situation ................................................................................... 104 4.4.2.1 The Institution .................................................................................. 104 4.4.2.2 The Department ................................................................................ 106 4.4.2.3 MTIH-ED program and curriculum ................................................. 108 4.5 SUMMARY ....................................................................................................... 111 iii CHAPTER 5: TEACHER AND TEACHING FACTORS ................................ 112 5.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................. 112 5.1 TEACHER FACTORS ...................................................................................... 112 5.1.1 MTIH-ED academic faculty ...................................................................... 113 5.1.1.1 Background information .................................................................. 113 5.1.1.2 Lecturers in focus ............................................................................. 114 5.1.1.3 Professional development ................................................................ 116 5.1.2 Lecturers and CLT .................................................................................... 118 5.1.2.1 Endorsement ..................................................................................... 118 5.1.2.2 Confidence ....................................................................................... 119 5.1.2.3 Interpretation of CLT ....................................................................... 121 5.2 TEACHING FACTORS .................................................................................... 123 5.2.1 Participant organization ............................................................................ 124 5.2.1.1 Few opportunities for interaction ..................................................... 124 5.2.1.2 Dominance of lecture mode ............................................................. 126 5.2.1.3 Lack of student learning support ...................................................... 128 5.2.2 Content ...................................................................................................... 130 5.2.2.1 Exclusive coverage of subject matter ............................................... 130 5.2.2.2 Form-oriented lessons ...................................................................... 131 5.2.3 Lesson control ........................................................................................... 133 5.2.3.1 Teacher-controlled ........................................................................... 133 5.2.3.2 Textbook-bound ............................................................................... 135 5.2.4 Teaching materials .................................................................................... 136 5.2.4.1 Text-only materials .......................................................................... 136 5.2.4.2 Lack of locally produced materials .................................................. 137 5.2.5 Other issues ............................................................................................... 138 5.2.5.1 Thrift of praises ................................................................................ 139 5.2.5.2 Formulation of questions ................................................................. 140 5.2.5.3 Nomination with name list ............................................................... 141 5.3 SUMMARY ....................................................................................................... 143 CHAPTER 6: LEARNER AND LEARNING FACTORS ................................. 145 6.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................. 145 6.1 LEARNER FACTORS ...................................................................................... 145 iv 6.1.1 Student background ................................................................................... 145 6.1.2 English program in high school ................................................................ 147 6.1.3 Circumstantial constraints ......................................................................... 148 6.1.3.1 Time budget ..................................................................................... 148 6.1.3.2 Motivation ........................................................................................ 150 6.1.4 Communicative English study .................................................................. 151 6.2 LEARNING FACTORS .................................................................................... 154 6.2.1 Classroom reality ...................................................................................... 155 6.2.1.1 Interaction and negotiation of meaning............................................ 155 6.2.1.2 Student modality .............................................................................. 157 6.2.2 Views of learning ...................................................................................... 158 6.2.2.1 Students’ expectations of their teachers ........................................... 159 6.2.2.1.1 Dual roles ................................................................................ 159 6.2.2.1.2 Polarized views ....................................................................... 161 6.2.2.2 Assumptions about teachers’ status ................................................. 162 6.2.2.3 Learning styles ................................................................................. 164 6.2.2.3.1 Authority-oriented learners ..................................................... 165 6.2.2.3.2 Inclination for individual work ............................................... 166 6.2.2.4 Vietnamese/English use in the classroom ........................................ 168 6.2.3 Students’ endeavors .................................................................................. 169 6.2.3.1 Willingness to communicate ............................................................ 169 6.2.3.2 Perception of collaborative work ..................................................... 170 6.2.3.3 Learner autonomy ............................................................................ 173 6.3 SUMMARY ....................................................................................................... 176 CHAPTER 7: DISCUSSION AND INTERPRETATION ................................. 178 7.0 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................. 178 7.1 CULTURAL ORIENTATIONS ........................................................................ 178 7.1.1 The Hofstedian dimensions ....................................................................... 179 7.1.1.1 The ‘original’ dimensions ................................................................ 180 7.1.1.1.1 Power distance ........................................................................ 180 7.1.1.1.2 Individualism versus collectivism ........................................... 183 7.1.1.1.3 Masculinity versus femininity ................................................. 185 7.1.1.1.4 Uncertainty avoidance ............................................................. 187 v