VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
********************* CẦM THỊ KIỀU ANH AN EXPLORATORY STUDY ON THE INFLUENCE OF THE MOTHER
TONGUE (L1) ON THE ENGLISH ACQUISITION OF THAI STUDENTS
AT THAI NGUYEN MEDICAL COLLEGE

Tìm hiểu về tác động của tiếng mẹ đẻ đối với việc học tiếng Anh
của sinh viên dân tộc Thái tại trường Cao đẳng Y tế Thái Nguyên M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60140111

Hanoi - 2014
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
*********************

Hanoi, 2014
Researcher

Cam Thi Kieu Anh

ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First and foremost, I would particularly like to express my deepest gratitude to my
supervisor, Dr. NGUYẾN HUY KỶ for his precious advice, remarkable, suggestions, kind
guidance and careful correction.
Next, I would like to acknowledge all my teachers at University of Languages and
International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, especially those who are
working at the Faculty of Post - Graduate Studies for their interesting lectures which
enable me to gain a great deal of theoretical knowledge and practical experience.

2. L2= Foreign language or second language
3. E = English
4. E
1
E
n
= English example 1….n
5. T = Vietnamese Thai
6. T
1
…T
n
= Thai example 1….n
7. E
s
= English sentences produced by the participant
Table 3.5. Errors in prepositions 32
Table 3.6. Errors in word order 35
vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii
ABSTRACT iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv
LIST OF TABLES v
PART A - INTRODUCTION 1
1. Rationale 1
2. Aims of the study 2
3. Research questions 2
4. Scope of the study 3
5. Significance of the study 3
6. Research methods 3
7. Thesis structure 3
PART B - DEVELOPMENT 5
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 5
1.1. The Thai people and language in Vietnam 5

3.2. Major findings 35
PART C - CONCLUSION 37
1. Recapitulation 37
2. Conclusions 37
3. Pedagogical implications 38
4. Limitations and suggestions for further studies 39
4.1. Limitations 39
4.2. Suggestions for further study 40
REFERENCES 41
APPENDICES I

1

PART A - INTRODUCTION
This part presents the rationale, the aims of the study, the research questions and the
methods used to achieve the research objectives. The scope, significance and the
organization of the study are also stated.
1. Rationale
Today, English becomes an important and influential language worldwide, with
over 300 million native speakers and between 400 and 800 million non-native users
(Manivanan, 2006). It is considered as a tool for international communication and world-
wide data sharing. English proficiency is of significance for individuals since it enables
them to update their knowledge and share their practices and experiences or seek help from
other people around the world in case obstacles arise at study and work. English, thus, can
“contribute to students‟ personal, linguistic, social, and cultural development” (Canh Le,
2004, p.167).
Apparently, everybody would like to learn English; however, not so many people

new language is a simpler task, where language learners only need to find out if the
systems of the new language are the same or different from those of the language they
know, and if different, what their nature is. Owing to the great importance of L1 grammar
into L2 learning, this research aims to investigate the relationship of Vietnamese Thai and
English and its possible effects on Thai learners of English with respect to grammatical
aspects only.
2. Aims of the study
In an attempt to improve the quality of teaching English to the Thai students at Thai
Nguyen Medical College, this study aims:
1. To investigate how the Thai students‟ L1 might affect their learning of English.
2. To implement a contrastive analysis to figure out the similarities and differences
between the Thai grammar and its English counterpart.
3. To offer suggestions for overcoming negative linguistic transfers that the Thai
learners of English may encounter in their learning of English.
3. Research questions
The present research aims to answer the following three questions:
1. What are the most common differences between the Thai and English grammar at
the word and sentence level? 3

2. How may these differences affect the Thai students‟ English learning at the tertiary
level?
3. What teaching strategies could minimise the effects of the Thai students‟ L1
interference in their English learning?
4. Scope of the study
Due to the nature of a minor study, the scope of the present study is limited to a
small number of students at Thai Nguyen Medical College, and its very focus is on the
impacts of Thai learners‟ L1 on their English written production at the word and sentence

It also provides a thorough description of the data collection procedure and the
analytical procedure.
c. Chapter 3: Result and Discussion
The chapter reports the findings of the study and discusses the prominent
aspects to answer the research questions stated in the previous chapter.
 Part C - Conclusion
This part states the conclusions of the major findings, recommendations, limitations
of this research, and suggestions for further studies. 5

PART B - DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter establishes the theoretical background for the study. It first provides an
overview of the Thai and their language then presents a contrastive analysis of English
and Thai, the definition of ‘errors’ and ‘mistakes’ and their distinction followed a
prediction of the errors likely committed by Thai learners of English.
1.1. The Thai people and language in Vietnam
1.1.1. The Thai people
The Thai people originated from China (Wyatt, 2003) and emigrated to Vietnam
between the 7
th
and 13
th
century (Quang Mai, 2004). The history and the language of the
Vietnamese Thai people have a common origin with the Thai group in South China, Laos,
Thailand and Burma. The number of the Vietnamese Thai people is more than one million,
and they mainly populate the South West of the Red River. Other groups belonging to this
language family include the Giay, Lu, San Chay, Tu Di and Bo Y.

similarities and differences at different level and in various areas. This section only
outlines major similarities and differences between Thai and English with respect to their
verbs, nouns, articles, prepositions and word order.
1.2.1. Verbs
Thai and English originate from different language families, but their verbs share a
number of similarities, especially the types of verbs that the two languages possess. These
similarities between the two languages are summarised in the following table:
Table1.1. English and Thai types of verbs
Types
Languages
Intransitive
Transitive
Ditransitive
English
+
+
+
Thai
+
+
+
Note: ‘+’ means ‘existent’
Examples:
S V
(E
1
): He swam.
(T
1
):

Adjective
English
+
+
+
+
Thai
+
+
+
+
Note: ‘+’ means ‘existent’
Examples:
(E
1
): They bought fruits.
(T
1
):
(E
2
): He likes her.
(T
2
):
(E
3
): He speaks naturally.
(T
3


adverb
(T
1
): (Po thảu coi khay quãm tỗ)
(E
2
): He speaks very
fast.

adverb
(T
2
): (Mẵn pák vẵn hênh)

adjective
Another big difference is that English verbs receive morphological marks for tenses
while words are normally added to the verbs or the ending of sentences to show tenses in
Thai, which is summarised in the table below:
Table1.4. Formation of tenses in English and Thai
Notion
Languages
Morphological changes
Adding words
English
+
+
Thai
-
+

3
):
(Mẵn
CHÍ MÃ
nỉ nẳng bườn máư)
The agreement between a subject and its verb is another big difference between
Thai and English. In Thai, there are no such a relationship between a subject and its verb in
a sentence, but it is a marked grammatical aspect in English. The table and instances below
clearly state this contrastive feature between the two languages:

9

Table1.5. Subject-verb relation in English and Thai
Notion
Languages
Subject-Verb agreement
English
+

Thai
-
Note: ‘+’ means ‘existent’; ‘-’ means ‘nonexistent’
Examples:
Plural
(E
1
): My friends

(T
2
): (Mẵn
ỉn
phạị
chu mự)

Plural
(E
3
): Her parents
watch
dancing
every night. 

(T
3
):

chu cữn)

The negation in English is also far different from that in Thai. English uses
auxiliaries plus the word ‘not’ to form a negative form while the negation in Thai is formed
by adding a negative words like (báu’, ‘hễ’) (which are equivalent of „not‟ in
English) in front of a verb:
Table1.6. Negation in English and Thai
Notation
Languages
Use of auxiliaries plus
NOT
Adding negative words
only 10

English
+
-
Thai
-
+
Note: ‘+’ means ‘existent’; ‘-’ means ‘nonexistent’
Examples:
(E
1
): He
didn‟t do
his homework yesterday.

doesn‟t want
to drink anything.

Aux. + NOT (T
3
):
(Mary
báu é
kìn xằng xắc nỏi)

BÁU + V

Another difference between the two languages is the absence of the particle ‘to’ in
case two verbs are juxtaposed and the omission of the copula verb „to be‟ in front of an
adjective and a noun.
For examples:
(E1): My father wants to buy a new pot.
(T
1
):
( Ải cù é  xự khảng mỏ máư nưng.)
(E2): I am tired.
(T
2
):
(Cù  nưới)
1.2.2. Nouns

-
-
-
+
Note: ‘+’ means ‘existent’; ‘-’ means ‘nonexistent’
The most striking point to notice is that English nouns are divided into „countable
nouns‟ (e.g., book, pen, umbrella, and computer) and „uncountable nouns‟ or „mass nouns’
(e.g., water, milk, salt, and rice)‟. By contrast, Thai has no such classification. This
distinction results in many other differences between English and Thai nouns. Normally,
morphological marks are added to English singular nouns to establish their plural form or
change into a different form to show plural, while that of the Thai language is created by
adding the words like (‘pững’) in front of the single form. For example:
ENGLISH
THAI
Singular
Plural
Singular
Plural
a book
books

pặp xừ nưng
pững pặp xừ
an old book
old books

pặp xừ cáu nưng
pững pặp xừ cáu
one child
children

category:
Table1.8. English and Thai articles
Articles

Languages
Indefinite „a/an‟
Definite „the‟
English
+
+
Thai
-
-
Note: ‘+’ means ‘existent’; ‘-’ means ‘nonexistent’
Thai has an equivalent translation of English indefinite articles „a/an‟, but it does
not always satisfy the characteristics of its English counterparts: (1) to indicate a specific
person/thing that is unfamiliar to the addressee or is first-mentioned and (2) to indicate a
whole class of entities (Jacobs, 1995). They are added before a noun. The Thai
counterparts of English indefinite articles („nưng/điều‟) can be used for both
specific and generic cases, but they are added after a noun.
Example 1:
(T):
(Cữn nị cù hền bả lák nưng nẳng cuồng xuồn hưỡn cù)
(E): Last night, I saw a strange man in my garden.
Example 2:
(T): 
(Tồ quãi điều lỏ men chương khòng chũa hưỡn) 13

above,
over,
on top of,
atop
the table
by,
near next
to, close
to, beside
the window.
The example above suggests the difficulties and confusion regarding the use of English
prepositions that the Thai learners of English may encounter.
1.2.5. Word order 14

English and Thai share a basic word order „subject-verb-object (S-V-O)‟ and their
dominant position is that a subject lies before a predicate. Similarly, when the copula verb
„to be‟ is used to link a noun to another, its position can be changeable.
Examples:
(E
1
): Ms. Linh
is
my teacher of English.
(E
2
): My teacher of English
is

(E
1
): His
Dog is quite friendly.
Poss. Adj.
N
(T
1
): .
Tồ mà
khòng mẵn ín đù hênh
N
Poss. Adj.
(E
2
): He has a lot of
good
books.

Adj.
N
(T
2
):
Mẵn mĩ lài
pặp xừ
muôn.
N
Adj.
The positions of English adverbials are more flexible than those of Thai, but they

): Non-existent (E
1c
): He carefully does his homework.

adv. of manner (T
1c
): Non-existent (E
2a
): He was learning at 9 last night. adv. of time

(T
2a
): . (Mẵn nhẵng ép xừ mưa cảu chỡ cữn nị)

adv. of time

(E
2b

writing, they are parts of conversation or composition that deviates from selected norms”
(Dulay, Burt, & Krashen, 1982, p.138).
In short, an error is a piece of language produced by a non-native speaker of a
foreign language, which can cause failures or unintelligibility in communication.
16

1.3.2. Mistakes
Like the notion of „error‟, a mistake is also defined in lots of different ways. In the
words of Corder (1967), mistakes are defined as adventitious, random errors in
performance due to memory lapses, physical states, etc., of which the speaker may be
immediately aware. Similarly, a mistake is an inconsistent deviation that is sometimes the
learner „gets it right‟ but sometimes wrong (Norrish, 1983). According to Richards et al.
(1984), a mistake is an inappropriate use of a piece of language made by a learner when
writing or speaking and which is caused by lack of attention, fatigue, carelessness, or some
other aspect of performance.
To sum up, a mistake is a linguistic failure, which might occur in a particular
situation but may not appear in another one, and language learners could overcome them if
attention is paid.
1.3.3. Distinction of errors and mistakes
Both errors and mistakes can be seen as linguistic failures, but linguists and
scholars reach agreement that they are different in many aspects. Their differences are
illustrated in the table below:
Table 1.10. Comparison of errors and mistakes

ERRORS
MISTAKES
Frequency