A. INTRODUCTION
1. REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC
The thesis teaching vocabulary to young learners deals with the need of a
teacher to know his or her learners and to understand their needs and problems.
Other issue mentioned in the thesis is the question of motivation and including
fun and games into the teaching process. The last issue the thesis deals with is
the usage of different methods and approaches for teaching young learners.
“Why? What is it good for? Is it good for them at all? Do they really need it? Is
it not only a useless worry? Why do we have to make them learn something
more than what they really need and have to? How much hope shall we place in
it?”
These are the most frequent questions I have been thinking about. I have
discussed them with many pupils, teachers and parents. Reactions and opinions
were, of course, different. I have been teaching English for many years at a
primary school. I have to admit that at the beginning I doubted about any
acquisition for young learners and many arguments seemed cogent to me.
During the time I began to realize chances and occasions that English language
can offer to children and I started to be a big fan of teaching English to young
learners.
I ran against a lot of troubles that I would like to share in my final thesis
and also I would like to share some ideas for teaching vocabulary to young
learners. At the beginning during the discussions with my colleagues we found
out that some kind of conception was needed, next we pointed out that there
were missing good textbooks or materials, also didactic aids and methodology
books. Frequent complain of many teachers is that it is extremely difficult to
teach children that seem to lack the basic talent for learning languages.
Therefore I would like to refer to the possibilities which teaching a foreign
language to young learners brings.
The aim of this work is to show several ways that can be used for teaching
vocabulary to young learners. I would like to show why and how teaching
vocabulary to young learners can be more efficient.

3. RESEARCH TASKS
- Systematizing some theoretical issues about the procedures and
activities in teaching vocabulary in English Primary program according to the
communicative approach.
- Exploring the present situation of teaching vocabulary at Primary School
and suggesting some techniques in teaching vocabulary to develop skills for
primary students, helping them be more confident to communicate in English.
4. RESEARCH TIME AND LOCATION
Research Time : School Year 2014-2015.
Research Location: Dong Ninh Primary School
Research Object: " Experience in teaching vocabulary for primary
students "
The respondents of the research: With this research I focused on the
primary student, especially the students of class 4.
B. CONTENT
1 . RATIONALE
1.1. Young learner - who is a young learner?
A young learner – who is he or she? This term covers a wide age range,
this can be anybody from the age of three to the age of eighteen. There is a big
difference between what a –three-year-old child can do and what a child of
fifteen can do. We should consider their development too. Some children
develop faster, others need more time. Teaching young learners requires the
knowledge of knowing all the development differences. Understanding these
differences can help me as a teacher to develop methods and a system of work
that I will use in the process of teaching. Of course, it is not possible to say that
every child of six will know this and that. But it is possible to pick out some
characteristics which I as a teacher should know and should be aware of.
2



- They understand situations and through situations – they use several
senses.
- They are able to use language skills not even realizing them.
- They do not realize what fact is and what fiction is sometimes.
- They want to learn and are happy when they learn something, then they
have to share it with somebody and they are proud that they learnt something,
they can show off a little bit.
- Often they “teach” each other.
- They love to be praised for what they have done and learnt, this is very
important fact to keep their motivation.
- Very often they pretend they understand everything and they know
everything.
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Halliwell states that:
- Young children are already very good at interpreting meaning without
necessarily understanding the individual words
- Already have great skill in using limited language creatively
- Frequently learn indirectly rather than directly
- Take great pleasure in creating fun in what they do
- Their imagination is ready
- “above all take great delight in talking” (Halliwell, 1992, p 3)
I do agree with Halliwell and her observations. My observations are the
same as hers. These examples of characteristics I have mentioned above are
great hints how to teach young learners and what kind of methods we should
use. It is very important to choose the right way of teaching for these little
children. The teacher definitely has to be very sensitive to the children’s needs
and has to prepare the lessons well.. We should avoid a stereotype, the 12
lessons have to be creative and lively. Otherwise this could have really bad


To meet these challenges the learner needs to:
- Acquire a critical mass of words for use in both understanding and
producing the language
- Remember words over time, be able to recall them readily 14
- Develop strategies for coping with gaps in word knowledge, including
coping with unknown words, or unfamiliar uses of known words
- Have to take responsibility themselves for vocabulary expansion”
(Thornbury, 2002, p 31).
1.2.2. How are words learned?
“Without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing
nothing nothing can be conveyed.”
David Wilkins, linguist
To know a word is one thing but we have to pause on the fact how this
knowledge is acquired. Thinking about little children who learn to speak, then
they always start with words used for labeling, so that the concept, for example,
of a cat has a name cat. But of course not every animal is a cat. The child needs
to learn how far to extend the concept of a cat. “In other words, acquiring a
vocabulary requires not only labeling but also categorizing skills.” (Thornbury,
2002, p 18) The child has to realize that these common words like cat can be
replaced by super ordinate terms like animals. And to this category also belongs
other animals, not just cats. Thornbury states that the children have to develop
some kind of network building – constructing some complex idea. Than during
this process they will realize there also exist words like synonyms, homonyms
etc.
There are many different methods and approaches how to teach a foreign
language, including vocabulary. I will mention just some of them that can be
used for teaching young learners.
- To help the learners understand it is important to visualize the item and
get the pupils to repeat or use the item actively. One good way of doing this is to

and topics. Nowadays all the course books are organized into themes and they
provide vocabulary according to it. If there is a theme “Animals”, then we can
expect words like naming animals, also where they live, what they eat etc.
Words that have quite specific meaning should be avoided with young learners.
Ur states the learners need to be taught the form of the word, then
grammar, collocations, meaning and word formation.
In the form pronunciation and spelling should be mentioned. “The learner
has to know what a word sounds like (its pronunciation) and what it looks like
(its spelling).” (Ur, 1996, p 60) The grammar of a new item also needs to be
taught. Again, depending what level the learners are they should be taught to
follow some grammatical rules. For example when teaching nouns, we would
like to present their plural forms, also regular and irregular (girl-girls, mousemice). When teaching verbs, maybe we would like to present their past forms,
especially if the verb is irregular (forget-forgot).
Word formation – using prefixes and suffixes, using hyphenated words
etc. is too difficult for young learners.
To summarize this, firstly I think that knowing the word and
understanding its meaning go hand in hand. Secondly, it is easier to remember
concrete words like a chair or a dog than abstract words. Young learners often
put words together with what they can see, hear or with what they can touch.
But as said above they also need to know other aspects of the words they learn.
In my opinion, it is important to teach them all these aspects. Of course, we will
not teach them, for example the irregular plural form right away, but they need
to know it. I think that if we keep repeating the plural form “mice”, after some
time most of them will not say “mouses”.
2. THE PRESENT SITUATION OF THE PROBLEM
For many years, teaching vocabulary was viewed as a mastery of these
skills. Vocabulary followed what the study called mentioning, practicing, and
assessing procedure where teachers mentioned a specific skill that students were
to apply, had students practice the skill by completing workbook pages, then
6

students is acquired after a few weeks of the school year with the methods of
teaching vocabulary. I had 40 minutes to test students in grade 4 to survey and
classify the students. The following chart will show the result:
Grade The numbers Excellent
Good
Fair
Poor
Fail
of students
(A)
(B)
(C)
(D)
(F)
4
78
0
17 = 22% 32 =
22= 28% 7 = 9%
41%
According to the survey result, I have classified the students and
immediately applied the methods and experiences which I accumulated over the
years to improve the teaching and learning quality.
3. THE SOLUSION
According to the present situation in English classes at my school.
Learning vocabulary is so difficult for all grades from 3 to 5. To improve this
situation, I would like to present some techniques for teaching vocabulary and
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The presentation of new vocabulary can be classified for example
according to verbal and visual techniques. Among visual techniques we can find
pictures - flashcards, photographs and magazine pictures, wall charts, posters,
blackboard drawings, word pictures, several realia 20 that teachers can hold up
or point to. Mime, action and gestures can be used especially for explaining
actions and times. Learners can label pictures or objects or perform an action.
Verbal techniques consist of using illustrative situations, descriptions, synonyms
and antonyms, collocations, scales, and using various forms of definition: for
example, definition by demonstration (visual definition), definition by
abstraction, contextual definitions, and definition by translation. Explanation can
become extremely difficult especially with beginner levels.

8


Another way that can be used is translation. This technique is not used
much recently, even though it is quick and easy but can be very discouraging for
learners. They cannot interact with the words. Words can be organized into sets,
subclasses and subcategories often aided by visual presentation. Translation is
one of the traditional ways of explaining the meaning of words. It could be done
by the teacher or with using a dictionary. It has its advantages but also
disadvantages. Using this technique, learners can learn how to use dictionaries.
Most of the young learners have never used a dictionary before so it is a need to
teach them to use dictionaries first. They have to be told there are two parts –
English-Czech and Czech English. Then they have to be told about the
alphabetical order and about other things they can find there. In my opinion it is
good to use both picture dictionaries and classical dictionaries where they find
the meaning with young learners. Teachers can prepare quite interesting lesson
where the learners learn how to use dictionaries.
3.2. Be realistic


warm them up. Of course, there are activities that have the opposite effect. They
may seem to settle the pupils. Before the lesson is planned, there should be
considered what kind of activities should be chosen knowing the effect of them.
Activities that can stir the class are, for example, oral work, games, and
competitions. Another aspect we should think about is activities which engage
children’s minds and which keep them physically occupied.
We should not forget context developing activities. “If we are to help the
learners acquire independent second language lexicons, we need to highlight the
importance of the context in which the language naturally occurs. Once the idea
of context playing a decisive role in the choice of language is firmly established,
we can begin to introduce varieties of the language used in different contexts.
Many course books provide learners with plenty of opportunities to develop
their own context for the language presented, for example activities like “odd
one out, filling-in exercises, dialogues” etc”.
Another factor that teachers should bear in their minds is to keep the
lessons simple. We often try to make our lessons varied. This is good but can
lead to misunderstanding. The lesson can be varied by doing lots of activities on
different topics. But this can mean we may produce a lesson which is a disaster,
too many activities and changing the activities all the time can destroy the lesson
well. The children’s minds have to jump from one topic to another with not
much time to let things sink in effectively. We should realize some important
things.
- “We will not help the children to develop their capacity to concentrate if
we jump inconsequentially from one topic to the next.
- There are ways of varying the oral work so that it is making different
demands on the children and therefore feels different even when the topic
remains the same.” (Halliwell, 1992, p 27)
Variation does not only mean changing the topics and materials but also
the change of work we do. Variation comes in the forms of activity as Halliwell

signals the end of the game. Children are very often concerned with controlling
whether everybody follows the rules and whether they are not broken. Piaget
(1967) (Piaget in Teaching English to Children) saw children’s games as, ´the
most admirable social institutions´. (Khan, 1995, p 143)
It is obvious that the games need to be motivating. “For young learners,
motivation deriving from the factors outside the classroom, such as parental and
social attitudes, is likely to be weaker than that created by events in the
classroom itself. Children need to be involved and even excited in order to learn
effectively.” (Khan, 1995) Games may focus on oral or written part of the
language; they offer a vast selection of activities.
Language can also be picked as a result of an enjoyable activity. “Telling
stories to students can result in natural language acquisition on their part.”
(Rixon, 1995, p 37) Teachers can tell stories the learners are familiar with in
their own language. Then the learners are able to follow it better. Again, the
stories need to be picked carefully, the level of the learners needs to be
considered and the teacher has to investigate time into preparation. Teachers can
come up 25 with a simple version of the story. Appreciated story can be The
Story of the Big Enormous Turnip.
Several activities can allow and involve more creative use of the
language. New sentences and activities can be produced by the children
themselves. Songs are most grateful way for this. The learners can make up new
verses, and then they can be extended. Example - a song “This is the way, I ...”
or “If you are happy and you know it...”.
As said above games and fun are important parts of the lesson. A play is in the
essential nature of the child. There are many possibilities for adapting games we
can find. The teachers should not forget the values of games and fun activities in
the lessons. All this can be applied to teaching vocabulary too. Teachers can
“play” with vocabulary while teaching it. It is very appreciated by the learners.
3.3. Practical part
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- Pictures and photos, a family poster, pieces of paper, a story book, color
pencils, handouts
* Assumptions:
- Learners know each other and their families
- They are ready to share and are ready to play
1. Talking about families:
Today we are going to talk about families. Do you live in a family? Who
belongs to your family? Do you have any brothers or sisters? What is your
brother’s / sister’s name? How often do you see your grandmother and
grandfather?... Ok, now I will talk about my family. (On the black board there is
a family poster all the time, so that I can point to it anytime. While talking, I use
pictures of my family and point to the right person and repeat who he/she is. For
example, “this is my daughter Kristyna”. I repeat the word “daughter”. And so
on.)
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2. Working with their pictures:
(The learners were supposed to bring to the class pictures of their family
members. I have to count on the fact, they forgot, so I distribute either my
pictures or pictures from magazines.) Now, it is your time to show me who is
who. Is this your mother? Is this your sister? Is this your grandfather? After
some time we will play a game. Now, we are going to play a game and the
winner gets a reward! I will say a sentence, for example:” Show me your
mother!” And you have to show me your mother’s picture. After each sentence I
make the learners say whose picture they are showing me. So I ask. Who is this?
Your... mother, father, sister etc.
3. Reading and coloring:
I distribute the handouts (Appendix I) that I have prepared for them and
the color pencils and the learners will color the people. While doing this I read a

13


- Pictures, a color poster, pieces of paper, a story book, color pencils,
picture of rainbow, color chalk * Assumptions:
- Learners probably already know the colors
- They are ready to play
- Color dictation should be easy and fun for them
1. Talking about colors:
I will say several words and you tell me what I am speaking about. We
will do it as a game called “silent post”. The very first person who knows will
tell me and then we will send it to others and the last person says that outloud.
Ok, listen up! Black, white, green, blue... Well done! Now you know we will
talk about colors today. Do you any colors? Which one is your favorite? What
does black mean for you? How do you feel about yellow? What does it evoke? I
will tell you a story about rainbow... (While we are talking, I put the poster on
the wall. Every time I call out some color, I take a color chalk and draw a big
circle on the board. I also point out to the right color on the poster.)
2. Working with “colors”:
Let’s take your exercise books now and you can see what I draw on the
board. I want you to do the same. But to each color you will write down the
name. You need to be careful about the spelling!... Now when you have finished,
I will pick up different color pencils and you can shout out the name of the color.
Let’s start now... (After each shout I repeat the color after them so that they have
a chance to hear the pronunciation well.) Well done, now we will write a
“dictation”. I know you do not like dictations but this one is going to be
different. I say:´Vezmi si yellow a nakresli sun. Potom si vezmi black a nakresli
three birds.´Well, are you ready?I do not want you to shout or look to your
friend’s paper. Let’s start now...
3. Finishing up the topic:

* Aids:
- Pictures, an animal poster, color pencils, handouts, a tape recorder
* Assumptions:
- Learners like animals
- Learners will probably know some English names of animals
- They are ready to share and listen
1. Talking about animals, brainstorming:
Well, children, I will start up the lesson in a little bit different way than
usually. I will write something on the blackboard and you have to find out a
hidden word in it. You cannot talk, the winner gets a price! If you think you
know, just put your hand above your head.
WHAT
SONG
PICTURE
MOTHER
CARD
LOVE
CH R I S T M A S
In these words you can find 1 word, the topic of today’s lesson... Well
done! The word is ANIMALS! And the winner is ……..? Here is your price!
What is it? Yes, it is a toy dog. So as you can see, we are going to talk about
animals today. What animals do you know? What is your favorite animal? Have
you ever been to the zoo? Do you like big animals? Are you scared of any? Do
you know any exotic animals? Do you have an animal at home? (During this
talking I write down on the blackboard all the animals the learners name and
distribute pictures of animals among the children. I get ready the tape recorder.)
2. Listening:
Now, we will listen to a tape recorder. You are going to hear several
sounds of animals and I want you to write their names on a piece of paper. You
will hear 5 sounds and I think you will know all of them. To make it easier I

what exactly needs to be written there or how exactly it has to be done. I usually
have examples with me in the lesson, so I can show them so that they get ideas.
This lesson can be varied in many ways and can be done with younger learners
too. Probably the hidden word would be too difficult for them, so the teacher
would have to come up with a different activity. The topic is also very grateful
and from my personal experience the children always have a lot of fun with it.
3.3.4. Lesson plan 4
Topic = The Weather
* Aims:
- To understand the text about weather
- To find out the odd words - to revise some basic terminology
- After the lesson the learners will know 5 new words
* Aids:
- Reading texts, flashcards, a poem Assumptions:
- Learners already know some weather terminology
- The learners usually are not as willing to talk so I have to ask right and
direct questions
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1. Talking about weather:
Good morning, children! (I look very tired and I am not happy. I assume
the children will ask me what is wrong with me. If not, I have to say it myself.) I
am not happy today, I am tired and I would like to be at home in my bed with a
hot cup of tea and my favorite book. This is all because of the weather. Do you
like this kind of weather? What do you like to do in this kind of weather? What
is your favorite season? Why? Do you prefer hot weather to cold weather? etc.
2. Reading:
Now, we will read a short text about the weather and then we will talk
about it. You will have to answer some questions too. I will write the questions

result in the first semester of the school year 2014-2015 shows the increase in
the percentage of students who can remember vocabulary and use them
correctly. The significance of the methods of teaching vocabulary can be seen
17


when examining the percentage of students with a reading age above their
chronological age since the program’s implementation. The number of students
assigned to be improving their skills. Comparing with the result survey at the
beginning, I find that the recent result is better than the old one. The following
chart will show the result:
Grade The numbers Excellent
Good
Fair
Poor
Fail
of students
(A)
(B)
(C)
(D)
(F)
4
78
16=20.5 32 = 41% 26=
4= 5.2%
0
%
33.3%
In conclusion, the changing of the students’ learning vocabulary has


18


because young learners get bored if they do the same activities in the same way
all the time. The Practical Part proved what I mentioned in the theory.
I have to admit that in practice I tried out all the lesson plans and it worked well.
Sometimes, some activity took longer time so the learners were assigned
homework.
The focus of this thesis is the personality of young learners and teaching
vocabulary to them. Testing and assessment will be the theme of my next future
research.
This research investigated the methods of teaching vocabulary for primary
students, lesson delivery and sequence of content and learning expectations used
by teachers of English at Dong Ninh Primary School. This research brings
broader understanding of strategies for teaching vocabulary to students whose
first language is not English. The rationale for the study stems from the need to
gain greater international perspective of the teaching of English learners. Results
reflect analysis of classroom observation field notes of 45 students of class 4A.
D. RECOMMENDATIONS
1. To the leaders
To enhance the capacity of teachers in teaching English, the leaders
should organize the training courses for the English teachers regularly. Through
the training courses, teachers have the opportunity to exchange and learn their
experiences.
2. Acknowledgments
I am grateful the experts of Dong Son Education and Training Office, my
colleagues at Dong Ninh Primary School, for providing helpful comments for
the research.
I also would like to encourage Vietnamese teachers to have more

7. REDMAN, Stuart: A Way with Words. Vocabulary Development Activities for
Learners of English.Book 2. Cambridge University Press, 1991. 124 s. ISBN-0521-35919-8.
8. REDMAN, Stuart: A Way with Words. Vocabulary Development Activities for
Learners of English. Book 3. Cambridge University Press, 1991. 124 s. ISBN-0521-35921-X.
9. RIXON, Shelagh: Young Learners of English: Some Research Perspectives.
Longman Essex, 1999. 110 s. ISBN-0-582-42082-2.
10. SCOTT, Wendy A.; YTREBERG, Lisbeth H: Teaching English to Children.
Essex: Longman, 1991
11. THORNBURY, Scott: How to teach vocabulary. Longman Essex, 2002. 185
s. ISBN-0-582-42966-8. 11. UR, Penny. A Course in Language Teaching:
Practice and theory.UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 375 s. ISBN-052144994-4.
12. WRIGHT, Tony. Roles of Teachers & Learners.UK: Oxford University
Press, 1996. 160 s. ISBN 0-19-437133-6. 44
Other resources :
1. http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk
2. http://www.longman.com/young_learners
3. http://www.eslkidstuff.com

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INDEX
A: INTRODUCTION
1. REASON FOR CHOOSING THE TOPIC
2. THE PURPOSE OF THE RESEARCH
3. RESEARCH TASKS
4. RESEARCH TIME AND LOCATION
B. CONTENT
1 . RATIONALE
2. THE PRESENT SITUATION OF THE PROBLEM