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

NGUYỄN HẠNH TUYẾT

AN INVESTIGATION INTO TEACHERS’ AND STUDENTS’
ATTITUDES TOWARDS THE USE OF VISUAL AIDS IN
TEACHING AND LEARNING VOCABULARY AT LE QUY DON
GIFTED HIGH SCHOOL, DIEN BIEN

NGHIÊN CỨU THÁI ĐỘ CỦA GIÁO VIÊN VÀ HỌC SINH ĐỐI VỚI VIỆC
SỬ DỤNG GIÁO CỤ TRỰC QUAN ĐỂ DẠY VÀ HỌC TỪ VỰNG
Ở TRƯỜNG THPT CHUYÊN LÊ QUÝ ĐÔN – ĐIỆN BIÊN

M.A. MINOR THESIS

Field:

English Teaching Methodology

Code:

60 14 10

Hanoi, 2011


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

This study aims at finding out the attitudes of the teachers and students at Le Quy Don
gifted high school in Dien Dien towards the use of visual aids in teaching and leaning English
vocabulary.
In the study, the quantitative and qualitative methods are employed. The instruments to
collect data for the study are survey questionnaires and interview. After gathering and
analyzing the collected data, some major findings have been revealed. The first finding is that
most of the teachers and students at LQD gifted high school in Dien Bien have positive
attitudes towards the use of visual aids in teaching and learning vocabulary. The second
finding shows that most of the teachers tend to use different types of visual aids in teaching
vocabulary. Nevertheless, they still restrict themselves to some visual types only. Moreover,
their ways of exploiting visual aids to teach vocabulary is limited. They just mainly focus on
using visual aids to present new words. This means that the teachers have not made use of
visual aids to their fullest potential to aid their students or arouse their interest in leaning
vocabulary. The third finding is that both the teachers and students still encounter certain
challenges when using visual aids in teaching and learning vocabulary.
It is hopeful that this study can be of some help to the teachers at LQD gifted high
school and the school itself about their teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards the use of
visual aid in teaching vocabulary or other teachers and schools interested in the subject matter.


iv

LISTS OF ABBREVIATIONS
LQD

Le Quy Don (gifted high school)

No.

Number of informants


Figure 4:

Data collected from question 5 of the teachers’ questionnaire

21

Figure 5:

Data collected from question 9 of the teachers’ questionnaire

24

Figure 6:

Data collected from question 12 of the teachers’ questionnaire

26

Figure 7:

Students’ interest in learning vocabulary through visual aids

28

Figure 8:

Students’ evaluation on the usefulness of visual aids in vocabulary teaching

28


Figure 14:

Data collected from question 2 of the interview for the teachers

33

List of tables

pages

Table 1:

The teachers’ evaluation of the specific visual aids

21

Table 2:

The teachers’ frequency of visual aids use in teaching vocabulary

22

Table 3:

The teachers’ ways of using of visual aids to teach vocabulary and the

23

frequency of the teachers using these ways to teach vocabulary


Table 9:

The students’ evaluation on their teachers’ frequency of using visual aids to

30


vi

teach vocabulary

Table 10:

The reasons for the students’ interest in learning vocabulary through visual aids

31

Table 11:

The reasons for the students’ de-motivation in learning vocabulary
through visual aids

32

Table 12:

The problems faced by the students when learning vocabulary through visual aids

33

v

TABLE OF CONTENT..........................................................................................................

vii

PART A: INTRODUCTION.............................................................................................

1

1. Rationale of the study......................................................................................................

1

2. Aims of the study.............................................................................................................

2

3. Research questions...........................................................................................................

2

4. Scope of the study............................................................................................................

2

5. Methods of the study........................................................................................................

3


5

1.1.2.3. Vocabulary classified according to the functions.......................................

5

1.1.2.4. Vocabulary classified according to the frequency of use...........................

6

1.2. Vocabulary and its significant role in language teaching and learning........................

6

1.3. Visual aids.....................................................................................................................

7

1.3.1. Definitions of visual aids......................................................................................

7

1.3.2. Types of visual aids..............................................................................................

8

1.3.2.1. Chalkboards................................................................................................

8



1.4. Benefits of using visual aids to teach vocabulary.........................................................

14

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY....................................................................................

16

2.1. Research question.........................................................................................................

16

2.2. Subjects of the study.....................................................................................................

16

2.2.1. The students..........................................................................................................

16

2.2.2. The teachers..........................................................................................................

16

2.3. The instruments.............................................................................................................

17

2.3.1. The questionnaires................................................................................................


3.1.1.2. Results from the students’ survey questionnaire........................................

28

3.1.2. Results from the interviews for the teachers.........................................................

33

3.2. Findings and discussion................................................................................................

36

PART C: CONCLUSION.................................................................................................

38

4.1. Summary of the study...................................................................................................

38

4.2. Recommendations.........................................................................................................

38

4.3. Limitations and suggestions for further study...............................................................

40

REFERENCES.....................................................................................................................

and learning process.
The idea of using visual aids to better aid students learn vocabulary has been conducted at
LQD gifted school by many teachers including the researcher and all agree that visual aids are of
great use to aid both the teachers and their students in teaching and learning vocabulary. Many
students admit that they can remember new words more easily by both listening to their teachers
and looking at the visuals. They also get involved to the lesson more actively by guessing the
words’ meaning through the visuals, describing the visuals, asking and answering questions
related to the visuals, etc. Therefore, students gradually retain more words and can better
communicate in the target language. For teachers, many agree that they can reduce their talking
time of explaining new words in stead of introducing words directly through different types of
visual aids.
From what the teachers and students have mentioned about some of benefits of visual
aids, the researcher can partly know about their attitudes towards the use of visual aids in
teaching and learning vocabulary. This inspires the researcher to conduct the study entitled “An
Investigation into Teachers’ and Students’ Attitudes towards the Use of Visual Aids in Teaching
and Learning Vocabulary at Le Quy Don Gifted High School, Dien Bien.” with hope of
understanding more about not only the teachers’ and students’ attitude towards the use of visual
aids but also the overall problems faced by them in teaching and learning vocabulary through
visual aids. Hopefully, this study will be of some values to those who want to improve their
vocabulary teaching, especially by means of visual aids.


2
2. Aims of the study: The study aims at:
- Investigating the teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards the use of visual aids in teaching and
learning vocabulary.
- Exploring the extent to which visual aids have been used in vocabulary teaching and learning
- Finding out the possible problems faced by the teachers and students in teaching and learning
vocabulary through visual aids.
3. Research questions: In order to achieve the above-stated goals, the study was carried out to

1.1. Vocabulary
1.1.1. What is vocabulary?
According to The Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics,
vocabulary is defined as “a set of lexemes, including single words, compound words and idioms”.
Otherwise, in the Oxford Advanced learner’s Dictionary, vocabulary is defined quite simple as
“all the words that a person knows or uses.”
In Stahl’s view, vocabulary is the knowledge of words and word meanings then he offered
a clear and specific definition of vocabulary by saying that “vocabulary knowledge is knowledge;
the knowledge of a word not only implies a definition, but also implies how that word fits into
world.” (Stahl, S.A. 2005). The author emphasizes that when learning vocabulary, learners must
acquire the knowledge of words or word meanings and understand how the word they have learnt
can be used appropriately in the real-world situations.
1.1.2. Classification of vocabulary
1.1.2.1. Vocabulary classified according to the concept of morpheme
McCarthy (1990: 5) divides words into three kinds: simple, derived and compound.
+ Simple word : A simple word is one that consists of only a root morpheme, which can not be
further subdivided such as eat, do, learn, live...
+ Compound word: Compound words are items that consist of more than one root but have a
single identity in that they name a single thing or concept such as sewing machine, campground,
electric fan....
+ Derived word: A derived word is one that consists of a root and one or more derivational
morphemes such as teacher, worker, helpful...
1.1.2.2. Vocabulary classified according to the meanings
Read (2000: 18) states that vocabulary can be divided into notional words and functional
words.
+ Notional words are words with clear lexical meaning. They address objects, actions, qualities,
etc, and they have meaning in themselves. Notional words form a great number of each speaker's
vocabulary. For example, a boy, a ball, to make, to go...



new word, especially when the objects are available in the classroom. She reinforced that “in
most cases, a picture of something is less helpful than the thing itself”. She also gives the general
recommendation “for showing the meaning of an English noun, use the real object whenever


5
possible” (p25). Representational objects are objects that can replace real objects in case teachers
and learners cannot bring the real ones for use in classroom.
1.3.2.3. Mime (Gesture and Facial expressions)
Mime is a type of acting using only gestures and facial expressions. According to Alton
(2002), “A gesture is a form of non-verbal communication made with a part of the body, used
instead of or in combination with verb communication.” Facial expressions are also simply
known as the expression on a person's face, resulting from specific use of the facial muscles.
1.3.2.4. Pictures
In Look Here! Visual Aids in Language Teaching, Bowen (1982) introduces some kinds
of pictures such as flash cards, sequence pictures, wall pictures and wall charts, etc. In fact,
pictures of all kinds are considered useful visual aids in language teaching, especially in teaching
vocabulary. They can be used to illustrate very large objects which are not easily brought into the
classroom, for example: an airplane, a car, a washing machine, a typewriter, etc. They are also of
great help for teachers to stimulate students’ imagination and memory of new words. Teachers
can use pictures to clarify the denotation meaning of vocabulary without much explanation.
1.3.2.4.1. Wall pictures and wall charts
According to Bowen (1982: 13):
A wall chart is a large diagram or picture display card. Most wall charts consist of
combinations of visual and verbal material. Their aim is to give information on topic. A wall
picture, on the other hand, is simply a large illustration of a scene or event, or a set of scenes or
events.

In Visuals for the Language Classroom, Wright and Haleem (1991: 44) also offer a very
simple bur clear definition of wall picture as “Wall pictures illustrate scenes, people or objects and

all eight teachers at LQD gifted high school at the beginning of March 2011. The survey was
divided into three main parts. The first five questions focus on finding out the teachers’ attitudes
towards the use of visual aids in teaching vocabulary. The second part with questions from 6 to 8
aims at exploring the extent to which visual aids have been used in teaching vocabulary. The five
following questions are raised to investigate the teachers’ problems when applying visual aids to
vocabulary teaching.
2.2.1.2. The students’ questionnaire
The students’ questionnaire, comprising of 11 questions, was delivered to 116 students at
the same time of the teacher questionnaire. Similarly, the survey for the students covered three
main points.
2.2.2. The interview for the teachers
The researcher conducts informal interviews with all teachers in order to get more
insightful information to supplement the result of the teachers’ questionnaires or to interpret
responses to questionnaires.


7

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION
3.1. Results from the teachers’ survey questionnaire
1. The teachers’ attitudes towards the use of visual aids in vocabulary teaching
Teachers' interest in using visual aids to teach vocabulary
70.0%

62.5%

60.0%
50.0%
37.5%


1. present new vocabulary
2. help students practise and retain
the new words

always
50%

often
37.5%

sometimes
12.5%

hardly ever
0%

never
0%

0%

0%

50%

25%

25%



Percentage
Time-consuming to prepare
7
87.5%
Money consuming
4
50%
Difficulties to prepare
3
37.5%
The lack of time when using.
5
65.5%
Difficulties in finding suitable visual materials
5
62.5%
Difficulties in class management
0
0%
Table 7: The challenges faced by teachers when using visual aids to teach vocabulary
As shown in table 7 the possible problems faced by the teachers when using visual aids to
teach vocabulary. In fact, the teachers found some challenges that hindered them from using


9
visual aids in teaching vocabulary. Remarkably, 87.5% of the teachers claimed that it was timeconsuming to prepare visual aids. Also, 62.5% of the teachers said that they met difficulties in
finding suitable visual materials. Half of the teachers found the preparation of visual aids money
consuming.
3.2. Results from the students’ survey questionnaire
1. The students’ attitudes towards the use of visual aids in teaching vocabulary


4.30%

Neutral

Very useful

Useful,
65%

Useful

Uninterested

0.0%

Figure 7

Figure 8

As can be seen from figure 7, the percentage of the students who felt interested and very
interested in learning vocabulary through visual aids is much higher than that of those who had
neutral and uninterested attitudes (74.1% as compared to 25.9%). This fact once again confirms
that visual aids really interest the students. Accordingly, all of the students highly appreciated the
usefulness of visual aids in helping them learn vocabulary. 65% and 35% respectively evaluated
visual aids useful and very useful (Figure 8). As a result, most of the students (97.4%) said they can
learn vocabulary easier and faster thanks to visual aids. (Figure 9)
2. The extent to which visual aids have been used in vocabulary learning

Types of visual aids


4.3%
7.6%
25%

0%
6.9%
14.7%

0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%
0%

0%
0%
6.9%
21.6%
20.7%
16.4%
23.5%

30.2%
19%
18.1%
31.9%
31%

No. of
Percentage
informants
Learning vocabulary through visual aids is boring
0
0%
Learning vocabulary through visual aids is difficult to understand
7
6%
Learning vocabulary through visual aids is distracting
21
18.1%
Learning vocabulary through visual aids is confusing
26
22.4%
Table 12: The problems faced by the students when learning vocabulary through visual aids
Considering the problems faced by the students when learning vocabulary through visual
aids (Table 12), 22.4% of the students said that learning vocabulary through visual aids was
confusing. 18.1% stated that it was distracting and 6% admitted it was difficult to understand.
Surprisingly, no one felt bored when the teachers used the visual aids. These percentages are not
very high, they are still worth considering by the teachers in order to make visual aids really
something that aids the students’ vocabulary learning process.
3.3. Results from the interviews for the teachers
Ways of teaching vocabulary
Verbal technique (illustrative situations (oral/written),
definition, synonym/antonym, gradable items,
examples of type, etc.)
Visual aids

Translation

When being asked to support for this statement, all of the teachers agreed that most of
their students have quite positive attitudes towards their teachers’ applying of visual aids in
vocabulary teaching.
3.4. Findings and discussion
Basing on the data collected from the survey questionnaire for both of the teachers and students
and the informal interviews with the teachers, the results show that:
Both of the teachers and students at LQD gifted high school have positive attitudes
towards the use of visual aids in teaching and learning English vocabulary. The teachers at LQD
gifted high school tend to use different types of visual aids that are tested. However, they still
restrict themselves to some types of visual aids only. Another finding is that the ways the teachers
exploit visual aids in teaching vocabulary are rather limited. As mentioned previously, the
teachers mainly employ visual aids to present new words during their vocabulary teaching,
whereas they rarely use visual materials to help their students practise and retain the new words.
Regarding the last question aiming at finding out the possible problems faced by both the
teachers and the students while teaching and learning vocabulary though visual aids. It can be
concluded that despite their numerous benefits brought to the teachers’ and the students’, visual
aids still bring their users some challenges. For the teachers, they faced such problem as the lack
of time to prepare, the lack of time when using, difficulties in finding suitable visual materials,
money consuming and difficulties in preparing as well. For the students, a number of the students
still find learning vocabulary though visual aids confusing, distracting or difficult to understand,
which require the teachers to re-examine if they exploit visual aids properly or not.


12

PART C: CONCLUSION
4.1. Summary of the study
To gain reliable and valuable data and information for the study, survey questionnaires
and interview were employed as the methods of the study. The data collected from the
questionnaires and interview for the teachers reveal that both of the teachers and students have

try to collect the most suitable ones from different sources or some mentioned above. However,
all these above recommendations for solving the teachers’ difficulties in using visual aids just
come from the teachers’ own efforts. It would be better if the teachers should be financed to take
part in more training programs to enhance their ability of exploiting visual aids by the managing
board of the school or they should be given more budgets to make more effective visual aids. For
the students, many still feel confused, distract and difficult when their teachers employ visual
aids in class to teach vocabulary, This problem, probably, is owing to the low effectiveness of the
teachers’ using visual aids, their unvaried types of visual aids applied. In order to solve these
problems, the teachers should keep improving their visual aids to become more attractive,
creative and varied in types. They should always keep in mind two key words: creativity and
imagination because “the teacher must be creative and imaginative in order to develop techniques
for exploiting aids” (Chamberlain: 1980: 9).
4.3. Limitations and suggestions for further study
Firstly, the author's practical experience of using visual aids in teaching vocabulary is
limited. Therefore, the recommendations in the last part are likely to be subjective.
Secondly, the researcher did not have access to all 11th form students at LQD gifted high
school. Therefore, the conclusion on the students’ attitudes towards the use of visual aids in
learning vocabulary may not be well generalized for the rest of the 11th form students at the
school.
In conclusion, despite some inevitable limitations, the researcher has, to a certain extent,
succeeded in answering the research questioned stated at the beginning. Hopefully, in further
studies, the teacher’s and students’ attitudes towards the use of visual aids will be focused on not
only vocabulary teaching and learning process but also grammar or other language kill teaching
and learning processes such as writing, reading, listening or speaking.


14

REFERENCES
1. Allen, V.F. (1983). Techniques in Teaching Vocabulary. Oxford University Press.


York: Longman.
11. Hoang, V. (2006). Tieng Anh 11. Hanoi: Nha Xuat Ban Giao Duc
12. Mc Cathay, M. (1990). Vocabulary. New York: Oxford University Press.
13. Nation, P. (1994). New Ways in Teaching Vocabulary. Pantagraph Printing.
Bloomington: Illinois USA
14. Nunan, D. (1992). Research Methods in Language Learning. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
15. Read, J. (2000). Assessing vocabulary. New York
16. Richards, J.C. & Rodgers, T.S. (1986), Approaches and Methods In Language Teaching.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
17. Schmitt, N. and M, McCarthy. (Eds.). (1997). Vocabulary: Description, Acquisition and
Pedagogy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
18. Stahl, S.A. (2005). Four Problems with Teaching Word Meaning (and what to do to make
vocabulary an integral part of instruction). In E.H Hiebert and M.L. Kamil (eds.).
Teaching and learning vocabulary: Bringing research to practice. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
19. Ur, P. (1996). A Course in Language Teaching: Practice & Theory. (pp. 184-187).
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.


15
20. Wilkins, D.A. (1972). Linguistics in Language Teaching London. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
21. Wright, A. (1989). Pictures for Language Learning. Cambridge University Press.
22. Wright, A. (1987). Principles of Teaching. Cambridge University Press.
23. Wright, A. & Haleem, S. (1991). Visual for the Language Classroom. Longman Keys to
Language Teaching. Longman.
24. stick-figures
25. />