FELTE QUARTERLY ISSUE 3

FELTE QUARTERLY
☼ Issue 3 ☼ Autumn 2012

Faculty of English Language Teacher Education
University of Languages and International Studies, VNU

For internal circulation only

Felte Quarterly


For internal circulation only

Editors
Mr. Ngô Xuân Minh (Division II)
Ms. Trần Hoài Giang (Division II)

Layout Editor
Ms. Trần Hoài Giang (Division II)

Editorial Advisory Board
Ms. Trần Hoài Phương, FELTE Dean
Ms. Nguyễn Thị Ngọc Quỳnh, FELTE Vice Dean
Mr. Khoa Anh Việt, FELTE Vice Dean


Table of Contents

Editors’ Notes............................................................................................... 4
FELTE Rhythm
The “Project 2020”
Nguyen Thi Ngoc Quynh ............................................................................... 5
The 14th AUN actual quality assessment at program
level for Fast-track Bachelor of Arts in English
Teacher Education
Nguyen Nhue Giang ...................................................................................... 6
IELTS Oral examiner training workshop 2012
Nguyen Tuan Anh .......................................................................................... 7
FELTE Faces
Ms. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Quynh, a multitasking leader
Tran Hoai Giang & Ngo Xuan Minh ............................................................... 9
Been there done that
Vu Thi Kim Chi & Do Hanh Chi ...................................................................... 12
Tran Hoai Giang & Ngo Xuan Minh ............................................................... 13
Feature Article
An investigation into Vietnamese tertiary ELT teachers’ needs in the
emergence of modern assessment paradigm
Duong Thu Mai ............................................................................................. 14
Review
Mitchell, R. & Myles, F. (2004). Second language learning theories. London: Hodder
Arnold University Press.
Luong Huong Thao ........................................................................................ 27

Teaching in Focus
A guideline for teaching pronunciation
Khoa Anh Viet ................................................................................................ 29

Call for Contribution .................................................................................. 30


Editors’
Editors Notes

November 20th is probably the most delightful day to educators in Vietnam as
they are showered with wishes, flowers and gifts from their beloved students, friends and
families. On this pivotal occasion, FELTE Quarterly would like to extend its acknowledgement to
all teachers, particularly those in the FELTE family, for their devotion and commitment to the
noble teaching career.

To kick-start this third issue, FELTE Rhythm presents an authoritative update on the
National Foreign Languages Project 2020 by a faculty leader, a briefing on the outcome of the
AUN project by an insider, and a report on a critical examiner training workshop by its key
trainer.

In FELTE Faces, the reader will get to know better Ms. Nguyen Ngoc Quynh (FELTE Vice-
Dean) as she confides her personal secrets and philosophies. As in the previous issue, “Been
there, Done that” will provide a snapshot of FELTE teachers’ experience at ELT conferences.
The two events of this time, Cam TESOL 2012 & SEAMEO TESOL 2012, will be of special interest
to early-career lecturers who are seeking approachable and affordable professional
development opportunities.

The feature article of the issue is a research report by Dr. Duong Thu Mai, narrating her
attempt to foster more reliable and valid assessment of writing which so far has been subject to
teachers’ impression. In Material Review, Ms. Luong Huong Thao, a new M.A. graduate from
University of Queensland, introduces a “comprehensive and current” read on Second Language
Acquisition (SLA), a possibly novel subject to FELTE staff, yet increasingly viewed worldwide as
a prerequisite for TESOL practice.

The issue concludes with a concise introduction by Mr. Khoa Anh Viet, FELTE Vice-Dean to
his booklet on teaching pronunciation. Drawn from his research and personal experience, this
will prove handy for teachers wishing to incorporate more pronunciation in their classrooms,
yet in need of more guidance.

Hopefully, FQ readers will take delight in and derive more knowledge from this issue, and
then contribute to the forthcoming one. (Please refer to the last page of the journal for a
detailed contribution guideline.)

F.Q. Editorial Board

4

FELTE Rhythm

The “Project 2020”
Nguyen Thi Ngoc Quynh

For further information regarding Ms. Nguyen, please go to p.9

A large-scale education reform, widely Besides, ULIS has completed two training
known as the ‘Project 2020’, was launched by the courses in English proficiency and teaching
Ministry of Education and Training in 2008. This methodology for primary and lower secondary
project is aimed at radically innovating the teachers in May and August, 2012. In July, it was
teaching and learning of foreign languages, of commissioned by the Project to develop a
which English covers 98%, at all levels of the national ELT methodology curriculum for lower-
national education system in order to ensure that secondary school teachers. This mission was
Vietnamese school leavers by 2020 will become successfully undertaken by the FELTE.
‘independent users’ of a foreign language. As an
In addition, a number of FELTE teachers are
ambitious project, it covers a wide range of
participating in several other on-going activities
issues in foreign language education including
of the Project 2020 including the development
curriculum development and design, assessment,
and management of the national English test item
teaching qualification standards, teacher training,
bank.
and quality assurance. However, one of the first
and most crucial steps is to train and retrain Our commitment
teachers of English at all levels of education so
The whole university and particularly the
that they reach the required standards of B2 level
FELTE have been committed to high-quality
according to the Common European Framework
fulfillment of the Project 2020 objectives. Despite
of Reference for Languages (CEFR). Here is where
the limited human resource, time constraints,
ULIS, particularly our FELTE, takes an important
and heavy multi-task workload, FELTE has
part in.
actively participated in the assessment as well as
Our role the intensive teacher training during the last few
summer months. Its teachers have been
As the leading language teacher education
appraised by partners for reliable and valid
institutions in Viet Nam, ULIS has been a key
assessment of their teachers’ proficiency as well
participant in the project. It is one of seven
as their quality and dedicated teaching. In fact,
tertiary institutions nationwide authorized to
activities related to this Project have been
assess teachers’ foreign language proficiency
identified as new strategic functions of ULIS in
according to the CEFR and indeed the most active
general and the FELTE in particular. We all
one in the North of Vietnam. By far, our
understand that this is how we maintain and
institution has administered tests at sixteen
promote our reputation and status as a leading
provinces in the North of Viet Nam with the active
language teacher education institution in Viet
participation of FELTE teachers throughout the
Nam.
process.

5

FELTE Rhythm

The 14th AUN actual quality assessment at program
level for Fast-track Bachelor of Arts in English
Teacher Education.
Nguyen Nhue Giang

Graduated from the Fast-track program in 2011, Nguyen Nhue Giang now teaches
proficiency courses for students of the same program at FELTE. As one of the key
members in AUN project, Giang collected documented evidence for the self-evaluation
report as well as joined in the task force in the actual assessment.

Hanoi – 3-5 May 2012. ULIS had the honor to welcome the assessors of the 14th AUN actual quality
assessment at program level for Fast-track Bachelor of Arts in English Language Teacher Education. This
event has long been expected after one year of hard work and preparation by the AUN task force of
FELTE.

In only three days, the assessors undertook tremendous amount of work including reviewing the self-
evaluation report of the program, interviewing teachers, students and other stakeholders of the program,
visiting important campus sites, and finally writing up a report and preparing the presentation for the
closing session of the assessment. They often finished their work very late in the afternoon and even
brought some documents to their hotel for evening work. Fortunately, the assessors were fully supported
by the AUN task force led by Ms. Vu Tuong Vi, Head of the Fast-track Division and FELTE Managerial
Board.

Despite some points for improvement, the program received commendable results with the overall score
of 4.4, which exceeded the point of qualification. The evaluation findings were briefly presented in the
closing session and fully outlined in the final report received after approximately one month. The Fast-
track Division is now working hard on a plan for improvement.

The AUN actual quality assessment at program level in ULIS can be considered a milestone, marking the
very first success in ULIS’s efforts to reach the international standards. Prof. Nguyen Hoa, ULIS’s
President, has expressed his deep appreciation of all the teachers, students and staff that have
contributed to the achievement of the Fast-track program as well as to the AUN project.

6

FELTE Rhythm

IELTS ORAL EXAMINER
TRAINING WORKSHOP 2012
Nguyen Tuan Anh

Anh Tuan Nguyen has an MA in English Language Teaching from De La Salle University,
Manila, Philippines. He is currently a lecturer in English at Faculty of English Language
Teacher Education, University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National
University-Hanoi. He is also involved in mentoring and professional development
programmes at his faculty. His research interests include EFL assessment, TESOL
methodology, discourse analysis and second language acquisition.

Despite the fact that most FELTE teachers are familiar with the IELTS Speaking Test and have
extensive experience in examining students in end-term speaking tests, few of them have
received adequate training in the area. In an attempt to enhance the quality of assessment in
oral tests at FELTE in general and in IELTS-format speaking tests in particular, an intensive
workshop dedicated to FELTE teachers was organized in May, 2012.

For the first time at FELTE, our teachers had an opportunity to explore how the IELTS speaking
test is scored, to analyze what lies behind the IELTS Speaking Band Descriptors, and to apply the gained
knowledge to sample test situations. The training workshop includes two sessions as follows:

1. An overview of IELTS Speaking
A. Morning session
2. An analysis of IELTS Speaking Band Descriptors
3. IELTS Speaking Test Scripts
4. IELTS Speaking Test Sample Rating

5. Group Practice on 3rd-year students
B. Afternoon sesison
6. Final remarks

One of this workshop’s strengths is that the invited trainers are experienced IELTS teachers with
excellent IELTS grades in actual tests. More importantly, the trainers have undergone training sessions
on PET or FCE with Cambridge ESOL assessment experts.

Another good point is that in the afternoon session, FELTE teachers worked in groups, acting as IELTS
oral examiners to evaluate the performances of third-year students with a set of authentic IELTS
speaking test scripts. During this practice session, teachers were encouraged to change partners
frequently so that they would have a better chance to share their views and improve their inter-rater
reliability based on the following assessment criteria:

Fluency and Coherence: This refers to how good the candidate is at keeping talking at the right
speed and how good they are at connecting their ideas together. This is a fairly
general criterion which includes evaluating the relevance of the candidate's
answers, but in terms of the elements identified above, speakers need to be able to
understand and follow the rules of language at a word, sentence and text level
level.

7

FELTE Rhythm
Lexical Resource: This refers to how much vocabulary the candidate has and how well they use it
it.
As well as the rules of language at a word level, this criterion considers the
communicative functions of speech and the social meaning of speech.
speech
Grammatical Range and Accuracy: This refers to how many structures the candidate has and how
well they use them. Again, as well as the rules of language, this criterion considers
the communicative functions of speech
speech.
Pronunciation: This refers to how well the candidate pronounces the language. As well as
considering the communicative effect of the candidate's pronunciation, there is
evaluation of how much strain it causes on a listener and how noticeable their
listener,
accent is - although accent itself is not a problem. In terms of the elements we
have identified above, this criterion refers to speakers’ need to be able to produce
the phonological features of speech.

The success of the workshop is believed to contribute to realizing FELTE teachers’ desire for professional
development to reach the international standard in English language education. The workshop format
can be a good example for other faculties in building professional development activities for the purpose
of making ULIS a leading language education institution in Vietnam.

8

FELTE Faces

Ms. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Quynh, a multitasking leader

Quick facts:
• Full name: Nguyen Thi Ngoc Quynh
• Positions held: Director of the Center for Distance Education
and Teacher Development; Vice Dean of the Faculty of English
Language Teacher Education
• Research interests: Second Language Acquisition,
Bilingualism, Bilingual Education
“To be a leader, one • Hobbies: Reading online newspapers and playing chess
should be multitasking”

FELTE Quarterly Editors (FQE): Thank you, Dr.
(FQE chosen to do a job, I will devote my time and
Quynh for attending our interview today. energy to completing it with the best
possible quality. However, I am rather
Ms. Nguyen Ngoc Quynh (M.Q): My pleasure.
stubborn, and will not change my mind
FQE: Would you please disclose three personal
easily.
pieces of information that may be new to our
staff members?
“family and friends would come first in
M.Q.: Maybe the first important piece of
information is that I am not a PhD holder my agenda”
yet, so please do not call me Dr. Quynh. I am
FQE: Recently you have completed your Ph.D
still waiting for my PhD thesis examination
program in Melbourne, Australia. Would you
results. The examination normally takes a
mind sharing with us more information
few months in Australia after the
about your study?
submission. The second piece of information
about me is that I am a fun-loving person,M.Q.: I spent more than four years completing
though I may look serious sometimes! All my my PhD program. It may be surprising to
close friends can tell you that. The third, some people that half of my time was spent
well, is that although I am leading a very in Australia and half in Vietnam. What is
busy working life, ‘workaholic’, as what more, my research was related not to English
some colleagues are calling me, is not my language teaching and learning but to
type. If I had any chance to choose, family Vietnamese acquisition of Hmong ethnic
and friends would come first in my agenda. minority children.

FQE: Could you please use three adjectives to FQE: How did you come up with such an original
describe your personality? topic?

M.Q.: Well, I often perceive myself as decisive M.Q.: You know, luck and personal interest
played an important part. It all started with
since I can make up my mind very quickly
my hobby, photography. I love taking
even on challenging issues. Besides, I am
landscape photos, so I used to travel to the
dedicated. I mean whenever I have
North of Vietnam several times and have

9

FELTE Faces
special love for the natural beauty there. which there was no intervention to the
There besides the awe-inspiring scenery, I teaching and learning process in any way.
got to know really well ethnic minority kids With this research design, I could not predict
and their difficulties in learning Vietnamese beforehand where I was led to in the
as a second language. Interestingly, my PhD research process. In fact, halfway in the
supervisor in Australia is a leading expert on candidature, I had to change my research
bilingual education for indigenous people; design and simply collect a total different set
hence, she shared my great interest in of data.
Hmong group in Vietnam and after thorough
FQE: Lots of FELTE teachers intend to upgrade
QE
discussion I finally decided on the above
their qualifications in Australia. What pieces
mentioned research topic.
of advice do you give them especially
regarding scholarship application and course
“I will devote my time and energy to selection?
completing it with the best possible quality”
M.Q.: My advice for scholarship application
would be to grasp any opportunity that
FQE: Did you face any problems during your comes to you. My own story is an example. I
study? decided to pursue a PhD degree when the
M.Q.: My research was conducted in a quite deadline for submission of an Australian
special setting that my supervisor termed as Leadership Awards scholarship had been
‘laboratory-like’. To collect the data, I had to over. However, I was not at all discouraged
travel to the top of a mountain every and went on to apply for the Melbourne
fortnight during a year and stay with isolated University scholarships. You know, many
Hmong children so that I could find out how roads lead to Rome. Take one and head
they learnt Vietnamese as a second there.
language. So one challenge I had to face was Regarding the choice of courses, I would say
indeed the travel itself. After a train, we are in great need of experts on teacher
followed by a bus and a motorbike taxi, I professional development and curriculum
would have to walk to the school to reach design. Also, bilingual education is a
the children because there was simply no potential, yet unexplored area in Vietnam.
direct road to that site. The road up to the
mountain was bumpy, and there was always
a danger of landslide and flash flood
“Grasp any opportunity that comes to you”
whenever it rained. I still remember once
FQE: You currently take two management
when I got stuck in the mountain for 10 days
positions. How do you manage so well to
without electricity due to a flood. Another
fulfill all your duties?
problem was that I worked with minority
people who were very shy and did not speak M.Q.: To be a leader, one should be multi-
much. Therefore, it was hard to predict the tasking; I mean the ability to do many
volume of language they would produce things at the same time. Therefore, I’m
since I recorded them in natural settings. It trying to adjust myself to this kind of job.
took me quite some time to get myself Still, I am in the process of discovering my
familiarized to the kids before I could start own capacity so that I can fulfill all the
the data collection. And the biggest missions I’m assigned to. Indeed leadership
challenge was the nature of my research. I is now my adventure.
started out with an exploratory research in

10

FELTE Faces
three years we will successfully reach the
“Leadership is now my adventure”
destination. By the end of this year, we will
have completed the proficiency subjects and
FQE: Quite a few FELTE teachers are concerned started developing contextual and additional
about the dramatic changes in our faculty subjects. By the end of next year, we will
lately. On behalf of the management board, have finished revising the proficiency
could you please clarify the directions of our subjects for the first time, and will have
faculty in the near future, say the next five finalized the contextual and additional
years? subject syllabi. Then we will need around
M.Q.: “Adventure” can be used to describe both one more year to pilot and make necessary
my work and FELTE. There have recently amendments to the whole curriculum.
been lots of remarkable changes in the FQE: We guess the faculty staff will be glad to
management positions, staff members and hear about this. Thank you, Ms. Quynh for
the new missions (most importantly the sharing with us such interesting and useful
Project 2020). I imagine the whole faculty as information about your life and career. On
a four-wheel drive car, utilizing all our behalf of the FELTE Quarterly, we wish you
energy to venture off the beaten track. We health, happiness and success in all your
are experimenting with the integrated personal and professional pursuits.
methodology in language skill subjects and
M.Q.: Thank you for introducing me to FELTE
simultaneously preparing an array of new
Quarterly readers.
subjects. However, we should not be
alarmed and it is my belief that in two or

“It is my belief that in two or three years we will
successfully reach the destination.”

11

BEEN THERE DONE THAT

Having recently taken a course? Gone on a trip? Done something interesting? Met new
people? In this space of each issue of FELTE Quarterly we post a question for you to
share your experience and to learn about, and from, our colleagues.

Do Hanh Chi & Vu Thi Kim Chi

Hanh Chi is currently teaching in Division Kim Chi is an English lecturer
of English skills 3. Her research interest is of English skills 2. She had one
in Task-based Language Teaching and year studying in the US in
Teaching English to Young Learners. 2009-2010.

8th CamTESOL Conference, Phnom Penh - “Language and Development”

The four-day trip to Cambodia was an eye-
opening experience to both of us, not just
because of the knowledge we picked at the
conference but also because of the discovery of
Cambodia we never expected we would have.

The conference offered a lot of workshops in
different fields of language teaching, some of
which were by famous speakers in TESOL. One
workshop we found worth attending was
“Introducing humour into the ELF classroom”
done by a humourous-but-deny-to-be teacher.
Thanks to him, we have got some creative and
FELTE teachers with Professor Jack C. Richard useful suggestions to integrate humour into the
lessons. The last session about teacher education
which was spoken by Jack Richard, one recognized scholar in ELT field made a deep impression on us
both and evoked much thinking. What has been bearing in my mind since his speech is the concept of
“take-away values” which is what learners can get and remember after each lesson

Cambodia was much more than our reach of imagination. The country is peaceful and surprisingly
resembles Vietnam in many ways. We actually did not feel that we were being in a foreign country, but
rather in the South of Vietnam. Impressed me the most was the people here who are hospitable and
spontaneous in English speaking, both in capital Phnom Penh and Siem Reap, the land of Angor Wat. The
seven-hour coach to Siem Reap exhausted us, but the spectacular Wonder of the World energized and
really took our breath away.

12

BEEN THERE DONE THAT

Tran Hoai Giang & Ngo Xuan Minh
Tran Hoai Giang and Ngo Xuan Minh have been teaching language skills and research
methodology to TESOL and Translation – Interpretation majors for the past three years at
School of English II, Faculty of English Language Teacher Education, ULIS - VNU. Their
research interests include vocabulary acquisition, extensive reading and corpus linguistics.

3rd INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON TESOL
Jointly organized by TESOL HCM, SEAMEO RETRAC Vietnam, Curtin University and
College of Foreign Languages, Da Nang University

Along with the Vietnamese ELT community’s expansion,
quite a few TESOL conferences have recently been organized
in Vietnam. Among the most prestigious of these is
probably the annual TESOL conference jointly held by TESOL
HCM and SEAMEO RETRAC Vietnam. Following two highly
successful conferences in Ho Chi Minh (2010) and Hue
(2011), the third was convened in Da Nang City between
June 9th and 11th. There we had the honor to present our
research findings together with two FELTE colleagues, Dr.
Duong Thu Mai and Ms. Pham Thu Ha. FELTE Teachers at Da Nang

As stated by the organizing committee, the conference “English Learning: A Focus on English Use”
was intended to be an ELT forum discussing a range of issues with a particular stress on the
Vietnamese context. Besides, the embedded networking activities in the conference program were
expected to develop linkages among domestic and international educational institutions. From our
personal experience, all these goals have been achieved even beyond our initial expectations. We
were, on one hand, exposed to novel theories presented by Australian professors and, on the other
hand, got an insight into the disadvantaged English learning and teaching contexts of Vietnamese
colleagues and their innovative measures to make the best out of those situations.

The most memorable presentation in our personal view was presumably Professor Andy
Kirkpatrick’s on Asian English in use. According to him, as English is now a lingua franca,
international intelligibility rather than native-like proficiency should be the foremost target of
English language teaching and learning. Moreover, Asian/ ASEAN cultural knowledge should be
integrated into the English program since most students will use English in that regional context
rather than with native speakers of the language. Interestingly enough, this is also the direction
taken by ULIS where two new subjects named World Englishes and An Introduction to ASEAN
countries are under preparation and will be offered to English majors in the next academic year.

For the conference’s remarkable benefits and its reasonable fee, we highly recommend it to early-
career ELT teachers who are committed to professional development, yet cannot afford the luxury of
a week-long foreign trip to an international conference.

☼ Issue 3 ☼ Autumn 2012 A souvenir from the conference
13

Feature Article

An investigation into Vietnamese tertiary ELT teachers’ needs in the
emergence of modern assessment paradigm
Dr. Duong Thu Mai
Dr. Duong Thu Mai has been the Head of School of Language Skills 2 for a year
since her completion of the PhD of Education from the University of Melbourne,
Australia. Her areas of expertise include language assessment, performance
assessment, L2 writing, learning strategies, instrument development and
validation.

This paper presents an examination of ten Vietnamese ELT teachers’ perception of two
validated instruments, which are aimed to measure local students’ writing competence. The
results from this investigation reveal what these teachers need in the growth of modern
assessment paradigm in Vietnam, where norm-referenced and classical assessment is still
predominant. The paper contains a thorough analysis of trends and special exceptions in the
teachers’ opinions. The quotations are exactly what they spoke in English.

I. The dynamics of writing assessment
For over a hundred years, writing assessment has been considered a significant field. Looking
through the lens of assessment methods, Yancey (1999) identifies three overlapping paradigms
of writing assessment namely objective testing, holistic scoring and portfolio/ performance
assessment. This is a comprehensive capture of the writing assessment history, as also
reflected by other earlier and later authors.

Since the late nineteenth century, essay assessment has been used at Harvard University in
entrance examinations (Morison, 1930). However, it sometimes disappeared completely, as in
the 1940s, when parametric tests were the reigning educational assessment tool, and the word
“writing examination” meant answering selected-response questions in either standardized or
locally developed tests (Ruth & Murphy, 1988). This indirect writing assessment period lasted
through the World War 1 into the 1950s.

The switch from the first to the second paradigm of writing assessment happened in the 1960s
(Valentine, 1961). Direct writing assessment and criterion-referenced test interpretation were
the most widely discussed issues. From the 1960s to the 1970s, writing assessment was
argued to be more direct than multiple-choice tests; writing skills could only be assessed with
real writing products and that students’ mistakes in writing should be investigated to inform
followed-up instruction. Most language teachers then believed that they had found in holistic
scoring a reliable, and therefore valid, method for assessing writing. In the classrooms,
teachers assessed students’ one-and-final drafts based on the rubrics (Applebee, 1980). Essay

14

Feature Article
examinations and assessment were standardized and produced highly consistent results.
Today, holistic scoring is still considered the biggest breakthrough in writing assessment and
“the most common assessment tool” (Connor, 1991, p. 215). The paradigm is named holistic
scoring (Yancey, 1999) for this reason.

In the middle of the 1980s, it was noticed that more evidence than the holistic scores was
needed to make correct inferences about student ability. “In holistic scoring, the notion of a
true score is replaced by a consensus score because two scores are generated for each essay”
(Huot, 1990, p. 203). This seems to lead to even more serious errors of estimation and much
more emphasis on rater consensus than the more substantial issues of assessment validity,
raters’ personal judgment and students’ roles. A restriction of selves for the important
stakeholders in writing assessment resulted (Yancey, 1999). Moreover, asking students to
generate only one timed-impromptu essay to draw a conclusion about their writing ability
forms the impression that good writing is generated in a short time, and in only one sitting.
The problems with holistic scoring are even more obvious (Hamp-Lyons, 1991) where the role
of diagnostic feedback for students is highly important, such as in L2 performance assessment.

Meanwhile, the late 1980s witnessed a large number of great changes in education. One was
the increasing popularity of cognitive learning theories and learner-centred approaches to
teaching, which drove the shift from parametric to personalized assessment in educational
assessment in this period (Herman, Aschbacher, & Winters, 1992; Shepard, 2008). In addition
are the social-context approach and the expressive approach to the writing process (Grabe &
Kaplan, 1996). These changes in education and language assessment appeared to address
exactly the needs of writing assessment stakeholders, resulting in critical reforms. Specifically,
students’ essay writing started to be treated as a communication act: students and teachers
should be given the opportunities to express their (multiple) selves (Yancey, 1999). Assessing
writing also means discovering and assessing those processes of self-expressing. It was also
argued that writing ability should be assessed through many samples of writing produced at
different time and under no pressure (CCCC Committee of Assessment, 1995; Yancey, 1999).
Accordingly, there was a tremendous shift from objectively based, empiricist methods of
evaluating writing to one which is more contextually situated, more rhetorically defined and
more process-oriented (Hamp-Lyons, 1995; Lucas, 1988). Alternatives in writing assessment
methods have become popular. Besides journals, diaries, process-based tests, the method
which can best represent the reforms is writing portfolios, hence the name for this paradigm.
Another change is the connection of writing assessment researchers in different areas,
resulting in a prosperity of research, a rich variety of research approaches and a broadened
range of research questions (Bachman, 2000).

15

Feature Article
In summary, each period in the global writing assessment history has been dominated by
particular assumptions about assessment methods, technical quality and writing competence.
The modern paradigm of writing assessment, named portfolio writing assessment,
performance-based writing assessment or alternative writing assessment, has emerged, along
with two other paradigms. On balance, the co-existence of the new and old paradigms in
writing assessment can be advantageous, since there is no single best way to do assessment
(Brown, 1998).

In Vietnam, the adoption of multiple assessment methods has been indicated in many
documents by the Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training (MOET). Chapter 3 of the
Regulations on University and College Training (Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training,
2007) highlights a number of assessment methods and the weighting given to them. These
include essay writing, oral tests, term papers, major assignments, or combinations of these. In
other regulations, such as those for accredited mainstream tertiary and college training
(Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training, 2007), students’ final scores are required to be a
combination of scores from their attendance and participation, practicum, mid-term tests,
major assignments, group assignments, term papers and final-term tests (which are
compulsory and must account for at least 50% of the course credit). From these regulations and
policies, it appears that assessment reliability is a well-discussed issue. However, the rarity of
regulations on the validity of assessment, especially in alternative assessment methods, is
noticeable. In the regulations for Accredited Mainstream Tertiary and College Training (Vietnam
Ministry of Education and Training, 2007), the only relevant point is that: “final examination
contents of each subject should be appropriate to the course contents determined in the
curriculum” (p.10).

II. The signs of modern assessment paradigm at ULIS-VNU
In ULIS-VNU, the third paradigm of writing assessment and the validity issues in assessment
have started to be demonstrated. Portfolios have been applied. The instruments for assessing
portfolios have recently been developed and validated following a rigorous process of iterative
validation, an emphasis of the modern assessment paradigm. However, to obtain those final
products, the process of training teachers to be raters for the instrument validation process, as
described by the researchers, reveals their struggle to fulfil the role required from them
(Duong, Nguyen, & Griffin, 2011). What do these teachers need for the process of instrument
validation and for the new assessment paradigm? Obviously, the inadequate attention to this
issue may lead to the questionable quality of local ELT writing assessment, the unempirical
decisions made based on this assessment and the limited impact of assessment on instruction.

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As stated, the writing assessment instrument for second year English-majored students at
ULIS-VNU is a representation of the features of the modern assessment paradigm. The
framework for the instrument has been established on both theoretical and practical
backgrounds (Duong, Nguyen & Griffin, 2011). It entails that portfolio writing competence is
measurable through two domains of knowledge, each represented by three capabilities. The
capabilities in the first domain are further clarified into 20 indicators, 66 quality criteria while
the second domain has 13 indicators and 53 quality criteria. The quality criteria in the portfolio
instrument have been calibrated into continua of writing competence. The final instrument to
assess writing competence can avoid ambiguity, the most serious criticism of alternative
methods of assessment (Calfee & Perfumo, 1996).

III. The study
The study originated from the desire to understand what teacher participants in the
development process of the modern assessment instrument above need to be trained for using
it. Their participation includes drafting the instrument components before panelling, piloting
and trialling them. The research questions in this study involve the teachers’ reflection of all
those steps. Specifically, two questions are targeted:
What are the teachers’ perceptions of the instrument?
What do the teachers need in the modern paradigm of writing assessment?

IV. Methodology
1. Data collection
Table 1 Characteristics of Raters
Raters Qualifications Teaching Portfolio Division Participation
experience experience
1 Master degree 6 years, writing 4 years 2 Y (panelling and
course designer, piloting)
team leader
2 Master degree 7 years 3 years 2 and 3 N
3 Master degree 6 years 1 year 2 Y (piloting)
6 Master student 3 years 2 years 2 N
7 Doctoral student 9 years 4 years 1 N
9 Master student 2 years 1 year 2 Y (piloting)
10 Master student 2years 1 year 2 N

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Interviews - a regularly applied method in L2 research - were chosen as the instrument for this
data collection because they offer a convenient and flexible access to the perceptions of the
teacher participants. With interviews, the researchers can discover data at the depth they desire
and take plenty of steps to improve the credibility of the received data. Semi-structured
interviews, the most popular type of interviews, were also selected because they offer the
researcher opportunities to interrupt and probe for more information from raters, such as the
specific information which may clarify the raters’ answers and relate them to the research
focus.

Ten raters agreed to participate in interviews and signed consent forms. The interview
questions were designed to reveal the scale users’ opinions of its validity and what they need to
demonstrate in using the instruments well. Specifically, the main questions address:
a) the extent to which the raters satisfy with the content coverage of the instruments for the
second-year students’ writing course
In order to answer the question well, the teachers need to understand the course contents well.
b) the extent to which the instruments discriminate second-year students’ levels of
competence
The raters’ answers will show whether they understand different levels of students’
competence.
c) the applicability of the instruments compared to other existing instrument
Through the comparison and contrast between the new instruments with the existing ones, it is
possible to address the areas of highest concern for the teachers in using the new instruments.
d) the opportunity for the instruments to be used in the following semesters and the issues to
be addressed to improve their use
This question aims at discovering the feasibility of applying the instruments in local
assessment contexts in the near future. In answering this question, the raters had to assess the
available resources and contexts. More information on the means of formalizing the
instruments for assessment purposes in the future can thus be acquired. This question most
relates to the practicality of the instruments, and the possible consequences of using them in
the research contexts.

A popular problem with interview data collection is the trustworthiness of the collected data.
Regarding this, Morrow (2005) has mentioned that qualitative data collection and analysis
should comply with standards of credibility, transferability, dependability, and confirmability.
Several measures were taken so the data collection in this study could meet these standards.
First, the collection involves all rater participants and using semi-structured interviews.
Moreover, the interviews were recorded and transcribed by the researcher before the

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transcriptions were sent back to the teacher participants for an accuracy check. By providing
specific descriptions of the contexts of data collection and the relation between the researcher
and the participants, as well as emerging problems during the collection process, the
researcher aims at achieving transferability (generalizability) and dependability (reliability).
Lastly, the interview questions were worded carefully so that they did not convey the
researcher’s emotion for their answers. Additionally, as already stated, the researcher as the
interviewer always probed for further explanations for the participants’ answers, especially for
negative answers..

2. Data analysis
After quantitative data analysis, raters’ interviews were analysed to obtain additional evidence
for the functioning of the developed instruments. From the detailed transcription of interviews,
information was studied for its relevance to the questions. Similarities and differences between
raters’ answers were studied to discover patterns, which were then coded and grouped
thematically by the researcher. Notable answers from the raters were utilized to make
generalizations. The coding scheme was then subjected to confirmation by the researcher’s
supervisors and one representative rater, who provided feedbacks on the meaning attached to
the codes and the simplification or complication of meaning which the research has integrated
in the development of the codes and the coding schemes. Revisions were made as many times
as necessary until the final themes helped to describe the overall perception of raters on the
use of the instrument. This iterative process of data analysis and revision was carefully kept
track of to ensure the dependability and relative objectivity of the research findings.

V. Results
1. Content coverage
Almost all raters were able to give overall feedback on the course contents coverage of the
instruments, i.e. the instruments basically cover all the instruction areas for the targeted group
of students in the targeted time. When they were asked, raters were able to name the main
contents of the course, which included the titles of the course book units and the contents
related to the adopted writing instruction approach (process-oriented). Understanding that the
indicators are the areas of knowledge in the course, no raters answered that it was necessary to
add any others.

Two raters suggested possible additions of components for the instruments before ultimately
rejecting their own answers. The first was rater 8, who suggested adding the indicator of
creativity as a bonus for students’ ideas. On reasoning to herself that this indicator had already
been integrated in the two existing indicators of “select a variety of topics and cover the key
points” and “use multiple resources in writing, and that creativity was not instructed, she

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Feature Article
withdrew the idea. “I think the scales cover all the contents in the writing course….One thing I
want to add here is some creativity for the students….. When we do that, we need to have the
teachers to do that in all the classes. But this one will be difficult because it is up to the
individuals, this idea is brilliant or that idea is crazy”. This rater is currently teaching many
groups of students and did not participate in earlier stages of the study, which may be the
reason why they needed to be reminded of the course contents and requirements. Thus,
although the raters generally agreed on the content coverage of the instruments, they may
need to be retrained on the contents of the course before entering the assessment.

The interviews also revealed useful insights from the raters on the use of the indicators. For
example, rater 5 had difficulty understanding the differences between “identify weaknesses”
and “reflect on problem solving skills”, and between “reflect on planning strategies” and “reflect
on writing process monitoring strategies” so she supposed there was an overlap between these
pairs of indicators. This is also a problem of rater 10. Neither of these raters participated in the
study until the trialling stage. Therefore, although their suggestions should be taken into
consideration, the raters’ answers may have resulted from not participating in earlier stages,
when the justifications for and the meanings of indicators had been clearly articulated by other
teachers. In other words, there is a strong objective desirability for raters to be involved as
soon as possible into the instrument development process.

2. Competence discrimination among second year students
Interestingly, the raters’ answers reveal two different perspectives on the word “discrimination”;
one is the discrimination of general proficiency levels, and the other is the discrimination of
specific indicator performances. Most of the answers were related to the latter perspective. For
example, rater 4 said: “I think some indicators cannot cover all the levels of the students” as
soon as she was asked about the discrimination of the instruments, and then continued to give
examples of indicators which could not cover the range of students’ performances, so this rater
did not look at discrimination of the overall ability of students, but at the specific and analytical
performances in each indicators. Other raters gave more ambiguous meanings to the word
“levels”. Only rater 6 clarified what she meant by “levels” in both perspectives that “the most
interesting thing is we not only can see the groups of students in general writing competence,
but also in different parts of writing competence”. Despite that the analytical nature of the
instruments are new at the local contexts, the teachers are able to familiarize themselves with
it and learn their advantages soon.

Furthermore, many raters stated the complicatedness of student competence, which infers their
ability to judge the students analytically as well as holistically. In general, all the raters
mentioned the large proportion of students “in the middle levels” and that the proportions of

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Feature Article
students in the highest or lowest levels amounted to “only 10-20%” or “just a little”. Raters
seemed to be disappointed to find the small number of students at the extreme levels. This, in
fact, is reasonable because each of them scored only 30 portfolios, and it is normal for the
students to cluster in the middle levels. This result highlights the need for fundamental
assessment knowledge to be provided to teachers.

A subjective need of raters is revealed when raters expressed their difficulty in making
judgments which accurately reflected student ability. Firstly, some raters mentioned the need
to add more criteria because the writing products they rated were in the middle of two adjacent
criteria in certain indicators (raters 4 and 9). To be exact, these raters reflected a typical
difficult rating situation when “you can see they have some characteristics in this part (criterion)
and some characteristics in the other parts (criteria)” (rater 7). Another issue which made the
process of judging more difficult was the failure of students to succeed in the newer areas of
knowledge such as process-writing and reflection. Rater 5 suggested that the reason for this
was the different instructional focus of the teachers in different classes and the students’
different interpretations of the course guide. This rater is among those working in other
divisions and teaching other writing course and hesitating in giving the lowest scores to the
special cases.

At the first look, the above analyses would necessitate the provision of more rater training on
the skill of making judgments. However, raters themselves reported different strategies to deal
with difficult rating situations. First, they all agreed that it was the job of the rater to make a
fair judgment based on the evidence found on the portfolios. Besides, they reported the
comparisons of the difficult cases with other writings to determine the fairest judgment in
order to look for more evidence. A very interesting insight came from rater 3, who stated the
importance of making “holistic” judgments in an analytical instrument, especially for portfolios.
This means the raters have to make an overall or “holistic” judgement of students’ performance
levels in each indicator. This rating strategy for writing portfolios, interestingly, has been
discussed widely (Hamp-Lyons & Condon, 1993). Due to the comprehensive nature of
portfolios, it is hard for raters to maintain an even level of attention to all the details. What they
resort to, then, is making a general impression of the indicator they need to assess in the
student writings.

Thus, from the answers to question 2, the raters show a good understanding of the
discrimination aspect of assessment instruments despite differences in the use of terms of the
instrument components and the occasional lack of awareness of the writing programmes or
basic assessment knowledge. Faced with scoring difficulties, some of them even gradually

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discovered the right method to score with an analytical instrument, which is to make holistic
judgments of student performances in each indicator.
3. Differences between the instruments and the existing instruments
A neutral opinion was stated by many raters that the scoring analytical instrument required
more efforts, attention and consistency from the raters, which could bear both positive and
negative connotations. It is positive because the raters felt more effective to be totally absorbed
in the rating tasks, but it is negative because of the exhaustion scoring could entail. Moreover,
most raters stated that the instruments were long, complicated, and time consuming to use.
Each portfolio, for example, could take from 30 minutes to one hour to score (rater 10). The
first few reflection letters, as another example, could take a rater half an hour because some
students did not write according to the order of indicators in the instruments (rater 9).
Although most raters stated that rating speed increased when they got used to the
instruments, adopting the instruments in general means taking on a considerable burden. In
balancing this burden with the advantages of the instruments, most raters showed clear
hesitations.

In addition to comparing and contrasting the new instruments with the existing ones, the raters
also showed concerns about other issues of developmental assessment, many of which reveal
interesting insights into the local assessment contexts. For example, all the raters wondered
about the transformation of the analytic scores into normal scores for the Vietnamese students,
normally a range from 1 to 10. Vietnamese teachers and students are used to giving and being
given scores in this range without a clear definition of what each number indicates. Rater 3, an
experienced rater, described another dilemma for the raters when they had to omit a minority
of mixed evidence and made a holistic judgement based on the majority of evidence, so there
was a waste of evidence. In sharing this idea and similar ideas on the nature of the scoring
process, this rater appeared to be very committed to teaching and assessing. No other raters
were able to mention this controversy in writing assessment and the dilemma between scoring
or not scoring writing products (Huot, 1990). She, on the other hand, was fully aware that this
was a big issue, but did not want to go into detailed discussion on it. What she meant was only
the difficulties faced by raters when having to change the old method of rating (scoring all the
writing entries with a numeric score and giving specific comments on each of them) and when
learning to use new instruments which were developed from a totally new assessment
philosophy. Another matter the novice raters faced is their limited experience in capturing the
ability range of the students and matching the criteria with the evidence in the writing products
(rater 10). Rater 9 also noted the inequality of similarly-coded criteria in different indicators,
such as between 1.1.1.2 and 1.1.2.2, which made it even harder to rank the students. It was
these concerns about the new assessment method which led to the more time-consuming
ratings, especially for the first few portfolios.

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In short, question 3 illuminates the needs of raters in understanding how to merge the
criterion-referenced instruments in the local norm-referenced contexts.
4. Feasibility of applying the instruments in the future
Following question 3, this question gives the most direct answers about the teachers’ needs.
The common trend of answers is that the instruments can be used if some facilitating actions
are taken. Training for teachers and raters was mentioned by all of the raters. The instrument
users, especially younger ones and those from other Divisions (raters 2, 5 and 7), wished to
have better training and more discussions on indicator clarification, score transformation and
scoring time management. It is noteworthy that no rater in Division 2 with experience in
scoring writing products for second-year students mentioned indicator clarifications in
answering this question. The two youngest raters in the groups (raters 9 and 10) also named
the new teachers’ problems in classifying the student ability, the need to have other teachers’
assistance and the difficulties of marking even after a lot of training. From these answers, it
seems that what the raters desire to be trained on are also the reasons for their problems in
using the instruments, such as the inadequate knowledge of the second-year students’ writing
programme, the limited understanding of the rationale for certain indicators and the difficulties
of making holistic judgments. The training needs are also closely related to what raters
considered to be disadvantages of the instruments: their complexity and time consumption. For
example, one opinion is that raters should be trained on time saving tips in scoring. Rater
training therefore should be a contextualized task and should suit specific raters’ experience.

Beside rater training, student orientation was also mentioned as an important measure if the
instruments are to be used. The responsible persons for the training would be the teachers.
The reasons were that the assessment indicators needed to be reinforced by the teachers
during the semester for students to remember. As rater 5 stated: “The course supposed that by
reading the course objectives, the students know what they have to do, and the teachers know
what to do. But now after marking, we find that this is not what happens”. This is a valuable
recognition on the ineffectiveness of students’ self-study, which has never been studied at the
Department before. In other words, students need to be assisted in their self-study of writing
assessment indicators. Similar to answering the question on the advantages and disadvantages
of the instruments, the answers to this question reveal the need to strengthen the link between
instruction and assessment at the Department.

This message was even further emphasized in the answers of the more experienced raters. The
difference between their perspective and those of the novice raters is quite clearly expressed.
More experienced raters showed a broader view and stressed the importance of changing all
the stakeholders’ beliefs on assessment. The rater in the group with the most experience in
teaching writing stated that “first, if you are the group leader, all the teachers must be willing

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to do assessment... Second, the students must know that they are going to be assessed in this
way and they will learn something from self-assessment, peer assessment and teachers’
assessment. Many other things we cannot do, such as the rules of the school; sometimes, they
are out of our control”. Experienced teachers seemed to be highly aware of the relation
between teachers’ beliefs and actions, as well as the need to have the collaboration of all
stakeholders in reforming deeply-rooted assessment practices. They therefore are not being
confident about the chances that the instruments will be used in the near future.

To improve the chance for the instruments also means to find solutions for what the raters
considered the instruments’ weaknesses. Some methods were proposed to lighten the rating
burden at the end of the semester such as dividing the instruments into many parts to
familiarize the students with them during the semester and specialising the rating tasks so that
each dimension is scored separately. If these individual interviews had been changed into a
focus group interview, these tips and the discussion on time consumption and the instruction-
assessment relationship would have been very beneficial for the novice raters in particular and
for the writing teachers in general.

Compared to other questions, question 4 provides the clearest insight into the practicality of
the instruments, the needs of teachers and the future development of the local assessment
contexts. A variety of rating tips employed by the raters were shared, but the most important
message is their call for action from all the concerned stakeholders: teachers, raters,
administrators, and students. This is a very important issue in Vietnamese education in general
and at VNU in particular.

VI. Summary and discussion
In general, three main themes can be detected in the teachers’ perception of the new
assessment practice, namely appreciations, depreciations, and aspirations.
Appreciations
On the whole, this is a clear pattern in the raters’ answers. The raters appreciated the quality of
the new assessment practice by complimenting the complete range of writing knowledge for
second-year students in the instruments. Analogously, they found it easy to place second-year
students’ writing performances on the continua. The modern assessment instruments are also
claimed to be most appropriate for local students’ ability range. To paraphrase, they are
relevant and well-targeted. Besides other advantages over the existing assessment methods,
the concreteness and clarity of the new assessment practice are highly appreciated by the
raters for instructional and assessment purposes.
Depreciations

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Most raters named time burden as the most serious disadvantage of the new assessment
practice for portfolios and tests. The reason for this complaint may be that analytical
instruments themselves are often more complicated and take more time than holistic
instruments. Analytical instruments for scoring performance-based subjects are even more so.
Moreover, because simple holistic instruments are still the only assessment tool available in the
studied context, the raters easily became exhausted when they were introduced to new
analytical instruments. The process of adaptation to the new method cannot happen in a short
time.
Aspirations
In order to improve the use of the instruments, two trends of needs evolve from the analysis.
Firstly, raters suggested that a more careful training programme should be provided for them,
other teachers, and students. The proposed contents for the training vary from general
assessment principles, assessment methods, rating techniques, indicator clarifications to
hands-on experience and related course features. Administrators and educational leaders
should also play an important role in emphasizing the benefits of the new assessment
methods. It is clear from the raters’ interviews that the attention paid to-date to assessment in
the local context has not equalled their needs, an issue reflected on a macro-scale in the
incompleteness of Vietnamese educational regulations in terms of assessment validity (section
1.1.1) (National Assembly of the Social Republic of Vietnam, 1998, 2005; Vietnam Ministry of
Education and Training, 2007).

Additionally, teachers indirectly revealed the need for reinforcement on the content of the
course, the construct of assessment and the targeted group of students’ competence. They
also need to be involved in the whole process of assessment rather than just the rating
component. The teachers’ feedback is summarized in Figure 1

25

Feature Article
Figure 1. Teachers’ Perceptions of the Use of the Instruments
In general, the themes show that positive perceptions are held by the raters on the new
assessment practice. Also, although many obstacles still stand on the way of reforming the
assessment in the context, specific solutions have been suggested and are highly feasible. It is
hopeful that once the teachers’ needs as addressed in this study are considered and an action
plan is made accordingly, there will be a hopeful future for alternative assessment in L2 writing
instruction in the researched university.

References
Applebee, A. N. (1980). A study in writing in the secondary school. Urbana, Illinois: National Council of
Teachers of English.
Bachman, L. F. (2000). Modern language testing at the turn of the century: assuring that what we count
counts. Language Testing, 17(1), 1-42.
Calfee, R. C., & Perfumo, P. (Eds.). (1996). Writing portfolios in the classroom : Policy and practice,
promise and peril. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc.
CCCC Committee of Assessment. (1995). Writing assessment: A position statement. College Composition
and Communication, 46(3), 430-437.
Connor, U. (1991). Linguistic/Rhetorical measures for evaluating ESL writing. In L. Hamp-Lyons (Ed.),
Assessing second language writing in academic contexts. . Norwood, New Jersey: Ablex
Publishing Corporation.
Duong, M. T., Nguyen, C., & Griffin, P. (2011). Developing a framework to measure process-oriented
writing competence : A case of Vietnamese EFL students' formal portfolio assessment. RELC
Journal, 42(2), 167-185.
Grabe, W., & Kaplan, R. B. (1996). Theory and practice of writing : an applied linguistic perspective. New
York: Longman.
Hamp-Lyons, L. (1995). Uncovering possibilities for a constructivist paradigm for writing assessment.
College Composition and Communication, 46(3), 446-455.
Hamp-Lyons, L., & Condon, W. (1993). Questioning assumptions about portfolio-based assessment.
College Composition and Communication, 44(2), 176-190.
Herman, J., Aschbacher, P. R., & Winters, L. (1992). A practical guide to alternative assessment.
Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Huot, B. (1990). The literature of direct writing assessment: Major concerns and prevailing trends. Review
of Educational Research, 60(2), 237-263.
Lucas, C. K. (1988). Toward ecological evaluation. The Quarterly, 10(1), 1-17.
Morrow, S. L. (2005). Quality and Trustworthiness in qualitative research in counseling psychology.
Journal of Counseling Psychology, 52(2), 250-260.
National Assembly of the Social Republic of Vietnam. (1998). The education law.
National Assembly of the Social Republic of Vietnam. (2005). The education law
Ruth, L., & Murphy, S. (1988). Designing writing tasks for the assessment of writing. Norwood, New
Jersey: Ablex Publishing Inc.
Shepard, L. A. (2008). The role of assessment in a learning culture. Journal of Education, 189(1), 95-108.
Valentine, J. (1961). College Entrance Examination Board. CCC, 12, 88-92.
Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training. (2007). Regulations for accredited mainstream tertiary and
college training.
Yancey, K. B. (1999). Looking back as we look forward: Historicizing writing assessment. College
Composition and Communication, 50(3), 483-503.

26

Review

Second language learning theories
Mitchell, R. & Myles, F. (2004)
London: Hodder Arnold

Review by Luong Huong Thao

Thao Luong has worked as a teacher of English at the
University of Languages and International Studies- Vietnam
National University for over 4 years. Her research interests
include English phonetics and semantics, computer assisted
language learning and pronunciation in second language
teaching and learning.

Being collaboratively written by a linguist (Myles) and an educationalist (Mitchell), this
book draws on the expertise of two specialists in both second language acquisition and second
language pedagogy. It is aimed at providing a comprehensive and current introduction to the
field of second language acquisition for all readers from undergraduate students to teachers
and researchers. This revised and updated version of the book builds on the strengths of the
previous edition and incorporates more recent empirical studies and expands the evaluation
sections in each chapter.

The book consists of nine chapters, through which the authors have presented a broad
overview of the most significant theories and research findings of relevant studies. The first
chapter is dedicated to introducing key concepts and issues such as learning and acquisition,
property and transition theories, universal grammar and interlanguage, which will be further
discussed in the subsequent chapters. The second chapter offers a historical overview of SLA
field, focusing on theoretical foundations of current approaches. The two major theories during
the period from 1950s to 1980s - Behaviourism and Monitor Model - are extensively
examined. In this chapter, the authors also give a thorough review of the early approaches and
hypotheses such as Contrastive Analysis, Error Analysis, and Input hypothesis. Meanwhile, the
next six chapters deal with the current formal theories such as Universal Grammar and
interaction approaches. Each chapter provides an insight into one of the above-mentioned
theories and follows the same structure: the authors always begin with an introduction to the
theory or approach, which is supplemented with the explanations of the basic terminologies,
and then they examine the theories from the perspectives of first language acquisition and
second language acquisition. Furthermore, the empirical studies supporting those theories are
described and analysed, followed by the evaluation of the application of those theories. The
book ends with a chapter summarizing the current research emphasis and trends, and
prediction of future direction for second language learning research.

One noticeable strength of the book is that the presentation of issues and theories in the
book is particularly comprehensible and readable; therefore, the book successfully provides an

27

Review
introductory survey of the most significant theories and perspectives in the field of SLA for a
wide range of audience ranging from language teachers and researchers to undergraduate
students. For example, the explanation of key concepts at the beginning of each chapter
followed by the description of theories is useful for readers without substantial background
knowledge of the field whereas the analysis of the empirical studies and the final evaluation are
valuable to readers such as graduate students, teachers and researchers who want to
investigate further into the theories.

This book also offers a wealth of valuable and updated information that can reflect the
rapid development of the field, which is essential to the study of second language acquisition.
As the authors mentioned in the introduction, this edition of ‘Second Language Learning
Theories’ is updated with recent empirical studies which either support or reject the application
of the theories. Chapter 3 can be taken as an example. In this chapter, the authors cited a
number of recent empirical and theoretical studies inspired by the Universal Grammar approach
such as Herschensohn (2000), Hawkins (2001), White (2003), and Chomsky (2000). The UG
approach is supported by a series of studies (Bishop, 2001; Jenkins, 2000; Lorenzo and Longa,
2003) investigating the relation between language learning and intelligence. The principles and
parameters of the UG approach are more specified by Chomsky (2000) with the Minimalist
Program, Hawkins (2001) and Herschensohn (2000) with the head parameter. The fact that
more recent empirical evidence is still added to the explanation of a theory shows that the
theory is still controversial and has influence on the studies in the second language learning
field.

Nevertheless, one limitation of the book is that although most theories are explained in
connection to each other, some relations are still vague. The comparison between processing
and constructionist approaches presented in chapter 4 is an example. Though they are both
inspired by Cognitive theory, they are developed in two different strands. However, their
differences are not extensively analyzed. Moreover, in terms of supporting evidence, the
second chapter provides insufficient results from relevant empirical studies. In this chapter, the
authors analyzed little evidence from researches concerning the hypotheses developed during
the 1950s and 1960s. The lack of research evidence makes their explanation not as strong as
expected.

These shortfalls are relatively insignificant given the book's many strengths, particularly
the richness of information about SLA theories and the analysis of these theories from different
perspectives. This edition is clearly an ideal introduction to the field, especially for those
students without substantial prior background in second language learning.

28

TEACHING IN FOCUS

A guideline for teaching pronunciation
Khoa Anh Viet

Mr. Khoa Anh Viet is the Vice-Dean of FELTE and Director of Center for
Information and Technology. He was an ULIS graduate and obtained an MA
from the University of Queensland, Australia. His main interests are teaching
language skills, methodology, and using technology in learning, teaching,
testing and researching.

Pronunciation plays an integral part in teaching and learning a language.
However, it has never been paid due attention partly because it is not included in the
curriculum, even if included it is not given enough time, partly because teachers are not
confident to teach. They claim that they do not have enough knowledge and skills.

To provide a solution to this problem, I have composed a compact guideline for
teaching pronunciation. It is comprised of five parts, beginning with a theoretical
overview of pronunciation, followed by a recommendation on the elements of
pronunciation to be taught, a communicative framework of teaching pronunciation,
techniques for teaching pronunciation, and concluding with a review of latest
technology used in teaching pronunciation.

All these parts are introduced in the task-based approach with keys provided at
the end to support teachers working on their own. To download the e-book, please
follow the link below.

http://www.mediafire.com/view/?2eaxw1dyst97g89

It is my hope that FELTE Quarterly readers will find this guideline useful. Should
you need any further information, please contact me at khoaanhviet@vnu.edu.vn.

29

Call for Contribution
Editorial Board

FELTE Quarterly (FQ) is a journal of, for and by FELTE teachers to report on
multifaceted life at Faculty of English Language Teacher Education, ULIS, VNU and to engage its
staff members in collegial discussion about issues in the TESOL field.

The journal is published every two quarters in the electronic format and for internal
circulation only. FQ invites you to submit articles in accordance with the guidelines below.

1. Submission categories
- News (in FELTE Rhythm about pre-eminent activities involving FELTE teachers to keep the
Rhythm)
whole faculty staff up to date.

- Interviews (in FELTE Faces with conspicuous faculty figures so that their colleagues can
Faces)
learn from their recipes for success.

- Brief travel reports (in Been there done that on FELTE teachers’ trips to conferences or
that)
study tours domestically and internationally.

- Research reports (in Feature Article on a variety of ELT issues.
Article)

- Reviews (in Review corner) of ELT- related books, articles, and other teaching – learning
materials

- Practical ideas for classrooms (including but not limited to lesson plans, worksheets and
Power Point slide shows) (in Teaching in Focus
Focus)

2. Technical requirements
- The submission should conform to the style guidelines in The Publications Manual of the
American Psychological Association (6th edition). For information, see the APA Web site.
- Authors may use British or American spelling, but they must be consistent.

- A short self-introduction (biodata) of no more than 50 words and a profile picture should be
attached to the submission email.

- All manuscripts should be submitted electronically to the FQ Managerial Board via the email
address chidoangiaovienspta@gmail.com.

- Submissions should be in Microsoft Word or compatible program. Please submit figures,
graphs, and other graphic elements in a standard graphic format (e.g., JPEG) or Excel.
Tables should be created in Microsoft Word or compatible program.

- All quoted material must be cited in text and in a reference list. The FQ Editorial Advisory
Board will determine a clear policy and definition of plagiarism, and its decision will be final.

30

FELTE QUARTERLY



31

FELTE QUARTERLY ISSUE 3

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