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

GENERAL LINGUISTICS
FINAL ASSIGNMENT

FACTORS AFFECTING LEARNERS ACHIEVEMENT IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNING

STUDENT: Pham Duc Long CLAS: K20B INSTRUCTOR: Pro. Hoang Van Van

Hanoi, May, 2012

TOPIC 5 FACTORS AFFECTING LEARNERS ACHIEVEMENT IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNING

I.

INTRODUCTION

According to Pro. Mai Trong Nhuan, the world is getting flat, buring and crowded, so learning foreign language in the time of global integration in Vietnam have become an urgent and crucial mission to communicate with foreigners or multiple the job opportunities...Learners of foreign language can achieve their goals under the influence of many factors both internal factors (such as their learning motivation, age, personality and language aptitute...) and external factors (namely social factors and cultural factors...). The present writing aims at discussing such factors affecting learners sucess in learning foreign language. II. DISCUSSION

II.1. Internal factors II.1.1. Motivation According to Dornyei (2001), motivation could be understood as a matter indicating why people decide to do something, how long they are willing to sustain the activity and how hard they are going to pursue it. Gardner (1985) formulates motivation as effort + desire to achieve a goal +attitudes. He explains that effort could be viewed by many components: effort to succeed, to please the teacher or the parents or even to pass examination. From his perspective, motivation is clearly classified into integrative and instrumental one in which intergrative motivation refers to the leaners attitudes towards target language and culture oriented whereas instrumental motivation highlights academic
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language learning purposes, especially the neccessity to pass exams or enter university. Three Indian scholars Narayanan, Nair & Iyyappan (n.y) contributed their great efforts to giving tree diagram of the characteristics 2motivated learners of foreign languages.

Narayanan, Nair & Iyyappan (n.y)

It is important to spend a little time clarifying the characteristics of motivated learners

1. Positive task orientation: In order to study foreign languages, learners must be willing to deal with difficult tasks and holds their long-standing belief in their achievements. 2. Ego-involvement: The learners must realise the importance of preserving and promoting their face (self-image in public) via endless efforts aiming at their success in learning foreign language. 3. Need for achievement: It is essential that foreign language learners possess considerable need to obstain what they set out to do. 4. High aspiration: The learners must have a strong wish to be top proficient ones of foreign language.

5.

Goal orientation: The learners must clearly perceive of their targets of learning and always set periodic specific tasks to reach their goals.

6.

Perseverance: The learners constantly employ a great deal of time as well as

have endless

determination in learning which is not interrupted by issues from their living environment.

II.1.2. Language aptitude The second internal factor which affects learning foreign language belongs to natural ability or aptitude. Such learners with great aptitude are excellent at dealing with large quantities of material which necessiate to be memorized quickly and easily. Based on language aptitude, the question Why do some learners learn a foreign language quickly and thoroughly while others with the same opportunities fail? is partially maken clear. John Carrolls (1981) divides language aptitude into several independent abilities as follows:

II.1.3. Learners age Mara (etc, (2003) distinguishes between adults and children in term of foreign language learning aquisition. The researcher shows that adults learn faster than
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children when the former start to study grammar. However, in the case of mastering native-like pronunciation, the childern is superior. Contributing his speech to role of learners age towards mastering foreign language, John (1981) states that when learning foreign language, the younger learners are, the better they get. Additionally, in agreement with Mara (etc, (2003), he asserts that mechanic language acquisition is better for young chid but is extremely restricted to older adolescents and adults. Regarding culture acquisition of a foreign language, John (1981) shows that young children obtain less cultural understandings compared with adults. However, very interestingly, young chidren can be more well-prepared to take challenges when experimenting with new foreign language knowledge. II.1.4. Learners personality There is a famous proverb Sow an act, and you reap a habit: Sow a habit, and you reap a character: Sow a character, and you reap a destiny describing the influences of human beings act and habit on developing characters and even shaping destiny. Similarly, foreign language learnerscharacters result from activities and habit in practicing foreign language. It is noticeable that 2 categories of personality characteristics (extroversion & introversion, inhibition & risktaking) can lead to learners sucess at differnt extent. Extroversion & Introversion It is often argued that an extrovert person is more well-suited to foreign language learning than an introvert one. However, so far this conclusion has still been controversial. Some studies have revealed that learners success in language learning is in close association with extroversion such as decisiveness and adventurousness, while
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others have recognized that many successful language learners are not highly judged on measures of extroversion. Inhibition & Risk-taking It has been shown that inhibition or feeling of embarrassment and worry often stops the learners from taking up challenging tasks, which are proved to help them make progress in language learning. Inhibition is often regarded as a popular issue for adolescents and adults, who gain higher consciousness in comparison with younger learners. Inhibition can be considered a negative force for foreign language pronunciation performance. It is higly believed that inhibition may have more influence in language performance II.2. External factors II.2.1. Social factors Society often combines many social classes, namely lower class, working class, middle class and upper middle class. Some studies have shown that there is a close relationship beween social class of a learner and the extent of his/her achievement approaching foreign language (FL). Social factors may affect your language, depending on your status in society. According to Coulmas (1997), middle-class chilren can develop explorary and clear use of language while children from lower class have tendency to enhance the development of expressive and implicit language use. However, Labov (1970) argues that in various social classes despite the fact that differences in the form and values attached to using language; ability of spoken language of middle-class childdren is not much better than that of lower-class children. He holds profound belief that children of different social groups possess equal foreign language proficiency.
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In Vietnamese settings, I am in agreement with Coulmas (1997) that children from lower socio-economic class are less successful in learning FL than children from higher class. As can be seen from Northern mountainous provinces of Vietnam, many chilren from Son La, Yen Bai and Tuyen Quang have encountered much trouble with learning English, because they have been pursuaded by their family to stay home, work on the mountains to help their own family instead of being encouraged to go to school, even other children who prefer to learn English cant access to English book sources and audio-visual equipments. It can be clearly concluded that learners from lower class of society rarely have advantageous chances to succeed in learning foreign languages except Lao Cai where thanks to tourist attraction Sapa, children of different class seem to be given equal chances. II.2.2. Cultural factors According to Nguyen (2009), language is a product of the culture and is considered the window to culture. In the process of approaching the foreign or second language, learners need to gradually absorb knowledge of its culture as well. Cultural factors having influence on foreign language aquisition can come from both mother tongue level and native culture level. Kaplan (1966) has described the influence of cultural thought from mother tongue upon writing in academic contexts. He has claimed that in some certain cultures in which the rhetorical features of descriptive writing were not similiar with those used in English academic writing style, the learners often failed to express their thoughts to the professors in English-speaking academic schools. Therefore, he advises them to consider the English writing culture if they really want to get their success in communicatining with the native speakers. In Vietnamese settings, the same issue can be showed. A considerable number of students are still affected by Vietnamese when they express English thoughts. For
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example, In my opinion, I think smoking should be banned by Vietnamese government (Theo ti, ti cho rng vic ht thuc l nn b cm bi chnh ph) is one of the most popular errors make by Vietnamese students even English-major learners when they show their personal viewpoints about social issue smoking. Similarly, Mohan and Lo (1985) has also showed a big difference between Chinese students in China and those pursuing their study in an English-speakinng environment when analyzing their writings of same topic. To be specific, while the latter who had spent a considerable time studying in foreign countries presented their writing in direct-oriented style; the Chinese students studying in China showed their implicitness. Two researchers explained that in Chinese culture, it is better to tell a lie rather than give explicit viewpoints but can make the examiner uncomfortable. III. CONCLUSION In order to master foreign languages, the learners need the combination of both internal factors and external factors. Among the internal factors is motivation which has been considered the golden key to unlock the door of learners achievement in foreign language learning. Next, the difference of learners age can result in dissimilarities in learning acquistion of grammar and phonetics between children and adults. Learners personality characteristics (extroversion & introversion, inhibition & risk-taking) are regarded as speed-related factor affecting long or short period of time needed to learn foreign language. Furthermore, socio-cultural elements can lead different classes in the society to both dissimilar chances of learning foreign language and success at the various extent in communicating with the natives speakers.

REFERENCE:

Coulmas, F (1997). The handbook of sociolinguistics. Oxford (UK) & Cambridge (MA): Blackwell Gardner, R. (1985). Social Psychology and Second Language Learning. London: Arnold. John, C. (1981). Individual differences: Learner belief, anxiety, aptitude, age and other individual characteristics.

Kaplan, R.B. (1966). Cultural Thought Patterns in Inter-Cultural Educa-tion. Language Learning.
Labov, W. (1970). The study of language in its social context. The U.S.A
Mai, T. N. (2012). Loi chuc Tet Nham Thin 2012 cua GS Mai Trong Nhuan. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfjPwOdX-L4

Mara, d. P.G.M (etc). (2003). Age and aquisition of English as a foreign

languages. Great Britain: the Cromwell Press Ltd.

Moan, B. & Lo, W. (1985). Academic writing and Chinese students: Tranfer and development factors. TESOL Quarterly, 19, 515-534.
Narayanan, R., Nair, N. R., & Iyyappan, S. (n.y). Some factors affecting English learning at tertiary level. India. Nguyen, T.P.T. (2009). Influences of some Vietnamese cultural factors on Freshmens English. Hanoi Univeristy of Languages and International Studies.