Professional Documents
Culture Documents
46-PHAN-NHA-THU-LAM-20DH712768-Thư-Lâm
46-PHAN-NHA-THU-LAM-20DH712768-Thư-Lâm
GRADUATION PAPER
Declaration
Date:27/06/ 2024
Writer’s Signature and Full name :
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
To complete this thesis, I would like to thank the lecturers of the Department of
Foreign Languages, Ho Chi Minh City University of Foreign Languages and
Information Technology for creating opportunities to study, practice, and accumulate
knowledge for thesis writing.
Finally, I wish you good health and much success in your work.
Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 4.1: High school teachers’ evaluation about the importance of incorporating
British cultures into teaching English............................................................................16
Figure 4.2: High school students’ evaluation about the importance of incorporating
British cultures into English lessons..............................................................................16
Figure 4.3: General Benefits of Applying British Cultural Aspects to English Learning
in students’ opinion........................................................................................................17
Figure 4.4: English skills improvement when utilize aspects of British culture as
teaching materials in English classes.............................................................................18
Figure 4.5: Elements of British cultures that teachers choose as the best one...............19
Figure 4.6: Elements of British cultures that students are interested in.........................20
Figure 4.7: Effective strategies for teachers to integrate British cultural themes into the
framework of English curriculum planning...................................................................21
Figure 4.8: Activities that students want to see in the English classes..........................21
Figure 4.9: Challenges teachers have to cope with when applying English cultural
aspects to English guidance...........................................................................................23
Figure 4.10: Evaluation the number of teachers having taken the English training
sessions about teaching English cultures.......................................................................24
Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT................................................................................................................1
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION............................................................................2
1.1 Background............................................................................................................2
1.3 Objectives..............................................................................................................4
1.4 Scopes....................................................................................................................4
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY.........................................................................12
3.3 Materials..............................................................................................................13
Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
3.4 Procedures............................................................................................................14
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS.......................................................................................16
4.1 Evaluation about the importance of incorporating British cultures into English
lessons..................................................................................................................16
4.4 Effective strategies for teachers to integrate British cultural themes into the
framework of English curriculum planning.........................................................21
4.5 Challenges teachers have to cope with when applying English cultural aspects to
English guidance..................................................................................................23
4.7 High school teachers' additional opinions on the benefits of pedagogical training
courses to increase the application of English culture in English teaching.........25
CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION..................................................................................26
5.3 Implications.........................................................................................................31
Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
6.1. Conclusion..........................................................................................................33
6.2. Recommendations...............................................................................................34
REFERENCE............................................................................................................36
ABSTRACT
This research paper aims to investigate the adoption of British cultural aspects in the
English curriculum at high schools in Ho Chi Minh City. By incorporating aspects of
English culture such as literature, history, traditions, films, and so on, this study amply
illustrates their valuable importance in enhancing the educational experience and
students' foreign language proficiency at this stage of development. On the other hand,
the research also underscores the subjective and objective challenges when
implementing British cultural components in English instruction. However, these
limitations cannot overshadow the numerous benefits that this combination provides to
Vietnamese education. Therefore, the research proposes many different pedagogical
methods so that educators can overcome these limits and include British cultural
elements in high school lectures. In addition, teaching training sessions, which help
teachers be deeply aware of developing innovative teaching approaches connected to
target cultures' utilizations, are also highlighted in this research article. All of the above
findings present common contributions to the Vietnamese education system in general,
and HCM City in particular, making it a diverse and advantageous system, assisting the
country in training talented future generations in order to effectively integrate with
global cultures, and promote international partnerships.
Key words: British culture, English learning, benefits, pedagogical methods, cutural
awareness.
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background
In recent years, English has become a common language utilized in many commercial
and cultural domains around the world, as these were controlled by the nations directly
impacted by the British Empire in the past, in addition to many European, American,
and Australian countries nowadays. Thus, linguistic knowledge of English is both
helpful and even essential. As a result, English as a second language is globally
widespread as countless people choose to study and work in this tongue, mainly
because they believe English is vital to learn and develop. Furthermore, English is
taught in schools in many countries as a second language, and students begin studying
it at a very early age, proving its significance. It is now the language of many kinds of
fields such as education, diplomacy, aviation, and tourism. Possessing English
competence improves students’ chances of landing a solid position in a large global
corporation. Consequently, the importance of English proficiency is being emphasized
in Vietnam, a country that is passionately committed to fast modernization and
international integration for the past 50 years. As Vietnam enters the world arena,
English fluency has become a valuable advantage, propelling remarkable progress in
education, science, industry, and technology development while also fostering
relationships with the global community. From schools to boardrooms, English
proficiency serves as a springboard to achievement, allowing individuals and the
country to make a stand in an increasingly linked world.
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cultural context as well as the deeper understanding of culture integrated into the
language being taught. In some classrooms and textbooks, including Vietnamese
culture in English books helps students understand vocabulary and context more easily.
However, because Vietnamese culture appears excessively in the books, it will obscure
the English cultural context as well as cultural awareness in language learning, further
hindering linguistic absorption.
English education in high school is very important for Ho Chi Minh City students to be
able to compete in a globalized world. However, some traditional methods of Vietnam,
of which the grammar-translation method is likely the most popular, may not appeal to
all high school students or prepare them adequately for cross-cultural
communication. This is clearly stated in the research of Cam (2017) , where she
explained that these fairly common teaching methods, especially the grammar-
translation technique, present certain drawbacks. Indeed, Kramsch (1993) believes that
culture and language have a very deep relationship with each other, so teaching
language without cultural context can hinder students' ability to communicate
effectively. According to Byram (1997), this further highlights the development of
intercultural communication through exposure to diverse cultural perspectives and
practices in the context of language learning, especially English. All studies shown
above highlight the need to include cultural components in English instruction.
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Chi Minh City
In spite of merging British cultural content into English classes at high schools, many
English teachers in Ho Chi Minh City may feel that this combination will be a
enormous challenge for them because of many reasons. The availability of culturally
appropriate teaching materials and resources can be limited, making it difficult for
teachers to incorporate cultural content into their lessons. Additionally, very few
training sessions occurred that increased the awareness needed to integrate cultural
aspects into their teaching performance effectively. More importantly, with the huge
workload, both teachers and students do not have much time to search for information
about other countries' cultures and integrate them into their lessons. All these problems
can lead to a range of limitations. First, students may struggle to engage with English if
it is taught in isolation from the cultural context relevant to their lives. Second, teachers
may have a misunderstanding of a grasp of cultural characteristics and distinctions
between Vietnamese and English culture, making it difficult to effectively combine
cultural themes into their instruction.
1.3 Objectives
The object of this study is to put a spotlight on the importance of incorporating culture
into English teaching, thereby creating a premise for finding some pedagogical
methods to apply aspects of culture in teaching English to high school students.
1.4 Scopes
Many studies emphasize the strong importance of incorporating English culture into
the English curriculum. By incorporating social norms and British traditions into the
curriculum, students can improve their foreign language knowledge as well as cross-
cultural acquisition. The study chose high school students as an ideal subject for many
reasons. First, this age is the most cognitive and developmental stage, where children
are developing their thinking and critical abilities, being able to grasp both English
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Chi Minh City
knowledge and cultural awareness. In addition, the high school curriculum gives
students a lot of knowledge related to Vietnamese culture, history, and geography in
the most detailed way, so high school students have the opportunity to compare
cultures in both countries, thereby finding profound meanings related to culture and
language. In addition, this research also points out some pedagogical methods to apply
target cultures to English teaching. However, this combination necessitates procedures
that are consistent with the curriculum but no less creative and innovative. Therefore,
the target audience for this research is the community of high school teachers with
many years of experience in Ho Chi Minh City.
This scientific - report will be structured in five sections. The first section will be
about the importance as well as existing methods and approaches of applying British
culture in teaching English to high school learners. The structure of the report will also
be presented in section 1. In section 2, Literature Review, both previous studies from
domestic and foreign researchers will be reviewed carefully. The literature review will
provide the base to formulate the research methodology in section 3. Based on
reviewed documents, the methodology will be proposed to (1) recognize the
importance of English culture; (2) determine a case study and scope of the study; (3)
set up a survey and make questionnaires; and (4) implement and assess the collected
results related to the topic of the thesis. In section 4, the results will be represented and
discussed. Finally, conclusions and recommendations will be proposed in the terminal
section.
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2.1.1 The synergy between British cultural understanding and English language
proficiency.
Kramsch (1998) argues that language is closely connected with cultural aspects and
that effective communication tends to require awareness and certain notions of these
cultural elements. In her study, she underlined the fact that language teaching should
integrate such cultural elements to foster linguistic comprehension and competence, as
well as to broaden understanding of cultures.
Whorf (1956) stated that language structure has profound effects on cognitive skills
and the general perspectives of speakers. This argument has led to further debate and
research into how language affects mindsets and cultural concepts. Sapir (1921)
highlighted that language is a cultural artifact that represents the values, beliefs, norms,
and customs that regulate a society, thus reinforcing the link between languages and
cultural identity.
Jiang ( 2000 ) stated two examples which are the words “lunch” and “dog” in English.
“Lunch” can arouse a thinking of a hamburger or a pizza for a British or an American
while bread or rice will definitely occur in a Chinese or Asian’s mind. Another
example is the word “dog” in English, which represents the character “gou” in Chinese,
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
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referring to the same animal. However, “dog” in Western countries is most considered
a friendly pet, a trustful companion with positive idiomatic phrases such as “lucky
dog”. On the other hand, Chinese people, by contrast, associate “gou” with watchdogs,
which defend their households or even a food source, together with such derogatory
idioms as “gou tui zi” (“hired thug” or “chó săn”). Therefore, along with such cultural
aspects, English words and their Chinese translations (or vice versa) show significant
disparities and often arouse different images and memories.
2.1.2 The importance of combining British cultures with English language teaching in
high school education.
It can be said that British cultures play an extremely essential role in understanding and
absorbing English, a global language, and numerous researchers strongly affirmed the
necessity of incorporating cultural aspects into English teaching in the formal
education system for generations of students, especially high school curricula, to
improve their English. Indeed, this pivotal issue has been discussed frequently through
various scientific studies. This report must mention the seminal research of Cruz
(2010) because it has provided heaps of compelling evidence elucidating the great
impact of culture in teaching and learning foreign languages. He also demonstrated to
readers that applying cultural aspects to English lessons enhance foreign language
proficiency and absorption across all language skills: listening, speaking, reading, and
writing. This indicates if students are taught culturally relevant information, their
English proficiency eventually improves more fully. The steady development of these
skills through the exposure to British societal values is also confirmed by Wang
(2011). In addition, by clarifying the definition of culture, Kechnaoui (2020)
emphasizes the close-knit and unbreakable relationship between cultures and
languages. He emphasized: “The relationship between language and culture is
dynamic, language is influenced by culture, therefore it is one of the most important
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Chi Minh City
carriers of culture and it reflects the latter.”. This recognition highlights the
significance of integrating cultural aspects into English classes in order to foster a
comprehensive understanding of the language through an explanation of its origins.
Furthermore, by integrating idioms, visuals, game shows, and music related to the
target culture into English lessons, teachers can ensure adequate knowledge of English
cultures to teach students and create a fascinating classroom atmosphere. This
approach was accentuated by the researchers Sarigul (2005) and Alekseevna (2023) in
order to raise teachers' awareness of bringing the target culturfe into English classes.
2.1.3 Existing pedagogical methods and approaches to teaching English to high school
learners in Vietnam
Nevertheless, along with the innovative, creative teaching strategies mentioned above,
there are still some inadequacies in the English pedagogical system in Vietnam. The
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Chi Minh City
most common mistake that most teachers make, according to Nhan (2013), is placing
tremendous pressure on students to prepare for school exams focusing on two main
skills: reading and writing, which indirectly disregards the remaining English skills that
are required more frequently, namely Speaking and Listening. On the other hand, some
schools and teachers also employ the grammar-translation teaching method as their
primary approach. According to Brown (2007), the grammar-translation method is
considered an ineffective one for acquiring and learning English. This method is
highlighted by Richard and Rodgers (2001) for only memorizing vocabulary and
sentence structures translated into the native language. It is difficult and time-
consuming for students to comprehensively develop full communicative English skills
if teachers apply this strategy.
2.1.4 Challenges and gaps in applying British culture within teaching English at high
school
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
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they emphasized that many teachers have yet to receive training sessions on ideological
work related to British culture so that they can clearly understand this pedagogical
method. Ultimately, Enkeleda (2015) listed many challenges that students in his
country deal with during English culture lessons at schools. One prominent difficulty
he mentioned is that students were not well aware of the importance of the target
culture to the English language, which resulted in a lack of focus on it. Additionally,
students tended to have limited opportunities to discuss cultural aspects as well as to
not have the opportunity to communicate or present on this topic, given the amount of
workload posed by different school subjects.
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are listed namely news, game shows, tourism advertisements, magazine photos, etc
(Peterson & Coltrane, 2003). They claimed that by using these resources, instructors
can design many different tasks, such as watching videos and answering questions,
listening and filling in the blanks, describing pictures of traditional festivals, and so on.
Through the above methods, learners not only are able to take in a great deal of
understanding of diverse cultures, but also improve their foreign language abilities.
In his research article, Enkeleda (2015) mentioned many obstacles that students had to
go through when researching and contemplating English culture in English classes at
school; however, no suitable solutions were proposed to overcome the problem. In
contrast to the above author, Wang (2011) has put forth numerous innovative and
cutting-edge solutions that are very helpful for English teachers to apply in their
lessons. Nevertheless, he did not mention the difficulties that educators and students
encounter when the education system provides new knowledge that needs to be
absorbed. Taylor and Francis (2016) also conducted a poll to assess teachers'
understanding of teaching British culture in their lessons, from which they concluded
that the majority of teachers were not highly aware of the relationship between British
culture and English. However, they have not come up with specific methods to
improve the situation given its importance, thereby not creating some unique
pedagogical methods.
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Chi Minh City
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY
The purpose of this study is to understand the significant impacts of infusing English
curriculum with British cultural perspectives at high schools in Ho Chi Minh City,
which is regarded as one of the most developed cities. Specifically, this survey aims to
assess the level of interest of the school education sector in incorporating English
cultures into English instruction as well as to measure the value of access in terms of
students' gains in language and cultural competency. In addition, by exploiting aspects
of culture such as history, literature, books, movies, and so on to provide students with
English culture lessons, the following experiment determines whether high school
students enjoy learning English through British cultures.
The survey comprises two different groups of participants: one group is high school
students from Tran Phu High School, and the other group is high school English
teachers in Ho Chi Minh City. The student group is made up of 130 students randomly
from grades 10 and 11, representing both genders, with an English level equivalent to
A2 to B2 (based on the overall English level of high scholl students in Ho Chi Minh
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Chi Minh City
city, stated by the city’s FCE survey, Bao Thanh Nien, 2024 ) on the Common
European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR), and have ever been
exposed to English literature. All these criteria aim to discover how high school
students perceive the impacts of incorporating British Culture with English lessons at
school as well as understand whether these aspects of culture affect students' English
learning outcomes. In the remaining group, 60 teachers with varying teaching
experience levels who have been teaching English in high school environments
throughout Ho Chi Minh City were interviewed. Teachers' keen observations may
enable the research to clarify more accurately the value and relevance of utilizing target
cultural aspects as a method to teach English, which has a direct influence on the
content of this research. Generally, creating these two distinct groups of research
subjects objectively assesses the importance of English literature to foreign language
education in this key city.
3.3 Materials
There are two questionnaires for two distinctive subjects of the experiment, and both
were conducted using both quantitative and qualitative methods.
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
which could address each student's perspective about how improving knowledge
related to English culture will help them in the future, highlighting the importance of
learning target cultures in school.
3.3.2 Survey of English Teachers around Ho Chi Minh City
There are twelve questions, which include four personal questions related to age,
school they work in, and number of years in the profession. The next 6 questions are
the ones that completely revolve around the content that the researcher is working on,
including the benefits and drawbacks of applying British culture in the official
curriculum, teachers' awareness of the aforementioned teaching process as well as how
to combine learning English culture and learning languages together. All three of such
six questions employ qualitative approaches, which can assist the researcher in
acquiringnew opinions and ideas from teachers in order to enrich this study.
3.4 Procedures
The research process consists of four steps. Firstly, the researcher created
questionnaires using Google Forms and made simple questions and answers in order to
ensure clarity of the questions. In the second step, the researcher distributed the form to
groups of students at at from grade 10 to grade 11 Tran Phu High School by directly
providing them a QR code in the classroom. With the group of high school English
teachers, the researcher collected data by sending a Google-Form link via Zalo and
Facebook. Thirdly, a three-week-long time limit was set for the respondents to
complete the survey, with a request for honest and careful answers, and the option to
seek clarification for reliable responses. Almost all the participants possessed basic
technical knowledge and were able to use applications such as Google Forms, Email,
Facebook, and so on. After three weeks, the researcher compiled the responses in Excel
for analysis. In the fourth step, the data collected was carefully analyzed and examined
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
to give clear findings and results with the help of visual means such as charts and
graphs and eventually lead to discussions of the paper.
The data collected from the questionnaire was analyzed using descriptive statistics,
such as frequencies and percentages, to summarize the responses and provide an
overall picture of students' and teachers’ attitudes toward the benefits of applying
aspects of British cultures to English lessons at high school. The questionnaire data
was also used to identify teaching methods to incorporate British culture in English
Teaching and Instruction. Furthermore, all data was displayed in the form of pie charts,
bar charts, and tables to make it easier for explanation. As a result, the ensuing findings
was far more empirical and fact-based than subjective and opinion-based.
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
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CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS
4.1 Evaluation about the importance of incorporating British cultures into
English lessons
Based on the survey data including 60 high school English teachers, the importance of
applying British cultures to English teaching is depicted in Figure 4.1. The vast
majority of English teachers (95.1%) were deeply aware of the importance and great
benefits that various aspects of British culture provide for English teaching. Similar to
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
the results of the teacher survey, in figure 4.2, a considerable proportion of students
studying at high schools in Ho Chi Minh City (75.4%) also agreed that language
learning combined with English cultural elements is vital. Although the percentage of
people agreeing with Figure 4.2 is smaller than in Figure 4.1, both statistics indicate
that the overwhelming majority of respondents in the two surveys recognized the
importance of the aforementioned issue. On the other hand, only about 4.5% of
teachers believed that the above application was unnecessary for various reasons, while
in figure 4.2, this number witnessed a significant fivefold disparity from 4.5% to
24.6%, possibly because some students still lack specialized experiences in learning
English culture in high school classrooms. However, these figures are trivial to the
wide plurality of participants who agreed on their importance. Generally, by viewing
the application from two distinct perspectives, this identification can reflect educators'
profound connection between language and culture, enabling them to enrich their
students' linguistic abilities and broaden their worldview.
The figure 4.3 demonstrates students' multiple perspectives on bringing target cultures
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
into the English curriculum in high schools. With 26.2% of the total survey
participants, the potential for improving skills using cultural aspects is evident as
English proficiency through cultural immersion has the highest rate, which illustrates
that the majority of students view cultural understanding as essential for language
development. Furthermore, up to 23.8% of students recognized that discovering more
about cultural heritage contributes to increasing confidence when communicating with
native speakers, showing the importance of the issue raised in this study. In addition,
20,8% and 16,9% are the percentages of students' opinions on the objective of
enhancing cultural knowledge, namely "Absorbing the essence of other countries" and
"Learning English more easily and interestingly", respectively, helping to diversify the
benefits of this combination. Meanwhile, about 12.3% of students believed that there
are no benefits here, however, this figure is insignificant compared to all students
participating in the survey. Overall, this evidence clearly highlights that integrating
English culture into language learning provides students with several benefits in
boosting their English language capabilities.
Concerning the practical benefits in detail, the researcher raised the main purpose of
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Chi Minh City
improving English skills in Figure 4.4. Surprisingly, the proportion of students, who
admitted that learning English culture supports them in comprehensively improving the
four main skills, is the highest with 46.1% of the total number of students participating
in the survey. This displays its significant influence on students' English acquisition
through many different approaches that are suitable for each skill. Besides, the
remaining percentage of students (53.8%) selected it to have a specific impact on a key
skill, especially English-speaking competence, which was superior to other skills
(25.4%). This emphasizes that students have an opportunity to practice communicating
with foreigners naturally and easily by learning more about the cultural aspects. In
short, delving deeper into the rich tapestry of English cultures not only allows students
to develop listening and communication skills but also helps students increase their
necessary knowledge in order to sharpen English writing and reading skills.
In conclusion, both figures above determine the great perks that deepening their
exploration of the diverse facets of English cultures brings to students. This question
exclusively polls in the student area to help the researcher better understand students'
opinions and thoughts on this issue, thereby drawing accurate and beneficial
conclusions for students, which is also the main essence of this research paper.
4.3 A comparison of teachers' and students' choices of British cultural aspects
Figure 4.5: Elements of British cultures that teachers choose as the best one.
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
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Figure 4.6: Elements of British cultures that students are interested in.
Figure 4.5 and Figure 4.6 emphatically illustrate which aspects of British culture are
interesting to instructors and students. In Figure 4.5, up to 61.5% of the total number
of students participating showed passion and enthusiasm for music. Due to an apparent
understanding of students' interests, lots of teachers, specifically nearly 61% of the
entire group in Figure 4.6, also utilize this pop-culture as an effective resource to teach
English cultures, allowing students to be able to feel entertained and relaxed but still
absorb enough knowledge about the target culture. Similarly, some aspects that are
equally practical and fascinating are also prioritized by both instructors and students,
such as literature, film, art, etc. However, in Figure 4.6, teachers consistently voted
literature-related resources as the most effective feature, accounting for 63.9% of the
total, illustrating teachers' greater focus on the necessity of developing critical thinking
and deeper literature appreciation. Overall, the survey results indicate a strong
connection between student and English teacher preferences for expanding their
knowledge base on the cultural nuances of England in English classes.
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
4.4 Effective strategies for teachers to integrate British cultural themes into the
framework of English curriculum planning.
Figure 4.8: Activities that students want to see in the English classes.
The combination of Figures 4.7 and 4.8 highlights both the congruence and the
contrasts in evaluating the tactics preferred by English teachers and students in high
schools to incorporate cultural elements into English lessons. One of the prominent
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Chi Minh City
applications among teachers is role-playing and performing arts activities with more
than 61% of participants approving, while the percentage of students appreciating the
same activities is 40.8%, which is much less than the proportion teachers. This proves
that teachers regarded this experiential activity as the most dynamic and practical way
to easily introduce culture to students, even though many students anticipated that it
took them a lot of time to prepare for the performance. The results were similar for
English presentation activities on various facets of British culture, where 78% of
teachers, accounting for the highest proportion of the total, felt this was the best means
of acquiring cultural knowledge and developing speaking skills, however, only 43.7%
of students acknowledged the effectiveness of this activity. Conversely, students
believed that watching a movie or related material would be the most engaging way
(61.5%). In contrast, the majority of instructors disagreed. All the activities listed in
this survey question were chosen by a substantial percentage of teachers and students,
except for the activity of teaching and learning by boring theories, in which there were
only 13% of students and 2% of teachers who support such methods, obviously
indicating that they all express a common aversion to uninspiring teaching methods. In
summary, most teachers strongly considered alternately combining an assortment of
different approaches as a good way to promote efficacy and help students easi
ly assimilate English cultural awareness.
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
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4.5 Challenges teachers have to cope with when applying English cultural aspects
to English guidance.
Figure 4.9: Challenges teachers have to cope with when applying English
cultural aspects to English guidance.
Figure 4.9 depicts some of the obstacles that teachers endure when including English
cultural content in their lessons. First and foremost, the research must mention the
shortage of multiple materials to present English cultural insights as part of their
teaching, when up to 73% agreed with this difficulty, showing the critical need for
teachers to convey British cultural knowledge to students. Additionally, 63.5% of
teachers dealed with heavy workloads in the standard curriculum set by the Ministry of
Education, which limits their flexibility in enriching their lessons with English cultural
teachings. Furthermore, there are other challenges such as time-consuming preparation,
lack of interest from students, and cultural sensitivity issues, which are also hampering
educators' ability in combining aspects of target cultures and teaching. In a nutshell, the
aforementioned amalgamation is extremely effective and important. Nonetheless, there
are still many challenges for teachers to embed English cultural teachings within their
curriculum.
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
Figure 4.10: Evaluation the number of teachers having taken the English
training sessions about teaching English cultures.
Figure 4.10 summarizes the situation of teacher training to cope with challenges in
implementing English cultural elements to English teaching at high schools. The data
from this survey questionnaire shows that the bulk of English teachers (about 62%)
have received professional training sessions related to this issue. This implies that there
is a positive movement towards endorsing the importance of acculturation in English
language coaching, improving the standard of education. However, there are still 38%
of teachers having not participated in the above training course, leading to teachers
remaining ill-prepared to apply target cultures to English teaching. To wrap up, in
addition to numerous teachers participating in these courses, further endeavors are
necessary to ensure that all teachers are able to receive more opportunities in order to
develop language guidance, hence augmenting the nation's educational system.
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
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CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION
The research results reveal the importance of British culture in improving the English
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proficiency of high school students in Ho Chi Minh City. From two distinctive
perspectives, both teachers and students are deeply aware of the deep bond between
cultures and languages, which complement each other. It is affirmed that combining a
variety of real-world English cultural sources such as movies, history, English
literature, etc with the English program at school gives students a wide range of
exposure to the language, assisting students in comprehending how to utilize words,
structures, and phrases correctly in their context. This suggests that the essence of
British culture is to support students in better absorbing lectures through incredibly
engaging and visually appealing materials because students can easily relate to the
cultural context and situation while learning this language. In addition, students have
opportunities to comprehensively improve their English skills, especially listening and
speaking skills, by participating in classroom activities such as role-play, cultural
presentations, performing some artwork, and so on. Finally, the research has identified
that students can increase cultural knowledge and sensitivity through learning English
culture. Once British culture is included in the curriculum, students are nurtured with a
globalized vision, allowing students to discuss with countries worldwide.
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rigidly, leaving little space for the utilization of other cultural elements. Such a strict
structure further limits the ability of educators and teachers to integrate cultural
elements into their lessons. As a result, due to the policy of standardized testing and the
strict structure of the main program, cultural aspects are often underestimated.
Moreover, students in Ho Chi Minh City often face a hectic schedule due to the fact
that numerous subjects contain a substantial amount of knowledge requiring them to
absorb in a short period, not to mention the practice of extra classes of subjects such as
Math and Literature. Therefore, this situation underlines the demand for a more
balanced approach that recognizes the importance of both linguistic proficiency and
cultural competence in the overall educational development of students in Vietnam and
Ho Chi Minh City.
5.2.3 Pedagogical methods for embedding British cultural content into the English
curriculum at high schools in Ho Chi Minh City.
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For example, watching extractions from famous movies and series such as "Harry
Potter" and "Sherlock" enables students to have more knowledge on cultural aspects of
language such as ordinary slang, phrases, exclamations, and idioms while gripping the
context in which such phrases are used.
This immersive approach not only improves students' pronunciation skills but also
boosts their confidence in speaking English. Moreover, it made language learning more
dynamic and interactive, fostering a deeper understanding and appreciation of British
customs and traditions.
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Vietnamese festivals such as Tet Nguyen Dan (Lunar New Year) or the Mid-Autumn
Festival, Vietnamese textbooks could incorporate stories about traditional English
festivals such as Christmas and Harvest Day, their origins, common activities, and their
meanings. Another example is that rather than exclusively learning about tourism in Da
Nang and Nha Trang (famous tourist attractions of Vietnam), students can learn about
ancient cities in Britain and their tourist spots, common tourism activities, and
festivals. This fosters the connections between cultural understanding and linguistic
aspects during the learning process. Integrating English cultural elements into the
Vietnamese curriculum not only enriches students' learning experiences but also
promotes cross-cultural understanding and appreciation.
Creating some English games aiming to raise students’ awareness of cultural aspects
Teachers can consider implementing some captivating and engaging English games
that focus on cultural aspects, enhancing students' engagement and studying process.
These games not only make learning interesting and entertaining but also offer a
variety of background contexts for linguistic phrases through famous plays, movie
extractions, and song lyrics which, obviously, are more captivating than heaps of
figures and facts in the form of plain text. Moreover, teachers designing games should
consider cultural aspects as well as specific vocabulary and grammatical points related
to British culture. This leads to improving students' lexical resources and grammatical
ranges while ensuring the knowledge's accuracy and genuineness.
A typical example for this is the culture bingo game, in which teachers make several
bingo cards containing interactive pictures such as Big Ben, Birmingham Palace,
Stonehenge, Fish and Chips ( a famous British meal ) instead of plain, boring numbers.
Subsequently, teachers will describe the pictures using English, and students will
choose the correct cards with the pictures accordingly. Students with the first five
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5.3 Implications
The findings of this study have important implications for language learners and high
school instructors who seek to enhance language teaching skills by using British
cultural contexts in teaching English at high schools in Ho Chi Minh City. In terms of
education, this advantageous combination enables teachers to enhance their teaching
skills by designing innovative and diverse teaching methods that incorporate British
cultural elements. This also helps students become more active in their learning,
thereby ameliorating English proficency for high school students such as vocabulary,
grammar, critical thinking, and reading comprehension. Socially, by using this
approach, educators can cultivate a global outlook in students that encompasses a wide
range of British cultural elements, promoting global awareness and competence to
absorb world culture, thereby promoting international cultural exchange relationships
in the future. However, this requires many high-quality resources, ensuring that the
cultural knowledge that teachers bring is complete and accurate, suitable for students'
abilities. On the other hand, even though this is a useful artifact to apply to the English
teaching program, educators must not overuse this reference and view this as a
replacement for traditional language instruction. Features of British culture are
additional material for students to enhance their language skills and access to world
culture. Therefore, educators have the role of developing suitable teaching strategies to
optimize their advantages of the resources, bring rich educational experiences, and help
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5.4 Limitations
For a number of objective and subjective reasons, this thesis still has some limitations.
First, the number of respondents was not high enough to be considered effective, with
only 130 people in the high school student group and 60 people in the formal teacher
group responding to the questionnaire. In addition, this study did not organize direct
interviews and opinion polls, which may affect the relativity of the above data. Second,
because of time constraints, some of the participants answered in a rather sketchy way,
even that the answers were not related to the content of the question, causing the author
to filter them again to have the most precise answer table. Finally, the researcher only
conducted the survey to get answers within 3 weeks, then collected and processed.
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6.1. Conclusion
Despite such positive impacts, there are still challenges in incorporating British culture
into English classroom lessons. Firstly, teachers may face difficulties regarding the
lack of practical resources and inadequate necessary training for suitable pedagogical
methods. Additionally, students may initially find themselves struggling with cultural
elements that are not their native ones or present tremendous differences with their own
culture. Therefore, teachers are the ones who play a significant role in balancing the
introduction of foreign cultural elements and the familiarity or the ease of
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Ultimately, while integrating British cultural aspects into English teaching in Ho Chi
Minh City high schools presents substantial advantages, it still requires more careful
solutions and implementation methods to the challenges. Teachers can create an
interesting, engaging, and effective learning environment through incorporating
various cultural elements, not only to reinforce students’ knowledge absorption but
also to prepare students for communication in an increasingly globalized world.
6.2. Recommendations
Based on the results of this study, some recommendations are sincerely offered for
future research to optimize all the potentials that aspects of British culture bring to the
English teaching process in Vietnam generally.
First, the future researchers should broaden the survey's scope and include more survey
participants, especially high school English teachers, to be able to gain general findings
concerning the significant impact of combining culture and language. In addition,
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The third piece of suggestion for researchers is to devise long-term methods to address
the challenges that this combination faces. The current Vietnamese education system in
general still strictly manages the content included in the curriculum to create a common
standard in English teaching. This leads to educators not having the opportunity to
implement the educational methods proposed in the study. Therefore, future research
should find a long-term solution that can provide new knowledge about culture but is
still allowed by the education sector, from which the arguments in the research article
on the topic will be more convincing.
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methods.
REFERENCES
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
Kechnaoui, C. (2021). The importance of integrating teaching the target culture into
EFL classrooms: Adrar Middle School learners as a case study (First Year).
African University Ahmed Deraia of Adrar, 14-17.
Kramsch, C. (1993). Context and culture in language teaching. Oxford University
Press.
Lalima, & Kiran Lata Dangwal. (2017). Blended learning: An innovative approach.
Universal Journal of Educational Research, 5(1), 129-136.
Maylor, U. (2016). ‘I’d worry about how to teach it’: British values in English
classrooms. Journal of Education for Teaching, 42(3), 314–328.
Peterson, E., & Coltrane, B. (2003). ‘Culture in Second Language Teaching’. Center
for Applied Linguistics. Retrieved October 22, 2006.
Richards, J., & Rodgers, T. (2001). Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching (p.
204). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Sarigul, E., & Ashton-Hay, S. (2005). Culture and English language teaching: Raising
awareness. In 9th International INGED (Turkish English Education
Association) Conference "New Horizons in ELT".
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Chi Minh City
Nhan, T. (2013). Promoting content and language integrated learning in gifted high
schools in Vietnam: Challenges and impacts. Internet Journal of Language, Culture
and Society, 38, 146-153.
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PART I
Very interesting
Somewhat interesting
Neutral
Somewhat not interesting
Boring / Not intersting at all
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
Chi Minh City
PART II
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Applying Aspects of British Culture in Teaching English to High School Students in Ho
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All skills
Reading
Listening
Writing
Speaking
9. What aspects of English culture would you like to see more of in
your English classes?
(Bạn muốn thấy những khía cạnh nào của văn hóa Anh trong các lớp học
tiếng Anh của mình?
Literature (poems, plays, novels )
Music (songs / lyrics)
Films or documentaries
Art or visual media
Traditional customs and rituals
Cultural Festivals
Other (Please specify)
10. Which activities do you think would be most effective in
incorporating cultural aspects into English lessons? (Choose one
or more)
Bạn nghĩ hoạt động nào sẽ hiệu quả nhất trong việc kết hợp các khía cạnh
văn hóa vào bài học tiếng Anh? (Chọn một hoặc nhiều)
Role-Playing activities
Playing some English games about cultural aspects
Watching and discussing movies or TV shows from different
cultures
Quizzes, Mini tests, assignments
Discussing and presenting about one aspect of culture
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PART II
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PART II
1. Have you applied aspects of culture into your English language
lessons?
Yes
No
2. How important do you believe it is for students to learn about
different cultures while learning English?
Very important
Important
Not very important
Not important at all
3. In your experience, how do students typically respond to lessons
that apply aspects of culture?
They are highly interested.
They show a little interest and engagement.
They seem disinterested.
4. What types of culture do you often include in your lessons?
(Check all that apply)
Literature (poems, plays, novels)
Music (songs / lyrics)
Films or documentaries
Art or visual media
Traditional customs and rituals
Cultural Festivals
Other (Please specify)
5. What specific strategies will you use to apply culture to your
English lessons?
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45