Pham Hai Ha, a literature teacher at the Olympia School in Hanoi, said she wanted to see students who argue with their teachers and show evidence to prove their arguments.

“The success of the literature teacher does not lie in the students’ capability of writing essays, but in their capability of arguing with teachers on different issues,” she said.

“If students can argue with their teachers, this means they have critical thinking and that they are honest and dare to express their viewpoints,” she added.

“Students need to be encouraged to speak out their thoughts. If they don’t, they will never be able to correct their mistakes,” she said.

A teacher in Hanoi also noted that Vietnamese students were weak at critical capability and this can be explained by the educational philosophy which has existed for many years.

Students are told that teachers are always right because they have better knowledge and have more experience than students. They are told that students must respect their teachers and answering back to the teacher is bad conduct. 

Therefore, the teacher noted, the ‘listen-and-take note’ education method has existed for hundreds of years, under which students simply listen to their teachers and write down in their books what the teachers say.

“I feel that my lessons are boring as my students just listen to me while they never have questions,” the teacher said.

A parent complained on an education forum that she felt embarrassed when her son’s teacher gave the boy 9 marks for an essay about a cat.

“I find the essay boring and uncreative. However, the teacher gave my son a high mark and gave a compliment that my son was very attentive in class and wrote the essay exactly the way the teacher told students to do,” the parent wrote.

“The teacher gave a good mark to my son because he was an obedient student, not because of the interesting essay,” she said.

Professor David Pickus from University of Arizona in the US said she sometimes receives letters from Vietnamese students who ask for help. The students did not describe their problems in detail in the letters and did not clarify what they needed. The majority of students said they were facing big challenges and did not know what to do.

The professor suggested they do three things – update information, learn English and other foreign languages, and make an effort. These are within the students’ reach and they help can help eliminate passiveness, one of the biggest hindrances to students’ study.

Infonet