VietNamNet Bridge - Teachers of English at general schools cannot communicate well in English, so they focus on teaching reading and writing. As a result, Vietnamese students also cannot speak English well.

Students of the HCM City University of Education during an English lesson

When asked why pedagogy universities were not chosen as partners in the program on upgrading foreign language skills, an official of the HCM City Education and Training Department said the institutions themselves needed to update their training.

Also according to the official, teachers of English in HCM City have poor listening and speaking skills, especially older teachers, even though HCM City is believed to be better than other localities in English skills.

The only solution to the problem is organizing more refresher courses for the substandard teachers to improve their skills.

In HCM City, Seameo is one of the two training establishments allowed by the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) to re-train teachers of English within the framework of the national program on upgrading foreign language skills by 2020.

Trinh Thi Hoa My from Seameo said that most teachers’ English skills improved after they attended the training courses. However, very few teachers meet higher than required standards. 

For example, there are very few teachers who can meet C1 standard though they are only required to have B1.

Also according to My, many teachers fail listening tests, and the proportion of failed teachers is higher in remote areas.

“Students have to relearn English from the beginning when they enter universities, even though they studied English for seven years at general school,” she said.

My pointed out that the communication environment was ‘unreasonable’: teachers teach English but communicate in Vietnamese.

Students have to relearn English from the beginning when they enter universities, even though they studied English for seven years at general schoo

“At refresher courses, when we asked why teachers of English do not communicate in English, they said because they felt tired when speaking English,” My said.

“The ideal situation is that English is taught to students from the primary education level, and that teachers are encouraged to speak English as much as possible,” she said.

Nguyen Loc, former deputy head of the Vietnam Education Science Institute, said that teachers of English were bad at all four skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing.

Loc confirmed that people do not have confidence in the training quality of pedagogy schools, though teachers of English have improved considerably.

“This is because the teachers at pedagogy schools were trained in the old method which did not attach much importance to listening and speaking,” he said.

A survey conducted by the HCM City University of Education showed that 70 percent of students said their teachers used both Vietnamese and English during lessons, while 15.3 percent used too much of Vietnamese when teaching English.


NLD