English language teaching in Vietnam: A comparison of teachers' beliefs and practices, and students' perceptions

This research compares the beliefs and practices of teachers of English as a foreign language and their students' perceptions with regard to three issues in communicative language teaching: organizing and monitoring of group work activities, use of the first language (L1) in class, and focus of error correction. Three teachers and their students in three English-major listening/speaking classes at Cantho University in Vietnam were observed and videorecorded. After each observation, interviews with the teacher using a variation of stimulated recall with the videorecording were conducted to review the classroom activities and elicit teacher's beliefs. After all observations were conducted, a questionnaire was distributed to the students and a similar one to the teachers. Analysis of the data focused on episodes from recorded observations that exemplified group work organization, L1 use and error correction. Results showed more consistencies than inconsistencies between the teachers' beliefs and their practices regarding the three research foci. Substantial consistency was noted between the teachers' and students' preferences in terms of error correction. They also shared common preferences about the kinds of activities occurring in their classes. In addition, the teachers' comments on teaching methods were compared with those of the head of the English Department and the dean of the School of Education whose views were obtained from interviews. Results indicated consistencies between all of the participants. In contrast to Basturkmen et al. (2004), the current study found more consistencies than inconsistencies between teachers' beliefs and practices. However, differences between technical and practical knowledge could be one of the reasons for the inconsistencies found in the two studies.