Common Vietnamese

Grammar Errors
 Workshop Contents
● Why?
● Overview of Common Errors
● General Advice for Solutions
● Specific Advice for Solutions
 Disclaimer

I am not an expert (in grammar or Vietnamese)

 Citations
Dam, Phap. “Analyzing Some Persistent Errors in English Made by Vietnamese Speakers.” Institute of Vietnamese Studies, Texas
Women's University , 18 Feb. 2010, 2:38 AM, www.viethoc.com/Ti-Liu/bien-khao/khao-
luan/analyzingsomepersistenterrorsinenglishmadebyvietnamesespeakers.

Tran, Mai Thi. “4A08 Tran Thi Mai Common Grammatical Errors in English Writing and Vietnamese Writing of Vietnamese
Learners.” Academia.edu,
www.academia.edu/17133619/4A08_Tran_Thi_Mai_Common_grammatical_errors_in_English_writing_and_Vietnamese_writing_of_
Vietnamese_learners.

Dao, Dan Van. “Some Vietnamese Students' Problems with English Grammar.” Scribd, Scribd,
www.scribd.com/document/340321893/Some-Vietnamese-Students-Problems-with-English-Grammar-pdf.

Bui, Phung Thi Kim. “COMMON STRUCTURAL ERRORS IN VIETNAMESE - ENGLISH TRANSLATION MADE BY ENGLISH MAJORED
STUDENTS AT DUY TAN UNIVERSITY.” Duy Tan University, Duy Tan University, 2018,
jst.udn.vn/BBao/2018/10/PDFFull_2018m010d09_17_2_9.pdf.
 Why?
Interference errors:
● Vietnamese is very different from English.

● The areas where Vietnamese and English differ most will tend
to create problems will not simply be resolved naturally with
enough time and exposure to the language.

● Students are often translating from L1 → L2

 Why?
“The native Chinese speaker who treats plurals and past tenses as optional
rather than obligatory in English is reflecting the rules of Chinese. Of
course such a learner needs to learn how to produce grammatical English
sentences. But understanding the variety of structures that different
languages and dialects use to show meaning, including grammatical
meaning such as plurality or past tense, can help teachers see the logic
behind the errors of their students who are learning English.”
-Lily Wong Fillmore
and Catherine Snow
Overview of Some*
Common Errors
Tense and Aspect
 Tense and Aspect
● Three tenses: past, present, and future
● English has four aspects: simple, continuous,
perfect, and perfect continuous
● In English, tense and aspect are expressed
explicitly in the grammar
 What about in Vietnamese?
Vietnamese also has aspect and tense however they are expressed through
context.

For example, to express tense and aspect in English we often conjugate or

change the verb.
“to watch”
watch/watches
is/are watching
watched
 Bạn làm gì vào ngày hôm qua ?
You what on yesterday ?
What did you do yesterday?
Huy

Tôi xem phim.

I watch film.

I watched a film.

Duy
 Tenses in Vietnamese
When necessary, Vietnamese does have some explicit ways of expressing
tenses. To express past, present, and future in Vietnamese, a word is added to
a sentence.

đã đang sẽ
past present future

These words are called ‘time markers’

 Tôi sẽ xem
phim
I (future marker) watch film

There are three ways to express this in English.

I am going to watch a film. Which one(s) do you think

I am watching a film. your students are most
likely to use? Why?
I will watch a film.
 Perfect Aspect in Vietnamese

Vietnamese doesn’t have an explicit way to express perfect aspect.

The present perfect and past perfect are expressed using the past marker đã

The future perfect is expressed with the future marker sẽ

Articles
 Articles in English:
Nouns in English are preceded by either:

● a definite article: “It is the best movie I’ve ever seen.”

● an indefinite article: “I saw a great movie last night.”

● no article: “I have lived in Vietnam for two years.”

 What about in Vietnamese?
● There is no exact parallel to articles in the Vietnamese language.

● As such, this is a very difficult area for Vietnamese students.

● The closest thing they have is a type of word called a classifier, but
the rules for their usage are not the same as in English.
In his paper, “Analyzing Some Persistent Errors in English Made
by Vietnamese Speakers”, Phap Dam provides three examples of
Vietnamese article errors:

● “I'd like to become doctor, not dentist.”

● “I live in the Vietnam.”
● “I hope that you will hear a good news. The article a is not
needed. In Vietnamese, people often say that anh hy vọng
em sẽ nghe một tin tốt (lit: I-hope-you-will-hear-a-good
news).”
Subject-Verb Agreement
Subject-Verb Agreement
Plural vs Singular
● He is hungry.
● They are hungry.

Third person singular

● John likes cheeseburgers.
● The children like cheeseburgers.
Errors in Syntax and Multi-
clausal Sentences
 My father worked until fainted.

If don’t have jobs, they will not have food.

That man is very impolite so nobody likes.

In Dalat, have a lot of flowers.

Because he was reckless, so he caused a terrible
accident!

Although I like fish, but I don’t like sushi.

Discussion, Feedback, Questions?
 Words of Warning
● Avoid over-correction
○ Don’t correct every mistake, set priorities
○ Be conscious of student’s confidence and enthusiasm
○ Don’t hinder a student’s fluency
● Recognize limits
● Be aware this is a two-way street
● Be aware of student’s goals
● Intelligibility is sometimes good enough (but not just
intelligibility to you)
General Advice for
Solutions
 General Advice for Solutions

● Make them aware of the differences. Many students

simply perform a 1:1 translation from VN to EN.
● Obviously this rarely if ever works
○ words with multiple meanings (có)
○ collocations (go bike vs ride bike)
○ word-order
● Practice, practice, practice
 General Advice for Solutions
● The goal is for them to think in English but that’s perhaps
unteachable
● However, we can facilitate conditions which encourage the
student to develop that ability
○ Simultaneous repetition: listening, speaking, reading
simultaneously
○ The text shouldn’t be difficult
○ Follow-up with some questions
 Raising Student Awareness
● Example: You can line the sentences up next to one another
○ I am here since last week. (VN)
○ I have been here since last week. (EN)
● Elicit the grammatical difference between the sentences
● Use your TAs (questions, reminders, etc)
● Give them practice (don’t neglect writing)
 General Advice for Solutions
● Give self-correction exercises
○ Audio recording
○ Writing (practice the test writing before the test)
■ Write an example essay with useful sentence
structures
● Hopefully this encourages independent self-correction
● Introduce error-correction and feedback in the freer
practice stages of production
Discussion, Feedback, Questions?
 Solutions: Tense and Aspect
● Prioritize the most important tenses/aspects
○ Present Simple
○ Present Continuous
○ Past Simple
○ Present Perfect
● Have students practice tenses in suitable, realistic contexts
(especially important for younger students)
● After mastery of one tense, have them practice multiple tenses
simultaneously
○ Storytelling exercises
 Solutions: Past Tenses
● Plenty of practice producing the grammar in speech and
writing*.
● Verb conjugation: Do speaking exercises with familiar verbs.
Essential irregular verbs (go, take, have) and regular verbs (-ed
endings)
● Self-correction: Do a writing / audio recording, identify
errors, and do it again
● Avoid excessive focus on tense; not worth a huge tradeoff
with fluency
 Solutions: Future Tenses
● Make sure students understand the different purposes of
the various forms of the future tenses.
● Give them a variety of contexts which lend themselves to
understanding these different purposes.
● Advanced students: don’t allow them to use ‘will’.
● Again avoid obsessing about the differences between
various future tenses
 Solutions: Perfect Tenses
● Provide realistic contexts
● Compare present/past perfect with the past simple, have
students use it with other tenses simultaneously
● Get students to think about time in relation to the way an
action or event occurs.
○ Example: “He write many songs for the group for the
past ten years”
Discussion, Feedback, Questions?
 Solutions: Articles
● Give students a lot of practice and error correction.
● Since it’s boring, turn the practice into a game.
● Give contextual practice:
○ For Definite vs Indefinite: Give them an example in
which both are used to describe the same noun.
○ “I saw a great movie last night. The movie was about a
cop and a criminal.”
● Not a high priority point
Discussion, Feedback, Questions?
 Solutions: Subject-Verb Agreement

● Don’t neglect to teach beyond the basics

○ Names (for younger students)
○ Noun phrases: The conclusion of the experiments
○ Tricky phrases: I am the kind of person that loves to eat
hamburgers
Discussion, Feedback, Questions?
 Solutions: Multi-clausal sentences
● Give students practice with sentences that have multiple
clauses (sometimes 3+)
● Seize opportunities to introduce multi-clausal sentences in
speaking exercises
● Don’t neglect to teach basic some basic principles of
writing (e.g. run-on sentences)
Discussion, Feedback, Questions?