A Phenomenological study of challenges encountered by mountainous high school students in Vietnam

Abstract

English writing skills have received considerable attention from Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training with their decision of involving the skills in the national examination for General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) for the past two years. However, many high school students in mountainous areas in Vietnam are encountering challenges of writing in English, which results in their low marks in writing tests, or even their avoidance of writing assignments. With such phenomenon, this paper aims at investigating challenges that high school students in mountainous areas encounter in English writing. This is a descriptive survey with a 5-point Likert scale questionnaire. To collect research data, the sample of the study includes five hundred twenty Grade 12 students from three high schools in mountainous areas, Vietnam. The results of the study revealed that high school students in mountainous areas encountered many challenges related to English writing. It is obviously proved that poor spelling, inadequate mastery of grammatical structures, the first language interference, lack of vocabulary, and poor understanding of a well- organized presentation are the most common challenges. The study will be the first step to assist high school teachers to achieve in-depth understanding of students’ challenges in English writing as well as to prepare for the textbook changes in Vietnam in 2018.