ILITE Conference Proceedings 2

INNOVATION FOR SUSTAINABLE EDUCATION
IN THE CHANGING CONTEXT

Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on
Innovation in Learning Instruction
and Teacher Education – ILITE 2
Hanoi, December 11th & 12th 2021
ĐỔI MỚI SÁNG TẠO TRONG DẠY HỌC

VÀ ĐÀO TẠO GIÁO VIÊN
Chủ đề: Đổi mới sáng tạo vì sự phát triển bền vững của giáo dục
trong bối cảnh nhiều biến đổi
NHÀ XUẤT BẢN ĐẠI HỌC SƯ PHẠM

PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2nd INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON INNOVATION IN LEARNING INSTRUCTION AND TEACHER EDUCATION – ILITE 2
Co-organization
Hanoi National University of Education
UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education towards Sustainability, York University (Canada)
University of Bayreuth (Germany)
University of Cologne (Germany)
National Taiwan Normal University
Sponsors
National Foundation for Science and Technology Development
VIN Innovation Fund
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PART 1: DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION IN EDUCATION
STEERING COMMITTEE
(Decision No. 3332/QĐ-ĐHSPHN, date 18th August 2021)
1. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Minh, President, Hanoi National University of Education (HNUE)
2. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Trao, Vice President, HNUE
3. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Hien, Vice President, HNUE
4. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Duc Son, Vice President, HNUE
5. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Duong Minh Lam, Head, Office for Science and Technology Management, HNUE
5. Dr. Trinh Tuan Anh, Head, Office for Academic Affairs, HNUE
6. Dr. Dinh Minh Hang, Vice Head, President’s Office, HNUE
7. MA. Bui Duc Nam, Head, Financial Office, HNUE
8. MSc. Nguyen Duy Hai, Director, Center for Information Technology, HNUE
ORGANIZING COMMITTEE
(Decision No. 3334/QĐ-ĐHSPHN, date 18th August 2021)
1. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Trao, Vice President, HNUE
2. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Duong Minh Lam, Head, Office for Science and Technology Management, HNUE
3. MA. Nguyen Nhat Tan, Head, Office for Political and Student Affairs, HNUE
4. Dr. Dinh Minh Hang, Vice Head, President’s Office, HNUE
5. MA. Bui Duc Nam, Head, Financial Office, HNUE
6. Dinh Quang Huy, Vice Head, Office for Infrastructure and Falicity Management, HNUE
7. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Hoai Nam, Vice Dean, Faculty of Technological Education, HNUE
8. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Bien, Vice Dean, Faculty of Physics, HNUE
9. Dr. Tran Ba Trinh, Director, Center for Research and Teacher Professional Development,
10. MSc. Nguyen Duy Hai, Director, Center for Information Technology, HNUE
11. Mr. Bui Cong Khoang, Head, Security Office, HNUE
12. Dr. Ho Cong Luu, Vice Head, President’s Office, HNUE
13. Dr. Do Thi Kim Cuong, Vice Head, President’s Office, HNUE
14. Dr. Dao Thi Thu Hang, Vice Head, Office for Science and Technology Management, HNUE
15. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Hoang Hai Ha, Vice Head, Office for Science and Technology Management, HNUE
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INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE
Prof. Dr. Valentina Klenowski (Adjunct) Queensland University of Technology, Australia

Prof. Dr. Timothy Teo Murdoch University, Australia
Prof. Dr. Martin Hayden (Adjunct) Southern Cross University, Australia
Prof. Dr. Daniela Schmeinck University of Cologne, Germany
Prof. Dr. Chun Yen Chang National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan
Prof. Dr. Gabriele Schruefer University of Bayreuth, Germany
Prof. Dr. Charles A. Hopkins York University, Canada
Prof. Dr. Chan-Jong Kim Seoul National University, Republic of Korea
Prof. Dr. Sonya Martin Seoul National University, Republic of Korea
Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Minh Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Prof. Dr. Do Viet Hung Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Prof. Dr. Do Huong Tra Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Chang Chew Hung National Institute of Education, Singapore
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Sandra Milligan University of Melbourne, Australia
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Chatree Faikhamta Kasetsart University, Thailand
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Shit Fun Chew National Institute of Education, Singapore
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Vu Bich Hien Hanoi Metropolitan University, Vietnam
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Trao Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Duc Son Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Bien Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Thi Mai Huong Vietnam National University
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Hoai Nam Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Tran Thi Le Thu Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Assoc. Prof. Dr Nguyen Thi Mai Hoa University of New South Wale, Australia
Dr. Etsuke Saito Monash University, Australia
Dr. Le Tuan Anh Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Dr. Tran Ba Trinh Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
Dr. Ngo Vu Thu Hang Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
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INTRODUCTION OF ORGANIZING INSTITUTIONS
Hanoi National University of Education

Hanoi National University of Education (HNUE) is a public university, founded in 1951. It
is the oldest and leading institution in providing undergraduate and postgraduate teacher
education in Vietnam. HNUE is a medium-size university with approximately 10,000 students
on campus and an annual student enrollment of more than 3,000 for undergraduate and
1,500 for postgraduate programs. Currently, the total number of full-time faculty and staffs
of HNUE is around 1,000, including nearly 700 professors and lecturers across all departments
and schools on campus. The University ranks among the top public research universities in
Vietnam.
HNUE continuously strives to sustain and enhance its quality in teaching, research, public
service, and educational development, while serving as an active facilitator in the country’s
modernization and development in the 21st century. HNUE’s values are transparency and
accountability, creativeness, excellence and collaboration.
University of Cologne
The University of Cologne (UoC) is one of the oldest and largest universities in Europe.
Due to its outstanding scientific achievements and the high quality and diversity of its degree
programs, UoC also has an excellent international reputation. Its mission is to create, preserve
and impart knowledge, to offer its students and early-career academics outstanding academic
education, to qualify them for both academic and professional careers, to promote cutting-edge
research, and to drive innovation while focusing on the continuously changing needs and
challenges of today’s society.
Source: https://portal.uni-koeln.de/en/university/uoc-at-a-glance
University of Bayreuth
The University of Bayreuth is ranked 45th out of the world’s top 475 universities younger
than 50 in the ‘Times Higher Education (THE) Young University Ranking’ and is in the top ten
percent of 5,500 universities worldwide in THE World University Ranking.
The University of Bayreuth aspires to be more than just a university. And so, we consider it
indispensable to constantly improve and to examine each classic field of action, to see whether
and how it can adequately address the four questions of our time – internationalization,
digitalization, equal opportunities and diversity, and sustainability. We therefore consciously
perceive these areas as cross-cutting issues honing our profile in a new dimension.
Source: https://uni-bayreuth.de/en/profile
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National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU)

Characterized by both tradition and innovation, National Taiwan Normal University
(NTNU) has long been recognized as one of Taiwan’s elite institutions of higher education.
Founded in 1922, NTNU was formerly an institution dedicated to teacher education. The
university later evolved into a comprehensive university that provides students and scholars
with opportunities to study and conduct research in a wide range of fields. Throughout its
long history, NTNU has always been committed to academic excellence and this is reflected in
the many influential educators and researchers that have studied at NTNU over the years.
NTNU’s mission is to nurture individuals who are critical thinkers and who are prepared to
meet the challenges of an ever-changing world has attracted thousands of talented students and
scholars from Taiwan and abroad. With three campuses in Taipei City and New Taipei City,
NTNU offers 63 academic subjects in nine degree-granting colleges. These include the
College of Education, College of Liberal Arts, College of Science, College of Technology
and Engineering, College of International Studies and Social Sciences, College of Sports
and Recreation, College of Arts, College of Music, and College of Management. The
internationally renowned Mandarin Training Center is also located at NTNU. Each year,
approximately 1,800 students from over 70 countries take part in language courses offered by
the Mandarin Training Center.
Source: https://en.ntnu.edu.tw/aboutus.php
York University with its UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education

towards Sustainability
York University in Toronto (Canada) is committed to giving a broad demographic of
students access to a high quality, research-intensive learning environment committed to the
public good. The mission of York is the pursuit, preservation, and dissemination of knowledge.
York promises excellence in research and teaching in pure, applied and professional fields,
testing the boundaries and structures of knowledge and cultivating the critical intellect. A
community of faculty, students, staff, alumni and volunteers committed to academic freedom,
social justice, accessible education, and collegial self-governance, York University makes
innovation its tradition.
Source: https://www.yorku.ca/about/mission-and-vision/
The UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education towards Sustainability focuses on

strengthening global networks and fostering research that supports responsible and inclusive
policymaking in education. As one out of 840 UNITWIN/UNESCO Chairs in the world, we
specifically focus on our mandate to provide support for policy making and to serve UNESCO
in achieving SDG 4 Quality Education as a key enabler of all of the SDGs. The UNESCO Chair
at York is the first one in the world focusing on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD).
Source: https://unescochair.info.yorku.ca/about-us/
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FOREWORD
Hanoi National University of Education (HNUE), the University of Cologne (Germany),

the University of Bayreuth (Germany), National Taiwan Normal University, and York
University (Canada) with its UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education towards Sustainability,
with the generous support of the Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training, NAFOSTED,
VIN Innovation Foundation and Jurnal Penelitian dan Pembelajaran IPA, are honored to
organize the 2nd International Conference on “Innovation in Learning Instruction and Teacher
Education” from 11th-12th December 2021.
The Conference aims to create an international forum for international scholars, educators
and policymakers to share theoretical and practical research on the sustainable development of
education; innovations in school models and governance, teaching content, techniques, methods
and assessment (at all levels); and reform of teacher education and training in the changing
contexts, especially the global pandemic and the 4.0 Industrial Revolution. In doing so, the
Conference is expected to provide valuable scientific evidence and insights for policymaking
and school/university teaching, as well as for teacher education, towards sustainable and stable
development of education; and contribute to the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for
Sustainable Development with its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially SDG 4
on equitable access to an inclusive quality education and lifelong learning opportunities for all.
Conference topics include:
– Educational strategy in the context of globalization: trends and approaches.
– Sustainable development of education in the context of a pandemic: opportunities,
challenges and solutions for teaching and teacher education (at all levels).
– Trends, opportunities, challenges, and solutions for educational renovation in the digital
age: teaching content, methods, techniques, and assessment; competence of students and
teachers; conversion skills and digital competencies; smart education, smart school,
intelligent pedagogy.
– Modern schools and global citizenship training goals: building school programs to develop
students’ competencies; coordinating education between home, school and society;
internationalism, intercultural and interdisciplinary aspects of teaching; building Education
for Sustainable Development (ESD) schools.
– STEAM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math).
– Inclusive education and education for people with disabilities.
– Educational management and teacher development policy.
The hybrid Conference brings together researchers, academics, professionals, experts in
educational science, educators from all over the world. The international character is illustrated
by many countries represented by around 300 participants coming from Australia, Canada,
Germany, Japan, Indonesia, Mongolia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, USA, and Vietnam,
etc. The conference will include eight oral sessions, nine keynote presentations. 210 abstracts
were reviewed and only accepted abstracts were invited to submit a full paper. After two rounds
of anonymous review, 54 full papers have been selected to be published in the Conference
Proceedings and HNUE’s Journal of Science. The new knowledge from this Conference will
provide excellent references and most recent scientific knowledge contributing to the field of
teaching and education in Vietnam and internationally.
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WELCOME REMARKS
Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Minh
President, Hanoi National University of Education
Dear distinguished delegates and participants,

As President of the Hanoi National University of Education, it is my pleasure to warmly
welcome you to the second International Conference on Innovations in Learning Instruction and
Teacher Education. This year’s theme is: Innovation for sustainable education in the changing
context.
This conference is held on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Hanoi National
University of Education. This is an important milestone for the university as a leading
institution in providing undergraduate and postgraduate teacher education in Vietnam. The
university constantly enhances its quality in teaching, research, public service and educational
development to be a proactive facilitator and leader in the country’s educational modernization
and development.
Over the past two years, Vietnam, along with every country around the world has
experienced seriously negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on human health, the
economy, environment, and society. The pandemic has caused significant disruptions to
education due to school closures during the worldwide lockdowns. Despite using supportive
technology to rapidly switch to virtual learning, learning losses and inequality have affected
millions of students across the world, especially those who are from low-income countries.
Therefore, stakeholders need to build more resilient systems for sustainable education both
globally and locally, particularly considering the possible advent of future global crises.
Sustainable education is important for the implementation of the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable
Development Goals.
Aligned with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, it is a great honour for our
university to organize this International Conference on the theme of “Innovation for sustainable
education in the changing context”. The Conference addresses current issues and solutions
through 9 keynote presentations, 26 oral presentations and 54 papers in the Conference
proceedings. The conference has over 200 registrations from participants from across Vietnam
and 10 countries including Australia, Canada, Germany, Singapore, Thailand, the US, the UK,
Taiwan, etc. This conference is a great platform for educational managers, researchers, experts
and other related stakeholders to share their work, experience and solutions towards Sustainable
Development Goal 4 to “Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong
learning opportunities for all”.
On this occasion, on behalf of the university board, I sincerely express our special thanks to
Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training, National Foundation for Science and Technology
Development, Vingroup Innovation Foundation for choosing our university to support this
conference. Our special thanks go to all co-organizers and partners, including University of
Bayreuth, Cologne (Germany), UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education towards Sustainability,
York University (Canada) and National Taiwan Normal University. I acknowledge and pay my
respects to the contributions and collaborations from partners across Vietnam and around the
world for working together towards Education for Sustainable Development.
I am delighted to welcome all keynote speakers, presenters and participants. Wishing you
all good health and happiness, a productive and successful conference and we look forward to
the prospect of continuing collaborations and development.
Thank you!
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OPENING KEYNOTE
Prof. Dr. Charles Hopkins
UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education towards Sustainability
York University Toronto, Canada
Do our education systems hold a key to unlock a better world?
Changing expectations towards education

Public expectations towards education systems around the world continue to grow and
expand. Education is expected to prepare our children and youth for a rapidly changing and
uncertain world, but education systems are also called upon to play leading roles as key partners
in enhancing overall societal well-being and promoting a concept of lifelong learning. While
always being recognized important for the pursuit of a better future for all, education
stakeholders have traditionally followed global agendas, but seldom have they developed or
proactively influenced them.
Shaping a sustainable future through Education for Sustainable Development (ESD)
With the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the 17 Sustainable Development
Goals (SDGs) at the core, there is a great opportunity for educational institutions, especially in
higher education, to become proactive and take such societal leadership. In SDG 4, a quality
education with Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is affirmed as a vital means of
implementation for sustainable development overall. ESD is both an integral element of such a
quality education AND a key enabler of all the other SDGs.
ESD can shape a more sustainable future, both at the local and global levels. Even prior to
this current understanding in the 2030 Agenda, education has been seen as a crucial means of
implementing sustainable development. Within Agenda 21, the first global plan to implement
sustainable development in 1992, education’s contribution was identified within four spheres or
thrusts.
 Access to and retention within quality education,
 Reorienting existing education and training systems towards sustainability,
 Public awareness and understanding of the concept of addressing sustainability, and
 Training programs for all sectors
Today, UNESCO refers to ESD as a holistic learning approach that ‘... empowers learners
to take informed decisions and responsible actions for environmental integrity, economic
viability and a just society, for present and future generations, while respecting cultural
diversity.’ (UNESCO 2020)
ESD and Global Citizenship
As well as having the knowledge and skills to comprehend sustainability challenges that
currently exist, together with those that emerge during their lifetime, students need the
willingness and ability to engage as empowered citizens, with the skills to shape their own
destiny. To enable this, ESD is often accompanied by Global Citizenship Education (GCED).
GCED aims to empower learners of all ages with the knowledge, skills, values, and perspectives
to assume active roles, both locally and globally, in building more peaceful, tolerant, inclusive,
and secure societies (UNESCO 2021).
This pursuit of sustainable development is perhaps best understood as a purpose of today’s
education systems. ESD and GCED, each with their own cognitive, socio-emotional, and
behavioural domains, synergistically seek to create graduates with knowledge, competencies
and the cultural awareness and values to address issues of people, planet, peace and prosperity
9
in partnership and interdependence with ‘others’. The overarching goal is to establish the
potential for ongoing adaptation, resilience, innovation, creativity, and flexibility to address
changing individual and collective social, economic, and environmental needs. Additionally,
their goal is to promote communication and other social skills that allow for dialogue to address
contentious issues and refocus conflict toward harmony and collaboration.
Transformative education
The challenge is to take the global concepts, such as those currently identified in the
sustainable development goals and transpose them into local settings and realities. Education
systems are also wrestling with the dilemma of continually adding to an overcrowded
curriculum in a traditional classroom setting that does not serve all students equally well. In the
pursuit of addressing SDG 4, i. e. of ‘ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and
promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all’, UNESCO aims towards a transformative
education to meaningfully engage the learner.
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TABLE OF CONTENT
Page
INTRODUCTION OF ORGANIZING INSTITUTIONS 5
FOREWORD 7
WELCOME REMARKS
Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Minh 8
President, Hanoi National University of Education
OPENING KEYNOTE
Charles Hopkins 9
UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education towards Sustainability
York University Toronto, Canada
PART 1: DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION IN EDUCATION 15
WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES, ONLINE MATERIALS AND LEARNING PLATFORMS ALONE
DO NOT PROVIDE GOOD TEACHING 16
Daniela SCHMEINCK
DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION IN VOCATIONAL EDUCATION AND TRAINING TO MEET CURRENT REQUIREMENTS
OF EDUCATION REFORM AT VOCATIONAL SCHOOLS IN SOUTH CENTRAL COAST 24
Nguyen Xuan Tao, Nguyen Van De, Phan Ngoc Thach
EVALUATING THE CURRENT STATE AND APPROACHABILITY OF SMART SCHOOL MODELS IN HANOI
38
Bui Thi Thuy Hang, Vu Minh Trang, Lai Phuong Lien, Tang Thi Thuy, Nguyen Trung Hien
THE USE OF VIRTUAL REALITY IN DESIGNING AND IMPLEMENTING APPLICATION ACTIVITIES
IN TEACHING HISTORY AT HIGHSCHOOL 52
Dang Thi Thuy Dung , Nguyen Thi The Binh
ENHANCING ONLINE LEARNING THROUGH USING BACKWARD DESIGN MODEL
66
Ngo Van Thien
USING VIDEO IN ASSESSING AND DEVELOPING PROSPECTIVE MATHEMATICS TEACHERS’ PROFESSIONAL NOTICING
78
Le Thi Bach Lien, Tran Kiem Minh
BUILDING A MANAGEMENT MODEL FOR TEACHER TRAINING WITH WEBINARS
90
Pham Ngoc Son, Nguyen Thanh Huyen
USE OF PERSONALIZED VIDEOS IN TEACHING BIOCHEMISTRY PRACTICALS
102
Shit-Fun Chew
THE ROLE OF TECHNOLOGY PLATFORMS IN MUSIC TEACHER TRAINING FOR GENERAL EDUCATION IN VIETNAM
112
Nguyen Thi Ngoc Dung
PART 2: PRE-SERVICE AND IN-SERVICE TEACHER EDUCATION 129
REFLECTION IN TEACHER EDUCATION IN CANADA: IMPLICATIONS FOR VIETNAMESE TEACHER EDUCATION
130
Tu Duc Van, Nguyen Thi Nho, Giap Binh Nga
CREATIVE TEACHER MODEL – A SOLUTION TO THE PROBLEM OF TEACHER QUALITY IN THE CURRENT CONTEXT
141
Nguyen Sy Thu, Nguyen Huu Le
FLIPPED CLASSROOM IN MATHEMATICS TEACHER EDUCATION IN VIETNAM: ADVANTAGES AND CHALLENGES
153
Tran Kiem Minh, Nguyen Dang Minh Phuc, Xayaphet Keodavanh
11
TRAINING EFFECTIVE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS:

CURRENT PRACTICES AT A CENTER FOR FOREIGN LANGUAGES IN VIETNAM 163
Luu Nguyen Quoc Hung
APPLYING FLIPPED CLASSROOM TO DEVELOP EVALUATION-COMPETENCY
OF PRE-SERVICE TEACHERS IN PRIMARY EDUCATION IN TEACHING ABOUT UNDERSTANDING PHILOLOGY MATERIALS
172
IN VIETNAM’S PRIMARY SCHOOLS
Luu Thi Diu, Pham Thi Thu Huong, Nguyen The Hung
APPLYING THE TPACK MODEL TO INSTRUCT PRE-SERVICE TEACHER OF PRIMARY EDUCATION TO DESIGN LESSON
PLANS OF SUBJECTS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY – CASE STUDY OF TAY NGUYEN UNIVERSITY 185
Nguyen Manh Huong, Le Thi Thuy An
ENHANCING THE TEACHING COMPETENCE IN BIOLOGY EXPERIMENTAL PRACTICAL LESSONS IN HIGH SCHOOL FOR
PEDAGOGICAL STUDENTS
201
Phan Duc Duy, Pham Thi Phuong Anh, Dang Thi Da Thuy,
Nguyen Thi Dieu Phuong, Le Minh Duc
DEVELOPING STUDENTS’ EXPERIMENTAL COMPETENCY THROUGH INQUIRY-BASED LEARNING OF GENERAL PHYSICS
LABORATORY 215
Nguyen Thanh Loan, Nguyen Van Bien, Tran Ngoc Chat
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT THROUGH LESSON STUDY: PROSPECTIVE MATHEMATICS TEACHERS’ KNOWLEDGE
FOR TEACHING VARIABILITY IN STATISTICAL GRAPHS 228
Nguyen Thi Ha Phuong, Tran Kiem Minh
PRIMARY TEACHER’S COMPETENCE TO IMPLEMENT PROJECT-BASED LEARNING
IN THE CENTRAL HIGHLANDS – VIET NAM 246
Bui Thi Tam, Duong Giang Thien Huong
IMPLEMENTATION OF TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT IN UNIVERSITY TRAINING
IN THE NEW CONTEXT 262
Bui Duc Tu, Dang Nhu Thuy Vy , Bui Nguyen Tu My
SOME STUDIES ON TEACHING MANAGEMENT WITH THE ORIENTATION
OF DEVELOPING LEARNING COMPETENCIES 274
Nguyen Van Hieu
REVIEWS OF “LESSON STUDY” REFLECTED FROM WORKS IN JAPAN AND VIETNAM
287
Nguyen Nam Phuong, Nguyen Dac Thanh, Tetsuo Kuramoto
PART 3: HIGHER EDUCATION 297
THE IMPACT OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE – THE FUTURE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
298
Dinh Thi My Hanh, Ngo Tu Thanh, Tran Van Hung
CURRENT STATUS OF THE JOB COMPETENCIES OF STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF AGRICULTURE
AND FORESTRY, THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY 312
Hua Thi Toan, Trinh Thanh Hai
MUSIC EDUCATION IN MULTIDISCIPLINARY UNIVERSITIES IN VIETNAM
326
Nguyen Thi My Liem
DESIGNING CORE SKILLS TRAINING MODEL FOR ENGINEERING STUDENTS TO ADAPT TO CHANGING CONTEXT
336
Nguyen Thanh Thuy, Vo Phan Thu Huong
12
FORMATIVE B-ASSESSMENT – A NEW CONCEPT IN HIGHER EDUCATION. CASE STUDY AT UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE
AND EDUCATION, THE UNIVERSITY OF DANANG, VIETNAM 348
Pham Duong Thu Hang , Nguyen Hoai Nam
THE ROLE OF FOREIGN LECTURERS AND HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT PRACTICES: A CASE STUDY IN HIGHER
EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS IN VIETNAM 363
Nguyen Thi Nhai, Duong Thi Hoang Yen
CURRENT USE OF TECHNOLOGY AND DEVELOPMENT ORIENTATION FOR SMART UNIVERSITY – A CASE STUDY AT
HANOI UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY 375
Bui Thi Thuy Hang, Nguyen Hoai Nam, Bui Ngoc Son, Nguyen Thi Huong Giang, Amrita Kaur
THE STAKEHOLDERS’ ROLES IN ENHANCING UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS’ EMPLOYABILITY SKILLS IN VIETNAM
390
Pham Duc Long, Nguyen Thuy Nga
UNIVERSITY LECTURERS’ COMPETENCE FOR THE USE OF ICT IN TEACHING: THE CASE OF TRADE UNION UNIVERSITY
399
Bui Thi Bich Thuan
PROPOSING A PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING ORGANIZATIONAL PROCEDURES TO FOSTER PROBLEM-SOLVING
COMPETENCY ASSOCIATED WITH STUDENTS’ MAJORS: AN ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLE FOR NURSING MAJORS 412
Nguyen Thi Thanh Huyen, Do Huong Tra, Tuong Duy Hai
USING MODEL OF BLENDED LEARNING IN VIETNAMESE UNIVERSITIES OF EDUCATION – DIFFICULTIES FROM
PERSPECTIVE OF LECTURERS AND LEARNERS 424
Tieu Thi My Hong
PART 4: TEACHING NATURAL SCIENCES AND TECHNOLOGY 439
AN ASSESSMENT OF PEDAGOGICAL STUDENT’S AWARENESS ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE EDUCATION IN VIETNAM’S
UPPER SECONDARY EDUCATION PROGRAM – CASE STUDY AT HANOI NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF EDUCATION 440
Pham Thanh Hai, Tran Khanh Van, Nguyen Thi Hang Nga
DESIGN “WIND CHIMES” TOPIC ON THE APPROACH OF STEAM EDUCATION TO DEVELOP COMPETENCIES
AND QUALITIES FOR PRIMARY SCHOOL STUDENTS 458
Nguyen Hong Duong, Nguyen Hoai Nam
DEVELOPING THE COMPETENCE TO APPLY CHEMICAL KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS FOR 10TH GRADE STUDENTS
OF SOME HIGH SCHOOLS IN NAM DINH PROVINCE 478
Vu Thi Thu Hoai, Nguyen Thi Dung
DEVELOPING STUDENTS’ COMPETENCE OF APPLYING KNOWLEDGE INTO PRACTICE THROUGH PROJECT-BASED
LEARNING ON THE TOPIC OF “ELECTRIC BATTERIES AND ELECTROLYSIS” 488
Vu Minh Trang, Bui Thi Thuy Hang
SELF-DIRECTED LEARNING READINESS FOR VIETNAMESE STUDENTS IN INFORMATICS
500
Kieu Phuong Thuy, Nguyen Chi Trung
DESIGNING STEM ROBOTICS TOPIC FIRE ALARM SYSTEM FOR 8TH-GRADE STUDENTS TO ENHANCE STUDENTS’
PROBLEM-SOLVING COMPETENCE 512
Vu Quoc Thang, Dang Dong Phuong, Le Hai My Ngan
WHAT DO I CARE ABOUT STUDENTS’ CONCEPTIONS? TEACHERS’ SUBJECTIVE THEORIES ON STUDENTS’ IDEAS
IN GEOGRAPHY CLASSES 527
Dr. Kati Barthmann
13
THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE 5E INSTRUCTIONAL MODEL IN DEVELOPING SCIENTIFIC COMPETENCY

OF PRIMARY STUDENTS 541
Nguyen Thi Hao, Truong Hoang Thong
EFFECTIVENESS OF TECHNOLOGY-ASSISTED LABORATORY EXERCISES IN TEACHING AND LEARNING OF THE
CONCEPTS OF DIFFUSION AND OSMOSIS TO SECONDARY THREE BIOLOGY STUDENTS 555
Gilbert Tan Wei Beng, Shit-Fun Chew
THE IMPACT OF ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING ON LEARNER PERFORMANCE IN INFORMATICS AT HIGH SCHOOL
574
Dang Ngoc Tuan, Ngo Tu Thanh
EXAMINING PRESCHOOL PRINCIPALS’ AND TEACHERS’ AWARENESS OF STEAM EDUCATION IN HO CHI MINH CITY
585
Dang Ut Phuong, Dinh Lan Anh, Lai Hai Ha, Hoang Quy Tinh, Tran Hong Nhu Le
DEVELOPING STEAM TOPICS FOR TEACHING BIOLOGY 8 TO DEVELOP PROBLEM – SOLVING COMPETENCY FOR
STUDENTS AT LOWER SECONDARY LEVEL 597
Le Thi Phuong, Do Thuy Linh
APPLYING BLENDED LEARNING MODEL IN TEACHING BIOLOGY GRADE 12 FOR IMPROVING
STUDENT’S SELF-STUDY COMPETENCE 610
Nguyen Thi Thuy Quynh, Nguyen Hoang Trang, Le Thi Quy
PART 5: CHILD PSYCHOLOGY, TEACHING SOCIAL SCIENCES AND LIVING SKILLS 621
GOING BEYOND TEACHER-CENTEREDNESS AND STUDENT-CENTEREDNESS: AN EXAMINATION AND PROPOSAL
622
Shihkuan Hsu
DEVELOPING CRITICAL THINKING AMONG VIETNAMESE HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS THROUGH LITERATURE LESSONS
632
Hoang Lan Anh
LEXICAL TRANSFER FROM VIETNAMESE TO ENGLISH IN COLLOCATIONS OF ADVERBS AND VERBS
646
Nguyen Dieu Linh
ENHANCING THE COOPERATION BETWEEN FAMILIES AND SCHOOLS IN THE EDUCATION OF SOCIAL
AND EMOTIONAL SKILLS FOR 5- TO 6-YEAR-OLD PRESCHOOLERS 659
Phan Thi Thuy Hang
TEACHING COMMUNICATION SKILLS TO CHILDREN WITH MILD INTELLECTUAL DISABILITIES
IN MOUNTAINOUS PRESCHOOLS 670
Ho Sy Hung
LIVING VALUES PRACTICES AND RECOMMENDATIONS TO IMPROVE LIVING VALUES EDUCATION
FOR PRIMARY STUDENTS 680
Tran Thi Le Thu, Bui Bich Lien, Bui Thi Nga, Bui Thi Diem My, Phung Thi Nam, Cao Thi Lan Nhi
SUPPORT FROM HOME FOR EARLY LEARNING AND DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN UNDER FIVE YEARS OLD
FROM ETHNIC MINORITIES IN VIET NAM 693
Bui Thi Lam, Ben Phạm, Tran Thi Kim Lien, Nguyen Thi My Dung, Ho Sy Hung
HOW TO USE STEAM APPROACH TO DISCOVER VALUES OF THE CULTURAL HERITAGE OF HUE ANCIENT CAPITAL
FOR TEACHING HISTORY IN VIETNAM’S HIGH SCHOOLS 705
Nguyen Thi Bich, Nguyen Thanh Nhan, Tran Thi Hai Le
PARENTING BEHAVIOR AS A PREDICTOR OF SCHOOL DEVIANT BEHAVIORS AMONG ADOLESCENTS
718
Tran Thu Huong, Le Thi Ngoc Lan, Tran Thu Huong, Nguyen Thi Minh
THANKS TO THE CONTRIBUTORS AND SPONSORS 731
14
PART 1
DIGITAL
TRANSFORMATION
IN EDUCATION
15
WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES,

ONLINE MATERIALS AND LEARNING PLATFORMS ALONE DO NOT
PROVIDE GOOD TEACHING
Daniela SCHMEINCK*1
Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic came as a surprise and was accompanied by many profound
challenges. Schools, teachers and students had to adapt to completely new teaching approaches
within a very short time. Children spontaneously and largely unprepared had to learn and to
study from home, regardless of the spatial and technical conditions prevailing there or the
existing abilities of the parents to support the children in learning accordingly. Schools had to
develop and implement new organisation and hygiene concepts again and again. Quasi from
now to immediately teachers had to reorganize and redesign their teaching. This led to the fact
that online learning sources in particular as well as the idea of learning with digital technologies
experienced a significant upswing in times of the pandemic.
While some people very much welcome this current trend, others are rather critical of the actual
developments. This raises the question to what extend the digital transformation currently taking
place in schools should and will remain after the so-called Corona crisis and what we can and
ought to learn from the past weeks and months for the future?
Keywords: Corona crisis, digital transformation, primary school, teaching and learning
INTRODUCTION
Due to the unexpected dynamics of the COVID-19 pandemic, all schools in Germany were
closed by mid of March 2020. Thus, all students-with the exception of a few emergency
arrangements – were sent into so-called home-based or distance learning. (Fickermann &
Edelstein, 2020) Since that time and due to the COVID-19 pandemic various forms of
home-based learning, learning at a distance or distance learning, hygiene regulations and
distance rules have determined the everyday life of teachers and learners.
More or less simultaneously, due to the closed schools and the resulting lack of face-to-face
teaching, the use of digital technologies has increased significantly in the educational context.
According to Döbeli Honegger (2020), the “emergency distance learning” (in German:
Notfallfernunterricht) of the last few months has made clearly visible that regarding digital
technologies in schools as well as concerning digitalisation in learning and teaching much more
is possible in education than previously thought. He therefore concludes that the pandemic has
given the topic of “digitalisation and school” a further boost.
CONTENT
1. Digitization in schools in times of the COVID-19 pandemic – a critical analysis
Especially during the first weeks and months of the pandemic, the lessons provided for
distance learning in most cases did not meet the requirements of contemporary teaching. The
results of a German Forsa study with 1031 teachers undertaken in April 2020 show that the
most frequently used assignment format, during the first weeks of distance learning, was still the
classical worksheet. A total of 84 percent of teachers participating in the study stated that they
had regularly used worksheets for distance learning during the first weeks of lockdown. Only 39%
* Corresponding Author: Daniela SCHMEINCK; Email Address: Daniela.Schmeinck@uni-koeln.de

1 University of Cologne, Germany
16
of respondents used explainer videos as additional support for the learners, 17% used digital
presentations, and just 14% taught via video conferencing tools. Moreover, the results of the
study show that teachers from secondary schools use video conferencing, tutorials or
presentations much more frequently than teachers from primary schools. Regarding the use of
digital media in the classroom, elementary school teachers indicated that only less than a quarter
of their colleagues had regularly used digital media in the classroom before the pandemic.
Overall, the results of the study found that according to the teachers, the majority of schools
(66%) were less well or poorly prepared in terms of digital media equipment and technical
requirements (forsa. Politik- und Sozialforschung GmbH. Büro Berlin, 2020a).
Even eight months later, the teachers' assessment of the equipment in the schools has not
changed significantly. In the follow-up study, undertaken in December 2020, 61% of
respondents still underlined that schools are less well or poorly prepared in terms of digital
media equipment and technical requirements. So, for example, among the primary school
teachers surveyed, as many as 82% still complain about the fact that the schools were
inadequately equipped (forsa. Politik- und Sozialforschung GmbH. Büro Berlin, 2020b).
Regarding the greatest existing need for improvement at their own school, 80 percent of
teachers note students’ technical equipment at home as an urgent need of improvement.
58 percent also underline the crucial need for improvement concerning the technical equipment
of teachers (e.g., mobile devices) and in the technical equipment of the school (58%). However,
57 percent of respondents also identified a clear need for improvement in teachers’ skills
regarding digital learning formats and for further training of teachers which still need to be
qualified in the use of digital learning formats (55%) (ebd). The results of both studies thus
clearly demonstrate the need for improvement in the school and educational sector.
The foregoing statements do both, they show the current efforts in the German education
sector to drive forward the long overdue digitization at schools. On the other side, they raise the
question to what extend the digital transformation currently taking place in schools should and
will remain after the so-called Corona crisis and what we can and ought to learn from the past
weeks and months for the future? Is it enough to equip schools with technical infrastructure,
high speed Internet and appropriate digital devices? Can necessary digitization processes within
the school system be achieved solely through technologies and technical infrastructure? What
are the dangers of the Corona-based “flash digitization” that is currently taking place in many
schools in Germany and in other countries around the world? Last but not least, what role do
teachers and appropriate teacher training play in this context? And how can contemporary,
pedagogically, and didactically founded teaching and learning succeed during and especially
after the COVID-19 pandemic?
1.1. Technical equipment in schools
The demand for better technical equipment in German schools is not new. Already in 2015
the results of the study “Children + Media, Computer + Internet” (KIM study) notes in this
respect that digital media are almost ubiquitous in everyday life of many primary school
children (Medienpädagogischer Forschungsverbund Südwest (MPFS), 2015). The results from
the follow-up KIM studies from 2016 and 2018 clearly underlined these results
(Medienpädagogischer Forschungsverbund Südwest (MPFS), 2017, 2018). Nevertheless, the
handling of digital media took place predominantly outside of the school (Bos et al., 2014).
Therefore, Eickelmann et al. (2015) point out that today’s children tend to grow up with digital
media and, in general, completely autonomously, learn to use and use them. A fact that does not
automatically imply that children can deal productively, appropriately, critically, or even
reflectively with the various types of media (Schmeinck, 2013a, 2013b). Within the school
context, before COVID-19 pandemic, learning was only rarely taking place by the use of digital
17
media and other education-related activities based on digital media have only played a marginal
role for primary school children.
However, since the growing up of children is in many respects embedded in the actual
digitalization processes (Tillmann & Hugger, 2014; Kühn & Lampert, 2015; Wagner, Eggert &
Schubert, 2016; Schmeinck, 2018, Medienpädagogischer Forschungsverbund Südwest (MPFS),
2018; Irion, 2020) and thus, digitalization has decisive influence on primary school children,
primary school education has to deal with the consequences and upcoming tasks of digital
transformation, too. Appropriate technical equipment thereby appears to be indispensable. This
has also been recognized by policy and decision makers in Germany.
Back in 2018, and thus even before the pandemic, the so-called “DigitalPakt Schule” (in
English: digital pact for schools) in the amount of 5 billion euros was resolved. The aim of the
pact was to improve digitization in general education schools in whole Germany and to ensure
the nationwide establishment of a modern digital education infrastructure. Later, and as a
consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic, the amount was increased to around 7 billion euros.
Among other things, 500 million euros of this was made available with the aim of ensuring that
students are equipped with digital devices at home and taking an important step toward
educational equity.
Just in time for the start of the new school year 2020 – 2021, numerous schools in Germany
were quickly equipped with digital (mobile) devices like notebooks and tablets as well as with
wireless network for the (whole) school building. In the meantime, at least most schools have
basic technical equipment – although this is certainly still far from adequate. In principle, this
development can be seen as positive. After all, many schools have waited long enough for the
appropriate equipment. But what exactly are the schools supposed to do with the devices and the
infrastructure now?
And how is the sustainability of the devices ensured? Since technologies and technical
possibilities change and develop very fast, equipment that is purchased once becomes old and
outdated quite quickly, too. It is therefore far from sufficient to equip schools, teachers and
children with the appropriate devices once and then believe that the problem of the missing
digitalization in schools will be solved in the long term. If schools are to be equipped with
appropriate technology on a permanent basis, then this must also be understood as a permanent
task and implemented accordingly in financial and organizational manners.
1.2. Technical equipment of children
The COVID-19 pandemic, however, has not only exposed shortcomings and deficiencies in
school facilities. It has also revealed clear differences in the technical equipment that children
have access to outside of school. For example, especially in primary school, not all children had
and still have equally good access to digital devices, a reliable internet or even to supplementary
hardware such as printers or scanners. Even though there are different reasons for the inequality
in the digital home environment, it inevitably leads to a widening gap between children from
financially disadvantaged and/or educationally disadvantaged and educationally advantaged
backgrounds.
Appropriate technical equipment must therefore not only be seen against the background of
rapidly changing technologies and adequate school equipment. In order to meet the goal of
educational equity, appropriate technical equipment must also be guaranteed in the home
environment of teachers and students (e.g., in the form of loan equipment or leasing models).
But even governmental provided financial investments such as the “DigitalPakt Schule”
would presumably have done little to close the existing digital gap children have to focus
outside of the school context. Because the provided financial support for the digitization of
schools was primarily mainly provided for the school equipment and was geared toward normal
face-to-face teaching.
18
Even if the “DigitalPakt Schule” would have been implemented earlier or more quickly,
there would have been only a better functioning infrastructure in the school, but still, the distance
learning would not have benefited significantly from this, as learners would still not have been
appropriately equipped for distance learning.
And even the basic quality of teaching cannot be ensured by technical equipment alone.
1.3. Digital communication - video conferencing and messenger services
Not only in the working and private context, but also in the area of education, the COVID-19
pandemic has greatly increased the frequency of use of video conferencing tools or messenger
services. As a result, many children, parents and teachers are currently proudly reporting how
competent in the use of media the children have become due to the pandemic, as they are now
even able to participate in an online conference without parental assistance. And for sure, the
ability to use digital media e.g., for video conferencing and messenger services can be seen as
an aspect of the required digital literacy of children. But this is by no means the only or even
decisive competence that children should be enabled to in the context of media literacy.
According to the strategy paper “Education in a Digital World” of the Conference of
Ministers of Education (in German: “Ständige Konferenz der Kultusminister der Länder in der
Bundesrepublik Deutschland” (KMK)), the fundamental goal in digital orientated education is
to provide all students, entering the primary school by the year 2018 – 2019, by the end of their
compulsory education with the required competences (Ständige Konferenz der Kultusminister
der Länder in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (KMK) 2012, p. 18). The strategy paper
highlights two key objectives for general school education:
1st Aim: “Starting with primary education, countries include the competences required for
active, self-determined participation in a digital world into their curriculums. This will not be done
by a separate curriculum for one’s own and new subject, but will become an integral part of the
subject curricula of all subjects. Each subject contains specific approaches to the competences in the
digital world. Thus, subject-specific competencies are in the same way acquired, then basic (subject)
specific characteristics of the competencies for the digital world. In this way the development of
competences takes place (analogous to reading and writing) in manifold learning opportunities and
experiences.” (Original in German; Ständige Konferenz der Kultusminister der Länder in der
Bundesrepublik Deutschland (KMK) 2016, p. 11f.)
A total of six different competence areas for the promotion in educational context are
mentioned in the strategy paper:
1. Research, process, and store
2. Communicate and cooperate
3. Produce and present
4. Protect and act safely
5. Problem solving and acting
6. Analyze and reflect (KMK 2016, p. 15ff.)
Thus, the competence areas, described by the KMK, involve much more than the skills to
use an online conference tool, an online messenger or to simply search for information on the
internet. On the contrary, considerably more far-reaching competencies are required of the
learners here.
And after weeks of distance learning most of the educational experts agree on this aspect,
too: Even if video conferencing or messenger services were the only possibility for
communication between teachers and students in times of Corona, and for special cases (e.g.
participation of children in times of pandemics, catastrophes, diseases, etc.) offer a lot of
potential for the time after Corona, they cannot replace the important social togetherness and
school community in everyday school life. Thus, for video conferencing or messenger services,
which were used by at least some teachers in times of the COVID-19 pandemic for regular
19
communication with the children, the application scenarios in regular or face-to-face teaching
will be rather marginal.
1.4. Online materials and learning platforms
In times of complete school closures, the devices that were mostly still privately purchased
by the teachers were mainly used for daily lesson preparation. The certainly dedicated efforts of
the teachers quickly revealed the fundamental problems regarding the required digital
transformation at primary schools. Many of the analogue teaching methods and materials
otherwise successfully used by the teachers could not and cannot be easily transferred into
digital teaching formats or materials. For example, photographing a traditional worksheet and
uploading it to a learning platform or sending it by email does not meet the requirements for
good teaching with and via digital media any more than simply flicking from page to page in a
digitalised textbook (Schmeinck 2020).
The strategy paper “Education in a Digital World” of the Conference of Ministers of
Education (in German: “Ständige Konferenz der Kultusminister der Länder in der
Bundesrepublik Deutschland” (KMK)) states in this regard and as the second key objective for
general school education:
2nd Aim: “For the design of teaching and learning processes, digital learning environments
are systematically used in accordance with curricular requirements and in line with the primacy
of education. By adapting the teaching methods to the newly available possibilities, the
opportunities of individualization and the assumption of individual responsibility in learning
processes are strengthened”. (Original in German; Ständige Konferenz der Kultusminister der
Länder in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (KMK), 2016, p. 12.)
The numerous digital teaching materials, learning offers and learning platforms, some of
which have mushroomed in times of the pandemic, often lack not only professional quality but
also a well-founded pedagogical and didactical conception – even though they certainly
amounted to a saving straw for many teachers in times of sudden school closures.
The increasing influence of companies, organizations, institutions, and even private
individuals must be seen as particularly critical hereby. In times of the pandemic, numerous
online media, digital teaching and learning materials or interactive learning platforms have been
provided from an out of school area. Although these have been accepted and used with gratitude
by many teachers, the fact that the materials in comparison to standard educational materials
have not been approved by the ministry or checked by educational experts bear the danger that,
for example, targeted marketing, false information, or even influential messages get into
classrooms in this way. Thus, these materials do not represent a permanent solution for modern,
pedagogically, and didactically founded teaching that is oriented towards the individual needs of
the learners (ebd.).
Again, researchers and experts mainly agree on the fact that digital media offer a lot of
potential for new learning methods and concepts (Ladel, 2016; Schmeinck, 2016; Irion &
Scheiter, 2018; Schmeinck, 2018; Anders et al., 2019). However, these must then also be
reviewed in terms of their quality and effectiveness. Therefore, a huge amount of research is still
needed to enable evidence-based development, implantation, and evaluation of school-based
teaching concepts for contemporary, pedagogically, and didactically founded teaching and
learning in elementary schools.
The provision of freely accessible teaching materials and concepts seems sensible and
necessary against the background of supporting teachers in digitization. However, these
materials must not only be geared to the learning objectives of the lessons. They must also be
tailored to the respective needs of the learners and checked for quality, accuracy, and neutrality.
20
1.5. Digitization-related competencies and skills of teachers

Teachers are in many ways crucial in determining the motivation and attitude to learning as
well as the learning success and enjoyment of learners (Hattie, 2012). They also play a crucial
role in the implementation of new digital concepts, as they act hearby as both facilitators and
role models. However, the experiences of the last months have revealed major deficits in this
area in particular. For example, many teachers – especially in elementary schools – not only
have major problems operating and/or using digital devices. They also have difficulties
understanding the technical devices and underlying informatic processes themselves. Without a
basic understanding of the devices, their functions and effects, however, teachers cannot explain
the devices to the children or make them understandable or even teach them how to use them
competently. The well-founded selection of media, materials, and tools, as well as an
assessment of the benefits or added value of materials, is only possible if the teachers are
familiar with them and can recognize and assess both the teaching potential and/or the possible
dangers or limitations. Therefore, in addition to a well-founded university teacher training,
regular in-service training for teachers is indispensable.
Nevertheless, most teachers do not have the necessary IT skills or specific qualifications in
areas such as IT security, data protection or secure data storage. Even school administrators, and
many school boards are still overwhelmed with the selection and handling of digital media.
Therefore, it seems important and necessary that teachers receive support from appropriate
experts for both, for further school development, and for all questions and aspects related to
digitization in schools. And again, this must be understood as a permanent task and implemented
accordingly.
2. Conclusion
Digital technologies, materials and learning platforms do not automatically improve
teaching, but must be used by teachers in a targeted, age-appropriate manner, taking into account
pedagogical and didactic issues, in order to promote learning. In the sense of pedagogical
valorisation, i.e. the pedagogical-didactical utilisation of the currently available information and
communication technologies, teachers must be able to decide where, for example, the use of
digital media can meaningfully support teaching-learning processes (Kasper et al., 2020).
For contemporary, pedagogically and didactically based teaching during and after the
COVID-19 pandemic, however, we not only need comprehensive digitisation-related competences
on the part of teachers, we also need clearly defined, scientifically evaluated and research-based
teaching concepts as well as quality criteria or standards for good teaching. Last but not least, and
this aspect appears to be of crucial importance against the backdrop of current developments
(e.g. fake news), teachers also need comprehensive digitisation-related competences that enable
them to promote the learners’ media competence in the classroom appropriately and sustainably.
For example, it is important to sensitise primary school children to the critical handling of data
and the reflexive use of digital technologies and media (Schmeinck, 2020).
The current process of equipping schools, teachers and learners with the necessary digital
technologies can certainly be seen as a first step in the right direction. However, without the
appropriate teacher training and in-job training, it will be difficult to achieve the necessary
digitalisation-related competences among teachers as outlined above. There is still a clear need
for continuous action here. It is not enough to look at digitization in schools from the
perspective of technical devices and possibilities. They are only one of the many fundamental
conditions for success. Instead, the main focus has to be on the quality of the teaching and
learning processes. Only in this way can we meet the future requirements of a qualified and
future-oriented education in schools.
21
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About the author

Daniela Schmeinck is Professor for Primary Science and Social Sciences, at University of
Cologne. She is a member of the steering committee for the International Geographic Union –
Commission on Geography Education (IGU-CGE), Vice-President of the European Association of
Geographers (EUROGEO) and a book review editor of the journal of International Research in
Geographical and Environmental Education (IRGEE). Her research focus is on teaching and
learning in Primary School, conceptual change, media literacy, digital technologies in education
and coding in Primary School.
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DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION IN VOCATIONAL EDUCATION AND

TRAINING TO MEET CURRENT REQUIREMENTS OF EDUCATION
REFORM AT VOCATIONAL SCHOOLS IN SOUTH CENTRAL COAST
Nguyen Xuan Tao*1, Nguyen Van De2, Phan Ngoc Thach2
Abstract: The industrial revolution 4.0 with its outstanding application of media and digital
technologies (DTs) has influenced almost every aspect of life. DTs have facilitated novel and
creative ideas to work more productively and effectively. DTs have also led different companies
and businesses to a crucial strategic task: digital transformation (DT). Therefore, implementing
DT is an important mission for every business and organization or institution. In such a context,
using DT is considered an inevitable trend in the vocational education and training (VET) system
to innovate itself to meet the ever changing requirements of businesses and employers at the
present time. However, the implementation of DTs at some vocational schools, in reality, is facing
lots of difficulties. This paper, using both qualitative and quantitative methods, investigated the
status quo of DT activities in VET, identified the challenges of implementing DT at vocational
schools in South Central Region (SCR), and proposed solutions to improve the quality of VET at
the schools in the region in accordance to the current requirements of education reform.
Keywords: digital technologies (DTs), digital transformation (DT), vocational education and
training (VET)
INTRODUCTION
The fourth Industrial Revolution (IR 4.0) with advances in science and technology has
continuously supported the development of industrialization all around the world. In terms of
education, the IR 4.0 wave has allowed educators to align human skills with innovative
technologies. Digitalization has facilitated innovations and creativity in teaching and learning
more effectively. Therefore, implementing DT is both an important mission and an inevitable
trend for the VET system. In such a context, vocational schools in SCR are expected to innovate
the teaching and learning methods by using DTs. It isnecessary to transform the existing
education system, including VET, dominated by classical understanding into a new version of
DTs in accordance with today’s conditions (Parlak, 2017).
However, DT at some vocational schools in SCR, in reality, seems not to be an easy job.
Bridging the gap between theory and practice, for example, is a big challenge for many schools.
The existing curricula need revising to be aligned with the new trend of DT. Training teachers
and preparing students for using DTs is another problem. Besides, lots of preparation is required
to modify facilities and equipment accordingly. Those are considered barriers to the DT at
vocational schools in the area.
This research is to find out the status quo of VET activities, the challenges of implementing
DT in VET at vocational schools in SCR are facing, then proposed solutions to improve the
quality of VET in the region in accordance to the current requirements of education reform. The
research aims to answer two questions:
1. What DT activities are being implement at vocational schools in SCR?
2. What are the challenges of implementing DT at vocational schools in SCR?
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Xuan Tao; Email Address: taokhanhhoa@gmail.com

1 Cam Lam Vocational School
2 Dong Thap University
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In this research, we use both qualitative and quantitative methods to get the most valuable
results.The scope of this research is focused on sixteen vocational schools in SCR (2 vocational
schools in each province; especially, 01 vocational school in Ninh Thuan, 03 vocational schools
in Khanh Hoa). The quantitative research method was used to collect data through
questionnaires (Likert scale questions), multiple choice and open-ended questions with 336
participants (16 leaders, 80 managers, 240 teachers). Besides, annual report documents,
observable notes and interviews were also employed to get in-depth data. The interview
participants are managers, teachers and students. The interview sessions took up approximately
10-15 minutes each to find out the participants’ perspectives on DT and its status in VET.
CONTENT
1. Literature Review
1.1. The concept of digital transformation
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (2018) stated that DT refers to
the economic and societal effects of digitization and digitalization. Digitization is the
conversion of analog data and processes into a machine-readable format. Digitalization is the
use of DTs and data as well as their interconnection which results in new or changes to existing
activities. DT as the use of technology to radically improve performance or reach of enterprises
(Boundfour, 2016, pp. 20-21). DT can be seen as the use of new DTs (social media, mobile,
analytics or embedded devices) to enable major business improvements (such as enhancing
customer experience, streamlining operations or creating new business models) (Fitzgerald, et
al., 2013, p. 2). Ebert and Duarte (2018) emphasised that DT is not only about adopting
disruptive technologies to increase productivity, value creation, and the social welfare, is a
convergence of hard and soft forces, including human resources and movements from which
additional values emerge.
Indeed, it is perceived as a fundamental transition of society, driven by generations called
“digital” (including Generation Y, born between 1980 and 2000, and Z, born from the 2000s)
for which DTs are deeply rooted in their culture and daily practices. In this context, companies
must be able to adapt themselves by changing their business model or develop a new one. DT as
“a disruptive or incremental change process. It starts with the adoption and use of DTs, then
evolving into an implicit holistic transformation of an organization, or deliberate to pursue value
creation” (Henriette et al., 2016, p. 3).
Siebel (2019) stated that DT arises from the intersection of cloud computing, bit data, IoT,
and IA, and it is vital to industries across the market today. Some describe it as the power of
DTs applied to every aspect of the organization. Parlak (2017) showed that thanks to the rapidly
developing information and communication technologies, digital tools used in educational
settings are also increasing and changing in this direction. Taşkıran (2017) argued that DT in
education is inevitable as a result of the use of increasing technology in everyday life.
From the above concepts of DT, we assert that DT in VET is not only about the
implementation of DTs solutions but also for reforming activities of vocational teaching and
learning by using DTs in vocational schools.
1.2. The digital transformation elements in vocational education and training
1.2.1. The digital transformation in the curriculum of vocational education and training
DTs lead to massive changes in the skill sets needed for the world of work of the present
and future. Hence, the vocational schools need to integrate DTs seamlessly into the curriculum
which emphasises on creative thinking skills, practical skills, soft skills, knowledge of DTs
integration and application. The curriculum must be updated and changed in accordance with
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the labor market requirements in today’s digital age and students can easily access to digital
learning materials (DLM) through the internet connection. DTs and the internet allow for easy
sharing of such resources that is called Open Educational Resources (OER) in VET. They can
take many different forms: They range from textbooks to curricula, syllabi, course materials to
lecture notes, assignments, tests, audio, video and animation (Ehlers et al., 2018, p. 3).
Through DTs, digitalization of education is a powerful trend in terms of reformation and
modernization of global education environment. Digitalization means transformation of all
information types (texts, sounds, visuals, video and other data from various sources) into the
digital language (Machekhina, 2017, p. 2). Hence, reforming the VET curriculum by DTs
integration and applicationis really necessary for learners so that they have many creative ideas
when accessing many different quality DLM. This is seen as an opportunity to improve the
quality of VET and offer solutions to long-standing problems such as lack of reference material
sources and unavailable materials in a digitally usable format; restricted internet access,
especially in mountainous and island areas; the gap between theory and practice in VET.
Moreover, VET systems are often not flexible enough to respond to the changing needs of the
labour market (European Commission, 2020, p. 17). Therefore, vocational schools need to
flexibly develop the availability of DLM to meet labor market requirements and facilitate the
use of DLM for learners.
1.2.2. The methods of vocational teaching and learning by Digital technologies
Mokhtaret et al. (2019) argued that under the driving force of IR 4.0, education is expected
to undergo a transformation that challenges traditional teaching methods and requires
imagination as well as vision in addition to technical expertise. With traditional teaching
methods, classwork and lessons do not contribute to students’ personal initiatives to learn
something new, establish objective connection between their knowledge and the real world
(Machekhina, 2017, p. 5). Therefore, digital innovations are supposed to support a shift from
teacher to learner-centred practices thereby fostering creativity, communication and problem-
solving skills (Langthaler & Bazafkan, 2020, p. 12).
Dörner and Rundel (2021) considered that DT is seen as an opportunity as well as the
possibility of new forms of teaching and learning. Thanks to this, learning can be organized
more flexibly regardless of strains of time and location. Schwendimann et al. (2018) stated that
DT can contribute to integrating student learning in vocational education conducted in school
and workplaces; for example, apps, blogs, digital portfolios, mobile phones, simulations, social
media and video diaries can be used to bridge the learning gap between the arenas.
In DT process, Benedek and Molnár (2015) asserted that digitalization of the content of
education and on-line courses are also conceivably successful and easily applied in new projects
(technology transfer, non-formal training and vocational training). The schools, hence, need to
change their teaching and learning methods through using DTs. There are six areas of learning
holding promise for VET such as distance learning and assessment, simulation, flipped
classrooms, gamification, open education resources and personalization (see Table 1).
Table 1. Six areas of learning holding promise for vocational education and training
Areas of learning Description Application in teaching and learning Technologies used
Learn anywhere and Blended learning (Classroom training and Ubiquitous computing and
Distance learning anytime e-learning), Massive Open Online Courses Internet with Broadband,
and assessment (MOOCs). Learners access to education easily. Mobile broadband, Cloud
computing
Modelling of work- Learning vocational practice to develop skills. By Extended reality (ER):
Simulation environments in digital using ER to create an environment where Virtual reality (VR),
worlds learners can make mistakes and try again Augmented reality (AR), Mixed
without real-life repercussions reality (MR)
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Areas of learning Description Application in teaching and learning Technologies used

Receive knowledge at Students study the materials and communicate Artificial intelligence (AI)
Flipped classroom home/online, practice with the teacher before studying in class. for teaching and assessment,
skills in class Students practice skills to develop creativity in classroom management
class with of teacher’s support. system (eLMS, Teams, etc.)
Using game incentives Blending gamification into the vocational Softwares (Quizz, Kahoot,
Gamification
schemes to increase teaching and learning process. Students Educandy, Powerpoint...)
motivation participate in classroom activities positively.
Increasing access to Students improve learning experiences and Blockchain
Open education education by removing generate innovation in open educational Data base, Internet of things
resources restrictions to content practices. Students can use the computer with (IoT), Cloud computing
the guarantee of privacy and security.
Enabling each student Students identify their chosen individual learning Collaboration technologies
to study according to and actively learn to improve their skills in a (Facebook, Google Groups;
Personalization
their own abilities and personalized learning environment. Students can Dropbox, Google Drive,
aspirations collaborate with anyone in real time. WhatsApp and Skype...)
Source: Grech and Camilleri (2017)
Technological elements in particular such as Ubiquitous computing, ER, AI, Blockchain,
Collaboration technologies are driving innovation in VET. Therefore, DTs enable new forms of
participation in the learning processes for the students. With online education such as e-learning,
MOOCs, and e-lectures by teachers, students have opportunites to learn anywhere, anytime they
want through using technological devices and the Internet, without the restrictions of an agenda.
They can access a great OER for acquiring knowledge and skills to learn quickly and easily by
using technologies. They can also control the content and self-manage their learning. Gradually,
the traditional method of teaching and learning will be replaced by modern methods of teaching
and learning and students are becoming more interested to learn this education model. Wyman
(2020) stressed the importance on teaching students not what to study, but how to learn and how
to adapt to rapidly-changing technology. Langthaler and Bazafkan (2020) argued that
digitalization bears the potential to foster innovative, creative, self-organised learning, what
emerges here is that for this potential to deliver, digital schooling needs to be accompanied by
high-quality tutoring based on personal interaction between teachers and students. Hence,
implementing DT in VET is really essential in the context of current education reform.
1.2.3. The digital infrastructure in vocational education and training
While the physical infrastructure of the school plays an extremely important role in
providing an enabling environment in the student’s learning journey, another important aspect is
the digital infrastructure, a key differentiation among the schools that has really changed the
delivery of VET content in schools. Digital infrastructure refers to the DTs that provide the
foundation for an organization’s information technology and operations.
For today’s students, wifi and internet connectivity are indispensable tools to support their
learning. Digital tools have been introduced both as mediums of learning (digital devices such
as computers, tablets or mobile phones) and as part of the curriculum (from digital user skills to
programming, coding and highly specialised digital skills) (Langthaler & Bazafkan, 2020, p. 12).
The technology has enabled a new pedagogy, one much more appropriate to today’s students
and that enables access to study materials and tools whenever and wherever students wish (Sims
& Solmonides, 2008, p. 11).
Akash (2018) confirmed that teaching and learning by integrating learning technology have
met great success. And the trend is poised to gain further strength in the times to come. Hence,
the vocational schools must be equipped with digital infrastructure to ensure effective teaching
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and learning through using DTs. In addition, to remain innovative and engaging for students,
these schools must keep up to date with current technological developments and respond to the
demands of the digital economy by providing students with the skills and new digital
competencies during vocational training.
1.2.4. The digital competences of teachers and students in vocational education and training
European Commission (2020) stated that innovation and digitalisation in VET require a
multitude of support (covering software and hardware, support to trainers and teachers, and
many other aspects). In which one of the important elements is the digital competences of
teachers and students in vocational teaching and learning. DTs have the potential to enable
teachers to support learners in and out of the classroom by leveraging digital tools and internet
connectivity to communicate with learners and monitor their progress. Therefore, encouraging
teachers and students to learn digital skills is really necessary and ensure the improvement of
the quality of VET in implementing DT at vocational schools.
The vocational schools ensure that a range of formal and informal professional learning
opportunities are available to teachers and students at all stages to equip them with the skills and
confidence toutilise DTs appropriately and effectively. Swinney (2016) stated that the schools
should carry out the following key activities: encouraging teachers to share innovative and
effective practice both face-to-face and through digital platforms; ensuring that students are
sufficiently supported in the appropriate and effective use of DTs; ensuring that appropriate
career-long professional learning opportunities are offered to a range of teachers; ensuring
students are involved in sharing their digital experiences and skills and that they are given
opportunities to comment on the use of DTs to deliver learning and teaching. UNESCO-
UNEVOC (2021) identified that TVET needs to play its part in preparing both youth and adults
with the required digital skills – adhering to both industry needs and enabling continuous
learning. However, current research and practice often neglects the possibilities of investigating
the role of collaboration in vocational education, where the interaction between people in
different locations is fundamental to the systems’ effective functioning of the (dual) systems
(Schwendimann et al., 2018, p. 35).
1.3. Opportunities and challenges when implementing Digital transformation in
vocational education and training
While raising the demand for new skills, DTs are also creating new opportunities and
challenges for TVET and skills development systems (International Labour Organization, 2020,
p. 13). The education system as a whole is called to adapt and evolve to take advantage of new
technologies and tools and to develop strategies and actions to play an active role in the DT
process (OECD., 2019, p. 128).
Through DT, the students benefit from increasing different competences like gaining
theoretical expert knowledge, solving practical tasks or using new technologies in their working
environment (Wuttke, et al., 2020, p. 58). Educational organizations, however, do not seem
sufficiently well prepared for the challenges of digitalization, often struggling with bad
infrastructure or staff shortages (Bernhard-Skala, 2019). Moreover, DTs has now evolved not
only to project text and figures, but also animations, video clips etc., thus the teachers are now
equipped with tools to teach effectively (Wikramanayake, 2005, p. 6).
Therefore, the vocational schools need to prepare an educational strategy to adapt
accordingly to the new context. These schools need to adjust their teaching content and methods
through the application of DTs. This can be considered as a real challenge since the schools do
not have enough training capacity to immediately access DT, especially those in mountain and
island areas.
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2. Situation and problems

2.1. The status and challenges of carrying out digital transformation at vocational
education and training schools in South Central Region
2.1.1. The vocatinal training scale in South Central Region
The SCR including eight provinces (Da Nang, Quang Nam, Quang Ngai, Quy Nhon, Khanh
Hoa, Ninh Thuan, Binh Thuan) with the area of 45,000 km², about 10 million people is one of
the important economic region of Vietnam. However, human resources in this region have not
yet met the requirements for the sustainable development of the marine economy (Tran Van
Tung, 2019). Currently, Vietnam including the SCR was faced with many challenges of low
technical and professional qualifications of the human resources. The trained workers with
degrees and certificates is only account for 24.5% of the workforce (Communist Party of
Vietnam 2021, p. 42). In order to increase the quantity and improve the quality of human
resources in this region, the vocational schools have actively implemented counseling and
enrollment with positive results in Table 2.
Table 2. Status of enrollment in the South Central Region
Training level Training scale Actual enrollment Enrollment results (%)
Colleges 30159 26113 86.58
Intermediate level 26294 27605 104.98
Elementary level 144535 146826 101.58
Total 200988 200544 99.78
Source: The SCR Departments of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs (2020)
The VET system in enrolls about 200544 people annually, accounting for 99.78% of the
training scale. However, enrollment results of college and intermediate training levels are still
very low in Chart 1. In order to meet the requirements of quality human resources in the region,
vocational schools need to increase the enrollment scale of college and intermediate levels in the
next time.
Chart 1. Enrollment results of vocational training levels (2020)

2.1.2. The status of digital transformation in the vocational education and training curricula
The entire workplace world is undergoing a highly dynamic process of DT. DTs such as
computers, the Internet, digital platforms, robots, artificial intelligence, and big data
technologies have led to a “digital transformation” (Morandini M.C., et al., 2020, p. 4). Because
more than ever, learners who are future skilled workers are required to be able to perform more
related tasks, and to completely control processes and systems in the digital era of Industry 4.0.
In order to keep pace with the new technologies, the VET curriculum must be updated to
transform new curriculum (digital curriculum). Digital curriculum is any digital content that
takes many forms to support the delivery of the curriculum and facilitates the achievement of
educational goals (Al-Awidi and Aldhafeeri, 2017, p. 107). However, the vocational schools in
SCR face challenges when implementing transformation from traditional curriculum to digital
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curriculum (Table 3). All 5 items asked for managers and teachers were selected to focus on the
responses to grade “Slightly agree” from 2.46 to 2.80 and the response to grade of 4 “Agree” is
only 3.14 (using the Likert scales). Thus, the status of DT in the VET curriculum is still slow
and does not meet the requirements of the labor market.
Table 3. The status of digital transformation in the vocational education and training curricula
Strongly disagree (1); Disagree (2); Slightly agree (3); Agree (4); Strongly agree (5); N = 336
Number of responses
The survey questions Mean Rank
1 2 3 4 5
Schools have completely made transformation from the paper
0 68 178 62 28 3.14 1
instructional materials to DLM.
Schools have developed DLM for vocational training curricula. 35 59 184 53 5 2.80 2
Schools have integrated knowledge and skills of DTs (Big Data,
42 126 110 51 7 2.57 4
IoT, AI,...) into the curricula.
Curriculum ensures interaction between the school and the
40 102 125 59 10 2.69 3
new digital workplace.
Curricula for new occupations are related to the Industry 4.0
59 109 104 48 9 2.46 5
such as Cloud Computing, Data Analytics.
Source: The vocational schools in the South Central Region (2021)
2.1.3. Reforming methods of vocational teaching and learning by digital technologies
DTs has created opportunities for reforming methods of vocational teaching and learning.
Transforming from traditional teaching method to innovative teaching methods through the
application of DTs has supported pedagogical innovation and improve the quality of vocational
teaching and learning. However, the vocational schools in SCR were not ready for reforming
methods of teaching and learning (Table 4). All 6 items asked for managers and teachers were
selected to focus on the responses to grade “Slightly agree” from 2.44 to 2.86. With these
results, the status of reforming methods of vocational teaching and learning by DTs in this
region should be improved to enhance the quality of teaching and learning. Thereby, ensuring
human resources will meet the region’s economic development requirements in the next time.
Table 4. The status of reforming methods of vocational teaching and learning
Number of responses
1 2 3 4 5
Teachers and students often use DLM in teaching and learning. 45 103 117 61 10 2.67 3
Face to face teaching methods combining with the use of DTs in
34 89 126 63 24 2.86 1
the classroom are used very often.
The school’s online learning is really effective in VET, especially
32 160 94 45 5 2.50 4
during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The “Blended Learning” model are being popularly applied in
38 158 95 42 3 2.45 5
the vocational schools.
Teachers have made the transition to personalized learning by
31 179 87 39 3 2.44 6
using collaborative technologies.
The connection between learning at school and the digital
41 101 125 58 11 2.69 2
workplace has effectively supported students.
Source: The vocational schools in the SCR (2021)
2.1.4. Digital infrastructure in vocational teaching and learning
Students currently in the vocational schools in the industrialised world have accessed to
web-based technologies and tools, and are likely to have engaged with online activities
throughout their VET experiences. More widely, there is increasing pressure on these schools to
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provide flexible learning environments and access to digital infrastructure in vocational teaching
and learning. However, the availability of equipment and digital infrastructure for teachers,
students and managers are also challenges for these school which are faced with many
difficulties of using digital media extensively in VET (Table 5). All 6 items asked for managers
and teachers were selected to focus on the responses of grade “Slightly agree” from 2.79 to 2.95
and the responses to grade of 4 “Agree” from 3.18 to 3.25. Therefore, the digital infrastructure
does not completely meet the requirements of organizing teaching and learning in the digital
environment.
Table 5. The status of digital infractructure in vocational teaching and learning
Number of responses
1 2 3 4 5
The available physical infrastructure ensure setting to
19 49 129 107 32 3.25 1
establish the digital infrastructure.
Schools ensure electronic devices to access to the
20 93 126 81 16 2.94 4
Internet and respond to teaching and learning.
Schools ensure the network system (LAN, WAN) and
18 69 110 102 37 3.18 2
broadband to access the Internet anywhere, anytime.
Softwares ensure that encrypted information transfer
29 98 115 79 15 2.86 5
and password authentication are always protected.
Schools ensure the human resources to set up and
25 95 108 87 21 2.95 3
maintain digital infrastructure.
School has enough financial resources to set up and
35 112 96 74 19 2.79 6
maintain digital infrastructure.
2.1.5. Digital competence of teachers and students in vocatinal education and training
In order to shift from the traditional instructional materials to digital and more innovative
resources, teachers have to be prepared for the transformational curriculum. Teachers need to
acquire all the technical and pedagogical skills that enable them to integrate DTs effectively into
the school curriculum (Al-Awidi and Aldhafeeri, 2017, p. 121). However, the problems of
teachers’ digital competencies is posing challenges to the vocational schools (Table 6). All 5
items of teachers’ digital competencies asked for managers and teachers were selected to focus
on the responses of grade “Slightly agree” from 2.73 to 2.85 and the responses to grade of 4
“Agree” from 3.24 to 3.41. With these results, many of the teachers still lack the experience of
integrating DTs into their lectures. However, most of them are confident when using IT in
teaching and learning.
All 5 items of students’ digital competencies asked for managers and teachers were selected
to focus on the responses to grade “Slightly agree” from 2.29 to 2.69 (using the Likert scales).
Thus, they will face many challenges in digital learning.
Table 6. Digital competence of teachers and students in vocational education and training
The survey questions Number of responses
Mean Rank
Digital competence of the teachers 1 2 3 4 5
Teachers are completely confident when using IT in
18 70 92 126 30 3.24 2
Teachers have basic IT knowledge and skills to carry out
0 76 81 145 34 3.41 1
learning and teaching activities.
Teachers easily integrate DTs into their lectures to improve
32 120 92 71 21 2.79 4
students’ thinking and creative skills.
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The survey questions Number of responses

Mean Rank
Digital competence of the teachers 1 2 3 4 5
Teachers often use electronic devices to optimize
28 119 101 70 22 2.85 3
vocational teaching and learning.
Teachers actively apply teaching and learning
33 127 90 68 18 2.73 5
management softwares to improve the quality of VET.
Digital competence of the students 1 2 3 4 5 Mean Rank
Students are completely confident about online learning 42 138 81 65 10 2.62 3
Students have basic IT knowledge and skills to carry out
31 129 96 74 6 2.69 1
digital learning.
Students easily look for, select and exploit information
59 147 89 61 5 2.65 2
from DLM.
Students is able to designrequired products (Web pages,
60 156 76 44 3 2.35 4
models...).
Students from remote regions have equal access to their
73 152 56 50 5 2.29 5
digital learning.
2.1.6. The difficulties when implementing digital transformation in vocational education and
training at the schools
Surveying the difficulties when implementing DT in VET at the vocational schools by 336
managers and teachers.The results are shown in the following column charts (Chart 2).
Chart 2. The difficulties when implementing DT in VET

As shown in Chart 2, the vocational schools are facing many difficulties when
implementing DT in VET. These schools were not ready for new method of teaching and
learning by DTs. In order for overcoming challenges and taking advantage of DT’s
opportunities for VET innovation, the schools must have solutions to improve the quality of
VET in the region in accordance to the current requirements of education reform. Pfeiffer
(2015) argued that the VET system needs to restore its lost attractiveness because in any
circumstances, it remains an indispensable building block for future development. Educational
managers need to analyze the current state of the system in order to have appropriate solutions
when implementing DT in VET.
2.2. Results and discussion
In this section, we present the results obtained from this research and discuss the findings.
With a total of 336 targeted participants in this research, while all 16 leaders, 80 managers,
280 teachers of the vocational schools were successfully interviewed by talking directly, on the
phone or by email. The results are separated and then merged with the quantitative results for
purposes of interpretation and discussion. The different tools of data collection, namely
questionnaires, annual report documents, observable notes and interviews allow the collection
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of data that complement each other and help confirm, deny, or enrich results for purposes of
wider interpretation. The results obtained from the analysis of the questionnaire and survey data
are presented in Table 7.
Table 7. Solutions for implementing DT at vocational schools in the SCR
Response option Number of responses Percentage
Propagating and raising awareness of responsibility for implementing DT in VET 292 86%
Improving teachers’ and students’ capacity to applying DTs in the teaching and learning
320 95%
process
Updating and developping VET curricula in the direction of integrating DTs in accordance
306 91%
with labor market requirements
Cooperating closely the enterprises with advanced technology application into the vocational
316 94%
training process
Developing mechanisms and policies towards enhancing the DTs application in the teaching
239 71%
and learning process
As shown in Table 7, the highest number of responses goes for improving the capacity of
teachers and students to apply DTs in the teaching and learning process (95%), and cooperating
closely with the enterprises with advanced technology application into vocational training
process (94%). Updating and developping VET curriculum in the direction of integrating DTs in
accordance with labor market requirements ranked next (91%) which can be considered as a
very important factor when implementing DT in VET. Propagating and raising awareness of
responsibility for implementing DT in VET showed a very high percentage (86%), while
developing mechanisms and policies towards enhancing the DTs application in the teaching and
learning process is difficult to implement DT at VET schools in the SCR got the least responses
from the participants (71%). Therefore, to renew VET activities the next time, the vocational schools
in the SCR need to focus on implementing some of the following breakthrough solutions:
(i) Improving the capacity of teachers and students to apply DTs in the teaching and
learning process. Organizing DTs fostering classes regularly is considered a very effective way
to improve digital skills for teachers and students. Besides, self-study groups can be seen as a
good way for peer teaching where teachers can mutually help each other. This is very much
aligned with the previous study by Ebert and Duarte (2018) that DT requires not only
technologies but also the soft forces, namely, human resources for better quality.
(ii) Cooperating closely the enterprises with advanced technology application into the
vocational training process. By working actively with the enterprises, schools can develop
vocational training programs related to Industry 4.0, invite experts of the enterprises to
participate in vocational training, and evaluate students’ practicum and apprenticeship. This
finding is in line with Schwertner’s (2017) conclusion that in DT, it is not enough to use as
many technologies as possible. The strategy is moving, it must have a clear vision for
development. A close and efficient cooperation with companies and enterprises can help
improve students’ employability after graduating.
(iii) Updating and developping VET curriculum in the direction of integrating DTs in
accordance with labor market requirements. Technology integration into the curriculum is an
essential factor to improve the quality and innovation in VET. The students can apply computers
and technology skills to learning and real-world problems solving in support of the teachers.
(iv) Raising awareness of responsibility for implementing DT in VET among the
stakeholders, including staff, parents, employers, and students themselves. Once they are fully
aware of the roles and significance of DTs application in management, teaching, learning and
scientific research activities, the process of implementation can be carried out much more easily
since it can get support from all those who concern.
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(v) Developing mechanisms and policies towards enhancing DTs application in the
teaching and learning process should not be neglected in the process. Therefore, the availability
of digital infrastructure and the legal framework in a digital learning environment for managers,
teachers and students will facilitate implementing DT in VET successfully and effectively.
These solutions are implemented in accordance with the reality of each vocational school in
the region.
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
With the trend of implementing DT in VET, the vocational schools in the SCR need to
actively improve the quality of VET and implement breakthrough solutions in applying DTs for
teaching and learning organization. Reforming in VET at vocational schools is really necessary
for the vocational training of the region. Hence, these schools will gradually enhance the quality
of human resources in line with the needs of the labor market. The graduates of VET schools in
the region will adapt to the rapid change technologies of industrial revolution 4.0 when
participating in the industrial production process as well as meeting the requirements of “the
working world 4.0”.
Thus, DT in VET has had a strong impact on the vocational schools in the region, it offers
new requirements for renewal of training content and methods through the DTs application.
Especially, these schools should soon shift from traditional teaching methods to new teaching
methods through use of DTs to promote the students’ potentials. Even in automated processes,
vocational learning needs should be structured differently to meet the requirements of each
student. Because of this, the goal of these schools should also be towards educating each student
to enhance their professional knowledge and skills, a personal capacity to adapt to the rapidly
changing industrial revolution 4.0. This will help to improve the country with the power of
skills as well as enhancing the national competitiveness of human resources in the future.
It is also recommended that the vocational schools should soon develop DLM and innovate
training curricula annually in order to keep up with technological changes of this industrial
revolution. The curricula, then should be updated participatory process in which all the
stakeholders such as curriculum developers, educators, trainers, students, parents and employers
should be involved. In this way, the vocational schools can meet the current needs of the
trainees and employers. Besides, these schools should actively promote cooperation with
international training institutions to develop vocational training programs and curricula according
to national and international standards to meet requirements of “the working world 4.0”.
Moreover, it is crucial to complete the system of mechanisms and policies including digital
infrastructure investment; digital competency training for managers, teachers and students; close
cooperation of the stakeholders in VET; legal framework for VET in the digital environment;
planning the network of vocational schools in the region. This system of mechanisms and
policies will create motivation for the vocational schools to implement DT in VET sustainably
and effectively. In this way, the vocational schools can meet current requirements of education
reform in the context that DT is seen as one of the important solutions for the country’s
economic and social development.
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About the authors

– MSc Nguyen Xuan Tao is the principal of Cam Lam Vocational Training School, Khanh
Hoa. He is currently doing PhD studies at Dong Thap University. His field of interest is
innovation in vocational education and training. He has published 3 articles in the field.
– Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van De used to be the Rector of Dong Thap University and is
now the Chairman of Dong Thap University Council for Science and Training. He has
supervised lots of master’s degree theses and doctoral theses. He has written many books and
published lots of articles in the field of educational leadership and management.
– Dr. Phan Ngoc Thach works at Dong Thap University. He earned his Master Degree in
Learning Innovation, and his Doctoral Degree in Curriculum Development at Queensland
University of Technology, Australia. Dr. Phan has published an article on Studies at Higher
Education, and many others in Vietnamese. He has supervised both Master’s and PhD students
in the area of educational science.
37
EVALUATING THE CURRENT STATE AND APPROACHABILITY

OF SMART SCHOOL MODELS IN HANOI
Bui Thi Thuy Hang*1, Vu Minh Trang2,
Lai Phuong Lien , Tang Thi Thuy2, Nguyen Trung Hien3
2
Abstract: In the context of the Industrial Revolution 4.0, the Vietnamese government issued
Directive 16/CT-TTg to orient building smart schools to train smart learners to meet the
requirements of human resources of the modern technological society. The goal of this research is
to study the criteria for building smart schools in the world and in Vietnam to build a survey
evaluating the current state and approachability of the smart school model in Hanoi. 437
educational leaders and teachers (74 leaders, 363 teachers) from over 12 primary, secondary and
high schools in urban and suburbs areas of Hanoi participated in this survey. The survey
questions are related to 6 areas: Curriculum and teaching methods; Teachers training; Managers
and teachers; Policies and strategies of teachers and schools; Facility and technology
infrastructure; Smart service. The results of the analysis of the survey have painted a panorama of
the situation of schools at all levels, analyzing the difference between groups of teachers in the
urban and suburbs of Hanoi, and among primary, secondary and high school levels in 6 areas.
From there, the authors will evaluate the approachability of the smart school model in Hanoi
based on the evaluation criteria of the smart school model in the world and in the Vietnam.
Finally, recommendations will be suggested on the roadmap for building and deploying a smart
school model that is applicable to the current situation of schools in Hanoi.
Keywords: smart school model, current state of schools in Hanoi, ability to approach the smart
school model, teachers of all levels, recommendations on the roadmap for building smart schools
INTRODUCTION
The process of integration and globalization in the context of the Industry 4.0 demands the
national education to supply society with a human workforce that is composed of people with
knowledge, modern working skills, high expertise and adaptability to meet the rapidly changing
requirements of the economy. This has challenged the education system to pave a new path to
properly prepare the future human workforce to fulfill the demands of society. As a result, smart
education is one of many powerful trends picked up by a considerable number of countries.
Smart school is the center of the smart education system and is where smart education’s
ideas are actualized with the help of Information Technology and Media applications and
platforms, “Smart schools are schools that use resources based on modern digital technology
achievements flexibility and effectively in order to improve the education quality, meeting
society’s demands of training the new generations” (Vu, 2018). Smart schools emphasize
improving the skills of creative thinking, perception and self-control in learners using activities
that involve experiencing, exploring and creating knowledge under the guidance and control of
teachers. In the smart school model, the learner is the center of the education process: learners
get to convey their perception of the world, improve personal skills, present their ideas
independently in virtual classes, therefore competent learners will quickly approach various
complex topics while slow-paced learners will continue with the activities until they complete
the topic. In this way, smart schools create a learning environment that is equal, non-biased in
* Corresponding Author: Bui Thi Thuy Hang; E-mail Address: hang.buithithuy@hust.edu.vn

1 Hanoi University of Science and Technology
2 VNU-University of Education
3 VNU-International School
38
the education process, narrowing the gaps between social classes, genders and eventually,
countries. Moreover, a smart school also brings a comprehensive change in the education
system – from teaching and learning methods, curriculum to the assessment and evaluation
process where science and technology, especially when Information technology and Media have
infiltrated and deeply influenced the perception and role of education and schools. Therefore,
the birth of the smart schools model has propelled and created a precedence for each and every
school to improve adaptability and the ability to develop in a balanced way in the face of the
rapid changes of society and the demands of globalization and integration in a digital era – to
train a generation of smart citizens (Vu, 2018; Vu, 2020).
In the 1990s, Poland was one of the first information societies in the world to focus national
resources on making information technologies the base for the 21st-century skill set taught in
schools. The preparation for the new national strategy of applying ICTS (information and
communication technologies) in education in schools has been commenced. IT has been utilized
effectively with the purpose of giving every child the right to receive education in the school
community. The practice has been changed from using the traditional Internet to the newest
mobile technology and social media. The main criteria, therefore, is technology has to be
considered a learning tool (Niemi et al., 2013). In 2014, the New York smart school committee’s
summary report stressed that technology support in teaching and expertise development is
crucial in ensuring all American citizens can approach a high-quality education that is ready to
compete globally. Schools, educators, students, and families all benefit when digital tools and
materials are effectively integrated into classrooms and communities. Technology has the
potential to increase students’ participation and learning responsibility, improve students’
academic achievements and alter the relationship between students and teachers. Technology
can break the barrier between parents and teachers, homes and classrooms as well as amongst
schools across the States. It can facilitate interaction among students, parents and teachers and
help expand learning beyond the classroom, to home spaces. Technology also allows teachers to
carry out lessons from online locations, enhancing even the most experienced teachers’
reputation. Moreover, providing updated tools for all students is essential to ensure New York
students develop necessary skills to compete in the 21st-century economy (New York Smart
Schools Commission Report, 2014).
In Vietnam, on August 1st of 2018, the Prime Minister signed Decision No. 950/QD-TTg,
approving the “Scheme for development of smart sustainable cities in Vietnam in the 2018 – 2025
period with orientations by 2030”, according to which, 3 cities: Hanoi, Da Nang, Ho Chi Minh
City will be given the minimal financial support to build smart cities. The Ministry of Education
and Training of many provinces/cities such as Da Nang, Hanoi, HCM City, Quang Ninh,
Hai Phong... have already begun project construction or piloting smart teaching models for all
school levels.
With these advantages, the smart school model has been applied in many countries in the
world as an essential development trend in the education world in the context of integration and
globalization of the Industrial Revolution 4.0.
The goal of this research is to study the criteria for building smart schools in the world and
in Vietnam to build a survey evaluating the current state and approachability of the smart school
model in Hanoi. The survey results of the current state of smart school construction will be
presented and discussed in 6 areas: Curriculum and teaching methods; Teachers training;
Managers and teachers; Policies and strategies of teachers and schools; Facility and technology
infrastructure; Smart service. From there, recommendations will be suggested on the roadmap
for building and deploying a smart school model that is applicable to the current situation of
schools in Hanoi.
39
CONTENT
1. Standards for smart school
According to Wan, Mohd, and Alwi (2009), a Smart School is an instructive foundation
that receives educational cycles and instructive administration rehearses which encourage
fundamental changes that are expected to empower students to conquer the difficulties presented
by technology and data innovation. All the same, Smart school is an innovation-based
instructing learning foundation for getting youngsters ready with the viable usefulness of a keen
school which requires talented staff, and all-around planned educating, learning and supporting
processes (Asemi, 2006). It supports dynamic reasoning interaction while its current
circumstance propels understudies to utilize (PCs), the web and intranets as exploration and
specialized instruments. Understudies can get to online libraries, utilize electronic mail (email)
or a blend of work area video-conferencing, and visit spaces for doing instructional exercises
(Kousha, 2004).
As indicated in the research of Asemi (2006) and Kousha (2004) on Iran education system,
the idea of smart school is defined to revolutionize the education system through the
development of a holistic approach that concerns making value-based education available to
anyone, anytime and anywhere. Implementing smart schools successfully will be a complex
task, requiring a changing teaching-learning process; management functions; people, skills, and
responsibilities; and technology (see Figure 1).
Figure 1. The elements of a smart school (Omidinia et al., 2013)

In Malaysia, smart schools have been developed since 1996 that address some relevant
issues such as management and administration, people and responsibilities, technology,
processes and policies. According to Smart School Conceptual Blueprint (1997), the major
concepts in the smart school are those of curriculum, pedagogical process, teaching-learning
materials, and assessment models. The curriculum of the Smart School emphasizes seven
learning areas. They are (1) language and communication, (2) science and technology, (3) social
studies, (4) physical and health development, (5) vocational and personal awareness, (6)
practical and creative arts, and (7) values development. Figure 2 depicts the conceptual
framework of technology education in the Smart Schools.
40
Figure 2. The conceptual framework of technology education in Smart Schools

(Jen & Huang, 2004)
In Indonesia, Sampebua & Mangiwa (2017) showed an empirical model of smart school
through the architecture of smart school application services with an online learning system (see
Figure 3). Smart school application services can change the teacher-centered learning model
into student-centered learning. This causes students to be responsible for learning activities such
as learning planning, student interaction with teachers, student interaction with students, and
assessment of the discover that has been finished.
Figure 3. The architecture of smart school (Sampebua & Mangiwa 2017)
41
Zhu and He (2012) stated that “the essence of smart education is to create intelligent
environments by using smart technologies, so that smart pedagogies can be facilitated as to
provide personalized learning services and empower learners, thus talents of wisdom will have
better value orientation, higher thinking quality, and stronger conduct ability could be fostered”.
Based on this definition of smart education, a research framework is proposed as follows:
Figure 4. Framework of smart education

Thus, there have been many studies on the criteria for evaluating smart schools. To sum up,
there are a number of criteria that scientists have mentioned for the smart school model.
Table 1. Summary of Criteria of Smart School
Bătăgan & Boja Frost & Deloitte Supangkat et al., Citiasia
Criteria
(2011) Sullivan (2014) (2015) (2018) (2015)
Education digitization x x
Adaptive Learning and Counseling x
Solving educational problems x
Personalized Education x
Lifelong learning x
Cooperation with the university x
Virtual classroom x x
Computer-based training x
The infrastructure x x x
Facilities: software, hardware, personnel x
Online system, network connection, data
x x x x
management
Learning methods x
2. Research Methods
2.1. Sample
This study employed the quantitative research method through a survey of 437 educational
leaders and teachers (74 leaders, 363 teachers) from 12 schools (6 rural schools and 6 urban
schools) including primary schools, secondary schools and high schools.
42
2.2. Instrument
The data were collected by a questionnaire developed to determine the criteria of a smart
school. The questionnaires consisted of two parts. In the first part, the questions cover personal
characteristics such as sex, age, experience, school. In the second part, questions were prepared
to determine 6 dimensions of the smart school model including: (1) Curriculum and teaching
method, (2) Teachers training, (3) Managers and teachers, (4) Policy and strategy of teacher and
school, (5) Facility, (6) Smart service. In each of these six subscales, a four-point Likert-type
scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree, and never to very often. The Cronbach α
coefficient of the scale was found to be higher than 0.70. This instrument has good reliability.
2.3. Data collection
Data collection is done through a survey. After planning the investigation, the collaborators
of the project contacted the school administration to introduce the research including the
purpose of the study and the instrument of the study. The educational leaders who were
surveyed in the study were core teachers in the school management board. There were 5-6
leaders and 25-30 teachers in each school to participate in this study. Each participant had 15-20
minutes to answer the survey. This study adopted SPSS 25.0 to analize the data by descriptive
statistics as mean, standard deviation.
3. Research results
3.1. Teaching method and program
Curriculum and teaching method are fundamental elements in schools’ teaching process.
Acknowledging the importance of learner-centred teaching approaches such as integrated
teaching (IT) and differentiated teaching (DT) to apply into practice is essential to increase
study motivation and create optimal conditions for learners to achieve their maximum potential
and competency. Mean score, standard deviation and range of score of significance and
deployment level of IT and DT is shown in the Table 2 below:
Table 2. Descriptive Statistics of Curriculum and Teaching Methods Variables
Variable Mean Standard Deviation Range of Score
Significance of IT 23.34 3.31 [13; 32]
Deployment level of IT 11.41 2.51 [6; 20]
Significance of DT 19.75 2.93 [13; 28]
Deployment level of DT 8.94 2.21 [5; 16]
Results from the table above shows that generally, teachers have a rather adequate
understanding of the 2 teaching approaches: integrated and differentiated teaching. The scores
of these 2 scales prove that teachers tend to approve the significance of both teaching
approaches; it also shows their deployment levels are still low – merely occasionally and not yet
often.
Next, we investigate the correlation between the significance of these two teaching
approaches and the extent to which teachers apply them in teaching practice. The 2-way Pearson
correlation coefficients between the significance and the application of IT and DT are shown in
the table below:
Table 3. Correlation between Significance of IT and DT and their Deployment Level
Significance of IT Significance of DT
Deployment level of IT .36** Deployment level of DT .15**
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
Results from Table 3 show that there is a statistically significant positive correlation
between the perception of the significance and the implementation of the corresponding
teaching approach. It can be seen that the correlation coefficient between significance and
43
deployment level of IT is higher than the correlation coefficient between significance and
deployment level of DT.
3.2. Teacher training
Teacher training is one of the important activities to improve the professional ability and
pedagogical skills of teachers. The results of descriptive statistics on the level of participation in
the training of IT and DT are shown in the table below:
Table 4. Descriptive Statistics of Teacher Training Variables
Training 16.31 2.85 [8; 32]
Statistical results show that the level of teachers’ participation in IT and DT training forms
is low, equivalent to the occasional level.
Statistical results of the correlation between teachers training and perception of significance
and deployment of IT and DT are shown in the table below:
Table 5. Correlation between Teacher training and Significance of IT
and DT and their Deployment Level
Teacher training Teacher training
Significance of IT .20** Significance of DT .12**
Deployment level of IT .47** Deployment level of DT .32**
It can be seen that there is a statistically significant positive correlation between teacher
training, significance, and deployment level of IT and DT.
3.3. The school faculty
The results of the statistical analysis describing the survey opinions on the teaching of
teachers and the leadership of the management team are shown in Table 6 below.
Table 6. Descriptive Statistics of Teaching of Teachers
and Leadership of Management Team Variables
Teachers’ Teaching 32.19 4.23 [12; 36]
Management Team’s Leadership 31.93 5.13 [18; 36]
The results of the survey on the teaching of teachers show that the scores collected across
the scale are considerably high, which means teachers and the management team tend to highly
approve of expertise, teaching abilities, and self-improvement abilities of teachers in the school.
Likewise, the survey on the leadership of the management team gives highly positive results,
proving teachers tend to approve or highly approve of the management team’s leadership –
which involves sharing, caring, and creating motivation for innovation and applying smart
pedagogy into teaching and educating, solving the school’s problems, building connection
among members and organization both inside and outside of the school.
3.4. Policy and strategy
The results of the statistical analysis describing the opinions on policies and strategies of
teachers and schools are shown in Table 7.
Table 7. Descriptive Statistics of Teachers’ and Schools’ Policies and Strategies Variables
Teachers’ Policies and Strategies 21.15 2.41 [12; 24]
Schools’ Policies and Strategies 21.03 3.07 [12; 24]
The results in the table above show that the scores of the policies and strategies of teachers
and schools are quite high, which means that teachers and the administration boards tend to
44
agree or strongly agree with the teachers’ concerns and behavior toward students, as well as
school policies toward various educational forces.
Table 8. Correlation between Teachers’ Teaching and Policies and Strategies,
Management Team’s Leadership and Schools’ Policies and Strategies
Teachers’ Teaching Management Team’s Leadership
Teachers’ Policies and Strategies .44** Schools’ Policies and Strategies .50**
Statistical results of the correlation between teachers’ teaching and teachers’ policies and
strategies and the correlation between the management team’s leadership and schools’ policies
and strategies show that there is a statistically significant positive correlation between these two
pairs of variables (Table 8).
3.5. Facilities and technology infrastructure
Of the 32 surveyed teaching and learning facility items, touch desks for students, personal
tablets, and paper/object scanners are not yet equipped in most schools. Smart devices such as
smart podiums, smart classrooms, smart libraries, STEM classrooms are not available in the
majority of schools. Basic items such as administrative rooms, conference rooms, and computer
labs are still lacking in some schools.
The survey results of 17 categories of technology infrastructure for teaching demonstrate
that most schools do not have cloud computing technology and software systems/tools to build
digital learning materials and school automation software systems. Software systems/teaching
tools, tools for testing and evaluation, learning management software systems, student database
management software systems, information and resource management software systems, and
facilities management software system are essential factors to operate virtual classrooms and
deploy smart schools but are still lacking in many schools.
Table 9. Independent Samples T-student Statistics of Facilities
and Technology Infrastructure Variables
Mean
F T
Urban teachers (N=213) Suburban teachers (N=224)
Facilities 32.33 24.14 28.74 4.40**
Technology Infrastructure 16.76 12.93 14.73 3.54**
The comparison between the means of the quality of facilities and technology infrastructure
of the urban teacher group and the suburban teacher group in Hanoi using the T-student test
shows that the mean of the group of teachers in the urban area is higher, more statistically
significant compared to the group of teachers in the suburban area (p < .01).
Table 10. Post Hoc Tests Statistics of Facilities and Technology Infrastructure Variables
Mean p
Variables PST (1) SST (2) HST (3)
(1)-(2) (1)-(3) (2)-(3)
(N=156) (N=143) (N=138)
Facilities 21.28 19.46 44.86 .56 .00 .00
Technology 10.60 12.69 21.72 .09 .00 .00
Infrastructure
Comparing the means of facilities and the technology infrastructure serving teaching
purposes of 3 groups – primary, middle, and high school teachers based on the Tamhane test in
Post Hoc Tests, the results from Table 10 show that the group of high school teachers has the
highest mean. There is a statistically significant difference between two groups of primary
school teachers (1) and high school teachers (3) and between two groups of middle school
teachers (2) and high school teachers (3) while there is no statistically significant difference
between two groups of primary school teachers (1) and secondary school teachers (2).
45
3.6. Smart services

Survey results on 11 smart services provided in schools show that most schools have not yet
provided smart parking services, transportation services for students, catering services, counseling,
financial resources, digital learning materials, consulting, and online courses services.
Table 11. Independent Samples T-student test Statistics of Smart Services Variables
Mean
Urban teachers Suburban teachers F T
(N=213) (N=224)
Smart Services 12.18 7.57 5.81 7.17**
Comparing the mean of the quality of smart services provided in the school of two groups
of teachers from urban and suburbs areas based on the T-student test, according to table 11, we
can see the mean of the urban teacher group is higher, more statistically significant compared to
the suburban teachers’ group (p< .01).
Table 12. Post Hoc Test Statistics of Smart Service
Mean p
Variable PST (1) SST (2) HST (3)
(1)-(2) (1)-(3) (2)-(3)
(N=156) (N=143) (N=138)
Smart Services 10.62 6.93 11.89 .00 .29 .00
When comparing the mean of smart service quality of 3 groups of primary, middle, and
high school teachers through the Tamhane test in Post Hoc Tests, we can see that the group of
high school teachers has the highest score, followed by the group of primary school teachers,
and the group of middle school teachers has the lowest score. There is a statistically significant
difference between two groups of primary school teachers (1) and high school teachers (3) and
between two groups of middle school teachers (2) and high school teachers (3) (p < .01) while
there is no statistically significant difference in two groups of primary school teachers (1) and
secondary school teachers (2) (p > .05).
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
This article has presented the outline of the smart school models: the role, practical
significance as well as the urgency of implementing this model in the education system in
Hanoi. Based on the overview of studies on building standards for smart universities, a survey
was conducted to investigate the conditions for implementing the smart university model at all
school levels in Hanoi in six areas: Programs and teaching methods; Teachers training;
Management team, teachers; development policies and strategies; infrastructure; Smart service.
437 teachers from 3 levels: high school, middle school and primary school from the urban and
suburbs of Hanoi responded to the survey. The survey results have given an overview of the
current situation and the approachability of the smart school, level at all school levels in Hanoi.
Regarding the curriculum and teaching methods, teachers tend to agree with the meaning of
IT and DT, so the extent of deploying these teaching views is at an occasional and regular level.
These are two student-centered teaching approaches aimed at raising interest, improving
teaching quality, and maximizing learners’ interests and abilities (Le, 2012; Dao, 2012). There
is a positive correlation between the perception of the meaning of IT and DT and the degree of
their application in teaching practice. This finding indicates that understanding the meaning of
learner-centered teaching methods will guide teachers in their teaching activities. Regarding
teacher training on IT and DT, the teacher’s answers demonstrate that the level of participation
of teachers is low. A positive correlation is also found in teacher training with the meaning and
application of IT and DT, which proves the importance of regular and continuous training for
teachers on student-centered teaching methods.
46
As for teachers and administrators, teachers tend to appreciate the expertise, pedagogical
capacity, and self-improvement of the teachers and agree with the managers’ leadership,
including caring, encouraging the innovation of teaching methods towards integrating
technology and applying technology in school management and leadership, effectively
mobilizing resources to develop the school and its staff. Regarding policies and strategies of
teachers and schools, teachers tend to agree with their behavior and policies towards students as
well as school policies such as application of information technology in teaching, transparency
of school activities, close links with educational forces. In reality, in order to convert traditional
schools into smart schools, school leaders and managers need to acknowledge and exploit the
power of information technology to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning while
optimizing time, financial and social resources (Vu Thi Thuy Hang, 2018). A positive
correlation was also found between the teachers’ teaching of and policies and strategies for
learners, between the leadership of the management team and the policies and strategies for the
school. This result shows consistency when evaluating teachers and the management team.
In terms of facilities and technology infrastructure, facilities and smart equipment that have
not been equipped in most schools are smart desks, smart classrooms, object scanners, and
STEM classrooms. Even basic infrastructure such as administrative rooms, conference halls,
computer labs are lacking in some schools. The essence of smart school is to optimize resources
based on the application of advanced digital technology (Aliasb & Sirajc, 2012; Vu, 2018) in
order to provide learners with a personalized learning service to maximize their thinking
capacity, communication skills, teamwork, creativity and problem-solving ability (Zhu et al.,
2016). These are important conditions, affecting the implementation of smart pedagogical
activities, the quality and effectiveness of teaching and learning as well as the management of
schools. Along with the teaching facilities, the software system is also crucial to deploy virtual
classrooms, especially in the context of the current Covid pandemic. If it had not been for
copyrighted software systems for online teaching such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams; learning
management systems, and tools for testing and assessment, it would have been difficult to
ensure continuity of learning as suggested by the motto “stop going to school but never stop
learning” (Communist Party of Vietnam, 2021). Should the school be well prepared and fully
equipped with testing and assessment tools, the school will be able to conduct the examination
during the pandemic situation while ensuring seriousness and fairness. Regarding the smart
services provided in schools, most schools do not have smart parking services, services for
transporting students, and providing snacks. Because the schools surveyed are all public schools
with limited financial resources, therefore there is no transportation service and light meal
provision service. In the digital age, online courses and online learning resources are abundant
and diverse. If properly consulted and oriented, those courses and learning resources can be
effective in improving the quality of teaching and self-study of students.
Comparing surveyed areas (urban and suburbs of Hanoi), we can conclude that: Urban
schools are more invested in public facilities and technology infrastructure for teaching, so their
service quality is also better; Smart service quality in urban areas is also rated higher than that
of suburban areas. When comparing the results obtained from 3 groups of primary, middle, and
high school teachers, it can be observed that: The quality of facilities and technology
infrastructure at the high school level is rated higher than that of the other two levels. Similarly,
the quality of smart services at the high school level is also rated higher than that of the primary
and secondary school level.
It’s apparent that the advantages of implementing the smart school model in Hanoi are
mainly related to awareness, professional readiness, personal development capacity as well as
teachers’ and schools’ strategic policies. Difficulties when approaching the smart school model
are the lack of facilities, smart technology infrastructure, and smart services, without which the
school cannot optimize resources in all aspects. Therefore, it is necessary to continue to care for,
47
foster, and encourage the development of existing human resources in schools, and at the same
time focus on investing in facilities, technology infrastructure, and smart services in schools.
More attention should be paid to primary and secondary schools. In particular, the education
sector should prioritize the development in all aspects of education for schools in the suburbs of
Hanoi to narrow the gap in education quality and physical conditions compared to urban
schools. We will be able to create unity and synchronization when implementing smart school
models for all levels of school successfully and with high efficiency.
Derived from various studies on the evaluation criteria and the current application of the
smart school model conducted based on the evaluation criteria of smart schools in high schools
in Hanoi, we propose a plan for building and implementing the model of smart school in Hanoi,
which includes the following steps:
1) Build a strategy to develop the smart school model
The smart school development strategy is an important basis to draw more attention from
the education system and the community to this model. This will attract more financial
investment needed to prepare essential pedagogical conditions for smart schools. From there, we
can raise the awareness, the will, belief, orientation and encourage behaviour of administrators,
teachers, students, parents, and the community towards the smart school model. Research on
smart schools in Malaysia shows that mobilizing comprehensive resources is the key to the
successful application of the smart school model. Another example from New York is that the
state implemented a public financial policy and a transparent division of responsibilities
between the government, state educational management authorities, and the schools. Therefore,
to develop the smart school model in Hanoi, it is indispensable for all levels and sectors, from
the central to local levels to unite in order to cooperate with the education sector to actualize this
advanced school model.
2) Deploy theoretical and practical studies on smart school development in current Vietnam
conditions
To do this, educational management authorities play an important role. Research on smart
schools in terms of theory and practice needs to be invested in and implemented in order to
properly determine the nature, characteristics, and requirements to develop smart schools. The
research and analysis on the current school model determine the gap between the conditions and
qualifications of Vietnam compared to the requirements and characteristics of smart schools,
thereby looking for possible directions and methods of implementation for Hanoi.
3) Develop and improve curriculum and teaching methods
In order to advance the model of smart learning, the curriculum and teaching methods need
to be highly integrated and humane, aiming to encourage the development of individual
potentials as well as the interests of learners. This can only be done when it is guaranteed that
the curriculum and teaching methods are both integrated and differentiated. In addition, the
development approach should be the main orientation in building a leaner-centered curriculum,
ensuring to meet the requirements of future workers in a modern society with the context of
extensive application of digital technology.
4) Develop a team of administrators and teachers
The staff and teachers are the indispensable factors that determine the success of the smart
school model. Therefore, in order for the application of the smart school model to be effectively
implemented, it is necessary to have thorough preparation in terms of human resources.
Teachers need to be standardized with regard to professional qualifications, teaching and
learning strategies and equipped with a sense of professional development, skills, and attitudes
to create good relationships with students and parents. The management team also needs to be
standardized in terms of expertise and management skills, aiming to develop the school team
and encourage innovation in the current educational institution, and simultaneously, they need
48
to be equipped with necessary skills to connect and maximize resources internally and
externally (Vuong Quoc Anh et al., 2019). Team development can be achieved through
fostering and training programs or spread widely by emulation movements inside and outside
the school, on a large or small scale. In addition, an appraisal policy which encourages and
rewards individuals and groups who are active or achieve good results should be carried out,
thereby creating motivation for the staff and teachers.
5) Invest in facilities, equip and improve the quality of smart services
In the context of the 4.0 science and technology revolution which is having a profound
impact on all fields, including education, the investment in facilities and smart services plays an
important role in the implementation of smart pedagogical activities, the quality and teaching
effectiveness of teachers and students as well as the management of schools. The investment in
facilities should focus on both factors: infrastructure (houses, rooms, and equipment) and
technology infrastructure (databases, software, etc.). In addition, it is necessary to equip and
improve the quality of smart services in order to move towards a friendly, positive model of
smart school, optimally supporting the learning, teaching, and management of students,
teachers, and administrators. These activities need to be researched, investment activities must
be planned and investment items shall be identified to ensure synchronization, quality,
efficiency and sustainability.
Relating to information technology (IT) infrastructure: IT infrastructure plays a major role
in the application of ICT in the teaching, administration, and management of smart schools.
Building and upgrading IT infrastructure go hand in hand with deploying management
applications for effective utilization, at the same time, analysis and design of the system is open,
allowing easy scalability and technology upgrade (high-speed Internet system, Close circuit
television system, computer system...) (Vuong Quoc Anh et al., 2019).
Invest in building a system of standardized rooms with synchronous and modern
equipment: halls, meeting rooms, multi-purpose practice houses, public offices, canteens,
system of function rooms, subject-based classrooms, STEM practice room (hall room, online
meeting room using modern communication network technology such as IP, ATM, ISDN; smart
classrooms and classrooms equipped with all preeminent features to serve teaching and learning
purposes, focusing on the ability to transmit audio, images, videos, electronic teaching software,
interactive devices for the whole class and individual devices for each student, classroom
management software...; subject classrooms, multi-purpose rooms equipped with modern
equipment and specialized software; STEM practice rooms to promote innovation in teaching
activities, education-oriented learning to increase the accessibility of the 4th Industrial
Revolution; electronic library with collections stored in digital form and accessible by
computer) (Vuong Quoc Anh et al., 2019).
6) Develop and ensure supporting policies for smart school
The policy to support the development of smart schools is useful for the process of
converting, maintaining, and developing sustainably the elements of smart schools. The
transition to smart school is the process of preparing human, material, and financial resources to
meet new requirements. Therefore, it is necessary to develop policies that ensure a democratic
education, enhance individual strengths and capabilities, increase internal participation within
each school and the educational process, create an intellectual and technology-equipped
workforce, provide holistic development for individuals, and encourage participants to get
involved in the operation of the smart school model.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This research was funded by the Hanoi Department of Science and Technology Vietnam
under grant Number: 61X-12/01-2019-3.
49
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About the authors
– Bui Thi Thuy Hang is Associate professor in the school of Engineering Pedagogy,
Hanoi University of Science and Technology. The author is also involved in teaching and
supervising graduate students for the Master’s Program in Higher Education Pedagogical
Advisor at University of Poitiers – French. She has done a lot of research in the fields of
students’ learning motivation; teachers’ teaching style, students’ learning style; Vocational
education and training; Higher education in Vietnam and in the world; Smart pedagogy and
smart schools.
– Dr. Vu Minh Trang is Senior Lecturer of Major of Teacher Education in Natural
Sciences, Faculty of Teacher Education, University of Education, Vietnam National University
– Hanoi. She has participated in many scientific research projects and studies and has many
works published in domestic and foreign magazines, as well as presented in many national and
international seminars on the field of Education Sciences (Theory and method of teaching
Chemistry) and the field of organic biochemistry.
– Dr. Lai Phuong Lien is Lecturer of Major of Teacher Education in Natural Sciences,
Faculty of Teacher Education, University of Education, Vietnam National University – Hanoi.
She has participated in many scientific research projects and studies and has many works
published in domestic and foreign magazines, as well as presented in many national and
international seminars on the field of Education Sciences (theory and method of teaching
Biology) and the field of molecular biology.
– Dr. Nguyen Trung Hien is Lecturer/ Head of student affairs department of International
School – Vietnam National University – Hanoi. He has participated in teaching subjects such as
marketing, marketing and new media technology, tourism management. His areas of research
consist of digital marketing, new media technology, tourism management, destination
management, tourism and sustainable development, and smart school.
51
THE USE OF VIRTUAL REALITY IN DESIGNING AND IMPLEMENTING

APPLICATION ACTIVITIES IN TEACHING HISTORY AT HIGHSCHOOL
Dang Thi Thuy Dung*1, Nguyen Thi The Binh2
Abstract: This research aimed at clarifying the advantages, the processes, the measures, and the
feasibility of the application of Virtual Reality (VR) in designing and implementing activities in
teaching history lessons at high schools. Virtual Reality (VR), one of the top ten strategic
technologies, is universally being employed in education in many countries including Vietnam. In
teaching History, the application of VR poses its strengths in helping learners to reproduce the
past vividly and objectively, serving as the basis for a deeper understanding of history and better
applying the knowledge into practice, which is one of the core competencies for the learners
according to the 2018 History Program. This article delved into the theoretical analysis of VR, the
role of applying activities in history lessons, the indications of learners’ competences in exercising
the acquired knowledge and skills into practice. Besides, processes and measures to apply VR in
designing and implementing activities were proposed in history lesson plans based on the
quantitative and qualitative evaluation results. Thereby, the article affirmed the advantages of
VR in innovating the practice of teaching and learning history in high schools.
Keywords: virtual reality, design, implementing, activities, history lessons, high schools
INTRODUCTION
Science and technology have been increasingly developing and there have been
breakthroughs such as: virtual reality (VR), artificial intelligence (AI). The application of high
technology in education has been much interested by researchers around the world. In Vietnam,
the use of information technology (IT) in teaching has made many positive changes,
contributing to bringing the national education into the world education. Studies on teaching aids
and tools show that the high applicability of science and technology in teaching helps improve
the teaching quality and increases students’ capacity to meet the requirements of the society.
VR technology was first introduced in the 50s of the twentieth century. Accordingly, the
research on and application of VR in education has become a global trend. Along with the
development of computer science and software, there have been many applications that support
virtual reality technology. Never before have humans experienced and interacted in a “virtual”
space, but they have “real” feelings. It is this feature of VR technology that has brought new
suggestions in teaching in general and teaching History in particular. Due to the fact that
historical knowledge is about the past and non-repeated, VR technology has a special advantage
in recreating the past in a realistic, vivid, attractive and objective way.
In 2018, Vietnam’s Ministry of Education and Training issued the General Education
Program and the History Education Program whose focus lies on the synchronous renewal of
elements of the teaching process. Particularly, shifting teaching objectives from content-based
to competency-based (general; specific) and learner-centred is considered a key factor, leading
to the renovation of curricula and textbooks, methods, techniques, and forms of teaching and
testing and assessment. As for History, the ability to apply learned knowledge and skills is the
highest level of acquisition and thinking among the three components of the specialized
 Corresponding Author: Dang Thi Thuy Dung; E-mail Address: dangthithuydung@hpu2.edu.vn

1
Hanoi Pedagogical University 2, Vietnam
2 Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam
52
competence of History. In order to develop this capacity, activities designed for knowledge
practice in history classes play greatly significant roles. Following the trend of using
technological advances in education, the application of VR in teaching and learning History in
many countries around the world has become more and more popular. In Vietnam, history
teaching has been increasingly improved in the direction of developing students’ active learning
through learning experiences. Applying VR technology to design and organize learning
activities in general and application activities in particular is a useful suggestion, replacing the
requirement to memorize knowledge purely through activities of stimulating learning, creating,
thinking critically, and synthesizing. These help to develop specific competencies of History,
contributing to the achievement of the subject objectives and educational goals of high schools
in Vietnam today.
CONTENT
1. Theoretical background
1.1. Virtual Reality
Virtual Reality was first mentioned as a fictional object in science fiction by Stanley
Weinbaum in his work Pygmalion’s Spectacles in 1935, which mentioned the concept of
“glasses” that allow the user to watch movies with such different senses as sight, hearing, touch
and so on from fiction to reality. In the 50s and 60s of the twentieth century, the first VR
devices were introduced in the field of cinema. A typical example was the Sensorama
multimedia movie player, which was released by Heilig (1957). From here, the concept of VR
gradually formed, not in fiction. In the last years of the twentieth century, many new concepts of
technology were born such as: synthetic environment, cyberspace, artificial reality, simulation
technology, etc. In 1992, Steuer defined VR as “a computer-generated simulation that allows
the user to interact in an artificial three-dimensional space through head-mounted eyewear.”
There are also studies that define VR as a technology that convinces participants that they are
indeed in an environment with perceptions generated by computer data (Heim, 1998; Yoh, 2001).
Based on the views stated in previous studies, along with the VR experience in the context
of today’s modern science and technology development, the author believes that: VR is a
technology that helps users to experience, role-play, and actively interact in artificial
environments through electronic devices. The main feature of VR is to make users feel like they
are part of a virtual environment and are using many different sensory elements such as sight,
hearing, physical sensation and motion perception at different levels. Basically, types of VR
usage are, based on the level of actual sensory experience perceived by users, divided into: VR
with basic computers and smartphones; VR with support of virtual reality glasses (VR Headset);
VR with Headset, controller and other technology devices.
In the field of education, many studies have pointed out the advantages of VR in teaching
and learning. Mantovani believes that VR will support learners in contexts that are impossible
or difficult to have real-life experiences and help increase students’ adaptability and active
learning. It is designed to match students’ different characteristics and needs, etc. (Mantovani,
2001). When it comes to another benefit of VR in education, Pantelidis (2009) stated that
VR allows students to experience at their own pace; students can decide what to do when
interacting with the virtual environment in an arbitrary time and not limited by the fixed space
of a real-life class.
Black asserted that VR acts as a form of preserving historical values in historical research,
“Virtual reality is the next step in historical preservation and interpretation following the
development of the written word, the printing press, the photograph, the phonograph, motion
pictures, and video” (Black, 2017, p. 44). In teaching History, VR is highly appreciated for its
53
advantage of bringing good personal experience, and its ability to vividly reproduce historical
events and spaces, which helps improve teaching effectiveness. John Allison believed that VR
“allow(s) students to question what is real and to explore a multiplicity of different pasts in an
immersive experience” (Allison, 2008, p. 344). VR can be used to present simulations of
historical events and locations and in recreating these, educators can recreate events from using
a multiplicity of sources. However, teachers of history need to help learners be clearly aware
that VR only has the function of reproducing and visualizing the past but not completely
recreating the historical events as real ones. This was noted by Ethan Black that “Any educator
that wants to use VR in their classroom needs to make sure their students understand that they
are not “entering the past”” (Black, 2017, p. 47); instead, students are going through carefully
recreated virtual environments to gain a deeper insight into history.
For Vietnamese education, VR has been applied in natural sciences such as chemistry,
physics, geometry, etc. In teaching history, the participation of VR in the classroom will act as a
vivid visualization tool, contributing to improving the effectiveness of the lesson. Some
applications that support the design and use of VR in teaching can be named as:
Cospaces Edu: CoSpaces Edu was created by Delightex, a company providing innovative
technologies for the transformation of education. It has an interface with 3D Diagramics, and it
is currently widely applied in teaching natural sciences (Chemistry, Physics, Geometry).
EON-XR is an application developed by EON Reality, Inc., belonging to the category of
education. The application allows teachers to create lectures with virtual reality technology
including VR and AR (augmented reality). Teachers can post lectures by themselves and design
tasks for students in the learning process. The application allows uploading audio files, through
which teachers can combine their own lectures while students can also record the screen with
the screen recording function.
Thinglink is a website, which does not require users to install an application. It supports the
design of virtual exhibitions, 360-degree images and allows teachers to attach interactive tasks.
The operations on Thinglink are very simple. Teachers and students can freely show their
creativity in designing, aligning, supplementing or arranging items, based on their pedagogical
aims, to achieve teaching and learning purposes.
The software tools with VR in education are now developed and in various forms. Each
application may bring different features with its own methods for users to experience. However,
no matter which tool is used in teaching in general and in teaching history in particular, if
teachers have a reasonable and flexible application, it will increase the vivid visualization and
interactivity in the virtual environment, thereby promoting students’ creativity and active
thinking to solve learning tasks.
1.2. Application activities in a History class
In order to determine the application activities, it is necessary to start from the previous
studies on human cognition, thinking and learning activities.
According to the theories of perception, the principle of human perception was suggested
by Lenin with the famous formula as From vivid intuition to abstract thinking, then from
abstract thinking back to reality (Lenin, 1963). Accordingly, the process of rational perception
does not stop at the level of knowledge acquisition but must return to practice and use practice
as a measure of the truthfulness of the acquired knowledge. To form a complete perception of
an object, people need to apply their existing knowledge to solve practical tasks. This is the way
to practically test the knowledge that people have perceived.
When it comes to education, a student’s cognitive process does not take place in a separate
way of groping and trial, but occurs simultaneously with the learning process, including the
following stages: acquiring new knowledge, consolidating, applying, testing and evaluating to
turn knowledge, skills and techniques into their own assets (Tran, 2012). Thus, application
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activities are a stage of the cognitive and learning process where students can gain and master
knowledge, skills and techniques. Educational psychologist Benjamin Bloom has made a point
of view on cognitive activities of learners through 6 levels including: knowing, understanding,
applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating (Bloom, 1956). When applying Bloom’s
taxonomy of cognitive process into the teaching, it can be seen that analyzing, synthesizing, and
evaluating are cognitive levels that show high application, and at this level, students can solve
learning tasks associated with real-life situations.
According to the perspective of cognitive psychology and educational studies, researchers
of History education in Vietnam believe that: The way of providing Historical knowledge goes
from providing facts, creating symbols, forming concepts, to building up historical principles
and lessons (Phan, 2012). Thus, in order to form historical knowledge, students need to undergo
cognitive activities, based on general principles of human cognition, from simple to complex.
Among these, the activity of forming concepts and drawing rules and historical lessons requires
students to apply the learned knowledge and skills to carry out the thinking process and to
generalize knowledge, producing specific products. (concepts, principles and lessons of history).
Accordingly, the level of application in historical learning includes analyzing, synthesizing and
evaluating historical events.
To concretize the awareness levels in the educational program, in 2018, the Ministry of
Education and Training issued a new master program and subject program that clearly defines
the general and specific competencies that need to be formed for students. As for History,
specific competencies include: (1) Understanding history: initially identifying, distinguishing
and exploiting a number of learning materials; (2) Developing historical awareness and
thinking: describing and initially presenting the main features of events, presenting the
historical context and making comments; (3) Applying learned knowledge and skills: using
historical knowledge to explain practical problems, accessing and processing information from
various sources, self-studying, self-discovering historical topics. These specific competencies in
History are categorized according to the increasing level of students’ awareness and thinking.
Applying learned knowledge and skills is the competence that shows the highest level of
historical competence, associated with cognitive activities and higher thinking, typically
application activities.
In each lesson, the cognitive process is shown in a series of learning activities, including
(Training, Official Letter 5512/BGDDT – GDtrH, 2020):
– Identifying the learning problem/task/introduction;
– Building up new knowledge;
– Practice;
– Application.
It can be seen that, according to this official letter, the applying activity is the last in the
series of learning activities, but this is not the last activity that occurs in the classroom. Instead,
the application can also be integrated into other cognitive activities, from building up
knowledge to practice and reinforcement in each lesson.
Based on the viewpoints of previous researchers combined with the understanding of the
General National Education Program and the History Education Program (2018), the author
supposes that the activity of application in history class is at the highest level among learning
activities according to the cognitive logic of students, aiming to support learners to connect
knowledge of history to solve “similar” or “new” real-life situations, contributing to the
development of the ability to apply learned knowledge and skills into reality. When designing
and organizing activities of application in teaching history, teachers need to rely on the 2018
History Education Program to clearly analyze the manifestations of the competencies to apply
learned knowledge and skills, serving as the basis for determining the activities applied in a
55
lesson. The specific manifestations are: (1) Students, through the knowledge and skills they
have learned, draw historical lessons and apply historical knowledge to explain real-life
problems; (2) Based on the acquired knowledge, students learn about historical issues by
themselves, and then develop positive and creative thinking; (3) Students access and process
information from different sources to solve learning tasks. (4) Students have the consciousness
and long-lasting self-studying skills of learning History (MOET, 2018).
In order to design and organize highly effective application activities in the formation and
development of learners’ competencies, there are now many technological devices and teaching
techniques for teachers to choose from. Among them, VR is one of the technologies that not
only brings novelty in learning but also enhances the interaction and experience for students.
1.3. Advantages of VR technology in designing and organizing application activities in a
History class
Having understood the benefits of VR in teaching, the necessary requirements for an
application activity in a History class and the manifestations of the competence to apply learned
knowledge and skills, the author believes that VR technology has the following advantages in
designing and organizing application activities in history lessons as follows:
First, with the ability to reproduce past images associated with scientific information, VR
opens up opportunities to access and reproduce various types of historical knowledge. VR helps
students to experience inaccessible learning environments in a real-life context, where students
easily use VR to access historical landmarks and spaces in the virtual environment that VR
supports. Therefore, it is possible to apply VR in information researching and application
activities in many historical lessons (from ancient times to modern times). Experiencing the
historical space and contexts with the use of VR also contributes to bringing a more interesting
and appealing lesson.
Second, VR helps students to draw historical lessons and make comments and assessments
from a multi-dimensional perspective. VR technology creates objects that look wide, panoramic
and more detailed than conventional ones. According to Hussein and Nätterdal: Visual effects
and 3D objects can explain certain topics where text can not (Hussein & Nätterdal, 2015, p.12).
Students can actively explore the details of the object from any angle they want, thereby making
personal judgments and assessments on historical issues. This helps students easily draw
comments or history lessons from different angles and then apply what they have learned to
solve practical tasks.
Third, VR aims to improve students’ autonomy and self-study skills in both face-to-face
and online classes. Virtual reality allows the learner to proceed through an experience during a
broad time period not fixed by a regular class schedule, at their own pace (Pantelidis, 2009,
p.62). VR allows students to actively interact, not necessarily following the fixed space and time
of the classroom, so students can choose the time and context to interact with VR and solve
learning tasks. At the same time, VR is also a useful means to organize application activities
during online lessons with the high participation and engagement from students in all learning
spaces and times.
Fourth, with the use of VR, students can promote their creativity by actively finding,
selecting and processing information from various sources to solve difficult learning tasks.
Learners can experience and design products and learning materials with historical contents by
themselves. Unlike simple VR experience tasks, the tasks of application activities are often
highly difficult and complex in terms of manipulation, students can design and create
impressive personal VR products. In order to recreate a historical and cultural event or object
through a 3-D presentation or in the form of 360-degree VR, students, besides requiring IT
skills, need to know how to apply knowledge from many other sources of information, as well
56
as build up the basic content of the presentation from their perspectives. In spite of complex and
difficult manipulation activities, VR brings the novel space that motivates students in
completing learning tasks.
For example, when teaching about the Industrial Revolution in the modern period under
the topic Industrial revolutions in the world history, teachers guide students to perform
application activities with the following tasks: Using the knowledge learned in the lesson and
information from the Internet, combined with attending a virtual exhibition: The Industrial
Revolution in 360-degree VR format, working in groups and creating a collection of images to
support the statement: The Industrial Revolution in the modern period helped the world to make
a breakthrough.
Figure 1. An image taken from VR 360 exhibition named The Industrial Revolution
(Source: Retrieved from https://artsandculture.google.com/story/xQXx4Z7cSUF-qA
on 8 am, August 1, 2021)
When participating in the virtual exhibition, you can observe the space of the industrial
revolution with outstanding achievements in a more realistic and vivid way. Students draw the
characteristics of achievements in the industrial revolution, thereby recognizing and evaluating
the role of those achievements in their work and lives. Performing the above application task,
students need to use the knowledge they have learned in the lesson and actively process
information collected from the Internet and virtual exhibitions, based on their personal views, to
highlight the changes in the world that the industrial revolution brings. From there, students can
search and select the corresponding images to put in their collection.
It can be seen that the application of VR technology to design and organize application
activities in History class will bring vivid, attractive and positive experiential simulations that
will meet learners’ desires. In order to apply VR effectively, each teacher needs to have an
appropriate and scientific process of designing and organizing teaching activities, aiming to
create the highest opportunities for students’ active learning.
2. Using Virtual Reality to design application activities in a History class
The process for designing a learning activity is to suggest steps or structures for carrying
out a learning activity, to plan pedagogical ideas, to formulate a learning task, to prepare the
necessary learning materials for a teaching-learning activity, particularly application activities.
Within the scope of this research, the author focuses on using the EON-XR application to design
application activities with the support of VR. Based on the requirements of a teaching activity,
the following process can be used:
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Diagram 1. Process of designing an application activity

Step 1: Identify objectives: This is an important step that helps teachers clearly define the
purpose of conducting a learning activity. It should be noted that the goal of the application
activity must contribute to the accomplishment of the overall goal of the lesson, especially the
goal of developing the ability to apply learned knowledge and skills through specific
manifestations. The 2018 overall program and the 2018 subject program will be the basis for
teachers to determine the goals for the activity.
Step 2: Generate ideas for the application activity: Teachers come up with pedagogical
ideas, search for appropriate teaching methods, techniques and tools. At the same time, they
give plans to guide students to perform learning tasks. With the application of VR, teachers
clearly define the interactive tasks and the level of interaction with VR from students; effective
pedagogical measures are solutions to enhance students’ autonomy and self-realization to
complete the learning task. Depending on the duration of the lesson and the difficulty of the
learning task, the teacher may consider whether it is for students to perform the application
activities during or outside of class time.
Step 3: Choose the tools and design application activity: As mentioned above, there are
many tools to support the application of VR in teaching History. Based on the objectives of
the activity, the characteristics of the tools, teachers choose the right ones to use. For example,
EON-XR has support for many pre-designed 3D Diagramics, and Thinglink has the advantage
of designing lectures with 360-degree VR clips and images.
Step 4: Make evaluation and adjustments: This step is conducted after application activities
are performed, teachers can make evaluations through students’ products, by getting students’
feedback. Then teachers make adjustments and improvement on pedagogical ideas, teaching
methods to increase the effectiveness of the application activities.
To illustrate the process more clearly, we have designed an application activity in the lesson
about Egyptian Civilization (under the topic Some world civilizations in the ancient - medieval
period) with the support of VR as follows:
Objectives of the activity:
– Collect historical documents to learn more about Egyptian civilization.
– Study and present an imprint of Egyptian civilization that still exists today.
Objectives are determined towards students’ applying knowledge gained from such
activities as: opening, building knowledge, and practice to solve new learning tasks associated
with the real life. After learning about the formation and achievements of Egyptian civilization,
students will get an overview of ancient Egypt, and from the knowledge they have achieved,
students study and explain the origin and meaning of an ancient historical mark that the
Egyptian civilization left to mankind today (e.g. Pyramid, Sphinx, etc.).
Main contents of the activity
Students work in groups, based on their learned knowledge, combined with knowledge
collected from documents, books, and the Internet to study an imprint of Egyptian civilization
that has survived to this day, and then build up a presentation about the historical imprint in the
form of 3D Diagramics.
Some suggestions on supplementary materials:
Source 1 – Text documents about architectural and sculptural achievements of Egyptian
civilization: “Between the pyramids is a giant statue of Xbrah up to 20m high, with the head of a
lion, carved from a monolith. This statue itself is enough to show the talented hands of ancient
58
Egyptian sculptors. More than that, the statues of the Scribe, Rahotep, Nophoro, “Chief Bolet”,
etc. have amazed art researchers and modern sculptors. Among those statues, the portrait of
Queen Nephectiti – the wife of the Pharaoh Iknaton is the most beautiful, etc.” (Ninh, 2008).
Source 2 – Internet article: Egyptian Civilization - Effects across space and time. Link:
https://thanhnien.vn/van-hoa/van-minh-ai-cap-nhung-anh-huong-xuyen-khong-gian-va-thoi-
gian-1251890.html.
Source 3 – Internet video clips about Egyptian civilization:
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-obKX-mqjXQ.
Duration: Because it is a task with high difficulty, it takes time for students to collect data
and design the activity. Hence, teachers should allow students to perform the activity out of the
class time and for a long time (5-7 days). Products can be submitted online through a number of
tools such as Padlet, Email, Google Classroom, etc.
Teaching aids:
With the task of designing 3D presentations, the EON-XR tool will have convenient
features to use, taking advantage of the available 3D Diagramics. Teachers can provide
suggestions on tools to design or let students choose their favorite one, according to their IT
capabilities.
Figure 2. Some pre-designed 3D Diagramics of EON-XR to be used in teaching History

(Source: Retrieved from
https://core.eon-xr.com/Lesson/Lesson3DCreate?categoryID=1&searchTerm=&pageSize=48&tab=2
on 8 am, July 10, 2021)
Step 4: Making evaluation and adjustments. Teachers develop assessment tools including
product evaluation sheets, self-assessment cards in groups of students. Through the evaluation
results, teachers make adjustments to improve the effectiveness of using VR in designing
application activities.
The process of designing an application activity as mentioned above helps teachers
determine clear teaching objectives based on the requirements to be achieved by the end of the
lesson and the subject program. Teachers can develop pedagogical ideas with specific teaching
methods, select VR tools suitable to the content of the application activity, and balance the time
for the activity in accordance with the teaching and learning reality. The step of evaluating and
adjusting is the final stage of the process, performed after organizing the teaching activity,
through assessment from teachers and the results of students’ self-assessment, teachers consider
the advantages and limitations of the application activity, as well as difficulties when using VR
in the learning process, thereby improving the use of VR in their classes.
3. Applying VR to organize application activities in a History class
Based on the organizational structure of a learning activity, it is possible to organize an
application activity in History class with the use of VR according to the following 4-step
process:
59
Diagram 2. Steps to organize an application activity

(Source: Lesson plan, Official Letter 5512/BGDĐT-GDTrH)
It can be seen from the diagram that the step of assigning learning tasks plays an important
role, which decides the form and product of the activity, and demonstrates the requirements to
apply the knowledge and skills learned from previous activities to solve new problems in study
and life. The more practical the task is, the more effective it will be, contributing to building and
developing students’ ability to apply learned knowledge and skills as well as problem-solving
skills and a sense of creativity. In this case, the learning task is focused on combining
knowledge and skills with the application of a VR tool to create a learning product.
Using the application activities designed on Egyptian Civilization (Section 2.2) in a History
class, we conducted the following steps:
Teacher assigns the learning task: Ask students to work in groups to discuss and design a
3D presentation about an imprint of Egyptian civilization that still exists today. Requirements
for the presentation include:
(1) 3D graphics that simulate historical imprints.
(2) A description in text or audio which shows details of the name, origin, and outstanding
features of the historical imprint selected by the group.
Students perform the task: Specify what students need to do (with the help of VR – in a
detailed report, not in a too general one) The maximum time to perform the group task is 7 days.
Students present their learning product: The learning product is presented by links and
submitted at the Padlet page of the History class. Representatives of the groups present their
products to the class in the next lesson.
Figure 3. A 3-D image of the Sphinx in Egypt

Notes: 1- Size; 2- How the Sphinx was built; 3- The Statue of Sphinx
(Source: A photo of learning products designed with EON-XR tools of students in the Experimental Group)
Teacher gives feedback: Teachers gives comment and evaluation (repeatedly) on the
learning product evaluation sheets and instructs students to self-assess their learning products.
Based on the actual assessment situation to give a score (which accounts for 10% of the total
score). This is believed to help motivate students’ teamwork (Students do not leave the paper
blank).
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Figure 4. Criteria for evaluating group products

(Source: Evaluation criteria used in the Experimental Group)
Organizing application activities with the above process, students have time to prepare and
conduct application tasks to create real products, which are stored and publicized in the online
data page of the History class. With the use of 3D graphics, the audience can use the function of
placing images in a real space, which helps increase the vividness of the products that students
design. Students can give interactive questions and explanations to clarify the ideas that the
group wants to convey. This is a chance for students to show their creativity and originality in
their presentation. Thereby, teachers can easily evaluate students’ skills of processing
information from learning materials and applying the learned knowledge and skills into practice.
At the same time, the teacher’s evaluation and the student’s self-assessment also show the
effectiveness of students’ self-study and group work in performing the assigned learning tasks.
To initially find out the advantages and disadvantages of applying VR in teaching as well as
the applicability of the proposed design and organization process, the author conducts teaching
experiments with 10th-grade students at No. 1 High School, in Lao Cai City. Teaching
experiments include 2 main contents: 1 – Egyptian civilization (under the topic: Some world
civilizations in the ancient – medieval period) and 2 – Preserving and promoting cultural
heritage values (under the topic: Preserving and promoting the values of cultural heritages in
Vietnam). For each lesson, there is a Controlled group and an Experimental group with the same
number of students specializing in natural sciences (Class 10A1 and Class 10A2).
After conducting activities of introduction, knowledge building, and practice with similar
teaching methods in both classes, the teacher organizes application activities with differences in
methods and teaching aids in the Experimental Group compared to the Controlled Group.
Specifically, in the Experimental Group, the teacher carried out the process proposed by the
research and assigned the task of asking students to create VR products to present the
achievements of Egyptian civilization and the local tangible cultural heritages. In the Controlled
Group, the application task is that students present the imprint of Egyptian civilization and a
tangible cultural heritage without applying VR to perform the task.
To evaluate the experimental results, besides evaluating group products, the researcher uses
interviews and observations combined with the Likert scale. Observations and interviews are
61
conducted with groups and individual students, to determine the duration of the task and the
level of excitement with the learning task. To assess the level of development of the ability to
apply learned knowledge and skills, the researcher uses the Likert scale on individual students.
The evaluation criteria in the Likert scale are designed to correspond to the manifestations of the
components of the ability to apply knowledge and skills learned in the historical specific
capacity. The scale consists of 4 levels from 1 to 4, equivalent to the level of performing tasks to
solve learning tasks in the direction of competency development, specifically: 1 – no
performance, 2 – perform little well, 3 – perform quite well, 4 – perform well. In particular,
when students achieve level 3 or above 3, the first step is considered to meet the indicators of
competency development.
The experimental results obtained are as follows:
Table 1. Results of applying VR in designing and organizing application activities
in the Experimental Group
Contents Results from Experimental Group Results from Controlled Group
(10 groups – 30 students) (10 groups – 30 students)
Notes
Results collected from the evaluation of 80% get mark 8 or over 60% get mark 8 or over
groups’ learning products in both contents 20% get lower than mark 8 40% get lower than mark 8
Results collected from students’ self-assessment
Time length Content 1 0 – 3 hours: 0% Time length for application activities
for 3 – 7 hours: 33.3%
application 7 – 10 hours: 66,7%
activities Content 2 0 – 3 hours: 0% 0 – 3 hours: 0%
3 – 7 hours: 70% 3 – 7 hours: 80%
7 – 10 hours: 30% 7 – 10 hours: 20%
Level of excitement with the learning task 100% 70%
Assessing the level of forming the ability to apply learned knowledge and skills
Criteria Level Level
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
(responsive to (responsive to
capacity-forming capacity-forming
indicators) indicators)
Applied learned knowledge and skills to solve 6.7% 20% 40% 33.3% 10% 30% 33.3% 26.7%
life’s problems
Self improvement of history knowledge to 0% 0% 53.3% 46,7% 6,7% 20% 50% 23.3%
complete the learning task
Creativity in building contents and performing 0% 13.3% 33.3% 53.4% 10% 46.7% 30% 13.3%
learning tasks
Self enhancement of historical knowledge from 0% 6.7% 56.6% 36,7% 0% 23.3% 46.7% 30%
various sources
Self-study of history to perform learning tasks 3.3% 23.3% 46,7% 26,7% 6.7% 60% 13.3% 20%
Willingness Use VR to design presentations 100% * Only for the Experimental Group
to apply VR in Use VR in studying beauty 100%
studying spots and historical sites
History * Use VR in combination with 100%
other teaching aids.
Initial results show that the proposed design and organization process are feasible and
applicable in teaching History in high schools. The group learning products show that the
application of VR helps students to design more high-quality, attractive and creative products
than the usual oral presentation. While only a few students saw VR in games before, they are
62
more excited when they have access to high-tech tools in their classes. At the end of the activity,
100% of students confirmed that they would continue to apply VR to study History and other
subjects if given the opportunity. Through self-assessment, it can be seen that the manifestations
of the ability to apply learned knowledge and skills are more evident in the group of students
using VR. In particular, students have a sense of self-learning to complete the task (the total
number of students achieving levels 3 and 4 reached 100%), become more creative in
understanding the content and performing the learning task (the number of students achieving
level 3 and above accounted for 86.7%) and actively build the knowledge of history from many
different sources so that they can use it effectively for application activities (93.3% of students
achieved level 3 and level 4).
The biggest difficulty students face when performing learning tasks with the application of
VR is the considerable time length to complete the learning task. One of the important reasons
is that students take time to get used to new tools in learning. This problem is quite a lot
improved in the second teaching experiment compared to the first one (the ratio of students who
spend 7-10 hours on the task reduces from 66.7% in the 1st time to 30% in the 2nd time). Thus,
if students can work with VR more often and in different subjects, students will gradually
develop their skills in using new IT tools, which makes the learning process become easier, and
then the problem of time limit will be improved.
From the results of teaching experiments, it can be seen that applying VR in designing
and organizing application activities has a lot of positive feedback from students to the lesson.
However, to use VR effectively, teachers and students need to have skills in using IT at a
proficient level, students need to work with the tools many times and get familiar with EON-XR,
Thinglink, Cospaces Edu or other VR tools. Although there are many positive points, there is
one limitation that makes it difficult for VR to become popular in teaching in Vietnam today,
which is the relatively high cost of VR application, which requires huge investment in facilities
to meet the requirements when creating a learning environment with the use of high-tech
devices. Also, due to the lack of facilities, students can only use VR at a low level, through
phone and laptop screens, and not many students can use VR glasses or other technology tools
in their learning.
4. Discussion
Based on the experimental results, the researchers believe that in the current context of
Vietnam, the application of VR is useful in designing learning activities in the history class to
increase the efficiency of the lesson and to get positive feedback from the students. However,
there are still obstacles that make it difficult to apply VR to all students in Vietnam, especially
those in mountainous and rural areas.
First of all, about the effects and positive feedback of students: Students from the classes
with the VR application are all interested in the space that VR brings, since then, students are
more active in exploring, creating, and solving learning tasks. The passive acquisition of
knowledge has been replaced by activities that enhance students’ experience, thanks to the use
of VR, and History lessons also become more exciting and active. This is like what Gürkan
Yildirim argues: “history courses might be more enjoyable as VR technologies removed their
negative biases towards history courses” (Gürkan, 2018, p. 67). The VR products that students
make in application activities demonstrate their improved skills in gathering and transforming
information as well as their active thinking and creativity. In addition, VR contributes to
promoting learner autonomy. Başaran (2010) emphasized that one of the main advantages of
VR implementations was individual-oriented control programs. Students can self-study without
limitation of space and time, and personal experiences they have in learning activities are very
varied. This has also been agreed by Veronica S. Pantelidis that VR allows learners to have
learning experiences at their own pace (Pantelidis, 2009). Students can experience cultural works,
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events and historical imprints anytime, anywhere, and are not confined to the classroom space,
as long as they have basic technological equipment such as smartphones with Internet connection.
However, there are still some difficulties with the use of VR in education today. The first
typical problem is the high cost of devices needed to support VR in teaching. This makes it
difficult to synchronously in schools. Another challenge is the teachers’ and students’ lack of
certain IT skills to be able to use VR in teaching and learning. These problems need to be solved
step by step. First of all, it is necessary to invest in materials and technical facilities for
educational institutions. The next important factor is fostering high-level IT application skills in
teaching and learning for teachers and students. Although VR has many advantages, in order to
apply it effectively, teachers need to define clear goals, know how to choose and use appropriate
supporting softwares, and flexibly apply teaching techniques and methods. Ethan Black pointed
out that “using VR in and of itself is not a magic solution that brings classrooms “into the 21st
century.” It takes deliberate, thoughtful, and specific applications and scenarios for VR to be
effective” (Black, 2017, p. 57).
Currently, in Vietnam, VR has not yet brought into full play its full potential in education.
In order to improve the efficiency of applying VR in designing and organizing learning
activities in general and in application activities in particular during history class, apart from
choosing suitable softwares, teachers and students need to ensure a combination of continuity
and appropriate level of difficulty. This means that the frequency of using VR is just useful for
teachers and learners to get used to the technical manipulations and gradually form necessary
skills. Nevertheless, it doesn’t mean that VR should be overused as it will cause boredom and
burden to the learners.
CONCLUSION
To meet the new requirements of today’s education and society, it is necessary to have teachers’
and students’ constant efforts and creativity. Applying IT advances is no longer something new
in teaching, however, if teachers want to maximize the role of technology in education, they
need to have plans to use technology in designing and organizing specific learning tasks. In
teaching history, the application of VR contributes to bringing the past closer to the present,
erasing the distance in both space and time, creating opportunities for students to apply learned
knowledge and skills to create unique and impressive high-tech products. Designing and
organizing application activities with the support of VR, although facing many difficulties in
terms of facilities or technological capabilities of teachers and students, achieve positive feedback
from students. In the future, VR has the potential to make teaching no longer limited to books
and documents. Instead, education will take on a new look with multi-dimensional space, and
VR also helps stimulate students’ senses in learning. When applying VR appropriately, students
will have a true technology-assisted learning environment in the 4.0 era, while teachers ensure
good implementation of lesson objectives, subjects, and educational programs.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors would like to send the most sincere thanks to the Board of Directors, History
teachers, and students of the two classes 10A1 and 10A2 (Cohort 59) at No. 1 High School in
Lao Cai City for their active participation in the experimental process so that the authors can
complete this research.
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University of Education Publishing House.
11. Mantovani, F. (2001). VR learning: Potential and challenges for the use of 3D
environments in education and training. In I. G. (Eds.), Towards cyberpsychology: Mind,
cognitions and society in the Internet age (pp. 207-226). Amsterdam: IOS.
12. Mustafa Hussein, C.N. (2015, June). The Benefits of Virtual Reality in Education – A
Comparison Study. Thesis Summary on Management Science and Software Engineering.
Göteborg, Sweden: UNIVERSITY OF GOTHENBURG.
13. Luong, Ninh (2008). History of the Ancient World. Hanoi: Hanoi National University of
Education Publishing House.
14. Oanh, T.T. (2012). Educational Studies, Coursebook, Ep. 1. Hanoi: Hanoi National
University of Education Publishing House.
15. Pantelidis, V.S. (2009). Reasons to use Virtual reality in education and training courses and
a model to determine when to use Virtual reality, Themes in science and technology
education. Klidarithmos Computer Books, Special Issue, 59-70.
16. Steuer, J. (1992). Defining virtual reality: Dimensions determining telepresence. Journal of
communication, 42(4), 73-93.
17. Yoh, M.-S. (2001). The reality of virtual reality. Proceeding Seventh International
Conference on. Virtual Systems and Multimedia. IEEE, pp. 666-674.
About the authors

– MA. Dang Thi Thuy Dung is currently a lecturer at faculty of History, Hanoi
Pedagogical University 2. She holds a master’s degree of History Education. Her main research
interests include promoting competences for students majoring in history education, ICT in
teaching history. She has presented at many national conferences as well as published some
articles in several journals along with the publication of a coursebook being taught at her university.
– Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Thi The Binh is currently a lecturer at Faculty of History,
Hanoi National University of Education. Her main research directions are pre-service and
in-service teacher training; teaching methods of history. Relating to her research area, she has
written and published 52 books, over 48 articles in prestigious journals and proceedings of
international conferences (01 article published in an international journal).
65
ENHANCING ONLINE LEARNING THROUGH

USING BACKWARD DESIGN MODEL
Ngo Van Thien1
Abstract: Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there is a clear trend towards online learning, but
there has been little guidance for online learning effectiveness. This study aims to identify factors
affecting the effectiveness of online learning through using the backward design learning course
model. The study was carried out on students in the department of primary education at Ho Chi
Minh City University of Education. Cronbach’s alpha is used to measure the reliability and internal
consistency of associated factors. The exploratory analysis factors are performed to extract
variables and to measure the factor loading in the study. One sample T-test is used to test
hypotheses. Finding from this study support that learning outcome statement (LOs), assessment
strategy (AS, learning task (LT), instructional content organization (ICO), course structure (CS),
learning resource materials (LRM), types of interactions (ToI), teaching present (TP), and social
and cognitive present (SCP) is satisfactory which indicates online learning is effective.
Keywords: instructional design, backward design course, effective online learning.
INTRODUCTION
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, teachers have been re-examined every aspect of their
teaching due to mandatory modifications in response to the global COVID-19 pandemic. As a
result, online learning has grown to complement traditional classrooms. One of the big
questions posed by faculty and curriculum designers is, how to design, develop, and implement
online course effectiveness? To answer this question, it is important to reflect on the type of
knowledge, skills students will be expected to gain during their study in virtual learning. In the
literature reviewed, there have been several researches on students’ satisfaction and their
perceived eLearning. However, little attention has been paid to the issue of an online learning
and teaching model to enhance learning outcomes. Hence, finding an online learning and
teaching model effectiveness for the online course is necessary for teachers to create a deep and
meaningful learning experience. This research used a backward design approach to design,
develop, and deliver an online course to facilitate teaching and learning in a virtual environment
with the aim of enhancing learning outcomes.
CONTENT
1. Literature review
There are two types of learning in the virtual learning environment, synchronous and
asynchronous learning. Synchronous learning requires all participants to access the same web
site at the same time and communicate directly with each other. This form of E-learning is
beneficial to the student in that they have access to immediate feedback and live online interaction
using the same communication tool. In asynchronous E-learning, participants communicate at
different times from different places using the same communication tool (Aguti, 2015).
In order to analyze, design, develop, and implement an online model, some educational
theories are most frequently used such as a behaviorist, constructivist, and socio-constructivist
theory. Behaviorist theory mentioned that knowledge is acquired through experience and interaction
with and within us (Schunk, 2012). In virtual learning, behaviorist theory is used to teach
 Corresponding Author: Ngo Van Thien; E-mail Address: thiencaothang@gmail.com

1 Cao Thang Technical College
66
concepts by presenting a series of steps that lead to expected learning outcomes. Moreover, this
theory can be used in giving students feedback, and measuring learning and retention.
The constructivist theory focuses on constructing new knowledge based on prior knowledge
and experience. As students experience the world and reflect on those experiences, they
construct their own representation and incorporate new knowledge into the existing one (Piaget,
1973). The socio-constructivist approach emphases that students construct knowledge through
interaction with people or things (Vygotsky, 1978). In regard to this aspect, collaborative
learning in a virtual environment impacted positively on E-learning (Henri & Cayrol, 2001).
In the online collaborative learning, online discussion forum provides students with the
opportunity to interact and share their thoughts and ideas with their peers.
Based on these learning theories, effective pedagogy online emphasizes on interactive
student-teacher, student-student, student-content both synchronous and asynchronous learning.
Pelz (2010) mentioned that interactivity is the heart and soul of effective asynchronous learning.
In terms of teaching, the online teacher’s role should be teaching presence as “design,
facilitation, and direction of cognitive and social processes for the purpose of realizing
personally meaningful and educational worthwhile learning outcomes” (Anderson et al., 2001).
In connection with learning goals, the learning outcome and contents have been designed and
embedded into the course. In respect of students, the online students have to interact with
content, their peers, and teachers to construct their own knowledge. To dissolve feelings of
isolation, students are encouraged and supported to work on collabaration. Engaging students in
learning tasks increases their attention and focus, which help them attain their learning outcome.
Thus, students-teacher interaction can be effectuated both asynchronous and synchronous.
In order to design an E-learning course, the instructional design (ID) is used such as
ADDIE model. The ADDIE model includes five stages: Analysis, Design, Development,
Implementation, and Evaluation (Ghirardini, 2011). In this study, a backward design course is
used to design, plan and deliver a learning course (Wiggins & McTighe, 1998). The backward
design course is a useful strategy for achievement result-based, student centered learning
(Reynolds & Kearns, 2017). The backward design course consists of three steps: the first step is
to formulate the desired learning; the second step involves considerations of assessment; the last
step is to elaborate the learning activities, and learning resource materials. The backward design
process is presented as follows:
Step one: Learners need to set their goal and measurable performance toward their studies
(Kennedy, 2006). The learning outcomes statement is clearly formulated first, then the specific core
standard for the course is mapped out (Grubbs & Strimel, 2015). The learning outcomes should
be clear, observable and measurable, and reflect what will be included in the course requirements.
Step two: The assessment is ongoing. It consists of three types of assessment: (1) Pre-assessment
should be administered to check your students’ prior knowledge to determine if they are prepared to
be exposed to the new content. (2) The feedback and formative assessment serve several
purposes, including checking on the progress of your students, identifying any misconceptions,
and giving them immediate feedback. The formative assessment in virtual learning is a key
factor affecting the effective E-learning (Baleni, 2015; Vonderwell & Boboc, 2013). Formative
assessment can be administered in synchronous and asynchronous forms. In the synchronous
form, where teachers and students are working together at the same time via online platforms
such as Zoom, Google Meet, teachers can provide feedback to students in real time. In the
asynchronous form, where teachers and students are separated by both space and time, online
tools such as Google Classroom and Moodle can help teachers provide feedback to students
through questions, tasks and quizzes. In regard to formative assessment, using Student Response
Systems can provide effective, immediate, and efficient feedback to students (Fernandez, 2014).
Therefore, it is necessary that integrating the student response system into a virtual learning
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environment is sine qua non for feedback and formative assessment strategy to students. (3) The
summative assessment confirms the level of content mastery each student has obtained.
Step three: Referring to the two previous steps, the learning activities are planned, and
delivered to online students. The scenario based learning plays an important role during the
learning process. Thus, the teacher needs to establish a learning strategy in order to facilitate
students discovering new knowledge through their learning experience, integrating them into
prior one, and applying them to solve real world problems (Tardif & Gauthier, 2005). In this
study, the flipped classroom is used as a scenario based learning in the virtual learning. The
flipped classroom work can be categorized into three phases, namely, pre-class learning
preparation, in-class learning activities and post-class learning consolidation (Kong, 2015).
Analyzing students’ profile is necessary so as to ascertain the type of scenario eLearning which
is appropriate to online students. The scenario eLearning should be mapped to each order
outcome. The scenario should be structured with a sequence of learning tasks. Learning tasks
play an important role in instructional settings. They serve to actively control the learning
process so as to facilitate successful learning. They stimulate reactions, referring to learning
material, thus enhancing the students to engage intensively in the course (Richter, 2012). The
learning tasks should be stated in the way that students are faced with the problem (Van
Merriënboer & Kirschner, 2007). Each learning task is planned, including task requirement,
teaching method, assessment tool, and online learning materials, i.d, video, instructional
contents, and type of eLearning such as synchronous and asynchronous. The learning task
should be established on deadline task scheduling. During delivering content, an online teacher
plays an important role as monitoring, mentoring, questioning, and guiding students toward
learning goals (Hagenauer & Volet, 2014). With respect to online teachers, the types of
presence, including social and cognitive presence and teaching presence have been highlighted
in online learning (Anderson et al., 2001).
The effective online learning refers to the individual’s feeling and attitudes towards the
education process and perceived level of achievement connected to the individual’s desire to
learn (Chang & Chang, 2012).
Referring to the backward design model, designing and course delivering steps are depicted
as in Figure 1.
Designing an online course

Learning outcome Assessment Learning task Instructional content
statement strategy organization
Building an online course
Course structure Learning resource materials
Delivering an online course
Types of interactions Social and cognitive Teaching presence

presence
Figure 1. Stage of backward design model for online learning
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Based on literature above, we have elaborated a framework for online teaching and learning,
as seen Table 1.
Table 1. Framework for designing, building, and delivering an online model
Subscale Description
Learning outcome statement Lists the specific core standards required for the course (Grubbs & Strimel, 2015)
Assessment strategy Refers to improve online teaching and learning by making use of student learning data (Vonderwell &
Boboc, 2013)
Learning task Refers to stimulate reactions referring to learning material, thus prompting the learners to engage
intensively in the problem solving (Richter, 2012)
Instructional content organization Refers to design a content roadmap for course development (Khanna & Mehrotra, 2019)
Course structure Describes a framework for course structure and curriculum evaluation (Kumari et al., 2014)
Learning resource materials Refers to learning materials to prepare for an active learning experience in the classroom (Bušljeta,
2013)
Types of Interactions Refers to student-content interaction, student-teacher interaction, and student-student interaction
(Aydin, 2013)
Teaching presence Teacher keeps students motivated and engaged in the online learning (Cormier & Siemens, 2010)
Social and cognitive presence Refers to build positive rapport by using open, friendly communication, to construct new knowledge
based on prior knowledge (Parrish et al., 2021)
Based on the backward design course model, we assume that the BD model enhances
online learning as follows:
HA1: The learning outcome statement enhances online learning,
HA2: The assessment strategy to students enhances online learning,
HA3: The learning task enhances online learning,
HA4: The instructional content organization enhances online learning,
HA5: The structured course enhances online learning,
HA6: The learning resource materials enhance online learning,
HA7: The types of interactions enhance online learning,
HA8: The teaching presence enhances online learning,
HA9: The social and cognitive presence enhances online learning.
2. Research method
2.1. Research context
The study was conducted toward second year students in the department of primary
education at Ho Chi Minh City University of Education, the online course chosen is titled
“fundamental natural science at primary course”. The study took place in the COVID-19
pandemic, from 22 February 2021 to 22 March 2021.
2.2. Research design
The first, E-learning materials were designed based on a backward design course, and
uploaded to the Microsoft Teams application. Then, the online course was delivered through the
flipped classroom type. After the online course finished, an online questionnaire was sent to
students to survey students’ perceived E-learning effectiveness.
2.3. Empirical model and scale
Based on inheriting the theories and results of an experimental study, this study proposed
an E-learning model effectiveness based on theory framework, as seen in Table 1. This study
selected and proposed the model consisting of nine factors with 30 observed variables. These
variables were designed for survey questionnaires following the Likert scale. The statement
consists of choices of answers with the values (1) very dissatisfied, (2) dissatisfied, (3) neutral,
(4) satisfied, and (5) very satisfied.
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Table 2. Measurement scales

Code Measurement scales
LOS I. LEARNING OUTCOME STATEMENTS
LOS1 1. Identifying specific outcome which students know, and able do at the end of course
LOS2 2. The content knowledge is clarified to students, the required skills are stated to solve problem
LOS3 3. The real situation is proposed to facilitate student developing competency
AS II. ASSESSMENT STRATEGY
AS1 1. Teachers regularly monitor students’ progress in the learning process
AS2 2. Teachers comment on the extent to which students gain knowledge after finishing an appropriate learning topic
AS3 3. Teachers provide feedback to students to correct knowledge deficiencies for students timely at the end of the unit
AS4 4. The teacher usually assesses and confirms the level of competency the student has achieved as compared to the learning
outcomes listed at the beginning of the lesson
LT III. LEARNING TASK
LT1 1. The learning task is designed in such a way that students are confronted with a problem situation
LT2 2. The learning task helps students build their own knowledge
LT3 3. The learning task promotes application of the acquired knowledge in a real situation so as to solve problems
ICO IV. INSTRUCTIONAL CONTENT ORGANIZATION
ICO1 1. The teacher organizes content knowledge in a logical way by providing a roadmap for students
ICO2 2. The core content knowledge has been organized to support the student effectuate learning task
ICO3 3. The prior knowledge has been organized to help student construct new learning
ICO4 4. The content knowledge has been organized to help students solve problems
CS V. COURSE STRUCTURE
CS1 1. The course flow, including learning outcome statement, learning task, and content knowledge, and assessment strategy have
been appropriately elaborated
CS2 2. The combination of both synchronous and asynchronous learning have been explicitly organized
CS3 3. The combination of prior knowledge, learning task, and learning situation has been explicitly to accomplish the established
learning goals
LRM VI. LEARNING RESOURCE MATERIALS
LRM1 1.The instructional content organization in a logic way
LRM2 2. The learning video is fully equipped
LRM3 3. The assessment tool is fully effectuated
ToI VII.TYPES OF INTERACTIONS
ToI1 1. Student-teacher interaction in order to stimulate interest and motivation to learn as well as help students apply their learning
ToI2 2. Student-student interaction through collaborative learning
ToI3 3. Student-content interaction through learning tasks, assignment task
CSP VIII. COGNITIVE AND SOCIAL PRESENCE
CSP1 1. The social presence refers to nurturing connectedness and community
CSP2 2. The cognitive presence refers to collaborative problem solving
CSP3 3. The cognitive presence refers to constructing knowledge through an authentic situation that is relevant to the prior knowledge
and goals
TP XIX. TEACHING PRESENCE
TP1 1. The set of materials developed in advance of the course term
TP2 2. Teacher sets clear expectations for students
TP3 3. Teacher coaches and guides learners to keep pace with the course
TP4 4. Teacher examines student responses and using probing, challenging questions
2.4. Sample and sample size
A survey questionnaire was sent to 300 students who have completed the online course,
received from 250 and response rate 83%. A structured questionnaire is used as a data collection
instrument. Data were used to examine the online learning model based on the backward design
course.
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According to Hair et al. (2010), the sample size must be 5 times larger than the observed
variables. This means that if n is the sample size, m variables, then n >= 5m. In this research,
the theory model has 30 variables, so the sample size is n > = 5.30 = 150. In this research, a total
of 250 students participated in the survey, thus the sample size responds to the research.
In the survey, a structured questionnaire is used as a data collection instrument. The
questionnaire was distributed in 9 groups of categories including learning outcomes statement
(LOs), assessment strategy (AS), learning tasks (LT), Instructional content organization (ICO),
course structure (CS), learning resource materials (LRM), types of interactions (ToI); social and
cognitive presence (SCP), teaching presence (TP).
2.6. Analyzing data
The data were encoded in SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) 22.0 and were
analyzed through the following process.
– Reliability Analysis by Cronbach’s Alpha
The Cronbach’s alpha has been used to evaluate the reliability of the factors and to
understand how far they are internally consistent. Internal consistency describes the extent to
which all the items in a test measure the same concept, and Cronbach’s Alpha is one way of
measuring the strength of that consistency.
– Exploratory factors Analysis
Exploratory factor analysis is designed for a situation where the relationships between the
observed and latent variables are uncertain (Yong & Pearce, 2013). Exploratory factor was used
in this study because that survey questionnaire included the new items. All 30-items in the
questionnaire have been analyzed to find the factor that contributes to the enhancing online
learning by using the Varimax method, which attempts to minimize the number of variables that
have high loadings on each factor. According to Williams et al. (2010), discovery and analysis
must be considered under the following 4 criteria.
 The reliability of the observed variable (Factor loading > 0,5): This research will use a
Varimax rotation process to produce multiple group factors. Factor loadings which indicate
correlations between the variables and the factors are required to have values greater than 0.5.
 Verification of model appropriateness: The sampling adequacy of factor analysis is based
on the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure. In the case that the KMO has a value between
0.5 and 1.0, and Sig. is smaller than 0.5, the factor analysis is accepted.
 Bartlett’s test of sphericity: The Bartlett’s test of sphericity tests whether a matrix is
significantly different from an identity matrix. To apply factor analysis, some relationship
between variables are needed, thus, a significant Bartlett’s test of sphericity is required
(Sig. < 0.05).
 The cumulative variance: The cumulative % gives the percentage of variance accounted for
by n first components. The variance explained should be greater than 50%.
– Using one sample T-test
Nine hypotheses were developed to measure the students’ learning satisfaction by using the
backward design model for online learning at University level. To test if the mean satisfaction
score of students at this University is significantly different than 4 score using a one sample
T-test. The null and alternative hypotheses of this test will be:
H0: µ = 4 (“the mean satisfaction score is equal to 4”)
H1: µ ≠ 4 (“the mean satisfaction score is not equal to 4”)
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3. Results
3.1. Reliability test
Testing the quality of scale by Cronbach Alpha’s coefficient is used to evaluate the
reliability of factors and understand how far they are internally consistent. The quality testing
results of the scale seen in Table 2 revealed that the coefficients ranged from 0.62 to 0.95,
indicating that all factors had a high rating for reliability, seen in Table 3.
Table 3. Cronbach Alpha’s coefficient
Scale Observed variable Number of Items Cronbach’s Alpha
Learning outcomes LOs1, LOs2, LOs3 3 0.82
Assessment strategy AS1, AS2, AS3, AS4 4 0.83
Learning tasks LT1, LT2, LT3 3 0.86
Instructional content organization ICO1, ICO2, ICO3, ICO4 4 0.84
Course structure CS1, CS2, CS3 3 0.81
Learning resourse materials LRM1, LRM2, LRM3 3 0.77
Types of interactions ToI1, ToI2, ToI3 3 0.59
Teaching presence TP1, TP2, TP3, TP4 4 0.95
Social and cognitive presence SCP1, SCP2, SCP3 3 0.62
3.2. Factor analysis
An exploratory factor analysis has been effectuated to determine the underlying
relationships among the variables which have been used to measure the effectiveness of online
learning based on the backward design course. The initial analysis was performed to obtain
eigenvalues for each factor in the data. The Kaiser-Meyer Olkin Measure verified the sampling
adequacy for analysis, KMO = 0.713 which is above Kaiser’s recommended threshold of 0.6
(Kaiser, 1974). Bartlett’s test of sphericity (p < .0000), as seen in Table 4. It means that the data
used for this research are suitable for exploratory factor analysis.
Table 4. KMO and Bartlett’s Test
Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy. .713
Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity Approx. Chi-Square 3768.241
Df 435
Sig. .000
3.3. Exploratory factor analysis results
To extract factors from the observed variables, the principal component and varimax
rotation have been used. A total of 30 items from the factor analysis results in nine factor
groupings and has explained 72.72% of the variance, as seen in Table 5. The factor loadings are
greater than 0.41 for all the factors which endorses that there is a good association between the
items and the factor groupings to which they belong. This is consistent with the research by
Williams et al. (2010).
Table 5. Total Variance Explained
Extraction Sums of Squared Rotation Sums of Squared
Initial Eigenvalues
Loadings Loadings
Component
% of Cumulative % of Cumulative % of Cumulative
Total Total Total
Variance % Variance % Variance %
1 3.741 12.469 12.469 3.741 12.469 12.469 3.568 11.893 11.893
2 3.688 12.293 24.762 3.688 12.293 24.762 2.792 9.308 21.201
3 2.796 9.319 34.081 2.796 9.319 34.081 2.784 9.279 30.480
4 2.485 8.284 42.365 2.485 8.284 42.365 2.381 7.936 38.415
72
Extraction Sums of Squared Rotation Sums of Squared

Initial Eigenvalues
Loadings Loadings
Component
% of Cumulative % of Cumulative % of Cumulative
Total Total Total
Variance % Variance % Variance %
5 2.229 7.430 49.794 2.229 7.430 49.794 2.308 7.693 46.108
6 1.967 6.558 56.352 1.967 6.558 56.352 2.285 7.616 53.724
7 1.809 6.029 62.381 1.809 6.029 62.381 2.138 7.125 60.849
8 1.723 5.745 68.126 1.723 5.745 68.126 1.790 5.965 66.814
9 1.379 4.595 72.721 1.379 4.595 72.721 1.772 5.907 72.721
10 .894 2.980 75.701
11 … … … … …. …
30 .070 .234 100.000
Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis.
3.4. One sample T-test

There are nine hypotheses used to measure the effectiveness of online learning based on the
backward design course. The result shows that the degree of freedom is 249. The outcome of the
test of hypotheses is presented in Table 6.
Table 6. One sample T-test
Test Value = 4
95% Confidence Interval of the Difference
t df Sig. (2-tailed) Mean Difference
Lower Upper
LOs 18.217 249 .000 .5107 .455 .566
AS 1.483 249 .139 .0340 -.011 .079
LT 4.770 249 .000 .1853 .109 .262
ICO 2.259 249 .025 .0667 .009 .125
LRM 5.682 249 .000 .1960 .128 .264
CS 3.336 249 .001 .0987 .040 .157
TP 21.564 249 .000 .5610 .510 .612
SCP 5.170 249 .000 .1242 .077 .172
ToI 2.892 249 .004 .0703 .022 .118
The above table shows that for one sample T-test at 5% significance level and at 95%
confidence level the p-value [Sig. (2-tailed)] for learning outcomes (LOs) is .000 (p < .05)
which supports the hypothesis HA1 and approves the learning outcome statement is worthy to
add value to the designing for online course. The p-value for assessment strategy (AS) is smaller
than .05 which endorse that this factor plays an important role in the learning process. The
p-value for the instructional content organization (ICO) is below than .05 which supports that
the backward design course is effective for online learning. For the factor learning task (LT)
p-value is less than 0.05 which supports the hypothesis HA4. The p-value for course structure is
p < .05 which approved the hypothesis HA5 that backward design courses facilitate the
coherence between learning outcomes, assessment strategy, learning tasks, and the rest. The
p-values for the learning resource materials (LRM) is < .05 which support hypothesis HA6 that
learning materials such as presentations, videos and audios are appropriate for online learning.
The hypothesis HA7 for types of interactions is supported as the p-value is less than .05.
Hypothesis HA8 for teaching presence has been proved as the p-value is lower than .005. The
p-value for social and cognitive presence is less than .05 which approved that this hypothesis
HA9 is supported.
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4. Discussion
There are nine hypotheses developed in the study and all of them are significantly
accepted, indicating that organizing online course based on the principles of backward design
enhances learning outcomes from students’ perception of online courses.
These factors are divided into three groups including designing online courses, building
online courses, and delivering online courses. The findings show that these factors have a
coherence between the three stages of the backward design course, which contribute to
enhancing learning outcomes. In this term, Tanis (2020) mentioned that effective online
teaching and learning requires a carefully designed course that promotes student engagement
with faculty, peers and course content. The results of the research consisted with those obtained
by Wiggins & McTighe (2005), who stated that the learning outcomes should be clarified in
order that students be able to think and do to successfully complete assessments. The BD
emphasizes how students and the teacher will know if they are learning. Therefore, types of
assessment such as diagnostic assessment, formative assessment, and summative assessment are
designed, planned, and presented to students before the course delivery. The result aligned with
those obtained by Andrade (2015), who mentioned that effective instruction requires feedback
and assessment effectiveness. The effectiveness of the assessment process improves student
learning, and students’ self-regulated learning. Moreover, Tanis (2020) stated that short of
feedback was detrimental to students’ online learning experience. Therefore, in this study, a
“student response system” as a tool was designed, planned, and integrated into the online
course. This feedback and formative assessment tool have helped students monitor their
progress in relation to the learning goals setting. In the online learning environment, both
formative and summative assessment practices require an understanding of the features and
tools inherent to the electronic medium (Perera-Diltz & Moe, 2014). With respect to learning
activities, the learning task is designed, planned to involve students in constructing knowledge,
assessing their progress by themselves in relation to learning outcome setting. The learning task
has required students to learning by interacting with their peer, teacher, and learning materials in
the virtual learning. Basing the learning tasks, the instructional content organization is
effectuated. The content organization is considered as the core knowledge sequence to support
students in problem solving. The result from study aligned with those obtained by Khanna &
Mehrotra (2019), who mentioned that the content organization is followed by identification of
appropriate teaching-learning strategies or experiences to be created in order to align backward
with program and institutional outcomes.
The course structure is organized based on the learning outcome statement, assessment
strategy, the learning task, and the content organization. The course structure is built based on
the designed course. Finding from study revealed that the course structure with the flipped
classroom organization, in which both synchronous and asynchronous activities are scheduled,
has enhanced learning outcomes. In terms of course organization, the LRM is created, and
integrated into the online platform learning. In this study, learning materials consist of
presentation PowerPoint, instructional video. The presentation is provided for students with a
knowledge roadmap to guide them to the desired learning. The results of this research are a
consistent with the work of Chang & Chang (2012), who stated that learning resource materials
support student learning, motivate them to learn, and help develop independent learning.
The teaching-learning interaction is directed by the backward design course. This approach
supports teachers in designing and planning interaction types in online learning. In this study,
the types of interactions consist of teacher-students interaction, student-student interaction, and
student-content interaction. These interactions help students to dissolve the feeling of isolation
in virtual learning. The results were consistent with those from the previous finding by Baleni
(2015) who stated that interaction between students and teachers is an important factor to help
74
students learn. In this study, these types of interactions are effectuated through collaborative
online learning in which three interdependent elements – social, cognitive and teaching presence
have been established. The results of this research are consistent with the work of Anderson et
al. (2001), who stated that cognitive presence can be defined as the teacher and the students are
able to construct and confirm meaning through sustained discourse in online learning. Moreover
Garrison, et al., (1999) mentioned that “collaboration among students and instructors in the
expression of emotion, open communication, and group cohesion is essential for social presence
particularly as it supports cognitive presence”. In terms of teaching presence, the planning and
implementation of educational experiences are highlighted. Building understanding is focused
on learners’ knowledge acquisition, and direct instruction presenting content and confirming
student understanding through the design and implementation of assessment are performed.
Finding from this research is considered as an E-learning model to enhance effectiveness in
virtual learning. These above-mentioned factors made online learning more interesting and
created a positive ambiance of students and teacher interaction in the learning outcome and
assessment methods.
The limitations of the study incdule having a single intervention in a university, which was
analyzed here. Despite this limitation, the findings show that using backward design courses has
enhanced students’ learning outcomes from students’ perception. This intervention study is
significant because the use of backward design shows a possibility to also enable constructivist
learning in the online learning environment. The students’ perceptions give evidence on how the
use of backward design can be adapted.
CONCLUSION
In this study, we have analyzed, designed, developed, and implemented an eLearning
model through instructional design model based on the backward design course. Based on the
finding, it was concluded that nine factors, namely, learning outcome (LOs), assessment
strategy (AS), learning task (LT), instructional content organization (ICO), learning resource
materials (LRM), course structure (CS), types of interactions (ToI), social and cognitive
presence (SCP), and teaching presence (TP). Nine factors have been divided into three groups:
Group one pertains to LOs, AS, ICO, and LT; group two relates to CS and LRM; and group
three include ToI, SCP, and TP. Group one has been generated to build group two. Group two
helps teachers to deliver and manage an online course. The results lead us to validating,
generalizing this online model in order to enhance online leanning.
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About the author

Ngo Van Thien is a physics teacher in Department of General Education at Cao Thang
Technical College, Ho Chi Minh city. He received his Ph.D.in science education from the
University of Lyon 2 in France. Actually, he also works in cooperation with Ho Chi Minh city
University of Education, where he leads courses and workshops on teaching STEM integration.
His research focuses on didactic and pedagogy.
77
USING VIDEO IN ASSESSING AND DEVELOPING PROSPECTIVE

MATHEMATICS TEACHERS’ PROFESSIONAL NOTICING
Le Thi Bach Lien*1, Tran Kiem Minh2
Abstract: There has recently been a great interest in using video for developing mathematics
teachers’ professional competence. Research indicated that videos are an effective tool used in
prospective mathematics teachers’ professional development. Nevertheless, one of the
limitations of using video in initial mathematics teacher education is that prospective
mathematics teachers (PMTs) usually do not gain new insights or ideas about improving their
teaching from simply watching classroom videos because they have fewer teaching experiences.
In this study, we used video to develop Vietnamese PMTs’ professional noticing. More specifically,
we proposed an MKT_PID Lesson Analysis framework (MPLA) to assess and improve PMTs’
professional noticing related to the interpretation of the concept of derivative in an economic
context. Then we examined the relationship between PMTs’ knowledge for teaching and their
professional noticing based on an experimental study involving 25 Vietnamese PMTs. The MPLA
framework was used to characterize possible connections between PMTs’ knowledge for teaching
and their professional noticing based on the analysis of two teaching video clips. The results
suggested that different components of teacher knowledge influence teacher noticing differently.
The findings provided us with the first evidence of weak connections between prospective
mathematics teachers’ knowledge for teaching and their professional noticing skills and a
limitation of their professional competence. The study also showed a meaningful and effective
use of our MPLA framework for assessing and developing PMTs’ video-based professional
noticing.
Keywords: mathematical knowledge for teaching, professional noticing, prospective
mathematics teachers, video-based approach
INTRODUCTION
Studies in mathematics education have significantly expanded our understanding of the
nature and type of knowledge that impacts teachers’ performance in the last two decades.
Researchers pointed out that teachers’ knowledge and teaching competence have a substantial
impact on student learning outcomes. As such, mathematics teacher educators are charged with
preparing prospective mathematics teachers (PMTs) to develop knowledge for teaching and
leverage this knowledge in daily practice. According to the situated approach, professional
noticing is a concept that has become widely accepted as a fundamental aspect of teacher
professional competence (Jacobs et al., 2010; Sherin et al., 2011; Blömeke, Gustafsson &
Shavelson, 2015; Kaiser et al., 2017). The competency model of Blömeke et al. (2015) refers to
the noticing approach under the name of three situation-specific skills: perception,
interpretation, and decision-making. Many researchers have focused on clarifying how to
evaluate and develop PMTs’ professional noticing. Several studies have explored using video as
a supporting tool for developing teacher noticing (Santagata & Yeh, 2014, 2016; Yang, Kaiser,
König, & Blömeke, 2019; Tyminski et al. 2020). Most of these studies have suggested specific
content frameworks to guide teachers in video analysis (Santagata et al., 2021). Some content
frameworks are based on research on students’ learning specific mathematical concepts (Fisher
* Corresponding Author: Le Thi Bach Lien; E-mail Address: lethibichliendhqb@gmail.com

1 Quang Binh University, Vietnam
2 University of Education, Hue University, Vietnam
78
et al. 2019); others guide participants to attend specific classroom interactions (Walkoe & Levin,
2018). Santagata et al. (2010) developed a lesson analysis framework for assessing teacher
professional noticing focusing on four aspects: lesson objectives, student thinking, and learning;
the impact of teaching on student outcomes; alternative plans. In another study, Tyminski et al.
(2012, 2014) developed a framework that focuses on students’ mathematical thinking.
Thus, researchers have attached great importance to proposing content frameworks to guide
teachers in analyzing video to evaluate and develop teachers’ professional noticing. However,
the proposed content frameworks did not cover all types of mathematics knowledge for teaching
(MKT model) (Ball, Thames, & Phelps, 2008). For example, common content knowledge
(CCK) and specialized content knowledge (SCK) have not yet appeared in these frameworks. In
particular, there have not been many studies using video clips according to this model to
evaluate and develop PMTs’ professional noticing in Vietnam. This study aims to propose a
lesson analysis framework related to six types of knowledge in the MKT model and use this
lesson analysis framework to promote the PMTs’ professional noticing. We focused on finding
the answer to the research questions:
 How can PMTs’ professional noticing be understood and measured through the proposed
lesson analysis framework?
 How is PMTs’ professional noticing characterized through analyzing video-based teaching
situations?
CONTENT
1.1. Professional Noticing
Researchers have classified studies of PMTs’ noticing into three areas: (1) theoretical
perspectives of noticing that ground the design of video-based activities, measures, and analytical
approaches; (2) use of video technologies; and (3) research methodologies of video-based
studies on noticing (Santagata, 2021). The first area focuses on how video-based studies of the
development of mathematics teacher noticing have conceptualized the construct of noticing.
Santagata et al. (2021) have categorized the theoretical frameworks used in these studies into
four main perspectives on noticing, as follows: a cognitive psychological perspective drawing
on the work of van Es and Sherin (2002), a socio-cultural perspective drawing on Goodwin’s
(1994) work, a discipline-specific perspective that builds upon Mason’s (2002) work, and an
expertise-related perspective that draws upon the novice-expert differences paradigm discussed
by Berliner (1988).
In everyday language, noticing is a term used to indicate the act of observing or recognizing
something, and people engage in this activity regularly as they navigate a visually complex
world. Recently, researchers have been interested in the particular type of noticing done by
teachers – how teachers pay attention to and make sense of what happens in the complexity of
instructional situations. In the midst of all that is happening in a classroom, where do
mathematics teachers look, what do they see, and what sense do they make of it? (Sherin, 2011).
Scholars have been interested in the concept of teacher’s noticing since Van Es and Sherin
(2002). Researchers have described teachers’ noticing in terms of two aspects: attending and
making sense of classroom events. Building on the work of Sherin (2002), Jacobs et al. (2010)
introduced three skills related to teacher professional noticing: attending to the details in
children’s strategies, interpreting children’s understanding reflected in their strategies, and
deciding how to respond based on children’s understandings. Similarly, Kaiser et al. (2015)
proposed that teachers’ noticing under the name of three situation-specific skills (PID model)
include: Perception, Interpretation, and Decision making. The relationship between the
79
situation-specific skills in the PID model and the elements of the notice approach is described as
follows: Perception of the specific events in the classroom corresponds to attending specific
events in the classroom; interpreting the perceived activities in the classroom corresponds to
making sense of the events in the classroom; Decision-making, such as predicting response to
student activities or suggesting an alternative instructional strategy, corresponds to providing
appropriate responses to student actions. In this approach, teacher noticing relates to a broad
range of teaching aspects that focus on students’ thinking (Yang et al., 2020). Based on this
point of view, we have designed a lesson analysis framework to evaluate the PMTs’
professional noticing through three situation-specific skills: Perception, Interpretation, and
Decision making.
1.2. Model of mathematical knowledge for teaching
The model MKT consists of two main domains of knowledge: subject content knowledge
and pedagogical content knowledge. In each of these domains, the authors distinguished
different types of knowledge (Figure 1). One of the unique contributions of the model MKT is a
distinct categorization of different types of knowledge, and especially the existence of
specialized content knowledge (SCK), which is considered as knowledge unique to teaching
(Ball et al., 2008, Lien & Minh, 2018).
Common content knowledge (CCK): CCK refers to common mathematical knowledge used
in everyday life or knowledge that “is used in the work of teaching in ways in common with
how it is used in many other professions or occupations that also use mathematics” (Hill, Ball,
& Schilling, 2008, p. 377). This type of knowledge is called “common” because it is not unique
to teaching.
Specialized content knowledge (SCK): SCK is a type of knowledge that is only unique to
teaching. SCK enables teachers to ‘‘accurately represent mathematical ideas, provide
mathematical explanations for common rules and procedures and examine and understand
unusual solution methods to problems’’ (Hill, Ball, & Schilling, 2008, p. 378). For example, as
part of SCK, teachers should be able to analyze right or wrong answers given by students to a
mathematical task or choose an appropriate representation of a mathematical concept for solving
a given problem. Non-teachers probably do not need this type of knowledge.
Subject content knowledge Pedagogical content knowledge
Common Knowledge of
content content and
knowledge student (KCS)
(CCK)
Specialized Knowledge of
content content and
knowledge curriculum
Horizon (SCK) (KCC)
content Knowledge
knowledge of content
(HCK) and teaching
(KCT)
Figure 1. Model of mathematical knowledge for teaching (Ball et al., 2008)
80
Horizon content knowledge (HCK): HCK is “an awareness of how mathematical topics are
related over the span of mathematics included in the curriculum” (Ball, Thames, & Phelps, 2008,
p. 403). It also refers to an awareness of a broader context that contains mathematical topics in
the curriculum.
Knowledge of content and students (KCS): Hill, Ball, & Schilling (2008) defined KCS as
knowledge of a particular mathematical content combined with knowledge of how students
think about, know, or learn this content. Teachers with this knowledge can know how students
learn a concept or recognize their common mistakes and misconceptions. This implies a deep
understanding of students’ thinking.
Knowledge of content and students (KCT): KCT combines knowledge of particular
mathematical content and knowledge of teaching that content. As part of KCT, teachers should
also know how to provide appropriate instructions for students to accomplish a given task or
modify it to make it easier for students.
Knowledge of content and curriculum (KCC): KCC refers to knowledge of the content of
the curriculum as well as knowledge of how to apply a specific content of the curriculum to
appropriate learning activities.
1.3. Video-based approach to assess and develop Prospective Mathematics teachers’
professional noticing
Most studies in noticing involved pre-service teachers, and only a few centered on in-service
teachers (Santagata et al., 2021). Studies have shown that PMTs can successfully engage in
noticing within a method’s course activity (Amador et al., 2017; Roth McDuffie et al., 2014).
For example, in a study of PMTs in a middle-level mathematics method course, Star and
Strickland (2008) found that PMT’s noticing improved by watching video clips of mathematics
lessons throughout the semester. Some researchers have focused on building the framework to
further focus PMTs’ attention on specific aspects of teaching and learning. Santagata et al.
(2007), Santagata and Angelici (2010) used a lesson analysis framework to motivate teachers to
observe mathematics lessons recorded video, focusing on four aspects: lesson objectives,
students’ thinking and learning; the impact of teaching on student outcomes; alternative plans.
They found that this framework aided teachers in learning how to elaborate on the details of
observations, suggest alternative strategies for instruction, and analyze instructions (Santagata et
al., 2007; Santagata and Angelici, 2010).
Similarly, Seidel et al. (2013) used two different instructional approaches with two groups
of PMTs to analyze the same video. They compared the groups and found that PMTs’ learning
differed based on the approach used. They concluded that using videos without prompts is
impossible to lead teachers to notice effectively. Like previous researchers on PMTs’ noticing,
Roth McDuffie et al. (2014) also designed and conducted a video analysis activity with PMTs in
their mathematics methods course. However, this study places more emphasis on noticing
equitable teaching practices that draw on students’ strengths. PMTs were asked to view video
clips and analyze teaching and learning practices through four “lenses” (teaching, learning, task,
and power and participation).
Although studies have continuously clarified the frameworks to assist PMTs in analyzing
video clips in many aspects, the relationship between types of knowledge and professional
noticing in those frameworks is unclear. Therefore, we have developed the MKT-PID lesson
analysis framework (MPLA) to evaluate PMTs’ noticing according to the MKT model’s
specific type of knowledge. The framework consists of 11 open-ended questions described in
Figure 2.
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Items MKT PID

1 What do you comment on the accuracy of the mathematical content in the lesson? CCK
2 Did the teacher explain the correction/incorrection of the student’s answers? Are the explanations SCK
reasonable? Why? Please give your alternative teaching strategy.
3 How did the teacher explain the new mathematical concepts in the lesson? Are the explanations SCK S_PID
reasonable? Why? Please give your alternative teaching strategy.
4 What topics in other subjects does the lesson content relate to? Please specify the advanced HCK
mathematical knowledge related to the lesson content.
5 Please specify the teaching methods/techniques teachers have used to promote students’ learning KCT
in the lesson. How have the teacher’s methods/techniques helped students to develop their
knowledge? Please give your alternative teaching strategy.
6 Please comment on the suitability of examples or situations given by the teacher to illustrate the KCT
new concepts? Please give the reasons why the teacher has used those examples/situations.
Please give your alternative teaching strategy.
7 Did teachers provide instructions to help students reach lesson goals? Specify those instructions (if KCT
any). Are they reasonable? Please give your alternative teaching strategy. Explain why you think
your strategy will support students well in achieving learning goals. P_PID
8 Did the teacher provide any questions or exercises to assess students’ understanding? Specify KCT
those questions or exercises (if any). Are they reasonable? Please give your alternative
questions/exercises. Explain why you think your plan will evaluate students effectively.
9 Did the students make progress towards the learning goals? Why do you think so? KCS
10 Please give some students’ difficulties related to the lesson. What will make students interested in KCS
learning this lesson?
11 What are the primary learning goals? How do the lesson learning goals relate to students’ prior KCC
knowledge and knowledge that students will learn?
Figure 2. MPLA lesson analysis framework
The questionnaire was divided into two competency groups: 4 items in the S_PID group
(Subject Instruction: Perception, Interpretation, and Decision-Making) and seven items in the
P_PID group (Pedagogy Instruction: Perception, Interpretation, and Decision-Making). The
questions in the S_PID group focus on assessing perception, interpretation, and decision-making
skills related to the subject content knowledge. The questions in the P_PID group focus on
assessing perception, interpretation, and decision-making skills related to pedagogical content
knowledge. Each question assesses all three skills: perception, interpretation, and decision-
making. For example, in item 2: “Did the teacher explain the correction/incorrection of the
student’s answers?” (perception); “Are the explanations reasonable? Why?” (interpretation);
“Please give your alternative teaching strategy.” (decision-making). This framework can be
applied to assess the PMTs’ teaching competencies according to the situated approach to any
teaching topic.
Thus, the questions in the MPLA assess the situation-specific skills combined with the
knowledge types in the MKT model. The specific components related to the skills and knowledge
of the PMTs’ competencies are evaluated in the MPLA Framework described in Figure 3. The
inner circle describes the specific skills; the outer circle describes six types of knowledge in the
MKT model related to the specific skills.
82
Figure 3. Description of components in MPLA

The concept of derivatives is a crucial topic in the Vietnamese upper secondary school
mathematics curriculum. Research has shown that upper secondary school students have many
difficulties in learning derivatives. The Vietnamese mathematics curriculum explicitly mentions
both the geometric and physical meanings of the derivative. However, the economic meaning of
the derivative is not mentioned in the Vietnamese high school mathematics curriculum. It is
only implicitly presented through exercises in the teacher training program, although this is an
important aspect when applying the derivative into practice. Therefore, here we focus on
teaching the meaning of derivatives in economics.
2. Methodology
2.1. Participants
Participants of the study are 25 PMTs studying at two universities in Vietnam (the third
year of a four-year program). These PMTs had studied differential calculus in the first three
semesters of their undergraduate program, and they had subsequently completed other courses
related to mathematical analysis. They had also studied the subjects related to the teaching of
mathematics.
2.2. Instruments and Data collection
The research instrument was two video clips for teaching the economic meaning of the
derivative (12-15 min each) and a questionnaire, respectively. Essential scenes from the lessons
are used in the video clips, such as introducing a mathematical task followed by students’
activities. To help participants more understand the videotaped teaching entirely, background
information of the class and lessons before the videotaped lesson was provided. In order to be
close to actual classroom teaching, each video could only be watched once: rewinding or
pausing was not possible before the items had to be answered.
The questionnaire consisted of 11 items in the MPLA framework covering the facets of
teachers’ noticing in the PID model: perception, interpretation, and decision-making related to
six different types of teachers’ knowledge of the model MKT. This questionnaire was
completed after many trial versions and consultation with experts.
83
2.3. Data collection and analysis

After watching the videos, the test takers were prompted to complete the questionnaire. The
data collection process consists of three phases, as described in Figure 4.
Figure 4. Data collection process

The data were analyzed qualitatively. We coded the answers of the PMTs according to the
strategy they used to answer the questions to characterize their noticing in two aspects: content
knowledge (CK) and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK).
3. Results
In this section, we present preliminary results recorded when applying our MPLA
framework to the analysis of a teaching session involving the topic of derivatives. The PMTs’
noticing competence is shown in three specific situational skills: perception, interpretation, and
decision-making. We characterize the skills of PMTs for two aspects of knowledge: CK and
PCK, in relation to the interpretation of the derivative in an economic context.
3.1. PMTs’ perception skill
Regarding the perception of specialized content knowledge, we observe the PMTs’
responses to question 2, asking PMTs to describe and comment on the teacher’s explanations
for students’ responses in the video. Most PMTs (12/25) only focused on the students’ answers
and the teacher’s comments on the correctness of the answers but did not describe the specific
content of the teacher’s explanation (Figure 5). Up to 5/25 PMTs did not give any description.
There are 8/25 PMTs who described teachers’ explanations, but not entirely.
Teacher’s
Students’ answers explanation Assessment and interpretation Your strategy
Yes No
Group 1: Duc Binh  Teachers have explicit evaluations and All the teacher’s explanations
initial expenses: 0 explanations. were clear and satisfactory.
84
C(100) = 378836
C(101) = 39770
Group 2: Nhat Anh  Teachers evaluate and comment clearly on //
C(0) = 8836 each part and explain clearly and
C(100) = 378836 understandably.
C(101) = 397747
Figure 5. Illustration of the PMTs’ response to question 2

Regarding the perception of pedagogical content knowledge, specifically the knowledge of
content and students, we observe the PMTs’ responses to question 10, asking PMTs to comment
about students’ difficulties and interests in the video. All participants did not describe students’
difficulties and interests shown in the video. They only gave their comments (Figure 6).
Students’ difficulties: Students do
not remember knowledge related to
derivatives.
Things that make students
interested in learning this lesson:
Real-life examples, easy to
understand, clear explanations,
lively and exciting videos.
Figure 6. Illustration of PMTs’ response to question 10
3.2. PMTs’ interpretation skill

Regarding the interpretation of specialized content knowledge, we observe the PMTs’
responses to question 3, asking PMTs to describe and comment on the teacher’s explanation of
the new concept in the video. Most of the PMTs (16/25) only described the teacher’s
interpretation of the concept without further comments. Up to 1/25 of PMTs did not give any
comments. 8/25 PMTs could give their comments on how to explain the concept of teachers, but
very few PMTs could give both a specific description and comments like that PMT in Figure 7.
85
Teacher explained the new Evaluation Your

Interpretation
mathematical concepts reasonable Inconsequential strategy
Definition: Marginal cost is the incremental Yes Give open-ended questions to
cost required to produce one more unit help students understand the
Symbol: CM(x) concept given by the teacher.
Formula: C(x+1) – C(x) Give examples to help students
The relationship between derivative and understand and grasp the
marginal cost: formula and the relationship
C ( x  1)  C ( x) between derivatives.
C ( x  1)  C ( x)   C '( x)
( x  1)  x
Figure 7. Illustration of PMT’s response to question 3
Regarding the interpretation of pedagogical content knowledge, we observe the PMTs’
response to question 6, asking PMTs to comment on the appropriateness of the examples/
situations that teachers give to illustrate new concepts in the video. There were 8/25 participants
who could not provide any description or comment on this question. Up to 17/25 PMTs
described the examples given by teachers and commented on the appropriateness of those
examples, although they were not complete (Figure 8).
3.3. PMTs’ decision-making skill
Regarding the PMTs’ decision-making skills based on specialized content knowledge, we
observe the PMTs’ responses to question 10, which requires PMTs to assess the reasonableness
of the teacher’s explanation and give their solutions to replace the teacher’s plan in the video.
Most PMTs only evaluated the rationality of the teacher’s explanation without providing their
solution to replace the teacher’s plan in the video (Figure 6). Only 5/25 PMTs offered an
alternative solution, but it was not clear.
Regarding the decision-making skills of the visual teachers associated with the pedagogical
content knowledge, specifically the knowledge of content and teaching, we observe the PMTs’
responses to question 6. PMTs were asked to assess the appropriateness of the
examples/situations that the teacher gives to illustrate the new concepts and their solutions to
replace the teacher’s plan in the video. Most PMTs only evaluated the appropriateness of the
examples/situations in the video without offering their alternative solutions. Only 4/25 PMTs
gave an alternative solution but did not explain why the example was appropriate (Figure 8).
86
Examples given by the teacher Suitability The reason why the teacher has used Your strategy and explain
to illustrate the new concepts Yes No to give those examples or situations
1. The first situation  The teacher gives a situation to lead to The cost to produce x products is:
the concept of marginal cost and its C ( x )  x 3  98 x 2  2700 x  8836
meaning. a) Find the formula for the cost of
Help students understand the meaning of producing the (x+1) product, CM (x) a
 C’(50), CM(50), and their relationship. nd C’(x).
2. The reinforcement situation b) Fill in the following table and give your
comments:
CM (x) C’(x) x
6
26
46
Figure 8. Illustration PMT’s response to question 6
CONCLUSION
This study deals with using video to develop the PMTs’ professional noticing. We have
proposed a lesson analysis framework that focuses on promoting teachers’ professional noticing
about mathematical knowledge for teaching. The research results show that the proposed lesson
analysis framework in the study has effectively supported the using video clips in developing
PMTs’ professional noticing. Based on the PMTs’ responses according to the lesson analysis
framework after observing the video clips, we characterized the PMTs’ professional noticing in
connection with the types of mathematics knowledge for teaching.
The research results also show that the Vietnamese PMTs’ professional noticing was
limited, especially perception and decision-making. Many PMTs have difficulty perceiving the
content related to specific content knowledge and knowledge of content and students. This can
be partly explained because the teacher training program has not been fully equipped with the
knowledge types according to the MKT model for the PMTs (Minh & Lien, 2018). On the other
hand, the cultural, social, and educational factors also partly affect the PMTs’ professional
noticing (Yang et al., 2019). Therefore, we suggest that the teacher training program adds
content about the types of knowledge needed to teach according to the MKT model and
increases the use of video clips to develop PMTs’ professional noticing, which is a crucial
component constituting their teaching competencies.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This research is funded by Vietnam National Foundation for Science and Technology
Development (NAFOSTED) under grant number 503.01-2020.308.
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About the authors

– Le Thi Bach Lien is a doctoral student in Mathematics Education at Hue University of
Education, Vietnam. She’s just finished her PhD this July 2021. She is also a full-time lecturer
at the Department of Natural Sciences, Quang Binh University. Her main research interests
include the teaching and learning of school mathematics, mathematics teacher education and
professional development. She has been the principal investigator of three research projects
funded by Hue University of Education and Quang Binh University.
– Dr. Tran Kiem Minh is currently an Associate Professor in Mathematics Education and
Dean of the Mathematics Department at the College of Education, Hue University, Vietnam. He
earned a PhD in Mathematics Education at the Paris Diderot University in France. His research
interests are mathematics teachers’ professional competencies and the use of technology in the
teaching and learning of mathematics. He has published research articles in some international
journals of mathematics education such as ZDM, Canadian Journal of Science, Mathematics and
Technology Education.
89
BUILDING A MANAGEMENT MODEL

FOR TEACHER TRAINING WITH WEBINARS
Pham Ngoc Son1, Nguyen Thanh Huyen1
Abstract: Webinars are named as a general term for various types of online conferences and
seminars using technology applications and the internet. It is fact that Webinars are a
remarkable innovation in the field of technology, providing a platform for people to interact and
collaborate across vast geographical boundaries through the internet. Using webinars in
teaching is a simple level of online teaching, but is currently being used widely because of its
convenience. However, there is very little research on the management and use of webinars,
leading to not fully exploiting the advantages of webinars in education. This study deals with building
a webinar management model for teacher training and retraining at a higher education institution,
and at the same time establishes the relationship and requirements of elements in the model.
Keywords: webinars, online teaching, management model, teacher training
INTRODUCTION
The Covid-19 pandemic has made many areas of our lives more difficult in many ways.
Social distancing has forced educators, professionals and learners to communicate with each
other online, use digital platform solutions, and find new ways to work together in a digital
environment (Frith, 2021, pp. 1-6). In the United States, the number of remote jobs, mainly
from the technology, finance and law sectors, have doubled in 2020 (Gardner, 2021). An
increasing number of colleges and universities have organized online courses (Hartocollis,
2020). In different ways, the work of professionals, educators, learners have changed so that
teaching online, working in virtual groups and using software applications have become
familiar. There are more workgroups, meetings, classes, reports, presentations and social events
that have “moved” to cyberspace. Despite the increasing productivity of working in virtual
environments (Thompson, 2021), challenges are still present, hence the advent of tools to solve
problems (Wickman, 2014).
Currently, Viet Nam is promoting digital transformation in education (Prime Minister, 2021)
and educational innovation is associated with the application of technological achievements
accordingly (Prime Minister, 2017). The purpose of online teaching is to support or replace
face-to-face teaching at general education institutions and continuing education institutions, and
help these institutions to improve teaching quality and complete education programs (Ministry
of Education and Training, 2021). Recently, online teaching in Viet Nam has developed mainly
by using webinars. Therefore, how to use webinars appropriately and effectively, especially for
teacher training, is an issue that needs further study. This paper deals with building a webinar
management model for teacher training at the university level, and at the same time establishes
the relationship and requirements of component elements in the model.
CONTENT
1. Online teaching
In terms of form, online teaching has 3 popular types as follows:
– Synchronous e-learning: A real-time and direct learning process where teachers and
learners interact through a technology platform (Karen Hyder, Ann Kwinn, Ron Miazga,
 Corresponding Author: Pham Ngoc Son; E-mail Address: pnson@daihocthudo.edu.vn

1 Hanoi Metropolitan University
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Matthew Murray, 2007). The roots of synchronous online learning stems from 3 main
relationships: learner, medium and teacher (Clark, Dublin, L., Gottfredson, C., Horton, B.,
Mosher, B., Parks, E., et al., 2007). An important element to define synchronous learning is
“Interaction of learners with teachers via the Web in real time” (Khan, 2006). Websites,
softwares or applications that respond to this form of teaching are collectively known as
Webinars.
– Asynchronous e-learning: An interactive learning community that is not limited by time,
space, place, or class constraints (Mayadas, 1997, pp. 1-16; Akbari, Ghanbari& Ghanbari, 2013,
p. 12). This form of learning requires students to complete the learning process on their own,
almost without too much support from the teachers. The teacher will record a clip before the
lessons and learners will watch the video anytime they want. Then they will do the exercises
that the teacher assigns in the course and compare with the answers. Learners can interact with
the teacher through discussion on the provider’s application platforms (Shahabadi & Uplane,
2015, pp. 129-138).
– Blended learning: is a combination of both online and face-to-face learning (Picciano,
2006) or the traditional form of teaching in the classroom and the second form of teaching
(Tayebinik & Puteh, 2012, pp. 103-110). Many other researchers believe that blended learning
is an integration of face-to-face instruction in the classroom and instruction through computers
(Bonk & Graham, 2006; Osguthorpe & Graham, 2003).
A tool that meets the minimum needs of an online training session has several basic
features (Verma & Singh, 2018, p. 131):
 Video calls directly from teachers and learners, two-way interaction with both audio and
video images.
 Interact via live chat between instructors and learners, not only allowing teachers to
engage in class with learners and build relationships, but also to improve classrooms based on
feedback received from learners.
 Ability to share screens and webcams of all participants. Can turn on-off sound or
webcam.
 Ability to share application windows, thereby helping teachers to present resources and
learning materials such as PowerPoint lectures, videos, websites...
 There is a whiteboard for teachers to share and present teaching content directly.
 The class organizer has the right to allow others to join the class, or force them to leave
the class and turn off their microphones and cameras.
 Allow learners to ask questions and engage in conversations, which is a way to increase
interaction in the learning process.
 Can be recorded and edited like other media products; this product is reusable.
 Allow large numbers of learners to participate without being limited by physical space.
2. Webinars for online teaching
Many researchers share a common view that in any learning space, face-to-face classes are
always the most popular and effective form. Therefore, when building webinars platforms for
teaching via the internet, technology applications all try to simulate and formulate the traditional
classroom model (Hill, Wiley, Nelson & Han, 2004, p. 28). A webinar class is a synchronous
classroom led by the instructor, where learners participate online at the same time, but in
different locations (Colvin & Kwinn, 2007). Webinars provide tools and features for
participants to communicate two-way through audio, video, diverse interactions and there is a
room for small group activities. Besides, webinars require close and sustainable interaction with
each other, between participants and content, between teachers and learners and between
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learners themselves so without that interaction, learning will not be achieved as desired (Colvin
& Kwinn, 2007).
With a webinar, you can share your presentation with your audience without having to meet
in person (Verma & Anoop Singh, 2018, p. 131). This software is a remarkable innovation in
the field of technology which provides a platform for people to interact and collaborate across
vast geographical boundaries through the internet. The platform provides two-way
communication which leads to greater efficiency of the participants (Verma & Singh, 2018).
Currently, there are some popular webinar platforms: WebinarJam, EverWebinar, Demio,
Zoom, Google Meet, Skype, Gotomeeting, Join, TrueConf Online, the Facebook workplace,
eMeeting, Mikogo, Cisco WebEx, Zavi (Zalo) and Microsoft’s Teams. If the other platforms are
simply webinars, Teams also has more functions for classroom management (Microsoft, 2021)
such as assignment, grading, organizing tests, taking attendance of learners, saving lesson
history and exchanging ideas in class.
Above all, every model of cooperation in the virtual space aspires to approach the
efficiency of direct cooperation (Stewart, 2017). Developing advantages and overcoming
limitations when teaching in the cyberspace environment, our research is based on a learning
model that emphasizes sustainable and rigorous interaction (Colvin & Kwinn, 2007) along with
tools available on Google Workspace with a view to building an online learning space model.
Recent studies show that the number of people using Google’s tools is increasing, especially in
studying and working because of its outstanding advantages. The Google Workspace platforms
provide the right features for training, teaching with professional workflow. Practically, Google
Workspace is a tool for working, teaching, collaborating and communicating with the ability to
build, store and use rich and friendly resources that is not only suitable in epidemic conditions
of Covid-19 but also in normal social conditions (Milanesi, 2020). Google’s toolkit (including
Google Classroom, Google Drive, Google Site, Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, etc.) contains
many ideal features on collaborative teamwork platforms, smart connectivity, large storage
which are the reasons we choose to exploit and use in education and training.
3. Model building
Studying to minimize the limitations and promote the advantages of each application is one
of the missing points of the webinar teaching process. In this study, we propose a management
model and set the tasks of each element in the model to ensure a number of principles as
follows:
– Managers must easily grasp the activities of teachers and learners.
– Establish relationships and interactivity among participants.
– The system of online classrooms must be reasonably built, ensuring that teachers and
learners can easily access them.
– Abundant learning materials and materials, used reasonably and effectively.
– Enhance interaction in the classroom as well as outside the classroom.
Principles of model building
– Goal principle
The management model is a goal-based management process, so when setting it up, it is
necessary to adhere to the goal principle. This principle requires the building of a management
model based on the goal of the teaching process to choose the form and content of the model so
that it is appropriate and capable of best completing the goals.
This principle also indicates that the constituent links of the system must also have their
own goals. In the process of building a model, the formation of parts of that model must be
based on their goals. If a part does not have a clear operational goal, that part also has no reason
to be completed.
– The principle of functional unity
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In the formed management organization model, it may include many components and parts
with different operating functions. However, according to the requirements of this principle, all
operational functions must have a common unification point that is directed to the
implementation of common goals in the most effective way.
– Lean principle
The organization and management model built must ensure that it is lean, simple, the
relationships are clear, economical and easy to operate while still satisfying all the requirements
set forth.
– Principles of relationships between elements in the model
This principle requires the established management organization model to satisfy the
requirements of the participants in that model, so that they feel most comfortable and
convenient in performing tasks. At the same time, the principle creates favorable conditions to
expand cooperative relationships between elements and individuals operating in that model.
Components of the system
The online teaching using the webinar tool can be divided into 3 main components (Figure 1),
each of which has its own functions, tasks and capabilities.
Figure 1. Elements of an online teaching system (Authors’ compilation)

Learners: are the main beneficiaries of the teaching process. Some requirements to learners:
• Have equipment and know how to use technology devices (computers, laptops, smart
devices...).
• Be self-disciplined, independent and proactive in the learning process.
Instructors: Including administrators, lecturers, technical experts, teaching assistants. Some
requirements to instructors:
• Develop and implement an online teaching plan.
• Prepare appropriate materials, learning materials and lectures.
• Use webinar in accordance with actual conditions.
Webinar: Includes applications and tools for online teaching, the requirements of this
system we mentioned in the above section.
Model “Teacher on the move”
Currently, most education institutions and teachers are using webinars in the form of: each
teacher has an account and learners are provided with the IP address of the teacher. At class
time, learners log in to the application according to the IP or link provided by the teacher. When
transferring classes, learners log out of this class and log in to another teacher’s class – the
model “student on the move”.
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With this model, learners have to move many times between classes, which leads to
technical errors. In addition, learners must simultaneously memorize many IDs, which makes it
difficult for learners to log in to the class. Therefore, we propose to use the model of “Teacher
on the move” (Figure 2).
Class A Class B
Figure 2. Model “Teacher on the move” (Authors’ compilation)

In this model, the school gives each class an account while the class ID is given to the
teacher. At his or her lecture time, the teacher logs in to the class to teach, while the learners sit
in a fixed position in the classroom. At the time of any subject, there will be a teacher of that
subject to teach. This avoids the case of “running around” when students are looking for a class,
minimizing the case of entering the wrong class.
A management model of using Webinar for online teaching
By analyzing the tasks and functions of the components, on the basis of a student-centered
model (Colvin & Kwinn, 2007), we build a management model for online teaching using
webinars and establish relationships in this model (Figure 3).
(2)
Teacher Other students

Content
(4)
(1) (5) (6)
(7) (3)
Webina
Administrator
(8)
Technician
Student
Figure 3. Management model of using a Webinar for online teaching
(Authors’ compilation)
The relationship (1) is a two-way coordination between the important factors of the model.
In this relationship, administrators coordinate with teachers to develop teaching plans while
technicians support administrators and teachers to use webinar applications effectively.
In the relationship (2), the teacher gathers learning materials to build the content of the
lesson. Learning materials should be diverse in form (video, image, sound, simulation, etc.)
including recorded video of the teacher’s previous teaching session. The content of the lesson
also has an impact back on the teacher. Accordingly, through the results of the previous lecture,
the teacher can replace, supplement, adjust the content and learning materials to make the lesson
more effective.
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The relationship (3) between learners in which learners can exchange lessons, cooperate in
teamwork, and complete a certain learning task. Usually, this relationship will be effective when
using collaborative teaching, project-based teaching in the form of blended learning.
Relationships (1), (2), and (3) are relationships outside of webinars, usually occurring in
advance to prepare for the best teaching with webinars.
Relationships (4), (5), (6), (7) and (8) are two-way interactions through the webinar
application. Here, the teacher controls the lesson, using the content and learning materials to
convey knowledge to learners. The learner is the person who receives the learning information
from the learning materials and the teacher along with the exchange with the teacher and other
learners to acquire knowledge. In addition, administrators and technicians interact with teachers
and learners through webinars to check, monitor and provide technical support for the
classroom. To be the central position, through webinars, learners can interact with all other
components of the model, thereby absorbing knowledge of the lesson.
This management model can be applied to all schools using online teaching, including
schools which have self-built tools or use tools provided by technology companies. However,
the effectiveness of the model is highest when the school uses the same tool system (for
example, all teachers use Teams or Google Classroom). If each teacher uses a different tool for
teaching, the efficiency of the model is significantly reduced.
Basic conditions to deploy the model
First, developing documents to specify the functions and duties of managers, teachers,
technical support staff and students on the implementation of online teaching and learning.
Second, there should be synchronous and rhythmic coordination of the participating components.
Managers must have certain qualifications in the field of information technology and basic
skills to be able to perform tasks such as monitoring and checking systems. Teachers need to
have skills to organize online classes, be able to build learning materials, lectures, and skills to
use applications in online teaching. Students have to understand and operate the software as
well as have minimal equipment for learning.
In specific conditions, the school can organize training sessions on the use of teaching
software and open discussions on effective online teaching skills. The system implementation also
needs to ensure the minimum conditions for hardware devices (computers, smartphones, etc.),
the internet connection or copyrighted teaching software (Zoom, Meet, Google Classroom, etc.).
4. Webinars and the building of a management model for teacher training
Models of teacher training
Currently, many countries have confirmed that teacher training is a fundamental issue in
educational development, creating favorable conditions for teachers to have the opportunity to
study, study regularly, and study for their whole life. Edmond & Burns (2005) refer to research
that helps managers in developing countries and funding agencies use information and
communication technology to improve and expand Teacher Professional Development (TPD)
activities. Accordingly, there are 3 main types of professional training mode for teachers as
follows:
– Standardized TPD programs: These are programs that focus on quickly providing content
and equipping teachers with skills through training, implementation, and core training. Typical
sorts of training activities are: training seminars and core training.
– School-centered TPD: programs that focus on long-term change, normally through on-site
consulting through building executive communities which operate directly. Typical training
kinds include: observation/assessment; open class hours; lesson study; research group; action
research etc.
– Individual or self-directed TPD: the programs that focus on individualized, self-directed
processes with generalized support.
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In recent years, these three models have all appeared in training programs in Viet Nam.
Each type has its certain strengths and limitations. Which model to choose depends on the
purpose of training, the time frame allowed and the budget to deploy in institutions.
For the past years, school-centered training has been developed in many countries around
the world and has become a new trend in teacher training activities in Viet Nam. The training
activities in the form of lesson studies have been very effective and positively received by
teachers. In the current period, especially in the time of Covid-19 pandemic, the practice shows
that the implementation of teacher training in the form of e-learning has many advantages which
include replicability, cost savings while still ensuring quality. Actually, information technology
has contributed greatly to the success of teacher training (Nguyen Kim Hong, 2019, pp. 5-18).
The requirements of teacher training
– Sustainability of training programs
Teacher training will be effective and sustainable when it is focused both in the formal
training process and in post-retraining activities (Barnett, 2002). However, “specific difficulties
arise when theory is put into practice” (Doukas, 1998). Therefore, post-retraining work with
creating opportunities for teachers who apply the trained theory into practice to have the
opportunity to reflect on problems and receive support is extremely important to work.
– The practicality and applicability of the training program
The practicality and applicability of the training programs are what students are most
interested in mentioning. The program needs to be specific and realistic. The evaluation
methods that are good or advanced, but without guidance on how to apply these advanced
methods in practice in teaching in Vietnam, are still difficult to achieve effectively.
– Method of training
Selecting a method of regular training to meet the continuous professional development
needs of each teacher, the Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training has directed localities
to implement teacher training in the 2012 – 2013 school year and subsequent years. Accordingly,
the method of implementing teacher training can be carried out in the following forms:
+ Training by self-study, through documents and topics in combination with professional
and professional collective activities at the school’s subject groups, inter-schools or school
clusters.
+ Focused, direct training in the traditional form (face to face in class) to guide self-study,
practice, systematize knowledge, answer questions, guide difficult content for teachers; meeting
the needs of teachers in fostering learning; creating conditions for teachers to have the
opportunity to exchange expertise, profession and practice skills.
+ Training via the Internet, using modern technology and means, design appropriate forms
of training such as e-learning (complete training on the internet) or b-learning (combining the
Internet and the traditional training form).
Webinars for teachers training
Training teachers with Webinars at Hanoi Metropolitan University
Hanoi Metropolitan University is currently training 22 university-level disciplines. In
addition, the University also organizes many short-term training programs for teachers and
school administrators such as: Training for standard qualifications professional name; Fostering
the test and assessment of capacity; Fostering teaching methods to meet requirements of the
2018 General Education Program, etc. Most of the training programs are implemented online at
the website built on the basis of Google workspace tools (https://sites.google.com/daihocthudo.
edu.vn/lms, 2021). As it can be seen in Figure 4 and Figure 5, the model of online studying
space with webinars in Hanoi Metropolitan University includes conference rooms, seminar
rooms and separate zones to serve different learners. In practice, to implement the management
model effectively, the University has organized training courses concerning online teaching
96
with webinars for lecturers, administrators and technical staffs; standardized teaching
documents and methods; and issued guidance for all persons concerned. Up to now, the system
has served more than 10,000 (ten thousand) teachers from many cities and provinces in
Vietnam. Because it is operated on a common system, the management and organization of
classes become convenient and effective.
Studying the successful model of Hanoi Metropolitan University and the experience of
other educational institutions, we recommend to use synchronously tools of Google workspace
to build the management and operation system with webinar as follows:
- Managing classrooms by using Google Sites:
+ The website has a simple and friendly interface (Figure 4). Learners and teachers are easy
to manage, search and access the class they need.
+ Users only need to click on the icon or the name of a classroom (Figure 5), the system
will lead to a webinar.
Figure 4. Home page area and conference room, seminar room

(Source: https://sites.google.com/daihocthudo.edu.vn/lms)
Figure 5. ID of pre-made classrooms

(Source: https://sites.google.com/daihocthudo.edu.vn/lms)
– Set up a webinar with Google Meet tool: Class ID is fixed by Google Calendar and
teacher, technician, and learner accounts are set up beforehand. When joining a class, users just
need to click on the link on the website to enter the class immediately. In case of using an
unregistered account, learners need to get permission from the teacher. In many situations,
especially when implementing short-term training topics, the school only needs to provide the
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address of the classroom and afterward students and teachers just simply click on the class
according to the schedule without having to register or ask for a private ID.
+ Teachers develop learning plans as well as forms and methods of teaching. Teachers can
use direct online teaching or blended teaching (b-learning).
+ Using associated applications in Google Meet to build lesson content such as the Driver,
YouTube, tests, exercises. The system allows teachers to manage students’ learning outcomes,
test results as well as learning tasks such as projects and large assignments.
Along with above mentioned advantages, in the process of implementation, there have been
a number of challenges faced by managers, teachers, learners and technical staff concerning
system security control, class discipline assurance, internet quality, supporting devices
availability, and last but not least, how to enhance interaction between teachers and learners.
Hanoi Metropolitan University has carried out effective solutions simultaneously, but it takes
time to minimize some disadvantages. Generally, in the time of digital technology and social
distancing because of Covid-19, teacher training with webinars is a good choice and, the
advantages of this model far outweigh the disadvantages.
CONCLUSION
Online teaching with webinars is a basic method, selected by many educational institutions
to develop, especially explosive when the Covid-19 pandemic occurs. The tools used are also
increasing and improving the technology to help users have more choices.
Using webinars for online teaching is a primitive form, but it is the foundation to develop
other forms of systematic teaching or use as a tool to support very effective teaching methods.
Using the appropriate model in online teaching via webinars will help limit inadequacies
and increase the effectiveness of the teaching process. This model can be used in both
synchronous e-learning and blended learning.
With the management model that we propose, universities and schools can use it to build an
online training management system or for teacher training. This management system could be
used flexibly for the training of short-term topics, with the different ability of teachers to use
technology devices.
Contribution of authors
Dr. Pham Ngoc Son and Dr. Nguyen Thanh Huyen equally contributed to developing the
main idea, discuss the research findings and to the writing of the final manuscript of this paper.
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About the authors
– Dr. Pham Ngoc Son is Vice Dean of the Faculty of Pedagogy, Hanoi Metropolitan
University. He earned a PhD degree in education in 2012 with the topic “Application of
information and communication technology in teaching Chemistry in high schools”. His
research focuses on the application of information technology in teaching innovation and
management in educational institutions. He has published 22 reference books, 3 textbooks and
many articles in scientific journals, national and international scientific conferences. His recent
studies are related to the educational innovation process in Viet Nam and the application of
technology in teaching, meeting the current requirements of digital transformation in education.
– Dr. Nguyen Thanh Huyen is Head of the Department of Pedagogy of Literature, Faculty
of Pedagogy, Hanoi Metropolitan University. As the head of the department, she manages and is
in charge of the teaching quality and improvement of education methods. She is an experienced
lecturer in the field of Literature education. Her research focuses on early childhood education
and philology. She is the author and co-author of 10 articles and 2 textbooks. Her recent
research is the innovative model for preschool teacher training, educational innovation in the
digital age.
101
USE OF PERSONALIZED VIDEOS

IN TEACHING BIOCHEMISTRY PRACTICALS
Shit-Fun Chew*1
Abstract: The use of technology in communicating content knowledge and supporting the
pedagogy to enhance students’ learning has been well documented by Technological
Pedagogical Content Knowledge framework. In Biochemistry practicals, students need to know a
great variety of biochemical techniques and carry out many steps in the protocol when they
perform the experiments. Although many of these techniques have been demonstrated in videos
and are easily available to learners on the internet, such videos may not be suitable since they do
not provide the exact information needed for the practicals implemented. Thus, it would be more
appropriate if the instructor can develop personalized videos to be used in teaching of the
practicals. In addition, due to the recent pandemic when there are restrictions to face-to-face
lessons and use of laboratory space, it is necessary to resort to using such personalized videos to
teach the Biochemistry practicals. Together with the In-Learning Department of the National
Institute of Education, we produced a number of videos complete with subtitles to teach the
students various biochemical techniques like sample preparation, homogenization, and
spectrophotometry to be used in two different Biochemistry practicals. Such videos were
uploaded into the virtual learning environment provided by the Institute for students to view and
students were also asked to write out a flow chart of the protocol before they come for each
practical. Interestingly, it was observed that the students were more confident in performing the
experiments and they were able to complete the experiments with greater accuracy. A short
survey was conducted to gather the students’ feedback on the use of such videos. The students
were pretty much satisfied with such an instruction mode although they have also provided
improvements that can be made. Such videos have indeed enhanced the students’ learning as
observed from their practical reports.
Keywords: active learning, educational technology, Technological Pedagogical Content
Knowledge, undergraduate, biochemistry
INTRODUCTION
Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) framework was first introduced by Shulman (1986,
1987). According to Shulman (1986, 1987), both the content knowledge and the pedagogical
knowledge are essential for the teacher to bring about effective instruction. When considering
the intersection of these two knowledge domains that gives rise to PCK, the teacher will need to
have a complete understanding of how the subject matter can be organized and presented using
the most appropriate pedagogy to the students. Thus, teaching can be attained using PCK when
the teacher has a deep understanding of the content information and is capable of presenting
using different methods to the students. In 2006, Mishra and Koehler added a new knowledge
domain into the PCK framework which is the technological knowledge. Teachers should also
have the knowledge and skills to use technology in their teaching. This framework is termed
Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPCK). However, Thompson and Mishra
(2007) changed it to Technology, Pedagogy, and Content Knowledge (TPACK) because they
believe that TPACK better reflected the interdependence of the three contributing knowledge
domains (Voogt et al., 2013). Mishra and Koehler (2006) stressed that teachers should not only
have a deep understanding of how technologies could help them to improve their teaching but
*
Corresponding Author: Shit-Fun Chew; E-mail Address: sfun.chew@nie.edu.sg
1 National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University
102
physically used it in their classroom to enhance their teaching and students’ learning.
Furthermore, Angeli and Valanides (2009) proposed the concept of information and
communication technology (ICT)-related PCK (ICT-PCK) which is described “as the ways
knowledge about tools and their affordances, pedagogy, content, learners, and context are
synthesized into an understanding of how particular topics that are difficult to be understood by
learners or difficult to be represented by teachers can be transformed and taught more
effectively with technology”.
In this digital age, with teachers who are now better equipped with the skills to use
technology, it would be much easier for teachers to use the TPCK or ICT-PCK framework when
designing lessons for lectures, tutorials or practicals. In Life Science Curriculum at the tertiary
level, Biochemistry is usually a core module/course taught to the undergraduates. The concepts
involved in many of the molecular processes are very difficult to comprehend without the aid of
technological or visualization tools (Rundgren & Tibell, 2010; Starbek et al., 2010; Chang and
Yao, 2014). Teaching lectures in Biochemistry is very challenging given the vast amount of
content that is needed to communicate to students within a short period of time, the limited prior
knowledge that the students have, and the difficulty in understanding the underlying concepts in
Biochemistry. At the tertiary level, most of the science courses would be accompanied with a
practical laboratory or hands-on learning component which is needed to link theory and practice
(Hofstein & Lunetta, 2004). In the case of Biochemistry practicals, there is a need for students
to learn many of the molecular and biochemical techniques to understand how the theories were
established. To facilitate students to carry out these experiments, there is a need to acquire many
biochemical equipment which can be expensive, specialized and sophisticated. However, due to
a reduction in funding in some of the higher institute of learning, and the limited laboratory
space available to store such sophisticated equipment, some institutions have resorted to using
virtual laboratories or simulations to provide a positive learning experience for students. Thus,
many researchers have documented the use of virtual simulations to support learning in their
Biochemistry practicals (Trindade et al., 2013, Ye et al., 2016; Herráez, 2019) especially during
this Covid-19 pandemic (Quesada, 2020; Sherrer, 2020; Vasiliadou, 2020).
While studies have shown that virtual laboratories may have many advantages over
physical laboratories (De Jong et al., 2013), many studies have also concluded that it is still
necessary to have the physical laboratories especially when the instructional goal is for students
to acquire a sophisticated epistemology of science, learn the practical skills, manipulate
sophisticated equipment and learn to troubleshoot when experiments failed (De Jong et al.,
2013; Trindade et al., 2013). In addition, a number of researchers have demonstrated that
combining physical and virtual laboratories have yielded better performance among the students
as compared to using one single approach that is either virtual or physical laboratories alone
(Huppert et al., 2002; Climent-Bellido et al., 2003; Zacharia et al., 2008; Olympiou and
Zacharia, 2012; Jakkola et al., 2013; Koplloffel & De Jong, 2013). These studies indicated that a
blended approach to learning would in fact enhance students’ learning.
In the National Institute of Education (NIE), Biochemistry is taught to trainee teachers
(referred to hereafter as students) reading “Biology” as an academic subject in their second year
within the Bachelor of Science (Education) Programme. In this module, the students will attend
lectures to learn the basic biochemistry concepts and practicals to learn the biochemical
techniques. In the practicals, the students will have to spend time to learn to operate some
sophisticated equipment for example the bead homogenizer, centrifuge, and spectrophotometer.
In addition, they will need to learn to handle animal specimens and extract metabolites or
enzymes from these animal specimens. Given the limited time of three hours, it posed a great
challenge for the lecturer to teach the students (i) to dissect the animal, (ii) to sample the tissues,
(iii) to extract the metabolites, (iv) to carry out the metabolite analysis and (v) to learn to operate
103
the equipment. As many of these students do not have the background knowledge in dissection,
the biochemical techniques and handling of such sophisticated equipment, thus it is even more
challenging for them to acquire the skills to carry out the steps (i) to (v) in such a short period.
Using the support-challenge concept outlined by Horobin et al. (1992), Chew (2019) has
demonstrated the need and importance in providing the students with the support in order to
match the challenge posed in Histology practical sessions. In doing so, the students will be able
to learn more effectively and efficiently and perform well in the module.
To help students overcome the difficulties faced in the Biochemistry practicals, a blended
approach was adopted in conducting the practical lessons. Although there are many videos
available on YouTube that demonstrate how various biochemical techniques are performed, the
equipment used and the context in which these techniques are used are usually very different.
Thus, the author attempted to produce personalized videos that are specific to the practical
lesson carried out. Students will get to view these videos and know exactly what to expect
before they come for the practical sessions. Students were also tasked to write flow charts for
the experiments to be carried out after reading the practical manual. It is hoped that using the
personalized videos developed and getting the students to write the flow chart will help them
overcome the difficulties faced during the practical sessions.
Thus, the aims of this project are to (i) produce personalized videos on the biochemical
techniques used for two practical sessions; (ii) get the students to view them so that they are
familiar with the techniques before the practical sessions and (iii) evaluate if students would be
able to complete the experiments in the practical sessions with greater confidence and ease.
CONTENT
1. Methods
In NIE, there is a Centre for Innovation in Learning (IN-Learning) that provide a spectrum
of IT support to serve our teaching and learning needs. Thus, the author collaborated with
IN-Learning to produce two videos on the skills needed to carry out two biochemistry
experiments. The first biochemical experiment is on “Measurement of free-cholesterol in the
muscle and hepatopancreas of a mudcrab” while the second biochemical experiment is on
“Measurement of lactate dehydrogenase in fish muscle”.
1.1. Production of videos
With the help of the video production team, we wrote the script, prepared all the equipment
and animal specimens for the filming. In the first practical, the students would need to learn to
kill the mudcrab and dissect the muscle and hepatopancreas. Then they will need to pound the
tissues in liquid nitrogen using a mortar and pestle and learn to extract free cholesterol using
isopropanol. Thus, the first video demonstrated the following: (i) killing of the mudcrab; (ii)
collection of muscle from the pincer; (iii) collection of hepatopancreas; (iv) pounding of the
muscle sample; (v) weighing of sample and (vii) extraction of free cholesterol from the sample.
In the second practical, the students would need to (i) pound fish muscle tissue that have been
collected and stored in 80°C freezer; (ii) homogenize the tissue using the bead homogenizer,
and (iii) measure the activity of lactate dehydrogenase in the supernatant using the
spectrophotometer. The second video was split into three sections. The first section
demonstrated how to pound the fish muscle tissues that were already frozen in liquid nitrogen
while the second section demonstrated how to use the bead homogenizer to homogenize the fish
muscle. The third section demonstrated how lactate dehydrogenase activity was measured using
the UV-double beam spectrophotometer. These videos were uploaded into the virtual learning
environment or Blackboard for students to view before they come for the practical sessions.
104
1.2. Implementation of the Biochemistry Practicals

There were only seven students in the 2020 cohort and the students were given the practical
manual containing the protocols for the two Biochemistry experiments. After reading the
practical manual, they had to write the flowchart to show how the experiment would be carried
out based on their understanding. They were also instructed to view the videos that were
uploaded in Blackboard before the practical session. The ability of the students to complete their
experiments with accuracy were noted during the practical sessions.
1.3. Survey administration
A survey form was designed to get the students to perform a self-evaluation and feedback
on the videos produced. A formative evaluation was carried out using an evaluation form with the
following items/questions shown below:
1.3.1. Time spent by students on viewing videos, reading practical manuals and writing flow charts
1. How many times did you watch the videos?
2. How much time did you spend reading the practical manual?
3. How much time did you spend writing the flow chart?
1.3.2. Evaluation of the videos
Students were asked to rate their perception of the videos in guiding them to carry out the
two Biochemistry experiments on a 5-point Likert scale of strongly agree to strongly disagree
for the following statements and were given the opportunity to provide open-ended comments at
the end of the survey.
a.Video for measurement of cholesterol in the tissues of mudcrab
1. The video guided me on how to kill the crab and dissect the tissues.
2. The video guided me on how to prepare the tissues for cholesterol extraction.
3. The pace of the video was just right.
4. The length of the video was just right.
5. I am clearer of what I need to do for the practical after watching the video.
6. I am able to complete my experiments faster after watching the video
7. I am able to access the video without difficulty.
b. Video for measurement of Lactate dehydrogenase in fish muscle
1. The video guided me on how to pound the fish muscle.
2. The video guided me on how to use the bead homogenizer.
3. The instructional video guided me on how to use the spectrophotometer to carry out the
enzyme assay.
4. The pace of the video was just right.
5. The length of the video was just right.
6. I am clearer of what I need to do for the practical after watching the video.
7. I am able to complete my experiments faster after watching the video.
8. I am able to access the video without difficulty.
2. Results
Two sets of videos were produced. The video produced for the practical on “Measurement
of free-cholesterol in the muscle and hepatopancreas of a mudcrab” was 12 min long. The video
for “Measurement of lactate dehydrogenase in fish muscle” consists of three sections with the
first section demonstrating the pounding of fish muscle (5.5 min), second section demonstrating
the how to use the bead homogenizer (3.5 min) and the third section demonstrating how to use
the UV-Visible spectrophotometer for measurement of the enzyme (11 min).
Students were requested to conduct a self-evaluation on the number of times they spent on
(i) viewing the videos; (ii) reading the practical manual; and (iii) writing the flow chart of the
105
protocol. Results obtained for the practical on “Measurement of free-cholesterol in the muscle
and hepatopancreas of a mudcrab” showed that 85% of the students viewed the videos at least
twice before coming to the practical (Figure 1A). There were 28% of students who have viewed
the video three times. In addition, 71% for the students spent 15 min or more reading the
practical manual while 85.7% of the students spent 30 min or more to writing the flowchart of
the protocol, before attending the practical session (Figure 1B).
Figure 1. (A) Number of times video was viewed and (B) amount of time spent by students on reading
the practical manual and writing the flow chart before coming to the practical on
“Measurement of free-cholesterol in the muscle and hepatopancreas of a mudcrab”
Table 1. Summary of responses from students to survey items 1-7 for video
on “Measurement of free-cholesterol in the muscle and hepatopancreas of a mudcrab”
No. of responses No. of responses No. of responses
Item Mean ± SD
who Strongly Agree who Agree who are neutral
1. The instructional video guided me on how to kill the
7 0 0 5.0 ± 0
crab and dissect the tissues.
2. The instructional video guided me on how to
7 0 0 5.0 ± 0
prepare the tissue samples for extraction of cholesterol.
3. The pace of the video was just right. 5 2 0 4.7 ± 0.49
4. The length of the video was just right. 7 0 0 5.0 ± 0
5. I am clearer of what I need to do for the practical. 7 0 0 5.0 ± 0
6. I am able to complete my practical faster. 5 1 1 4.6 ± 0.79
7. I am able to access the video without difficulty. 7 0 0 5.0 ± 0
The responses of the students on their perception of the videos in guiding them to carry out
the two Biochemistry experiments based on a Likert scale of 1 to 5 where 1 = strongly disagree;
2 = disagree; 3 = neutral; 4 = agree; and 5 = strongly agree; were summarized in Tables 1 and 2.
When students were asked to evaluate the videos based on the 5-point Likert scale, all of them
strongly agreed that the videos provided them with the instructions to carry out the protocols on
killing the crab, dissecting the tissues, preparation of tissues for cholesterol extraction and
cholesterol extraction from the tissues. The students also agreed that the video has given them
clear instructions on what was required to do during the practical session. However, not all
students agreed that they were able to complete the practical at a faster pace after watching the
video (Table 1).
For the “Measurement of lactate dehydrogenase in fish muscle” videos, 71% of the students
have viewed them twice before coming for the practical. The maximum number of times the
lactate dehydrogenase videos were viewed by the students was two as compared to a maximum
number of three for the cholesterol video. Interestingly, a greater percentage (71%) of students
106
spent 20-30 min reading the practical manual for the “measurement of lactate dehydrogenase in
fish muscle” experiment. In addition, all the students took 30 min or more to complete writing
the flow chart (Figure 2).
All the students strongly agreed that the videos provided them with the instructions to carry
out the protocol on pounding the muscle tissue. All the students also agreed that the video had
guided them to use the bead homogenizer and spectrophotometer. Overall, the students agreed
that they are clearer of what they need to do during the practical and able to achieve greater
efficiency in completing the practical after watching the videos (Table 2).
Some samples of the flow charts written for the first and second practicals by the students
are also presented in Figure 3.
Figure 2. (A) Number of times video was viewed and (B) amount of time spent by students
on reading the practical manual and writing the flow chart before coming to the practical on
“Measurement of lactate dehydrogenase in fish muscle”
Table 2. Summary of responses from students to survey items 1-8 for video
on “Measurement of Lactate dehydrogenase in fish muscle”
No. of responses No. of responses No. of responses
Item Mean ± SD
who Strongly Agree who Agree who are neutral
1. The instructional video guided me on how to pound
7 0 0 5.0 ± 0
the frozen muscle.
2. The instructional video guided me on how to use the
bead homogeniser for homogenisation of the muscle 6 1 0 4.9 ± 0.38
tissue.
3. The instructional video guided me on how to use the
6 1 0 4.9 ± 0.38
spectrophotometer to carry out the enzyme assay.
4. The pace of video was just right. 5 2 0 4.7 ± 0.49
5. The length of the video was just right. 5 2 0 4.7 ± 0.49
6. I am clearer of what I need to do for the practical. 5 2 0 4.7 ± 0.49
7. I am able to complete my practical faster. 6 1 0 4.9 ± 0.38
8. I am able to access the video without difficulty. 7 0 0 5.0 ± 0
107
Figure 3. Samples of the flow chart written by the students

on “Measurement of free-cholesterol in the muscle and hepatopancreas of a mudcrab”
Figure 4. Samples of the flow chart written by the students

on “Measurement of lactate dehydrogenase in fish muscle”
3. Discussion
With the advancement of technology, many University instructors or facilitators of
Biochemistry courses are resorting to virtual laboratories as a tool to support learning in their
Biochemistry practical sessions (Trindade et al., 2013; Ye et al., 2016; Herráez, 2020;
Vasiliadou, 2020). No doubt implementing virtual laboratories can help to overcome challenges
like laboratory space constraint, limited funds to purchase expensive instruments or equipment
and limited time to carry out certain complex Biochemistry experiments, it cannot totally
replace the traditional laboratory sessions (De Jong et al., 2013; Trindade et al., 2013; Ye et al.,
2016). This is because students need the hands-on-experiences and the opportunities to make
sense of imperfect measurements that can only be achieved in a physical laboratory session (De
Jong et al., 2013). Many students have also given the feedback that although they enjoy the
process of learning in virtual laboratories, they still value the need to practice the skills to
operate the equipment and carry out the experiments. However, with the recent pandemic
whereby the face to face sessions cannot be conducted, many researchers have reported the
adoption of remote lab activities and virtual laboratories to teach biochemistry (Quesada, 2020;
Sherrer, 2020; Vasiliadou, 2020).
In the National Institute of Education, students learning Biochemistry faced difficulties in
carrying out the experiments during the practical sessions mainly due to the lack of technical
skills. To help the students overcome the difficulties, personalized videos were produced and
uploaded into the online learning platform for them to view before attending the practical
sessions. Although the student number was small for the cohort, from the responses obtained for
both practical sessions, all the students agreed that the instructional videos have guided them in
carrying out various techniques like preparation of the samples for the extraction, use of the
homogenizer and the spectrophotometer (Tables 1 and 2). The other favorable aspects of the
videos produced was that they were short and direct. This allows students to be engaged and
learn the techniques within a short period of time. Therefore, it was heartening to know that
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most of the students would view the videos at least 2 times to learn the techniques (Figures 1A
and 2A). The engagement of the students with the videos could have led them to be more
competent in carrying out the experiments and thus they were able to complete the experiments
at a faster pace. The students also spent substantial time reading the manual and writing the flow
charts in preparation for the practical sessions (Figures 1B and 2B). The flow charts submitted
by the students showed that they did spend time writing out the details of the experiments be it
in words or in drawing format (Figures 3 and 4). This could also have led them to be familiar
with the procedures and thus enable them to complete the experiments with greater accuracy
and speed. As mentioned by Loveys and Riggs (2019), the best way to use video-components is
to ‘keep-it-short’ and ‘humanize it’. This “humanising” effect was also advocated by Jacobson
(1993) and O’ Reilly (2000) as there was a need to help students feel connected to the teacher
and their peers. In addition, this idea was supported by Long et al. (2016), as over 43% of
participants preferred instructor-developed video over alternative-source video. Indeed, after
performing a thorough search on YouTube, it was impossible to find a suitable video that
captured what was carried out in our practical sessions. Thus, the personalized videos developed
in this project not only enable the students to learn the exact skills needed to carry out the
experiments in the two practical sessions, they also allow the students to again greater
confidence in carrying out the experiments. This could have led the students to complete the
experiments at a faster speed. As the videos produced were short and direct, the students would
be more engaged to learn the techniques.
CONCLUSION
As documented by many researchers, it is advantageous to use virtual laboratories to
conduct various types of practical sessions. However, many students had provided the feedback
that there was still a need to have physical laboratory sessions. Thus, we have adopted a blended
learning approach in this study whereby personalized videos were used to teach the students the
techniques before they come into the practical sessions to practice the skills. In addition, getting
the students to write the flowchart before the practical session had helped them to be familiar
with the protocols needed to carry out the practical. It was observed that the majority of the
students were able to complete the practical sessions with greater ease and confidence.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This work was carried out in collaboration with colleagues from the IN-Learning
Department of NIE.
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About the author

Dr S.F. Chew is an Associate Professor in the Natural Science and Science Education
(NSSE) of the National Institute of Education, Singapore. She is currently the Deputy Head
(Research and Postgraduate Matters) of NSSE. She has taught many Biology courses of the
Diploma in Education, BSc (Education), Postgraduate Diploma in Education and In-service
Programme. She is a biologist working on Nitrogen metabolism and Ammonia Toxicity of
Air-breathing fishes and has published over 100 articles in this area of research. In addition to
science content research, she has taken an interest in using educational technology to enhance
her teaching and her students’ learning in this new learning paradigm.
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THE ROLE OF TECHNOLOGY PLATFORMS

IN MUSIC TEACHER TRAINING
FOR GENERAL EDUCATION IN VIETNAM
Nguyen Thi Ngoc Dung*1
Abstract: The General Education Program 2018 is entering widespread implementation. There is
a saying, "what content, that method," the new program requires support from technology
platforms in active teaching. For the arts, especially music, the "specific elements" of the subject
have now become the advantages developed by educational technology platforms, making the
way of training music teacher vibes, interested and practical. Each element of music finds an
appropriate technology platform to support it. And the smart user is the one who can maximizer
all benefits of the resource. The article uses qualitative research methods to clarify the role of
technology platforms in training music teachers through various approaches with specific
examples. Understanding the core values and the various ways of applying technology platforms
in music education will benefit the lecturers, the students, and the universities. Furthermore, to
meet the human resource needs of society, music teachers-to-be cannot ignore the technology
factor in art education oriented to build a smart learning environment in the direction of
developing the musical ability of pupils in the future.
Keywords: technology platforms, music teacher training, general education, elements of music
INTRODUCTION
A technology platform is an environment for building and running applications, systems,
and processes. These can be viewed as toolsets for developing and operating customized
and tailored services. The following platforms are common types of technology platforms
(Spacey, 2019).
Table 1. The common types of technology platforms
Operating systems Computing platforms Database platforms Storage platforms
Aplication platforms Mobile platforms Web platforms Media platforms
Robotics API platforms Analytics Security
Content management systems Internet of Things AI platforms Game platforms
The promulgation and deployment of the 2018 Music Curriculum in General Education
have breathed a new wind in teaching and learning music in Vietnam (MOET, 2018b). Many
modern music education methods were first officially introduced and systematically applied to
Vietnamese schools for the first time; active teaching and learning in general education are
focused and maximized. Therefore, music teachers have to be well prepared for knowledge and
skills in two components: musicology and pedagogy (Art Faculty S.U., 2021). Musicology
includes music theory, musical skills, and some specific music methods (such as the method of
Kodaly, Dalcroze, Orff-Schuwerk). Pedagogy includes the teaching process and teaching
activities, both in the direction of active teaching and learning (see Figure 1).
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Thi Ngoc Dung; Email Address: ms.ng.ngoc.dung@gmail.com

1
Saigon University; AMPA Education
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Figure 1. Modeling of music teacher training for General Education in Vietnam

(Author’s compilation)
With the news in the 2018 Music Curriculum and the average number of students (over 40
students per class), Vietnamese music school needs technology platforms to make the course
effective and enjoyable. At the same time, reduce the pressure of teachers to prepare lessons by
building up a music library for each content in the textbook, such as beats for the songs (with
transpose and change tempo function), images, and demo sound for Vietnamese Musical
Instruments, animation for Music Stories or a short documentary for introducing Vietnamese
composers and works. To bring music to every school in the country, we need platforms with
interfaces in Vietnamese, Vietnamese lyrics, Vietnamese music, and a unique layout that shows
Vietnamese culture. Further development, a Vietnamese technology platform for training music
teachers is also urgently needed in 2 main areas (music and pedagogy). However, there is no
Vietnamese technology platform that meets the above requirements until now. And filling that
gap are popular foreign technology platforms, which is used to train the music teacher-to-be in
some elements of music by lectures in universities.
According to The Cognitive process dimension of Bloom (1956) and the improved version
compiled by Anderson and Krathwohl in 2001, the levels of learners’ thinking are classified
from low to high and from shallow to deep as follows in Figure 2 (Heer, 2021):
Figure 2. A Model of Learning Objectives–based on A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching, and Assessing:
A Revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (Heer, 2021)
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For example, the Understand level is only the second level from the bottom that counts up.
In Anderson and Krathwohl’s revision, the depth of the Understand level is detailed into
Summarize, Classify, Clarify, and Predict.
In today’s digital era, accompanied by the pandemic context, the application of technology
platforms in music teacher training becomes more necessary than ever. To do that, it is required
to answer the following questions: (1) what areas can the technology platform support in music
teacher training, (2) formative of the technology platform and (3) how deep is the supporting of
the technology platform in The cognitive process of Music education students.
CONTENT
1. Technology support in Musicology component
1.1. Technology support active exercises in Music Theory learning
Music is typical kind of art form with its own language, which is very diverse and delicate.
However, within the scope of Music education (Art Faculty S. U., 2021), the students were
introduced to the essential elements of music: pitch, duration, dynamic, timbre. Combining
essential music elements will create musical expression such as melody, rhythm, harmony,
musical texture, musical form.
The support of technology platforms in Music Theory can be divided into two parts:
a. Theory topics/lessons usually carried in websites that introduce systematic knowledge
(from simple to complicated), illustrate images, animation, and sounds like musictheory.net,
8notes.com.
b. Theory exercises are usually carried in mobile phones applications like Tenuto apps,
Music Tutor apps, Rhythm Cat Pro HD apps. The valuable point of these apps is applying music
theory into practical exercises but customizing it on instrumental display.
For example, with the Tenuto apps, the students can get some achievements in the cognitive
process by doing exercises via:
– Note identification, Key Signature identification, Interval identification, Scale
identification, Chord identification. All are in the first level of Bloom’s Taxonomy (Remember
level) and in B level of Anderson and Krathwohl’s Revision (Recognize level).
– Key Signature construction, Interval construction, Scale construction, Chord construction.
All are in the second level of Bloom’s Taxonomy (Understand level) and in B & C level of
Anderson and Krathwohl’s Revision (Classify & Clarify level).
In the picture below, the Tenuto apps applied the topic Chord construction of music theory
into exercises for students and changed the screen to Piano learners or Guitar learners (see Figure 3).
Figure 3. The application of Chord Construction in Tenuto apps
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Nevertheless, today, both lessons and exercises were fully delivered to students via
websites or apps, such as teoria.net, Music Theory Illustrated apps.
c. The music notation is the mainstream of music theory and was a variety supported by
professional softwares and websites such as Encore, Finale, Sibelius, Notion, MagicScores
Maestro, or websites like musescore.org, noteflight.com. In these technology platforms, music
notation is exploited with all its approaches: from classical notation to contemporary, from
vocal to instrument, from solo to orchestral, from popular instrument to specific instrument.
Music Education students have a chance to quickly look through the notation’s history. They
not only practice their music notation but only create the new tune, play, print, and purchase
beautiful music sheets via these platforms.
These advantages of foreign technology platforms supporting teaching music theory in
Vietnam are helping students Remember and Understand knowledge intuitively and
systematically – all in step 1 and step 2 of The cognitive processes dimension, also encouraging
students to try more and more via record and static the results of homework. However, the lack
of criticizing and explanation for every mistake students made is the reason why technology
platforms cannot help learners improve their knowledge in the depth dimension. Besides,
language is an obstacle for students because they do not understand all the definitions and
concepts in English. In addition, there are several popular music theory terms in Vietnam today
that are incompatible in understanding the original meaning in English (see an example in Table 2).
Table 2. Some examples of confusing terminology
Term Understanding in Vietnamese Understanding in English
Parallel
keys
Relative
x
keys
Keys
with
the x
same
name
1.2. Technology support active exercises in Music Skills

Music skills needed for students of Music Education (Art Faculty S. U., 2021) is a set of
core skills as follows:
1.2.1. Aural skill
Aural skill (also known as ear-training) is a fundamental facet of musicianship. Learning to
listen, identify, discern, and understand music without notation present helps develop the inner
listening skill needed to become a well-versed musician.
Some examples of aural skill’s approaches in order linked to the essential elements of
music (Table 3):
Table 3. Aural skill’s approaches
Recognizing pitches
Feeling interval distances Pitch
Recognizing chords
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Discerning tonality
Understanding tonal patterns (scale)
Understanding cadences
Understanding harmony progression
Finding the steady beat
Recognizing strong and weak beats
Duration
Discerning meter
Understanding rhythm and rhythm pattern
Recognizing dynamics Dynamic
Recognizing instruments Timbre
All aural skill’s practices require concentrated listening and the analysis reaction at once
time. Therefore, aural skills help musicians at all levels become more discerning in the way they
play, sing and listen to music to improve their musical abilities.
To meet the 2018 Music Curriculum (MOET, 2018b), especially the content of Music
Appreciation, training Aural skills for students of Music Education has one more mission than
before: aural skill for dictation in music and aural skill aim to the context of music pieces. To
do it, we should not teach them based on one element of music only (as melodic dictation in
piano), but combine many core elements of music at one time. That’s why we need the support
of technology platforms for effectively training, such as phone applications: Audacity,
EarMaster, Triad Tutorial, Relative pitch, Auralbook, Music Rhythm Trainer, or web-based
platforms such as e-musicmaestro.com, musicca.com.
For example:
The melody is just a series of pitches and durations representation by one timbre. With
intervals ear training step by step, you can learn how to play a melody by ear. With the sound of
piano or guitar etc., on each sample, you can learn the timbre of popular instruments.
The chord is just a series of pitches in horizontal and representation by one timbre. With
chords ear training in piano timbre step by step, you can discern the chords of a song from
simple as Triad to complicated as Seventh chord or Altered chord.
Recognizing chord progressions by ear is a superpower too. Getting used to hearing
common progressions with an ear training tool will change the way you think about the musical
context of the songs (see Figure 4).
Figure 4. Harmonic progression for Beginner
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The rhythm and rhythm patterns belong to the duration – an essential element of music too.
The ear training rhythm app works simply: Students listen to the rhythm that the app plays, and
then they tap it out on the screen of their phone or tablet correctly to move forward. In this way,
students don’t just practice their ears to listen to the rhythm, knowing what rhythms look like,
but they also practice how to play the rhythm, which is just as important as listening to it. The
app gives a slow learning curve or helps students practice every day. Lessons start with basic
beats, but they get to work on more complex rhythms as their progress, preparing for the most
complicated music (see Figure 5).
Figure 5. The process of duration ear training in Rhythm Trainer apps

The aural skill carried in the technology platforms are pretty rich, in different approaches:
from singular elements of music like pitch or duration to a combination of factors to create the
various contents of aural training course such as melody, harmony, rhythm pattern, and
systematic all. However, it is time for Vietnamese to think about their own technology platforms
for aural skills for Music Education, using resources from Vietnamese music, integrating songs
and music pieces mentioned in the new Vietnamese music textbooks, and helping the training
music teacher more practical.
1.2.2. Sight-reading skill
Sight-reading is the ability to play a piece of music that you have never played before
simply by reading it off a music sheet. Being able to look at a pretty new piece of music and
play or sing it at sight is a fantastic skill to have. Especially if you are a Music teacher-to-be.
Good sight-reading skill will bring you confidence, especially in case that you are facing music
you are never heard before; expand your musical opportunities; make your music foundation
stronger with pitch and rhythm; and last, it is the exciting challenge in your music journey.
Technology platforms in Sight-reading training were developed in web-based platforms or
applications for mobile phones.
For the beginning level, they can be divided into two groups, based on the essential
elements of music:
 The Note Sight-reading: Improve pitch notation reading speed and accuracy in reading
music sheets by identifying music notes in timed sessions. Students choose to practice between
treble, bass, and/or alto clefs for a duration of 1, 5, or 10-minute sessions. During the practice
session, every note is displayed along with the sound of the note (see Figure 6).
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Figure 6. Note identification in Music Tutor apps

 The Rhythm Sight-reading: Improve rhythm notation reading quickly with immediate
feedback of timing accuracy. It is structured by carefully graduated levels from simple to
professional allow students to start at their best level and improve at their own pace, more
rapidly than on their own instrument. The valuable point of the sight-reading app is students can
practice anytime and anywhere.
For example, in the Rhythm Sight-reading Trainer app, each time signatures have 4 to 5
levels in which different time durations, from simple to complicated (see Figure 7).
Figure 7. Time value idetification in Rhythm Sight Reading Trainer apps

For the advanced level, technology platforms in Sight-reading training are websites or
softwares because the students have to be taught in completed musical information, and it
requires a massive material of resources that mobile apps cannot handle. Students can access
some popular websites like: sightreadingfactory.com, practicesightreading.com, or simply pick
up a music sheet in the library and practice the sight-reading skill in their way (see Figure 8).
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Figure 8. Sight-reading in Piano style in website sightreadingfactory.com

Generally, in sight-reading class, the student’s job is a chain of simultaneously scanning
and identifying various visual symbols (music notation), processing each one (both individually
and collectively), and effectively communicating those instructions to other parts of the body to
physically produce the correct sounds. Each link of that split-second process requires its own
individual development and understanding, spanning everything from pitch, timing, and dynamics,
to harmony, rhythm, and technique all of which are essential to becoming a well-rounded music
teacher and a capable sight-reader. Sight-reading abilities directly connect with the music sheet
and the audio (the better ears, the stronger accuracy sight-reading). That is the reason why
sight-reading and ear-training always go together.
In another way, like languages, reading music notation should be done in the context – not
done in a separate element of music. That’s why the technology supporting sight-reading skills
is most for the beginning level in apps or simple games (learners recognize separate symbols in
music notation) and using web-based learning forms at an advanced level.
1.2.3. Sing or Play an instrument
Sing or Play an instrument is a combination skill from sight-reading, aural skill, and
vocal/instrumental skill. It is the first step of Apply level in The cognitive process dimension
(Bloom-based). Students in Music Education are trained in two primary branches: Sing and/or
Play instruments. Singing or playing music is the rich music field for technology platforms to
exploit. Based on the principle of “learning by doing” mainly websites explain the knowledge
and accompany the music by sample vocals or sample backing tracks. Lovely accompaniments
& animations encourage students to practice at home over and over until they are fluent. The
content in tutorials sites in singing and performance is organized systematically. Not only do the
music guides for a specific type of instrument, but some web-based platforms also provide the
music instructions for many different instruments.
In the website charanga.vn, the student explores vocal health and progressive vocal warm-up
activities. The songs on this website are organized by many categories, such as Age suitability,
General difficulty, Musical style, Song genre, Topics/Themes, Curriculum subject, Language,
Performance option, Musical features, etc. (see Figure 9).
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Figure 9. The vocal warm-up activities in charanga.vn

For example, the website charanga.vn has many tutorials and music sheets from the
beginning level for school instruments, such as keyboard, piano, recorder, xylophone, etc and
scores for playing the instrument with accompaniment (this is the first concept of a corporation
and ensemble in music).
For each instrument in the music classroom, the Charanga website shows a step-by-step
course for students to play & perform pieces from the beginning with lively accompaniment
(this is the first concept of competency “corporation and creation” – from the 2018 Music
Curriculum (MOET, 2018b)). Each note is introduced with a song about child-friendly
characters. The words of the songs give the rhythm of each piece, and there is a simple guide to
reading music. The represented is new with an exciting interactive digital format; the selected
music materials are perfect for individual, group, and whole-class teaching (see Figure 10).
Figure 10. The play-a-long song for recorder practicing in charanga.vn
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The role of technology platforms support on Sing or Play instrument is mainly in the
beginning level, matching with pretty simple requirements such as playing the right notes, in the
right rhythm, and coordinating with the backing track. Because the websites are impossible to
provide direct comments on technique, articulation, or sound quality or offer instructional
features, the benefit of technology platforms to Music Education students in Sing or Play an
instrument is to encourage mechanical skills – which is the Apply step of The Cognitive
processes dimension and in the A level (Respond) of The Knowledge dimension.
1.3. Technology support in Specific Music Method
Specific Music Methods (like Kodaly, Dalcroze, Orff-Schuwerk) are named after the
founder. Each method has its history, advantages, and missions. These methods have unique
educational philosophies, teaching tools, and pedagogical processes deployed throughout from
idea to practice. They are popular globally but are first officially mentioned in Vietnamese
music education. Depending on educational philosophy, classroom democracy, learning topics,
and teaching object, teachers choose appropriate specific music teaching methods.
Zoltan Kodaly said “Music is a manifestation of the human spirit, similar to language. Its
greatest practitioners have conveyed to mankind things not possible to say in any other
language. If we do not want these things to remain dead treasures, we must do our utmost to
make the greatest possible number of people understand their idiom.” (cited in Samild, 2021).
According to Kodály (Samild, 2021), musical learning evolves from a variety of children
experiences including singing songs (in unison, rounds, canons, and in parts); singing themes
from great instrumental music; using tuned and untuned percussion instruments as
accompanying instruments for playing and improvising; mini-games, and memory activities are
designed based on beat, rhythm, pitch, and timbre Kodály musical training always attaches with
active music-making. The application of the Kodály method in Vietnam music classroom is the
Vietnamese Folk song, Handsign, Solfa-syllables, and the moveable-Do system. They are used
to teach skills in pitch discrimination, intervals, harmony, and analysis. These skills are
reinforced with a system of hand signs. Rhythmic skills are developed using a system of time
names based upon the rhythm duration syllables.
For example, the Kodály method in Vietnam music classroom (extract from the new
version of Vietnam Music Textbook, grade 1 and grade 10) (see Figure 11).
Figure 11. The Kodaly methods in 2018-version of Vietnam Music Textbook

Emile Jaques-Dalcroze said (quotestats.com/, n.d.) “Music acts on the whole of the
organism like a magic force which suppresses the understanding and irresistibly takes
possession of the entire being. To insist on analysing this force is to destroy its very essence”.
Dalcroze music education is divided into three main categories:
 Eurhythmics engages the body in rhythmic movement and active listening.
 Solfège develops internal melody and harmony, along with a holistic response to musical
notation.
 Improvisation brings out the creative spirit with the voice, an instrument, or the body.
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It is a process for awakening, developing, and refining innate musicality through rhythmic
movement (often called eurhythmics), ear training, and improvisation. The application of the
Dalcroze method in Vietnam music classroom is Eurhythmics, it brings a playful, exploring
energy for young children while learning music.
For example, the Dalcroze method in Vietnam music classroom (extract from the new
version of Vietnam Music Textbook, grade 1 and grade 6) (see Figure 12).
Figure 12. The Dalcroze methods in 2018-version of Vietnam Music Textbook

Carl Orff said “Tell me, I forget, show me, I remember, involve me, I understand” (cited in
branyMusic and movement are the two primary art forms in the Orff-Schulwerk concept, and
they have to deliver to children in “elemental”. Because of that, all music activities in class were
disciplined as follows (Resources, n.d.).
Speech. Children’s play frequently involves little sayings and rhymes, with or without
specific meaning, often accompanying a game in some way. These rhythmic activities
surrounding it can be expanded to stabilize sensitivity to beat and develop the sense of pattern.
Singing. Children’s group play involves simple little songs, often with accompanying
games, that provide a basis for (1) strengthening the ability to sing, and (2) developing the sense
of tonal relationships.
Movement. In the early stages, time is spent in developing a vocabulary of non-locomotor
and locomotor movements or combining both of them.
Playing instruments. This instrument category tends to be particularly identified with the
Schulwerk approach:
- Body Percussion.
- Unpitched hand percussion.
- Orff-Instruments. (These special pitched percussion instruments were designed to be of a
size readily accessible by children and to produce a satisfying musical sound with a minimum of
a technical facility).
The application of the Orff method in Vietnam music classroom is Speech & Instruments
(Unpitched hand percussion & Body Percussion). This is the first time Vietnamese children
officially play instruments in all grades in the classroom, and it also is the mark of the 2018
Music Curriculum than the previous Music Curriculum.
For example, the Orff method in Vietnam music classroom (extract from the new version of
Vietnam Music Textbook, grade 6) (see Figure 13).
Figure 13. The Orff-Schulwerk methods in 2018-version of Vietnam Music Textbook
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The common point of these specific music methods is: playing as learning, imitation the
study of music as the study of mother languages, focusing on students’ experience, so it requires
communication and interaction directly with humans throughout the learning process. There is
not any technology platforms support for each specific music method. Instead, learners can find
technology support through learning activities & exercises, as mentioned in sections 1.1 and 1.2.
In general, the role of technology platforms support in Vietnam Music Education in the
Musicology component is mainly in knowledge and skills, from beginning to intermediate
levels, with various forms of exercises, encourage students’ self-study ability (in the low level
of The Cognitive process dimension of Bloom’s). However, the highest barrier for these foreign
platforms is language and culture. Therefore, these platforms do not help Vietnamese students
enhance their aesthetics and awareness of Vietnamese culture.
2. Technology platforms support in Pedagogy component
Pedagogical competence is the integration of many knowledge and skills in the same field.
Students of Music Education are guided in two areas: building the teaching process and
organizing learning activities in an active teaching approach.
2.1. Teaching process
According to the Official Letter 5512/BGDĐT-GDTrH about organizing the educational
plans in secondary school and high school (MOET, 2020), the music teaching process in general
education in Vietnamese schools usually has four steps (see Figure 14):
Figure 14. Teaching process guidance in Official Letter 5512/2020 – (MOET, 2020b)
It can be seen that the above four steps are quite similar to The Cognitive process
dimension according to Bloom’s, and there are changes for technology platforms to support the
classroom in each step.
2.2. Learning activities
After having a logical teaching process, the teacher will design all learning activities. In
each step of the teaching process, there are many different activities, so the ability to apply
supporting technology platforms is considerable and usually is classified by function as follows
(MOET, 2020a):
 Technology platforms for operating the classroom such as MS Team, Google Classroom,
Zoom, Moodle, ClassIn, etc.
 Technology platforms for developing teaching content, mainly for presentation, including
PowerPoint, Prezi, Keynote, Video Editor...
These technology platforms mentioned above are tools to support both the teaching &
learning process in general, not only Music Education. But some technology platforms support
the specific perspective of music, such as Audacity, Chord Pulse (aural skill), musescore.org
(notation), teoria.net (music theory), etc. And some technology platforms integrate all functions,
such as the website specific for music school charanga.vn, bringing the resource of knowledge,
skills, activities for teachers and schools while teaching music in the classroom.
For examples:
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 Using activities suggested in charanga.vn for the first step of the Teaching process
(Warm-up) (see Figure 15).
Figure 15. Warm-up activities in website charanga.vn

 Using the explanation & illustration in charanga.vn for the first & the second steps of the
Teaching process in Singing class (Warm-up & Forming new knowledge) (see Figure 16).
Figure 16. Forming new knowledge activities in website charanga.vn

 Using music sheets in charanga.vn for the third step and the fourth step of the Teaching
process (Practice). The students play the song’s melody & start to improvise with the
backing track (see Figure 17).
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Figure 17. Practice activities in website charanga.vn

 Using the Productions function of charanga.vn for the fourth step (Applied & Creative).
The learning product of music is a Musical at the end of the semester. The resources in
this website provide everything you need to learn, rehearse and perform, including
scripts, scores, and director guides (see Figure 18).
Figure 18. Applied & Creative activities in website charanga.vn

Moreover, Vietnamese lectures can apply one platform but in different areas, so students
can create their knowledge and learn through group presentations, open discussions, peer
reviews, fieldwork, role-playing, project, etc. The lesson is delivered to students not by
transmitting knowledge but by enhancing student-to-student interaction, engaging students’
experience, and stimulating students to participate in course contents via synthetic technology
platforms like charanga.vn, teoria.net, etc. In addition, we can use professional instruction on
international school music platforms as a benchmark, thereby adjusting the training of music
skills to students of Music Education in Vietnam to gradually approach the international
standards.
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The above analysis and examples show that the application of technology platforms in
training music teachers in Vietnam is possible. In fact, the first steps have been taken.
This 3D diagram of Figure 19 using Bloom’s Taxonomy, Anderson & Krathwohl scale, and
Rex Heer ideas (Iowa State University) is revealing the actual role of technology platforms in
training music teachers in Vietnam: It enhances the student’s competency, but only at the
Apprentice level or at the beginning of Journeyman Practioner level. To further in their career
path, music teacher-to-be needs the interaction of human and direct guides from their live
lectures.
Figure 19. A model of Learning Objectives based on A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching,
and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives
For example, the Charanga’s

musical elements learning by age in
this spiral diagram below are built
around the essential elements of
music: pulse, rhythm, pitch, tempo,
dynamics, timbre, texture, structure,
and notation (see Figure 20).
Figure 20. Musical elements spiral of

learning progress
CONCLUSION
Through the above analysis & examples, we can see that to develop the 2018 Music
Curriculum successfully, it must have the help of the technology platform in the music
classroom: bring joy to the learners, and help the teachers spend more time paying attention to
each student. For training music teachers in Vietnam, we can implement technology platforms
in two components:
126
 Improve musicology competence (via platforms support to music theory, specific musical
skills such as aural skill, sight-reading skill, singing or playing skill). These platforms
help students remember and categorize learned knowledge through systematic lessons &
exercises – step 1 and step 2 of The Cognitive processes dimension and in the A or B
level of The Knowledge dimension.
 Improve pedagogy competence (via platforms support to learning activities), from class
operations to developing content. Especially the role of synthetic platforms, which is
helping to transform knowledge/skills from teacher-to-be to pupil-in-future more lively
and conveniently.
By extension, it’s time for Vietnamese to think about and design synthetic technology
platforms to meet the music curriculum in the general education of Vietnam. This is the most
necessary and urgent thing: building the completed music platform in Vietnamese language,
following Vietnamese education programs, using Vietnamese material teaching, and promoting
Vietnamese music. At that time, we believe that the quality of music teacher training in Vietnam
will be significantly improved. Simultaneously, popularizing music in general education
throughout Vietnam will become possible and enjoyable than ever.
REFERENCES
1. Applied Arts Faculty (2019). Curriculum. Van Lang University.
2. Art Faculty (2015). Curriculum. Van Hien University.
3. Art Faculty, S.U. (2021). Music teacher training Curriculum.
4. azquotes.com (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.azquotes.com/quote/692242.
5. changa.vn (n.d.). Retrieved from Charanga: https://www.charanga.vn/site/.
6. Heer, R. (2021). Iowa State University. Retrieved from Center for Excellence in Learning
& Teaching: https://www.celt.iastate.edu/teaching/effective-teaching-practices/revised-
blooms-taxonomy/.
7. Moore, J. (n.d). Philosophy of the Alliance for Active Music Making. Retrieved from
http://www.allianceamm.org/philosophy/.
8. Music is magic famous quotes & sayings (n.d.). Retrieved from https://quotestats.com/
topic/music-is-magic-quotes/.
9. Music Faculty (2016). Curriculum. Nguyen Tat Thanh University.
10. Orff, C. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/carl_orff_303565.
11. Quotes, D. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://quotestats.com/topic/music-is-magic-quotes/.
12. Resources (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.allianceamm.org/resources/orff-schulwerk/.
13. Samild, J. (2021). The Kodaly Approach. Retrieved from https://musicaustralia.org.au/
discover/music-education/music-education-methodologies-approaches/the-kodaly-approach/.
14. Shehan, P.K. (1986). Major approaches to music education: An account of method. Music
Educators Journal, 72(6), 26-31.
15. Spacey, J. (2019). Retrieved from https://simplicable.com/new/technology-platform.
16. Vietnam Ministry of Education & Training – MOET (2018a). General Education Program
2018.
17. Vietnam Ministry of Education & Training – MOET (2018b). Music Curriculum in
General Education.
18. Vietnam Ministry of Education & Training – MOET (2020a). ETEP Text Document for
training teachers.
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19. Vietnam Ministry of Education & Training – MOET (2020b). Công văn số 5512/BGDĐT-
GDTrH ngày18/12/2020 về việc Xây dựng và tổ chức thực hiện kế hoạch giáo dục nhà
trường. (Official Letter on organizing the educational plans in secondary school and high
school).
20. What is Dalcroze (n.d.). Retrieved from https://dalcrozeusa.org/about-dalcroze/what-is-
dalcroze/.
About the author
Dr. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Dung is a Musicologist and a Pianist. She was educated in Ho Chi Minh
City Conservatory in both two majors: Piano & Musicology, so supported many conferences/
masterclasses/ workshops in academic music. She got a master’s degree and won the Ph.D.
fellowship, continuing studying in Poland with a major is in Music Theory. Although busy with
the role of lecturer in Saigon University (Art Faculty), she participated in national education
projects, published scientific papers in music & music education. Her research
named Contemporary music language in Vietnam symphony achieved Ho Chi Minh City Music
Association Reward (HMA) in 2018. As Head of Music in AMPA Education Organization, she
developed the Publishing and the Grade Exams of International Music Certificates in Vietnam.
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PART 2: PRE-SERVICE AND IN-SERVICE TEACHER EDUCATION
PART 2
PRE-SERVICE AND
IN-SERVICE TEACHER
EDUCATION
129
REFLECTION IN TEACHER EDUCATION IN CANADA:

IMPLICATIONS FOR VIETNAMESE TEACHER EDUCATION
Tu Duc Van*1, Nguyen Thi Nho2, Giap Binh Nga1
Abstract: Teacher education is globally recognized to be crucial for supporting students’ learning
and achievement. In Vietnam, teacher education is considered as the key to effectively
implementing the new curriculum introduced in 2002. Therefore, the Vietnamese government
has made a great effort to launch educational reforms in which teachers are required to update
their knowledge and adopt new pedagogies, particularly those originating from Western
countries. Reflection initially proposed by John Dewey in the 1930s has become one of the most
recommended theories in teacher education in recent years. This article aims to explore the
reflective learning theories and their implementation in teacher education, specifically the
approaches to educators’ professional learning in Canada. The article also provides implications
for teacher education in Vietnam.
Keywords: teacher education, Canadian teacher education, Vietnamese teachers, reflection
INTRODUCTION
The notions “reflection”, “reflective practice”, “reflective learning”, and “reflective thinking”
abound in the literature on teacher education and teachers’ professional development (Admiraal
& Wubbels, 2005; Birmingham, 2004; Loughran, 2002; McGarr, 2021; Rodgers, 2002), and
reflection has been advanced as an ideal in numerous teacher education programs. In the
Canadian context, the endorsement of reflection in teacher education is authorized as a key
objective. Schön’s work is often considered a watershed, initiating what has been labeled “the
reflective turn” (Schön, 1991); however, the seminal impact of Dewey (1910, 1997) has
strongly influenced the development of a variety of understandings and perspectives on
reflection in education. The ideals or purposes of reflection in education are as manifold as the
term itself: development of self-monitoring teachers, teachers as experimenters, teachers as
researchers, teachers as inquirers, teachers as activists, teachers as artists. It is not always clear
whether reflection is conceptualized as an exclusively cognitive activity (as a special case of
thinking, pondering, etc.), or what exactly constitutes its relationship to ongoing, past or future
events. Across the diversity of perspectives and positions, reflection is generally assumed to
promote understanding and insight and to have transformation or empowerment as its purpose
or effect.
In the study presented here, the focus is on teacher education, specifically the approaches to
educators’ professional learning. Reflection as the object of teacher education and reflection as a
discursive tool mediating learning, numerous teacher education practices are designed to
develop teachers as reflective practitioners in Canada. In contrast, teacher education in Vietnam
is largely done in lecture style and with an orientation on theory. This is because the faculty of
the universities of education and teacher training colleges are strongly theory-oriented, and this
is reflected in the training content.
However, what is required of Vietnamese teachers of today is not only theory, such as
“what exactly is student-centered learning?” but also “how to implement it in actual lessons”.
The future challenge, therefore, is to increase practical teacher education. Therefore, the
research questions for this study are: What are reflective learning theories? Who are the
* Corresponding Author: Tu Duc Van; E-mail Address: vantd57@gmail.com

1 Hanoi National University of Education
2 National Academy of Education Management
130
authors? What is the state of educators’ professional learning in Canada? What are the
implications for Vietnamese teacher education?
CONTENT
1. Reflective learning theories
John Dewey is thought to be the founder of reflection as it relates to personal learning.
Dewey highlighted that reflection in a learning context is not just a passive recall of an event.
Reflection is a deliberate and active process. It is about thinking to learn. In Dewey’s words, it
is an “active, persistent and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge
in the light of the grounds that support it, and further conclusions to which it leads” (Dewey,
1933, p. 118). Dewey (1933) believed that reflection could be really useful for making sense of
situations or events that we found puzzling or hard to explain. He suggested that reflection for
learning should include recalling the event and then posing questions to explore why things
turned out the way they did and what possible actions could have given a different outcome.
Dewey argues that “We do not learn from experience. We learn from reflecting on experience”
(1933, p.78). He thus defines reflection as “active, persistent and careful consideration of any
belief or practice in light of reasons that support it and the further consequences to which it
leads” (Dewey 1933, p.9). Since Dewey’s initial work a variety of models have been proposed
to capture the components of reflection within learning.
Schön built on Dewey’s work and linked reflection more solidly to professional
development and professional practice. Schön claimed that by using reflection, practitioners can
make explicit, hidden knowledge. This knowledge is the theory that underpins what
practitioners do often by instinct (Schön, 1983). Further, this new understanding can help
practitioners improve their practice and become increasingly expert at what they do. Schön
identified two types of reflection: reflection on action, which is undertaken retrospectively, and
reflection in action, which is essentially “thinking on your feet” (Schön, 1983). He also
proposed that repeatedly carrying out the process of “reflecting on action” can help practitioners
to build upon previous experiences and scenarios (Schön, 1983). This leads to the creation of an
extensive repertoire of rehearsed interventions. When new or unexpected situations occur in
practice, this repertoire enables the expert practitioner to respond rapidly and instinctively in an
appropriate manner.
Kolb and Fry (1975) looked at the constituent parts of reflection and from these, created a
learning cycle framework. Kolb identified four parts to the learning cycle. Kolb highlights an
important point. Individuals tend to have a preference for carrying out one part of the learning
cycle over the others. For example, theorizing in the “abstract conceptualization” of the model
(Kolb & Fry, 1975). In many cases this is not problematic, so long as a level of skill is
maintained in the other areas. However, if an individual develops a very strong preference for
one part of the cycle, then they may neglect and become deskilled in the other areas. This can
cause the subsequent learning to become skewed and unbalanced. Therefore, maintaining a level
of competence in all parts of the learning cycle is essential to ensure comprehensive learning
(Kolb & Fry, 1975).
Both Schön (1983) and Dewey (1933) tend to ignore the effect of emotions when
considering reflection. Schön’s theory is seen as being more concerned with professional
practice and the development of the expert practitioner. Kolb’s theory has also been criticized as
being too theoretical and not acknowledging the effect of feelings as well. However, Boud,
Keogh and Walker (1985) challenge this assumption. They assert that for reflection to be a valid
way of learning, the emotions that are associated with the event must be taken into account (e.g.
fear, panic hesitation, calm, or elation). They also highlight that emotions can influence how
individuals recall events. Strong emotions may skew the way events are interpreted or indeed
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what part of an event is concentrated upon during reflection. By ignoring the impact of emotion,
learning from reflection may be an incomplete process.
Reflection was thought of as a way of steering teachers into new and better ways of
thinking, acting and acknowledging the complexity of teachers’ work. It was also seen as a way
of enhancing teachers’ autonomy in the teaching profession. Furthermore, teachers can use
reflection as a strategy for developing a knowledge base that is founded on practice (Bates et al.
2009). There are other definitions of reflective teaching. Some put emphasis on rather solitary
processes of introspection and retrospection, focusing specifically on a teacher’s actions and
thoughts before, during or after teaching. They define reflective teaching as “the teacher’s
thinking about what happens in classroom lessons and thinking about alternative means of
achieving goals or aims” (Cruickshank & Applegate 1981, p. 202).
On the other hand, Richards and Lockhart define reflective teaching as: ‘teachers and
student teachers collect data about teaching, examine their attitudes, beliefs, assumptions and
teaching practices, and use the information obtained as a basis for critical reflection about
teaching’ (1994, p. 1). They argue that reflective practice can be practiced by both pre-service
and in-service teachers so long as they have some current, ongoing teaching experience that can
serve as a basis for reflection. Other definitions take a broader stance and embed the concept of
reflection within the social and political contexts of programs, schools and communities. For
example, Zeichner and Liston (1996) define reflective teaching as: “recognition, examination
and rumination over the implications of one’s beliefs, experiences, attitudes, knowledge, and
values as well as the opportunities and constraints provided by the social conditions in which
the teacher works” (Zeichner & Liston 1996, p.6). While the cognitive processes of recognition
are still carried out by individuals, this definition emphasizes the social contexts in which
teaching occurs. They believe that simply thinking about teaching does not necessarily
constitute reflective teaching. It must have a reflective dimension: “If a teacher never questions
the goals and the values that guide his or her work, the context in which he or she teaches, or
never examines his or her assumptions, then it is our belief that this individual is not engaged in
reflecting teaching.” (Zeichner & Liston 1996, p.1).
According to these authors, the practice of a reflective teacher must include reflection about
the unexpected outcomes of teaching because teaching, even under the best conditions, always
involves unintended outcomes. This element of unpredictability leads teachers into troublesome
areas, and sometimes reflection leads teachers to uncomfortable awareness – as in any case,
teachers needed to be open-minded and take responsibility for their professional development
with whole heartedness.
2. The State of Educators’ Professional Learning in Canada
2.1. The education system in Canada
The following chart (see Figure 1) illustrates the structure of the educational system in each
province and territory at the elementary, secondary, and postsecondary levels.
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Figure 1. Structure of the Educational Systems in Canada (Source: tadtravel.vn)

Schools and Enrolments
As of 2020, there were approximately 14,600 public schools in Canada (CMEC, 2020):
10,100 elementary schools; 2,600 secondary schools; 2,100 mixed elementary and secondary
schools. In 2018–19, provinces and territories reported that there were almost 5.7 million
students enrolled in public elementary and secondary schools with an average of 390 students
per school (CMEC, 2020).
Early Childhood or Pre-Elementary Education
Every province and territory provides Kindergarten programs, whether full-day or half-day,
mandatory or voluntary. Eight provinces and territories provide full-day Kindergarten for all
five-year-olds. Kindergarten in Canada is considered part of the formal education system and
has a dedicated curriculum in all 13 provinces and territories. While these programs are only
compulsory in a few provinces, 97 percent of children who are of eligible age attend
Kindergarten in Canada (CMEC, 2020).
Elementary Education
The ages for compulsory schooling vary among provinces and territories, but most require
attendance in school from age 6 to age 16. In some cases, compulsory schooling starts at 5, and
in others, it extends to age 18 or graduation from secondary school. In most provinces and
territories, elementary schools cover six to eight years of schooling. Almost 98 percent of
elementary students go on to the secondary level (CMEC, 2020).
Secondary Education
The secondary school covers the final four to six years of compulsory education. The secondary
school graduation rate in 2017 –18 was 81 percent, with 84 percent of females and 77 percent of
males graduating. The overall graduation rate has been steadily increasing while the longer-term
dropout rate has declined as older students complete their secondary education. In 2017–18, the
dropout rate (defined as 25- to 64-year-old without an upper-secondary education) had fallen to
8 percent (CMEC, 2020).
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Postsecondary Education
Canada has 223 public and private universities, and 213 public colleges and institutes.
According to Universities Canada, in 2019, there were 1,090,000 full-time university students,
as well as 266,000 part-time students. In 2018, Canadian universities awarded an estimated
197,830 bachelor’s degrees, 65,706 master’s degrees, and 7,923 doctoral degrees. There are
more than 10,000 undergraduate and graduate degree programs offered in Canadian universities,
as well as professional degree programs and certificates. Most institutions provide instructions
in either English or French; others offer instructions in both. In 2020, Canadian universities
employed over 47,000 full-time faculty members (CMEC, 2020).
2.2. Educators’ Professional Learning in Canada
Globally, there is a focus on the importance of developing teachers as crucial for supporting
students’ learning and achievement. Canada has been recognized as a country with high
educational performance and interested in knowing the approaches to educators’ professional
learning in Canada.
However, there is limited Pan-Canadian data and research available. The State of
Educators’ Professional Learning in Canada study (Campbell et al., 2016; 2017) was funded by
Learning Forward to address this gap in available research. There are differences in details
between and within provinces and territories, between and among different professional groups,
across locations and contexts, and for individual educators’ needs and their students’ needs.
Nevertheless, there are commonalities within Canada linked to features of effective professional
learning: the importance of combining evidence, inquiry and professional judgment to inform
professional learning; the priority of developing teachers’ knowledge and practices to support
diverse learners’ needs; the valuing of a broad range of student and professional learning
outcomes; the need for relevant, practical and collaborative learning experiences within and
beyond school walls differentiated to professionals’ needs; and the role of system and school
leaders in engaging in their learning and supporting teacher and student learning. There are also
common challenges: time for professional learning integrated within the workday; inequities in
access to, and funding, for professional learning; and contentions in the balance between
system-directed and/or self-selected professional learning for teachers. Where there are
persisting challenges, inequities and issues, further dialogue and action are required across
Canada to raise these priorities and seek solutions. It is our collective responsibility to ensure
that Canada’s educators and students have access to, and engage in, the highest-quality learning
opportunities and experiences.
In Table 1, we summarize the main findings from the case in relation to the key findings of
the overall study of educators’ professional learning in Canada (Campbell et al., 2017)
Table 1. Summary of Educators’ Professional Learning in Canada
Key Components
and Features of Effective
Professional Key Findings from the Study of Educators’ Professional Learning in Canada
Learning identified
in the Research Literature
Quality Content Evidence, inquiry, and professional judgment are informed to be professional learning policies and
practices.
The priority area identified by teachers for developing their knowledge and practices is how to support
diverse learners’ needs.
A focus on a broad range of students’ and professionals’ learning outcomes is important.
The appropriate balance of system-directed and self-directed professional development for teachers is
complex and contested.
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Learning Design and There is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to professional learning; teachers are engaging in multiple
Implementation opportunities for professional learning and inquiry with differentiation for their professional needs.
Collaborative learning experiences are highly valued and prevalent within and across schools and wider
professional networks.
Teachers value professional learning that is relevant and practical for their work; “job-embedded” should
not mean school-based exclusively as opportunities to engage with external colleagues and learning
opportunities matter also.
Support and Sustainability Inequitable variations in access to funding for teachers’ self-selected professional development are
problematic.
Time for sustained, cumulative professional learning integrated within educators’ work lives requires
attention.
System and school leaders have important roles in supporting professional learning for teachers and for
themselves.
Teachers can also choose to participate in self-selected teacher professional learning
opportunities. While much of the work of the consortia is to develop and deliver mandated
professional learning on behalf of the Ministry, as an Executive Director explained:
One of the things that we really know about teacher learning and its impact on student
learning is that the shot in the arm doesn’t really do it. It might give them exposure to new ideas
but if we want it to become deeply embedded in practice the more we learn together over time
the greater our abilities to think about impacting actual practices and student learning in
classrooms. So we’ve started designing more of our learning opportunities for teachers with
that notion in mind. We’ve designed collaborative communities and so it’s the teachers coming
together, cross-jurisdictional because it’s that collaborative time together, where we can know and
understand some of the best around whatever the theme or topic is for our collaborative. (E.D).
We believe that teachers are in the best position to know their own learning needs and
should be in control of their own professional learning in whole life. According to the teachers
and school leaders who were interviewed. A representative from them explained that:
Our commitment to professional learning simply reflects the belief that teachers are
expected to be lifelong learners. We’re expected to grow in our practice. As the body for the
profession, we should be helping our members do that and assisting many in that, and teachers
need to undertake individually and collectively professional learning to both enhance their own
professional practice and to contribute to the profession1.
Council of Ministers of Education, Canada (CMEC) holds annual teachers’ conventions for all
teachers, organizes a host of specialist workshops and conferences, runs mentoring programs for
beginning teachers and administrators, and hosts online webinars and school-based workshops. Some
opportunities are short-term, one or two days in length, and others are more longitudinal, with teachers
working together over the course of a full school year or even longer. The CMEC has also formed
partnerships with Finland and Norway where teachers and students participate in short-term exchanges
to collaborate on mutual learning focused around teaching and learning at the classroom level.
Teachers additionally have many opportunities to engage in teacher leadership through participation in
a variety of programs at both the provincial and the national levels.
Although there have been some criticisms that teacher professional learning has been
increasingly determined by those other than the teachers themselves, there is recognition across
the nation that teachers are in the best position to determine their learning needs. Hence, we
have observed that, in many schools, districts, and provinces, control over professional learning
is increasingly becoming the purview of teachers themselves. For instance, a teacher in one of
the previous studies around policies and practices to support the teaching profession (Zeichner,
Hollar, & Pisani, 2017) commented:
1 Alberta, Education Partners.
135
It’s very much teacher-driven. You won’t see very many experts anymore leading sessions
where teachers sit back and listen and take it in…. You get to pick what you want…. There are
many opportunities online and at the district level and at the school level where you can become
more informed about literacy or assessment or feedback. I’m very happy with our professional
learning because I can choose how I want to learn and where I want to learn and I kind of go
about it at my own pace.
Likewise, teachers and school principals interviewed for this issue noted that more and
more opportunities for teacher-led, collaborative learning were being created:
I think we are shifting into doing a lot more things collaboratively with our catchments, and
different communities of practice are coming up. There’s a technology education community of
practice now that’s been going for several years and so technology leads are together several times
over the course of the year and they work together and collaborate and go back and share in their
schools. With our Career Pathways work that we are starting on now and a change to a career and
technology foundations curriculum, now there’s a community practice with that. So people that are
teaching that they come together over time, share their work and they develop share sites and that
kind of thing too. More and more collaboration all the time1. (Teacher)
In general, I think there’s a cultural shift happening to more collaboration and more
ownership, not people waiting for things to be done to them, but people taking responsibility and
ownership for their own learning and making it happen. My Assistant Principals right now are
co-leading a group of Assistant Principals that they created to bring Assistant Principals together
from across the District. They have a plan for the year. It aligns with District goals and school goals
and challenges and they have made that happen. So it’s really meeting their needs, it’s not the
District central big guys doing it to them. (Principal)
So, the movement away from top-down teacher learning is partially a result of the latest
collective agreement, which “mandated that school jurisdictions had to provide time for teachers to
fulfill their own professional goals and to reduce workload.” Yet, the degree to which teachers have
professional autonomy to develop and meet the learning goals in their growth plans does vary across
the system.
3. Implications for Vietnamese teacher education
Develop, apply, measure and institutionalize standards for teacher professional development
We know from research what constitutes effective professional development. Despite this
knowledge, within donor-funded humanitarian and development projects, there are not yet
standards defining quality professional development and too few qualified providers in Vietnam.
Without a shared and codified understanding of “quality” professional development,
teachers are often subjected to mediocre, and in some cases, malign professional development
that doesn’t help them and that in fact wastes their time and donor money.
We are aware that many in the education community have been averse to the development
and implementation of standards-in part because the challenges and volatility of many fragile
contexts may make the attainment of standards challenging and in part because of what may be
perceived as their excessive rigidity.
But standards define minimal competencies of providers and benchmarks of quality that
promise improved inputs and experiences. They need not result in excessive rigidity. Standards-or
teacher professional development curriculum can be customized or contextualized to adapt to
Vietnam situations.
1
Alberta, Education Partners.
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Create professional development opportunities that promote teacher collaboration

The research on teacher collaboration everywhere is unequivocal. Collaborating with
colleagues and the culture of trust and knowledge sharing that collaboration produces has been
linked to increased teacher effectiveness, improved student test-score gains, and teacher
willingness to adopt innovations.
But collaboration does not happen suddenly-people must have a reason to collaborate, be
oriented on how to be a productive team and collaborative groups must, at least at first, be
facilitated by a “more knowledgeable other.”
To further promote teacher collaboration, the authors propose three actions: 1 – Design for
collaboration, for example by promoting peer-to-peer classroom visits with time for feedback;
2 – Strengthen peer-to-peer instruction; 3 – Promote and nurture effective and active teacher
learning communities.
Provide teachers with ongoing support
Teacher “support” is not monolithic, but rather a multilayered array of different types of
assistance that help teachers successfully transfer learning from a professional development
setting to a classroom setting. It can include administrative, instructional, resources, peer
support, supervisory support and instructional support from a “more knowledgeable other.”
The research on ongoing teacher support notes that teachers who receive on-the-job
support, guidance and feedback from a supervisor or a trained support person apply new skills
and strategies more frequently and appropriately and adopt a more diverse range of instructional
practices than teachers who do not receive such supports (Showers & Joyce, 1996).
To address this situation, the authors propose four actions: 1 – Develop systems for (real,
“high touch”) instructional coaching-not just monitoring or data collection that we misbrand as
“coaching”; 2 – Use appropriate and available technologies to provide ongoing support; 3 –
Shift professional development away from workshops to more support-based interventions-
modeling, coaching, observations and feedback; 4 – Strengthen school leadership so that
headteachers and directors can provide ongoing support.
Invest in high-quality teacher educators
Teacher educators or teacher trainers, in- or pre-service, are often the weakest link in the
teacher education ecosystem. Implementing agencies eagerly inventory the shortcomings
associated with many teacher training universities and ministry of Education-run in-service
providers. But implementing agencies deserve their share of the blame when it comes to
unqualified teacher trainers. Many implementing agencies entrust professional development in
critical areas such as literacy or numeracy to people who have never been teachers.
Teacher educators need the same skills as teachers-among these are deep content
knowledge; different models of instructional strategies and assessment practices; learning and
development of children and adults; clinical and supervision skills; the ability to model effective
instructional and assessment practices; the ability and disposition to coach and support teachers
and hold planned or informal meetings with teachers; and the ability to support teachers through
observations, feedback, modeling, workshops, coaching, and/or planned/informal meetings
(Cordingley, et.al., 2007).
To ensure those who are employed to advance teaching are effective in their work, the
authors propose the following:
Recruit professional development providers with extensive teaching experience
Strengthen teacher-professional development provider capacity
For areas with no teacher educators offer audio/radio instruction, or didactic materials, and
draw on skilled community members and other teachers to provide instruction in key areas.
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Build instructional leadership at all levels of the educational system

School principals are second only to teachers as the most important school-level
determinant of student achievement. They are responsible for the quality of teaching and
learning in their schools. Yet too often we see poor instructional school leadership holding back
Schools in disadvantaged areas benefit tremendously when their lead learners, the head
teacher and the school principal, ensure that teachers are in their classrooms every day, covering
the syllabus at an appropriate pace, instructing students in developmentally appropriate and
engaging ways, and attempting to apply to their classes the knowledge and skills gained through
professional development activities.
For this to happen, the following activities should be followed: 1- Help Ministry of
Education and Training establish and implement instructional competencies for head teachers
and school principals; 2- Promote collaboration among head teachers and among school
principals; 3- Ensure practical professional development opportunities for head teachers and
school principals.
Use Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to provide access to content,
professional development and professional learning communities
Technology-radio, mobile phones, TV and the Internet can offer teachers, even in low-
resource environments, access to content, to curriculum, colleagues and a variety of learning
experiences. Technology, if part of an overall system focused on instructional improvement
(Nga G.B., 2013), can help reduce costs, increase impact, and offer information/skill
development in previously unavailable forms.
To support the wise application of ICT the guide proposes three priority actions: Offer
audio-learning to support teacher development in and with particularly difficult-to-reach areas
and populations; Promote the use of video for teacher self-study and share models of intended
practice; Provide teachers with access to teaching and learning resources through open content
and help them integrate this content into their instruction.
CONCLUSION
This article aims to explore the reflective learning theories and their implementation in
teacher education, specifically the approaches to educators’ professional learning in Canada.
The article also provides implications for teacher education in Vietnam. They are development,
application, measurement and institutionalize standards for teacher professional development,
creating professional development opportunities that promote teacher collaboration in Vietnam,
and providing teachers with ongoing support and investing in high-quality teacher educators.
Furthermore, we can build instructional leadership at all levels of the educational system and
use Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to provide access to content,
professional development and professional learning communities. While the above broad
implications do not address all the intricacies of teacher professional development in fragile
contexts, we hope that our guide can jumpstart serious conversations about promoting the
quality of professional development where it is needed most in the poorest and most fragile
contexts of Vietnam.
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About the authors

– Tu Duc Van is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology and Pedagogy at
Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam. His research focuses on teacher education
from preschool to higher education levels. He’s been particularly interested in training initial
and in-service teachers in response to the innovation of high school education in 2018. He has
been authored or co-authored over 40 papers at national and international conferences and
education-specialized journals.
– Nguyen Thi Nho is the Senior Lecturer in the Department of Psychology and Pedagogy
at the National Academy of Educational Management. She has been training initial and
in-service teachers and educational administrators of all levels for more than 40 years. She has
authored or co-authored over 40 papers on teacher education at preschool and elementary levels.
Her research interest is neuroscience-based early childhood education.
– Giap Binh Nga is the Senior Lecturer of Hanoi National University of Education. He
received his double BA degrees from the Hanoi National University of Education and his MA
and Ph.D. from the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, Germany. He had an
internship at Hiroshima University, Japan, and worked as a short-term scholar at the University
of Georgia, the US. He received the Outstanding Young Teacher Award from the Vietnam
National University, Hanoi and the Campaign medal of the Vietnam Psychology Association.
His empirical research focuses on divergent thinking in creative learning and innovative
teaching, especially the effects of problem-based learning on the creative thinking abilities of
students. He has been authored or co-authored over 54 papers at national and international
conferences and psychology-specialized journals.
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CREATIVE TEACHER MODEL – A SOLUTION TO THE PROBLEM

OF TEACHER QUALITY IN THE CURRENT CONTEXT
Nguyen Sy Thu1, Nguyen Huu Le*2
Abstract: Students’ positivity, initiative and creativity are based on the foundation of creative
education implemented by teachers. The creativity of teachers is an indispensable requirement of
society: the development of science and technology promotes advances in education and
training which place high demands on the quality of teachers; the professionalism of the
teaching profession naturally brings with it creativity; changing the evaluation of the
effectiveness of education demands a change in the evaluation of teacher quality. Creative
teachers become valuable and the foundation of quality in education. This paper outlines a
theory of a creative teacher model and demonstrates this approach by a combination of
literature research and interviews with 128 teachers and managers in a number of primary
schools and junior high schools in Ho Chi Minh City and Ba Ria - Vung Tau province using a
questionnaire to determine the authenticity of the elements of the creative teacher model
through teacher perception. On the basis of the creative teacher model theory, the authors give
some views on the future direction of training and fostering teachers in response to the demand
to innovate education and training in Vietnam.
Keywords: creative teacher, effective teacher, creative teaching, creative teacher model
INTRODUCTION
In the second half of the 20th century, the education and training sector performed well for
the political mission of the country. Entering the 21st century, Vietnamese education must be
suitable for socio-economic development in the context of international integration. Newly set
goals require the teaching process to be student-oriented, so that students can be active,
proactive and creative in the learning process. Renovating curricula and textbooks along with
teaching requirements oriented towards developing learners’ competencies is among challenges
for teachers in general educational institutions today. Although there have been solutions to this
problem, such as implementing training and fostering programs for teachers, promulgating legal
documents classifying teacher quality, along with salary policies to create motivation, it has not
been enough to improve the quality of teachers to satisfy the new goals of education.
In recent years, the teacher quality policy has been implemented by ranking to promote
their advancement. Classification of teacher quality is regulated by legal documents of the
Ministry of Education and Training and has a framework such as: Circular No. 20/2018/TT-
BGDDT stipulating professional standards for high school teachers, circulars stipulating
professional codes and titles for public high school teachers, including: Circular No.
02/2021/TT-BGDĐT for primary school teachers, Circular No. 03/2021/TT-BGDDT for junior
high school teachers, and Circular No. 04/2021/TT-BGDĐT for high school teachers. The
question is whether the “core teachers” (according to Article 12 of Circular 20) or the
classification of teachers (the highest is Grade I) of Circular 02, Circular 03, Circular 04 are
creative teachers or not? If a teacher’s creative ability is a superior ability, what shows that
capacity? If creativity is a highly effective activity for education, how are creative teachers
recognized? In the current context of Vietnamese education, is the creativity of teachers
affected? If teachers’ creativity is recognized and promoted by being consistent with the goals
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Huu Le; E-mail Address: huulebrvt@gmail.com

1 Ho Chi Minh City University of Education
2 Baria-Vungtau College of Education
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and requirements of educational innovation, how can it be formed and developed? An issue that
many people in society are interested in is how to get a large number of excellent teachers so
that they can effectively implement educational goals, a clear basis for the implementation of
policies for teachers. The study builds a creative teacher model as one of the solutions to
improve the quality of teachers in the context of fundamental and comprehensive innovation of
education and training in Vietnam.
CONTENT
Creativity in general, and specifically creativity in education has been studied for more than
a century and has recently become a topic of debate in educational psychology (Smith and
Smith, 2010). Due to rapid social, economic and technological changes, creativity is once again
recognized as the main goal of education. In this overview, we mention four issues: the nature
of the creative process, the creative teacher model, the teacher’s creativity in teaching, the
relationship between teachers’ creativity and students’ academic achievement.
Vietnamese Dictionary defines the word “creativity” in two ways: (1) from the perspective
of value of “making new physical or spiritual value”; (2) from the perspective of process of
“finding new things or solutions, without being constrained or dependent on pre-existing ones”
(Institute of Linguistics, 1997, p. 817). Creativity is both a phenomenon and an indication of an
operational state of a person, so it is not only the object of psychology but also the object of
many branches of science, such as pedagogy, social sciences & humanities, technology,
engineering, philosophy (especially philosophy of science), theology, sociology, linguistics, art,
economics, and mathematics. Therefore, the definition of creativity depends on the field of
study and consequently there are a range of definitions from different people. According to
Isbell and Raines (2003), creativity is ideas based on experience. And San (2004) argues that
creativity exists in human potential, and, when encountering the right situation and
circumstances, it gives birth to new ideas. Although there is not yet a complete concept of
creativity, the interpretation of Torrance (2000) is considered to cover many issues. In his
opinion, creativity is “being sensitive to problems, disorders, lack of information, missing items,
incompatibility; defining the difficulty, seeking solutions, making predictions or developing
hypotheses regarding the deficiencies, changing or retesting these experiments, and then
communicating the result to others” (Torrance, 2000), p. 2). In the article The Standard
Definition of Creativity, Runco and Jaeger (2012, p.93) argue that what is unique and effective
is related to creativity. According to Runco and Jaeger, for a thought or a product to be creative,
it must be something previously unexplored, unique, unconventional and untraditional. With the
approach from teachers, the object of pedagogy, creativity is understood as a process of human
thinking to create new, unique and valuable products.
In the field of education, many people have emphasized the importance of creative teachers
and the promotion of creative individuals (Abdulla, et al., 2020). When creativity is considered
from this perspective, the creative teacher model becomes an important issue. Barrett and
Donnelly (2008) describe the teacher’s role as “facilitating creative learning and helping
students develop the capacity to recognize, represent, and assess their own creativity” (p. 126).
According to this statement, it is important for future teachers to explore their own creativity,
develop their creativity and self-assess their creative performance in the vocational education
process. In terms of training, they become teachers in accordance with the creative teacher
model. The creativity of teachers promotes pedagogical creativity, expressed by the interaction
of three factors: teaching to be creative, teaching creatively, and learning creatively (Lin, 2014).
A teacher with creative capacity is considered a talented teacher “Creativity has been recognized as
an important characteristic of TAG (talented and gifted) teachers” (Rejskind, 2000, p.153).
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VanTassel-Baska (1992) recommends that teachers of the talented and gifted should be assessed
on their ability to use creative thinking and problem solving, only in certain circumstances.
Although there are different opinions about creative teachers, the main focus of pedagogy with
creative teachers is still to measure creativity and demonstrate the effectiveness of teaching.
(Lin, 2014, p. 44). Currently, measurement of teacher creativity is made from many aspects,
including the scales for teachers, namely the Creative Self-Efficacy Scales - CSEs, developed by
Tierney and Farmer (2002). Measuring teacher creativity is the basis for recognizing, promoting
and improving the positive, unique and effective factors of teachers in the educational process
towards quality goals.
One of the most important characteristics of creative teachers is creative teaching. Creative
teaching by teachers is a matter of great interest to many. Lin (2009) states that creative
teaching refers to the application of original teaching techniques to searching for resources in a
systematic way and showing creativity in the teaching environment. Creative teaching uses
flexible and relevant techniques to make classes fun and enjoyable. Its ultimate goal is to
encourage students to develop their creative skills (Baghaei & Riasati, 2013, p. 1576). In
creative teaching, the teacher is the one who inspires, guides and shares knowledge. Based on
the science of creativity and the psychology of creativity, Chen et al. argue that “creative
teaching is an open and inspiring approach that encourages students to explore and innovate in
order to develop creativity and thinking ability” (2012, p. 778). Teachers’ creativity is reflected
in the design and teaching of lessons by “using imaginative approaches to make learning more
enjoyable, exciting and effective” (NACCCE, 1999, p. 102).
Another approach is the effectiveness-based creative teacher approach, i.e. the study of the
relationship between teacher creativity and student achievement. Schacter, Thum and Zikfin
(2006) studied the relationship between teachers’ creative teaching and academic performances
of primary school students. Davidovich and Milgram (2006) studied creative thinking as a
predictor of teacher effectiveness. These studies show that the role of creative teachers in the
quality of education is obvious and very important.
Currently, there are many creative teaching models (Cayirdag, 2017) that are applied by
researchers in teacher development studies. One notable creative teaching model is the Torrance
Incubation Model (Torrance, 1979). The model consists of three components: Heighten
anticipation, deepen expectations, and extend the learning. Heightening anticipation aims to
provide purpose and motivation through initiation and activities that create curiosity and
increase the desire to learn about content through exposing students to ambiguities and
uncertainties. Deepening expectations involves deeper engagement with the topic by analyzing
concepts and ideas, thereby helping students dig deeper and explore beyond what is previously
known. Extending the learning involves engaging learners in content beyond what is taught and
discussed in class. Cropley’s (1997) model provides a more specific list of teacher behaviors
that promote creativity including: (1) Encourage students to learn independently, (2) Have a
collaborative, socially inclusive teaching style, (3) Encourage students to master practical
knowledge, so that they can have a strong basis for divergent thinking, (4) Delay assessment of
students’ ideas until they are well researched and well-formed, (5) Encourage flexible thinking,
(6) Promote self-assessment in students, (7) Take student suggestions and questions seriously,
(8) Give students the opportunity to work with a variety of materials and under a variety of
conditions, (9) Help students learn to deal with disappointment and failure, so that they have the
courage to try the new and the unusual. Creative teaching models have fostered a creative
teacher development model.
In summary, the problem of creative teachers is approached by scientists in different ways,
but most of them are directed towards the nucleus of creativity: that is, pedagogical creativity
whose essence is “creative pedagogy teaches learners how to learn creatively and become
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creators of themselves and creators of their future” (Aleinikov, 2013, p. 327). The problem of
how to link the factors that govern the creativity of teachers in a structure to form a creative
teacher has not been studied. Therefore, it is urgent to build a creative teacher model in
Vietnam, because from there, it is possible to orient the training and fostering of teachers
towards building an excellent team of teachers, to serve as the core for both improving the
quality of teachers and meeting the requirements of fundamental and comprehensive innovation
in education and training today. That is also the reason for us to propose the Creative Teacher
Model (Figure 1).
2. Creative Teacher Model
Tierney and Farmer (2002) asserted creative self-efficacy as “the belief that one has the
ability to produce creative outcomes” (p. 1138). The creative teacher is not a phenomenon but a
structure within the system of educational activities. The creative teacher has two components:
the teacher and the teacher’s creativity. Social and psychological factors can promote the
formation of teachers’ creativity. Creativity in teachers is a thinking activity whose practical
basis is a combination of three factors: self (wisdom), training (trained in a quality educational
environment and conditions), and experience (developing the ability to observe, think and
accumulate experience through practice).
The content of the following model are issues that we based on the research results of
scientists (James & Asmus, 2000-2001; Ikere, 2008; Gluck, Ernst, & Unger, 2002; Mumford,
2003; Sawyer, 2006) and educational practice in Vietnam.
The following Figure 1 shows, a creative teacher must have three elements of the creative
quality: Exceptional intellect, creative thinking and a positive attitude.
– The indicators to evaluate exceptional intellect are:
(1) The ability to acquire new knowledge and methods.
(2) The ability to observe and recognize creativity in others.
(3) The ability to observe others to draw experience for oneself.
(4) The ability to make connections and develop when looking at a problem.
(5) The ability to create knowledge and methods in one’s own way.
– The indicators to evaluate creative thinking are:
(1) The ability to collect and filter information.
(2) The ability to consider and evaluate existing solutions.
(3) The ability to find alternative or complementary solutions.
(4) The ability to present ideas by linking topics.
(5) The ability to apply the proposed measures.
– The indicators to a positive attitude are:
(1) Eager to learn, explore and discover.
(2) Appreciate novelty and originality.
(3) Tolerant of ambiguity and abstraction.
(4) Aesthetic feelings and aspiration for beauty.
(5) Self-confident and independent thinking.
These creative qualities are always influenced by many factors and this impact can be in
conflicting directions. The impact on teachers’ creativity is a motivator: it allows teachers to be
“more proactive in the face of difficulties and adversities, more likely to exhibit creative
supportive teaching behavior because they are less likely to accept and work within these
constraints rather than reverse or challenge them” (Cayirdag, 2017, p.1971). In the context of
Vietnamese education, we identify three factors that influence creative teachers: recognition
(which are the conditions that ensure the existence of creative teachers), creativity barriers
(which are ongoing realities that need to be eliminated), policies that promote creativity (the
motivators).
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– Factors that show recognition of creative teachers

(1) Complies with the provisions of the law and suits social needs.
(2) Creativity applied with great efficacy.
(3) Unique creativity recognized by many people.
(4) Breakthrough creativity, innovative creativity and highly effective creativity.
– Factors that present barriers to creative teachers
(1) Administrative procedures and regular inspections.
(2) Curricula and educational goals lack the elements to encourage creativity.
(3) Lack of assessment criteria promoting creativity in the documents of the Ministry of
Education and Training.
(4) Insufficient information and unsuitable environment.
– Factors that represent promotion policies for creative teachers
(1) Legal educational copyright for creative teachers.
(2) Motivated by economic and social benefits.
(3) Provided with more knowledge and new methods.
(4) Appropriate teaching and research environment.
Teachers’ creativity takes place at 3 levels, corresponding to each situation and condition
for the creative process to take place.
(1) Expressive creativity is the first and most frequent level. It is an improvised, free,
spontaneous type of creativity. This type of creativity is essential for teachers when teaching
because it is associated with excitement or when there is a stimulating factor to create a
wonderful connection between teacher and student in some teaching situations.
(2) Technical creativity is based on expertise to create a new method or product, or achieve
an unexpectedly high result. This type of creativity can be seen as inventing something new
which is capable of engaging or attracting students.
(3) Innovative creativity is the basic principles to change a mindset or create a completely
new model in a certain field. This type of creativity is rare but essential, especially in the current
context of fundamental and comprehensive innovation.
Figure 1. Creative Teacher Model (Authors’ compilation)
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Regardless of the level, the creative process for creative teachers must go through a 4-stage
process:
(1) Idea. Ideas do not come naturally, nor are they exclusive innate properties, but
according to James Webb Young (1965), “they are merely forms of combining already existing
things in such a way that no one has done it before.” In the book A Technique for Producing
Ideas, Young argues that all ideas follow a five-step process consisting of: 1) Gathering
information and learning knowledge, 2) Reviewing and experimenting with organizing old
knowledge from a new perspective, 3) Recharging yourself by relaxing and stopping thinking
activities, 4) Allowing ideas to come back to you naturally and 5) Checking in the real world
and adjusting them based on feedback. More importantly, in Young’s view, the possibility of
new combinations depends on each person’s perspective on the relationships and connections
between existing concepts. To do this, each individual must learn and improve to possess a
certain amount of basic knowledge as a foundation. Thus, training and fostering also play an
important role in forming creative ideas for teachers.
(2) Preparation. Whether the idea is realized or not depends on the preparation of the
necessary conditions to implement it. In addition to preparing documents and tools for
implementation and testing when the idea is completed, a blueprint (detailed outline) to link
knowledge, experience and a plan is the most necessary preparation. Hypotheses are made to
select the optimal technical factors to solve it in the implementation of the selected content in
this stage.
(3) Implementation. Finalizing the details of the blueprint is the process of creating the
initial product of the idea. The process of finalizing the blueprint will present many obstacles,
some of which can potentially distort the idea. Therefore, developing content to realize the idea
depends considerably on the preparation stage.
(4) Evaluation.
At the testing stage, after realizing the ideas and applying the results, it is verified whether
the problem is solved or not. The proof or refutation of hypotheses and assumptions is made. If
the problem persists, then the process will start again. If the problem is solved, then one moves
on to the solution to the next problem.
At the assessment stage, the criteria for assessing the products of the creative process must
be based on educational principles, in which: novelty, efficiency, economy, and feasibility are
most often selected.
3. Method
3.1. Research hypothesis
The process of data collection and analysis, exploratory research addresses the following
general questions: Are there any differences in perceptions of creative teacher qualities? Are
there any differences in the perceptions of creative teachers between managers, professional
leaders and teachers? Are there any differences in the perception of creativity between
elementary and junior high school teachers? What is the level of awareness of the factors
affecting teachers’ creativity among managers and teachers?
3.2. Research tool
Teachers in Vietnam have undergone many educational reforms and changes in textbooks,
participating in professional training courses according to the training programs of the Ministry
of Education and Training and of the Department of Education and Training. The knowledge,
experimentation, experience and personal and colleagues’ experiences have given rise to latent
creativity or creative experience in every teacher. However, whether each teacher is aware of
the pedagogical creativity they know or have experienced or not is the issue that we are
concerned with. Therefore, our purpose in building a questionnaire was for teachers to reveal
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their own perception and judgment when selecting answers to the questionnaire. The contents of
these answers are issues that we based on the research results of scientists (James & Asmus,
2000-2001; Ikere, 2008; Gluck, Ernst, & Unger, 2002; Mumford, 2003; Sawyer, 2006) and
educational practice in Vietnam. The creativity of teachers includes 03 elements: intellect,
thinking, attitude; The scale for each element has 5 criteria with 3 levels: agree, disagree,
undecided.
Similarly, we also built a cognitive scale on the impact on creative teachers with 3 factors:
recognition of creative teachers, barriers to creativity, policies to promote creativity.
The scale was applied to 128 teachers, of which 57 people are in primary schools,
accounting for 44.5% and 71 people are in junior high schools, accounting for 55.5%. The
number of people divided into two administrative areas, 65 people in Ho Chi Minh City
(central), accounting for 50.8% and 63 people in Ba Ria – Vung Tau province (peripheral area),
accounting for 49.2%. Within this number, 65 are professional managers and team leaders,
accounting for 50.8% and 63 are teachers, accounting for 49.2%. In terms of years’ service, the
number of people who have worked for ≤ 5 years is 16, accounting for 12.5%; the number of
people who have worked for about 6 to 15 years is 35, accounting for 27.3%; the number of
people who have worked for about 16 to 25 years is 45, accounting for 35.2%; the number of
people who have worked for over 25 years is 32, accounting for 25.0%.
4. Results
4.1. Teacher’s perceptinons of elements teachers’ creative personality
According to Table 2, all three elements of the teacher’s creative personality are considered
low, specifically as follows:
– Regarding Intellect ( X = 1.46), there are 3 observed variables that are considered low:
the ability to acquire new knowledge and methods ( X = 1.17); the ability to observe and recognize
creativity in others ( X = 1.16); and the ability to make connections and develop when looking
at a problem ( X = 1.3). However, there are 2 observed variables that are considered to be at a
medium level, namely the ability to observe others to draw experience for oneself ( X = 1.91);
and the ability to create knowledge and methods in one’s own way ( X 1.76).
– Regarding Thinking ( X = 1.58), there are 4 observed variables that are considered low:
the ability to collect and filter information ( X = 1.56); the ability to consider and evaluate
existing solutions ( X = 1.27); the ability to find alternative or complementary solutions ( X =
1.65); and the ability to apply the proposed measures ( X = 1.62). However, there is 1 observed
variable that is considered to be at a medium level, namely the ability to present ideas by linking
topics ( X = 1.83).
– Regarding Attitude ( X = 1.52), there are 4 observed variables that are considered low:
eager to learn, explore and discover ( X = 1.55); appreciate novelty and originality ( X = 1.65);
aesthetic feelings and aspiration for beauty ( X = 1.24); and self-confident and independent
thinking ( X = 1.16). However, there is 1 observed variable that is considered medium, namely
tolerant of ambiguity and abstraction ( X = 1.97).
Table 2. Descriptive statistics on teachers’ perceptions of creative teachers
Coding Mean SD
Intellect Intellect 1.46 0.46
1. The ability to acquire new knowledge and methods. Int1 1.17 0.38
2. The ability to observe and recognize creativity in others. Int2 1.16 0.36
3. The ability to observe others to draw experience for oneself. Int3 1.91 0.83
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Coding Mean SD
4. The ability to make connections and develop when looking at a problem. Int4 1.30 0.46
5. The ability to create knowledge and methods in one’s own way. Int5 1.76 0.97
Thinking Thinking 1.58 0.71
1. The ability to collect and filter information. Thi1 1.56 0.51
2. The ability to consider and evaluate existing solutions. Thi2 1.27 0.44
3. The ability to find alternative or complementary solutions. Thi3 1.65 0.85
4. The ability to present ideas by linking topics. Thi4 1.83 0.91
5. The ability to apply the proposed measures. Thi5 1.62 0.83
Attitude Attitude 1.52 0.64
1. Eager to learn, explore and discover. Att1 1.55 0.76
2. Appreciate novelty and originality. Att2 1.65 0.71
3. Tolerant of ambiguity and abstraction. Att3 1.97 0.92
4. Aesthetic feelings and aspiration for beauty. Att4 1.24 0.43
5. Self-confident and independent thinking. Att5 1.16 0.37
Notes: Low=1-1.66; Medium=1.67– 2.32; High= 2.33-3.00
4.2. Awareness of factors affecting creative teachers
According to Table 3, all three factors affecting creative teachers are considered low,
specifically as follows:
– Regarding Recognition ( X = 1.52), all four observed variables had a low impact on
creative teachers: complies with the provisions of the law and suits social needs ( X = 1.56);
creativity applied with great efficacy ( X = 1.37); unique creativity recognized by many people
( X = 1.39); and breakthrough creativity, innovative creativity and highly effective creativity
( X = 1.29).
– Regarding the Barriers ( X = 1.), all four observed variables had a low impact on creative
teachers: administrative procedures and regular inspections ( X = 1.55); curricula and
educational goals ( X = 1.4); lack of assessment criteria promoting creativity ( X = 1.5); and
insufficient information and unsuitable environment ( X = 1.43).
– Regarding policies to promote creativity ( X = 1.47), all four observed variables had a low
impact on creative teachers: legal educational copyright for creative teachers ( X = 1.26);
motivated by economic and social benefits ( X = 1.4); provided with more knowledge and new
methods ( X = 1.27); and appropriate teaching and research environment ( X = 1.31).
Table 3. Descriptive statistics on teachers’ perceptions of factors affecting creative teachers
Coding Mean SD
Recognition of Creative teachers Recognition 1.52 0.65
1. Complies with the provisions of the law and suits social needs Rec 1.56 0.71
2. Creativity applied with great efficacy Rec2 1.37 0.66
3. Unique creativity recognized by many people Rec3 1.39 0.64
4. Breakthrough creativity, innovative creativity and highly effective creativity Rec4 1.29 0.59
Barriers to Creativity Barriers 1.40 0.71
1. Administrative procedures and regular inspections Bar1 1.55 0.77
2. Curricula and educational goals Bar2 1.40 0.68
3. Lack of assessment criteria promoting creativity Bar3 1.50 0.70
4. Insufficient information and unsuitable environment Bar4 1.43 0.67
Policies to promote creativity promote 1.47 0.58
1. Legal educational copyright for creative teachers Pro1 1.26 0.54
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Coding Mean SD
2. Motivated by economic and social benefits Pro2 1.40 0.67
3. Provided with more knowledge and new methods Pro3 1.27 0.54
4. Appropriate teaching and research environment Pro4 1.31 0.57
Notes: Low=1-1.66; Medium=1.67– 2.32; High= 2.33-3.00
4.3. Correlation (Pearson) between elements of a teacher’s creative personality and
factors affecting the creative teacher
According to Table 4, Intellect has a positive correlation with Thinking (r=.631, p<0.01);
Intellect has a positive correlation with Attitude (r=.419, p<0.01); Intellect has a positive
correlation with Barriers (r=.419, p<0.05). Attitude has a positive correlation with Recognition
(r=.227, p<0.01). Recognition has a positive correlation with Motivators (r=.274, p<0.01). This
means that if the teacher’s Intellect score increases, Thinking, Attitude and Barriers scores also
increase, and vice versa. If the teacher’s Attitude score increases, so does the Recognition score,
and vice versa. If the teacher’s Recognition score increases, so does the Motivators score, and
vice versa. Based on the correlation coefficient of Hinkle & Jurs (2003), we see that the
teacher’s Intellect has a medium correlation with Thinking, and a low correlation with Attitude
and Barriers. Attitude has a low correlation with Recognition. Recognition has a low correlation
with Motivators. The remaining variables did not have statistically significant relationships.
Table 4. Correlation results between elements of teacher’s creative personality
and factors affecting creative teachers
Mean N 1 2 3 4 5 6
1. Intellect 1.46 128 1 .631** .419** .161 .219* -.034
2. Thinking 1.58 128 1 .005 .077 .091 -.009
3. Attitude 1.52 128 1 .227** .080 -.015
4. Recognition 1.40 128 1 .114 .274**
5. Barriers 1.47 128 1 .115
6. Motivators 1.31 128 1
*. Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
5. Discussion
Objectives and research questions along with the proposed hypotheses have been clarified.
Based on the teachers’ choice of answer “agree” for each criterion, we have synthesized the
results to describe an overall picture of the teachers’ perception of creative teachers as follows:
– The “disagrees” on all criteria of creative qualities in each answer sheet shows that the
problem of creative teachers is still new to the teachers.
– The difference in agree opinions on the criteria of creative teachers’ qualities of primary
school teachers is larger than that of junior high school teachers, showing that teaching by
organizing activities for students in the teaching process has had many impacts on the creative
consciousness of teachers.
– The high agreement rate regarding the external impacts on the creative process of
teachers shows the need for a policy mechanism for creative teachers.
Contradictions occur in the awareness of the teachers about the creative teachers who do
not fully recognize the qualitative factors of the creative teachers and pay attention to the factors
affecting the teachers’ creativity. This shows that they have a desire and need for excellent
teachers in their team. Creative teachers, although not in the majority, will make students
excited, active and creative in learning. On another note, teachers who found themselves more
creative were more likely to teach creatively than others.
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In the current context, where egalitarian ideology is hindering the implementation of the
guiding documents on assessment and classification of teachers of the Ministry of Education
and Training, the issue of creative teachers has become even more important. Renzulli and Wet
(2010) suggest that teacher selection may be more important than teacher training because some
characteristics such as openness to experience, flexibility, non-authoritarian personality,
optimism and high energy are “initial materials” of creativity and these traits are difficult to
cultivate with practice in the teaching process. When we apply this to the concept of teacher
effectiveness, all such factors are more about the teacher’s personal qualities than external
factors. Teachers need such characteristics most in conditions where creativity is of secondary
importance (Cayirdag, 2017, p. 1970).
Based on the findings from psychologists and educationalists around the world in recent
years and measures of the perception of creative psychological factors of 128 people
representing the teachers, we research and propose a Creative teacher model. The creative
teacher model is not only a descriptive structure but also an action-oriented structure, in which
the role of teacher training and fostering activities in Vietnam is clearly demonstrated. For
training products to have the seeds of excellence, teacher training institutions must have a
creative lecturer team and specialized training programs. The erudition of university lecturers
can only be effectively promoted when it brings creativity to students by their own creative
methods. Therefore, excellent lecturer teams of teacher training institutions must be identified
by a separate scale of scientific value. The training innovation in teacher training institutions in
this orientation does not only support the training of talented people for the education sector but
also attracts proficient people to pedagogical schools; and at the same time removes the public’s
doubts about the future of education. Salite (2006) states that “If we want to promote the idea of
cultural sustainability through education and especially through teacher education, it is
necessary to unify the understanding of both teachers and future teachers regarding the
significance of the goals of education; their current problems and hopes determine the form and
content of teachers’ professional and personal frameworks” (p. 409). With this in mind, the
Creative Teacher Model (see Figure 1) needs to be studied in both depth and breadth in order to
build a theoretical framework based on the real situation in Vietnam, as a proposed basis for
legal policy for the teachers.
CONCLUSION
In a speech at Hanoi National University of Education, on July 20, 1959, the late Prime
Minister Pham Van Dong also affirmed: “The teaching profession is the noblest profession
among the noble professions of society, the teaching profession is the most creative profession
among the creative professions… The teaching profession is the most creative profession
because it creates creative people” (Nguyen, 2016). For more than half a century, that phrase
has been quoted in many educational speeches, but unfortunately it has not become a target for
action towards a progressive education. Creative teachers are not a flash of light from
competitions or announcements of achievements after an academic year but must always shine
to “set an example for creativity” (Cayirdag, 2017, p. 1971) and consider creativity as a
vocation while they are still teachers.
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About the authors

– Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Sy Thu, born in 1958, is a senior lecturer at Ho Chi Minh City
University of Education. He is an experienced educator and educational administrator who has
written more than 30 scientific research works on educational management. With his experience
and professional reputation, he has been invited by many higher education institutions to teach
and guide graduate students, many of whom have gone on to become outstanding scientists and
managers.
– Dr. Nguyen Huu Le, born in 1962, is currently working at Ba Ria – Vung Tau College
of Education. He has trained generations of students, many of whom have gone on to become
notable teachers. He simultaneously researches in the two fields of literature and education, and
has more than 70 research works in these 2 fields. Many of his papers have been published in
the proceedings of international conferences organized by the Academy of Education
Management and universities in Vietnam in association with many universities around the world.
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FLIPPED CLASSROOM IN MATHEMATICS TEACHER EDUCATION

IN VIETNAM: ADVANTAGES AND CHALLENGES
Tran Kiem Minh1, Nguyen Dang Minh Phuc1, Xayaphet Keodavanh2
Abstract: The flipped classroom is an innovative instructional model where students are
introduced to lesson content at home and work on problem-solving and discussion during class
time. In the flipped classroom, the teacher helps the students instead of merely delivering
information. In contrast, the students become responsible for their own learning process and
govern their own learning pace. While flipped classrooms have received considerable attention in
recent years, much remains unknown about their advantages and challenges for preservice
teacher education, especially in developing countries. The present study aimed to address this
gap by utilizing a Delphi methodology to examine the advantages and challenges of
implementing the flipped classroom in preservice mathematics teacher education in Vietnam.
We characterize the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom in mathematics teacher
education using a three-round Delphi method. Experts’ opinions were analyzed and grouped to
construct the indicators and shed light on each indicator’s importance. The preliminary results
indicate a high consensus of the importance of the proposed indicators of the advantages and
challenges of the flipped classroom in initial mathematics teacher education. In addition, some
contextual and institutional constraints of the use of flipped classrooms in mathematics teacher
education in Vietnam are highlighted.
Keywords: flipped classroom, mathematics teacher education, prospective mathematics teachers,
Delphi methodology
INTRODUCTION
The study of blended learning has become an essential aspect of the research on teaching
and learning. The flipped classroom is an innovative blended learning model where students are
introduced to lesson content at home and work on problem-solving and discussion during class
time. In the flipped classroom, the teacher helps the students instead of merely delivering
information. In contrast, the students become responsible for their own learning process and
govern their own learning pace (Lai & Hwang, 2016). Today, the flipped classroom model has been
implemented in many different disciplines and schools, and universities worldwide (Hao, 2016).
Some studies indicate that flipped classrooms offer many positive educational outcomes.
These studies suggest that flipped classrooms help to enhance students’ knowledge and essential
skills (Ng & Lai, 2012; Ng, Yuen, & Leung, 2013; Ng, 2018; Elmaadaway, 2018; Voig,
Fredriksen, & Rasmussen, 2020). Moreover, the flipped classroom enhances the quality of face-
to-face discussions and promotes student engagement and satisfaction (Zainuddin, 2018; Awidi
& Paynter, 2019).
In other studies, researchers draw attention to challenges associated with the flipped
classroom. Challenges can include more required time to redesign the course as a flipped
classroom (Schlairet, Green, & Benton, 2014), students’ difficulties to properly arrange their
time to follow the out-of-class learning content (Lai & Hwang, 2016), students’ low self-regulated
behaviors (Sun, Wu, & Lee, 2017). The literature shows that the flipped classroom encompasses
both advantages and challenges.
 Corresponding Author: Tran Kiem Minh; E-mail Address: tkminh@hueuni.edu.vn

2 Savannakhet University, Lao PDR
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However, previous studies have researched mainly the advantages and challenges of the
flipped classroom for students’ learning. Few studies have examined the advantages and
challenges of the flipped classroom in initial mathematics teacher education, especially in
developing countries. None of the previous studies has looked at experts’ perceptions and
consensus about the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom for students and
mathematics instructors in mathematics teacher education. Therefore, experts’ views on the
advantages and potential challenges for effective flipped classroom implementation must be
addressed.
The purpose of the present study was to address this gap by utilizing a Delphi methodology
(Hasson, Kenney, & Mckenna, 2000) to investigate the advantages and challenges of the
implementation of the flipped classroom in mathematics teacher education in Vietnam.
Specifically, we examined: (1) the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom for
prospective mathematics teachers (PMTs); (2) the advantages and challenges of the flipped
classroom for mathematics teacher educators (mathematics instructors).
CONTENT
1.1. Research on Flipped Classroom
In recent years, the educational paradigm has shifted from teacher-centered teaching mode
to student-centered learning mode. Among the various learning modes, the “flipped classroom”
is considered a potential and extraordinary learning method that engages students in applying
their learning and conducting higher-order thinking, rather than receiving direct teaching
instruction (Davies, Dean, & Ball, 2013; Lai & Hwang, 2016). The flipped classroom will equip
learners with subject knowledge and develop generic skills such as collaboration, critical
thinking, information technology, problem-solving, and self-study skills (Ng & Lai, 2012; Ng,
Yuen, & Leung, 2013; Ng, 2018).
Flipped classroom represents the teaching and learning approach that exchanges the time
used to deliver basic knowledge in class and the out-of-class time for applying the knowledge or
doing homework (Bergmann & Sams, 2012). It means that teachers can engage students in more
learning activities for applying the knowledge they have learned through practicing, doing
projects, discussions, and solving problems in class (Missildine et al., 2013). The out-of-class
learning is mainly related to the knowledge levels of remembering and understanding (Mason et
al., 2014).
Figure 1. The learning model of the flipped classroom (Lai & Hwang, 2016, p. 127)
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Most of the research on the flipped classroom has reported positive feedbacks on students’
performance, skills, and motivation (Kong, 2015; McLaughlin et al., 2014; Ng, 2017; Murillo-
Zamorano, Lopez-Sanchez, & Godoy-Caballero, 2019; Cevikbas & Kaiser, 2020). According to
McLaughlin et al. (2014), the flipped classroom can promote a deeper understanding of
knowledge and concepts. Most students agreed that the knowledge and skills they developed
would be helpful to them in the future. In a study of the flipped classroom in higher education,
Murillo-Zamorano, Lopez-Sanchez, & Godoy-Caballero (2019) confirm that flipped classrooms
positively affect students’ knowledge, skills, and engagement.
Concerning the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom for both students and
instructors, Akçayır and Akçayır (2018) indicated that the most frequently reported advantage
of the flipped classroom model is the improvement of student learning performance.
Additionally, researchers have reported numerous advantages of this model, such as enhanced
learning motivation, students’ positive attitudes, and skills. In a systematic review of the
literature, Akçayır and Akçayır (2018) also found several challenges in this model. Most of
these are related to out-of-class activities, such as much reported inadequate student preparation
before class. For example, the quality of videos and other resources for out-of-class activities is
a problem for students’ learning. Moreover, the interaction tools and students’ technological
competency are also a challenge for implementing the flipped classroom effectively.
There has not been a consensus on the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom
approach until now. According to Akçayır and Akçayır (2018), additional research is needed to
examine this model’s advantages and challenges, and whether its broader use could lead to
greater student confidence, engagement, and more positive attitudes.
1.2. Flipped Classroom in Preservice Teacher Education
The flipped classroom can play an essential role in teacher training in that they model
pedagogies that promote active learning and collaborative learning strategies (Vaughan, 2015).
However, there have been relatively few studies on the use of flipped classrooms in teacher
training (Yough et al., 2017). According to Vaughan (2015), students in flipped classrooms
display more ownership of their teaching, more creativity and curiosity during activities, and
more ability to apply knowledge than their peers. In a comparative study, Fraga and Harmon
(2014) found that preservice teachers in the flipped classroom reported higher confidence in
specific aspects of teaching and a greater willingness to discuss ideas in class than the
preservice teachers in the traditional classroom.
Other studies examined preservice teacher reactions to flipped classrooms and the increased
use of technology associated with them. For example, Hao and Lee (2016) investigated
preservice teachers’ concerns during the stages of change for a flipping classroom. The findings
indicated that concerns associated with considering the consequences to students learning and
refocusing practices were moderately correlated with self-efficacy in instructional strategies,
classroom management, and student engagement. Using a survey of six teachers on their use of
technology and teaching efficacy, technology comfort, and attitudes toward technology, Unruh
et al. (2016) found that teachers using flipped classrooms scored significantly higher on all
scales than those teaching traditional classes. The authors suggested that technology in flipped
classrooms needs to play a supportive role that increases perseverance.
Yough et al. (2017) used a quasi-experimental design to examine differences in motivation
and objective learning outcomes between traditional and flipped sections of a foundational
educational course. The findings indicated that preservice teachers in the traditional section had
significantly higher scores on two indices of the motivation outcomes (intrinsic and identified
regulation), but that preservice teachers in the flipped sections had significantly higher scores on
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several indices of objective learning outcomes. The authors suggested that flipped classrooms
may be conducive for certain types of learning. While it has been widely believed that flipped
classrooms may be optimal for supporting student motivation, the authors recommended
otherwise that flipping alone is not to be sufficient. Yough et al. (2017) suggested that a greater
degree of purposeful intention toward the design and instruction of flipped classrooms needs to
be taken to support student motivation.
In a study of 73 university students enrolled in a teacher education program, Ng (2018)
examined whether flipped classroom, with reference to self-regulation principles, is good
pedagogy for enhancing constructive learning outcomes for students. The findings suggested
that students were very positive about flipped classroom activities. Various learning, teaching,
and assessment activities have enabled the students and teacher to accomplish the seven
principles for supporting and developing students’ self-regulated learning.
There have been relatively few studies on flipped classrooms in teacher education,
especially in mathematics teacher education. Some advantages and challenges of the flipped
classroom in teaching mathematics in university have been considered by several researchers
from empirical studies. However, almost no research has examined the advantages and
challenges of the flipped classroom in initial mathematics teacher education from experts’
points of view and experiences, especially in the context of developing countries.
2. Methodology
The Delphi technique is a qualitative method introduced to allow a group of experts to
discuss and make a decision on a problem without having to meet face-to-face (Goodman,
1987). This method allows a panel of experts to agree about a given set of tenets or beliefs about
knowledge. It involves administering multiple revisions of a survey to the experts in the field
being considered until a consensus is reached (Manizade & Mason, 2011). Delphi methodology
allows experts to receive feedback and refine their judgments based on their reaction to the
collective views of the group (Clark, 2006; Dressel et al., 2007). This methodology has recently
been used by several researchers in different domains, such as mathematics education
(Manizade & Mason, 2011), technology competency (Fong, Ch’ng, & Por, 2013), university
governance (Quyen, 2014). This study used the Delphi method to find experts’ consensus on the
advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom in initial mathematics teacher education in
Vietnam.
2.1. Pre-Delphi Construction of Potential Indicators
We did a comprehensive review of the literature on the use of flipped classrooms in
mathematics teacher education. We focused on the advantages and challenges of flipped
classrooms in teacher education. Potential indicators on the advantages and challenges of the
flipped classroom have been identified to build the first survey for experts.
2.2. Study Participants
We selected experts to participate in this study according to the following criteria: (a) being
mathematics teacher educators, (b) having experience using flipped classrooms in teaching
mathematics in universities. The total number of experts participating in this study is 13 and
they are all Vietnamese.
Table 1. Experts’ characteristics
Age Years of teaching experience Years of flipped classroom experience
33 – 36 (5) 5 – 10 (3) 1 – 3 (3)
37 – 40 (7) 11 – 15 (5) 4 – 6 (5)
40+ (1) 16 – 20 (5) 7 – 10 (5)
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2.3. Data Collection and Analysis

In Round 1, we summarized a set of indicators based on the literature review of the
advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom in teacher education. Then we conducted
multiple face-to-face meetings with an expert to refine these indicators. Our set of initial
indicators includes 20 indicators related to the advantages of the flipped classroom for PMTs,
five indicators related to its challenges for PMTs, six indicators related to its advantages for
mathematics teacher educators, and five indicators related to its challenges for mathematics
teacher educators. Then the set of indicators was sent via Google forms to the panel of 13
Vietnamese experts.
In Round 2, the experts reviewed all the indicators and rated the importance of each
indicator on a 5-point Likert scale: (1) strongly disagree, (2) disagree, (3) partly agree, (4) agree,
and (5) strongly agree. They could recommend changes (if any) to the indicators to better
address the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom model. Finally, they listed any
other comments on the indicators and returned the responses by Google forms.
After Round 2 responses were received, the data were quantitatively analyzed first. The
group response median value was used as the reference for the degree of importance of each
indicator. The degree of importance is divided into two levels (high and medium). To determine
the importance level, which is: high (in which the median value is four and above) and medium
(the median value is strictly less than 4). The quartile deviation was used as the reference for the
degree of consensus. The degree of consensus is divided into three levels (high, medium, and no
consensus). To determine the consensus level, which is: high (if quartile deviation is less than or
equal to 0.5), medium (if quartile deviation is in between 0.5 and 1), and no consensus (if
quartile deviation is more than 1). Moreover, experts’ opinions were also qualitatively analyzed
and grouped to construct the indicators and shed light on each indicator’s importance and
consensus. In our study, indicators that obtained high importance levels with high consensus
levels were used to develop a set of indicators of the advantages and challenges of the flipped
classroom.
In Round 3, the indicators defined as having low levels of consensus or importance were
sent to 3 experts who agreed to participate in this round. The interviews with experts were
transcribed, and data were qualitatively analyzed.
We first evaluate the consensus obtained in Round 1 before constructing a survey which is
sent to the panel of experts in Round 2. After Round 2, if it is found that the consensus has been
achieved, it can then be widely assumed that researchers have done well on Round 1. The
acceptable one reliability degree is fulfilled (Fish & Busby, 2005).
3. Preliminary Results
3.1. Advantages and Challenges of Flipped Classroom for Prospective Mathematics Teachers
Table 2 presents indicator statements found to be rated high importance and achieved high
consensus level about the advantages of flipped classrooms related to students’ knowledge
development. These items achieved a median value of 4 and above with a quartile deviation
value of less than or equal to 0.5.
Table 2. Indicators of the advantages of the flipped classroom for prospective mathematics teachers
Codes Indicators Median Q1 Q3 IQR QD
PMTs’ Knowledge
K1 PMTs acquire better and more profound knowledge because 4.5 4 5 1 0.5
they have more favorable conditions to search for learning
materials and more diverse resources.
K2 PMTs can study at their own pace, with flexible times 5 4 5 1 0.5
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PMTs’ Skills
S1 Promote teamwork and collaborative skills 4 4 5 1 0.5
S2 Promote communication and discussion skills 4 4 5 1 0,5
S3 Promote Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills 4.5 4 5 1 0,5
S4 Promote problem-solving and posing skills 4 3.25 4 0.75 0.38
S5 Promote self-study skills 5 4 5 1 0.5
PMTs’ Attitudes
A1 Promote PMTs’ self-confidence in learning activities 4 3.25 4 0.75 0.38
A2 Promote PMTs’ engagement in learning activities 4 3.25 4 0.75 0.38
A3 Promote PMTs’ readiness to participate in learning activities 4 3 4 1 0.5
A4 Promote PMTs’ creative attitude 4 3 4 1 0.5
In total, we found 11 indicators related to the advantages of the flipped classroom for
PMTs. These indicators were proposed under three categories: (i) PMTs’ knowledge, (ii) PMTs’
skills, and (3) PMTs’ attitudes. Based on the indicators listed in Table 2, the findings indicated
that consensus is emphasized on PMTs’ skills and attitudes when participating in a flipped
classroom. Meanwhile, the experts only agreed on two indicators related to PMTs’ knowledge.
There were four indicators related to PMTs’ knowledge that achieved a medium consensus.
These indicators were: (1) PMTs have better learning outcomes, (2) PMTs have a deeper
understanding of the lesson, (3) PMTs have a better problem-solving performance, and (4)
PMTs learn better because it is easy to discuss and give feedback to instructors.
Table 3 presents the items that achieved high or medium importance with a high consensus
level about the flipped classroom challenges for PMTs. These items achieved a median value of
4 and above with a quartile deviation value of less than or equal to 0.5.
Table 3. Indicators of the challenges of the flipped classroom for prospective mathematics teachers
C1 PMTs do not have a self-learning awareness and a motivation to learn 4 4 5 1 0.5
C2 PMTs do not have enough technological facilities to learn (Internet, laptop, smartphone) 3 3 4 1 0.5
C3 PMTs have difficulties in communicating with instructors in out-of-class activities 4 4 5 1 0.5
We found a high consensus by the panel of experts on three indicators involving the flipped
classroom challenges. The first challenge is related to the self-learning awareness and learning
motivation of PMTs. The second challenge involves the technological facilities to implement
flipped classrooms, especially in developing countries like Vietnam. Finally, the third challenge
involves the difficulty faced by PMTs in implementing mathematical communications with
instructors in out-of-class activities.
3.2. Advantages and Challenges of Flipped Classroom for Mathematics Teacher Educators
Table 4 presents the items that achieved high importance with a high consensus level about
the advantages of the flipped classroom for mathematics teacher educators. These items
achieved a median value of 4 and above with a quartile deviation value of less or equal to 0.5.
Table 4. Indicators of the advantages of the flipped classroom for mathematics teacher educators
AL1 Feel free to support PMTs’ learning 4 4 5 1 0.5
AL2 Be more active in teaching 4 4 5 1 0.5
AL3 ICT skills are enhanced 4 4 5 1 0.5
AL4 Pedagogical skills are enhanced 4 4 4.75 0.75 0.38
AL5 Classroom data is managed in a better way 4 3 4 1 0,5
There were all five indicators involving the advantages of flipped classrooms for
mathematics teacher educators. These five indicators refer to a high consensus regarding
158
mathematics teacher educators’ pedagogical and classroom management skills. None of the
indicators in the Round 1 survey achieved a medium consensus.
Table 5 presents the indicator statements found to be rated high importance and achieved
high consensus about the flipped classroom challenges for mathematics teacher educators.
These items achieved a median value of 4 and above with a quartile deviation value of less than
or equal to 0.5.
Table 5. Indicators of the challenges of the flipped classroom for mathematics teacher educators
It takes more time to prepare lessons compared to traditional
CL1 5 4 5 1 0.5
teaching approaches
It takes much mental power to prepare lessons compared to
CL2 5 4 5 1 0.5
traditional teaching approaches
It requires proficient use of technology tools compared to
CL3 4 4 5 1 0.5
traditional teaching approaches
Three challenges listed in Table 5 achieved a high consensus of the panel of experts. These
three indicators refer to the investment of time, mental power, and ICT expertise by
mathematics teacher educators when using flipped classrooms. These are common challenges
faced by instructors when implementing flipped classrooms. In addition, two indicators achieve
high consensus with medium importance. These two indicators are: (1) flipped classroom is not
suitable for teaching university mathematics, and (2) mathematics teacher educators feel
uncomfortable because they have to change the traditional teaching method. These two
indicators reflect some specific difficulties related to the mathematics discipline when
implementing flipped classrooms in universities. There is a strong consensus of the expert panel
on the difficulties of implementing flipped classrooms in university mathematics.
We interviewed three experts to reaffirm the indicators that achieved high consensus with
high importance in Round 2. The experts interviewed all agreed with these indicators. We also
interviewed these experts for indicators that achieved a medium or no consensus to seek further
explanations.
CONCLUSION
This study aimed to identify the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom in
initial mathematics teacher education in Vietnam. The Delphi method was selected to obtain the
consensus of a panel of experts on the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom.
At the end of Round 1, we identified a set of 24 indicators of advantages (20 indicators) and
challenges (4 indicators) of the flipped classroom for PMTs. For mathematics teacher educators,
we identified a set of 10 indicators of advantages (5 indicators) and challenges (5 indicators). At
the end of Round 2, the findings show 14 indicators related to the advantages for PMTs that
achieve high importance with high consensus (70%). It is interesting to note that, among these
14 indicators, there are 12 indicators involving PMTs’ skills and attitudes, only two involving
PMTs’ knowledge. This means that the expert panel emphasizes the advantages of the flipped
classroom for changing PMTs’ skills and attitudes rather than PMTs’ knowledge. This is
aligned with the findings of Murillo-Zamorano, Lopez-Sanchez, and Godoy-Caballero (2019),
which confirm the positive effects of the flipped classroom on university students’ knowledge,
skills, and engagement.
However, there are four indicators related to PMTs’ knowledge that achieve medium
consensus. This suggests that the advantages of the flipped classroom on university students’
academic performance still need to be studied further, as suggested by Akçayır and Akçayır
(2018). On the challenges of flipped classrooms for PMTs, the findings show a high agreement
of the expert panel on the challenges involving self-learning, technological equipment, and
159
mathematical communications with instructors in out-of-class activities. Here, we found a

subject-specific challenge. Specifically, the expert panel asserted that for mathematics lessons,
the one-to-one mathematical interaction between instructors and PMTs in out-of-class activities
is challenging, given the nature of the subject.
Regarding the advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom for mathematics teacher
educators, we identified ten indicators at the end of Round 1. After analyzing Round 2, the
findings indicate that eight indicators achieved a high importance level with a high consensus
level (75%). These advantages are mainly related to the pedagogical skills and classroom
management skills of mathematics teacher educators. More specifically, the expert panel
suggests that the flipped classroom helps to enhance the ICT, pedagogical, and classroom
management skills of mathematics teacher educators. The findings also show that the flipped
classroom entails three challenges for mathematics teacher educators: time-consuming, mental
power, and ICT proficiency. In addition, according to the expert panel, the unique nature of
university mathematics also causes some challenges for implementing flipped classrooms.
In conclusion, the research results allowed us to identify the advantages and challenges of
the flipped classroom in initial mathematics teacher education in Vietnam. This result shares
common advantages and challenges of the flipped classroom as suggested by Akçayır and
Akçayır (2018) and highlights the advantages and challenges that are specific to mathematics
and the Vietnamese context. Methodologically, our Delphi approach is appropriate in achieving
the study goals, especially to measure the indicators and the consensus. However, the number of
appointed Delphi experts for this study is limited. The number of Delphi rounds used for this
study is only three. The panel of experts has not further qualitatively analyzed the indicators that
achieved a medium consensus level.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This research is funded by the University of Education, Hue University under grant number
T.20 – GD.NCM – 01.
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About the authors
– MSc. Sayaphet Keodavanh is a lecturer at the Savannakhet University in Lao PDR. She
is currently a PhD student in mathematics education at the College of Education, Hue
University in Vietnam. Her current research focuses on the implementation of flipped
classrooms in preservice mathematics teacher education in Lao PDR and Vietnam.
– Dr. Nguyen Dang Minh Phuc is a lecturer at the College of Education, Hue University, in
Vietnam. His current research focuses on the use of digital technologies in the teaching and learning
of school mathematics and in mathematics teacher education.
Dean of the Mathematics Department at the College of Education, Hue University, in Vietnam. He
earned a PhD in Mathematics Education at the Paris Diderot University in France. His research
interests are mathematics teachers’ professional competencies and the use of technology in the
teaching and learning of mathematics. He has published research articles in some international
journals of mathematics education such as ZDM, Canadian Journal of Science, Mathematics and
162
TRAINING EFFECTIVE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS:

CURRENT PRACTICES AT A CENTER
FOR FOREIGN LANGUAGES IN VIETNAM
Luu Nguyen Quoc Hung*1
Abstract: Teacher is one of the most important elements in education. The quality of education is
largely determined by the teacher effectiveness. Few would argue against the view that effective
teachers are a central resource for the quality and success of an educational organization, and
thus attention needs to be given to examining teacher effectiveness as a key to guaranteed
education quality. Understanding teachers’ beliefs and perceptions about the effective foreign
language teacher is vital for successful teacher training programs. This small-scale study
investigated the characteristics of effective English teachers as perceived by 40 teachers at the
Center for Foreign Languages in Can Tho City, Vietnam with a self-report questionnaire
consisting of four categories of English proficiency, pedagogical knowledge, organization and
communication skills and socio-affective skills. Overall, the teachers indicated positive attitudes
towards the required components of an effective English teacher. From the findings, there are
important implications for training prospective English teachers. Continuous professional
development is a valuable tool for helping academic staff advance in their careers and enhance
their teaching performance. The current practice of English teaching certification in the Center’s
training program proves to be practical and effective for improving teacher effectiveness.
Keywords: professional development, quality, teacher effectiveness, training
INTRODUCTION
Effective language teaching has become a prominent issue in the field of education as there has
been a great demand on learning foreign languages throughout the world. As teacher quality is a
crucial factor in promoting effective learning, it would be truly beneficial if the characteristics
of effective teachers can be examined thoroughly. Understanding perceptions about effective
English teachers might help teachers develop themselves accordingly to create an emotionally
positive and academically productive atmosphere in the classroom. In addition, there is also
growing interest in identifying appropriate training activities for effective teaching in terms of
student achievement. This study aims to investigate the characteristics of effective English
teachers as perceived by a group of 40 teachers at the Center for Foreign Languages (CFL) in
Can Tho City, Vietnam. The results of the study are to inform educators and teachers of appropriate
training or professional development activities necessary to increase teacher effectiveness.
CONTENT
1.1. Effective foreign language teacher
Identifying the qualities of an ‘effective teacher’ is challenging, since the term ‘effective’
can be interpreted differently by different people. Young and Shaw (1999) found that teacher
effectiveness is associated with qualities such as “effective communication, a comfortable
learning atmosphere, concern for student learning, student motivation, and course organization.”
According to Stronge (2002), an effective teacher can mean a teacher who always produces a
* Corresponding Author: Luu Nguyen Quoc Hung; E-mail Address: lnqhung@ctu.edu.vn

1 Can Tho University, Vietnam
163
class of high-achievers, or a teacher who generally receives positive evaluations from

supervisors and administrators. However, if the focus is on the teaching process and not on the
end result, then it is possible to define an effective teacher as a person who “provides
information to students in a way that is clear, understandable, and motivating” (Leon & Neblett,
2018). Recently, Walker (2008) found out that there were 12 identifiable personal and
professional characteristics of an effective teacher in his study and these characteristics included
being prepared, being positive, having high expectations, being creative, being fair, displaying a
personal touch, developing a sense of belonging, admitting mistakes, having a sense of humor,
giving respect to students, forgiving, and being compassionate.
Based on the above definitions, an effective teacher displays a wide range of skills and
abilities that lead to creating a learning environment where all students feel comfortable and are
sure that they can succeed both academically and personally. An effective teacher is not
characterized merely by the factors of knowledge or teaching skills, but also communication
skills and the relationships the teacher has with students.
Although there seem to be universal general principles of effective teaching used to specify
an effective teacher, English language teaching presents learning objectives, tasks and
environments that are qualitatively distinct from those of other subjects. Borg (2006) examined
ways in which foreign language teachers are seen to be different to teachers of other subjects.
The factors that distinguish the experience of foreign language teachers from that of teachers of
other subjects include the following: 1) The nature of the subject matter itself, 2) The interaction
patterns necessary to provide instruction, 3) The challenge for teachers of increasing their
knowledge of the subject, 4) The need for outside support for learning the subject.
According to Bell (2005), the research literature suggests that there is no single accepted
definition of effective foreign language teaching. Foreign language teaching is a complex,
multidimensional process that means different things to different people. An effective foreign
language teacher is the teacher who is clear and enthusiastic in teaching that provides learners
with the grammatical, lexical, phonological, pragmatic, and socio-cultural knowledge and
interactive practice they need to communicate successfully in the target language.
In the current study, the research context is at a center for foreign languages which mainly
provides English courses at different levels, so the selected participants are English language
teachers.
1.2. Teacher training and professional development
Today, teacher training and professional development are seen as central mechanisms for
the improvement of teacher’s content knowledge and their teaching skills and practices in order
to meet high educational standards (Darling-Hammond & McLaughlin, 1995). Although there
may be some differences, training is usually equated with professional development and in this
article, both terms are used interchangeably to describe all professional activities and learning
that teachers are involved in.
1.3. CFL and its teacher certification program (ETC)
The Center for Foreign Languages, Can Tho University (hereafter referred to as the Center
or CFL) is committed to optimizing opportunities to improve teachers’ knowledge and skills at
all levels in the workplace. The development of academic staff is a joint responsibility shared by
the individual teacher and the academic administrator of the Center. Every year, all teachers are
required to sign a teaching contract which articulates their job description and responsibility at
their level. Individual teachers are primarily responsible for developing and following their own
professional development plans together with the Center’s workload. The current practice of
English teaching certification program proves to be practical. This teacher professional
development program is aligned to TESOL standards and specifically aims to provide updated
164
knowledge and extensive practice in English language teaching. Participants will revise
theoretical backgrounds, join in face-to-face discussion at the monthly training sessions,
practice the most applicable activities and get professional development achievement at the end
of the program.
There are 16 subjects in the 4 modules or main areas of effective English language
teaching. The first module is “English proficiency” which requires the participants to complete
C1 level of English. The second module is “Pedagogical knowledge” comprising of different
subjects such as outcome-based education, educational technology, online education, teaching
English to young learners, assessment and CLIL or STEAM. The third module is “Organization
and communication skills” which consists of 5 subjects such as lesson planning, classroom
instruction, classroom management, communication in classrooms and contextual and critical
thinking. The last module is “Socio-affective skills” consisting of motivating learning, learner
engagement, problem-solving skills and psychology for teaching young learners.
Teacher’s participation in every subject will be recorded and fully recognized and awarded
a certificate of ETC when completing all the required modules. Full-time teachers are honored
and receive the most privileges of CFL’s teacher.
2. The study
2.1. Research methodology
In this study, a mixed design with the descriptive survey and interviews was employed. The
study addresses the following research questions:
– What are typical characteristics of effective English language teachers?
– What are common training activities teachers would like to receive to improve their
teaching effectiveness?
2.2. The participants
The participants of the study consisted of 40 teachers who were teaching at the Center. All the
teachers were experienced in the field and have been teaching English for more than five years.
Most teachers are young in their career, and they are within the age range of 25-50.
2.3. The questionnaire
The online questionnaire used to gather data for this study was adapted from a previous
study (Park & Lee, 2006), which consists of four main sections. Section 1 is about English
proficiency with 5 statements; Section 2 about Pedagogical knowledge with 13 statements,
Section 3 about Organization and communication skills with 7 statements and Section 4 about
Socio-affective skills with 8 statements. The participants are asked to indicate the level of
importance, using a five-point Likert scale from 0 (not important at all) to 4 (the most
important).
2.4. The interview
Of the 40 teachers completing the survey, 25% of these participants were randomly selected
to participate in the semi-structured interviews. The interview session lasted 10 minutes and was
recorded for further analysis.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Survey
The results and discussion have been organized into four main characteristics of an
effective English language teacher. Generally, the mean scores are relatively high with the total
average mean score of 3.52. The statement related to Organization and communication skills
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“Prepare the lesson well” had the highest score with 3.88, and the statement “Provide constant
feedback” in the section of Pedagogical knowledge had the lowest mean score with 3.18.
3.1.1. English proficiency
It is natural that being competent in English plays a pivotal role as an English teacher. In
this study, most participants perceived the characteristics of English proficiency as being very
important as presented in Table 1.
Table 1: Mean scores for the items in English proficiency (N = 40)
Scale
Items M SD
0 1 2 3 4
Read, write, speak, and understand spoken 1 7 32
3.78 .480
English well (2.5%) (17.5%) (80%)
2 9 29
Have correct accent and pronunciation 3.68 .572
(5%) (22.5%) (72.5%)
1 11 28
Know English vocabulary well 3.68 .526
(2.5%) (27.5%) (70%)
3 12 25
Have good knowledge of English grammar 3.55 .639
(7.5%) (30%) (62.5%)
7 18 15
Possess extensive culture comprehension 3.20 .723
(17.5%) (45%) (37.5%)
Total mean 3.58
Of the five characteristics about English proficiency, “Read, write, speak, and understand
spoken English well” had the highest mean score, with M = 3.78. As generally required level of
proficiency, EFL teachers need to be fluent in four language skills for their classroom
instructions. This result is in line with previous study (Wulyani et al., 2019), indicating that an
effective teacher should be efficient in basic communication in English.
Relatively high percentage of the participants perceived “Have correct accent and
pronunciation” and “Know English vocabulary well” as being the most important characteristics
(72.5% and 70%, respectively), and these statements received the same high mean scores of
3.68. These characteristics generally are necessary for teachers’ efficacy and effectiveness in
classroom instruction (Gul & Aziz, 2015).
The lowest mean score (M = 3.2) was for the characteristic statement “Possess extensive
culture comprehension”. It is likely that teachers in the current study tended to perceive cultural
knowledge not a part of the language proficiency.
3.1.2. Pedagogical knowledge
Pedagogical knowledge generally refers to the specialized knowledge of teachers for
creating effective teaching and learning environments for all students (Dadvand & Behzadpoor,
2020). Of the characteristics about pedagogical knowledge, the participants in this study
perceived “Focus on learning outcomes and growth” of the learners as being the most important
with the mean score of 3.7 (see Table 2). The result is expected as learning outcomes are
commonly prioritized in teaching and learning process as revealed in different studies (Maher,
2004; Mahajan & Singh, 2017).
Table 2: Mean scores for the items in pedagogical knowledge (N = 40)
Scale
Items M SD
0 1 2 3 4
1 10 29
Focus on learning outcomes and growth 3.70 .516
(2.5%) (25%) (72.5%)
Promote communicative language learning 1 11 28
3.68 .526
through activities and discussion (2.5%) (27.5%) (70%)
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Scale
Items M SD
0 1 2 3 4
Create and maintain a good classroom 2 11 27
3.63 .586
atmosphere (5%) (27.5%) (67.5%)
Praise students for good ideas or for their 1 1 12 26
3.57 .675
efforts (2.5%) (2.5%) (30%) (65%)
Use various materials including video, 2 14 24
3.55 .597
audio, and multimedia (5%) (35%) (60%)
Develop students’ language skill through 3 12 25
3.55 .639
working in pairs or groups. (7.5%) (30%) (62.5%)
Motivate students by supporting their 1 17 22
3.53 .554
self-efficacy (2.5%) (42.5%) (55%)
Encourage the students to learn English 3 14 23
3.50 .641
outside the classroom (7.5%) (35%) (57.5%)
Teach subject matter in ways that are 1 2 16 21
3.42 .712
accessible to all learners (2.5%) (5%) (40%) 52.5%)
Assess what students have learned 3 19 18
3.38 .628
rationally (7.5%) (47.5%) (45%)
Avoid direct criticism of students when they 1 1 6 8 24
3.32 .997
make errors (2.5%) (2.5%) (15%) (20%) (60%)
Let students have some control over the 7 15 18
3.28 .751
learning process (17.5%) (37.5%) (45%)
2 6 15 17
Provide constant feedback 3.18 .874
(5%) (15%) (37.5%) (42.5%)
Total mean 3.48
The two statements “Promote communicative language learning through activities and
discussion” and “Create and maintain a good classroom atmosphere” had relatively high mean
scores of 3.68 and 3.63, respectively. Teachers in this study were likely to prioritize
instructional process such as structuring a lesson and classroom management.
The other characteristics in the pedagogical knowledge perceived by the participants as
being important include “Praise students for good ideas or for their efforts”, “Use various
materials including video, audio, and multimedia”, “Develop students’ language skill through
working in pairs or groups”, “Motivate students by supporting their self-efficacy”, and
“Encourage the students to learn English outside the classroom”. These characteristics of
pedagogical knowledge are necessary for effective teaching as reviewed in different literature
(Dincer et al., 2013; Zamani & Ahangari, 2016).
The statement “Provide constant feedback” had the lowest mean score of 3.18. The result is
relatively unexpected as feedback is generally perceived as being important for effective
teaching (Chen & Liu, 2021). It is likely that in this study, the teachers might avoid continuous
feedback to engage the learners in more participation; however, this explanation needs further
investigation.
3.1.3. Organization and communication skills
The way a teacher plans and develops a lesson generally influences the lesson quality and
the learner’s achievement in the subject a great deal. In addition, an effective teacher must
possess strong communication skills as these are essential in contributing to effective teaching
(Nesari & Heidari, 2014; Yusof & Halim, 2014). The participants in this study perceived
“Prepare the lesson well” as being the most important with the highest mean score (M = 3.88)
(see Table 3). The result is understandable as generally every teacher should be responsible for
their lesson planning.
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Table 3. Mean scores for the items in organization and communication skills (N = 40)
Scale
Items M SD
0 1 2 3 4
5 35
Prepare the lesson well 3.88 .335
(12.5%) (87.5%)
9 31
Speak clearly 3.78 .423
(22.5%) (77.5%)
Present the content in a well-organized 1 11 28
3.68 .526
way (2.5%) (27.5%) (70%)
Use easy language to aid student’s 2 11 27
3.62 .586
understanding (5%) (27.5%) (67.5%)
1 2 10 27
Stress the most important points 3.57 .712
(2.5%) (5%) (25%) (67.5%)
Vary the speed and tone of voice 1 2 20 17
3.33 .694
according to the situation (2.5%) (5%) (50%) (42.5%)
Use non-verbal behavior to solicit student 1 3 20 16
3.28 .716
attention and interest (2.5%) (7.5%) (50%) (40%)
Total mean 3.59
The characteristics “Speak clearly” and “Present the content in a well-organized way”,
and “Use easy language to aid students’ understanding” with the relatively high mean scores
(M = 3.78, 3.68 and 3.62, respectively) were understandable. It is natural that classroom
instructions should be clear, concise and well-organized, and teachers of English undoubtedly
need these to support learners to follow lessons effectively (Wang et al., 2014).
The statement “Use non-verbal behavior to solicit student attention and interest” had the
lowest mean score of 3.28, although the value is relatively high in the range. The explanation
can be that teachers in the study tended to focus on verbal instructions as the need of target
language exposure in an ELT environment. This explanation, however, needs further evidence.
3.1.4. Socio-affective skills
It is crucial that teachers have some basic socio-affective skills to interact with their students
and maintain the educational process effectively. These skills include a wide range of items
such as motivating students, sparing time for students when they ask for help, being enthusiastic
for teaching, having positive attitudes towards students, responding to students’ needs and
providing a stress-free classroom atmosphere (Park & Lee, 2006). In this study, 70% of the
participants perceived “Treat students fairly and equally” as being the most important with the
mean score of 3.7 (see Table 4). It is important that equal treatment of students should be
emphasized in classroom management as generally reviewed in literature (Margret & Faas, 2014).
Table 4. Mean scores for the items in socio-affective skills (N = 40)
Scale
Items M SD
0 1 2 3 4
12 28
Treat students fairly and equally 3.70 .464
(30%) (70%)
1 15 24
Listen to students’ points of view 3.58 .549
(2.5%) (37.5%) (60%)
17 23
Be patient 3.58 .501
(42.5%) (57.5%)
3 15 22
Be approachable and friendly 3.47 .640
(7.5%) (37.5%) (55%)
Be helpful to students in and outside the 3 17 20
3.42 .636
classroom (7.5%) (42.5%) (50%)
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Scale
Items M SD
0 1 2 3 4
5 16 19
Alleviate students’ anxiety in class 3.35 .700
(12.5%) (40%) (47.5%)
Have an interest in students, for example, 5 17 18
3.32 .694
address individual students by name (12.5%) (42.5%) (45%)
5 20 15
Have a good sense of humor 3.25 .670
(12.5%) (50%) 37.5%)
Total mean 3.46
The other characteristics “Listen to students’ points of view” and “Be patient” also had the
relatively high same mean scores of 3.58. It is relatively consistent in the previous study
(Hakim, 2019) that these characteristics of emotions are important for enhancing learners’
motivation.
About 50% of the participants considered “Be approachable and friendly” and “Be helpful
to students” as being the most important with the mean scores of 3.47 and 3.42, respectively.
Reasonably, these characteristics are necessary for an effective English language teacher,
particularly in a new class when teachers need to support and engage learners in classroom
activities.
The lowest mean score of 3.25 was for the characteristic statement “Have a good sense of
humor”. The result is somewhat different from the literature, generally indicating that teachers’
sense of humor is like a miracle in creating effective teaching and learning environments
(Motiagh et al., 2014). It is likely that the teachers in the current study were more cautious or
serious with their teaching and learning process.
3.1.5. Teachers’ level of satisfaction with ETC
Participants were also asked about their level of satisfaction with the current practice of
ETC. The percentage of teachers’ satisfaction is relatively high as shown in Table 5.
Table 5. Teachers’ level of satisfaction with ETC (N = 40)
Level of satisfaction 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
No. of participants 4 27 9
For many teachers, the program of professional development enables them to keep their
professional knowledge and teaching techniques updated. In reality, the greater the teachers’
willingness to participate in staff development programs, the more likely they are to enhance
their level of satisfaction.
3.2. Interviews
Through semi-structured interviews, the participants expressed their views of typical
activities they would like to undertake to improve their teaching effectiveness. Most participants
indicated the need of training of using technology for their teaching, especially technical support
for online courses. This is also an increasing trend of education for the past few years due to the
Covid-19 pandemic. Typically, one teacher commented, “I need new educational technologies
to improve online teaching methods”.
Learning new teaching methods through teaching demo, peer teaching or teaching sharing
sessions are common suggestions for professional development activities reported by more
teachers in the interviews. Some specific teaching methods or techniques for active learning,
warm-up activities and using games are commonly emphasized as teachers’ need of training.
One teacher indicated that “I need to learn about diverse warm-up activities from other teachers
and colleagues.”
Training for class management, especially for large, multilevel classes is also shared as a
common need by many participants in the study. Using effective pair and groupwork is
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perceived necessary for instruction quality. Most of the teachers shared the view of “learning
how to encourage learners to work in pairs, groups and self-study”. Specifically for effective
class management, one teacher suggested learning to “design fun but well-organized lessons”.
It is also natural that the participants in the interviews mentioned the need of enhancing
English proficiency through taking international tests or participating in English proficiency
improvement course.
It is also worth noting that the teachers in the study indicated the need of “using various
teaching resources for creating classroom activities”. One teacher particularly requested that
“the Center should provide teachers with access to teaching and learning resources through open
content and help them integrate this content in their instruction”.
CONCLUSION
This study investigated the common characteristics of effective English teachers through a
self-report questionnaire consisting of four categories of effective teaching: English proficiency,
pedagogical knowledge, organization and communication skills and socio-affective skills.
Overall, the total mean scores are generally high, indicating the teachers’ positive perception of
the importance of the characteristics of effective teaching.
The findings have the following implications for teachers’ training or professional
development. First, considering the teachers’ higher endorsement of organization and
communication skills over English proficiency, pedagogical knowledge and socio-affective
skills, appropriate training activities should focus on this area. The result is somewhat
group-specific as the majority of the teachers in this study were teaching young learners, so
classroom organization and communication skills is generally prioritized. However, the
difference of these mean scores is minor, so it is natural that effective teachers should require
appropriate training or professional development program of these four areas accordingly.
Second, teachers’ level of satisfaction with the current professional development program is
relatively high. For many teachers, the program of English certification enables them to keep
their professional knowledge and teaching techniques updated. In reality, the greater the
teachers’ willingness to participate in professional development program, the more likely they
are to enhance their satisfaction. Teachers should be provided with opportunities for
professional development for improving the effectiveness of teaching.
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About the Author
Luu Nguyen Quoc Hung is an English lecturer at Can Tho University. He has been
teaching English for 29 years, and currently a director of the Center for Foreign Languages, Can
Tho University. He holds a BA in TESOL from Can Tho University, an MEd in Educational
Leadership and Management from RMIT International University, Vietnam, and a PhD in
Education from the University of Wollongong. His research interests focus on academic
performance appraisal and quality assurance in higher education, social-cognitive theory in
teaching and learning, and pedagogy of teaching English for young learners, and teaching
English skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing.
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APPLYING FLIPPED CLASSROOM TO DEVELOP

EVALUATION-COMPETENCY OF PRE-SERVICE TEACHERS
IN PRIMARY EDUCATION IN TEACHING ABOUT UNDERSTANDING
PHILOLOGY MATERIALS IN VIETNAM’S PRIMARY SCHOOLS
Luu Thi Diu1, Pham Thi Thu Huong2, Nguyen The Hung2
Abstract: Flipped classroom is popularly in global educational system because of its effective
results and learners’ satisfactions with its learning ways. Evaluation is an important step of
training process as it heavily affects educational quality, effectiveness, and each teacher uses
around 50% of the time and work for this activity (Plake, 1993). As a result, training knowledge
and practicing evaluation-competence are significant contents in the program of training pre-
service teachers. The paper introduces ways to apply the flipped classroom to develop the
competence of evaluating primary education students’ possibility of reading and understanding
Philology’ documents. The paper aims to clarify: 1) the conception of developing students’
competence to read and understand Philology materials; 2) the situation of applying teaching
methods to improve students’ competence of reading and understanding Philology documents
in primary schools; 3) ways to apply the flipped classroom to improve the above competence for
pre-service teachers of Primary Education; and 4) effectiveness of applying the flipped classroom
for pre-service teachers of Primary Education in reading and understanding Philology documents.
Keywords: flipped classroom, inverted classroom, rating capacity, students of Primary Education,
understanding documents
INTRODUCTION
Evaluating in education connects closely with all teachers’ internal and external activities
and it is a component of teaching methodologies and a foundation to establish teachers’
pedagogical skills and intelligence (Nguyen, 2017). Evaluation competency in teaching
Philology in primary school, especially skills of reading and understanding materials, is also an
out-coming standard of professional competence for pre-service teachers of Primary Education
after graduation. In order to complete educational aims of establishing and developing
competence of reading and understanding materials for students in primary schools, it is
necessary and compulsory to educate and train pre-service teachers. This task needs to be
completed in all primary schools, in both the process of educating new pre-service teachers and
of training and re-educating current teachers. It means that the evaluation competency in
teaching skills of reading and understanding Philology materials needs to be established in
Pedagogical Universities and improved with higher level as they practise and work in primary
schools. In doing so, preservice teachers of Primary Education can obtain out-coming standard,
and be confident to effectively perform their teaching tasks in future.
Especially, in the situation of Covid-19 pandemic, lecturers of Pedagogical Universities
need to innovate both contents of knowledge and methodologies to establish and improve
students’ evaluation competency in teaching skills of understanding Philology materials.
Preservice teachers need more chances to co-operate, deeply research, and then practise and
experiment to connect learning theory with teaching practice in order to establish evaluation
competency in teaching Philology in primary schools. In this situation, the flipped classroom
 Corresponding Author: Luu Thi Diu; E-mail Address: ltdiu@ttn.edu.vn.

1 Tay Nguyen University
172
has advantages to improve preservice teachers’ competences. With advantageous technologies,

students use laptops, smart phones connected to the internet to support them in finding
supplemental materials and knowledge in learning activities. As a result, students can gain fully
any knowledge, and have a strategy to focus on difficult tasks. This teaching model also
improves the integration between teachers and students, between students and students.
Especially, the flipped classroom is suitable with diversified learners, effective to differentiate
students’ qualities and levels, and to expand classroom-spaces with various types of learning
activities rather than following only face-to-face classroom (Bergmann & Sams, 2012).
Accordingly, research to find an effective way to apply the flipped classroom in developing
evaluation competency of preservice teachers of Primary Education in teaching Philology in
primary schools has both scientific and practical meanings.
CONTENT
Evaluation and examination are the main steps with leading role to affect educational
quality and effects. Those activities obtain around 50% of all lecturers’ time in their working
period (Plake, 1993). Ways to response can be used to improve the effectiveness of lecturers
and results of students in teaching and learning activities (Hattie & Timperley, 2007). From the
idea that reading is an interacting process between readers and writers via a specific document,
Hamra and Syatriana perform the Interactive Model of Teaching Reading Comprehension
(IMTRC) to teach students reading and understanding documents in Indonesia. They propose
two types of examination including: evaluating all the reading process to improve students’
learning ability and evaluating at the final step to clarify and measure students’ levels and
results (Hamra & Syatriana, 2015). Responding skills create many values for teaching activities
as they help lecturers to discover students’ levels of understanding knowledge and their skills, to
experiment teaching methods and their results, to promote students’ progress of completing
their knowledge, and to improve students’ energy and behaviour to study carefully and
effectively (Ren et al, 2009).
Previous studies of Vietnamese scholars agree that evaluation competency is a key factor in
possibilities to teach Philology in general, and to instruct reading and understanding documents
in particular (Nguyen et al., 2015; Tran, 2020). Many scholars focus on proposing approaches to
develop evaluation competency for both lecturers and students in reading and understanding
Philology documents. Pham (2017) proposes to “organize for the fourth-year students of
university to complete an examination in Philology as students in Practical Schools” to improve
their competence of evaluation in general and their possibility of teaching students in reading
and understanding documents in particular. As Pham argues, during the pedagogical
experiments, the fourth-year preservice teachers need to have rights to conduct examination to
know their learning results precisely. Therefore, lecturers need to co-operate with teachers in
high schools to build a plan for preservice teachers to experiment pedagogy focusing on
instructing trainees to design a test to evaluate students’ competence of reading and
understanding documents; to mark examinations; and to explain all results for students in high
schools (Pham, 2017). Other scholars propose that solutions of improving students’ competence
to teach Philology can apply in training teachers of Primary Education. They include upgrading
students’ skills of understanding documents, conducting more activities for practising
pedagogical skills (Tran, 2020). Nguyen (2014) proposes to create several types of evaluation
competency of Philology based on project-based learning, and learning profile.
In general idea, flipped classroom is a type of combined learning or blended learning
(Ngo & Nguyen, 2015). As Lage and other authors argue, “inverting the classroom means that
173
events that have traditionally taken place inside the classroom now take place outside the
classroom and vice versa” (Lage, Platt & Treglia, 2000, p. 32). The term “invert” or “flip” is
used to compare with traditional teaching ways (face-to-face classroom), in which all lessons
and homework have to do at home instead of at classroom (Lo & Hew, 2017). Flipped
classroom is exploited to improve the interaction between lecturers and students, to encourage
learners’ interest in learning in order to improve their studying results and provide more
teaching skills for lecturers (Lo & Hew, 2017). Fundamental background of inverted classroom
is blended learning approach. This method is to combine both face-to-face and online learnings
in teaching students to exploit both their advantages and prevent their limitations. Therefore,
technologies are applied to help students to collect and use all learning materials. Different
types of learning materials such as text-books, lectures, PowerPoint slides, videos, learning
notes, homework, etc are archived and saved in the learning management system (LMS).
Students have to self-learn and to self-evaluate with supports of the LMS before going to class.
In the flipped classroom model, firstly students have to work with all lectures by reading
documents, journals, or watching videos, accessing website to have more knowledge (Marks, 2015).
Inverted classroom is designed for lecturers and preservice teachers to discuss expandable
themes of learning subjects deeply (Nazarenko, 2015). All the time in the classroom is used for
doing exercise, or applying theories to address learning problems, or discussing in groups under
lecturers’ instructions to have comprehensive knowledge. Instead of performing a “chalk and
talk” way, lecturers play a role of a guide and instructor to help learners to deal with difficult
learning tasks. It is noticeable that the inverted classroom model means for expansion of
teaching program, and for re-organization of classroom’s activities. Many previous studies have
showed that students’ learning results in flipped classroom are better than their results in
face-to-face classroom (Missildine et al., 2013). Moreover, students feel interested and want to
learn in flipped classroom and they are satisfied with their results in the inverted classroom
(Wanner & Palmer, 2015). They reflect the quality of flipped classroom in comparion with that
of other teaching and learning ways.
In conclusion, the previous studies about evaluation competency in teaching Philology in
primary schools, especially skills of reading and understanding materials, and about the flipped
or inverted classroom provide researching theory for this study. Based on the previous studies,
we tend to apply flipped classroom to develop preservice teachers’ evaluation competency in
teaching Philology in primary schools.
2. Methodology
This article aims to propose ways and process to apply the flipped classroom model with
remarkable notes in developing Primary Education students’ evaluation competency in teaching
skills of reading and understanding Philology documents. This article applies the following
methodologies to complete researching tasks:
– Collecting and analysing all materials and previous research about teaching competence,
the inverted classroom model to have a general background and theory for this research;
– Questionnaire: creating questions and doing a survey with 26 lecturers and 320 third-year
and fourth-year students of Primary Education in four universities in Vietnam including Hanoi
Pedagogical University 2, Tay Nguyen University, Quy Nhon University, and Sai Gon
University. By doing so, this paper evaluates lecturers and students’ opinions about the
significance of developing the evaluation competency in teaching skills of reading and
understanding Philology documents in primary schools for preservice teachers of Primary
Education; and the situation of using diversified teaching forms to develop their above
competence.
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– Pedagogical experiment: designing, preparing materials and organizing all teaching

activities to understand theory about evaluation competency in teaching Philology for 50
third-year preservice teachers of Primary Education, Tay Nguyen University. From then, the
paper examines and cross checks the possibility and effectiveness of using the inverted
classroom to improve evaluation competency in teaching skills of reading and understanding
philology’s materials. We apply a written examination with an assessment to evaluate students’
competence and capabilities and then differentiate students with different out-coming standard.
3. Findings and discussions
3.1. Conception of developing evaluation competency of Primary Education students in
teaching skills of understanding Philology documents
Vietnam’s popular education program in 2018 states that “competence is individuals’
characteristic that is established and developed due to their natural intelligence and their
learning and, practicing process. Those competences allow learners to mobilize their
knowledge, skills, and other natural characteristic such as feeling, belief and, interest to perform
a series of actions with good and predictable results successfully (MOET, 2018). Lecturers’
evaluation competency is a mobilization of all factors such as knowledge, skills, behaviour,
energy and belief to perform examinations for students’ competence during the teaching process
successfully. From the above conception, we understand that competence of evaluation in
teaching skills of reading and understanding Philology documents is the willing, positiveness to
mobilize knowledge, skills, behaviour, energy, interest, feeling, and belief to collect, analyze,
and explain all evidence related to students’ development of understanding competence. From
then, the paper clarifies both external and internal factors that affects preservice teachers’
evaluation competency; and proposes new methodologies to improve methodologies in teaching
skills of understanding Philology documents.
With the theory of “zone of development” (ZD), L.S. Vygotsky argues that students’
mentality transforms from “zone of actual development” (ZAD) to “zone of proximal
development” (ZPD). ZAD is an area in which learners’ existing mentality is nearly completed
and they can self-address all issues without external supports from other persons or instructors.
ZPD is an area in which learners’ mentality is immature, and they have to learn with assistance
from teachers or other people (friends and relatives), and they cannot self-complete difficult
tasks. Vygotsky argues that education is a process including activities of developing learners,
instructing and guiding them to ZPD and this process transfers learners’ mindset step-by-step.
Learners can develop themselves with teachers’ scaffolding. It means that development is a
movement forward of all subjects, a transformation from ZAD to ZPD, and then continuing to
create the next ZPD by a standardized test. This theory is important in teaching learners at
kindergartens and primary schools. As such, applying this theory to develop evaluation
competency of preservice teachers of Primary Education in teaching reading and understanding
Philology documents is a helpful activity to change, encourage and improve all students’
competence of understanding documents from ZAD to ZPD and then a next zone in order to
reach educational targets. We also suggest that:
– Developing evaluation competency in teaching Philology in primary schools is to focus
on knowledge and skills that help learners to understand and practise in ZPD rather than pay
attention to existing knowledge and skills that students have obtained in ZAD. It means that
teaching is a process to help students move forward to the ZPD with assistance of teachers who
guide and instruct them by creating scaffolding and bringing learners to social experience.
– Developing evaluation competency in teaching Philology, especially in skills of reading
and understanding documents is evidenced in learners’ improvement of their awareness,
behaviours, and pedagogical experiments.
175
– Improving evaluation competency in teaching skills of reading and understanding

Philology documents has to be conducted during the training process of Pedagogical
Universities. During this period, preservice teachers are required to have a precise awareness
and learn actively and creatively to focus on their target.
3.2. Situation of applying teaching forms to develop evaluation competency in teaching
Philology in primary schools
The paper argues that the ability of evaluating students’ possibility of understanding documents
is one of teaching abilities of Primary Education learners in the subject of Vietnamese language.
In order to research awareness of both lecturers and students about this capacity, a survey
participated by 26 lecturers teaching Vietnamese language and Methodology of teaching
Vietnamese, and 320 third-year and fourth-year students of Primary Education at four
universities: Tay Nguyen University, Hanoi Pedagogical University 2, Sai Gon University and
Quy Nhon University is conducted. Results of our investigation are presented in the Figure 1:
Figure 1. Awareness about the importance of developing evaluation competency in teaching skills
of reading and understanding Philology documents in primary schools
The Figure 1 shows that all lecturers joining the survey highly evaluate the importance and
necessity of developing ability of rating Primary Education students’ possibility of
understanding documents in Vietnamese language. 76.9% respondents demonstrate that this
capacity is very necessary and 23.1% view that this ability is necessary. Regarding students,
almost all of them agree that this ability is necessary and very necessary. From the above
results, we suggest that the ability of rating students’ possibility of understanding documents is
necessary and significant to help teachers to have full skills and capacities to have successful
results in both teaching Vietnamese language in general and understanding documents in
particular. Especially, that conducting new Vietnam’s popular education program in 2018 at
various levels and issuing the Decree No. 27/2020/TT of Ministry of Education and Training
about evaluating students in primary schools requires teachers to have rating ability during their
teaching process.
Via our investigation and survey, the situation of using teaching forms and methodologies
to develop preservice teachers’ evaluation competency in teaching Philology in primary schools
is presented in the following table:
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Table 1. Levels of using diversified teaching forms to develop preservice teachers’ evaluation
competency in teaching Philology in primary schools
Lecturers Preservice teachers
Teaching forms
Average Point Deviation Level Average Point Deviation Level
1 Micro teaching 3.15 0.967 7 3.29 1.089 8
2 Flipped classroom 2.69 1.289 8 3.21 1.045 9
3 Group teaching 4.08 1.093 1 4.31 0.785 7
4 Project-based teaching 3.31 1.225 6 3.58 1.041 5
5 Discovery teaching 3.77 0.908 3 3.91 0.929 2
6 Pedagogical experiment in primary schools 3.92 0.935 2 3.92 0.896 1
7 Practical experience 3.69 1.087 4 3.78 1.006 3
8 Watching model of teaching videos 3.54 0.761 5 3.71 0.986 4
9 Inviting teachers of primary schools to 9 3.09 1.324 10
2.54 1.529
teach sample lessons
10 Other teaching forms 2.92 1.093 10 3.56 1.049 6
Source: Survey Data
The above table shows that all pedagogical universities involved in the investigation pay
relative attention to developing competences of teaching Philology, especially in teaching skills
of reading and understanding Philology materials in primary schools. All lecturers teaching
modules relating to this competence apply diversified teaching forms to develop preservice
teachers’ capabilities. As the investigation’s results, the most popular teaching forms include
group teaching, pedagogical experiment in primary schools, discover teaching, and watching
sample teaching videos. Lecturers state that the flipped classroom is not applied regularly
although previous studies argue that this blended-learning has advantages to establish preservice
teachers’ knowledge and skills. We then conduct an in-depth interview with lecturers to know
reasons why they rarelyemploy flipped classroom to develop students’ evaluation competency
in teaching Philology. There are three main answers for this situation: 1) lecturers have not
experimented methodology to perform this teaching model; 2) their pedagogical universities
have unsatisfactory equipment and technology to apply the flipped classroom; and 3) their
limitation in using IT to apply this teaching model, especially in the online classroom. This fact
requires both scientists and lecturers to research and discover a new methodology to effectively
apply the flipped classroom to develop preservice teachers’ evaluation competency in teaching
skills of reading and understanding Philology materials.
3.3. Ways to apply the flipped classroom to develop evaluation competency in teaching
skills of reading and understanding Philology documents
3.3.1. Preparing teaching materials to develop students’ competence
In order to perform the inverted classroom model to develop Primary Education students’
evaluation competency in teaching skills of reading and understanding Philology documents, we
design several types of materials as such:
– Teaching materials: 01 file of word and 01 file of PowerPoint slides with three main
contents of: (1): using methodologies and forms to examine Primary Education students’
possibility of understanding documents; (2): building tools to examine Primary Education
students’ possibility of understanding documents; (3): using and analysing results of those
examinations to note and evaluate students’ improvement and lecturers’ changes in their
teaching approaches about understanding documents.
– Materials to instruct preservice teachers to self-learn: guiding videos, suggestions for
students about external activities outside classroom.
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In order to create the above materials, we exploit the value of IT and benefit from internet
such as: computer or laptop with internet connection, web-cam, microphone, Microsoft Word
software, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Expression Encoder 4 software (to record all the
teaching process via laptop), Corel Video Studio Pro software (to create and design teaching
video), and Ms. Team (to upload all teaching lectures and to interact with students). The process
of designing and creating an instruction video is below:
Map 1: Process of creating teaching videos

– Reading sources and other references: they include existing documents, files and other
materials that lecturers have provided to preservice teachers to self-read and investigate. In this
paper, we recommend some main and important books and journals such as:
1. Ministry of Education and Training (2020), Improving materials: evaluation, examination
primary students under the direction of developing their behaviour and competence Philology;
2. Ministry of Education and Training (2018), Vietnam popular education program, The
Philology subject;
3. Ministry of Education and Training & Department of Primary Education (2020),
Training materials: Evaluating primary students under the direction of developing their
behaviour and competence;
4. Nguyen Cong Khanh & Dao Thi Oanh (2016), Examination and evaluation in education,
Hanoi National University of Education Press;
5. Le Phuong Nga (ed) (2016), Methodologies of teaching Philology in primary education,
2 vols, Hanoi National University of Education Press;
6. All volumes of text-books of Philology at primary education.
3.3.2. Process to organise teaching activities to develop evaluation competency in teaching skills
of understanding Philology documents via the flipped classroom
The process of teaching all theory contents of module: “Examination, evaluation the
competency of understanding Philology documents for primary students under the direction of
developing their competence” is divided into 5 steps:
Table 2. Teaching process under the flipped classroom
Step Contents Collecting data Evaluating tools
– Students answer entry investigation/survey. – Survey paper – Survey paper
1
– Students make a test before starting the module. – Results of a competence-test. – A competence-examination.
Lecturers introduce the inverted classroom; train students
2
about learning process under the flipped classroom – Teaching diaries and
– Results from viewing learners’
Lecturers instruct students to learn about and work with lecturers’ viewing
3 behaviour and learning outputs
online classroom by Ms. Team software
Students learn with the flipped classroom model with
4
existing materials and tools as previous training
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Step Contents Collecting data Evaluating tools

– A competence-examination.
– Students’ evaluating
Lecturers use assessments to examine students’ evaluation Results of an examination about
paper/notes about teaching
5 competency in teaching skills of reading and students’ competence
competence of reading and
understanding Philology documents.
understanding Philology
documents.
Performing a specific activity is divided into three learning periods: Period 1: Learning
before going to class; Period 2: Learning in class; Period 3: Learning after class. For example,
towards the activity of finding information about conception, aim and requirement of evaluation
competency in teaching skills of reading and understanding Philology documents, we conduct
several following periods:
* Period 1: Learning before going to class
As the above picture, lecturers create online classroom on the software Ms. Team and then
send all supporting materials to class, also with videos to guide students’ self-learning in order
to help learners to understand and practice all studying tasks. Students’ jobs are to read
materials, complete their own homework and discuss questions in groups. By doing all the
above tasks, students have knowledge and, experience to clarify all contents related to
conception, aims and requirements of evaluation competency in teaching skills of reading and
understanding Philology documents. Learning results in this period help preservice teachers to
prepare knowledge, information, and experience to join in all studying activities in class
actively and creatively. It means that all learning activities in traditional classroom have been
transformed to self-learning at home in the model of inverted classroom.
* Period 2: Learning in class
In this period, firstly learners have time to report and present their self-studying results,
their considerations or what they have not done or have done unsatisfactorily in the previous
period. After that, both lecturer and students discuss and find answers for all concerns. Beyond
that, students debate wider subjects to help them to obtain more knowledge based on existing
information they got during their self-learning at home. In the inverted classroom model,
difficult tasks require higher capabilities to address. Learning targets are done in class with
discussion and interaction between lecturer and students. By doing so, learners can practice and
complete all learning targets well. It is contrast to the face-to-face classroom as most difficult
questions are required as homework because they have limited time in class.
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* Period 3: Learning after class
Students continue to self-learn after studying in the class to reinforce all knowledge. They
start to apply their information about conception, aims and requirements of evaluation
competency in teaching skills of understanding documents in teaching practice.
( Authors’ compilation)
In this period, each student has a specific learning task and lecturers use supporting tools in
online classroom to check and evaluate all learners’ works after going to class.
As such, with the inverted classroom, students have to learn in three periods, and they can
learn actively to obtain knowledge at highest level and then exploit that awareness in society
and teaching tasks.
In the flipped classroom model, lecturers do not play a role of teaching all knowledge but of
instructing and managing all students’ learning activities such as self-learning, discussion,
interaction. This transformation requires lecturers to have satisfactory skills of connection, and
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interaction, also the ability of guidance, instruction and management to promote students’
learning and sharing knowledge and ideas. Besides a direct connection, lecturers have to interact
indirectly with learners via the LMS and other educational systems to support students as they
need and to remind them about learning tasks.
3.3.3. Effects of applying the flipped classroom to develop preservice teachers’ evaluation
competency in teaching Philology in primary schools
In order to check chances and effects of applying the inverted classroom model in teaching
to develop Primary Education students’ evaluation competency in teaching skills of reading and
understanding Philology documents, we have experimented 50 third-year students of two
classes: K18 Primary Education and K18 Jrai Primary Education at Tay Nguyen University.
This experiment follows the previous proposed process. We use an assessment to examine
students’ entry quality. This test has 12 questions. Another test for output results has 24
questions. All questions are checked for correction and difficult levels; and output questions are
more difficult than entry ones. Results of evaluation competency is divided into 4 levels: level
1: unsuccessful; level 2: passable; level 3: good; level 4: excellent. Results of both entry and
output evaluations are below:
Figure 2. Comparing results of entry and output evaluations of students’ competence

Experimental results in the figure 2 show that after joining the flipped classroom, most
students’ competence of understanding Philology documents is higher than their competence
before taking part in the flipped classroom. There is no students’ competence at level 1 after
experiment. The number of students at level 2 reduces from more than 60% to 10% (with only
10 students) while the number of preservice teachers at level 3 increases noticeably from 14 to
36 (or from 28% to 72%). The figure for level 4 is higher but in fact the grap is quite small, and
it accounts for only 18%. From the above results, and based on students’ existing competence,
we recognise that most of learners have increased their capacity to understand Philology
documents, and especially several students climb up two levels (from level 1 to level 3 or from
level 2 to level 4).
After experimenting contents of theory, students’ knowledge about evaluation competency
in teaching skills of reading and understanding Philology documents has completed. They
clarify theory about evaluating activities in teaching philology in primary schools. They can also
start to apply that knowledge in designing a plan of evaluation, choosing suitable approaches,
building tools and organising activities to examine. Remarkably, they can use that result to
evaluate primary students’ competence of reading and understanding Philology documents.
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CONCLUSION
In both theory and practice, the flipped classroom model is effective and highly possible in
teaching students about contents related to evaluation competencies in teaching skills of reading
and understanding Philology documents. This research makes clear the conception of
developing evaluation competence in teaching skills of reading and understanding Philology
documents, the situation of applying teaching forms to develop students’ evaluation
competency, ways to apply the flipped classroom in improving preservice teachers’ evaluation
competency, and its effects. With this model, teaching process is changed and inverted, and it
pays attention to learners’ creative and active role, prevents and reduces their objective
characteristic as in the face-to-face classroom. Beyond that, this model creates a new habit of
interacting between learners and learners, or between learners and lecturers to establish new
behaviours and skills in the modern period. By contrast, the role of lecturers is changed as they
are more important in designing teaching contents and plan, and in managing students’ learning,
interacting, discussing and evaluating processes. With the inverted classroom model, learning is
not fixed in class but expanded to diversified spaces such as outdoors environment, at home or
anywhere with internet connection. However, to exploit the flipped classroom model well and to
develop Primary Education students’ evaluation competency in teaching skills of reading and
understanding Philology documents, lecturers are required to understand the conception of
inverted classroom clearly, clarify their aims in teaching students in this model, and have
suitable and effective approaches of evaluation students’ learning activities. By applying the
inverted model for 50 third-year students of Primary Education in Tay Nguyen University, the
research has a good result as it improves students’ evaluation competency. However, to perform
this model successfully, lecturers need to understand its characteristic, the central role of
students in the educational system, and the role of lecturers with flexible and suitable evaluating
approaches. Moreover, all Pedagogical Universities need to provide convenient classrooms and
techniques to support both lecturers and students.
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About the authors

– MA. Luu Thi Diu is a PhD student of Hanoi National University of Education,
specializing in Theory and Methodology of Teaching Literature and Vietnamese (Course 38).
She has conducted five institutional research studies related to her research area and have had
several articles published in Vietnamese journals and proceedings. Currently, she is a lecturer
working for the Division of Primary Education, Department of Education, Tay Nguyen
University. She is in charge of teaching the courses of Vietnamese and Methodology of teaching
Vietnamese to students of Primary Education. During nearly 12 years working for Tay Nguyen
University, she has made efforts to grow professionally and to be more innovative and creative
in teaching and improving teaching quality.
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– Assoc. Prof. Dr. Pham Thi Thu Huong is currently a lecturer and head of the theory and
teaching methods of Philology, HaNoi National University of Education (HNUE). She has
published 30 scientific articles in the field of the theory and teaching methods of Philology,
01 monograph, 01 syllabus and many reference books applying teaching methods in Literature
at schools. These works focus on reading comprehension and reading comprehension training,
teaching literary texts in schools, curriculum and Literature at high schools. She also teaches at
Nguyen Tat Thanh High School (HNUE).
– MA. Nguyen The Hung is currently a lecturer of the theory and teaching methods of
Philology, HaNoi National University of Education (HNUE). He completed his MA. at Hanoi
National University of Education in 2018. He has published 9 scientific articles in the field of
the theory and teaching methods of Philology and many reference books applying teaching
methods in Literature at schools. These works focus on multimodal texts and reading
comprehension multimodal texts training in schools.
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APPLYING THE TPACK MODEL TO INSTRUCT PRE-SERVICE TEACHER

OF PRIMARY EDUCATION TO DESIGN LESSON PLANS
OF SUBJECTS OF HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY – CASE STUDY
OF TAY NGUYEN UNIVERSITY
Nguyen Manh Huong*1, Le Thi Thuy An2
Abstract: Instructional design, instructional system design, or designing teaching plans/lesson

plans is compulsory to Vietnam’s teachers before organizing all internal and external teaching
activities. As a result, that training knowledge and practicing skills of designing lesson plans are
important contents of all teacher training programs in Vietnam. With recent increasing
development of ICT and the effect of applying ICT in education, it is required that all pedagogical
students have to be provided with necessary skills of designing lesson plans with ICT assistance.
The TPACK is an educational model established by Mishra and Koehler (2009) to help teachers to
combine ICT in teaching activities in order to secure that all factors of technology, knowledge,
and pedagogy are suitable with characteristic of each discipline and subject. It is also a
framework to evaluate teachers’ competence of blending ICT in teaching activity. In this article,
that applying the TPACK model is considered from the perspective of instructing students to
design teaching plans with requirements of combining all TPACK’s components. This paper will
clarify: 1) the conception, content and effectiveness of TPACK; 2) Situation of blending ICT in
teaching History and Geography of students of Primary Education under the TPACK model; and 3)
Proposals to apply the TPACK model to instruct pre-service teachers of Primary Education in Tay
Nguyen University to design lesson plans of History and Geography.
Keywords: TPACK, Tay Nguyen University, blended learning, designing lesson plan, pre-service
teacher of Primary Education, teaching History and Geography
INTRODUCTION
Instructional planning is essential for teaching because it is a process by which teachers
connect curriculum with learning activities (Clark & Yinger, 1980). Effective teaching usually
springs from a well-planned, well-organized, and well-presented lesson plan (Wood &
Miederhoff, 1988). In Vietnam, lesson plan is one of the compulsory and important documents
that teachers in all grades need to be prepared regularly and carefully (Training, 2020).
Accordingly, preparing lessons and designing lesson plans are significant contents in
educational programs of all Vietnam’s Pedagogical Universities. All those contents are
combined in modules of Theory and Methodologies of each discipline.
With increasing development of ICT, schools can exploit modern teaching technologies to
improve effectiveness in education. It requires that teachers to pioneer in applying ICT and then
develop their ability to use ICT to manage and organize all teaching activities. International
education organizations settle teachers’ competency-framework in ICT to impress the role of
ICT in education (UNESCO, 2011; ISTE, 2017). Redecker (2017, p. 4) also argues that “The
ubiquity of digital devices and the duty to help students become digitally competent requires
educators to develop their own digital competence”. It is clear that in the 4th Industrial
Revolution, teachers are required not only to control professional knowledge, teaching
methodologies, and EdTech tools but also to blend all those factors into teaching activities in
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Manh Huong; Email Address: nmhuongsphn@gmail.com

2 Tay Nguyen University, Vietnam
185
order to partly reform their teaching ways and students’ learning approaches. Combining ICT
with designing lesson plans is becoming popular for all teachers. Especially during the outbreak
and expansion of the pandemic Covid-19, as educational activities are transformed from direct
classroom to online learning, that applying educational technology in teaching is more
important. In order to create effective lessons, teachers can discover, choose suitable software
and ICT tools and teaching methodologies to design lesson plans under existing educational
aims and expected knowledge. There are many difficulties in applying ICT in teaching as the
quality of both teacher and pre-service teacher is unsatisfactory; or it is hard for teachers to use
EdTech tools in teaching as they are not trained ways to blend ICT into educational activities,
but only basic knowledge of ICT (Moursund & Bielefeldt, 1999; Jone, 2004). Some studies
argue that designing lesson plans can directly affect the final-year pedagogical students’ ability
of blending ICT into teaching activity (Lee & Lee, 2014; Kapici & Akcay, 2020).
As a result, that studying and providing detail instructions for pedagogical students to design
lesson plans with ICT assistance is necessary and compulsory with Vietnam’s recent education
innovation. In this research, besides introduction and conclusion, contents include discussing
about previous studies, about researching methodologies; and presenting research results.
CONTENT
Foreign studies about an instructional design, lesson plans, or instructional system design
are quite diversified. There are several models to design lesson plans such as ADDIE model (to
design framework) (Branch, 2009); Algo-heuristic model (as a way of prescribing instruction
for problem solving) (Landa, 1983); or Dick and Carey Model (or System Approach Model)
(Dick et al., 2005).
Previous studies show that in order to have an effective lesson, teachers’ lesson plans need
to cover educational aims, contents and teaching activities, ways to encourage students to learn
and approaches to evaluate comprehensively. Shulman impresses the role of instructional design
in all the educational program. He proposed Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) as a
knowledge base for teaching (Schulman, 1986), (Shulman, 1987) .
Applying ICT in a teaching activity requires a teacher to have more suitable teaching plans.
In order to have a better preparation for pre-service teachers, it is important to train them both
theory of intructional design and instruct them to practice in pedagogical experiment.
Pre-service teacher education should not only focus on how to use technology, but also how
technology can be used for teaching and learning (Tondeur et al., 2012). Based on Schulman
research about the PCK, Misha and Koehler propose Technological Pedagogical Content
Knowledge model (TPACK) to blend ICT into all training programs of Pedagogical
Universities. This model suggests that teachers need to focus on dealing well with all relations,
interactions of the three pillars of technological knowledge (TK), of pedagogical knowledge
(PK) and of content knowledge (CK) in order to have an effective combination between ICT
and teaching activity (Koehler & Mishra, 2009). This model solves difficulties in applying ICT
in education in training pre-service teachers. It is effective to provide and secure satisfactory
interactions between technology, content and pedagogy in specific discipline and subject. In
2009, Schmidt, Koehler and other authors create a survey instrument to access TPACK for pre-
service teachers to help teachers to design longitudinal studies to assess development of TPACK
(Schmidt et al., 2009). As such, TPACK is an important framework for assessing pre-service
teachers’ use and integration of technology into their instructional activities.
The suitability and effectiveness of the TPACK model and its exploitable values have been
presented in many previous studies. Wei Wang, Denise Schmidt-Crawford and Yi Jin (2019)
186
collect more than 500 papers related to TPACK’s development for pre-service teachers from
three sources of ERIC, PsycINFO, Mendeley under five study methodologies. The paper’s
contents focus on discussing how the TPACK is used in improving teaching methodologies,
training programs of Pedagogical Universities. It argues that training and teaching activities are
more effective with assistance of the TPACK model (Wang et al., 2019).
There have been studies on applying the TPACK in specific discipline and its effects.
Wendy Harte and Paul Reitano (2015) focus on applying the TPACK in teaching Geography;
while Agyei & Voogt (2015) do a research on Mathematics; Hsu’s research (2015) about
exploiting the TPACK in Science. Research of Kapici & Akcay (2020) proposes methodologies
to improve students’ competence to apply the TPACK model via lesson planning practice in the
virtual platform.
In Vietnam, researchers also focus on providing theory of ICT and skills of instructional
design, of designing lesson plans. This issue is presented briefly in text-books related to
Teaching Methodologies of each discipline (Phan et al., 2017; Pham et al., 2020). Other studies
focus on specific discipline. Nguyen (2017) proposes ways of practicing instructional design for
pre-service teacher via project-based learning. Doan & Hoang (2016) and Dao (2016) look into
about instruction of designing lesson plans for students of Philology. Pham and other authors
(2020) conduct research on a process of instructional design in subjects of History and
Geography at primary schools under Vietnam’s new education program of 2018. Other scholars
focus on building and exploiting electronic lesson plans or electronic teaching plans via
PowerPoint slides (Doan, 2009; Nguyen & Le, 2017).
Besides scholarships about instructional design and ways to apply ICT in teaching, other
researchers pay attention to researching and sharing knowledge about TPACK. Nguyen (2017,
2019) provides background about TPACK and how to exploit TPACK in teaching. Bui (2017)
applies the TPACK model in training teachers of technology; and Phan (2021) exploits this
model in building development program of ICT competence for pre-service teacher in primary
education. In 2020, Doan carried out a study about designing teaching plans for the theme
“Oriental and Western civilizations in the ancient and medieval periods” under the TPACK
model.
The pre-mentioned studies about instructional design, the TPACK model and ways to apply
the TPACK in different disciplines are fundamental theory for this research. They provide ideas
to investigate and research about the process to instruct pre-service teacher of primary education
to design teaching plans in History and Geography under the TPACK model via the case study
of Tay Nguyen University. To be specific, previous studies in Vietnam mostly focus on general
information about TPACK and its application on teaching subjects in high schools and there is a
lack of studies about applying TPACK in teaching primary schools, especially in the History
and Geography. As a result, previous studies about TPACK model and its application, about
designing lesson plans provide theory and fundamental knowledge for this research to apply in
teaching History and Geography in primary schools. This research therefore pays attention to
clarifying the process to instruct preservice teachers to design and build lesson plans in History
and Geography under the TPACK model via case study of Tay Nguyen University.
2. Methodology
In order to complete this research in Vietnam, we apply the following methods:
– Analyzing and synthesizing method: Methods of collecting and analyzing all information,
knowledge, references and data related to instructional design, lesson plans, or application ICT
in teaching, and the TPACK model.
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– Product-based research: analyze students’ teaching plans designed in the module of

teaching practice, especially lesson plans of History and Geography to clarify the situation of
blending ICT into teaching activities as they design lesson plan. Pisapia (1994) shows that ICT
integration is one way to apply information community technology to introduce, reinforce,
supplement and extend students’ skills during their learning process. To analyze students’
ability to apply ICT in designing lesson plans, we divided students’ results of building lesson
plans in two main groups: 1) students who cannot apply ICT in this activity; 2) students who
can integrate ICT. In group 2, we also defined smaller levels of 2.1: those just searching for
information on the internet to supply more knowledge for lesson plans; 2.2: those who can
apply fundamental software to design lesson plans; 2.3: those who can apply software creatively
to build lesson plans; 2.4: those who can fully understand advantages and limitations of
software and apply this well in creating lesson plans; and 2.5: those who can explain and help
other students to apply ICT in designing lesson plans. Criteria to divide preservice teachers’
results are based on the TPACK instrument and they will be presented in details in the following
part. Based on those levels, we firstly clarify the application of ICT in lesson plans. Secondly,
we identify the satisfactory combination between content knowledge of History and Geography,
and technology knowledge of ICT and software, and pedagogical knowledge to obtain
educational aims. Students achieve the highest level of integrating ICT in building lesson plans
as they could apply TPACK model well and creatively to secure both CK, TK and PK.
– Methods of investigation and survey: we apply and adapt Schmidt’s TPACK survey
instrument into Vietnam’s situation to serve our researching aims. We also make it easy for
pre-service teachers of primary education to understand. This survey is applied to investigate
online students’ ability to blend ICT into teaching History and Geography at elementary level.
There are 50 third-year and 42 fourth-year students of Primary Education at Tay Nguyen
University to involve in this investigation in July 2021. Due to the effect of Covid-19 pandemic,
the research limitation is to have only 92 respondents at Tay Nguyen University who could
directly participate in the research experiment after completing modules of teaching
methodology. That experimenting the TPACK model and the research results to preservice
teachers of other Pedagogical Universities will be conducted in the future as the situation will be
better and research groups will be able to travel and work directly with students.
– Interviewing 20 lecturers and pre-service teachers in the above groups to discover their
ability and situation of applying ICT in teaching. After lecturers and students complete the
module of teaching theory and methodologies that combined with our proposal process to apply
the TPACK model to instruct pre-service teachers to design lesson plan with ICT assistance, we
also receive their responses and suggestions to improve the proposed methods.
3. TPACK and lesson plans in teaching history and geography in primary schools
3.1. The nature of TPACK
“TPACK is the basis for effective teaching with technology, requiring an understanding of
the representation of concepts using technologies, pedagogical techniques that use technologies
in constructive ways to teach content, knowledge of what makes concepts difficult or easy to
learn and how technology can help address some of the problems that students face, knowledge
of students’ prior knowledge, and theories of epistemology and knowledge of how technologies
can be used to build on existing knowledge to develop new epistemologies or strengthen old
one”. (Koehler & Mishra, 2009, p. 66).
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Source: http://www.tpack.org/ (Mishra, 2009)

The above model clarifies the difference between teachers who apply ICT in teaching
specific discipline from specific scholars (historians or geographers), technological and
pedagogical professors.
Koehler and Mishra in 2006 also show all components in the TPACK model. They are:
1) Content Knowledge (CK): means professional knowledge including educational
program, disciplinary program, lesson’s topics and themes;
2) Pedagogical Knowledge (PK): means all teaching methodologies; pedagogical
approaches; skills of implementation, examination, evaluation; ways to organize teaching
activities; forms to perform classroom;
3) Technological Knowledge (TK): means all knowledge about technology and skills in
teaching, skills to apply specific EdTech tools, and information about using technology to
improve effect of teaching activities;
4) Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK): means a type of unique knowledge to teachers.
Teachers integrate and synthesize pedagogical knowledge and subject matter knowledge in
order to make it suitable with specific conditions, learners, educational aims and expected
results, existing methodologies and forms of organizing all lesson’s contents and final ways of
examination and evaluation;
(5) Technological Content Knowledge (TCK): means that using the best suited specific
EdTech tools to improve teaching effects (in both educational aims and teaching contents).
Teachers also understand how to re-structure lesson’s contents to create chance and gap to apply
educational technology effectively. TCK means how teachers understand the interaction and
influence between lesson’s content and technology;
(6) Technological Pedagogical Knowledge (TPK): means influence of technology towards
both teaching and learning activities. It also shows how EdTech tools can be deployed with
suitable teaching methodologies, forms, examination, evaluation in order to develop lesson’s
effect to be suited with specific learners;
(7) Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK): means the end results of the
highest level of combination of both technology and teaching (about nature and form). Its
framework includes both the science of the subject, pedagogical methodology, and application
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of EdTech tools. TPACK is a fundamental factor and productive way of effective teaching with
ICT assistance. However, there is no single technological solution that applies well for all
teachers, classrooms or teaching modules. Teachers need to be familiar with components of
TPACK framework and clarify clearly ways to interact knowledge, pedagogy, and technology
in specific teaching conditions.
Choosing EdTech tools is based on teaching contents and methodologies in the TPACK
model. It is noted that technology is only applied to perform all activities that teachers cannot
complete without ICT assistance. It means that technology is only a supplemental factor and
teachers need to avoid depending on technology or avoid doing with digital what you can do
without it. It is required that the combination of both content knowledge, pedagogical
knowledge, and technological knowledge is smooth, supportive in order to partly improve
teaching effect. When teachers obtain little effective or even ineffective results after applying
ICT in teaching activities, they should consider removing technology and focusing more on
content and pedagogical knowledge. No technology can replace the role of teachers or content
knowledge and pedagogical methodologies. In the TPACK model, teachers still maintain the
leading role of designing pedagogical activities and of choosing suitable EdTech tools, and then
of deciding when and how to apply ICT in teaching effectively.
3.2. Lesson plan, electronic lesson plan, electronic lectures in teaching History and
Geography of primary schools
“A lesson plan is the instructor’s road map of what students need to learn and how it will be
done effectively during the class time. Lesson plans provide you with a general outline of your
teaching goals, learning objectives, and means to accomplish them. It is a reminder of what you
want to do and how you want to do it”. (Milkova, 2012, p. 6)
Phan (2017) argues that teaching plan or lesson plan is a plan for a lesson in class which
presents briefly all teaching contents and methodologies designed and identified to obtain
teacher’s clear and expected aims. The teaching plan or lesson plan not only clarifies aims,
teaching methodologies and forms but also demonstrates ways and process of organizing all
teaching and learning activities for both instructors and learners.
By applying ICT in teaching, most researchers and educationists in Vietnam use the
conceptions of electronic lecture and electronic lesson plan. There are several discussions about
the two conceptions and their nature. Nguyen Manh Huong (2012, p. 144) argues that electronic
lesson plan and electronic lecture are two steps of all teaching process in high schools with ICT
and multimedia tool assistance. In order to complete a lesson in classroom with support of ICT,
teachers need to prepare it carefully, to design all teaching plans on PowerPoint slides
(electronic lesson plan). During teaching process in class, teachers use an existing plan flexibly
with multimedia tools assistance, together with teacher’s pedagogical competence to improve
effect of all teaching activities (that is electronic lecture).
Doan Van Hung (2009, p. 34) provides a similar opinion and confirms that “in order to
teach with laptop assistance, teachers need to create an electronic lesson plan to design all their
teaching plans”. In the classroom, teachers perform an electronic lecture with all teaching
activities with the support of multimedia tools mentioned in the electronic lesson. As such,
electronic lesson plan is a plan designed for a lesson in class and electronic lecture is a form of
teaching by using electronic lesson.
Based on the previous conceptions, this article argues that “lesson plan” and “lecture” are
two periods of the teaching process with assistance of ICT. They are different conceptions, in
which “lesson plan” is a plan prepared for the class, and “lecture” is the performance of the
existing plan.
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4. Research results and discussion

4.1. Competence of blending ICT into teaching activities and designing lesson plan in
subjects of History and Geography of pre-service teachers of Primary Education at Tay
Nguyen University
Tay Nguyen University was established on 11 November 1977 and it is located in Buon Ma
Thuot city, Daklak province, Vietnam. Being a multidisciplinary educational organization, this
university aims to “improve the quality of human resource, research and transfer technology to
serve the development of science, technology, economy, society, culture and education of all
provinces in Tay Nguyen and South-central regions of Vietnam, maintain and develop national
cultural values”.
Tay Nguyen University started to train pre-service teachers of Primary Education in 1977.
Pre-service teachers of primary education have different characteristics from other pedagogical
students as they are trained to be masters of all disciplines and to teach subjects of mathematics,
sciences, Vietnamese, History and Geography under the requirements of elementary educational
level.
The training program for Primary Education of Tay Nguyen University in 2020 provides
students with many modules about content knowledge of History and Geography and
methodologies to teach those subjects in the second year. In the third and fourth years, students
receive training in the application of ICT in teaching in many disciplines, including History and
Geography. In detail, they learn the History and Geography in the first semester of the third year
and the module of “History and Geography and teaching methodologies” in the first semester of
the fourth year.
Via investigation and survey, we collect data about students’ competence of combining ICT
with teaching activities in History and Geography. The results are shown in the below table:
Table 1. Comparing pre-service teachers’ competence to blend ICT into teaching History
and Geography under Schmidt’s TPACK survey instrument
4th year students 3rd year students
N Mean Std. Deviation N Mean Std. Deviation
Technological Knowledge
TK1 I know how to solve my own technical problems. 42 3.24 0.821 50 3.18 0.896
TK2 I can learn technology easily. 42 4.00 0.494 50 3.90 0.789
TK3 I keep up with important new technologies. 42 3.62 0.854 50 3.36 0.898
TK4 I frequently play around with the technology. 42 4.02 0.897 50 3.58 0.906
TK5 I know about a lot of different technologies. 42 3.10 0.790 50 2.92 0.829
TK6 I have the technical skills I need to use technology. 42 3.24 0.850 50 3.16 0.792
TK7 I have had sufficient opportunities to work with different 42 3.05 0.987 50 2.80 0.857
technologies.
Content Knowledge
CK1 I have sufficient knowledge about history and geography. 42 3.33 0.816 50 3.22 0.737
CK2 I have various ways and strategies of developing my 42 3.79 0.782 50 3.58 0.758
understanding of history and geography.
Pedagogical Knowledge
PK1 I know how to assess student performance in a classroom. 42 3.64 0.577 50 3.50 0.763
PK2 I can adapt my teaching based upon what students 42 3.90 0.576 50 3.70 0.789
currently understand or do not understand.
PK3 I can adapt my teaching style to different learners. 42 3.83 0.730 50 3.76 0.771
PK4 I can assess student learning in multiple ways. 42 3.83 0.696 50 3.58 0.731
PK5 I can use a wide range of teaching approaches in a 42 4.05 0.582 50 3.60 0.782
classroom setting
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4th year students 3rd year students

N Mean Std. Deviation N Mean Std. Deviation
PK6 I am familiar with common student understandings and 42 3.33 0.786 50 3.44 0.733
misconceptions.
PK7 I know how to organize and maintain classroom 42 3.55 0.832 50 3.40 0.700
management.
Technological Content Knowledge
TCK1 I know about technologies that I can use for understanding 42 3.33 0.816 50 3.24 0.870
and doing history and geography.
TCK2 I can choose technologies that enhance the content for a 42 3.67 0.650 50 3.42 0.883
lesson.
Technological Pedagogical Knowledge
TPK1 I can choose technologies that enhance the teaching 42 3.38 0.764 50 3.36 0.851
approaches for a lesson.
TPK2 I can choose technologies that enhance students’ learning 42 3.64 0.850 50 3.54 0.885
for a lesson
TPK3 I am thinking critically about how to use technology in my 42 3.64 0.727 50 3.70 0.789
classroom.
TPK4 I can adapt the use of the technologies that I am learning 42 3.69 0.811 50 3.46 0.838
to different teaching activities.
Pedagogical Content Knowledge
PCK1 I know how to select effective teaching approaches to 42 3.88 0.593 50 3.60 0.756
guide student thinking and learning in history and geography.
Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge
TPCK1 I can teach lessons that appropriately combine literacy, 42 3.69 0.680 50 3.32 0.819
technologies, and teaching approaches.
TPCK2 I can select technologies to use in my classroom that 42 3.50 0.707 50 3.46 0.908
enhance what I teach, how I teach, and what students
learn.
Source: Data from the authors’ investigation at Tay Nguyen University in July 2021
Results of this investigation reflect precisely the situation of applying ICT in teaching
History and Geography. As shown in Table 1, the fourth-year students obtain higher level under
the TPACK framework in comparison with the third-year students. The 4th year students are
also confident and highly self-evaluate their pedagogical knowledge (PK), especially at PK 2 (I
can adapt my teaching based upon what students currently understand or do not understand)
with average point at 3.9; and PK 5 (I can use a wide range of teaching approaches in a
classroom setting) with average point at 4.05. They also evaluate highly their technological
knowledge (TK), especially TK 2 (I can learn technology easily) with 4.0 points and TK 4 (I
frequently play around with the technology) with 4.02 points.
Both groups of students hold low opinions of two criteria: TK 5 (I know about a lot of
different technologies), and TK 7 (I have had sufficient opportunities to work with different
technologies). However, they highly evaluate competence to blend ICT into teaching History
and Geography as all average point is over 3.0. It is noted that results of pre-service teachers’
self-evaluation are frequently higher than their real capacity. In fact, all 3rd year students have
not learned the modules of “Teaching methodologies in History and Geography” and of
“Application ICT in teaching activities” but their investigated results are quite high.
In order to examine students’ capacity precisely and truly, we investigate their practicing
lesson plans deeply and interview the 4th year students. The result is that their lesson plans show
little information and knowledge about the ability of combining ICT with teaching activities. In
investigated lesson plans, students unclearly clarify name of technology, time to apply EdTech
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tools and how to combine ICT with other teaching activities. Even some lesson plans mostly
exploit traditional supportive tools such as maps, pictures in text-book.
With the interviewing question “How do you design your lesson plan?”, we realzie that
many students exploit existing lesson plans from internet on websites of https://violet.vn/ or
https://elearning.moet.edu.vn/; and then adapt to use for their own educational aims. Although
several students have learned the module of “Application of ICT in teaching activities in
primary schools”, most of module’s contents and students’ time geared towards practicing their
technological skills such as designing lectures on the PowerPoint software, using animations
and hyperlink. Because they focus on finding and learning from existing lesson plan on internet,
some students still copy previous resources and create just simple teaching plans objectively. It
is remarkable that, 50% of investigated students have no laptop or computer to practice
instructional design. It is difficult for them to improve their capacity and skill of combining ICT
and teaching activities as they only can practice this activity in learning period at University’s
technological rooms. It is quite noticeable that many students of Tay Nguyen University are
from rural and mountainous regions with poor economic condition. It is the most difficult for
them to learn and practice the competence of blending ICT into teaching activities. It is required
that Tay Nguyen University and other educational organizations in Vietnam need to have
proposals and solutions to help students to have chances to practice and experiment applying
ICT in teaching activity to improve the effect of teaching History and Geography after graduation.
4.2. Applying the TPACK model to instruct students to design teaching plans with ICT
assistance
From the previous research about theory and practice of designing lesson plans for
pre-service teachers of primary education; based on Vietnam’s popular education program of
History and Geography in primary education, all training materials of the modules 1, 2, 3, and 4
from the ETEP of Ministry of Education and Training about training teachers in primary
schools; with responses and suggestions of lecturers and students in the module of teaching
methodologies; we propose a process to instruct pre-service teachers to design teaching plans in
History and Geography in primary education with ICT assistance.
4.2.1. Proposing a process to design electronic lesson plan and to build lesson plan combining ICT
under the TPACK model
Step 1: Clarify and create aims of lesson plan
This step is an initial and important task for teachers during their process of designing
lesson plan. It is fundamental for teachers to clarify content knowledge and expected results
each student will obtain after learning. In order to identify lesson’s aims precisely, pre-service
teachers need to work on 1) education program for each subject at different educational levels
and classes; 2) expected content knowledge and the reduced program that the Ministry of Education
and Training issued; 3) Instructional materials to design teaching plans (MOET, 2021).
From instructions of the dispatch 2345/BGDĐT-GDTH about building educational plan of
primary education, each lesson’s aims need to be clarified clearly in both capacities (including
both specific and popular abilities with different criteria and evidences of knowledge, skills and
attitude); and human quality (the establishment and development of any of five characteristics:
patriotic, benevolent, hardworking, honest, and responsible).
It is noticeable that those aims are for learners, and therefore designers need to use the
precise verbs for different levels of awareness, skills, attitude under the direction of developing
learners’ ability in general, and of improving specific requirements of subjects of History
and Geography. All educational aims need to be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant,
time-bound (SMART rule).
193
As such, pre-service teachers need to answer two questions when designing lesson plan: 1)
What is expectation students need to obtain in both ability and attitude after learning the lesson;
and 2) Which verbs are suitable to write relevant aims in comparion with levels of awareness,
skills; and how to identify and build aims clearly, precisely and measurably.
Step 2: Identify basic content knowledge (required results) as education program
Students need to follow education program of each discipline (including instructing
materials, other references) to clarify fundamental content knowledge. Besides, students need to
study and discover content knowledge that is advantageous with ICT assistance to choose
effective EdTech tools, software to blend into teaching activity. At this step, students need to
answer the question: which is the content knowledge students need to obtain after the lesson?
Step 3: Choose software and educational technology to assist the performance of TCK
At this step, students need assistance of ICT in discovering, collecting and analyzing all
resources necessary and suitable with lesson’s clarified aims and contents. The supplemental
sources can be documents with expansive information, pictures, map, diagram, documentary
film. There are specific rules to exploit references from internet to know and clarify its truth,
preciseness, popularity, and license. Students also need to know about technology to find
references and materials; to transfer, analyze content knowledge; and to present lesson plan
effectively (such as ways to transform writing materials to images and pictures, mind map; or
other software to make figure, chart, and infographic).
At this step, students need to answer two issues. 1) Which are resources relating to content
knowledge can be discovered and analyzed by technology? How to improve lesson’s effect with
ICT assistance? 2) Which software and educational technology is available to help students to
obtain content knowledge effectively (infographic, mind map, timeline, documentary film)?
Step 4: Choose pedagogical methodologies to transfer content knowledge effectively (PCK)
Based on central content knowledge clarified in step 2, and knowledge presenting with ICT
assistance, teachers need to choose teaching methodologies to transfer content knowledge under
the direction of developing learner’s ability of self-learning actively and positively. Teachers can
apply different teaching methods of Q&A, scenario-based learning, role-play, and mind map.
At this stage, pre-service teachers need to answer the bellow issues. 1) Which are the
specific teaching methods for subject of History and Geography? Which methodologies can be
combined? 2) How to apply teaching methodologies to develop learners’ ability and possibility
and to differentiate level of students as expected educational aims?
Step 5: Choose ways and forms of combination between technological and pedagogical
knowledge (TPK)
In this step, students need to choose suitable pedagogical methodologies to develop effects
of technology. It is noticeable that technology just supports to complete things that cannot finish
without assistance. There are three factors affecting teachers’ choice of technology. They are
teachers’ understanding and their ability to apply educational technology in teaching activities;
students’ technological knowledge; and schools’ technological conditions. Because there is no
single technological resolution applied for all teachers and conditions, teachers need to be
familiar with EdTech tools and know precisely name and type of educational technology to
apply for their teaching plans. They can search the internet to find suitable software and using
guideline to apply effectively.
For example, firstly teachers chose to discuss on groups and then find EdTech tools to
support this teaching methodology. They can choose ClassDojo to create discussion groups
quickly and effectively, online stopwatch, music animation machine, online random
picker/random choice generator online tool; and other apps (on both mobile and laptop) to
collect and evaluate learners’ responses after learning.
194
As such, at this step, pre-service teachers need to answer two questions. 1) How does
technology help teachers to improve teaching effect? 2) Which are suitable pedagogical
methods to combine with educational technology?
Step 6: Choose methods and tools for examination and evaluation.
Examination and evaluation are final steps of teaching process. Teachers need to clarify
examining methods (written, observing, Q&A, documentary building, learning products), to
build examining tools (essays, multiple-choice questions, study sheet, rubric, checklist, scale,
documentary learning) for examination and evaluation learning results. Besides, teachers find
software and apps to assist in evaluating learners’ results.
At this step, pre-service teachers need to answer two questions. 1) Which are examining
methodology and tool to evaluate learners’ results effectively? 2) Which software and app are
available to support teachers in creating examination tools and in evaluating learner’s results?
Step 7: Design plan to organize teaching activity
This step is a combination of all content, pedagogy, and technology suited with specific
learners and learning condition. All those factors are blended at highest level of TPACK
framework to obtain the most effective result. At this step, teachers need to divide content
knowledge and process of teaching activities under existing educational program; to arrange
timeline suited with content; and to combine all steps to organize teaching activities in specific
conditions. World Bank (2020) and Nguyen (2021) identify logical order of designing a lesson
plan as below steps:
– Clarifying aims (expected results and requirements after each specific activity)
– Performing activity with 4 steps including evaluation of students’ learning products. They
are: transferring tasks and introducing, providing materials and references for students (it is
teachers’ task); completing the learning task (students work and finish all learning
requirements); reporting and discussing (students report their learning results; other learners
listen and discuss, debate); commenting, evaluating and concluding (based on students’ report
and discussion, teachers evaluate their results and presentation, conclude all necessary
knowledge; students listen and note all central knowledge). In each activity, teachers can apply
diversified methodologies around the central and leading method.
4.2.2. Script of designing lesson plan under the proposed process
Learning from previous references and instructional materials of World Bank (2020) about
teaching History and Geography under Vietnam’s popular education program of 2018, we
propose a script to teach a topic: “Thang Long – Ha Noi” by applying the TPACK model
presented in the section 4.1. In this article, we only create one of four activities namely
“Discovering Thang Long – Hanoi’s location and name”.
Clarify and Clarify basic Choose software, Choose ways to Choose Choose Design
write lesson’ content educational technology combine ICT and pedagogical method and plan to
aims knowledge pedagogical methodology tool of organize
(expected methodology examination teaching
results) and activities
evaluation
– What are Which is content – Which materials and – Which are specific – How to apply ICT – Which – Aims
expectations knowledge that references can be found with teaching to improve effects methods and –
students need students need to ICT assistance? How to apply methodologies and of teaching tools can be Organizing
to obtain in learn and obtain ICT to improve effects of forms applied for activities? applied to all activities
both ability to serve teaching teaching lesson? subjects of History – Which are suited examine and with 4 steps
and attitude aims? – Which is suited software, and Geography? Are pedagogical evaluate
after learning and educational technology there any other methodologies to students’
the lesson; to help students to obtain methods to combine? be applied? learning
– Which are content knowledge – How to apply, results?
195
evaluation
suited verbs to effectively? exploit those teaching – Which
clarify lesson’s methods and forms to software and
aims clearly develop students’ electronic apps
and precisely possibility and to can be used to
which is differentiate students’ support
relevant with levels to obtain teachers in
teaching teaching aims building tools
program’s proposed? and in
aims evaluating
students’
learning
results?
– Clarify – Location of – Combination between – Observing and Q&A Which pedagogical Q&A methods Design
location of Thang Long – sketches and pictures methods methodologies are and essay activities to
Thang Long – Hanoi – Teachers’ task: Which – Instruct students to suited with writing present
Hanoi on online apps can be used to use and exploit sketch practical clearly the
Vietnam’s map clarify location? and pictures condition? interaction
or sketch (For example, Google Earth, 1. Blended between
map) technology: teachers and
– Google students
Earth/Map
– How to apply
pedagogical
methods to use
Google Earth (to
clarify location,
and distance from
learners’ schools to
Thang
Long/Hanoi): firstly
teachers practice,
instruct
and then students
self-apply.
2. Only use sketch,
pictures to present:
– How to
download pictures
and sketches with
high quality?
– Which is the
most suitable
pedagogical
methods applied?
(For example, skills
to use sketch and
picture).
– Present – Names of Thang – Find materials and – Observing and Q&A – Is video long Q&A method, Design
several names Long – Ha Noi references on internet about methods enough with questions activities to
196
evaluation
of Thang Long Thang Long: documents, teaching process? present
– Ha Noi video. Do you need any clearly the
For example, a video to changes? Which is interaction
briefly introduce names of software, app to between
Thang Long-Hanoi in change and edit teachers and
different periods: videos? students
https://www.youtube.com/ – Which
watch?v=XRVoksjq0e4. pedagogical
methods can be
applied together
with using videos?
CONCLUSION
During the period of the 4th industrial revolution, especially in the context of the pandemic
of Covid-19, controlling educational technologies is a significant factor to help global teachers
to adapt with online teaching to obtain educational aims. Understanding and applying the
TPACK framework flexibly to teach History and Geography, to instruct pre-service teachers of
primary education to design lesson plan under the TPACK instrument partly improves
educational effects. This research clarifies the nature and conception of TPACK and
instructional design; presents situation of applying EdTech tools in teaching subjects of History
and Geography under the TPACK instrument; and proposes approaches to apply the TPACK
model to instruct pre-service teachers of primary education to design lesson plan of History and
Geography with ICT assistance. However, due to the effects of the pandemic Covid-19, this
research still has limitation as it just stops at level of proposing a process to instruct students to
design teaching plan of History and Geography under the TPACK model with advice and
suggestions from both colleagues and pre-service students. This research needs to be completed
by implementing the proposed process in real educational environment with clear applied
approaches. After instructing students to design lesson plan with ICT assistance in modules of
teaching methodologies, and to practice in experimental learning activities, pedagogical
experiment at primary schools, final results will be used to examine the possibility and effect of
proposed methodologies in this research.
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About the authors

– Assoc. Prof. Nguyen Manh Huong is currently a lecturer at faculty of History, Hanoi
National University of Education. Relating to his research area, he has written and published 80
books and over 80 articles in prestigious journals and proceeding of international conference.
Besides, he had 6 articles published in international journals.
– MA. Lecturer Le Thi Thuy An is senior lecturer at Faculty of Education, Tay Nguyen
university 2010 – present. She is a Ph.D student at Faculty of History, Hanoi National University
of Education. Theory and methodology of teaching history, 2017-2020. Since 2010, she has had
15 articles published journals and conference proceedings in national and international and 01
book related to research area. For example, she had an article published in proceeding of
international conference History teacher training and professional development for curriculum
and textbook reform: Application of information technology in teaching history for Primary
students to form their competency.
Regarding the field of study, she have chaired and completed two projects in Tay Nguyen
in 2015 and in 2018 namely Application of information technology in construction and use of
intuitive teaching aids in teaching history (2015).
200
ENHANCING THE TEACHING COMPETENCE

IN BIOLOGY EXPERIMENTAL PRACTICAL LESSONS
IN HIGH SCHOOL FOR PEDAGOGICAL STUDENTS
Phan Duc Duy1, Pham Thi Phuong Anh1,
Dang Thi Da Thuy , Nguyen Thi Dieu Phuong1, Le Minh Duc2
1
Abstract: The general education program for Biology 2018 is oriented to develop learners’
qualities and competencies. In this new educational program, the Biology competencies were
identified, including three core competencies: the cognition of Biology, the exploration of the
living world, and the application of learned knowledge and skills. To form these competencies,
the methods of teaching have to be changed significantly. Biological sciences belong to the field
of experimental science, therefore, using experiments to study in the classes and the labs is a
typical method in teaching to form biology competencies for students. By implementing
experiment activities, students perceive Biology sciences, explore the natural world and develop
the ability to apply knowledge to real life. The research to enhance the teaching competence in
Biology experimental practical lessons in high school for pedagogical students is necessary to
meet the requirements to educational renovation. In this research, the theoretical method and
pedagogical experimental method were used. Based on the theoretical method, the structure of
the pedagogical students’ competences in teaching experimental practices in Biology lessons was
identified. In which, it includes three core components: competence to design these lessons,
competence to conduct the teaching activities of these lessons, and competence to assess
students in these lessons. From there, we suggested measures to improve their competences in
teaching these lessons. The results of pedagogical experiments showed that the proposed
measures were effective and met the requirements of developing teaching competency for
Biology pedagogical students, who are the future Biology teachers.
Keywords: experimental practices, pedagogical competence, teaching competence, Biology
experimental practical lessons, teaching skills
INTRODUCTION
The general education program 2018 is oriented to form and develop the qualities and
competencies of students. In which, “focusing on practicing, applying learned knowledge and
skills to solve problems in study and life” (MOET, 2018, p. 5). “Natural science education has
the mission of forming and developing the scientific worldview in students; plays a key role in
educating students the spirit of objectivity, the love of nature, and the respect of the laws of
nature, so that they can behave with nature by the requirements of sustainable social
development and environment. Natural science education helps students gradually form and
develop natural science competencies through observation and experimentation, apply a
combination of knowledge and skills to solve problems in life” (MOET, 2018, p. 19-20).
Biology is one of the natural sciences and is also the experimental science. Therefore,
“experiment is a method of biological research, and also a typical teaching method of this
subject. Through the organization of experimental and practical activities, Biology helps
students explore the natural world, develop the ability to apply knowledge into practice and the
ability to orientate their careers after general education” (MOET, 2018, p. 3). Experimental
 Corresponding Author: Pham Thi Phuong Anh; E-mail Address: ptpanh@hueuni.edu.vn

1 University
of Education, Hue University, Vietnam
2 Sai Gon University, Vietnam
201
practice is the implementation of experiments in practical lessons. Through doing and observing
experiments, learners identify the nature of Biology phenomena and processes. From there, they
find the principles of Biology. By experimental practical activities, “students themselves can
discover new things from their intentional impacts on experimental subjects. Consequently,
students stimulate their interests in learning, create their passion and confidence, and the love
of science. They also recognize the role of humans in conquering and renovating nature”
(Dinh, 2001).
To renovate education, teachers and pedagogical students are the first forces that need to be
trained and fostered to improve their competencies to meet the requirements of the new
educational program. The competence of Biology teachers to teach and practice experiments is
one of the significant teaching competences. However, our survey showed that Biology teachers
in high schools today still face many difficulties and they were confused in designing and
organizing Biology experimental practical lessons. Therefore, the research of measures to
improve this competence in Biology is an urgent issue in education in Vietnam today. This
research helps to timely meet and be appropriate with the goals of the general educational
program 2018.
CONTENT
1. The competence in teaching experimental practical lessons
1.1. The concept of competence in teaching experimental practical lessons
Both the terms “competency” and “competence” are widely used nowadays. They have
been studied in various fields. Therefore, it is necessary to distinguish these two terms in the
researches. The review of the literature suggested that ‘competency’ and “competence” are two
distinct approaches to studies in the human resource management field. The term “competency”
is the person-oriented behavioral approach that refers to the behaviors or personal attributes
supporting an area of work. The term ‘competence’ is a task-oriented functional approach that is
used for describing an area of work tasks or job outputs (Wong, 2020). An example of the term
“competency” can be seen in Woodruffe’s research. In his research, he defined “a competency
was as the set of behavior patterns that the incumbent needs to bring to a position to perform its
tasks and functions with competence”. (Woodruffe, 1993). While in the research of Gonczi and
Hager, they showed a clear definition of the term “competence”. In their research, they showed
that there are several very different ways of thinking about competence, how competence is
conceived will make a big difference to the ways competency standards are used and assessed.
According to the integrated conception, “competence is conceptualized in terms of knowledge,
abilities, skills, and attitudes displayed in the context of a carefully chosen set of realistic
professional tasks which are of an appropriate level of generality” (Gonczi & Hager, 1996). In
our research, we tend to use the term “competence” in the purpose of the task-oriented
functional approach.
In the fields of vocational education in general and teacher training in particular, the term
“pedagogical competence” is widely used. According to Rahman, “teachers' pedagogical
competence is the ability to manage learning, which includes planning, implementation, and
evaluation of learning outcomes of learners. These competencies should be owned by every
teacher in order to achieve success in learning and teaching” (Rahman, 2014). La, in her
research, defined “pedagogical competence” as a professional competence of a teacher, includes
two components: teaching competence and educational competence. Teaching competence is
the type of professional competence that teachers need in teaching activities. It is the
combination of knowledge, skills, pedagogical attitudes, and personal experiences, which enable
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teachers to effectively perform teaching tasks according to the set standards under certain
conditions (La, 2019).
From the definition of pedagogical competence above, teaching competence can be seen as
one of two parts of pedagogical competence. It is “the complex combinations of knowledge,
skills, understanding, values, and attitudes, leading to effective action in the situation. Since
teaching is much more than a task and involves values or assumptions concerning education,
learning, and society, the concept of teacher competences may resonate differently in different
national contexts” (EC, 2013, p. 8). Teaching competence is specifically manifested through
four components of competences: competence to design teaching activities, competence to
conduct teaching activities, competence to test and evaluate teaching activities, and competence
to manage teaching activities. (Vu, 2016).
From the above studies, it can be seen that the teaching competence in experimental
practical lessons is the set of knowledge, skills, pedagogical attitudes, and personal experiences,
which enables teachers to successfully perform the experimental practical lessons. This should
include planning the lessons, implementation of the lessons, and evaluation of learning
outcomes of learners.
1.2. The structure of the teaching competence in Biology experimental practical lessons
Based on the studies of definitions of teaching competence above and the studies of
structures of teaching competence according to Vu Xuan Hung (2016), the model of
pedagogical competence of Olsson et al. (2010), the structure of the teaching competence in
teaching experimental practical chemistry by Ly Huy Hoang (2018), and the teacher
competences according to Estonian standards by Eisenschmid E. and Löfström E. (2014), a
structural model of teaching competence in Biology experimental practical lessons was
suggested in our research and it can be seen in Figure 1. In which, this competence is composed
of three core components: competence to design these lessons, competence to implement the
teaching activities of these lessons, and competence to assess students in these lessons. Each
component competence is represented by elements. Based on the indicators of each element, in
the process of training for pedagogical students, lecturers could assess the achieved levels of
each component competence. From our research, the specific indicators of each component
competence were studied and determined clearly in Tables 1, 2, and 3.
Figure 1. The structural model of the teaching competence in Biology experimental practical lessons
(Authors’compilation)
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1.3. The indicators of the teaching competence in Biology experimental practical lessons
From our research, the indicators of teaching competence in Biology experimental practical
lessons were identified. The component competences that constitute this teaching competence
had been concretized into elements with corresponding indicators in Table 1, Table 2, and Table 3.
In Table 1, the elements of the competence to plan Biology experimental practical lessons and
their indicators are shown. They include: defining the lesson objectives, determining the content
of lessons, choosing the teaching methods, designing the teaching activities, and preparing for
practical experiments.
Table 1. The indicators of the competence to plan Biology experimental practical lessons
The elements of the competence Indicators
to plan Biology experimental
practical lessons
1. Defining the lesson objectives Identifying the teaching objectives to meet the requirements of the curriculum and be flexible
with the actual teaching conditions.
2. Determining the content of lessons Fully identifying the main teaching contents that the practical lessons are aimed at.
3. Choosing the teaching methods – Selecting suitable teaching methods which go along with teaching objectives and contents.
– Coordinating flexible teaching methods to achieve teaching effectiveness.
4. Designing the teaching activities Designing teaching activities suitable to teaching contents and teaching conditions.
5. Preparing for practical experiments – Preparing specimens and materials for experimental practices.
– Using chemicals, facilities, and equipments for experimental practices.
– Designing and conducting practical experiments in the lessons.
– Anticipating teaching situations in the laboratory and suggest the appropriate measures.
In Table 2, the indicators of the competence to implement the teaching activities of Biology
experimental practical lessons are identified. It includes two elements with their indicators:
organizing and managing students' activities and handling teaching situations in the laboratory.
Table 2. The indicators of the competence to implement the teaching activities
of Biology experimental practical lessons
The elements of the competence to Indicators
implement the teaching activities of
Biology experimental practical lessons
1. Organizing and managing students' – Performing the sample experiment correctly and accurately.
activities – Guiding students to perform practical experiments correctly and safely.
– Coordinating teaching methods flexibly and effectively.
– Organizing teaching activities suitably to the conditions of the classroom.
– Managing students during the experiment in the laboratory.
2. Handling teaching situations in the – Taking appropriate measures to deal with situations of deviation in experimental results.
laboratory – Taking appropriate actions for laboratory safety situations.
Table 3 shows the competence to assess students in Biology experimental practical lessons
and their indicators, including two elements: building the assessment plan, and implementing
the assessment activities.
Table 3. The indicators of the competence to assess students in Biology experimental practical lessons
The elements of the competence to Indicators
assess students in Biology
experimental practical lessons
1. Building the assessment plan – Determining the goal of assessing students' competencies through experimental practices.
– Developing tools to assess students' competencies through experimental practices.
– Designing activities to assess students' competencies through experimental practices.
2. Implementing the assessment – Using tools to assess students' competencies through experimental practices.
activities – Assessing students' competencies to perform practical experiments.
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The identification of the indicators of component competences is significant to propose

appropriate measures to improve the teaching competence in Biology experimental practices
lessons. Based on these indicators, the measures to improve this teaching competence have been
suggested and applied in the teaching process for Biology pedagogical students.
2. The measures to improve the teaching competence in Biology experimental
practices lessons for pedagogical students
Based on the structural model of teaching competence in experimental practices in Biology
lessons (Figure 1) and its indicators in Tables 1, 2, and 3, seven key measures are proposed to
improve teaching competence in Biology experimental practical lessons for pedagogical
students as follows:
2.1. Guide students to analyze the content of Biology experimental practical lessons in
textbooks to determine teaching objectives, contents, and methods, thereby design
teaching activities
The identification of teaching objectives, contents, and methods is the basis for designing
lesson plans. Based on requirements of the curriculum and contents of textbooks and teaching
theory, lecturers guide pedagogical students to discuss and practice building teaching objectives,
determining teaching contents and teaching methods that are appropriate to the student’s level.
From there, they practice designing teaching activities for the experimental practices in Biology
lessons. These measures should be taken in teaching the modules of the Methodology of
Teaching Biology at the university.
2.2. Instruct students to study audiovisual media to learn how to conduct experiments and
teach Biology experimental practical lessons
Lecturers should use the audiovisual media of practical experiments in general and Biology
experimental practical lessons in particular in teaching at university. They should guide students
to analyze how to design practical experiments and organize teaching activities. These
audiovisual medias could be videos that are available on the internet or videos made by
lecturers. Teachers guide students how to analyze sample videos, then ask students themselves
to practice more.
Figure 2. Video of Practice observing the stages of mitosis on the red onion root microscopy specimens
on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bm8kvYErbhw)
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2.3. Instruct students in the preparation of specimens, materials, chemicals, and

experimental equipment
To conduct Biology experiments, the preparation for experimental practices is an important
required skill of Biology teachers. In the curriculums at the universities, pedagogical students in
the Biology departments have done lots of experiments in specialized subjects. However,
students rarely have opportunities to participate in experimental preparation. This job belongs to
instructors or laboratory assistants. Therefore, students are often confused in preparation
specimens, materials, chemicals, and equipments for experimental practice.
To practice this skill, students need to be guided to look for and make good specimens, and
to use materials and chemicals in the right way. They also have to learn how to use popular
practical equipment in biological experiments. Based on the content of the experiments, students
learn to select the appropriate specimens, materials, chemicals, and equipment to conduct the
experiments.
For example: To practice the experiment to observe the phases of mitosis on the red onion
root specimen, students need to prepare the following specimens, chemicals, and equipments:
– Specimens: Red onion roots were immobilized in Carnoy solution to keep the cells from
being damaged and the mitotic phases stable.
– Chemicals: Acetocarmine solution, acetic acid 45% solution.
– Experimental equipments: Optical microscope, microscopic glass slides, microscopic
coverslips, blotting papers, needles, razor blades, scissors, alcohol lamps.
2.4. Propose measures to improve in practical experiments to be suitable to the actual
conditions in the classroom
In most of the experimental practices, the textbook clearly shows how to conduct the
experiments. However, from the implementation of practical experiments in class, sometimes
teachers need to make flexible improvements to match the actual conditions and improve the
effectiveness in teaching Biology experimental practical lessons.
Here are some measures we have tested for the practical experiment: Observing the phases
of mitosis on red onion root specimens (Table 4).
Table 4. Some measures to improve the practical experiment:
Observing the stages of mitosis on red onion root specimens
Improvements Requirements Difficulties Measures
1. Specimens Red onion roots Textbooks do not – Choose mature and dry onions and plant them in moist soil
(Allium ascalonicum specify when to cut or moist cotton. The roots appear about 3-5 days before the
L.) roots. If the roots are experimental day.
cut at the wrong stage, – When the roots grow about 1-2 centimeters, wash them
it is hard to observe and cut the root tips about 3-4 millimeters. After that, put
cells in mitosis. and store the root tips in the Carnoy solution. Keep the roots
stable for 12 hours, then wash and store them with the 70o
alcohol solution.
2. Chemicals Acetocarmin dye May not have this The acetocarmine dye could be replaced with methylene
and chemical blue. The preparation of methylene blue dye is easy: mix 1%
experimental methylene blue solution in 10% acetic acid solution; filtered
equipments through filter paper and stored in colored vials in a cool place
(the obtained result was showed in Figure 3).
3. Procedure The experiment should It takes too long to It is possible to change the procedure of this experiment as
be conducted in one make a temporary follows: (the obtained result was showed in Figure 4)
class period (45 specimen according to – Soak the roots in 1.5N HCl for about 5 minutes. This
minutes). the instructions in the measure will make the root specimens moderately soft and
textbook, in which the be convenient for spreading cells evenly on the microscopic
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Improvements Requirements Difficulties Measures

waiting time to soak glass slide. In this way, the success rate is high, and it just
the roots in the dye is take a short time to execute.
30-40 minutes. – Use a needle to take 3-5 roots and heat up the roots in 4-
5% carmine dye solution until they are soft.
– Wash the dyed roots with 45% acetic acid before making
the microscopic specimens.
Figure 3. Mitosis stages on red onion root Figure 4. Mitosis stages on red onion root specimens
specimens stained with 1% methylene blue stained with acetocarmine in an improved manner
(400 times) under the optical microscope under the optical microscope
(Author's compilation) (a. Prophase, b. Metaphase, c. Anaphase,
d. Telophase, e. Interphase) (Author's compilation)
2.5. Use teaching cases to practice the students’ skills of planning and handling situations
that could happen in the laboratory
One of the difficulties for students and young teachers is that they do not have experience
in handling situations that happen in teaching experimental practice in the laboratory. To deal
with this problem, we use cases to train students on these skills. We have used two types of
cases: cases of false results of experiments and cases of the rules of using the laboratory. From
these cases, students have learned how to analyze the procedure of practical experiments to
predict possible situations and suggest the appropriate handling measures for these situations.
For example, from the practical experiment of observing the stages of mitosis on red onion
root specimens, we have predicted some possible situations and have suggested some suitable
measures to handle them. They are shown in Table 5.
Table 5. Types of cases that may happen in teaching the experimental practical lesson of observing the
phases of mitosis on red onion root specimens in the laboratory
Types of cases Possible cases Measures
Cases of false results Air bubbles appear in microscopy slide Instruct students to place the coverslip close to the edge of the
of experiments and specimens of the red onion roots. 45% acetic acid droplet and tilt it about 45°. Use a needle to
cases of the rules of support the coverslip and lower the foil slowly so that the water
using the laboratory runs along its edge to avoid air bubbles.
Students do not see onion red root cells Recheck if students use the microscope correctly.
under the microscope.
Students see cells but do not find any stage The students may use the root portion without the meristem.
of mitosis. Instruct students to choose the darker red-dyed root. This part is
the root tip with meristem.
The specimens are damaged, due to high Instruct students to pay attention to the time to heat up the roots
temperature or too long heating time, and and not to boil them.
mitosis is not observed (Figure 5).
207
Types of cases Possible cases Measures

Cases of the rules of Students may break the coverslips by Use their index fingers to gently rub on the coverslips to spread
using the laboratory rubbing vigorously with a needle. the roots evenly.
Students boil the carmine solution that Remind students to set the mouth of the experimental test tube
may cause the droplet to come out. toward no one and be careful not to let the acetocarmine solution
boil.
Dropping experimental equipment creates Remind students to do experiments carefully.
sharp shards. Prepare first aid measures in the laboratory.
Figure 5. The microscopy slide specimen of red onion root cells damaged by overheating
(Author's compilation)
2.6. Organize students to test the procedure of experiments in textbooks and improved
experiments
To guide students to perform practical experiments in the laboratory, teachers need to
conduct these experiments and verify the results before class to ensure the effectiveness and
accuracy of the experiments. It also increases the confidence of teachers in experimental
practical lessons. Therefore, we have instructed students to practice performing the experiments
in the textbook and the improved experiments to suit the actual conditions of the laboratory at
schools (Figure 6 and Figure 7).
Figure 6. Improved experiment to Figure 7. Experimental results for transpiration in leaves:

detect respiration in plants through a. Upper surface of leaf b. Underside of leaf
CO2 emissions (Author's compilation) (Author's compilation)
2.7. Practice teaching experimental practical lessons

The performance of experimental practical lessons has many differences compared to the
theoretical classes. The laboratory often has various equipment, so it requires teachers to have
the ability to organize teaching and manage the activities of students while they practice
experiments. Teachers also have to know how to assess the competence of students to perform
practical experiments. During the teaching practice, the pedagogical students could verify their
teaching methods and measures to handle situations in the laboratory. By attending the
pedagogical students’ performances, lecturers can give feedback after classes. In this way,
students can make appropriate adjustment to improve teaching effectiveness.
208
3. Research Methodology
3.1. Research question
If the structure of the Biology pedagogical students' competence in teaching practical
experimental lessons can be determined and measures to improve their teaching skills in these
lessons can be proposed, then this competence of Biology pedagogical students improves.
3.2. Sample
The study was done in two classes of fourth-year students in Biology Pedagogy
Departments at two universities: The University of Education, Hue University in Thua Thien
Hue province, and Saigon University in Ho Chi Minh City.
– Characteristics: Students have completed the modules of Teaching Theory and Teaching
Methods.
– Sample size: The total number of students selected to experiment was 72 students,
including 24 students in the University of Education, Hue University, and 48 students in Saigon
University.
3.3. Procedure
To evaluate the effectiveness of measures to improve the pedagogical students’
competences in teaching Biology experimental practices, we conducted a pedagogical
experiment to determine the change of their core components of these competences.
Due to time constraints, we surveyed the needs of pedagogical students to choose two
elements of the teaching competence in Biology experimental practical lessons to conduct the
pedagogical experiment. They include preparing for practical experiments and handling
teaching situations in the laboratory and can be seen in Table 6.
Table 6. The core elements of the competence of teaching experimental practical lessons selected
for the pedagogical experiment
The elements of teaching
Indicators
competences
1. Preparing for practical experiments – Preparing specimens and materials for experimental practices.
– Using chemicals, facilities, and equipments for experimental practices.
– Designing and doing practical experiments in the lessons.
– Anticipating teaching situations in the laboratory and suggesting the appropriate measures.
2. Handling teaching situations in the – Taking appropriate measures to deal with situations of deviation in experimental results.
laboratory – Taking appropriate actions for laboratory safety situations.
We designed a rubric to evaluate the elements of pedagogical students’ competences in
teaching experimental practical lessons through 6 indicators (skills) according to Table 6 at
three timelines: before, during, and after the experiment. We chose five experimental practical
lessons in the Biology curriculum in grades 10 and 11 to train pedagogical students and evaluate
their teaching competences, including:
– Lesson 1: Practice experimenting with primary contraction and anti-contraction
(Lesson 31, Basic Biology 10 Textbook, pages 51-52).
– Lesson 2: Practice some experiments on enzymes (Lesson 15, Basic Biology 10
Textbook, pages 60-62).
– Lesson 3: Practice observing the phases of mitosis on red onion root microscopy
specimens (Lesson 31, Advanced Biology 10 Textbook, pages 105-106).
– Lesson 4: Practice detecting chlorophyll and carotenoids (Lesson 13, Basic Biology 11
Textbook, pages 56-58).
– Lesson 5: Practice detecting respiration in plants (Lesson 14, Basic Biology 11 Textbook,
pages 59-60).
Experimental period: From September 2019 to December 2019.
209
4. Results
After the experiment, we processed statistics on the development of various teaching skills
of pedagogical students in teaching Biology experimental practical lessons. The obtained results
are shown in Table 7.
Table 7. Levels of pedagogical students’ teaching skills across the experiment
The elements of Indicators Levels Pre-test Mid-test Post-test Total
teaching competences variance
1. Preparing for practical Preparing specimens and Weak and poor 66.67 47.22 26.39 -40.28
experiments materials for % variance -19.45 -20.83
experimental practices. Pretty good and good 13.89 26.39 52.78 38.89
% variance 12.5 26.39
Using chemicals, facilities, Weak and poor 25 18.06 6.94 -18.06
and equipments for % variance -6.94 -11.12
experimental practices
Pretty good and good 41.67 63.89 75 33.33
% variance 22.22 11.11
Designing and doing Weak and poor 37.5 12.5 6.94 -30.56
practical experiments in % variance -25 -5.56
the lessons Pretty good and good 25 52.78 61.11 36.11
% variance 27.78 8.33
Anticipating teaching Weak and poor 52.78 34.72 5.56 -47.22
situations in the % variance -18.06 -29.16
laboratory and suggesting Pretty good and good 27.78 41.67 65.28 37.5
the appropriate measures % variance 13.89 23.61
2. Handling teaching Taking appropriate Weak and poor 58.33 30.56 15.28 -43.05
situations in the measures to deal with % variance -27.77 -15.28
laboratory situations of deviation in Pretty good and good 20.83 41.67 58.33 37.5
experimental results % variance 20.84 16.66
Taking appropriate Weak and poor 20.83 13.89 2.78 -18.05
actions for laboratory % variance -6.94 -11.11
safety situations Pretty good and good 55.56 61.11 79.17 23.61
% variance 5.55 18.06
* Percent variance (% variance) is the difference in the percentage of each skill across the
experiment.
From Table 7, it can be seen that:
Before the experiment, the percentage of students with weak and poor skills accounted for
the highest percentage in the skill of preparing specimens and materials for experimental
practices (66.67%) and the lowest in the skill of taking appropriate actions for laboratory safety
situations. The skills have a weak and poor percentage greater than 50% in the important skills
in experimental teaching, including some skills: Preparing specimens and materials for
experimental practices (66.67%), taking appropriate measures to deal with situations of
deviation in experimental results (58.22%), and anticipating teaching situations in the laboratory
and suggesting the appropriate measures (52.78%). The percentage of students with pretty good
and good skills in most of the teaching skills accounted for less than 50%, only taking
appropriate actions for laboratory safety situations accounted for more than 50% and reached the
highest rate (55.56%). The skill with the lowest percentage of pretty good and good students is
taking appropriate measures to deal with situations of deviation in experimental results (20.83%).
During and after the experiment, the percentage of students with weak and poor skills in all
skills decreased significantly, and the percentage of students with good and good skills
increased. In which, the skills that have been improved the most are: The skill of anticipating
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teaching situations in the laboratory and suggest the appropriate measures (reduced by 47.22%
in the rate of weak and poor levels and increased by 37.5% in the rate of pretty good and good
levels), skills of taking appropriate measures to deal with situations of deviation in experimental
results (reduced by 43.05% in the rate of weak and poor levels and increased by 37.5% in the
rate of pretty good and good levels), and the skill of preparing specimens and materials for
experimental practices (reduced by 40.28% in the rate of weak and poor levels and increased by
38.89% in the rate of pretty good and good levels). The skill that have been improved the least
was the skill of taking appropriate actions for laboratory safety situations (reduced by 18.05% in the
rate of weak and poor levels and increased by 23.61% in the rate of pretty good and good levels).
Comparing the curriculums at the Universities of Education - Hue University and Saigon
University, it can be seen that some skills that students have been trained in the process of
teaching specialized subjects. In these skills, most students were pretty good before the
experiment such as the skill of taking appropriate actions for laboratory safety situations and the
skill of using chemicals, facilities, and equipment for experimental practices. These skills were
also the ones with the least variations during the experiment. There were the skills that students
have not had much practice before but could be acquired more easily during short training
shown as highly variances (> 40%), including the skills of taking appropriate actions for
laboratory safety situations, taking appropriate measures to deal with situations of deviation in
experimental results, and preparing specimens and materials for experimental practices.
We also processed the sample mean values by the Duncan test and obtained the results
shown in Table 8 and Figure 8.
Table 8. The comparison of mean values of pedagogical students’ teaching skills in experimental
practical lessons across the experiment
The elements of Indicators Pre-test Mid-test Post-test Total
teaching competences variance
1. Preparing for practical Preparing specimens and materials for 50.05
2.22c ± 0. 116 2.75b ± 0.135 3.47a ± 0.138
experiments experimental practices
% variance 23.87 26.18
Using chemicals, facilities, and c b 25.13
3.22 ± 0.130 3.60 ± 0.121 4.08a ± 0.110
equipment for experimental practices
% variance 11.80 13.33
Designing and doing practical 29.71
2.88c ± 0.120 3.47b ± 0.095 3.79a ± 0.106
experiments in the lessons
% variance 20.49 9.22
Anticipating teaching situations in the 42.76
c b a
laboratory and suggesting the 2.69 ± 0.135 3.17 ± 0.158 3.96 ± 0.111
appropriate measures
% variance 17.84 24.92
2. Handling teaching Taking appropriate measures to deal 44.07
situations in the with situations of deviation in 2.50c ± 0.124 3.14b ± 0.126 3.72a ± 0.124
laboratory experimental results
% variance 25.60 18.47
Taking appropriate actions for 17.66
3.47b ± 0.114 3.78b ± 0.122 4.11a ± 0.094
laboratory safety situations.
% variance 8.93 8.73
* The score is calculated as the average score of the skills formed in each competence (on a
scale of the levels from 1 to 5, in which level 1 is the wost level, level 5 is the best level of each
skill), % variance is the increased percentage of the average score at the current time in each test
with the previous time point. The letters a, b, c indicate the statistically significant difference of
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the sample mean at p<0.05 (Duncan's test). Values marked with the same letter are not
significantly different at p<0.05.
Figure 8. Graph of the comparison of mean values of pedagogical students’ teaching skills in
experimental practical lessons across the experiment
The above chart shows that all six indicators of two elements of component competences in
the teaching competence of pedagogical students in experimental practical lessons, which are
the element of competence to prepare for practical experiments, and the element of competence
to handle teaching situations in the laboratory increased. That was shown through three
timelines of measurement, specifically:
– Before the experiment, the best skill that students could perform was the skill of taking
appropriate actions for laboratory safety situations (3.47), the worst skills were the skill of
preparing specimens and materials for experimental practices (2.22) and the skill of taking
appropriate measures to deal with situations of deviation in experimental results (2.50). From
this result, it was supposed that pedagogical students were even quite good at taking appropriate
actions for laboratory safety situations but they were not used to prepare for the experiments
themselves and did not deal well with situations of deviation in experimental results.
– During and after the experimental process, all the students' skills were increased. In
which, the most significant changes were the skills of preparing specimens and materials for
experimental practices and practical materials (50.50%), taking appropriate measures to deal
with situations of deviation in experimental results (44.07%), and anticipating teaching
situations in the laboratory and suggesting the appropriate measures (42.76%). This result
showed that these skills were the skills that could be rapidly improved in a short time if students
were trained well.
From the results of the pedagogical experiment, it can be seen that if there are appropriate
training measures, it is possible to improve the teaching competence of Biology experimental
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practical lessons for pedagogical students. Some elements of this competence could be
improved in a short time. But some other elements may require a long time and should be
continued to be self-trained by students in the future.
CONCLUSION
Through the research, the structural model of pedagogical students’ competence in teaching
Biology experimental practical lessons was determined. It has three core component
competences: competence to design these lessons, competence to implement the teaching
activities of these lessons, and competence to assess students in these lessons. This study also
showed the corresponding indicators of core competences. On this basis, we have proposed
seven measures to improve the teaching competence in Biology experimental practical lessons
for pedagogical students. Due to time constraints, we only chose two elements of this teaching
competence for the pedagogical experiment. The experimental results showed that the suggested
measures to improve this teaching competence for pedagogical have brought a remarkable effect
in the two assessed competences. Therein, some elements have been significantly improved in a
short time, including the skills of preparing specimens and materials for experimental practices
and practical materials, taking appropriate measures to deal with situations of deviation in
experimental results, and anticipating teaching situations in the laboratory and suggest the
appropriate measures. This result showed that these teaching measures are necessary and
significant in the teaching at the universities of education to contribute to the improvement of
teaching competence for Biology pedagogical students. From here, we also suggest that
universities of education should increase the application of measures to improve the pedagogical
students’ competence in teaching Biology experimental practical lessons to meet the
requirements of educational innovation towards a competency-based approach.
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About the authors
– Assoc. Prof. Dr. Phan Duc Duy is an educator and researcher in the field of biological
teaching methods at the University of Education, Hue University. His research fields are case
exercises in teaching, developing biology teaching skills, developing critical thinking skills for
students. He has had 35 articles published in prestigious national and international scientific
conferences/ journals, conducted 10 research projects, and wrote 10 books relating to this
research area.
– M.Ed. Pham Thi Phuong Anh is an educator and researcher in the field of biological
teaching at the University of Education, Hue University. Her main research fields include
constructivism as a theory for teaching and learning, the measures to develop students’
competencies and evaluate students’ competencies. She has had 10 articles published in
prestigious national conferences/ journals, conducted 2 research projects and wrote a book
relating to this research area.
– Dr. Dang Thi Da Thuy is an educator and researcher in the field of biological teaching
methods at the University of Education, Hue University. Her main research fields include
curriculum development, measures to develop students' competencies in teaching biology,
teaching biology based on problem-based learning, and environmental education in teaching
biology. She has had 29 articles published in prestigious national conferences/ journals,
conducted 6 research projects, and wrote 4 books relating to this research area.
– Dr. Nguyen Thi Dieu Phuong is an educator and researcher in the field of biological
teaching methods at the University of Education, Hue University. Her main research fields are
teaching to develop learners' competencies, organizing experiential activities in teaching
biology, testing and evaluating students’ competencies and integrated teaching. She has had 25
articles published in prestigious national conferences/ journals, conducted 3 and participated in
5 research projects, and wrote 4 books relating to this research area.
– M.Ed. Le Minh Duc is a predoctoral fellow in the Theory and Methods of Teaching in
Biology in the Biology department at the University of Education, Hue University. His main
research fields include handling situations in teaching biological experiments and teaching
equipments.
214
DEVELOPING STUDENTS’ EXPERIMENTAL COMPETENCY THROUGH

INQUIRY-BASED LEARNING OF GENERAL PHYSICS LABORATORY
Nguyen Thanh Loan*1, Nguyen Van Bien2, Tran Ngoc Chat2
Abstract: In this article, we conducted inquiry-based learning with an increasing degree of

openness to develop 21 behavioral indicators of experimental competency of students. We
conducted pedagogical experiments in 3 classes over an 8-week period. Students were expected
to have achieved the openness levels 1, 2, 3 by the end of the third, sixth, and eighth week. Our
results showed that the two least developed behavioral indicators are (5.3) improved laboratory
tooling and (5.4) manufacturing tooling, which were always at level 1. The other 19 behavioral
indicators were improved in our study. This course, therefore, has generally improved students’
experimental competency
Keywords: physics experimental competency, student, inquiry
INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE REVIEW

To meet the requirements of the 4.0 technology revolution, the teaching goal not only
equips learners with knowledge and skills, but also requires competence development for
learners. Physics is an experimental science, so the development of experimental competency is
extremely important and necessary. Nowadays, in the world, there are also a number of studies
on solutions to develop experimental competency for students. The study by Ville et al. (2013)
showed that an inquiry-based laboratory course enabled students to explore the limits of their
expertise (i.e. help them know what they know and what they don’t) allowing them to create
new knowledge in an environment, a way they have never experienced before, and help them
organize practical activities in schools. This paper examines the use of an inquiry-based
laboratory course, in which students plan, and conduct hands-on activities for use in high
schools. According to Parappilly et al., inquiry-based laboratory attracts students and students
have more fun doing the laboratories. Moreover, students can participate in the design of the
experiment, thereby giving them a deeper understanding of the theory because students need to
justify their methods and write comments about the results. In contrast, the recipe-based
laboratory is boring and is not attractive to students because they are not allowed to participate
in the experimental design. The research of Parappilly concluded that the worst inquiry-based
laboratory did not negatively affect student learning outcomes and could actually benefit
students’ learning. In particular, the inquiry-based laboratory is one of the most effective ways
to help students begin to think like a physicist or an engineer and contribute to the development
of practical skills for students. At the same time, inquiry-based experiments help students form
their own questions, or reconcile unexpected results and lead them to positive learning, arousing
students’ interest and engaging students with content physics (Parappilly et al., 2013). In
addition, some studies encourage inquiry-based teaching for science classes according to Dewey
(1938) and Schwab (1960). According to the article “Model-based Inquiries in Chemistry
(2007)” by Samia Khan who gave the GEM inquiry cycle model to chemistry students, the cycle
involves students in creating, evaluating, and hypothesis editing. It is mentioned in this article
that inquiry is again widely organized as a key approach to science instruction (Canadian
 Corresponding Author: Nguyen Thanh Loan; E-mail Address: loannt@hcmue.edu.vn

1 Ho Chi Minh City University of Education
215
Council of Ministers of Education, 1997; Duschl, 2004; NRC, 1996). Many science teachers
design inquiry classrooms with many curriculum goals. Inquiry is linked to positive student
learning outcomes, such as developing conceptual understanding, enhancing natural science
understanding, and developing research skills (Benford & Lawson, 2001; Marx et al., 2004;
Metz, 2004; Roth, 1993; Wallace, Tsoi, Calkin, & Darley, 2004). Many higher science
educators offer different types of inquiry classes (Harwood, Reiff, & Philipson, 2002), and
many different goals (Alberts, 2004; Collins, 1998), inquiry-based classrooms encourage
students to explore and understand their use of the world as a scientist does (Darden, 1991;
Dunbar, 1994; Francoeur, 2000; Nersessian, 2002; Zachos, Hick, Doane, & Sargent, 2000). A
recent study, the article “Redesigning Lab for pre-service Chemistry teachers: From cookbook
experiments to inquiry-based, Science, Environment, technology, and society approach (2019)”,
the author Muhamad Imaduddin et al. offer solution to develop students’ experimental
competency by redesigning traditional laboratory-based experimental activities. The promotion
of inquiry-based teaching is even more important in the experimental modules because these are
the modules in which students will apply the scientific research process (Christopher et al.,
2014). Christopher et al.’s research results have shown a positive effect of inquiry-based
teaching in biology laboratory courses on student learning gains. Vonani’s study also shows that
the effectiveness of guided inquiry-based lab clearly reflects the knowledge of the natural
sciences of first-year students (Baloyi, 2017). More recently, scientists have found that “courses
with guided-inquiry laboratory activities can foster the development of experimental design
skills for students who are least prepared across a range of course levels and institution types”
(Blumer & Beck, 2019). In another recent article related to fostering experimental competences
of prospective physics teachers, Bitzenbauer et al. suggest that experimental competency of
prospective physics teachers must not only be encouraged in the context of lab courses
(focusing on content knowledge CK) but also in the context of didactic education (linking CK
and pedagogical content knowledge PCK). They report a new seminar concept for students in
physics teacher study programs. This concept is based on the current state of research in physics
education, on the teachers’ professional competences and on the modelling of experimental
competency. This result of a pilot study in this article was carried out to evaluate the seminar
concept on basic experimental techniques (Philipp Bitzenbauer & Jan-Peter Meyn, 2021, p. 2).
In Vietnam, there are many studies giving solutions to develop experimental competency for
pupils in high school, for example, the construction and use of laboratory equipment (Vylaychit,
2019; Manh, 2020), construction of exercises and thematic inquiry-based laboratory (Van Bien,
2013; Binh, 2014; Diem, 2017) and creation of experimental instruments, innovating way of
testing and evaluating towards focusing on developing experimental competency (Linh, 2015),
etc. However, there are very few research projects that develop experimental competency of
students at university such as (Thu, 2016; Nhi & Thien, 2019). These three studies only focus
on practicing skills and mainly testing and assessment measurement and error handling skills.
There are also 2 projects of the Ministry of Education and Training. These include the
“Research on the competency of the ETEP pedagogical universities” of the Ministry of
Education and Training, and “Physics program 2020 in order to improve teaching physics’’,
developing experimental competency by strengthening practice laboratories. Currently, there is
obviously no dissertation, thesis or study on developing experimental competency of students
for General Physics Laboratory (part mechanics and thermodynamics) through inquiry-based
learning. Therefore, in this article, we have used inquiry-based learning model of General
Physics Laboratory to develop students’ experimental competency with different levels of
openness.
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Research question
Does inquiry-based learning model for General Physics Laboratory course develop
students’ experimental competency? What is the level of students’ experimental competency
development after taking this course?
Modelling of experimental competence
In the model of Schreiber et al. (Schreiber N. et al., 2009 & 2012), the three main domains
planning, realisation, and analysis encompass the characteristic features of the steps of
experimentation, plus two further features in between domain.
Figure 1. Model of experimental competence as presented by Schreiber et al.

After that, Bitzenbauer & Meyn follow the model presented by Schreiber et al. focusing on
the concrete realisation of the experiment rather than on the planning or on the analysis of data
(Philipp Bitzenbauer & Jan-Peter Meyn, 2021, pp. 4-5).
In this article, we modify the model of Schreiber experimental competency in the following
places: the first sub-competence “Planning” is split into “Determine the purpose of the
experiment” and “Design experiment”. In addition, we add sub-competence “Improve,
manufacture and replace damaged tools, creating simple laboratory tools” after “analysis of the
results”. Each sub-competence has corresponding behavioral indicators.
Besides, we have also based ourselves on the experimental path of the process of detecting
and solving problems and we have consulted some studies such as behavioral indicators in the
framework of experimental competence (Van Bien, Xayparseut, & Thuan, 2019, pp. 598-600);
three main domains planning, realisation, and analysis of the results (Philipp Bitzenbauer &
Jan-Peter Meyn, 2021, pp. 2-5) and then we revised the experimental competence structure
framework to fit the research purpose.
CONTENT
1. Methodology
1.1. Experimental competency
Experimental competency is the ability to mobilize a combination of knowledge, skills with
psychological attributes such as interest, belief, willpower to successfully perform experimental
tasks. Experimental competency includes 5 elements: determine the purpose of the experiment;
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design experiment (including selection of experimental tools, planning how to conduct and
collect data during the experiment); conduct experiment (assembling, arranging experiment,
collecting experiment results); process data, analyze, evaluate the results; improve,
manufacture and replace damaged tools, creating simple laboratory tools.
Inquiry-based learning for General Physics Laboratory is divided into 3 openness levels:
+ Openness level 1: Students conduct sample experiments with the complete guidance of
teachers. (the lowest level of inquiry)
+ Openness level 2: Students conduct sample experiments in new situations with partial
guidance from teachers.
+ Openness level 3: Students design experiments by themselves and do experiments by
themselves. (the highest level of inquiry)
1.2. Context and research part
a) Context
– Time for students to study the course “General Physics Laboratory” (part mechanics and
thermodynamics) includes 11 weeks, including 8 weeks of practice; 1 week for product report; 1
week for review and 1 week for the final exam.
– The experimental period is from May 19th to August 6th in 2020.
– Experimental location: at the general physics laboratory of Ho Chi Minh city University
of Education.
– Before starting to study, students do the pre-test PLIC online to measure pre-existing
knowledge concepts of students. (Walsh, Quinn, Wieman, & Holmes, 2019)
– The teacher prepares laboratory tools and equipment in advance according to the
instruction manual.
b) Research Participants
– As a second-year physics student at Ho Chi Minh city University of Education. We select
3 classes of equal level and random distribution. There are 2 experimental classes and 1 control
class. Experimental class 1 (G1) includes 15 students. Experimental class 2 (G2) includes 10
students. Control class (G3) includes 15 students.
– Each class is divided into groups. In each group, they made pairs to participate in
experimental activities and completed in 11 weeks.
– Experimental classes learn by inquiry-based teaching. In contrast, the control class learns
by practice method.
1.3. Research design of experimental method
Treatment: Inquiry-based learning
O1: Pre-test PLIC (online)
O2: Post-test PLIC (online) and O3: Final test
Table 1. Experimental research design
Class Pre-test Treatment Post-test
Experimental class: G1 O1 X (Inquiry-based learning) O2, O3
Experimental class: G2 O1 X (Inquiry-based learning) O2, O3
Control class: G3 O1 Practice method O2, O3
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1.4. The impact plan and weekly review tool
Figure 2. The impact plan

We organize inquiry-based learning in General Physics Laboratory for experimental classes
according to the impact plan (Figure 2):
From week 1 to week 3 students are set to achieve the minimum goal of openness level 1
and in the next 3 weeks, students will have to achieve a minimum of openness level 2. And
finally, in the remaining 2 weeks, students are expcted to achieve openness level 3. In particular,
there are 11 weeks in the impact plan:
Week 1: Expected attainment level 1
+ Students do pre-test PLIC to test students’ proficiency. Assessment tool is the pre-test
PLIC online.
+ Students learn a detailed outline of the General Physics Laboratory, objectives, contents,
teaching methods, learning methods, laboratory rules, experimental competency structure and
competence assessment standards experiment for students.
+ Teacher guides students to use assessment tools including rubric and portfolio (sway).
+ Teacher instructs students to draw spider web diagrams to evaluate students’
experimental competency.
+ Teachers prepare study slips and experimental tools.
+ Teachers support documents for students.
Week 2-3: Expected attainment level 1
+ Teacher provides students: purpose of the experiment, experimental equipment,
procedure.
+ Students conduct experiments according to the model with the instructions completely
from the teacher.
+ Assessment tools are rubric, spider web diagram.
+ Teacher only raises the problem for students to determine the purpose of the experiment.
Teachers help with experimental equipment and methods for students.
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+ Students conduct experiments in new situations with very little guidance from teachers.
+ Assessment tools are rubric, spider web diagram.
The teacher just raises the problem for students to determine the purpose of the experiment
by self-designing the experiment plan. Assessment tools are rubric, spider web diagram.
Week 9: Report the products of the groups. Assessment tool is rubric.
Week 10: Review of the experiments.
Week 11: Students take the final tests (post-test PLIC and final exam) and evaluate the
learning process. Assessment tools are post-test PLIC online test and the final exam (practice
and oral examination). After that, students do the survey on the google form.
1.5. Assessment tool and data analysis
In this article, we use combined evaluation to ensure the high reliability and validity of the
research results.
 Types of assessment tools:
+ Test skills for testing Pre-test and Post-test PLIC online (before and after study). PLIC is
an independent evaluation tool that includes a set of questions to evaluate critical thinking skills
in the context of physics experimentation (Walsh, Quinn, Wieman, & Holmes, 2019).
+ Rubrics evaluate the level of achievement of behavioral indicators of experimental
competency and then spider web diagrams to evaluate the development of experimental
competency of students.
 How to collect data
– Teacher has provided students with a rubric link to evaluate behavioral indicators of
experimental competency every week.
– Based on the rubric table, each student will evaluate himself or herself with proof and
peer assessment.
– Calculate the average value of behavioral indicators. Each student draws a spider web
diagram for each week using the mean. Each student has drawn 8 weeks with 8 spider web
diagrams on one image. And each student draws one more mean line. Finally, a total of 9 spider
web diagrams on one image per student.
 Instructions on how to draw spider web diagram
– Experimental competency includes 5 elements corresponding to 21 behavioral indicators.
Therefore, there are 21 rods with 21 behavioral indicators.
– After the first student has completed the rubric board, on each stick, students will round 1
point for their achievement level. Just like that, students finish on 21 sticks. Next, students
automatically connect the points together to create a round for week 1. Similarly, the first
student will draw circles for the remaining weeks.
– Do the same for the remaining students.
– On the spider web diagram, to evaluate the experimental competencies of each student:
where the concave is the weakness, the sharp point is the strong point of the student. In addition,
the spider web map can also assess the team’s capabilities.
2. Results and Discussion
The experimental results have answered the research question originally posed. After
experimenting, we found two results.
2.1. The first new result was obtained
To evaluate students’ experimental competency that we based on the experimental
competency structure framework that we proposed (Table 2).
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There are behavioral indicators within each sub-competence. The experimental competencies
of students with 21 behavioral indicators are summarized in the table below.
Table 2. The experimental competency structure framework
1. Determine the purpose of the experiment
(1.1) The ability to observe phenomena and determine related knowledge
(1.2) Make logical inferences to find the consequences to be tested
(1.3) Determine the conclusions that need to be drawn from the experiment
2. Design experiment
(2.1) Determine the experiment instruments to be used
(2.2) Determine the experimental arrangement
(2.3) Expected steps to conduct the experiment
(2.4) Expected data collection
(2.5) Expected process of data
(2.6) Selection of optimal experimental options
3. Conduct experiment
(3.1) Find out the parts of real equipment corresponding to the constructed plan
(3.2) Assemble, arrange experiment and conduct experiment with real equipment
(3.3) Perform planned experiment with real equipment
(3.4) Collect data
4. Process data, analyze, evaluate the results
(4.1) Process data
(4.2) Draw conclusions
(4.3) Evaluation of experimental results
(4.4) Application
5. Improve, manufacture and replace damaged tools, creating simple laboratory tools
(5.1) Determine the source of the error
(5.2) Error handling measures
(5.3) Improving tools
(5.4) Manufacture of laboratory instruments
How to use the experimental competency structure framework
For each sub-competence, build a rubric table to evaluate the achievement of behavioral
indicators. Corresponding to 5 sub-competence there are 5 rubric tables. Based on the student’s
self-reliance, each behavioral index is divided into 3 levels:
+ Level 1: the student performs the behavior under the complete guidance of the teacher.
+ Level 2: the student performs the behavior under the partial guidance of the teacher.
+ Level 3: students perform the behavior on their own.
Based on the rubric table, students self-assess the level of achievement of each indicator
behavior in each experiment. The assessment of the achievement level of student behavior
indicators is based on student learning products (Portfolio-sway, Experiment report, Rubric,
Spider Web Map, Video).
Based on rubric tables for each experiment, students draw a spider web diagram by
themselves weekly. Data analysis based on product proof learning and spider web diagrams. It
is important for teachers to see the spider web form, if there is a sharp point, the behavioral
index is strongly developed, and if it is tight, the behavior index is weak.
2.2. The second new result was obtained
We evaluate the experimental competency of students based on test report score, final exam
score, the spider web diagram and survey on a google form.
Test report score and final exam score
– Based on the test report score and results of final exam scores, the authors used excel
software to calculate the statistical parameters and the result of pre-test and post-test PLIC.
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Table 3. Statistical table of the test experiment report score

CLASS MEDIUM REPORTING SCORE VARIANCE STANDARD DEVIATION (S) V(%)
Experimental class 1 8.61 0.48 0.69 8.01
Experimental class 2 8.84 0.51 0.71 8.03
Control class 8.40 0.076 0.28 3.33
Table 4. Statistics table of final exam scores
CLASS MEDIUM REPORTING SCORE VARIANCE STANDARD DEVIATION (S) V(%)
Experimental class 1 8.59 0.71 0.84 9.78%
Experimental class 2 8.60 0.53 0.73 8.47%
Control class 8.04 0.51 0.71 8.83%
– Interpret the results in the two tables:
+ Based on the data in Table 3, the standard deviation (S) for the average score of the test
reports of the two experimental classes is higher than that of the control class, proving that the
data has a clear dispersion. However, the coefficient of variation (V) is less than 30%, so the
results are acceptable.
+ Based on the data in Table 4, class 1 has (S) and (V) higher than class 2, so the quality of
class 1 is not as good and uneven as class 2. Experimental class 2 is less dispersed data than
class 1. The values of standard deviation (S) and coefficient of variation (V) of the class 2 are
low, showing that the dispersion of scores around the average point of the experimental class is
small. This proves that the quality of the experimental classes is quite good and uniform.
Coefficient of variation V (8.47%) is less than 30%, so the results are reliable.
+ Based on the two data results above, the test report score and the average score of the two
experimental classes are higher than that of the control class. So that, this course has improved
the experimental competency of students. This result answers the first point of the research
question which is inquiry-based learning organization for General Physics laboratory course
develops students’ experimental competency.
Pre-test and Post-test PLIC
PLIC structure: the PLIC presents students with two case studies of groups conducting a
m
mass-on-a-spring experiment to test the Hooke’s Law model that: T  2 . Group 1
k
conducts 10 repeated trials for the period of oscillation for two different masses, uses the
equation to find k in each case, and compares the values. Group 2 conducts two repeated trials
for the period of oscillation for 10 different masses, and plots T2 versus M. The PLIC was
designed to evaluate three critical thinking constructs that are important in physics
experimentation: evaluating models, evaluating methods, and suggesting follow-up actions.
Each of these constructs was hypothesized to be represented by at least three questions (Quinn,
Katherine, Walsch, Cole, & Holmes, 2018).
Because this is the first time we have used this PLIC test for students, we do not have
experience, so the number of students participating is still small. The results are not good. There
is a clear difference between the test before and after the experiment. However, the difference is
not too much. Here are the results of the experimental class 1:
Table 5. Summary of experimental class 1 participation
Reported number of students in class 15.0
Number of valid PRE-responses 6
Number of valid POST-responses 1
Number of matched responses 1
Estimated Fraction of class participating 0.07
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Figure 3. Factor scores and total scores for our students (your class – experimental class 1) and students
enrolled in similar classes (other classes) who have taken the PLIC
The whiskers represent the range of student scores, while the lower and upper quartiles
enclose the box. The median score is marked with a horizontal line inside the box and outliers.
Here are the results of the experimental class 2:
Table 6. Summary of experimental class 2 participation
Reported number of students in class 10.0
Number of valid PRE-responses 4
Number of valid POST-responses 2
Number of matched responses 1
Estimated Fraction of class participating 0.07
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Figure 4. Factor scores and total scores for our students (your class – experimental class 2)
and students enrolled in similar classes (other classes) who have taken the PLIC
– Interpret the results in the two figures:
+ From Figure 2 we see that factor scores pre-test and post-test are different.
+ From Figure 3 we see that factor scores pre-test and post-test are different but less.
+ Total scores of the experimental class 2 are higher than the experimental class 1 and other
classes. This result coincides with the average score of the report and final exam in Table 3 and
Table 4.
+ From the above results, it has been shown that the General Physics Laboratory course has
brought good results and has contributed to improving the experimental competency of students.
The spider web diagram to evaluate the level of students’ experimental competency
development
– Based on the spider web diagram of each student in two experimental classes for the
authors to evaluate the impact of the course on the student’s experimental competency
development.
Figure 5. Spider web diagrams of two students of experimental class 2

– After drawing 10 spider web diagrams of the second experimental class and 15 spider
web diagrams of the first experimental class, all students with similar points are concave (5.3
and 5.4), which proves that only number of behaviors (5.3) and (5.4) students are still weak. At
week 7, the behavioral index has a low index showing that this week the test has different level
of difficulty. Maybe the students who have not focused yet are still neglected.
– New finding results: the impact of the developed course includes 5 elements and 19
behavioral indicators in the experimental competency structure. Behavioral indicators are
strongly developed in (1.1); (1.2); (1.3). These three indicators are in the competency to
224
determine the purpose of the experiment; (2.1) Determine the experiment instruments to be
used; (2.2) Determine the experimental arrangement; (2.4) Expected data collection; (2.5)
Expected process of data; (3.1) Find out the parts of real equipment; (3.4) Collect data; (4.1)
Process data; (4.2) Draw conclusions. However, there are two behavioral indicators (5.3)
Improving tools and (5.4) Manufacture of laboratory instruments are always at level 1. These
two behavioral indicators have not been developed. This result answers the second point of the
research question.
Survey on google form
To clarify the issue of why 19 behavioral indicators in the experimental competency
structure are developed and behavioral indicators (5.3) and (5.4) are not developed, we
conducted a survey of students.
– Based on the answers of the student survey on google form:
+ 80% of students said Because: In General Physics Laboratory, the teachers asked
that behavioral indicator questions related to the lesson, helping students orient the
(1.1) was most experiments they have to do. However, most of them are still
developed. students who have to learn about experiments, how to use
+ 73.3% of students said measuring tools, and collect data by themselves. Perform
that the behavioral experiments many times to find out the cause of the error and how
indicators (2.2); (3.4); to fix it. In addition, teachers strongly encourage students to find
(4.1) are developed the more new experimental options, comparing the optimization
second most. between two experiments. The orientation without holding hands
+ Over 60% of students and locking hands helps me to both try to focus on reviewing
said that the behavioral existing knowledge, learn from the experience of doing
indicators (2.1); (3.3); experiments, and reinforce the knowledge gaps and the competency
(4.2); (5.1); (5.2) are to practice experience.
developed third most. Students made a lot through the experiments and gradually
improved through the exercises.
Because students want to do the experiment, students need to find
out the experimental tools, assemble and arrange, then collect data,
comment on the results, state the cause of the error and how to fix it
in the experiment.
Because students are the ones who directly perform experiments,
they will develop experimental skills. From there, we can
understand more about the problem of the experiment.
With the identification of experimental tools as well as how
to conduct, arrange and perform experiments so that students can
self-learn first, and will not waste time in class reading, helping
students remember longer. Therfore, students come to the laboratory,
the conduct experiments faster and more efficiently.
+ 60% of students said that behavioral indicator (5.4) is not developed. And 26.7% of
students said that behavioral indicator (5.3) was not developed because learning time and
conditions to have the necessary tools for the experiment are not enough. 53.3% of students said
that the experimental equipment could not meet the content of the experiments. Because tool
making requires a deep understanding of tools, students are not equipped with this skill. In the
laboratory, most of the experiments have been assembled and pre-arranged. Students just need
to perform operations without having to assemble the experiment arrangement.
225
CONCLUSION
In this article, the authors found two new results. The first is the experimental competency
structure framework. The second is the development of students’ experimental competency.
The research results somewhat meet the initial goal that in the first 6 weeks all students had the
standard behavior, but in weeks 7 and 8, students did not reach the expected level. In particular,
the behavioral indicators (5.3) and (5.4) are still at the lowest level 1 from week 1 to week 8.
The authors have compared the impact of inquiry-based learning with traditional practice
teaching, inquiry-based learning based on the increasing degree of openness, not only
discovering new knowledge, discovering new methods, or how to conduct new experiments or
new experimental means. Author’s development direction in the next studies will rewrite the
content of the experiment document according to inquiry-based learning with clearer and more
specific inquiry learning tasks based on increasing openness from low to high in order to create
conditions for students to inquiry with many levels. At the same time, the author increases the
time for students to improve and manufacture experimental tools with students’ personal projects.
In the next studies, the author gradually replaced the experiments with pre-assembled arrangement
with experiments that only provide the purpose and experimental tools so that students can
inquiry the arrangement and assemble, design, repair and manufacture laboratory tools.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This study is supported by Ho Chi Minh City University of Education CS.2020.19.49.
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About the authors

– MSc Nguyen Thanh Loan works at the Department of Physics at Ho Chi Minh City
University of Education (Vietnam). She got MSc in methodology of teaching physics in Vietnam,
and her research interests include general physics, theory and methods of teaching physics.
– Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Bien is the Vice Dean of Faculty of Physics, and the Head
of the Department of Physics Didactic, Hanoi National University of Education (Vietnam). He
received his Ph.D degree in Germany. His research interests include physics education, STEM
education and science education. He has published articles, books on constructing physics
apparatus, active learning in high school physics and STEM education.
– Dr. Tran Ngoc Chat earned his Ph.D degree in Germany, and he is now working at the
Department of Physics Didactic, Hanoi National University of Education (Vietnam). His
research interests are designing and manufacturing physics experiments that connect with ICT
devices for use in teaching.
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PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT THROUGH LESSON STUDY:

PROSPECTIVE MATHEMATICS TEACHERS’ KNOWLEDGE FOR
TEACHING VARIABILITY IN STATISTICAL GRAPHS
Nguyen Thi Ha Phuong1, Tran Kiem Minh2
Abstract: Preparing the mathematical knowledge necessary for teaching for prospective
mathematics teachers (PMTs) is an essential issue in training teachers. This paper discusses the
development of PMTs’ knowledge for teaching variability in statistics through lesson study. More
specifically, we characterised the progress of PMTs’ knowledge for teaching variability on bar
charts and histograms in statistics through an adaptation of the Japanese lesson study.
Regarding the research method, we firstly used a pre-test based on the categorisation of teachers’
knowledge for teaching developed by Ball, Thames & Phelps (2008) to evaluate PMTs’ knowledge
of teaching data variability from bar graphs and histograms. We then implemented a lesson
study cycle to develop their professional knowledge. During this lesson study cycle, PMTs worked
collaboratively with the researchers to “plan, do and see” the lesson. The findings indicated that
Vietnamese PMTs’ knowledge for teaching variability, especially their specialised content
knowledge, knowledge of content and students, knowledge of content and teaching, has
improved progressively through the participation in a lesson study cycle. The results also showed
how the lesson study could be effectively adapted to initial teacher education in Vietnam to
develop PMTs’ professional knowledge.
Keywords: mathematical knowledge for teaching, lesson study, prospective mathematics
teacher, variability, statistical graphs
INTRODUCTION
Developing knowledge for teachers to teach a certain mathematical content effectively is a
significant research direction, especially in teacher training. Many researchers have developed
the work of Shulman (1986) to study the types of mathematical knowledge required to teach
different topics. Among those studies, Ball and her colleagues (Ball, et.al, 2008; Hill et al.,
2008) made an essential contribution to this area of research by distinguishing six different
types of knowledge that teachers need to teach effectively, called mathematical knowledge for
teaching (MKT).
Many studies have been based on the MKT model to evaluate and develop the types of
knowledge teachers need to teach a particular topic effectively. For example, Döhrmann et al.
(2012) based on the MKT model to develop a model to evaluate the professional competence of
mathematics teachers in many countries within the framework of the international assessment
program TIMSS. Gonzalez (2014) discussed statistical knowledge to teaching by using the
MKT model. Wilkie and Clark (2015) designed mathematics tasks based on the MKT model to
develop teachers’ knowledge about teaching functional thinking. In Vietnam, Le (2016) studied
the knowledge of PMTs to teach functions. Minh & Lien (2018), Nguyen & Tran (2019) have
started researching and applying the MKT model to evaluate and develop the mathematics
knowledge of PMTs to teach the application of derivatives in economics and statistics.
Teaching statistics has common characteristics in teaching and has its particularities (Cobb
& Moore, 1997). Many researchers have focused on describing the knowledge needed to teach
 Corresponding Author: Nguyen Thi Ha Phuong; E-mail Address: haphuong.dhsp@gmail.com

1 University of Science and Education, The University of Da Nang
2 University of Education, Hue University
228
statistics to help teachers understand statistics deeply (Garfield & Ben-Zvi, 2009; Jacobbe,
2008; Gonzalez, 2014). In the studies on teaching statistics, there were little researches on
teachers’ knowledge for teaching statistics to their contextual teaching practice. In particular,
studies on the relationship of knowledge types placed in the context of cooperative teachings,
such as lesson study (LS), were a new approach that was still little exploited. Recently, in
Vietnam, although there has been some research related to teaching statistics, almost no analysis
has mentioned teachers’ knowledge and professional development. Besides, statistics is one of
the three primary knowledge circuits included in the 2018 mathematics curriculum. Therefore, it
is urgent and necessary to develop teachers’ knowledge for teaching statistics.
In this study, we evaluated the types of content knowledge and pedagogical knowledge of
PMTs for teaching variability on bar graphs and histograms. As a next step, a LS cycle was
proposed by us from the improved LS cycle of Lewis (2009). This cycle helped PMTs to develop
their mathematics knowledge step by step. Specifically, we focused on developing common content
knowledge, specialized content knowledge, knowledge of content, and student and knowledge
of content and teaching for teaching variability on bar charts and histograms of PMTs.
CONTENT
1. Theoretical background
1.1. Mathematical knowledge for teaching
In the research on the mathematics teachers’ professional knowledge for teaching, Ball et
al. (2008) attracted much attention from the mathematics education research community and
achieved many significant results. Ball et al. (2008) made an important contribution by clearly
distinguishing different types of knowledge. This classification was often called the model MKT.
This model includes two areas of knowledge: subject matter knowledge (SMK) and pedagogical
content knowledge (PCK). Specifically, SMK is divided into three categories: common content
knowledge (CCK), specialized content knowledge (SCK), and horizon content knowledge
(HCK). PCK is also divided into three categories: knowledge of content and student (KCS),
knowledge of content and teaching (KCT), and knowledge of content and curriculum (KCC).
Many authors have been interested in adapting the MKT model into their research on
teachers’ knowledge. In this study, we chose the MKT model of Ball et al. (2008) as the main
theoretical framework to develop PMTs’ knowledge for teaching variability in statistical graphs.
Figure 1. Model of mathematical knowledge for teaching (Ball et al., 2008, p. 403)
1.2. Mathematical knowledge for teaching variability in statistical graphs

Combining the characteristics of the types of knowledge in the MKT model and the
specificity of teaching variability in statistical graphs, we built a set of indicators to evaluate the
required knowledge of PMTs. This set of indicators was applied in experiment and data analysis.
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Table 1. Set of indicators to assess knowledge for teaching variability in statistical graphs
Types of knowledge Indicators
A: Indicators related to CCK1: Teachers understand the concept of the variability of statistical data series; Teachers determine
Common Content which statistical parameters can be used to describe the variability of statistical data.
Knowledge (CCK) CCK2: The teacher can determine the variability of the data shown in the bar chart and the distribution
chart; Teachers can make comments, compare and explain the meaning of the data variability in the
graphs in the context of a specific problem.
B: Indicators related to SCK1: Teachers have evidence of their ability to determine the accuracy of students’ common and distinct
Specialized Content answers to a question/problem about data variability on graphs (especially when recognizing whether the
Knowledge (SCK) student’s answer is correct or not).
SCK2: Teachers can provide analytical evidence of true/false solutions for students’ answers; Teachers can
give explanations on the steps of reasoning that are statistically significant in a clear, accurate, and
appropriate way for the question/problem posed about the variability of the data on graphs.
C: Indicators related to HCK1: Teachers have the ability to understand the relationship between the variability of the data on the
Horizon Content Knowledge statistical graphs and other mathematics topics in the program or the content of different subjects.
(HCK) HCK2: Teachers have the ability to understand how the knowledge about the variability of data on
statistical graphs will be helpful to learners when applied to life.
D: Indicators related to KCS1: Teachers can predict reactions and common difficulties of students when learning about the
Knowledge of Content and variability of data on graphs.
Students (KCS) KCS2: Teachers can clearly understand how students reason, and think, and misconceptions about tasks
related to determining the variability of data on graphs.
E: Indicators related to KCT1: Teachers can plan lesson design and arrange teaching tasks and activities according to the content of
Knowledge of Content and the variability of data on the graphs.
Teaching (KCT) KCT2: Teachers have the ability to organize teaching, choose teaching methods and strategies suitable for
learners to improve knowledge for learners, provide teaching situations and deal with them effectively;
Teachers can guide students to apply knowledge to real-life problems and make statistically significant
statements.
F: Indicators related to KCC1: Teachers have the ability to master the structure of the program, understand the content of the
Knowledge of Content and program related to the variability of data on statistical graphs; Teachers know how to use program content
Curriculum (KCC) appropriately to design and implement lessons to achieve the best effect.
KCC2: Teachers have the ability to help students develop specific competencies required by the current
Vietnamese high school curriculum when learning about data variability on statistical graphs.
We have relied on this set of indicators to design the initial survey and as a theoretical basis
to analyze the knowledge of PMTs when participating in the experiment.
1.3. Lesson study
Lesson study (LS) is a collaborative approach to teacher professional development that
originated in Japan and China (Fernandez & Yoshida, 2004; Chen & Yang, 2013) and has
spread globally. LS is considered an effective and applicable innovation in teaching (Choksi &
Fernandez, 2004; Lewis et al., 2004; Takahashi & Yoshida, 2004). Although LS helps with
rapid professional development, LS is still relatively new to countries outside of Japan. Most
schools and teachers are in the early stages of applying LS and implementing innovation
(Murata, 2011). The aim of LS is to gain new ideas about teaching and learning based on a
better understanding of student thinking. So observing the study lessons is the core of the LS
cycle. However, the LS cycle requires more elements than studying student responses while
observing a lesson. LS cycle requires much time for a collaborative teacher to investigate all
aspects of the in-depth study content to be taught, the teaching materials, the post-lesson
assessment, and even the involvement of professionals, such as university faculty, mentors or
facilitators (Takahashi et.al., 2005). The main feature of LS is collaborative planning,
suggestions, and discussions that focus on the work results of the whole team, not any
individual. There are different procedures proposed by researchers for LS, such as those by
230
Baba (2007), Lewis (2009), or Murata (2011), that are suitable for their research objectives.
Although the LS cycle of Baba (2007), Lewis (2009) or Murata (2011) are different in form, in
summary, they all focus on the main steps such as lesson design, teaching, and observation in
one class, discussing and learning from experience, revising lesson plans and re-teaching
lessons in another class.
An increasing number of studies point to the potential of LS to promote teacher change
(Lewis et al., 2009). Fernandez (2005) was interested in LS to assist teachers in learning
mathematics to teaching. Research by Perry et al. (2009) has shown that developing
mathematics knowledge for teachers to teach is focused first in LS. Tepylo & Moss (2011) more
generally tracked the overall change in the teaching practice of four primary school teachers
participating in LS in the field of fractions. Meyer & Wilkerson (2011) conducted research on
24 middle school teachers divided into groups with different research topics. Their analysis
showed that particular elements of the LS cycle provided great opportunities for teachers to
improve their knowledge of teaching mathematics. Besides, LS has been explored and promoted
knowledge development for PMTs (Leavy & Hourigan, 2016).
Through the analysis of some LS cycles, we have proposed a suitable LS cycle for the
experimental implementation of this study. The purpose of our LS cycle was the development of
PMTs’ mathematics knowledge for teaching. Each step of the curriculum has contributed to the
development of specific types of knowledge. For example, in the planning step, teachers have
developed CCK, SCK when discussing content lessons, KCS when predicting student
responses, or KCT when teachers formulate questions or design teaching activities.
The steps of this LS cycle are described in detail as follows:
+ Identify topics and set common goals: the topics selected may not be entirely within the
general curriculum, but maybe extra-curricular topics, application topics or integrated topics in
STEM education. Teachers must determine the overall goal when choosing a teaching topic.
+ Planning: The members of the LS team discuss the research lesson, prepare the same
lesson plan, design teaching activities, build a system of closed and open questions, predict
students’ answers.
Figure 2. Proposed lesson study cycle

+ Teaching practice and observation: A teacher in the LS group teaches the lesson. The
remaining members observe, take notes to comment. The collected data focus on the logic, the
appropriateness of the lesson plan, the teaching steps and the teacher’s pedagogical ability, the
teacher’s analytical and feedback on the students’ answers.
+ Reflection and adjustment: After the lesson, the LS group discusses, gives suggestions,
edits the lesson plan, and adjusts the teacher’s methods if necessary. The reflection step can be
reflection after each teaching session or reflection at the end of the research process. In the step
of reflection and teaching practice, we can repeat it many times. This improves and enhances
knowledge and professional practice for PMTs.
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2. Methods
2.1. Research Design and Participants
Our research was conducted at two Universities of Education including the University of
Da Nang and Hue University in 2020. The study was divided into two phases.
In the first phase, we conducted a survey on 118 PMTs in their 3rd and 4th years. Most of the
PMTs participating in the research have completed the basic knowledge of the major, some
subjects on specialized knowledge, probability and statistics, subjects on teaching methods, and
developing teaching capacity, program analysis. At this stage, we evaluated the knowledge
patterns of PMTs to teach the variability of data in bar graphs and histograms through a survey.
Based on the index given in Table 1, we designed the research tool as a questionnaire consisting
of closed and open questions. Each question was a task that referred to each of the six
knowledge types CCK, SCK, KCS, KCT, KCC, HCK of the MKT model. The knowledge
components of the MKT model represented by each question in the survey are shown in Table
2.
Table 2. The components of the MKT are suggested by each of the questions given in the problem
Types of knowledge Question
Common content knowledge (CCK) Exercise 1.1, 2.1
Specialized content knowledge (SCK) Exercise 1.2, 2.2
Exercise 1.3, 2.3
Knowledge of content and student (KCS) Exercise 1.4, 2.4
Knowledge of content and teaching (KCT) Exercise 1.5, 2.5
Horizon content knowledge (HCK) Exercise 3.2
Knowledge of content and curriculum (KCC) Exercise 3.1
In this paper, we preferred to pay more attention to the following four types of knowledge:
CCK, SCK, KCS, and KCT of PMTs to teach the variability of data in bar charts and
histograms. The tasks designed to assess these types of knowledge in the survey was presented
as follows:
Exercise 1. The two graphs below show the monthly rainfall for two areas A and B.
1) Based on the characteristics of the graph, what area has greater variation in rainfall? Explain.
2) The following are four students’ responses to the question 1) above:
Students Answers
Student 1 The rainfall of area A has greater variability than that of area B because almost every month there is much rain.
The rainfall of area B has greater variability than that of area A because area B has more different monthly rainfall
Student 2
than area A.
Student 3 The rainfall of the two areas has the same variability because the mean amount is the same.
It is impossible to compare the rainfall variability of the two areas A and area B because the graph does not have
Student 4
enough data for calculation.
Please rate the true/false of the answers and explain why?
3) Guess for what reason each student answered question 2?
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4) In your opinion, what difficulties or mistakes would high school students encounter when comparing the variability of data presented in
the form of a bar graph like this exercise 1 (predict at least three difficulties/ mistakes and explain)?
5) Suppose you teach the variability of statistical data given as a bar graph. Provide specific instructions or notes to help high school
students correctly determine the variability of data based on the shape of the bar graphs (without having to do the calculations).
Exercise 2. The three histograms below show test scores on a scale of 0 to 10 in Statistics for classes A, B, and C.
1) Based on the characteristics of the graphs, which class has the lowest and highest variability? Explain.
2) The following are three students’ responses to question 1) above:
Students Answer
Student 1 Class C scores have the lowest variability because the graph has the slightest difference in column heights.
Class A scores have the highest variability because the graph has the most difference in column heights.
Student 2 Class A scores have the lowest variability because the graph has a large central peak, so there are many values
closest to the mean.
Class B scores have the highest variability because the graph is U-shaped, so there are many values furthest away
from the mean.
Student 3 Class B scores have the lowest variability because the graph has minor differences (7 columns).
Class C scores have the highest variability because the graph is spread and has the largest number of differences
(11 columns).
Please rate the true/false of the above answers and explain why?
3) Guess for what reason each student answered question 2 above?
4) In your opinion, what difficulties or mistakes will high school students encounter when comparing the variability of data presented in
histograms such as this exercise 2 (predicting difficulties/ mistakes and explain)?
5) Suppose you need to teach statistical data variability on histograms. Can you give specific instructions or notes to help high school
students correctly identify the variability of data on histograms (without having to do the calculations)?
In the lesson before the survey, we informed the PMTs teachers of the field of survey
content and how to do the test. We conducted a survey on teaching methods within one class
session (which can last five lessons). The PMTs were informed that taking the survey was seen
as a routine test. PMTs were allowed to use reference materials during the test.
After completing the data analysis and statistics of the survey results, we proceeded to the
second phase. Among the PMTs who participated in the first phase, we selected two groups: the
first group consisted of 3 PMTs at the University of Education – Hue University. The second
group consisted of 4 PMTs at the University of Education – Da Nang University. The PMTs
selected to participate in the LS had different types of knowledge at different levels. Although
the responses in the survey questionnaires of PMTs made typical mistakes, they all actively
expressed their views on the tasks set out in the survey. When invited to join the LS, PMTs
showed enthusiasm and voluntariness. Two researchers participated in LS as mentors. The two
researchers were also lecturers with expertise in math teaching methods. The researchers
worked closely with each study group, providing information on the subject matter, providing
guidance when needed, and being available for consultation during planning sessions. The steps
of the LS process and data collection methods were briefly described in Table 3.
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Table 3. Implementation and data collection in the lesson study

(Nguyen & Tran, 2021, p. 192)
Steps Activities Data collection methods
Step 1: Research – Researchers described LS with participating PMTs. – Record the process of exchanging, working,
the program, set – The researchers stated the topic and objective of the interviewing.
goals study lesson, provided the PMTs with relevant – Observe the discussions of the group members.
documents, and asked the PMTs to find additional – Note the strengths and limitations of the PMTs from
materials to use to design lesson plans. which to make initial assessments as a basis for
– The researchers interviewed to more closely evaluate comparing future knowledge progression.
the knowledge types of the PMTs of the world based on
the previous survey.
Step 2: Plan – PMTs work, discuss and prepare lesson content. – Record the discussion and exchange between PMTs and
– PMTs define specific goals, design lesson plans, make researchers.
teaching plans. – Observe discussions and take notes.
– Submit lesson plans for reviewers. – Table of assignments of work in the research group.
– Organize discussions between PMTs and researchers. – All versions of the lesson plan and the suggestions of
– PMTs edit lesson plans. the researchers.
Step 3: Practice – Choose a PMT to teach the lesson in the classroom. – Record video, record the lesson.
teaching for the – Other PMTs observe the lesson and take notes. – Researchers’ notes.
1st time – Observe the ability to comment and take notes of PMTs.
Step 4: Reflect – Organize discussion about the lesson, give suggestions, – Recording of discussions.
and learn from experience. – Notes of researchers and PMTs.
– Edit the lesson plan and teach the lesson again.
Step 5: Practice – Select a member of the group to re-teach the edited – Record video, record the lesson.
teaching for the lesson after the first lesson. – Researchers’ notes.
second time – Other PMTs observe the lesson and take notes. – Observe the ability to comment and take notes of PMTs.
Step 6: Discuss – Edit the lesson plan for the last time. – The final version of the lesson plan.
and reflect – Reflections of individual PMTs when participating – Interview questionnaire.
in LS. – Recording of discussions.
2.2. Data Analysis
After data collection in stage one, we analyzed the questionnaire using qualitative analysis.
Based on the specific keywords, we evaluated the mathematical knowledge types to teach the
variability in the bar charts and histograms of PMTs. We classified the answers of the PMTs
according to the solutions, then statistical the number of correct ideas that the PMTs gave. We
combined quantitative statistics with the qualitative analysis by constructing 5-level rating
scales numbered from 0 to 4 to code for each task. The rating scales were the basis of analysis
and statistics of PMTs’ answers. Encryption of data in open form was based on keywords
specific to knowledge types. Below, we presented a coding illustration of exercise 2.2 on SCK
after analyzing and statistics of the PMTs’ responses in Table 4.
Table 4. Assessment scale for exercise 2.2
Code Description
4 Accurately identify true/false and give clear explanations for the answers of all three students.
3 Accurately identify true/false, but only give correct explanations for the answers of two out of three students, including the correct
answer of student 2.
2 Accurately determine true/false but only give a correct explanation for one student’s answer.
1 Determine the true/false and provide explanations for the students’ answers but are not correct.
0 Neither true/false nor misinterpreted, no matching mathematics elements in the answer, or do not give any response.
In the second phase of LS implementation, we relied on the proposed indicators and
knowledge types to evaluate PMTs. Data analysis was carried out continuously during the
experiment. Then, we synthesized and evaluated the manifestations of knowledge of PMTs
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participating in the study in each step of the LS. In addition, the data were analyzed based on the
reflections of the participating PMTs themselves. Reflection questions required PMTs to
describe what they had learned, their progression of knowledge during discussions or
throughout the entire LS cycle.
This section presents the research results on each type of knowledge, focusing on the
analysis of CCK, SCK, KCS, and KCT of PMTs. Since then, we have made comparisons and
comments showing the progression of PMTs’ knowledge through the two phases of the study.
3.1. PMTs’ common content knowledge (CCK) for teaching variability in statistical graphs
and CCK development through lesson study
In the first stage, PMTs’ CCK for teaching variability in bar graphs and histograms was
evaluated through exercises 1.1 and 2.1. The results showed that for exercise 1.1, all (100%)
PMTs made correct statements about the variability of two areas A and B. However, only 47.5%
of PMTs could explain this question correctly. They gave different answers such as: using the
difference in rainfall of the months compared with the mean, range, or standard deviation of the
data set or based on the undulating or flat of graphs for an explanation. The results were the
opposite in exercise 2.1. Only 15.25% of PMTs correctly identified class A distribution
histogram with the lowest variability and class B with the highest variability. Most PMTs made
the mistake of comparing histogram variability based on the columns’ height difference as on
bar graphs. The above analysis showed that the PMTs’ CCK for teaching was still limited. They
did not fully understand the concept and representation of data variability on histograms.
Table 5. Illustrated answers to exercise 2.1
Teacher Illustration
PMT H34 was misinterpreted
due to confusion between data
values and frequencies, not
understanding the nature of
histograms
The average score of classes A, B and C is:

X A = 5.4; XB = 5.25; X C = 5.05.
– Based on the graphs, we can see that the values of the class C columns compared with the mean
score have the slightest difference, so there is the lowest variability.
– Class A scores have the greatest variability because the values of the score columns are higher than
the mean compared to those of class B.
PMT D31 correctly explained
based on the concept of
standard deviation
– Class A scores have the lowest variability because the graph has a high central peak value close to
the mean (=5.8), so the deviation between xi and X values is the least.
– Class B scores have the highest variability because the graph is U-shaped. The low central value
leads to the highest deviation between the xi values and the mean (=5.5).
Through the analysis of PMTs’ CCK, during the period of conducting LS, the researchers
chose the topic of the study lesson as “Variability of data in bar graphs and histograms” to
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consolidate and improve PMTs’ knowledge. In the lesson planning step, PMTs discussed how
to determine the variability in the bar graphs in exercise 1.1. They provided clear arguments to
explain the answer and made a judgment about the shape of the bar graphs so that variability
could be identified quickly.
PMT D09: In exercise 1.1, according to my intuition, the rainfall in area B is greater than in
area A because the difference in monthly rainfall in area B is more than in area A.
PMT D34: Because variability is evaluated by variance and standard deviation, we have a
1 m 2
formula for the variance s2  
n  i 1
(x i  x)  , so the further away the xi is
from the mean, the higher the variability. So visually, we can compare the difference
in monthly rainfall with the average rainfall to conclude that area B has a higher
variability.
PMT D17: Yes, based on the above analysis, we can quickly draw comments based on the
shape of the chart. Histograms with flat shapes have less variability than those
with undulating shapes.
However, in exercise 2.1, when considering the variability in histograms, PMTs still
thought that the height of the data column represented the frequency, so they assumed that the
class A histogram had the highest variability. This showed them to be wrong about the nature of
knowledge of histograms and how variability was determined. Through the discussion process,
under the suggestions of researchers, PMTs reviewed and made correct statements.
Researcher: Is the determination of variability in histograms the same as bar graphs? In
exercise 2.1, the histogram of which class has the smallest and largest variation?
Why?
PMT D47: Class C scores have the largest variation because class C scores range from 0 to 10,
class A scores have a minor variation because grades receive values from 2 to 9.
PMT D65: Class C scores have the lowest variation because the columns are uniformly tall;
class A scores have the highest variability because of the greatest difference in
height between columns.
Researcher: The variability is determined by the variance and standard deviation. So, first, let
us estimate the average of the 3-class point plots?
PMT D40: The horizontal moving average is about 5.4.
PMT D61: This is incorrect because such plotting corresponds to the frequency value, not the
data value. These are distribution charts, so the moving average should be a
vertical line for data values between 4.3-5.7 in the charts.
Researcher: So, how do you estimate the distance of the data values from the average line on
the point plot of the three classes?
PMT D61: Graph A has many values centered around the mean most, so the smallest
deviation from the mean means the lowest variability. Graph B has the most data
values farthest from the mean, so there will be deviations from the mean, inferring
the highest variability.
PMT D40: So, from the above analysis, we can also rely on the distribution shape of the
graph. A U-shaped chart will have a larger variation than a flat or bell-shaped
one, usually small.
In addition, the researcher emphasized the practical application of this content to help
PMTs better understand the meaning of variability in bar graphs and histograms. Through the
discussion about the content of the study, PMTs also realized that their knowledge has been
consolidated and gradually improved.
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3.2. PMTs’ specialized content knowledge (SCK) for teaching variability in statistical
graphs and SCK development through lesson study
PMTs’ SCK for teaching variability in bar graphs and histograms was assessed through
exercises 1.2, 2.2. 1.3, 2.3. Exercises 1.2 and 1.3 asked PMTs to comment on true/false and
explained the answers of 4 students about comparing the rainfall variability of two areas A and
B. The results showed that 55.93% of PMTs achieved codes 3 and 4 in exercise 1.2. Although
PMTs’ CCK achieved 100%, only half of them could assess the accuracy and specific
interpretation of the four students’ answers. This ratio was much lower in exercise 2.2 on
comparing variability in histograms. Up to 42.37% of PMTs have codes of 0 and 1, which
means they misjudged students’ answers or gave no feedback. Only 39.83% (code 2) PMTs
provided explanations for one student’s answer, mainly the wrong answer of student 3. With the
task of predicting the reasons for the student’s answers, it was possible to demonstrate the
ability of PMTs to deeply understand how students think when learning about variability in
statistical graphs.
Figure 3. Data representation of SCK1

The results of Exercises 1.3 and 2.3 in Figure 4 showed that the percentage of predictive
PMTs for students’ responses (code 4) in both cases was low. Most PMTs only got codes 1 and
2, which means they only made correct predictions for one student’s answer or answered
incorrectly. Some PMTs still did not understand how students reasoned or gave evidence of
knowledge for students’ answers.
Figure 4. Data representation of SCK2

The above analysis showed that PMTs’ SCK for teaching variability in bar graphs and
histograms was still very limited. Besides, the results also showed that even if the teachers had
good CCK, it was not possible to say that their SCK would be good.
During the LS phase, the development of PMTs’ SCK was demonstrated through
discussions and lesson planning steps. PMTs discussed exercise 1.2 and predicted the reasons
for the student’s answers.
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PMT H17: In exercise 1.2, student 2 answered correctly by using variance, the standard
deviation to explain variability. Student 1 answered incorrectly because
variability was not measured by monthly rainfall. The reason for student 1’s
answer was that area A had more months with higher rainfall, so there should be
more variability.
PMT H09: So, student 3 and student 4 both gave the wrong answer. Why did they give such
an answer?
PMT H34: Student 3 confused comparing rainfall variability with comparing average
rainfall. Moreover, student 4 thought that there must be specific data to
calculate to compare. Student 4 did not know how to compare the variation
based on the shape of the bar graphs.
Besides, PMTs were also active in providing arguments and explanations for students’
answers in exercise 2.3.
PMT D47: Student 1 confused histograms with bar graphs, so he relied on the difference of
the columns to infer the variability of the data.
PMT D61: Student 2 answered correctly. Here, student 2 can use variance to explain or
compare variability based on the shape of the distribution of the histogram.
PMT D40: Why did student 3 give such an answer?
PMT D65: Student 3 thought that the graphs with the most columns of data values had the
highest variability.
Although there were more in-depth discussions about students’ answer options, teacher
D47 was still confused in giving evidence of knowledge and arguments for some students when
teaching for the first time. This was improved in the second practical lesson after PMTs
discussed the first lesson together. The precise analysis of the nature of knowledge in students’
answers helped PMTs have a more comprehensive and complete view. So, PMTs’ SCK
was enhanced to serve good teaching. This was also responded to by PMTs when providing
end-of-cycle comments.
Commenting on students’ responses to the
survey helps PMTs predict student
responses. This helps the teacher prepare
the explanation in advance and point out the
students’ mistakes after the student
answers. Then, the lesson is better taught.
Students learn more effectively.
Besides, my knowledge in different aspects
has increased. In my opinion, this quality of
the teacher is essential. Not only does it
help teachers approach a variety of
problems, but it also helps teachers predict
student responses. From there, teachers
design appropriate questions to help
students learn more effectively. In addition,
predicting student mistakes helps teachers
to devise appropriate test questions to
evaluate students.
Figure 5. Illustrated PMT D61’s response to SCK
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3.3. PMTs’ knowledge of content and student (KCS) for teaching variability in statistical
graphs and KCS development through lesson study
Exercises 1.4, 2.4 were aimed at exploring PMTs’ knowledge about potential difficulties of
students when comparing the variability of data shown in bar graphs, histograms, and causes of
difficulties. PMTs’ answers were gathered and classified by keywords related to this type of
knowledge. Although we classified into seven difficulties and common mistakes, PMTs only
raised four opinions at most. PMTs raised four very low reasonable opinions (6 PMTs in
exercise 1.4 and 2 PMTs in exercise 2.4). About half of the PMTs mentioned two difficulties
and mistakes of students. In exercise 1.4, most PMTs focused on mistakes like “variability is
compared over the mean and assumes that variability of the data is the same if they have the
same mean” or “variability of the data depends on the height of the value column, the larger the
height of the value column, the higher variability.” In addition, the mistakes in the case of
variability in histograms (exercise 2.4) were raised mainly in the idea that “the histogram with
the largest difference in column heights has the highest variability” or “the greater the number
of columns of the histogram, the greater the variability.” Some common difficulties were also
raised by PMTs, such as “do not understand the concept of variability and do not know what
parameters variability is measured by” or “cannot determine the type of graphs and do not know
how to read the information on histograms.” PMTs also mentioned some common difficulties
and mistakes students make/face when learning the variability shown in the chart, but it was still
incomplete. Besides, few PMTs could explain the causes of these mistakes of students. This
showed that PMTs had not accumulated enough knowledge about students’ thoughts to
participate in the process of teaching this content effectively.
LS provided a suitable environment for group discussion, made general comments on the
knowledge components of KCS. This was revealed in the preparation and implementation of the
lesson plans. During the discussion and revision of the lesson plans, PMTs had to edit and
supplement the predicted questions and the student’s responses scenarios. This helped PMTs in
the process of teaching practice confidently and proactively. They pointed out the students’
mistakes and explained them clearly. In addition, they also set out appropriate tasks to properly
assess students’ abilities, create learning motivation and develop competence for students. After
the first practical teaching session, PMTs and researchers gave feedbacks to help consolidate
knowledge on how to ask questions or answer questions to clarify students’ thinking.
Researcher: What do you notice about the students’ understanding of the content of the
variability shown in bar graphs and histograms?
PMT D47: For the task of comparing the rainfall variability of two areas in bar graphs,
some students thought they had to calculate the variance of the two graphs to
compare, so when the graphs did not have specific values, students said that
there was no comparison. Some other students commented on the visual sense of
the shape of the diagram, but its mathematical nature could not explain it.
PMT D61: It is worth noting that when students already know how to determine the
variation based on the shape of bar graphs, they apply that knowledge to
histograms, which leads to mistakes.
Researcher: From the difficulties and mistakes, we need to analyze the nature of knowledge
better to help students understand better.
From the above analysis, PMTs made corrections in the following lesson plans. In addition,
the positive feedback on the development of KCS when participating in LS was also raised by
PMTs in the final interview form of the study.
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Anticipating the answers (true/false) of students helps

PMTs to be more active in teaching, not to be
surprised. At the same time, PMTs develop the ability
to predict situations in teaching. After the LS, I noticed
that PMTs’ ability to evaluate answers improved,
specifically:
– Can predict from basic to complex error situations.
– Be more careful in predicting and evaluating
students’ mistakes, explaining students’ answers.
Figure 6. PMT H34 feedback about KCS
3.4. PMTs’ knowledge of content and teaching (KCT) for teaching variability in statistical
graphs and KCT development through lesson study
KCT could be assessed by understanding the different ways and methods of teaching a
particular mathematical idea and knowing how to implement them effectively. Exercises 1.5 and
2.5 were intended to demonstrate PMTs’ ability to teach variability in bar graphs and
histograms. The provision of specific instructions and notes in teaching proved that PMTs
understood variability of data, how to describe or identify them in the graphs, combined with
the ability to teach this content effectively.
Figure 7 summarizes the number of ideas that PMTs have come up with about KCT. In
exercise 1.5, up to 29 PMTs (24.58%) did not provide any instructions to guide students to
determine variability in bar graphs. Most PMTs provided one or two instructions for students,
mainly focusing on the instructions “in bar graphs, compare the values from the columns with
the mean, if the level of data value is different from the larger, the graph will have a greater
variability” or “depending on the distribution shape of the bar graphs, if the graph has a flatter
shape, variability will be lower than the graph with an undulating shape. “In exercise 2.5, up to
63.55% of PMTs (75 PMTs) gave no feedback. The remaining PMTs only correctly state 1 or 2
instructions, mainly “determine or estimate the mean on the histogram, then compare the
convergence of data around the mean. The histogram with more data closer to the mean has less
variability.” Few PMTs guided how to determine variability based on the shape of histograms.
Figure 7. Graphs of PMTs’ opinions on KCT

From the above analysis, it was clear that PMTs can have good CCK of variability in bar
graphs or histograms, but it was unlikely that they could teach this content well. Therefore, it
was necessary to replenish and train pedagogical content knowledge in teaching practice for
PMTs to improve their professional capacity.
In the LS phase, the progress of PMTs’ KCT was seen through lesson plans and teaching
practice. Specifically, in the discussions of the planning step, PMTs spent much time choosing
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the suitable problems and designing them so that the knowledge sequence was arranged
correctly. In addition, PMTs were more interested in the system’s design, open and closed
questions to guide knowledge, and questions suitable for teaching situations.
PMT D47: We choose exercises for both the cases of variability expressed in bar graphs and
histograms. After students calculated specific parameter values, ask students to
identify or estimate them on two types of graphs, noting the different
representations of the mean in bar graphs and histograms.
PMT D61: From determining or comparing variability by variance or standard deviation based
on calculating specific values, it was necessary to teach students how to determine
variability by visualizing the range of variation, the convergence of the data values
from the mean, or based on the type graphs and the shape of their distribution.
PMT D47: In addition to selecting content, we need to outline the sequence of instructions
when teaching and design a system of appropriate leading-in and prompting
questions for teachers to be more active in teaching practice.
In the later stages of LS, PMTs have had more collaborations and exchanges on
pedagogical methods related to the design of lessons. In addition, they also made more general
statements about the significance of the variability shown in the statistical graphs.
“The instruction to analyze and look at graphs visually based on the parameters and the
shape of the graphs gives students the skills to analyze and acquire data information on graphs
quickly, contributing to the development of students’ statistical thinking ability.” – Comment of
PMT H34.
In the second teaching practice session and through the final questionnaire, the researchers
found a complete and solid development of knowledge about teaching variability in bar graphs
and histograms of PMTs. PMT D47 commented:
“As for building lesson plans, designing activities for the lesson is not an easy task in my
own experience. The synthesis of knowledge and transmission to students is not a one-day
process. Being involved in the study of the lesson, and working with other PMTs, we have
supported each other to improve the lesson plan step by step, gradually complete it and come up
with a variety of teaching design options that are suitable for students. The knowledge imparted
to the students is built more logically, mobilizing their ability to acquire the knowledge, not
passively impart it. When I myself deliver the lesson, this knowledge helps me confidently carry
out it more effectively, flexibly and proactively.”
Table 6. The development of PMTs’ knowledge for teaching variability in statistical graphs through LS
Practice
Practice Discuss
Research the teaching for
Plan teaching for the Reflect and
Indicators program, set goals the second
(Step 2) 1st time (Step 4) reflect
(Step 1) time
(Step 3) (step 6)
(step 5)
Do not understand Understand the Full expression Full expression Full expression Full
the concept of concept of expression
variability but know variability and
CCK1
the parameters to know the
evaluate parameters to
evaluate
Variability in the Discuss determining Present the Full expression Full expression Full
graphs has not been the variability in the meaning of the expression
CCK2
determined and chart based on the parameters and
explained yet parameters usage to students
No specific Discuss the answers Give correct Full expression Full expression Full
SCK1
explanation for and explain them comments to expression
241
Practice
Practice Discuss
Research the teaching for
Plan teaching for the Reflect and
Indicators program, set goals the second
(Step 2) 1st time (Step 4) reflect
(Step 1) time
(Step 3) (step 6)
(step 5)
students’ answers students’ answers
has been given
No evidence has been The discussion The solutions Discuss students’ Show analysis Full
given to analyze the provides relevant mentioned have answers to the and expression
students’ reasoning knowledge to clarify not been clearly problem explanations
SCK2
the reason for the analyzed for students’
student’s answer answers while
teaching
Not paying attention Discuss students’ Students’ Choose tasks that Good Full
to the common common reactions difficulties have clarify knowledge presentation of expression
difficulties of and difficulties not been clearly that students find questions that
KCS1
students analyzed difficult reveal
difficulties and
mistakes
Not to mention the Analyze answers to The reasons for Discuss and Clear analysis, Full
way of thinking or see how students the students’ predict students’ creating expression
KCS2
predicting mistakes think mistakes have not answer options excitement for
of students been given fully students
Only talk about Exchange, select Not showing Discuss, edit Full expression Full
content and goals teaching content, enough exercises to be expression
build a system of prompting more suitable,
KCT1
expected questions questions to mention the
exploit students’ meaning and
knowledge apply in practice
Not to mention the Discuss the Do not know how Discuss how to use Implement Full
teaching plan sequence of steps to to set up methods to help appropriate expression
class and situations for students learn teaching
KCT2
appropriate students to actively methods
teaching plans discover on their
own
CONCLUSION
Our study provided initial survey results on knowledge of PMTs for teaching variability in
statistical graphs. From there, we applied LS to develop PMTs’ types of knowledge for teaching
variability. Progress in both subject content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge of
PMTs was cultivated through each step of LS. PMTs, who participate in LS, must discuss
mathematics content knowledge and focus on pedagogical content knowledge, student learning
knowledge, and teaching knowledge. This helped them gain a deeper understanding of teaching
content related to the study lesson. PMTs themselves also noticed and gave positive feedback
about their knowledge development for teaching. They not only acknowledged the difficulties
but also affirmed that participating in LS was a perfect opportunity to equip themselves with
more knowledge, skills to develop their professional capacity and increase interest in learning
and teaching mathematics.
The results of the study have contributed to the initial confirmation that LS can be applied
in the professional training of teaching for PMTs, promoting the collaborative development of
their knowledge and teaching capacity in the training process. This assertion is consistent with
242
the studies of Leavy & Hourigan (2016, 2018) on the effectiveness of LS when applied to
teacher training. In addition, LS has helped PMTs to reflect more seriously on their teaching.
Furthermore, LS provides opportunities to build learning communities in the process of teacher
training, improves the ability to work in groups, and strengthens PMTs’ confidence to teach.
From the research results, we suggest that LS needs to be applied more in the practical subjects
of teaching mathematics at the university of education to develop professional competence for
PMTs, to respond to the current educational reform needs.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This research is funded by Vietnam National Foundation for Science and Technology
Development (NAFOSTED) under grant number 503.01-2020.308.
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About the authors

– MSc Nguyen Thi Ha Phuong is a lecturer at the University of Science and Education,
The University of Da Nang in Vietnam. She is currently a PhD student in Mathematics the
University of Education, Hue University. Her current research focuses on mathematics teachers’
professional competencies for teaching statistics at the secondary level.
Dean of the Mathematics Department at the University of Education, Hue University, in
Vietnam. He earned a PhD in Mathematics Education at the Paris Diderot University in France.
His research interests are mathematics teachers’ professional competencies and the use of
technology in the teaching and learning of mathematics. He has published research articles in
some international mathematics education journals such as ZDM, Canadian Journal of Science,
Mathematics and Technology Education.
245
PRIMARY TEACHER’S COMPETENCE TO IMPLEMENT PROJECT-BASED

LEARNING IN THE CENTRAL HIGHLANDS – VIET NAM
Bui Thi Tam*1, Duong Giang Thien Huong2
Abtract: Teaching competence is considered as a teacher’s core ability, in which the selection
and implementation of teaching methods play an important role in the realization of teaching
objectives. Project-based learning is a student-centered teaching model, learning by project not
only contributes to students’ knowledge and capacities but also develops communication and
cooperation skills, problem solving skills, creativity, self-study ability, presentation skills,
information and technology usage, etc. Acknowledge the great benefits of project-based
learning, many research has focused on its arguments and applied this method into high schools
teaching subjects. However, there’re still limitations in project-based learning research from
teachers in the primary school. In this study, we surveyed 406 primary teachers in 5 provinces of
the Central Highlands including Gia Lai, Kon Tum, Dak Lak, Dak Nong, and Lam Dong. The
working areas of the teachers are diverse, and range from disadvantaged communes (region 3)
to favorable locations (city) in terms of the primary teachers’ competence to implement PBL,
including the ability to select, organize, assess in projects, etc. Survey results show that the ability
to apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands is only at the average level. In addition,
the research also points out the factors affecting the capacity to apply PBL of primary teachers in
the Central Highlands such as qualifications, in-service training, seniority, and soft skills of
teachers. Based on obtained results, we give some recommendations for teachers, school
administrators, pedagogy universities, and teacher training institutions in the Central Highlands
to develop the PBL competence as well as other active teaching methods of teachers
Keywords: competence, project-based learning, primary teachers, Vietnam’s Central Highlands
INTRODUCTION
According to researchers, at the end of the 16th century, Italian schools of architecture and
construction started using teaching methods based on projects in some simple forms. However,
it was not until the beginning of the 20th century that American pedagogues, including
Kilpatrick, developed a theory for PBL and considered it as an important teaching method to
implement the student-centered approach, in order to overcome the disadvantages of traditional
teaching with the teacher-centered approach (Meier & Cuong, 2020). Similar to Kilpatrick, the
Buck Institute researchers (USA) also view PBL as a teaching method in which students acquire
knowledge and skills by working for a long time to investigate and answer a complex question,
problem or challenge” (Duc & Quyen, 2019). Meanwhile, K. Frey considered the PBL as a form
of teaching in which learners in a team identify a learning topic, agree on the content, plan and
carry out the work themselves to arrive at a meaningful ending with a recommendable product
(Huong, 2014). The uniqueness of PBL is the construction of an end product, a “concrete item”
that represents the students’ new insights, knowledge, and attitudes about the investigated
problems, commonly presented by videos, photographs, sketches, reports, models, and other
collected artifacts (Holubova, 2008). Kilpatrick proposed a process of PBL including
determining the purpose, planing, implementing and evaluating the project (Kilpatrick, 1918).
Katz and Lilian G. identified three phases of a project, including the beginning phase; the
implementation phase; and the presentation phase. For the beginning phase, the author
* Corresponding Author: Bui Thi Tam; E-mail Address: bttam@ttn.edu.vn

1 Tay Nguyen University
246
emphasizes the topic selection, (topics can be suggested by students or teachers). In the
implementation phase, the center of the project, students study, discover, explore, anticipate,
and discuss the topics. In the presentation phase, students prepare and present the results via
reports and products (Katz & Chard, 1992). PBL provided a range of benefits for both students
and teachers, namely: increasing participation, self-reliance to the content, and improving
attitudes towards learning of students; improving professionalism and collaboration among
instructors as well as opportunities to build relationships with learners (Thomas, 2000).
Learning through projects would increase students’ engagement and interest in contents,
significantly develop strongly problem-solving strategies, and transfer new skills (Holm, 2011);
enhance student’s learning motivation since they engaged with the real world and challenging
problems (Tamim & Grant, 2013). In addition, PBL may also foster the qualities of workers in
the new era that are the responsibility, independence and discipline of learners (Bell, 2010).
Besides the benefits, implementing a project would also face challenges from the curriculum,
student’s parents, teachers, and students (Aldabbus, 2018). Ravitz argued that even teachers
who are enthusiastic about innovative teaching methods feel difficult to implement projects in
their classrooms (Ravitz, 2003). Furthermore, successful implementation of a learning project
requires certain conditions such as spacious classrooms with adequate resources, technology,
and trained and experienced teachers to guide and motivate learners to investigate in-depth the
learning topic.
In the article “Project-based learning or teaching according to project”, Cuong (1997)
focused on presenting a history of the formation and development of PBL as well as analyzing
the philosophical basis of this teaching method. He said that PBL is a form of teaching in which
students, under the control and help of teachers, independently solve a complex learning task
that is not only about theoretical aspects, but especially in terms of practice, through which to
create practical products that can be introduced and published (Cuong, 1997). After that, the
study of the theory of PBL has been continued and enhanced by Thao (2009), Khoa (2015),
Binh & Tra (2018), etc. Up to now, many authors have studied the PBL in subjects from
kindergarten to vocational training and their results confirm the effectiveness of PBL for teacher
training (Thao, 2009), developing the student’s competencies (Khoa, 2015), improving the
quality of teaching subjects (Ha, 2016), (Nga & Tra, 2010) and educating social skills in
primary schools (Huong, 2016). In the field of teacher training, big projects such as Intel, high
school teacher development, and Viet-Belgium projects all refer to PBL and the application of
PBL in teaching. Studies have confirmed that in order to apply PBL, the factors of teachers,
learners, and facilities play a decisive role. However, in reality, the primary teachers in our
country are not evenly qualified. A part of them is not fully aware of PBL, has not masterfully
applied the steps in the teaching process, and thus cannot apply PBL, or apply without
understanding the nature of PBL.
The Central Highlands is a difficult area with the lowest quality of education in the country.
To be able to meet the conditions for the implementation of the new General Education Program
and further, to bring the Central Highlands out of the “bottom land” of education, the Central
Highlands’ education system needs to make more efforts to improve the quality of education.
One of the breakthrough solutions is to train the teachers according to new standards and
regulations, and at the same time prepare them for the readiness to receive innovation, including
fostering and updating theories on teaching competence development, applying teaching
methods and forms to develop students’ competence. Therefore, the survey of the ability to
apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands would provide educational agencies
with useful data that is the basis for content development and implementation training and
in-service training plan suitable for primary teachers in this region.
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RESEARCH CONTENT
1. Concepts
1.1. Competence
Hac (2013) said that “Competence is a combination of psychological characteristics of a
person (also known as a combination of psychological attributes of a personality), this
combination of characteristics operates according to a specific purpose to produce the result of a
certain activity”. In the General Education Program 2018, the definition of competence is as
follows: “Competence which is an individual attribute formed and developed by inherent
qualities and the process of learning, training enables people to mobilize the synthesis of
knowledge, skills and other personal attributes such as interest and belief, etc to successfully
perform a certain type of activity, achieving the desired results under concrete conditions”
(MOET, 2018). From this definition, the main characteristics of competence can be drawn as
follows: Competence is a combination of inherent qualities and the learning and training process
of learners; Competence is the result of general mobilization of knowledge, skills and other
personal attributes such as interest, belief or will. Competence is formed and developed through
activities and is expressed via successful performance in practice. From the above perspectives,
we define competence as follows: Competence is the ability to apply knowledge, experience,
skills, attitudes and interests to act appropriately and effectively in various situations of life.
1.2. Pedagogical competence
Pedagogical competence is a special ability of the teaching profession, according to Pham
Minh Hac’s point of view, “pedagogical competence is a combination of psychological
characteristics of personality to meet the requirements of pedagogical activities and determine
the success of these activities” (Hac, 2013). The teacher’s activities as an educator include two
basic types of activities: teaching and education. Therefore, when studying the competence of
teachers, it is necessary to study those two activities.
1.3. Teaching competence
For any teacher (including primary school’s one), to perform their roles and duties well, the
requirements for quality and competence are indispensable. Among the competencies, teaching
competence is the core one. The teaching competence of each teacher is the flexible
combination of subject knowledge with practical skills as well as the teacher’s interest to
achieve effective teaching goals.
1.4. Project-based learning
PBL is a form of teaching in which learners perform a complex learning task, with a
combination of theory and practice to create specific products. Learning tasks are carried out
with a high degree of self-reliance of students, from which they determine the purpose, plan
implementation, check, adjust, evaluate processes and results of the project (Vase & Tea, 2018).
The essence of PBL is that learners acquire knowledge and skills through solving a real-life
case study (project). At the end of the project, learners must complete at least one specific
product.
1.5. The competence to apply project-based learning
The competence to implement PBL is understood as the application of the teacher’s
knowledge and skills (including the ones about PBL) to organize PBL in the subjects in primary
schools. In this article, we investigate the competence to apply PBL of teachers from selecting,
implementing, to evaluating the project.
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2. Research methods
To what extent is the teacher’s ability to apply project teaching in the Central Highlands?
Do factors such as training qualifications, in-service training, educational environment and
the region, seniority and soft skills of of teachers affect the applicability of PBL? To answer the
above research questions, we used a questionnaire for 406 primary school teachers from
extremely disadvantaged communes to more developed cities in 5 provinces of the Central
Highlands, namely: Gia Lai, Kon Tum, Dak Lak, Dak Nong, and Lam Dong. The survey was
conducted in July 2021.
The survey is conducted as follows:
+ Develop a questionnaire to find out the current situation of the teacher’s competence to
apply PBL in primary schools in the Central Highlands. In this article, the PBL competence of
primary teachers is assessed on a 5-level scale:
1 = never implement: The teacher never applies PBL in teaching.
2 = rarely implement: The teacher rarely applies PBL in teaching.
3 = occasionally implement: The teacher applies PBL occasionally in teaching.
4 = frequently implement: The teacher applies PBL regularly in teaching.
5 = very frequently implement: The teacher applies PBL constantly in teaching
How to evaluate: Distance value = (maximum value – minimum value)/n = (5-1)/5 = 0.8
(with n=5). The values of levels are rescaled as follows: from 1.00 to 1.80 is never implement;
from 1.81 to 2.60 is rarely implement (low level); from 2.61 to 3.40 is occasionally implement
(average level); from 3.41 to 4.20 is frequently implement (fair level); from 4.21 to 5.00 is very
frequently implement (good level).
+ Select the survey samples: randomly sent to teachers in the Central Highlands provinces,
including Dak Lak (127), Gia Lai (88), Dak Nong (85), Kon Tum (55) and Lam Dong (51).
Among them, there are 64 teachers working in the city (accounting for 15.8%), 159 teachers
working in town/region 1 (accounting for 39.2%), 122 teachers working in region
2/disadvantaged areas (accounting for 30%), 61 teachers working in region 3 (accounting for
15%). About the working seniority from 1 to 5 years, there are 118 teachers (accounting for
29.1%), from 6 to 10 years there are 71 teachers (accounting for 17.5%), from 11 to 15 years,
there are 63 teachers (accounting for 15.5%), from 15 to 20 years there are 65 teachers
(accounting for 16%), above 21 years there are 89 teachers (accounting for 21.9%).
Conduct the survey: Online survey via Google Form.
Process the results after the survey using SPSS 20.0: We use frequency statistics for the
current situation of the teacher’s competence to apply PBL in primary schools in the Central
Highlands and analyze the variance factor (ANOVA) to find out the factors affecting the ability
to apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands.
3. Findings
3.1. The general current situation of the teacher’s competence to apply of project-based
learning in the primary schools in the Central Highlands
Despite advantages in developing student’s competence, the learning content is close to
real life and creates the student’s learning interest, PBL has not been prioritized by primary
teachers in Central Highlands. Firgure 1 shows that the percentage of primary teachers in The
Central Highlands who self-assess themselves at the level of very frequently implement is 4.9%,
the rate for frequently implement is 24.4%, the rate for occasionally implement is 50.5%, the
rate for rarely of implementation is 17.7% and the percentage of teachers who never implement
PBL accounts for 2.7 %. The results show that the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in
the surveyed group is average, there are still a large number of teachers who assess themselves
at low levels. We partly predicted this result before the survey, because compared with other
249
localities in the country, the Central Highlands has its own geographical characteristics (the
network of schools and classes is widespread, especially in communes in highland,
deep-lying, remote areas and special difficulties areas), historical factors left in teacher training;
social life is still difficult; facilities for teaching and learning are still weak and insufficient.
Firgure 1. The general situation of the teacher’s competence to apply PBL in the Central Highlands by the
level of implementation
To learn more about the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in Central Highlands, we
analyzed the survey results for each content in the questionnaire. We compared the level of
ability to apply PBL of primary teachers according to their working areas, training
qualifications, seniority, and soft skills. From there, the factors affecting the competence to
apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands were discovered.
2.3.2. The current situation of the teacher’s competence to apply PBL in the primary schools in
Central Highlands
a. The teacher’s competence in selecting project
Table 1. Levels of implementation in selecting project
Level (%) Mean Ranking
No. Items 3. occasionally 5. very
1. never of 2. rarely of 4. frequently of
of frequently of
implemention implemention implemention
implemention implemention
Select the project theme
1 Based on social
and local practical 2.7 30.5 49 14.3 3.4 2.85 9
issues
2 Based on the
goal/content of 0.5 20 54.9 21.4 3.2 3.07 1
the subject
3 Based on student’s
1.7 24.9 49 20.2 4.2 3.00 4
characteristics
4 Based on the
actual conditions 1.2 22.2 52.7 20 3.9 3.03 3
of the school
Identify project goals
5 Indetify the
students’ cognitive
2.7 26.1 48 20 3.2 2.95 8
level based on
Bloom’s revised
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Level (%) Mean Ranking

No. Items 3. occasionally 5. very
1. never of 2. rarely of 4. frequently of
of frequently of
implemention implemention
taxonomy:
remembering,
understanding,
applying,
analyzing,
evaluating and
creating
6 Use action verbs to
write goals which
1.7 24.1 50.6 20.9 2.7 2.99 5
are quantifiable
and measurable
7 Present the
student’s skills
2.2 24.1 51.3 19 3.4 2.97 6
developed in the
project topic
8 Present effects of
implementing
learning activities
on students’
2.0 23.9 50.7 20.4 3 2.99 5
awareness, life
values and
behavioral
orientation
9 Identify
competencies that
students have in
the process of
discovering
knowledge and 2.2 19 53.7 21.7 3.4 3.05 2
applying it to
solving practical
problems, creating
products of real
value.
Identify problems that need to be solved
10 Identify problems
to be solved in the 2.0 22.9 54.4 18.2 2.5 2.96 7
project topic
11 Develop specific
content that needs
2.2 21.2 48.8 24.6 3.2 3.05 2
to be used to solve
the problem
12 Give relevant
guiding questions
1.2 23.9 49.5 21.7 3.7 3.03 3
for each of the
above issues
The first step in the process of applying PBL is to select a project. In this step, the teacher
bases on the content/objectives of the subject/chapter/lesson, on the actual social/local/school
251
situation and students’ interests to build project topics and then define the objectives and the
problems to be solved in the project. The above table shows the four bases for choosing a
project topic. Among them, the teachers are most interested in the basis of objectives/content of
the subject; next are the ones of student’s characteristics, and of actual facilities conditions of
schools. Particularly, the basis of practical problems of society and localities is less interested in
than the others, and has the lowest average score, 2.95. This problem is completely consistent
with the current reality that teachers are too familiar with the traditional methods of teaching
and have not stepped out of the framework: school – classroom – teacher – student. This
problem is one of the challenges that many researchers point out in their research on PBL.
For the determination of project objectives, the percentage of teachers who choose never of
implementation ranges from 1.7% to 2.7%, of which 2.7% of teachers have not yet determined
the students’ cognitive level according to the Bloom’s revised taxonomy. The rate of rarely of
implementation ranges from 19% to 26.1%, in which items such as determine the students’
awareness level according to the Bloom’s revised taxonomy is 26.1%; present of student skills
developed in the project topic is 24.1%; present effects of implementing learning activities on
student’s awareness, life values and behavioral orientation is 23.9%; identify competencies that
students have in the process of discovering knowledge and applying it to solving practical
problems, creating products of real value is 19%; identify problems to be solved in the project
topic ranges from 48% to 54.9%, in which the items namely: identify competencies that students
have in the process of discovering knowledge and applying it to solving practical problems,
creating products of real value is 53.7%. The percentage of teachers who chose frequently of
implementation ranges from 19% to 21.7%. The rate of teachers who chose very frequently of
implementation is still at a low level, ranging from 2.7% to 4.2%. The results of the above table
show that, in terms of determining the project’s objectives, the competence of primary teachers
in the Central Highlands is at an average level. These are almost mandatory requirements when
implementing PBL, but the very frequently of implementation level of teachers is low. The
reason is that primary teachers in this region are still limited in terms of training qualifications
and in-service training.
For the criterion of determining the problems that need to be solved, the level of frequently
of implementation ranges from 18.2% to 24.6%, in which the item such as teachers perform at
the highest level are the developing specific content that needs to be used to solve the problem
(24.6%); the level of very frequently of implementation ranges from 2.5% to 3.7%.
b. The teacher’s competence to organize PBL in Central Highlands
Table 2. Levels of implementation in organizing PBL
No. Items Level (%) Mean Ranking
1. never of 2. rarely of 3. occasionally 4. frequently 5. very
implemention implemention of of frequently of
Prepare to train necessary skills for students before implementing the project
13 Train information 2.5 16.5 50.4 28.1 2.5 3.12 4
technology
colection skills
14 Train information 1.5 20.2 48 26.6 3.7 3.11 5
processing skills
15 Train 2.0 13.3 45.3 36 3.4 3.26 1
communication
and cooperation
skills
252

16 Train information 3.4 19 48 27.4 2.2 3.06 8
technology using
skills to present
products and
search for
documents on the
Internet
17 Train assessment 2.7 14.3 47.3 32.3 3.4 3.19 3
and self-
assessment skills
for students
18 Train presentation 2.0 15.3 46.4 32.8 3.5 3.2 2
skills
Teaching organization
19 Determine 3.4 24.1 50.3 19.2 3.0 2.94 10
conditions for
organizing
activities as space
(classroom, home,
laboratory,
production
facility...) and time
20 Determine the 1 20.4 51.3 23.9 3.4 3.08 6
main teaching
methods and
techniques to
organize activities
such as teaching
problem solving,
teaching discovery,
PBL, teaching
cooperatively, etc;
xyz, jigsaw, walk
galleries,
mindmap, etc
21 Determine means 2.7 22.2 49.3 21.9 3.9 3.02 9
to organize PBL
22 Detemine steps to 1.5 21.4 50.2 22.2 4.7 3.07 7
carry out the
activity: specify the
actions to carry out
the activity
In order to successfully organize PBL, teachers need to train students with some skills such
as information collecting and processing skills, communication skills, cooperation skills in
teamwork and presentation skills, etc. The survey results illustrate that the self-assessment of
the manifestations of PBL organization competence at the level of never of implementation
ranges from 1.5% to 3.4%, in which items such as: train information technology using skills to
present products and search for documents on the Internet is 3.4%; train assessment and
253
self-assessment skills for students is 2.7% and train information processing skills is 1.5%. For the
level of rarely of implementation, the rate ranges from 13.3% to 20.2%. The rate of level of train
communication and cooperation skills is 13.3%. For the level of occasionally of implementation,
the rate accounts for the majority, ranges from 45.3% to 50.5% of teachers. For the level of
frequently of implementation, the percentage ranges from 26.6% to 36%, in which items such
as: train information processing skills is 3.7%; train communication and cooperation skills rages
3.4% and train information processing skills is 2.5%. With the above results, we find that
primary teachers in The Central Highlands are very interested and often foster students in skills
such as communication and coordination skills, presentation skills and assessment and
self-assessment skills. However, skills in using information technology have not been
performed well (ranked 12/23). The reason is that the information technology competence of
teachers is still limited, the facilities at the schools are still inadequate, especially many schools
in the communes are in Region 3 where schools do not have projectors and basic facilities for
teaching activities...
For the ability of teachers to organize PBL activities, the percentage of teachers who chose
never of implementation varies from 1% to 3.4%, specifically the following items: determine
conditions for organizing activities as space (classroom, home, laboratory, production facility...)
and time is 3.4%; determine the main teaching methods and techniques to organize activities
such as teaching problem solving, teaching discovery, PBL, teaching cooperatively, etc; xyz,
jigsaw, walk galleries, mindmap, etc is 1%. The rate of teachers who chose the level of rarely
of implementation rages from 20.4% to 24.1%. There are 45.3% to 50.5% of teachers
self-assessing at the level of occasionally of implementation and the level of very frequently of
implementation rages from 3% to 3.9%. The above results indicate that the competence of
primary teachers to organize PBL is at an average level, especially for the following items such
as: determine means to organize PBL identifying methods, techniques and means and detemine
steps to carry out the activity, the the majority of teachers implemented very well, in particular,
the criteria for identifying c conditions for organizing activities as space (classroom, home,
laboratory, production facility...) and time the rate is low with Mean = 2.94.
c. The teacher’s assessment comptence in PBL in primary schools in Central Highlands
Table 3. Levels of implementation in assessment the project of primary teachers
Assessment tools used

23 Academic records 3.4 21.4 43.9 27.1 4.2 3.07 6
24 Questions/exercises 1.2 10.3 42.9 39.7 5.9 3.39 2
25 Assessment sheets 1.5 13.5 44.6 36.5 3.9 3.28 3
26 Observation sheets 1 10.3 41.7 38.4 8.6 3.43 1
Criteria to select assessment tools
27 Select the project 1.7 19.5 53.2 23.9 1.7 3.04 9
assessment tool is
suitable for primary
students to measure
their knowledge
and skills
28 Select the project 1.5 20.2 51.4 23.9 3.0 3.07 6
assessment tool is
suitable for primary
254

students to
measure
29 Understand the 1.5 20 53.1 22.7 2.7 3.05 8
advantages and
disadvantages of
each project
assessment tool
30 Select an 1.4 19.2 51.4 25 3 3.09 4
assessment tool is
suitable for the
assessment
content and time
31 Know how to use a 1.2 19.5 53.9 22.7 2.7 3.06 7
combination of
assessment tools to
promote the
advantages and
overcome the
disadvantages of
each type of
assessment tool
Design assessment tools
32 Design short and 3.0 17.5 50.5 27.3 1.7 3.07 6
clear questions,
exercises, and
situations that are
appropriate to the
assessment’s
content and object
33 Design observation 2.2 21.2 48.5 25.1 3.0 3.05 8
sheets to collect
information for
student
competence
assessment
34 Develop 2.5 19 52.6 22.2 3.7 3.06 7
assessment criteria
suitable to the
content to be
evaluated
35 Discuss with 3.0 21.7 48.7 23.9 2.7 3.02 10
students the
assessment criteria
before designing
36 Process assessment 2.5 19 49.7 25.8 3.0 3.08 5
results by
information
technology
255
Evaluation in PBL is the assessment for student’s ability, therefore in order to make an
accurate assessment, teachers also need to have assessment competence including identifying
and designing appropriate assessment tools. For 4 types of proposed tools, including: academic
records, assessment sheets, observation sheets and questions/exercises; the percentage of
teachers asked to choose a level of never and rarely of implementation ranges from 1% to
20.4%, in which, 1% of teachers have not assessed by observation; but up to 20.4% of teachers
rarely use academic records for assessment, which indicates that teachers do not really care and
understand about project assessment tools. The level of occasionally of implementation ranges
from 41.6% to 43.8%. The level of frequently of implementation ranges from 4.2% to 8.6%, of
which the level of very frequently of implementation academic records accounted for 4.2%;
assessment by observation accounted for 8.6%. Among all 36 items surveyed, the 3 criteria with
the highest average scores are assessment by observation (ranking 1), by questions/exercises
(ranking 2) and by observation sheets (ranking 3).
Regarding the selection of criteria to design assessment tools in PBL, from 2.2% to 20% of
teachers self-assessed have never or rarely implemented. As for the level of occasionally of
implementation, the rate ranges from 51.5% to 53.9%. The rate of the level of frequently of
implementation ranges from 22.7% to 25.1%. The level which teachers implemented very
frequently have the rate ranges from 1.7% to 3%. In general, the selection of evaluation criteria
is also not interested by teachers, the average score is low (Mean = 3.04 – 3.09).
Regarding the designing of project assessment tools, the rate of teachers who self-assessed
at the level of very frequently of implementation ranges from 1.7% to 3%. The percentages of
teachers frequently implemented ranges from 22.2% to 27.3%. The majority of teachers
implemented at the level of frequently ranges from 48.5% to 52.7%. The rate of the level of
never of implemtation ranges from 2.2% to 3%.
Comment: Teachers need to well understand some assessment forms and methods such as
competence development-oriented assessment, requirements-based assessment, and formative
assessment, because these assessment forms would affect the development of learners.
However, the percentage of teachers in the survey group who have access to formative
assessment and competence development-oriented assessment tools is still limited.
4. Factors impacting the teacher’s competence to implement project-based learning
in primary schools in Central Highlands
4.1. The factor of training qualifications
The difference in average score of the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in the
Central Highlands by the training qualifications indicates that the teacher’s competence to
implement PBL in this region depends on the teacher’s training qualifications. The application
PBL of teachers who have bacheler degrees of pedagogy and master degrees is higher than
teachers with college degrees of pedagogy. The results are presented in detail in Table 4 below:
Table 4. Compare the difference in the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers
in the Central Highlands by the training qualifications
Training qualifications Sample (N) Mean Std. Deviation Sig
College degree of pedagogy 112 2.52 .710 .000
Bachelor degree of pedagogy 282 3.32 .744
Master degree 10 4.50 .527
Total 406 3.12 .843
The results of Table 4 indicate that there is a difference between the Mean of teachers with
college degree of pedagogy, bachelor degree of pedagogy and graduate degree. Specifically, the
average score of teachers with college degrees is 2.52 while teachers with bachelor’s and
master’s degrees are 3.32 and 4.5.
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4.2. The factor of in-service training

The analysis results in Table 5 show that the element of in-service training on teaching
innovation for primary teachers has a significant influence on the ability of teachers to apply
PBL. Specifically:
Table 5. Compare the difference in the teacher’s ability to apply PBL in primary school in the Central
Highlands by participation in-service training
Participation in-service training Sample (N) Mean Std. Deviation Sig.
Have not participated in-service training 163 2.60 .595
Participated in-service training 243 3.48 .799
Total 406 3.12 .843
Table 5 indicates that teachers who have passed the in-service training courses have an
average score (Mean = 3.48) (fair level) while those who have not passed the in-service training
courses have a low mean (Mean = 2.6).
4.3. The factor of educational environment and the region
The influence of educational environment and regional factors on the ability to apply PBL of
primary teachers is significant. The analysis results are specified in the following Table 6:
Table 6. Compare the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands by province
Provinces Sample (N) Mean Std. Deviation Sig.
Dak Nong 85 3.48 .868 .000
Gia Lai 88 3.38 .716
Kon Tum 55 3.16 .811
Lam Dong 51 3.00 .721
Dak Lak 127 2.74 .809
Total 406 3.12 .843
The significant difference in the teacher’s ability in primary schools to apply PBL in the
Central Highlands provinces is shown clearly. The average score of Dak Nong teachers of this
item is higher than other provinces’one, and the lowest average score belongs to teacher’s Dak
Lak province. In addition, we compared the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in the
Central Highlands by communes, towns and cities to check the difference of the teacher’s
competence to apply PBL by their working areas such as advantaged areas (cities and towns)
and disadvantaged areas (communes belong to region 2 and 3).
Table 7. Compare the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands
by their working area as communes/towns/cities
Working areas Sample (N) Mean Std. Deviation Sig
Communes in region 3 (especially disadvantaged areas) 61 2.05 .530 .000
Communes in region 2 (disadvantaged areas) 122 3.00 .514
Communes in region 1 (towns) 159 3.37 .759
Cities 64 3.77 .792
Total 406 3.12 .843
Table 7 shows a significant difference in the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in the
Central Highlands by their working areas. The average score of teachers ranges from 2.05
(teachers working in communes in Region 3 – particularly disadvantaged areas) to 3.77
(teachers working in the cities). The results indicate that primary teachers working in the cities
have a good ability to apply PBL (Mean = 3.77), teachers working in region 2 (disadvantaged
areas) and towns have a medium average score. Particularly, teachers working in region 3
(especially disadvantaged areas) have low ability to apply PBL (Mean = 2.05).
257
4.4. The factor of seniority

Table 8. Compare the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands by their seniority
Seniority of teacher Sample (N) Mean Std. Deviation Sig.
1 to 5 years 118 3.01 .698 .001
6 to 10 years 71 3.28 .759
11 to 15 years 63 3.43 .689
15 to 20 years 65 3.17 .840
more than 21 years 89 2.90 077
Total 406 3.12 .843
Table 8 shows that primary teachers from 6 to 15 years of service experience have a higher
average score than other groups. The lowest average score belongs to the group of teachers with
more than 21 years of experience.
4.5. The factor of sources of knowledge of PBL of primary teachers
Table 9. Compare the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers
in the Central Highlands by their approach sources to PBL
Sources of knowledge of PBL Sample (N) Mean Std. Deviation Sig.
From in-service training courses 224 3.29 .837 .000
From pedagogical universities 74 3.15 .788
From Internet 68 2.90 .715
From colleagues 40 2.53 .847
Total 406 3.12 .843
The results in above Table 9 indicate that the average score ranged from 2.53 to 3.29. In
which, teachers who approach PBL from in-service training courses have higher than the other
groups (Mean=3.29); next are teachers who approach PBL from pedagogical universites
(Mean=3.15). Teachers who approached PBL from their colleagues have, lower than other
subjects (Mean=2.52).
4.6. The factor of teacher’s soft skills
Table 10. Compare the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers
in the Central Highlands by their soft skills
Soft skills Not at all good Slightly good Fair Good Excellent Sig
Information and communication technology skills 2.80 2.93 3.06 3.20 3.71 .011
Problem detection and solving skills 3.17 2.95 3.02 3.22 3.54 .035
Leadership and management skills 3.00 2.91 3.04 3.25 4.00 .001
Communication skills 2.80 2.84 3.09 3.18 3.54 .040
Motivation skills 3.14 2.94 3.14 3.11 3.77 .039
Table 10 shows that there is no clear difference in the mean of teachers at the following
levels: not at all good, slightly good, fair, good and excellent for their soft skills. However, the
average score of primary teachers’ ability to apply PBL is clearly distinguished in the group of
teachers who have good and excellent soft skills.
CONCLUSION
The results of the study on the current situation regarding the teacher’s competence to
implement PBL in primary schools in the Central Highlands of Vietnam show that the ability to
apply PBL of primary teachers in this region is at an average level. Specifically:
In terms of the competence of project selection: the majority of primary teachers in Central
Highlands have selected the project based on the content/objectives lessons and student
characteristics and the actual school facilities. However, the criteria to select the project comes
from social and local practical issues with the lowest average score. Theoretical analysis of PBL
258
indicates that practice orientation is one of the factors that make up the characteristics of the
project. However, reality shows that the teaching and project content are narrowing in the scope
of school, not yet linked with social forces in teaching and educating students.
In terms of the competence to identify goals: teachers have never and rarely implemented
contents such as: determining the students’ awareness level based on Bloom’s revised
taxonomy; writing project goals with action verbs. This is a challenge for education in the
Central Highlands because part of the teachers have not been in-service training; a large number
of teachers have not met the standard qualifications as prescribed, the level of students is
unequal in the areas, the school facilities are both poor and insufficient.
In terms of the competence to organize PBL: teachers have implemented better than other
contents in the process of applying PBL, especially the criteria such as determining teaching
methods, techniques and tools and the step of PBL. Evaluation is the most difficult step in PBL,
most primary teachers in the Central Highlands chose questions/exercises and observation
sheets as assessment tools. However they did not use specific tools of PBL such as worksheets
and academic records well. From that, it can be seen that assessment of projects of primary
teachers in the Central Highlands is still very limited, which easily leads to “misunderstanding”
that PBL evaluation is not different from assessment in normal lessons.
In terms of the factors affecting the competence to apply PBL: The research results also show
that the element of in-service training; training qualifications and working areas have a great
influence on the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands. Factors such
as seniority, PBL approaches of teachers also have a significant influence on the ability to apply
PBL of primary teachers. Particularly for the factor of soft skills, teachers with good and excellent
skills are teachers who are able to apply project teaching at a good and proficient level.
From the above research results, we make some following recommendations for primary
teachers and school administrators in the Central Highlands provinces to contribute to
improving the teacher’s capacity of applying PBL and active teaching methods:
For primary teachers in the Central Highlands:
In the context of educational innovation, if only traditional teaching methods are used, it
will be difficult to achieve the goal of students’ competence development. Therefore, each
teacher needs to raise awareness of the importance of innovating teaching methods, applying
teaching methods to promote active learning, the ability to explore and discover knowledge. To
do this, teachers themselves must make efforts to self-study, self-learn teaching methods and
techniques to suit the subjects, students, localities and schools. In order to apply effectively
PBL, teachers need to learn to firmly grasp the theory, determine the nature, self-improve
auxiliary skills such as problem detection skills, leadership and management skills and use
information technology skills, etc. In addition, it is necessary to increase participation in
professional in-service training sessions organized by the locality and the school. PBL is not too
difficult to apply in teaching in disadvantaged areas such as the Central Highlands, but on the
contrary, if teachers know how to choose topics close to students’ lives, it will create positive
effects. Students are not only passionate about learning and gaining knowledge, but also want to
contribute to educating the values of life and preserving the national cultural identity. For
example, when learning about the circumference of a circle instead of teaching theory in class,
teachers can prepare 3-4 gongs (a musical instrument of the Central Highlands), arrange for
students to study outside the school yard, groups of students to measure the diameter and size of
the gong themselves and report back to the teacher and the whole class, so learning the
circumference of a circle will no longer be difficult for elementary students.
For the primary school Administrators in the Central Highlands:
In order to improve the teaching capacity of teachers under their management, the school
administrators need to survey teachers about the need to foster active teaching methods and
259
assess student competence. Regularly organize in-service courses on PBL in particular and
active teaching methods in general. Organize professional activities based on lesson study
(select projects suitable for schools and localities), develop project organization plans within
schools, groups, blocks, during regular and extra-curricular lessons. Promptly encourage and
reward teachers with achievements in teaching or initiatives to improve quality in teaching.
For pedagogical universities which have primary teachers training faculty and teacher
training institutions in the Central Highlands:
The factors of training qualifications and in-service training have a decisive influence on
the ability to apply PBL of primary teachers in the Central Highlands, so pedagogical
universities and teacher training institutions need to focus on innovating teaching methods,
creating conditions for students to approach and practice modern teaching methods. In addition,
it is necessary to work closely with the Departments of Education and Training, the Bureau of
Education and Training, and primary schools so that students have the opportunity to practice
teaching and improve their teaching capacity right from the time they are in university.
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About the authors

– Duong Giang Thien Huong is an Associate Professor of Education of Hanoi National
University of Education (HNUE). She is working as a lecturer of the Faculty of Primary
Education (FPE), one of the leading faculties of primary teacher training in Vietnam with more
than 35 years of development. Her research publications are in areas related to Philosophy and
methodology of primary education, methodology of the Craft and Engineering, STEM education,
pedagogy skills training.
Asso. Prof. Dr. Huong contributes to the graduate education of FPE as a supervisor for
Master Thesis and Doctoral Dissertation in Philosophy and Methodology of Primary Education.
Many of her students have Master qualifications and some are going to defend Doctoral
Dissertation in the short run.
– Bui Thi Tam has been working as a lecturer in the Faculty of Primary Education, Faculty
of Pedagogy, Tay Nguyen University (TNU) since 2006. Her researching projects are in the
methodology of primary education fields, the methodology of Crafts and Engineer. At the
moment, Bui Thi Tam is a postgraduate of K38, majoring in theory and teaching methods in
primary school of Hanoi National University of Education.
261
IMPLEMENTATION OF TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT

IN UNIVERSITY TRAINING IN THE NEW CONTEXT
Bui Duc Tu*1, Dang Nhu Thuy Vy 2, Bui Nguyen Tu My3
Abstract: Teacher training respecting Total quality management (TQM) values represents a new
perspective in the science of educational leadership and requires the qualities, general
competencies, and core competencies of the subject of school administration. This paper aims to
investigate the application of the TQM approach in high school teacher management towards
Education 4.0. The results showed that the given orientation is still hardly recognized in high
school settings due to the training process, slow adaptiveness to the changes, and the
personalization of educational goals. Hence, to innovate the high school curriculum in Vietnam,
it is necessary to strongly deploy high school teacher training management following the TQM
approach.
Keywords: teacher training program, high school teacher training, Industrial Revolution 4.0,
Education 4.0, TQM
INTRODUCTION
The educational system embraces multifarious roles, including learners, teachers, learning
environment, curriculum, school, management, family, education policy, instructional materials,
in which the teacher is the crucial element that interacts with all the remaining ingredients. It is
necessary to improve the quality of teacher training to meet the requirements set out by the
Industrial Revolution 4.0 and take full advantage of the new technology evolution that brought
to education. It can be firmly stated that: “The quality of an education cannot prevail over the
quality of the teachers”. Therefore, according to the author (Guskey, 2002), training teachers
with full qualities and capabilities retains an essential issue for assuring the community’s quality
of education, wisdom, ethics, and social welfare (Braun, 2008).
TQM was initially a proposal to apply in the field of manufacturing. Later, as declared by
educational scientists, it was the best method (in principle) to improve the quality of higher
education through a focus on continuous improvement. Koch and Fisher (Koch & Fisher, 1998)
said that higher education institutions could be seen as a dynamic, characteristic environment,
and the process of introducing new knowledge and applying TQM principles can be beneficial.
Since 2007, the Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam has issued a set of school-level
quality assessment standards, ISO application in university management, and recently added the
activities of ensuring the quality of training and higher education institutions under AUN-QA.
The universities have gradually built and applied the quality management system following the
TQM approach in different levels and forms based on these requirements. The management of
high school teacher training activities must firmly adhere to the TQM quality management
approach to move towards Education 4.0 (corresponding to the Industrial Revolution 4.0).
Training management following the TQM approach is a new implementation in management
science in Vietnam. There is hardly any in-depth research on managing high school teacher
training according to the TQM approach towards Industrial Revolution 4.0 (Chinh, 2015; Duc
Chinh & Dung, 2017; Duc, 2004; Tuyet, 2013).
* Corresponding Author: Bui Duc Tu; E-mail Address: bdtu@sgu.edu.vn

1 Saigon University
2 University of Medicine Pham Ngọc Thạch
3 UEH-International School of Business
262
CONTENT
The wealth of literature on TQM attests to the continuing need for new insights into
evolving higher education structures. Among scholars’ works arose some prominent studies
(Fielding & Schalock, 1985; Hackman & Wageman, 1995; Sallis, 2014; Sohel-Uz-Zaman &
Anjalin, 2016a; Villegas-Reimers, 2003) that revolve around four main features: models and
practical experience in career development for students, activities that support students for
career development, skills and career pathway endorsement, career development as a
requirement of the educational reform process.
The success of total quality management in various sectors, including manufacturing,
medical examination and treatment, and services, has led to its application in education. It is
formed by a triadic element of design, process, and output. The theoretical framework for
applying TQM in education embraces five significant points: mission, customer, process
approach, human resources, and commitment leadership (Sallis, 2014).
“Managing Quality in Schools” is multidisciplinary research of TQM in education. On a
par with other studies, this work has systematically presented the concepts of quality and
customers in education, the cultural aspect, the leadership, and the human role in TQM. From
the practical application of TQM in an educational environment, the author attested a new
insight called The Components of Total Quality model (Asif, Awan, Khan, & Ahmad, 2013;
Sohel-Uz-Zaman & Anjalin, 2016b).
“Total Quality Management in Education” has examined the main issues of TQM in a
broad context of UK higher education. The opinions of many researchers and managers from
different UK universities have been generalized in a TQM diagram: “Quality circle” (Sallis,
2014). Marmar Mukhopadhyay (Mukhopadhyay, 2021) pursued the issue in a greater depth by
tailoring a plan of a possible strategy for applying TQM in higher education by focusing on the
quality of higher education, the application of principles, pairing with other characteristics such
as philosophy, customers, school assessment, human development, leadership, TQM practice in
universities in a specific cultural context.
The studies, as mentioned earlier, have solved the theoretical basis of applying TQM in
general and higher education in particular integrally. It is an essential basis for continuing the
research of TQM in higher education management. In Vietnam, TQM remains one of the most
invasive and intriguing quality management areas in higher education. The research of (Loc,
2016; Trinh et al., 2012) and (Nghi, 2000) ensured the quality of higher education, along with
indicators, standards, forms of assessment, quality assurance, and TQM in higher education,
theory applying in university education in general and universities in particular.
Along the same lines, Chinh anh Dung (Chinh, 2015; Duc Chinh & Dung, 2017), in quality
accreditation in higher education, proposed a set of evaluation criteria and guidelines for
evaluating educational institutions’ quality to enhance the quality of training. Besides, the
author focused on analyzing quality testing theories and models, quality assurance in higher
education.
“Manage and verify the quality of human resources training according to ISO & TQM”
systematizes the viewpoints and models of quality management, especially the application
model of ISO & TQM in overall training quality management (Duc, 2004). Kiem (Kiem, 2013)
corroborated the idea from another perspective. The application of TQM in educational
management hinges on some principles, from focusing on customers, setting a process for
management, improving the mechanism continuously, preparing the settings, managing the
263
cycle reasonably, to changing school culture. Specifically, school management and school
leadership in the twenty-first century “analyzes basic concepts related to the quality and school
culture, and delineating the process of managing centering on TQM (Loc, 2012b). The
complexity of TQM is analyzed in-depth by offering a wide array of opportunities when
applying TQM in Vietnamese universities (Loc, 2012a, 2016).
There were some notable PhD theses in Education Management involving TQM application
in university education (Huy, 2013); (Ninh, 2017; Phuong, 2015); (Trang, 2015); (Tuan, 2015);
(Thach, 2007). These authors promoted a theoretical framework for applying TQM in
universities, training activities, and facility management. Aside from this is an identification of
the current situation and advancing management solutions following the TQM approach to
improving the circumstances.
In summary, training management following the TQM approach emerges as a new issue in
Vietnamese educational leadership. The previously mentioned studies laid the foundation for
further research and opportunities to apply TQM in training management. The general concepts
have been presented, and the relevant theory of TQM set out a system of standards, the prospect
of applying TQM in education and training management.
2. Research methods and data analysis
The research methodology applied to the study respects the focus group interview and the
narrative research, which were deployed for a better understanding of attitudes and behaviours
of teachers towards the teacher training programs. From teaching experiences and from the
observation, the collection of documents and related studies of the subject, specifically some
emerging problematics: education management in the new technological era, the policies and
the legal framework for education to change the contents and methods of education, the
renovation of infrastructure, and the platforms and digital learning materials.
2.1. Analyzing narrative data
2.1.1. High school teacher training
High school teacher training is a purposeful, planned effect of the training subject on the
training object who are students. This procedure aims at transferring knowledge, skills and
professional high technique related to a particular topic, pairing with fostering the moral
qualities of teachers and preparing students to become teachers to meet the professional
standards of high school teachers. Aside from that, teachers should redefine content with the
knowledge and skills conforming to students’ expectations, removing impractical ability and
implementing timely new content that responds to the requirement of the labour market.
Accordingly, teachers should familiarize themselves with the process of personalizing students’
learning and using data analytics to support teaching and learning. Thus, this practice will open
up a new perspective closing the one-way education and hands-on instruction era.
2.1.2. Management concept in terms of systems approach and cybernetics theory
There are many definitions of management based on different approaches. However,
towards Education 4.0, management, especially system theory and control theory should be
understood as follows: Management is the process of controlling human-oriented activities on a
system to achieve the set objectives of that system.
264
KE TO KE TO
KE TO
KIEM DAO KIEM DAO
Notes:
KE = Plan
TO = Structure
organization +
Implementation
KE TO KE TO organization.
DAO = Direction +
KIEM DAO Leadership
KIEM = Inspection,
supervision
KIEM DAO DAO
KIEM
Figure 1. Four pillars of management functions (Tu, 2020)

There may be many approaches to management functions, but collectively the four main
parts that make up the “Four Pillars of management functions” revolve around Plan –
Organization – Direction/Leadership and Supervision. Each function in the four pillars has an
elusive relation to each other, and each part also fully contains four “sub-functions.” To
illustrate this concept, we rely on Figure 1, “Four pillars of management functions” (Tu, 2018).
2.1.3. Industrial Revolution 4.0 and Education 4.0
Industrial revolution 4.0 is characterized by intelligent manufacturing with production
materials and tools made up of elements: Artificial Intelligence – AI, Internet of Things – IoT,
and Big Data (Mohd Adnan, Abd Karim, Haniff Mohd Tahir, Mustafa Kamal, & Muhyiddin
Yusof, 2019).
Education 4.0 (E 4.0) is the educational stage corresponding to the Fourth Industrial
Revolution (IR 4.0). Compared to previous periods, the E 4.0 development could be described
as in Table 1 below:
Table 1. Education characteristics correspond to the industrial revolutions (Tu, 2020)
INDUSTRIAL MAIN INDUSTRIAL EVENTS
FEATURES OF EDUCATION
REVOLUTION FOR IDENTIFICATION
I 1.0 Mechanization: E 1.0.
Steam engines and The need for workers and the number of learners increased.
industrialization released The administrative divisions officially participated in national education.
human power Hence, education was no longer under the responsibility of religious
organizations.
I 2.0 Electrification: E 2.0.
Electricity appeared and the Universities were born in a large number, associated with the rapid
era of mass production development of printing and publishing technology. However, this stage is
mainly reserved for elite training but the popularity has yet been confirmed.
I 3.0 Automation: E 3.0.
Information technology and Information technology is applied gradually and diversely in teaching and
automation of many education.
production stages
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INDUSTRIAL MAIN INDUSTRIAL EVENTS

FEATURES OF EDUCATION
REVOLUTION FOR IDENTIFICATION
Classroom organization has been diversified, even online classes...
Education gained popularity.
The classes have been more interactive, there were more activities, learners
have been more self-motivated and active.
Education “learners-centered”. Move from focusing on “teaching” to
“learning”.
I 4.0 Artificial Intelligence: E 4.0
Smartening of information Focus on more thoroughly personalized learning.
technology applications, With the advent of various digital learning content, learners can opt for
biotechnology, materials learning content that suits their goals. The assessment thus is more
technology, digital status,... adaptive.
Learning information is synthesized and analyzed, thereby providing
valuable suggestions for learners and teachers.
The teacher will shift the prominent role of a lecturer to the task of learning
support as a coach, helping learners to develop their competencies
appropriate to each person’s learning goals.
Virtual reality technologies both help training institutions to save costs and
help learners experience and practice skills better, in order to better meet
the needs of society for educational products.
3. Research results
3.1. Managing training oriented towards TQM approach in high schools
3.1.1. Managing the input of the training process
The operation should focus on building and organizing some policies that centre on
admissions management. Based on this system, teachers should meet the requirements of
educational innovation towards E 4.0 while identifying three main criteria for enrollment
quality: subjects, levels, conditions, and supportive activities. In the second phase, educators
should manage the conditions for organizing training programs corresponding to the TQM
approach and continuously ameliorate the quality of lecturers following the requirements of
each training program. On a par with these formulae is the dyadic interaction between
management of facilities, equipment, materials, databases for training quality following the
TQM approach and elaborating policies for employee training and development and
compensation.
3.1.2. Managing the evaluation of training results and improving the quality of training in
university education in tandem with the TQM approach
Institutions should develop output standards of training programs and the subjects,
especially integrated curriculum, and evaluate training results according to their output
standards. Moreover, it is essential to assess the satisfaction of lecturers, staff, and learners
concerning training results and achievements in learners. Aside from this is an evaluation of the
social satisfaction level (mainly education and training departments, high schools) and
regulation of improving training quality. This evaluation could not gauge the effectiveness
without alterations in policies and legal corridors to change the teaching and methods of
education. The results are commensurate with teaching, testing, online assessment, quality
accreditation, recognition of results, intellectual property, personal information security, sharing
and exploitation of databases, international and national digital data warehouses and each
educational institution.
266
3.1.3. Managing materials, facilities, and equipment for training following the TQM approach
Higher educational settings should gravitate the management of materials towards
modernization and training to ensure the resources for teaching and learning and the quantity of
laboratory equipment for practice to meet the needs of teachers and students. Besides,
educational establishments should take the transformation of infrastructure, platforms, and
digital learning materials into account: technical structures with networks and computers,
changing the teaching and learning process, and the teachers and students’ works profoundly. In
other words, renovating the infrastructure dwells on digital platforms, services, control and
information sharing. Digital learning materials are associated with training programs and
contents of both national and international education systems.
3.1.4. Developing a training environment to motivate the training process appropriating to
output standards
Other notions for developing training process rotate around materials for teaching and
learning, producing social forms in the classroom by creating a friendly, open, sharing,
cooperative environment in education. Changing classroom environment relies mainly on
transforming teaching and learning methods, harmonizing teaching and learning with the
implementation of digital technologies and materials, including online teaching and learning,
reconciling student self-paced learning and assessments, personalizing student’s knowledge,
introducing AI in the classroom for supporting teaching and learning. Digital transformation is
an incentive for teachers and learners to untangle the pedagogical conundrum. Cramming and
hands-on instruction refer to quondam teaching methods, while technologies pave the way for
learning actively, self-directed, increasing self-study ability, learning without limitations for
being creative global citizens.
Otherwise, educational institutions must develop commitments and implement quality
commitments to provide the best training services to pedagogical students before, during, and
after training, which are deemed innovating policies on testing and evaluating students’ learning
results towards a dyadic goal: ensuring the quality of training and creating motivation for
students’ learning activities, especially those in exceptional circumstances (disability, financial
difficulties). The institutions should accomplish and regularly develop output standards
according to social needs and employers’ requirements, in tandem with a commitment to
training output standards. Accordingly, they have to review, update and adjust the training
program to meet the output standards and commit to implementation.
3.1.5. Managing the college training program following the TQM approach
This process embarks on managing activities of staff, teachers, teaching activities, and
learners’ activities. To “personalize” learners towards Education 4.0, it is necessary to promote
and organize learning policies for students and work effectively on the project. Apart from this
is the necessity of surveying learners’ needs to organize learning activities according to their
ability and needs. This process is congruent with developing planning skills, self-study skills,
self-test skills, self-assessment and adjusting the learning process, improving set learning
achievements (Loc, 2010, 2012b; Papanthymou & Darra, 2017; Quang Giao & Ngoc Thanh,
2020). The teachers should also monitor the learners’ progress to help them in the best way,
limit dropouts, or minimize the risk of interrupting students’ learning progress. We should also
take into account strict management of the academic advisor’s work and excellent support to
learners’ educational activities, and lead them to the ability of self-studying and experiencing.
267
3.2. Total quality management in the new context

Total quality management harmonizes with managing an organization focusing on quality,
based on the participation of its members to achieve long-term success by satisfying customers
and bringing benefits to its members and society. Many scientists believe that TQM is a three-
dimensional model including design, process, and output. The theoretical framework for
applying TQM in education is a symbiosis of 5 significant components: mission, customer,
process approach, human resources, and leadership commitment (Tu, 2020). In the new context
of the Industrial Revolution 4.0, management following the TQM approach has the conditions
to apply in the most meaningful and effective way compared to the previous contexts.
3.2.1. Managing high school teacher training activities by approaching TQM in the new context of
the Industrial Revolution 4.0
Teacher training and training management activities remain among the most invasive and
intriguing areas in educational research. Some notable works could be mentioned (Darling-
Hammond, 2006; Kemenade, El-Asawi, & Nguyen, 2020; Papanthymou & Darra, 2017),
dividing into four main research directions: models and practical experience in career
development for teachers, activities to support teachers for career development, skills and
professional knowledge development for teachers, career development for teachers.
In particular, the modern trend in teacher training in general, exceptionally high school
teachers, follows the TQM approach. The personnel apparatus involved in teacher training must
become a “learning organization” (Tu, 2018).
Teacher training management, according to the TQM approach, is the activity of applying
continuous quality improvement activities of the training management subject in the school to
have effects on the stages of the high school teacher training process, including input, process,
output to meet output standards and to satisfy customer needs (Khurniawan, Sailah, Muljono,
Indriyanto, & Maarif, 2020).
Customer needs - Strategy - Quality culture
Ke To
Input Process Output
Customer (1) Identify student (7) Teaching of (10) Evaluation Customer

needs - needs and social lecturers - (8) of training needs -
Strategy - needs - (2) Review Student results - (11) Strategy -
Quality training standards, learning - (9) Graduates Quality
culture training programs - Pedagogical (tracing of culture
(3) Enrollment - (4) practice former students'
Ensure human work)
resources (5)
Facilities - ( 6)
Financing
CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT
Kiem Dao
Customer needs - Strategy - Quality culture
Figure 2. Model of Training Management for high school teachers according

to TQM approach in the new context of Industrial Revolution 4.0
268
Four pillars of management functions Ke – To – Dao – Kiem (Plan – Organization –

Direction – Supervision) in Figure 2 are formed as follows (Tu, 2018):
(1) Planning training management: Institutions define an indicator system for ten elements
of high school teacher training in the new context, including diverse processes, essentially
determining customer needs, reviewing and adjusting standards output and training program,
student enrollment, human resources, facilities, equipment and materials for training, financial
cost training, self-regulated learning, pedagogical internship, evaluation results, issuing
diplomas, post-graduation activities. These procedures should be processed in concert with
creating a system of regulations, conceiving the integration of the ten elements mentioned above
in the high school teacher training context.
(2) Organization of training: Strengthen the organization, and personnel apparatus,
accustom indicators, regulations, educational processes following the plan retain the essence of
training activities. Along with it is the reconciliation of elements mentioned above to the
established system.
(3) Conducting the training process: Management subjects rectify deviations, foster and
share responsibility, build quality culture, standardize the indicator system, identify
opportunities and improvements for the next cycle.
(4) Supervise the training: The management supervises, measures, and evaluates the
implementation of the previously mentioned teacher training elements to make timely
adjustments. It is utterly necessary to combine periodic and ad-hoc inspection while interesting
new technology applications such as software for processing information from cameras,
teacher’s cards, and student’s cards.
3.2.2. Evaluate the current situation of high school teacher training according to the current TQM
approach
Most of the country’s pedagogical schools (departments) train high school teachers based
on the TQM approach at different levels. Most institutions recognize their success in
implementing the process of reviewing and adjusting training standards and training programs,
reforming the admissions process and regulating student learning pace and pedagogical practice,
modifying the evaluation process of training results and issuing diplomas.
In addition to the above strengths, compared to TQM theory, most schools (departments)
training high school teachers still have limitations that restraint the pathway to E 4.0. Among
others arise some conundrums residing in the regulations, evaluation systems for high school
teacher training management according to the TQM approach. Besides, the management process
remains discrete, not systematic, and regular. In particular, the results did not meet the
requirements for most of the eleven mentioned factors. All the influencing factors are still being
evaluated for pairing motivating and hindering the management of the training of high school
teachers according to the TQM approach at school that is clearly shown in the edge building
school culture.
3.2.3. The core qualities and competencies of the subject managing the high school teacher
training in the new context of the Industrial Revolution 4.0
In terms of enhancing management quality, the principal’s function and role have
continually changed and renovated to meet the expectations of a constantly changing education
in the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The main conclusion of our research can be drawn as
professional virtues, specific competencies in school administration, forming an educational
environment in school, improving school’s relationship with family and society, and the ability
to use foreign languages, information technology. Writing scientific research is essential and
feasible for school principals, vice-principals, and headteachers to successfully manage
269
administrative affairs and the school. All results obtained from this research are necessary for
managing schools effectively and successfully. From the finding of connecting the activities at
school with international activities, future researchers should consider the effects of foreign
language skills on the functions and tasks of a successful principal more carefully, especially
English skills (Tu, Chuong, & Nga, 2020).
Alongside previous statements, the capacity of the teacher training management is in
tandem with their impacts on mobilizing and connecting different resources (human, material,
and mastery of information) to launch training activities appropriate to the short-term school
goals and long-term strategies. In terms of required capacity, it could be cited as thinking
capacity, problem-solving capacity, and ability to connect with people. As regards core
competencies, school administrators must identify and solve problems. The specific
manifestations of this core competency manifested in identifying issues in the training process
while considering the source of information (receive and process noisy details).
Furthermore, management should rhyme with the capacity of analyzing problems,
introducing scientific and technological achievements of the Industrial Revolution 4.0 to explore
and examine arising problems, thereby pointing out the causes and identifying the target to
solve those problems and elucidate solutions in training management in the most reasonable,
feasible, and effective way. Apart from that is the infusion of traditional tools with AI (virtual
reality) to analyze data, connect the education system integrally throughout the training process,
and organize the teacher training process following modern devices (AI, IoT, Big Data).
Accordingly, current management knowledge and skills are constantly updated to harmonize
with the new context of the Industrial Revolution 4.0.
CONCLUSION
Developing teacher training activities while inheriting all vestiges of traditional teaching
should implement digital technologies. Nevertheless, using technologies (projectors,
experimental software) is merely an alteration to the grand perspective of educational training
activities. It is necessary to deploy the management of high school teachers’ training actively
according to the TQM approach to move towards Education 4.0 and, for the foreseeable future,
to innovate the high school curriculum in Vietnam. Moreover, it is vital to value the following
contents in the high school teacher training and management process, raising awareness about
the nature of Total Quality Management – TQM, thereby understanding the signs in high school
teacher training management.
Throughout the renovation of machinery for educational administration, the need to
develop an indicator system for training high school teachers according to the TQM approach is
uncontestable. Training for teachers, at the same time, is informing students and their families
of operating the system of regulations and processes, building and managing modern
monitoring, evaluation, and implementing types of equipment based on the science and
technology progress of the Industrial Revolution 4.0. Hence, TQM will be a premise for
building quality culture at institutions to respect four criteria: The True – The Good – The
Beautiful – The Benefit.
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About the authors

– Dr. Bui Duc Tu is a senior lecturer at Sai Gon University, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
With more than twenty-year experience in heading vocational colleges in Ninh Thuan province,
his main research interests gravitate towards the management at vocational colleges, national
education management, human resources development through education and training.
– Dang Nhu Thuy Vy is a Ph.D. candidate and a lecturer at the University of Medicine
Pham Ngoc Thach, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Majoring in English and French, she focuses
on developing learners’ language competencies and implementing new technologies in teaching
and learning.
– Bui Nguyen Tu My is a lecturer at the University of Economics Ho Chi Minh City,
Vietnam. She is interested in assessing learners’ abilities, analyzing and evaluating educational
problems at the universities.
273
SOME STUDIES ON TEACHING MANAGEMENT WITH THE

ORIENTATION OF DEVELOPING LEARNING COMPETENCIES
Nguyen Van Hieu*1
Abstract: The study used theoretical research methods to systematize, analyze, synthesize,
compare and draw conclusions from the literature on education towards developing learning
competency globally and in Vietnam. Following the study’s findings, there have been various
studies around the issue of teaching management with the orientation of developing learning
competencies; however, the research mainly goes into each element of the teaching process or
subject. As a result, there is still a lack of a general, methodical, systematic, profound and
comprehensive method with all the elements of the teaching process oriented towards
developing learning competency for an entire level of education in the general education system,
especially at the lower secondary level. The proposed findings and recommendations have not
illustrated the characteristics of the region or the subject. The results of this study are the
foundation for building a comprehensive theoretical framework for teaching management in the
direction of developing learning competency suitable to Vietnamese practice. The suitable
framework will act as a reference for the designing and surveying process of the current situation
of secondary schools in Ho Chi Minh city; with the findings as a foundation for proposing
recommendations to the teaching management development following learning competencies
in Ho Chi Minh city’s secondary schools in the coming time.
Keywords: management, competency, competency development, competency-based learning
INTRODUCTION
The context of globalization and the explosion of knowledge poses significant challenges to
the education and training of all countries. In order to ensure sustainable development, many
countries have constantly innovated education to improve human resources’ quality and equip
future generations with a solid cultural foundation and high adaptability to all changes of nature
and society. Therefore, educational innovation has become an urgent need and a global trend
(Ministry of Education and Training, 2018). One of the contents and requirements for
educational innovation is to renovate the educational program in the direction of a competency
approach instead of the previous content approach to adapt to the explosion of human knowledge.
In that context, the 8th Conference of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of
Vietnam (XI term) approved Resolution No. 29/NQ-TW dated November 4, 2013 on
fundamental and comprehensive reform of education and training to meet the requirements of
industrialization and modernization in the context of a socialist-oriented market economy and
international integration, have stated nine tasks and solutions, including: “... Continue to
strongly and synchronously renovate basic elements of education and training in the direction of
attaching importance to developing learning qualities and capacities... Fundamentally
renovating education and training management, ensuring democracy and unity; increase the
autonomy and social responsibility of education and training institutions; appointing importance
to quality management” (Central Committee, 2013).
Implementing Resolution No. 29/NQ-TW, the Ministry of Education and Training has
implemented and announced the overall general education program and curriculum of subjects
on December 26, 2018; and at the same time decided to approve the list of textbooks for grades
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Van Hieu; E-mail Address: hieusgd@gmail.com

1 Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City
274
1, 2 and 6 to be put into teaching from the 2019 – 2020 school year for grade 1. New curriculum
and new textbooks are developed in the direction of attaching importance to training;
developing both the quality and capacity of learnings; focusing on educating patriotism, national
pride, morality, personality and lifestyle; discovering and fostering talents and career orientation
for each student; strengthening foreign language, informatics and life and work skills in
conditions of international integration; and stepping up the application and promotion of global
scientific and technological achievements, especially in terms of educational technology and
information technology. Thus, one of the fundamental orientations of building new curricula
and new textbooks is to approach learning competency; therefore, teaching activities in schools
will have to change fundamentally in the direction of approaching learning competencies; and
so, teaching management in the direction of approaching learning competencies is an
indispensable and urgent issue.
There have been many studies on teaching in developing learning competency in Vietnam
and around the world. However, the issue of teaching management in the direction of
developing learning competency has not received much attention or in case to, but those studies
are not comprehensively systematic, complete, profound, and do not have a solid theoretical
framework. Therefore, it is necessary to have an overview study as a foundation for building a
theoretical framework that can be applied to practical research in a specific locality in Vietnam.
CONTENT
Teaching management in the direction of developing learning competencies has been
mentioned in many fields; as it is of interest to a wide range of audiences, from educational
researchers, employers to even parents. In particular, how to manage this activity is a matter of
research interest of many educational scientists in general and educational managers in
particular in the world and in Vietnam.
When a program follows an approach, the teaching activities also follow that approach.
Therefore, along with the management of building and developing educational programs
according to the competency approach, the managers must also change the management method
for teaching following this approach. Currently, the educational programs of most countries in
the world follow the competency approach, implementing decentralization of management at an
early stage with high appreciation of the autonomy and self-responsibility of schools;
accompanied by the management of all activities in the school, including teaching activities,
also according to the competency approach. When implementing decentralization in program
management and implementation, the general education programs are formed by administrators;
and teachers supplemented with contents customized to the school and locality based on the
national curriculum. Details are as follow.
In Australia, the development of educational curricula is decentralized to each state. On the
basis of national goals and educational needs, the states develop a framework program. The
State Framework Program is built on the following principles: practicality, integration,
differentiation. This approach to curriculum development defines that the student is at the center
of the teaching process. Following the state framework program, schools develop school
programs based on local characteristics (ACARA, 2016).
In the UK, schools have a high degree of autonomy in determining the curriculum
depending on the conditions of each school based on guidelines in the national curriculum
framework. The national framework program requires schools to ensure two main contents:
1) The program developed by the school must be developed based on the national curriculum
framework (meeting three common goals, forming six groups of life skills; ensuring compliance
with five requirements for program developers and teachers; implementing seven program
275
areas); 2) The program must be suitable to school conditions and students’ psycho-physiological
characteristics (UK Department for Education, 2013).
In China, the institutional centralized program management is the basis for the country to
propose program management measures and the commencement of a three-tier general
education program management system. This institution has apparent decentralization. The
school program takes the national program as the basis; the local program and the school
program are promulgated by the locality and the schools autonomously, allowing the schools to
independently choose the textbooks (Nguyen & Nguyen, 2014).
New Zealand also implements decentralization of program management. Based on the
national framework program, schools all develop educational programs that meet their students’
requirements and the school and locality’s conditions (Ministry of Education and Training, 2015).
For Korea, the educational program not only reflects common characteristics at the national
level but also shows the differences between districts, cities, and schools. Schools implement
programs with distinctive school-level characteristics. Two main measures have been taken: the
introduction and expansion of elective activities (classified into elective activities related to
subjects and creative elective activities) and the integration of elective programs together into
experiential activities that allow greater autonomy by not allocating specific durations to each
activity (Korea Institute for Curriculum and Evaluation, 2012).
Thus, most countries have a combination of centralization and decentralization in general
education program management. This approach can meet both national and local development
needs and different student groups because the general education curricula of these countries are
competency-based. This is an inevitable trend that most countries in the world are following.
The decentralization in program management has led to the issue of managing teaching
activities in high schools also following that approach/model, proven by the following specific
studies:
In 1988, in Seoul, Korea, UNESCO held a scientific conference with the theme “Asia –
Pacific Program on Educational Innovation for Development”. Here, scientists have determined
the importance and affirmed to form the necessary competencies for learnings, and at the same
time pointed out the shortcomings in the organization of teaching activities that have hindered
the development of students’ development of competencies and management of learning
activities (UNESCO, 1998). It is understood that if teaching is not oriented to develop learning
competency, managing this activity will also become difficult for administrators. Thus, this
workshop only discussed the need to manage teaching in the direction of developing learning
competencies, but did not focus on the specific methods of the issue.
In the study “Innovation in Professional Education: Steps on a Journey from Teaching to
Learning”, Boyatzis et al. (1995) pointed out some limitations of educational program
development and management such as lack and weakness in developing interpersonal skills;
short-sighted; narrow; failure to have a comprehensive, holistic approach in its values and
thinking; and not helping learners work well in groups and teams. To address these limitations,
Rausch, Sherman and Washbush (2001) argue that: It is necessary to carefully design the
educational program according to the outcome and the learning competencies approach, which
would make the management of teaching activities more convenient. This affirms that the
management of program development and the management of teaching and learning in the
direction of developing learning competencies have a strong relationship with each other.
Therefore, it is necessary to clarify the relationship between micro-management and macro-
management in the educational management system when researching and proposing
management measures.
When researching on the required competencies of managers in the public sector, including
the field of Education, the author Morley & Vilkinas (1997) has summarized 16 general
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competencies that managers need, including: (1) Vision and mission; (2) Implementation; (3)
Strategy; (4) People management; (5) Public relations, community; (6) Complexity; (7)
Relations with political processes; (8) Accountability; (9) Achievements; (10) Intellectual
capacity, thinking; (11) Personal characteristics, especially self-governance; (12) Policy; (13)
Interpersonal skills; (14) Change; (15) Communication; (16) Resource Management. Since then,
to improve management efficiency, managers themselves must develop specific competencies
for management activities; based on general competencies, each management field requires
specific competencies. These are only general guidelines, not yet specific in teaching
management and teaching management following the learning competency approach.
Author Rachel (2004) said that, in teaching management according to competency
approach, managers need to focus on promoting the role of teachers. They not only perform the
task of teaching the built-in program but must participate in the management of their teaching
activities. Thus, teachers are the ones who directly teach, so it is their duty to self-manage the
quality of teaching in developing learning competencies. Although this study has focused on the
subject of management is teachers – who directly teach learnings – but how teachers manage to
teach has not been mentioned.
In the study “School Leadership in the 21st Century: Developing a Strategic Approach”,
Davies, Linda and Bowring-Carr (2005) presented strategic plans for school development,
change management, leadership and quality management of education, analyzing the role of
principals in school management and development, including managing teaching activities of
teachers. When conducting empirical research on student learning outcomes concerning the
active or passive teaching style of teachers, the authors Norbert, John and Otmar (2009) have
also shown: The management of teaching activities is to manage the following factors: learning
context (creating an open and comfortable atmosphere in the classroom), lesson preparation
(crafting specific and creative lesson design before each teaching session), demonstration during
the lecture (best performing the lesson as planned), advancing (finding and using feedback).
When these factors are strictly managed or performed proficiently, the teaching effectiveness
will be enhanced. Thus, these studies still mainly focus on managing each element of the
teaching process without emphasizing the relationship between those components and the
overall process according to the output approach.
The relationship between school management, school leadership and teachers’ teaching
activities is pointed out by author Cooper (2008): teaching and learning management is an
important function of school leaders, which is to create the conditions and environments that
best support teaching and learning activities. This result indicates that good management will
create motivation for good teaching. If good teaching management is oriented towards
developing learning competencies, the product of the teaching process will be students with
good competencies.
Thus, most of the general education programs of the developed countries in the world are
designed according to the competency-based learning approach. The program management also
follows this approach, represented by a mechanism that combines centralization and
institutional decentralization to schools, directly implementing teaching activities. From the
approach to program building and management, many studies on teaching and managing
teaching activities to develop learners’ competencies have been emphasized. The authors focus
on analyzing the relationship between the management of teaching activities in general
education schools and building and developing educational programs. Many studies have
examined each teaching process element and analyzed the role and meaning of managing each
of those elements. However, the question of how to manage, or the detailed management
methods for all teaching activities towards the common goal of developing learners’
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competency, has not been explicitly recommended to assist educational administrators and
teachers themselves apply in the teaching process.
In Vietnam, research on teaching management is always related to general education
program construction management. Up to the present time (current program), the management
of the general education program in Vietnam is still highly centralized. However, to prepare for
the implementation of the new general education program, in 2013, the Ministry of Education
and Training issued Instruction No. 791/HD-BGDĐT on piloting the development of the
general education program. Many studies around the issue of construction management and
program development, which also refer to teaching management, have been published.
Specifically, Doan Van Ninh in the study “Management and development of high school
educational programs – Korean experience and proposed pilot application in Vietnam”, has
analyzed the contents and management process of the principal in the development of general
education programs in Korea; from which, some proposals to apply to pilot management of
Vietnam’s general education program include: “1) Organizing training and communication on
development and piloting the development of the general education program in Vietnam;
2) Processing the formulation and organization of implementing school education plans;
3) Innovating and managing the application of teaching and educational methods and practices;
4) Innovating the management of student learning outcomes assessment; 5) Strengthening
resources for the pilot process to enhance the general education program” (Doan, 2014). In
2016, he continued to publish a study on “Some orientations on the organizational structure to
serve the management of the construction and research of a new general education program in
Vietnam”. Accordingly, the organizational structure to serve the management of the
development of a new general education program includes Steering Committee for the
renovation of the general education curriculum and textbooks; Overall general education
program development board; Curriculum Development Board; International Advisory Council;
Project Management Board (Doan, 2016). Thus, the author has mentioned the management of
elements of the teaching process, including “teaching activities”.
Duong and Do (2017) clarified the concept of program management in general education;
objectives and principles of innovation in general education program management; and at the
same time affirmed and analyzed that the approach of “combining concentration and
decentralization” in the management and development of general education program to be
suitable for Vietnam today. Duong Quang Ngoc continues to publish the works “The capacity to
manage the educational program of the lower secondary school to meet the requirements of
program innovation” (Duong, 2018a) and “Advanced solutions to enhance educational program
management capacity of general schools to meet the requirements of reforming the curriculum
of general education textbooks” (Duong, 2018b). These works focus on describing the
components of the school planning management capacity of administrators and subject program
managers of teachers, studying the experience of managing educational programs of some
countries in the world, proposing several solutions to improve management capacity in
implementing educational programs of schools to meet changing requirements of the new
programs and textbooks of general education in Vietnam. In this year, T. Q. Nguyen (2018) also
published a study, “Decentralized model of general education program management: Practice in
China and experience for Vietnam”, with the content focusing on analyzing the hierarchical
model of general education program management in China; thereby drawing lessons for
Vietnam in the implementation of the new program.
In the study “Development and management of educational programs”, Nguyen, Nguyen,
and Pham (2019) also analyzed the management models of educational program development
and validated the use of the management model of educational program development. Any
program development theory should be based on many factors such as the concept of the
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program, approach to program development... At the same time, the study proposed the basic
tasks that school administrators must do in managing and developing the current program.
Nguyen et al. (2016), in the book “Competency-based approach and assessment program
for learnings”, analyzed how to develop a competency-based education program and illustrated
its implementation through Australia’s program development. The research provided a
theoretical basis with methods and techniques for building competency standards; described the
method of assessing capacity based on competency standards, thereby suggesting how to use the
assessment results to establish subject education plans, pedagogical intervention plans in
teaching.
Many authors in Vietnam have long mentioned research on teaching management in
general. Especially after each change of curricula and textbooks, the research focuses on
changing the appropriate teaching management to achieve the program’s goals. Teaching
management must follow the approach under which the education program is developed. While
from the change of curricula and textbooks in the early 80s of the 20th century to the issuance of
the new general education curriculum in 2018, the education curriculum and teaching activities
mainly followed the content approach, many studies have focused on the comprehensive
analysis of issues surrounding the management of teaching activities. Typical authors are Pham
(1986); Nguyen (1989); Tran (1990); Pham (1996); Nguyen, Dang, Nguyen, & Nguyen (2000);
Ha (2001); Dang (2002); L.M.T. Nguyen (2004); T.V. Nguyen (2004); Bui (2004); Bui (2007),
Nguyen & Nguyen (2010); Nguyen (2010); Dang & Nguyen (2011); Nguyen & Vo (2012);
Tran (2013); Pham (2014); V. Q. Tran (2015); Thai et al. (2015); K. Tran (2016); Do, Nguyen,
Ha, & Nguyen (2017), etc.; especially some doctoral theses majoring in Educational
Management such as: Nguyen (2003), Ninh (2008), Duong (2016), Chu (2017), S.V. Nguyen
(2017), C.K.T. Nguyen (2017), V.T. Nguyen (2018), etc. In general, the research works have
focused on analyzing the position, role and meaning of the management of the teaching process;
the need to innovate the management of teaching activities in order to improve the
effectiveness, efficiency, and modernity; linking science with the living and production
practices for both teachers and administrators; the issue of managing teaching activities in the
direction of taking students as the center; advantages and disadvantages of managing teaching
activities in class; the nature and relationship between teaching and learning activities
management; actual situation and management measures for each element of the teaching
process such as management of objectives, content, methods, forms, facilities and testing and
evaluation of teaching activities... The authors above have come from different approaches
when studying the management of teaching activities. However, the studies have not been
concretized into models and processes for managing elements of teaching activities in a more
appropriate and effective manner to be applied in the practice of each locality; have not deeply
analyzed and clarified which teaching elements need to be managed in the process, especially in
the case of applying teaching management research in a modern direction. As a result, the
proposed management measures are not highly specific and unable to show the specificity of
each locality/region.
Studies on teaching management oriented towards the development of learning
competencies: In Vietnam, the issue of teaching management oriented towards the development
of learning competencies has only become the focus of research since the development and
management of the education program under the approach is carried out following the guiding
spirit of Resolution No. 29-NQ/TW dated November 4, 2013. Along with the research on
learning competency-based teaching, studies on the management of the teaching activities in
each subject/field or at a specific educational level in a particular area are established as
follows:
279
Regarding teaching management in the direction of developing student’s competency for all
grades in general, there are several studies by authors such as D.T. Tran (2016), Le & Pham
(2015), H.V. Nguyen (2017), H.N. Nguyen (2017), N.T. Le (2017), A.V.T. Nguyen (2017),
Le (2019), etc. In general, these studies focus on clarifying the concept, management content
and conducting surveys on the current situation in specific areas, thereby proposing appropriate
management measures to overcome limitations from practice. However, the management
contents provided by the author did not follow a clear approach (access to content, functions,
both content and functions...) and did not cover all the issues and problems. The coordination
between methods in the current situation research is still not sufficiently precise and reliable.
The proposal of measures/solutions has not come from the actual situation of the issue and
failed to show the specificity of the issue in each research unit/locality. This is the basis for our
research to continue improving both in theory and practice in the coming time.
Some authors only studied the current situation or proposed measures/solutions for
managing this activity at primary, middle and high school levels, such as D.T. Tran (2015),
H.T.T. Le (2017), Vo (2020), etc. Although the research was conducted in a specific area with
an appropriate survey method, the survey content was not complete and detailed. Specifically,
the analysis of the collected data was still not thorough; the interview method was not enough to
supplement the questionnaire survey method. As a result, the obtained findings are not reliable
enough. Furthermore, the proposed measures are subjective without a clear theoretical, legal,
and practical basis, with a lack of testing the study’s urgency, feasibilities, and effectiveness.
Although the research object is specific, the recommendations are not customized and are still
vague. These limitations will be overcome and improved in our research.
Regarding the management of teaching activities in the direction of developing students’
competencies for specific subjects, there are several studies by authors such as Huynh (2016),
B.T. Le (2017), Nguyen (2019), etc. In general, these studies introduced the concept of tools
associated with each subject and analyzed the teaching activities following these principles,
thereby giving the content of managing teaching activities of that subject: management of
objectives, content, programs, teaching activities, learning activities, methods, teaching
conditions, examination and assessment of subjects..., and proposing management measures
according to the content-based or functional-based approach or both. However, the general
limitation of these studies is that they have not been able to deeply analyze the characteristics of
each subject to provide suitable management content. As a result, the survey content is only
based on a general theoretical framework, leading to the fact that the management method has
not highlighted the characteristics of each subject and the school where the study was
conducted.
In particular, studies related to teaching management in the direction of student competency
development in Ho Chi Minh City are also of great interest to many authors. In his research,
Duong (2016) has built a theoretical framework, researched, analyzed and assessed the
situation, thereby proposing measures to manage teaching activities in primary schools in Ho
Chi Minh City in the context of the fundamental and comprehensive reform of education.
Despite not precisely aiming for management according to output standards (competency
standards), this study has shown a comprehensive and systematic approach from theory to
practice, which is an important document to emphasize competency-based teaching and learning
management measures in Ho Chi Minh City junior high schools. In another research on district-
level primary schools, author Hoang (2018) analyzed the situation of managing teaching
activities to develop learning competency for students of the principals of primary schools in
Binh Thanh district. Nguyen (2019a) examined the current situation of managing innovative
teaching methods according to the competency approach of students in primary schools in Tan
Phu district. These studies have shown that there are still many limitations and inadequacies in
280
the management of teaching activities following the competency approach, where further
studies are required to have appropriate management measures in each district of Ho Chi Minh
City. To overcome these limitations, authors Nguyen (2019b) and Pham (2019) have proposed
several recommendations to manage innovative teaching methods in the direction of student
capacity development for elementary schools in accordance with the practical situation of each
district. It can be seen that there are no macro-scale studies at the City level. Going into specific
subjects, author Pham (2017) also offers a method of managing English teaching activities in
primary schools in Ho Chi Minh City according to the competency approach appropriate to the
local context. To help lower secondary school administrators in District 6, Ho Chi Minh City
acquires the capacity to manage competency-based teaching activities, author Luu (2016) has
proposed the enhancement through measures to renovate objectives, programs, organization and
evaluation of training results. According to this study, as elements of the teaching process
change in the direction of developing students’ competency, the training of administrators and
teachers must also change in this direction. This is a note for the researchers when proposing
teaching management measures oriented towards student competency development in Ho Chi
Minh City general education in the coming time.
Thus, in Vietnam, the issue of management, construction and development of educational
programs in the direction of decentralization has only been focused on research since Resolution
No. 29-NQ/TW dated November 4th, 2013 of the Central Executive Committee was issued.
Accordingly, although the policy has been moderately oriented towards management following
the output approach, the new studies mainly provide some orientations for program
management, without any specific management measures. Concerning program management,
there have been many studies focusing on proposing measures to manage elements of the
teaching process towards achieving the best learning results to meet the objectives of the
educational program. However, because the program’s goal is mainly content-based, the
teaching management measures aim to achieve the corresponding goal. In addition, to build a
program with a complete approach reform (following the general education program issued in
2018), many studies have originated from the common goal of “developing student
competency” to address the research issues. On the other hand, many general teaching
management measures have been proposed in a particular subject/field, level of study, area, and
characteristics, including Ho Chi Minh City. However, these recommendations are still
ineffective and difficult to apply because they are not based on a solid and complete theoretical
framework. Therefore, it is necessary to have a comprehensive, systematic, and unified study
between the program and certain subjects/educational fields to acquire the best competency-
based teaching management measures at the general education level.
CONCLUSION
Based on an overview of research works in the world and Vietnam on program building,
teaching and managing this activity in the direction of developing learning competencies, we
draw out a number of remaining issues that act as a basis for further research as follows: (1) The
issue of teaching management is always associated with the management of building and
developing education programs in the direction of developing learning competencies. These two
issues must be studied in a dialectical relationship with each other. (2) Research on teaching
management in the direction of developing learning competencies has only covered each
field/subject or each element of the teaching process. There is still a lack of an overall,
methodical, systematic, profound, comprehensive research direction with all the elements of the
learning competency-based teaching process (objectives, content, methods, forms, testing,
assessment, facilities and equipment for teaching activities) for an entire level of education of
the general education program, especially at the lower secondary level. (3) The proposed
281
measures/solutions in some researches have not yet clearly shown the specificity of the regions,
fields, subjects. In particular, no research has been conducted at the lower secondary level in Ho
Chi Minh City – a city with many characteristics on general education in general and lower
secondary education in particular. This is an opportunity for the research team to explore further
research progress.
The research findings are the basis for building a theoretical framework on teaching
management in the direction of developing learning competencies suitable for Vietnam,
which facilitates the design and organization of a survey of the current situation of the
research issue at lower secondary schools in Ho Chi Minh City. The obtained practical
situation will be an essential foundation for proposing teaching management solutions
in the direction of developing learning competencies in Ho Chi Minh City secondary
schools in the coming time.
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About the author

MA. Nguyen Van Hieu is a manager and researcher in the field of Education Management.
His research area is in managing the elements of the teaching process (objectives, contents,
methods, forms, tests, and assessments in teaching). He has published many kinds of research
related to managing teaching activities towards student capacity development. Currently, he is
vice-director at the Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City.
286
REVIEWS OF “LESSON STUDY” REFLECTED

FROM WORKS IN JAPAN AND VIETNAM
Nguyen Nam Phuong*1, Nguyen Dac Thanh2, Tetsuo Kuramoto3
Abstract: The paper provides a literature review of lesson study, which has been dug in scientific
works for ages in Japan but it has just been at the starting point in Vietnam, with the main
method of qualitative research. One of the key point findings is that due to linguistic
transformation at the very first stage, the definition of “lesson study” has been used in Vietnam
with different understandings. We the authors would like to give the insights for this term in
Vietnam by works in Japan and those presented in WALS (World Association of Lesson Study) to
get the three research issues clear: (i) definition and scope of “Lesson study”, (ii) fragment factors
in “Lesson study” and (iii) the right usage of “Lesson study” and reflection for Vietnam in reality.
The paper might probably give a strong knowledge base for any tentative publication of lesson
study in Vietnam. It also provides working suggestions for the practice of lesson study in Vietnam
these days especially with the 2018 General Education Curriculum launching and requirements of
teacher education in the changing context of the global pandemic and the 4.0 Industrial
Revolution.
Keywords: lesson study, literature review, Japan, Vietnam
INTRODUCTION
The two countries Japan and Vietnam have a large number of similarities in terms of
culture, education, perspectives. These two nations also have had a strong collaboration in
economy and human resources, which shows in cross-cultural perspectives in many fields,
especially in educational publications and projects (Saito, 2015; Sato, 2011; Kuramoto et al.,
2020). Recently, Vietnam has focused very much on teacher education for the past ten years,
thanks to the educational innovation nationwide critically in the 2018 General Education
Curriculum (GEC) launching (Nguyen et al., 2021; Nguyen, 2020; Vu, 2020).
Lesson study is the issue that has lately appeared in Vietnam (Ha, 2018; Le, 2014; Nguyen,
2018; Pham et al., 2018; Vu & Nguyen, 2010), while there has been a long-term research period
till now in Japan devoted to this issue (Sato, 1996; Takano, 1988; Kuga, 2007; Fernandez &
Yoshida, 2004; Kuramoto et al., 2009, 2014).
Given the considerably similar cultural-educational background, the scholars in Japan and
Vietnam still have had a number of different points including the issue of “Lesson study” to
some extent. Within this paper, the three research questions that should be answered are:
(1) What is the definition of Lesson study learned in Japan and in Vietnam?
(2) What are the components of Lesson study as works in Japan and in Vietnam?
(3) What should be implied in this review and recommended for Vietnam education these days?
CONTENT
1. Lesson study reflected in Japan
Conversely, researching “Japanese Lesson study” is internationally becoming an important
issue in the fields of teacher education, curriculum and instructional design, school management,
and other fields. Lesson study has its origins in Japan (Fernandez & Yoshida, 2004; Akita &
* Corresponding Author: Nam-Phuong Nguyen, Email Address: phuongnn@hnue.edu.vn

2 Ho Chi Minh University of Education, Vietnam
3 Yokohama National University, Japan
287
Lewis, 2008; Lewis et al., 2011), which is a direct translation of the Japanese Jugyo-Kenkyu
(translated as ‘lesson adapted till it is perfect’ in English).
Lesson study is one of the most remarkable achievements to come out of Japanese
educational culture.
Firstly, in the very first time of research on Lesson study, as the original meaning of the
Japanese word, Jugyo-Kenkyu, it has the main point in teacher education. This time, the goal of
Lesson study is to effectively improve the quality of teaching, such as by demonstrating
teachers’ model techniques for other teachers. Working in groups, teachers collaborate with one
another by, meeting to discuss learning goals, planning actual classroom lessons, observing how
lessons work in practice, and then revising and reporting on the results so that other teachers can
learn something new through their practical research. Since Lesson study means a Japanese
style of researching curriculum and instruction, or in-service teacher training in the school, the
concept will contribute to supporting school improvement (Lewis & Tsuchida, 1998; Stigler &
Hiebert, 1997, 1999; Akita & Lewis, 2008; Le, 2014).
Identified by NASEM (National Association for the Study of Educational Methods),
Lesson study is the science of the educational method “clarifies the aim, content, and method
and tries to contribute to teaching practice” (Sato, 1996, p. 270). Teachers who practice teaching
make lesson study for the purpose of promoting professional vocation of teacher and developing
practical ability of teaching, and make teaching practice an object of lesson study to do so and
develop professional ability through its study (Inagaki & Sato, 1996).
Since the 1960’s the term “Lesson study” has characterized one of its figures: reflecting
results of science to educational content as accurately as possible and to fundamentally
recompose educational content with non-government educational research movement as the
center of its movement of Lesson study (Sato, 1996).
An important issue of Lesson study in Japan is how it combines what is called today
teacher education connected with teacher education and in-service teacher training (Sugiyama,
1969, p. 112), including of “analysis of teaching-learning”, “instruction” and “learning”
(NASEM, 2011).
In the second aspect, regarding a literature review initially, the historical definition of
lesson study and the school’s common educational goals and content, should be established by
managing the school’s organization performance. Also, the quality of Lesson study must be
developed to create strategic teaching and curriculum (Plan), to implement the curriculum and
the actual teaching of lessons (Do), and to evaluate teaching effectiveness (Check). Finally,
improving the quality of curriculum design and teaching strategies (Act) should be completed
for students and teachers within a school year. This typical PDCA paradigm is called
“curriculum management with Lesson study” (Takano, 1988; Nakatome, 2001, 2005;
Kuramoto, 2018). Significant steps have been made since the introduction of Lesson study to
the international teaching community through the establishment of the World Association of
Lesson Studies (WALS) in 2008.
Since the international recognition of WALS as a profound teaching methodology was first
established, educators meet every year at an annual conference in various worldwide locations
to discuss research and to further develop pedagogical methods. Therefore, Lesson study is a
necessary component of the concept of curriculum management. Based on the principles of the
new “course of study” from 2020, the official school curriculum guideline, the following
approaches are recommended to ensure that school management understands “curriculum
management with Lesson study” (MEXT, 2016). It is classified with further explanation:
– The standard educational content for students must be approached from each subject’s
interrelation, and an integrated curriculum must be systematically developed based on school
goals.
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– A Plan-do-check-act (PDCA) cycle with a planned series of steps: Plan (formulate

curriculum), Do (practice), Check and Act (evaluate and improve), that must be established to
develop teaching skills based on examinations concerning the conditions of the entire school,
and various data for improving the quality of school education (this means that Lesson study is a
critical strategy).
– The standard educational content, teachers and students, and material must be effectively
managed as internal resources in schools, and external resources in the community must be
utilized.
Furthermore, thirdly, the concepts of Lesson study and curriculum management indicate the
building of positive school cultures (O’ Neill & Kinston,1996; Steven, 1998), and lastly, being
accountable for the communities (Kratzer & Teplin, 2007; Kuga, 2007; Kuramoto &
Tsuyuguchi, 2009). A number of books written by Japanese scholars on Lesson study that was
translated into Vietnamese mostly have focused on its practice in learning community, in
holistic schooling innovation (Saito et al., 2015; Sato & Sato, 2011).
In general, Lesson study refers to the ability of developing the curriculum management
through a holistic approach, rather than individual teachers making improvements
independently. Japanese Association for the Study of Educational Administration (JASEA) says
school curriculum management leads to improved teachers’ quality and fulfillment of
educational guidance in their teaching (NASEM, 2011; JASEA, 2008). In other words, a key
element of curriculum management is Lesson study to facilitate teacher training and
improvements in teaching quality in schools.
2. Lesson study reflected in Vietnam
Recently, Vietnam education has engaged in educational innovation according to the
implementation of the 2018 General Education Curriculum in this country. Though being newly
revealed, a number of academic works have given some aspects to identify “Lesson study”
critically as below.
Firstly, Lesson study is used to refer to an approach to professional development
through a school-based collaborative research process for improving the learning and
teaching process in a certain academy field.
From 2006 up to now, Lesson study has been paid attention to and developed in many
schools in Vietnam. There is much innovation as well as many challenges for schools on the
way of their teaching practice. The researchers have done several case study works not only to
point out the teachers’ difficulties in their working environment but also to reveal the critical
issues in the education policy in Vietnam (Saito et al., 2018; Saito et al., 2012). These described
why the school-level policies should democratize school culture and practices in teacher
operation and student learning in their classrooms. The aspects of Lesson study have been
shown with its vision, reasons, processing (Pham et al., 2018). One of school reform activities
known as professional teacher meetings (PTMs) has been critically sustained in schools for ages
even after its introductive project since 2006 (Saito et al., 2012). Although the PTMs under
Lesson study for learning community were introduced about 15 years ago, the teachers involved
are still conducting these in a present context, becoming the main trend to reinforce the school
staff as well as the enthusiasm and support of school seniors and authorities for PTMs. It has
been mentioned as an innovative way for running the 2018 General Education Curriculum in
Vietnam (Vu & Nguyen, 2010; Nguyen et al., 2021).
Secondly, the educators consider Lesson study as an important way in the competence-
oriented teacher education curriculum as the holistic classroom observation is provided, that
really makes sense for both of pre-service and in-service teacher education curriculum.
289
The practice of Lesson study which has mainly been understood as a method of classroom
attendance and classroom observation provides teacher students with knowledge, skills,
experience, and qualities in needs for them in the pedagogical school as well as linked to the
career in the future. Therefore, the profession-related content at teacher training colleges should
be provided to students with more authentic experiences. That illustrated by teachers’
observation and reflection (Saito, 2021; Saito & Khong, 2017), Lesson study has a great impact
on the teacher students who may have a lot of insights of methodology and pedagogies (Tsukui
et al., 2017; Khong, 2021). This approach contributes to improving the learning environment
towards the goal of developing professional competencies for learners. Perspective teachers
have demands on applying those pedagogies and methodology in the positive learning
environment. Meanwhile, the pedagogical universities should apply and improve the methods to
adapt to their learning conditions (Ha, 2018), having great chances to revise their training
curriculum, improving their pre-service teacher education quality as well as the government
policies adapted in this field (Saito et al., 2018; Tsukui, 2019).
Meanwhile, classroom attendance, classroom observation, syllabus development, analysis
and contribution is considered as an effective way to support colleagues and boost in-service
teachers’ in-class attempts (Nguyen, 2018), especially novice teachers (Nguyen, 2020). Lesson
study requires teachers to focus their research both in terms of their methodology and their
students’ feedback, being ready to immerse themselves in the wave of innovation (Saito et al.,
2012; Saito et al., 2018), to gradually improve their professional competencies. The practice of
Lesson study in Vietnam refers that the professional development here should be considered as
in-service teachers’ learning community (Saito, 2008; Saito & Tanaka, 2008; Tsukui & Sato,
2018). In this context, strengthening professional activities according to “Lesson study” is a
feasible way, so it should be done regularly in the subject-based teacher groups in schools (Vu,
2020; Nguyen, 2020; Khong, 2021), specifically feasible to the teachers who are in the early
stage of their career.
Thirdly, Lesson study is mainly mentioned in giving a more detailed description of
teachers’ lesson plans (syllabus).
According to guide official dispatch launched by the Ministry of Education and Training
(MOET) of Vietnam (2014), the teachers required follow critical steps in activities in subject-
based teacher groups concerning lesson planning. This mentions the steps of Lesson study (in
terms of classroom attendance), including: Step 1 – To choose a trial teaching topic followed by
choosing the title/headline, identifying the targets of the trial topic, selecting the active teaching
activities, preparing every tentative teaching activity; Step 2 – To design questions and
assignments basing on Bloom Taxonomy (remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing,
evaluating, and creating). Step 3 – To develop teaching processing (stages of preparation; on-
site at a classroom, and after the lesson). Step 4 – On-site performance and classroom
attendance. Step 5 – To analyze, revise and learn from experience. To this extent, it is shown
that Lesson study is conducted in the real classroom. In that process, a group of teachers works
together to design a lesson plan, teach, observe, revise, reteach, and share the results based on
careful observation of students’ learning and teachers’ teaching in one lesson
(C.C. Lewis, 2002; Huynh, 2017). Teachers’ renovation in their methods, such as adopting a
more dialogic approach (Khong, 2021), empowers their students to question, their colleagues
attending in the classroom and the quality of classroom talk during whole-class discussions. In
other words, Lesson study is a form of teacher professional development to enhance the quality
of their teaching and improve students’ learning experience (Fernandez & Yoshida, 2004;
Stigler & Hiebert, 1999).
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3. Reflection
We find it quite familiar in researches of Lesson study in Japan and Vietnam that they
mention, to a certain extent, the perspective of teacher education, specifically in-service teacher
education. Works in Vietnam and Japan (in previous times) have focused on critical classroom
observation. That’s why, up to now, once Lesson study is regarded, we mostly think of crucial
classroom activities observed, analysed and the syllabus revised and adapted. Both countries
consider Lesson study as a very good way to foster human resources in education, mainly
focused on in-service teachers, their practice in classrooms and improving their performance in
career of teaching, thanks to working in groups of in-service teachers as the utter format. Either
understood in Vietnam or Japan, Lesson study is for the purpose of promoting the professional
career of educators and developing the practical ability of teaching. It includes analysing
teaching and learning, instruction and learning. Those works mentioned above have showed that
Lesson study is the science of educational method “clarifies the aim, content and method and
tries to contribute to teaching practice” (Sato, 1996, p. 270). Lesson study might probably be
considered the connection between teacher education and in-service teacher training.
In terms of scope in educational development, in Vietnam, Lesson study has mainly been
concerning a critical subject, engaged with a real classroom and crucial incidents happened in
there. It might be supposed that works of Lesson study in Vietnam have mainly focused on
micro-term educational process as how to zoom students’ responses in classrooms, what are the
best standing points in classroom for the most effective observation, how teachers respond to
students’ abnormal behaviors. That explains the reason why Lesson study regarded in
Vietnamese papers mentions a lot of teaching techniques including teaching methods, classroom
observation as well as classroom behavioral management. Meanwhile, Lesson study in works of
Japanese cultural background has mentioned a larger perspective, not only within a classroom, it
spreads its scope to holistic school improvement, curriculum management, as well as the
contribution of the learning community. To some extent, Lesson study refers other factors
impacting education and schooling such as families, parents’ involvement with their children
and the teachers’ activities. It means that the scope of Lesson study includes in-class and off-class
dimensions, in macro term of education.
In terms of vision in educational development, Lesson study in Vietnam plays an important
role in pre-service teacher education and in-service teacher education as well. The literature
review above mentions these works with teacher students (in pre-service teachers education),
novice teachers as well as professional development for school teachers (namely in-service
teacher education). Whereas, works in Japan have regarded Lesson study as an essential
component in curriculum management and through a holistic approach of learning community,
rather than individually and independently teachers’ improvements.
RECOMMENDATION
Through this review research, we the authors would like to give out a number or
recommendation for Vietnamese researchers possibly in the near future.
Firstly, we should think of training workshops to adapt school managers’ awareness of
Lesson study, furtherly towards fostering their competences to perform Lesson study in schools
Based on the results reflected on works in Japan, which country has had long-term research
in this issue, it is clear that we might have had a considerably narrow perspective of “Lesson
study”. That might probably narrow the field and set a certain obstacle to researchers once they
want to look for solutions of educational innovation since the education process is preferably
supposed to deploy with more educational force engagement. This suggestion should be done in
291
terms of district-based managers towards educator network development and spreading the
portion of lesson study.
Furthermore, once the mindset of school managers has opened, every activity in schools
would get through. It is expected that there should be training courses for school managers of
Lesson study practice enlargement practically and theoretically. School managers including
principals and vice principals should support Lesson study within subject-based teacher groups
as well as encourage their autonomy and teachers’ leadership in bottom-up management model.
The school managers play an important role not only in assigning tasks to teachers but also,
more critically, in encouraging and connecting school educational resources in order for
schooling development.
Core teachers as leaders of subject-based teacher groups in schools should proactively
encourage grass-root lesson study activities. These are not only in-class activities anymore, as
learners’ improvement and competences are set as the ultimate target of each lesson, thus every
education process would be engaged with in-class and off-class resources (time, information,
personnel, infrastructure). Those mentioned above collectively boost the strength of school
managers’ competence for school development, which is essential these days in Vietnam
meeting the requirement of educational innovation within the 2018 GEC.
Secondly, it is expected to give training workshop for teachers on Lesson study in terms
of awareness and practice
It is recommendable for school teachers to join training workshops of lesson study for them
to have the right recognition of lesson study, its scope as well as its practice in the classroom
meeting the requirements of Vietnam 2018 GEC (Nguyen et al., 2021), improving the way we
support the novice teachers in their early stage in career (Nguyen, 2020), and promisingly
towards the learning community (Saito, 2015; Sato, 2011).
Thirdly, it is highly recommended for Lesson study practice in pre-service education
As the great impact of Lesson study practice on novice teachers, we also consider its
influence on teacher students. To pre-service education curriculum, Lesson study should be
considered as a teaching method (in classroom), as the practice of initial steps for pedagogical
students in practicum and having the best preparation for their career in the future.
Last but not the least, the review research of Lesson study gives us the great suggestion
in school infrastructure development. This means the good concentration on learning
conditions and the number of students per class (in micro terms of education), on encouraging
family engagement in schooling and social resource mobilization for schools (Nguyen &
Nguyen, 2021), regarding the macro terms of educational development. This might probably
ensure Lesson study runs with its righteous portion and scope.
CONCLUSION
A number of reflection of Lesson study recognition in Japan and Vietnam has been
revealed in this initial research. There is also a number of promising issues related to Lesson
study that should be widely published. Therefore, it is essential to compile a literature review in
an updated perspective considerably supporting the relevant research. This not only provides us
an overview of such a definition in education, educational management, curriculum
development but also gives us strong recommendations in doing critical research on teacher
education as an aspect of human resource development nationally. This paper opens the future of
educational research especially in the context of launching the 2018 GEC nowadays in Vietnam.
292
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About the authors
– Dr. Nguyen Nam Phuong is a lecturer in Faculty of Psychology and Pedagogy, Hanoi
National University of Education. She has been focusing on teacher education, more preferable
on in-service teacher education, with nearly 20 papers published in national and international
conferences concerning about this. She is one of the main trainers in ETEP projects with
training school teachers in the 2018 National Education Curriculum, engaging with guiding and
supporting the leader teachers to operate the activities in their schools. In early 2020, she gave a
presentation of initial research on lesson study in Aichi University of Education, Japan as a
visiting scholar. Then late 2020, as a member of WALS (World Association of Lesson Study),
giving a presentation with an international scholar team in a symposium of online conference
WALS 2020.
– Dr. Nguyen Dac Thanh, Vice Dean of School of Educational Sciences, Ho Chi Minh
University of Education. He has focused on in-service teacher education with such issues as
lesson study, action research and school curriculum development. He has got more than 10
international papers including 3 articles in ISI-Scopus list concerning these issues. He is a
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research team leader of a number of NAFOSTED-funded, MOET-funded and university-funded

projects. He has also published a number of academic books and textbooks for undergraduate
and postgraduate education aligned with their curriculum of educational sciences in universities
in Vietnam.
– Prof. Tetsuo Kuramoto is Head of Graduate School for teacher education in Yokohama
National University, Japan. He had been a primary teacher and then becomes an educational
manager. His research area is curriculum management at the school level in Japan, mainly
in-service teacher education at the post-graduate level. He has spent more than 20 years
researching lesson study and up to now has given national and international topics concerning
these in symposiums and conferences, as a member of WALS (World Association of Lesson
Study) and other associations. He also has papers and books published in the field of lesson
study, curriculum management and in-service teacher training.
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PART 3: HIGHER EDUCATION
PART 3
HIGHER EDUCATION
297
THE IMPACT OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE –

THE FUTURE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
Dinh Thi My Hanh1, Ngo Tu Thanh*2, Tran Van Hung3
Abstract: Launch and application of modern technologies into instructing and learning has been
promoted strongly over the past 30 years. It is the fact that the technologies have demonstrated
its own decisive role for the success of education through creating new methods to learn,
exchange, share, and work. Artificial intelligence (AI) is presently one of the modern and
advanced technologies with outstanding benefits offered such as automating basic operations in
education or proposing solutions to personalize learning. Besides, the way schools search, teach,
and support learners could be changed by data provided by AI. The teacher's role could be
changed more positively, etc. In addition to the benefits of AI in education analyzed, the process
that AI assists in education as well as possible impacts that AI brings in teaching and learning at
higher education institutions in the future are also indicated in the article. Futhermore, the
opportunities and challenges that Vietnamese higher education will encounter in the process of
applying AI are pointed to. Based on the research findings, the authors plan to keep on surveys,
assessment, experiments and building a teaching model with AI to improve the effectiveness of
higher education.
Keywords: artificial intelligence, education, impact, benefit, modern technology
INTRODUCTION
There are many factors influencing today's global challenging changes. Four of which are:
i) social impacts; ii) strategic actions; iii) talents and workforces; iv) technological impacts
(Bersin, 2018). The 4th technological revolution has been strongly impacting all aspects of
social life, through the technologies such as Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence (AI),
Virtual Realtime, Augmented Reality, social networks, cloud computing, mobile, analytics
based on big data, etc. to transform the entire real world into the digital world.
The rapid advancement of computation and information processing techniques has
accelerated the progress and applications of AI, allowing computers to perform tasks through
simulating human’s intelligent behaviors, such as reference, analysis, and decision-making
(Duan, Edwards, & Dwivedi, 2019).
One of the technologies mentioned a lot in the recent few years and contributing to creating
powerful breakthroughs and bringing “miraculous” results is AI. AI is an interdisciplinary field of
Philosophy, Psychology, Neuroscience, Mathematics, Cybernetics, Computer Science, Linguistics,
Economics (Russel & Norvig, 2003). AI will be one of the “levers” to help Information
Technology become closer and bring about breakthroughs in the coming years.
Technology is involved in the process of solving the problems of the modern society
including education. According to Ajuzieogu (2019), the current issues of education include:
(1) The world population explosion: Based on current growth rates in the different parts of
the world, a scenario from the United Nations gives the world population in 2150 as 694 billion.
This is very unlikely, but it shows the serious nature of the problem.
* Corresponding Author: Ngo Tu Thanh; E-mail Address: thanh.ngotu@hust.edu.vn

1 The University of Danang, Hanoi University of Science and Technology
3 The University of Danang – University of Science and Education
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(2) General education: the population explosion leads to a rapid growth in the need for
universal education. That poses great challenges for education both in terms of quantity and
quality of training.
(3) Lack of individualization in learning: Each learner is an independent individual who
differs in interest, ability, style and emotion, therefore should be treated separately. But the
current learning methods I offer are less individualized. All learners tend to be provided with the
same learning experiences, which is mainly due to large-size classes available today.
(4) The confusion between “information” and “learning”: it is almost thought that textbooks
or lecturers’ lectures are just learning materials; however, they should be regarded as other
content found on the world wide web. They are all sources of information that learners can refer
to and use in their learning. Accordingly, it is necessary to diversify and expand the definition of
reference sources and teaching and learning materials.
Artificial Intelligence in Education (AIEd) was born around the 1970s (Kay, 2015), focuses
on research, development and evaluation of computer softwares to improve teaching and
learning. The expected long-term goal is to collect learner’s feedback, assess learner's
competency and causes of weakness, personalize a person or a group of learners, and ultimately
use AI techniques to explore and develop teaching-learning theories (Woolf, 2015).
What is more, another interesting aspect of AIEd research is to find out its potential
implications for the role of teachers. The teacher role can shift from the central position in
learner’s knowledge acquisition to being a facilitator (King, 1993). This allows teachers more
time to build processes of supporting collaboration, collection, integration and processing
information of students, instead of owning information and knowledge for themselves (Roll &
Wylie, 2016).
Before broadly deploying AI in education, it is necessary to evaluate the opportunities and
challenges that AI brings to this field. This study is aimed at analyzing AI’s opportunities and
challenges for education from the perspective of Vietnam. The article is mainly to analyze the
positive effects of AI on education on a global scale and suggest solutions. At the same time,
challenges and difficulties when applying AI to higher education from the perspective of
Vietnam are also discussed in the article. Finally, some major solutions to help the deployment
of AI in Vietnam's higher education more convenient are proposed.
CONTENT
1. An overview of AI
1.1. Concepts of AI
J. McCarthy is the first person to make the phrase “Artificial Intelligence” become a
science concept. AI research is aimed to accurately describe aspects of intellectual process and
learning (to acquire knowledge) and create systems, machines simulating learning and
intellectual processing (McCarthy, 1955).
Figure 1 below shows the important development milestones of AI from its inception to the
present.
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Figure 1. The history of AI (Adapted from Anyoha, 2017)

Since its launch, there have been various theoretical understandings that AI is influenced by
chemistry, biology, linguistics, mathematics and that AI solutions have brought about
advancements. However, diverse definitions and interpretations remains controversial. Aimed to
analyze the impact of AI in higher education teaching and learning, Popenici et al (2017)
proposed a definition of AI. Accordingly, AI is computer systems with the ability of engaging in
human-like actions such as study, adjustment, synthesis, self-correction, and data use for
complicated processing tasks.
Russel and Norvig (2003) have described the term AI as either Machine Intelligence or
Computational Intelligence that includes sub-fields where learning as well as “special tasks”
such as playing chess, proving mathematical theorems, composing poetry, curing diseases are
all done”. Nilsson (2014) defines AI as all algorithms that replicate human intelligence. Simply,
after being received, the user's raw data will be filtered by devices, “processed” and made sense
before being used to satisfy the user’s requirements.
Figure 2. What is AI? (Source: Accenture )

The main fields of AI are Expert systems, Robotics, Vision systems, Learning systems,
Natural language processing, Neuron networks (Stair & Gorge, 2018).
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1.2. AI technology in education

The first conference related to AIE was organized by Masoud Yazdani in Exeter (UK) in
1983 and sponsored by the British AI Association called AISB. The researchers originally
aimed at building a system called Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS) or AIEd system. Both ITS
and AIEd share the same main objective of creating computer systems that could provide
personalized teaching, just as a knowledgeable teacher with professional teaching skills can.
(Self, 2016).
Cumming and McDougall (2000) predicted that AIEd would become a major trend in
education around 2010 and the following years. McDougall argued that AIEd should be
considered as overlapping with “cognitive science” even on a smaller scale. AIEd plays a key
role by combining science-oriented research (AI) and psychology/ pedagogy (education). Figure
3 illustrates two alternative notions of AI + Ed: (left) AIEd is the combined benefits of AI and
Education research; (right) AIEd is regarded as an independent, multidisciplinary field, defining
its own objective and scope among the respective AI and Education fields (Björn Sjödén, 2015).
AI AIEd Ed
Ed AI AIEd
Figure 3. The two alternative notions of AI and Ed (Sjödén, 2015)

While AI places machine learning and human-like intelligence as the focus, education
focuses on fostering learning capability and human intelligence. AIEd knowledge helps to
shorten this gap by providing techniques to foster more effective and smart interactions with
human to improve educational results.
AI in education has traditionally focused on designing digital tutors that not only deliver
concepts to be learned, but also have the intelligence to respond meaningfully to student’s behaviors,
such as providing adaptive support (Gilbert et al., 2015), addressing students' learning styles
(Dorca, 2015) or providing culturally appropriate communication (Blanchard, 2015).
In one of his study, Rad et al. (2018) presented a model in which AI-thinking is used to
explore cognitive and adaptive abilities in an educational environment, and at the same time
improve the communication ability of students and teachers by explaining complex human
reactions during their imparting knowledge on various topics. The proposed thinking strategy
goes beyond computational thinking by using extensive cognitive and learning modules that
differentiate the foundation from the traditional education-based framework: (i) deep and broad
learning: proposed AI thinking platform provides educational properties and features in a highly
scalable style where students can study a variety of subjects based on their learning pace and
interests. (ii) awareness and adaptation: proposed platform analyzes the educational
environment and explores the influence of internal and external factors such as observation,
classification and generalization to create the l personalized earning process.
This model was developed to define an AI thinking education foundation based on the
theory depicted in Figure 4.
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Figure 4. Theory of the proposed Educational Platform using AI-Thinking (Rad et al., 2018)
As can be seen in Figrue 4:
Hypothesis: A platform offers an enhanced education-based connection between students
and instructors by creating an environment that is easier to understand and use for students and
affords instructors access to more knowledge extracted by AI about student’s activities.
Variables: Key variables including (i) student’s learning and (ii) educational content.
Constructs: The proposed model builds some substructures such as (i) adaptive feedback
from students; (ii) personalization of learning; (iii) cloud infrastructure.
Proposition: The proposed model measures student’s Key Performance Indicators while
imparting knowledge of different subjects in personalized settings designed by themselves.
Since its launch, AIEd has been interested in studying how AI techniques could create tools
to personalize learning tailored to specific learners (Conati, PorayskaPomsta, & Mavrikis,
2018). The aim of bringing the AIEd system to the same level of efficiency as a private tutor for
humans has been an area of interest for researchers since the earliest days of computing
(VanLehn, 2011).
It may not be seen that “robot lecturers” entirely replace human ones in the near future.
However, by researching and launching products using “machine intelligence” like nowadays,
learning and teaching have reached the first positive changes.
Additionally, according to Sjödén (2015), the core problem is that technology is not used
with the purpose to “perfectly” model human characteristics (such as communication capacity
or intelligence), but it could be only used to elicit social schemas (e.g: of teachers/ students) that
engage students in productive interactions for learning.
2. Opportunities for universities with the support of AI
Technology helps to create relevant learning features and enhance personalization to
increase the learners’ experience. Below are the main ways that AI is more positively changing
education industry step by step.
AI is estimated essential for the future of Asia-Pacific educational sector, but only one-third
of higher education institutions in this region have implemented AI in their processes.
Accordingly, 75% of education leaders1 agree that AI will be able to drive competitiveness of
educational institutions. However, only 32% of higher education institutions in the region have
embarked on their AI journey. The reason why the educational sector lags behind other
industries in terms of AI readiness is in the data, strategy-investment and cultural aspects.
1
The survey was conducted with 207 business leaders and 150 education staff.
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AI-adopted educational institutions report that the improvement rate is in the range of 11 to
28%. Notably, it is expected that by 2021, education institutions with AI stand to experience the
biggest jump in higher funding, expected to increase by 3.7 times, higher than most other
industry sectors in Asia-Pacific (Microsoft & IDC, 2019).
2.1. Automate educational activities
In traditional educational ways, lecturers usually spend much time doing “repetitive” tasks,
such as homework classification, essay evaluation, marking. In addition, these tasks also make
teachers bored, tired.
AI contributes to automating and implementing the above management and teaching
activities for lecturers. AI provides interaction software tools and virtual reality-integrated
adjustment, deployed on digital devices. AI helps to reduce teacher’s time and efforts in
administration, assigning, marking, etc.
2.2. Personalize learning process
Goleman (1996) and Kowalski et al. (2011) observed that students’ emotions such as
confidence, boredom, confusion, stress, and anxiety are all strong predictors of achievements
and influence their learning outcomes. Individualized teaching for each learner begins with
timely instruction which is also appropriate to student’s perceptions, emotions (Woolf, Lane,
Chaudhri & Kolodner, 2013).
The method of “machine learning” and data mining is used to explore specific types of
educational data for better understanding students and setting up what students need to learn,
thereby maximum helping learners with the “costs” of time, effort, and material ... spent to get
the highest efficiency (Bali & Maha, 2017).
In the study related to the expectations that AI could bring in personalized learning,
Maghsudi et al. (2021) have outlined the basic ecosystem of online personalized education,
including all stakeholders, along with key factors and performance metrics (Maghsudi et al.,
2021) (See Figure 5).
Learners
Instructors
Effectiveness Usability
validation feedback
Teaching
Personalized learning support tools
experiences AI
Fairness, privacy, Content designers

Policy makers transparency Design and quality
regulations feedback
Learning
Population-level content
insights repository
Figure 5. The baseline ecosystem of AI-empowered personalized education

(Maghsudi et al., 2021)
With the same concept of knowledge, AIEd allows different students can acquire
differently. At this time, AI can know receptive capacity of each student and come up with
different teaching strategies which are suitable for each student. With a personalized curriculum,
provided learning content will adapt to each individual’s cognitive speed. It can offer more
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difficult knowledge or suggest proper knowledge, references for learning

needs/abilities/progress to accelerate learning if the students understand more, and continue to
increase (or decrease) depending on the learner’s level. In this way, both fast and slow learners
can improve their proficiency without affecting other students.
2.3. “Virtual” lecturer
In the era of technology and digital development, AI is used in education as a digital
assistant to assist teachers in teaching as well as personalizing learning materials (Hrastinski et
al., 2019). AIEd contributes to liberating teachers from their daily professional tasks (which
have become their habits), reducing the burden of monitoring all students as well as having
extensive knowledge to support students in their learning and discussing process (Goksel &
Bozkurt, 2019; Luckin et al, 2016; Roll & Wylie, 2016; Timms, 2016). AI techniques such as
word processing and machine learning can be used by an intelligent moderation system to
summarize and analyze data submitted by students. The results of processing and analysis are
reported back to teachers to provide better support and guidance for students (Luckin et al,
2016; De Laat, Chamrada & Wegerif, 2008).
Koedinger and Corbett (2006) show five critical aspects that a computer needs have to fully
function as a tutor in the same way that a human can: (1) Problem solving and reasoning
through the use of domain knowledge; (2) Understanding typical learning trajectories,
misconceptions, and informal knowledge; (3) Ability to follow the student's reasoning step by
step and recognize the student's knowledge gaps; (4) Providing feedback and support when
needed and in the right context; (5) Personalizing instructions in a continuous assessment.
An AI-integrated classroom is meant to provide students with a “virtual lecturer”. The
“virtual lecturer” applying Machine Learning and AI will bring about the most effective and
practical online learning method to users.
Moreover, we can also take advantage of AI support by “embedding” AI into teaching
applications and websites, thereby collecting and analyzing the “habits and behaviors” of
students in their learning process. Accordingly, the data is used to build a free model that can
provide inreal-time information about students’ understanding and their engagement under
specific topics. The data model also helps find models among many students and make
analytical predictions, such as predicting how students will perform (behave) in the future.
Using more-advanced AI may involve in complex image algorithms to analyze learners'
facial expressions, such as boredom and distraction, and linking to other data collected on some
other instances to create a more complete picture of the learner model. In most cases, the AI
sytems will switch the role of the instructor to a supporting role. The system also offers
“suggestions”, “advice” for students to choose a suitable learning method or course.
With the support of AI, teaching and learning could take place everywhere, every time. AI
could replace lecturers in some cases. Koedinger and Corbett (2006) also argue that providing
“virtual” instructors and personalized learning process by AIEd offers the potential to be more
cost-effective than hiring a private tutor. In many ways, technology is already driving some of
these changes in the classroom, especially in universities that are online or embrace the flipped
classroom model.
2.4. Regular responses by AI
Kowalski (2011) noted that chatbots can play a useful role for educational purposes because
they are an interactive mechanism as compared to traditional e-learning systems. Students can
continuously interact with the chatbots by making questions related to a specific field.
AI chatbot is one of the applications used in collecting student’s information related
to hobbies, habits and learning methods, even collecting frequent mistakes by students
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in a specific grammar. Chatbots can act as an enthusiastic “teaching assistant” in

education, specifically:
– Chatbots are designed with a script of frequently asked questions;
– Students' learning and self-learning progress can be monitored;
– Comments and feedbacks to each student are given;
– Personalized subject and material suggestions are offered.
2.5. New experiences in learning with AI
That learning can take place in any place and time, or that learners can experience trial-and-
error learning are exciting experiences in the learning process with AI systems. Students could
be offered a way to experiment and learn in a relatively non-judgmental environment, especially
when AI tutors could suggest solutions. In fact, AI is a perfect format to support this type of
learning as AI systems often offer trial-and-error learning method.
3. Challenges and suggestions to improve the application of AI in higher education
The development of information technology has promoted the rapid development of AIEd,
and the foundation of AIEd is the creation of personalized learning systems with highly
effective interfaces (Maghsudi et al., 2021).
Woolf et al. (2013) suggested five main aspects for ongoing research in education by using AI:
(1) Academic advisor for everyone
(2) Learn 21st century skills
(3) Interactive data for learning
(4) Access to global classrooms
(5) Holistic lifelong learning
The above-mentioned areas seem to be a useful framework to frame goals and generate
relevant ideas for researchers and bussinesses to continue researching and developing AI
applications in education.
The development of AI can threaten the existence and controlling the world of humans
(Chace, 2018), accordingly humans become the second intelligent species on the Earth (Barrat,
2013). In the education field, besides the above-mentioned positive impacts, AI also has
potential challenges and difficulties when applied in practice. In this part of the article, the
potential challenges when bringing AI into education to improve equity and quality of learning
will be focused.
3.1. The need of completing policy system for AI’s sustainable development
According to Francesc Pedro et al. (2019), education is both a “customer” and an “agent” in
the development of AI in general and AIEd in particular. On the one hand, AI has a great
potential to improve education system. On the other hand, higher education systems also
contribute to creating killed learners to thrive in a society where AI seems to be ubiquitous.
Currently, the application of AI in education in general and higher education in particular
mostly comes from the private sector. There are companies abroad such as Pearson, McGraw-
Hill, IBM, Knewton, Cerego, Smart Parrow, Dreambox, LightSide or Coursera. Most
governments are struggling to manage private sectors’ participation in the application of AI in
education. It is difficult for public policies to keep pace with AI development.
The development of the public policies related to AI in education is still inceptive, but this
is an area that is likely to grow exponentially over the next ten years. Therefore, it is necessary
to promulgate synchronous mechanisms and policies, facilitate the development of a complete
and diversified ecosystem, call for investment sources, build AI research centers, recruit and
train AI experts, especially in higher education institutions, attract more talents into the AI field
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through establishing excellent academic centers in AI networks, universities and research

institutes and scholarships.
In addition, it is necessary to continue promoting public-private cooperation in training,
researching and application deployment. This will, on the one hand, help to share human and
financial resources, on the other hand, help training products in ine with labor market need.
3.2. Ensured synchronization and fairness in developing AI in higher education
Besides its benefits, AI may also be contribute to inequality among disadvantaged and
weak populations that are more likely to be excluded from AI-supported education. The result is
a new type of digital division: a split in the use of data-driven knowledge to make smart
decisions (Hilbert, 2015).
When designing policies for AI in university education, it is crucial to ensure equity and
inclusion. Hilbert (2015) argues that the lack of basic infrastructure might also create a new
digital gap in using data-driven knowledge to make smart decisions. To remove these obstacles,
many policies must be launched. It is essential to create more international coalitions to build
infrastructure in the poorest parts of the developing world and to make the internet accessible to
everyone (Mutoni, 2017).
3.3. Ensure the lecturer’s capacity when applying AI in higher education
AI has been contributing to making learning data analysis systems, on which the systems
can help teachers predict the difficulties that learners are facing and implement personalized
interventions to solve those problems. However, the effectiveness of learning analytical systems
is not decided by prediction algorithms, but by usefulness and relevance for learners and
educators. Real-time data processing turns into real-time feedback, which is faster interventions
and personalized guidance. Instructors are still empowered to actively manage classes, based on
the view that they are most familiar with the need of their students.
AI cannot completely replace instructors. Teaching does not just mean providing
knowledge and ignoring the importance of creativity and social emotion (Bali & Maha, 2017).
The instructor is the one deciding the right time to use AI supportive tools. These tools are
developed and integrated into the teaching process in order to support what educators really
need, not what technology engineers think the educators need (Luckin, R. et al., 2016).
Accordingly, in order to use AI-assisted tools effectively, instructors need to acquire the
following new skills:
– Well understanding how AI-supported systems can facilitate and make teaching more
efficient;
– Skills in research, data analysis; new management skills to be able to manage human and
AI resources subjectively;
– Taking advantage of AI to perform repetitive tasks to bring more capabilities to people,
which they might not have had time to do before: mentoring, mental support, personal
communication skills, etc.
– Having a critical perspective on how AI and digital technologies affect human lives, new
frameworks of computational thinking and digital skills can enhance students' ability to
understand the strength, danger and capability of AI;
– Helping learners acquire skills and competencies that cannot be done by machines.
3.4. Problems of data development in applying AI
Data is one of the key factors to ensure the accuracy of learning machine algorithms and
predictability of AI. The data must be complete and accurate. However, collecting educational
data has still been a big problem in many countries. Educational data must be open and be used
at the school level.
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In addition, it is necessary to ensure demographic representativeness in collecting data (age,

gender, social background) in order to produce full analytical results on disadvantaged,
vulnerable groups. Simultaneously, the data comes from not only educational sources but also
other sources such as healthcare units. This proves the importance of data integration: When the
government’s systems are integrated, more data is shared and available across all fields. This
sharing of data means that the education industry could use more data to run AI algorithms and,
therefore, have more ability to generate analytics, models, or predictions (UNESCO, 2018).
3.5. Close relation between AI application in education and thorough research on
education
The potential of technology in innovating and improving the quality of education has been
mentioned a lot. However, for various reasons, this potential has not been fully exploited as
expected in developed countries or the developing countries yet. It is necessary to study and
evaluate the impacts of technology on the quality of education at schools, especially how to use
technology to achieve the desired effect.
AI can bring many benefits but requires an understanding of “local needs in the local
context”. It is really challenging to find a universal solution for all countries. Instructors should
be an agent, not a mere beneficiary or just a user of packaged technology solutions.
3.6. Ethical issues in data access, collection and exploitation
In the policies to develop AI in general and AI in education in particular, attaching ethical
issues to collection, production, analysis and dissemination of large-scale human data should be
strictly abided by.
Privacy and data security are concerned; the main challenge is protecting personally
identifiable information and personal privacy preferences while using the personal data. It is
also vital to install necessary security solutions to prevent data theft. In education, it is even
more difficult in the context of young learners, who are legally unable to give explicit consent to
the collection and use of their personal data.
Even when it is used to improve learning, collecting and using of personal data must always
be maintained based on clear and informed consent, transparency and fairness (Pedro et al.,
2019). It is still necessary to have specific discussions and guidelines related to ethical issues
when applying AI in education.
4. AI implementation in education in Vietnam
4.1. Strategies of AI implementation in education in Vietnam
Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc has affirmed that Vietnam needs to quickly catch up
with the 4th technology revolution, which means it is necessary to build an appropriate national
strategy for artificial intelligence development that is suitable for Vietnam.
On January 26th, 2021, Vietnam issued the National Strategy on Research, Development
and Application of Artificial Intelligence to 2030, setting the goal of promoting research,
development and application of AI, making AI an important technology field of Vietnam in the
4th Industrial Revolution. One of the important issues related to promoting the development and
deployment of AI applications in education is to predict the job demand of the market;
determine student evaluation criteria, assist students in identifying their job strengths upon
graduation; automate the professional work of teachers; determine criteria to achieve the
learning objectives; personalize learning, improve learning efficiency with the help of virtual
teachers and assistants; support to raise awareness among students.
This is considered an important legal basis and condition to promote more specific policies
and solutions to apply AI in education in Vietnam in the next period.
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4.2. Discussion on AIEd opportunities and challenges in Vietnam

In Vietnam, AI has been applied popularly in many fields such as healthcare, education,
agriculture, transportation, e-commerce, etc. Basically, the positive factors that AI brings about
for higher education in Vietnam are similar to that in other countries around the world.
Especially, in the context that Vietnam is still a developing country, implementing AIEd
thoroughly will bring about apparent changes.
However, like many other developing countries, Vietnam will face some challenges and
difficulties in AIEd implementation. Nye's study (2015) identifies 07 barriers to the adoption of
an ITS in developing countries.
(1) Availability of Information Communication Technolog (ICT) hardware;
(2) Electrical reliability;
(3) Internet reliability;
(4) Data costs;
(5) Learners’ basic ICT skills;
(6) Ability to use language fluently;
(7) Lack of culturally appropriate content.
AI has not been able to completely replace the role of teachers yet, but AI will signficantly
change the role of teachers in the 4.0 education era. It is necessary to further innovate teaching
and learning approaches in schools, in which teaching is learner-centered and the teacher is a
facilitator.
Human resources working in AI in general and teaching staff who are knowledgeable and
able to access. Applying and deploying AI in education in particular are also a problem for
Vietnam when it comes to promote AIEd in the future. Vietnam needs to start up and develop a
community of human resources experts in AI, form an AI ecosystem to support the development
of AI technology across all industries, fields and sectors around the world. Teaching staff who
can access technology in general and AI applications in particular should be quickly trained.
It is essential to improve skills and data in the widespread adoption and use of AI in
education. Fostering basic research might be important, but not be the solution to short-term
needs. Instead, in R&D, countries will have to significantly enhance their AI capabilities.
Countries with strong STEM education systems will have an advantage, but other countries will
need to import these skills in the short term. To do that, they have to create a strong incentive to
attract foreign talents. This means that they will have to relax labor laws to facilitate the import
of needed skills. Similarly, for AI industries to succeed, Vietnam will have to pay special
attention to enhancing both the 'dataization' (or data collection capabilities) of the economy and
the availability of data.
Promote responsible adoption of AIEd and management of its social impacts. In particular,
Vietnam needs to promote healthy competition through appropriate regulatory mechanisms that
will be crucial to building a dynamic innovation ecosystem in AI. This means the free flow of
data is allowed beyond existing silos, and responsible for protecting data privacy.
In the study findings by Microsoft and IDC (2019), 6 contribution aspects to AI readiness
in the education sector are evaluated and it is suggested that education institutions in Asia –
Pacific should focus on (1) Strategy and Investment, (2) Culture and (3) Its Data. This is an
essential reference information for education administrators in Vietnam in the process of
strategic planning to bring AI into education.
CONCLUSION
For education in general and higher education in particular, AI application will be a trend
that needs to be strongly promoted in the upcoming time because of its positives, in which the
outstanding is that technology helps reduce administrative procedures, instructor’s time-cost
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work such as marking, checking students’ attendance... With AI, such work could be automated.
Personalized curriculum and the emergence of “virtual tutors”/ “virtual assistants” will make a
difference in AI-assisted education. Another highlight is that AI creates excitement for learners
with real-time feedbacks, and learners will spend more time to interact with the system because
of their satisfaction of enthusiastic and immediate support.
Although ICT application in education has been extensively researched and implemented in
Vietnam and has initially achieved encouraging results. However, in-depth research on AI
application in teaching in Vietnam has still limited. Launched applications are mainly
commercial (fee-paying) or deployed in large technology corporations.
Especially, information infrastructure, pedagogical strategy, preparation and ability to use
IT of teachers and learners are still a limitation to enable this solution. What is a teaching model
with AI application in accordance with the characteristics of Vietnamese education, teachers
and students in order to achieve the highest efficiency? The problem will be studied and its
solutions should be given in the thesis.
However, some major difficulties and challenges when applying AI in education in the
global context in general and from the perspective of Vietnam in particular are also pointed out
in the article. In addition to providing knowledge, education is also expected to foster and
develop people comprehensively (culture, emotion, creativity, other social skills ...). Hence,
research, overall assessment of relevant issues are needed, based on the fact that technology in
general and AI in particular are identified just as a support tool, not a complete alternative for
the human factor in education. The analysis shows that it is necessary to complete the policies,
ensure fairness and synchronization when developing AI in education based on thorough
researches on education. Simultaneously, the staff capacity should be improved to enable AI
application in education.
The mentioned research findings and evaluation results are a fundamental basis, creating a
premise for further research and development to launch more suitable models and solutions to
apply AI in higher education scientifically and effectively.
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About the authors
- MSc Dinh Thi My Hanh is currently a lecturer and Head of Student Affairs Department
(The University of Danang). She earned Master degree in Computer Science at The University
of Danang – University of Science and Technology. Currently, she is a PhD student at the
School of Engineering Education, Hanoi University of Science and Technology (from May
2020). Her research focuses on the application of information technology, especially Artificial
Intelligence in education, with aim to improve the quality of teaching and learning in
Vietnamese universities.
- Assoc. Prof. Dr Ngo Tu Thanh is currently working at the School of Engineering
Education, Hanoi University of Science and Technology. His main research areas are
application of ICT in teaching towards constructivist – interactive teaching, building
architecture of E-Learning system according to cloud computing model, building ICT
interdisciplinary science and education relevant to the industrial revolution 4.0, applying
artificial intelligence to innovate teaching methods ... For the last 5 years, he has published 35
scientific articles in scientific journals, proceedings of domestic and foreign seminars on the
above research directions.
- Dr. Tran Van Hung is a lecturer of the Faculty of Informatics, University of Education
(University of Da Nang). Currently, Dr. Tran Van Hung focuses on Blended Learning, Flopped
Classroom and AI application in teaching. He has 23 domestic scientific papers and 4
international scientific papers, most of which are related to teaching methods, application of
information technology to improve the quality of teaching and learning.
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CURRENT STATUS OF THE JOB COMPETENCIES

OF STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF AGRICULTURE
AND FORESTRY, THAI NGUYEN UNIVERSITY
Hua Thi Toan*1, Trinh Thanh Hai2
Abstract: Agriculture has recently been one of eight priority sectors for implementing the
national digital transformation program. Therefore, human resources training institutions must
change their programs and methods to match the general development trend. This requires
universities in general and the University of Agriculture and Forestry, Thai Nguyen University
(TUAF) to highly focus on developing job competencies for students so that they are qualified to
catch the change of agriculture sector after graduation. To determine the current status of the job
competencies of students at TUAF, the article has used theoretical research, practical research,
expert methods, and data processing. The results of the article show how the students have met
the social requirements after graduation. It is also the basis for providing solutions to equip
students with the necessary skills to improve the education quality of the university and to meet
the requirements of digital agriculture and today's society.
Keywords: job competency, competency framework, University of Agriculture and Forestry,
employers
INTRODUCTION
In Vietnam, the national digital transformation program was approved through the Prime
Minister's Decision No. 749/QD-TTg dated June 3, 2020, in which agriculture is one of eight
priority areas for transformation implementation. Digital agriculture transformation means that
agriculture applies digital technology to create products of higher value, produce more
efficiently, and increase the share of the agricultural sector in the economy. Technologies used
in digital agriculture include cloud computing, big data, the Internet of things, and artificial
intelligence (PM, 2020).
The application of digital technology in agriculture will change production processes,
techniques and methods. Modern machines and technologies will replace manual labor and
human strength. This change helps to save resources, create a better working environment,
increase job opportunities for high-quality workers, increase productivity and product quality,
and reduce labor and production costs. The final result is to create better products and services
and improve farmers’ lives. In addition, business activities will also be changed in order to
create favorable conditions for consumers, increase the ability to connect with customers, and
improve the operational efficiency of the value chain.
Technological change leads to new requirements for workers’ skills. It is estimated that the
country currently lacks about 3.2 million trained workers in the fields of agriculture, forestry,
and fishery (Ngoc Anh, 2020). While the demand for human resources for agriculture is very
big, the tendency to study in this field has decreased sharply. Businesses constantly seek
employees but many students cannot find jobs. One main reason is that the qualifications of
students do not meet the needs of employers. They lack professional skills and necessary soft
skills. Therefore, assessing the current status of students’ job competencies will help universities
* Corresponding Author: Hua Thi Toan; Email Address: huathitoan@gmail.com

1 University of Agriculture and Forestry – Thai Nguyen University
2 University of Sciences – Thai Nguyen University
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determine the quality of the training program. Thereby, the university could make suitable
adjustments and changes to meet the needs of society and employers. This is also the key to
solve the enrollment difficulties of the university. For the students, they can choose the more
suitable jobs for themselves and self-equip with the necessary competencies to meet the
employment needs.
Studies which aimed at assessing the current status of job competencies and employer
satisfaction for agricultural students have been carried out by many authors including Graham
(2001); Alston, Cromartie & Wakefield (2009); Cole & Thompson (2002), Slusher et al.
(2011), Pollard et al., (2015), etc. According to Graham (2001), graduates of the University of
Arkansas Agricultural Extension still showed job confusion. They need to further improve their
professional skills, teamwork, decision making, and leadership skills to meet employer’s
requirements. The result of the research by Alston, Cromartie and Wakefield (2009) show that
employers in the United States evaluate that communication skills, teamwork, technology skills,
technical competencies, and work attitude are the most important for agricultural graduates.
Most studies above showed that student’s competencies after graduation are only average
because some essential skills need to be trained more and some technology-related skills are not
included in the university curriculum.
Domestic studies focused on assessing the job competencies of agricultural officers at all
levels. The job competencies of agricultural officers at the commune level in Hoa Binh province
according to Bui et al. (2014) include basic theoretical level, professional practice competency,
cooperation, responsibility, ability to research and apply science and technology, ability to
inspect and supervise, ability to propose solutions when necessary, ability to write reports,
ability to communicate, dissemination of knowledge transfer to farmers. Nguyen (2018) argues
that the job competencies of agricultural extension officers in Lai Chau province included
professional knowledge level (professional degrees, IT level, foreign language, and ethnic
language proficiency), professional skills (communication and teamwork, planning, report
writing, conflict resolution, and working with the elderly), professional attitude and ethics
qualities (lifestyle, behavior, and passion). Articles on this topic are also included in the studies
of Pham (2014) or Nguyen (2020).
Organizing seminars and talks with ministries, sectors, experts, and businesses is regularly
implemented by institutions in the field of agriculture and forestry to find solutions to improve
training quality to meet the needs of employers. Most recently, a seminar on job competency
analysis for Veterinary graduates organized by the Vietnam National Academy of Agriculture
gave the requirements for the competencies that Veterinary graduates need. Along with that,
trainers, businesses, and experts have jointly built characteristics of a good veterinarian that
includes the competencies of diagnosis, treatment, livestock disease prevention, disease
handling, animal quarantine, slaughter controlling and testing, consultancy on animal care and
treatment, and doing business (VNUA, 2020).
From the current research situation and the necessity of determining the job competencies
for students, we set out two research tasks as follows:
1. Determining the professional competency framework of students at the University of
Agriculture and Forestry;
2. Assessing the current situation of job competencies of students at TUAF.
Based on theoretical research method, practical research method, expert method, and data
processing, we will analyze the current situation of job competencies of the students of TUAF
and point out some causes leading to the limitations and some solutions to overcome.
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CONTENT
1. The job competencies framework
1.1. The concepts of job competencies
The concept of job competencies was emphasized in Europe in the 1990s to fix the
disconnection between education and the labor market. The European Qualifications
Framework was developed through competency standards set by professional associations to
meet job requirements (Carrier et al., 1979). According to Guerrero & De los Ríos (2012), “The
components of job competencies are a composite of personal attributes (capacities, motives,
personality traits, self-image, aptitudes, attitudes, values, personality, etc.) which complement
and integrate themselves in conjunction with other elements that are related to contexts of work
(knowledge, abilities, skills, values, behaviors, actions, experience, etc)”. According to Mulder
(2014), the concept of job competencies is related to motivation, intelligence, education, and
work performance; it is considered the ability to apply knowledge and skills to a certain degree
of independence and autonomy. Mcevoy et al. (2005) determined that this competency is
formed and developed by a combination of necessary knowledge, skills, and attitudes. In the
research on professional competence in medicine, Epstein (2002) said that: “Professional
competencies is the habitual and judicious use of communication, knowledge, technical skills,
clinical reasoning, emotions, values, and reflection in daily practice for the benefit of the
individual and community being served. Competence builds on a foundation of basic clinical
skills, scientific knowledge, and moral development”.
According to Vu (2018), performance competency is the necessary knowledge, skills, and
attitudes, which are combined smoothly and inseparable to perform specific tasks of a job to
meet the job standards, under certain conditions. Professional development activities mean
enhancing skills and knowledge of members of an organization in order to develop their
personal qualities and job competencies (Trinh & Kevin, 2010). Circular 07/2015/TT-BGDĐT
of Ministry of Education and Training (2015) clearly states that the competency of learners after
graduation is the ability to work individually and in groups in compliance with professional
safety principles, ethics, and dedication; including knowledge, skills, initiative, and creativity in
solving problems related to the respective industry/specialization for each training level.
Although there are many different approaches, they all agree that job competency is the
ability to flexibly apply knowledge, skills and attitudes to ensure the success of a certain
professional activity.
TUAF is a training institution for highly skilled human resources in the fields of
agriculture, forestry, natural resources, and environment for the Northern Midlands and
Mountains region and the whole country. To ensure the output quality, the school’s have clearly
stated that students must have solid professional knowledge and skills; expertise in state
management and their professional fields’ necessary soft skills; abilities to collaborate and
manage resources; good ability in language, IT, and scientific research; adaptability to a wide
range of work in scientific institutions, production management, enterprises or self-creation in
production and services in the professional field; good health condition, serious working attitude
and professional ethics. Based on the above characteristics, we consider the job competencies of
agroforestry engineers in this article to be a suitable combination of knowledge, skills and
attitudes with the characteristics of the profession to effectively perform assigned tasks in the
fields of agriculture and forestry.
1.2. Models for assessing job competencies
Assessment of job competencies is a judgment process on the ability of learners to apply
knowledge, skills, and attitudes in specific professional activities for recruitment, training,
retraining, and human resources development. This activity helps educational institutions and
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employers determine how well students meet the output standards and professional practice. It
also helps students plan to supplement the necessary knowledge and skills to choose a suitable job.
The most popular competence assessment model today is the ASK model of psychologist
(Bloom, 1956). According to Fitch & Semb (1993), this model includes 3 criteria, each criterion
is evaluated by a scale of 5 levels. We summarize the scale corresponding to the criteria
according to the table as follows:
Table 1. The description of the criteria and scales of the ASK model (Fitch & Semb, 1993)
Criteria Scale
Knowledge: the general understanding of professional and social issues. No understanding, little understanding, basic understanding,
good understanding, excellent understanding.
Skill: the ability to perform tasks effectively based on prior knowledge. Starting, progressing, practicing, mastering, excellent skills.
Attitude: An emotional state that expresses an individual’s perception Uninterested, normal, interested, determined, completely
and behavior towards work and life. focused.
According to the author, among the above three criteria, “knowledge” belongs to thinking
competency, “skills” belongs to performance competency, and “attitude” belongs to emotional
and behavioral scope.
This model is often used in human resource management to train and develop individual
competencies. Bakarman (2011) assessed competencies in terms of knowledge level, practical
skills, and attitude of readiness for the profession. Nguyen (2018) assessed faculty competencies
including qualities (politics, professional ethics, lifestyles), skills (teaching, scientific research,
and technology transfer, civic duty), knowledge (specialties, training programs, pedagogical
skills, etc). Another research done by Le & Nguyen (2012) assessed the competencies of
Vietnamese small business executives.
Similar to ASK, the COID (Conceive Operate – Implement – Design) model is also based
on the application of simulation of training principles according to social needs of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA) but exclude the assessment of attitude factor,
focusing on assessing knowledge and skills through observable and recorded behavior in order
to remove emotional factors in the personal assessment. The model uses a 5-level scale to assess
competencies, in which each level describes the proficiency of competencies in terms of specific
behaviors (Crawley, Malmqvist & Östlund, 2007).
Doing research on models and methods of assessing learners’ competence through the level
of awareness and satisfaction of students with the training program, Duque & Weeks (2010)
tested and proposed a model in which the quality of education, the quality of resources, and the
participation of learners directly affect the cognitive competence and satisfaction of learners,
thereby directly affect the output results. In a specific study on the impact of employers’
requirements on economic training programs, Nguyen (2013) has shown that the requirements
of employers have a great influence on the training program, including knowledge, professional
skills, ethics of graduates; outcome standards; the relationship between the university and the
employer; the reputation of the training institution.
Depending on the evaluation purpose to build or use appropriate assessment models. In the
current trend of competency development, assessment based on factors related to knowledge,
skills, and attitudes is appropriate. The level of student’s competence to meet the job
requirements depends greatly on not only their own efforts but also the suitability of the training
program and the quality of education. Therefore, in order for human resources to meet social
requirements, educational institutions need to develop training programs and outcome standards
that meet the job competency framework for each profession that they educate.
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2. Job competencies of students at TUAF

2.1. The framework of job competencies of students at TUAF
TUAF is a training unit at undergraduate and postgraduate levels in the field of agriculture
and forestry. Every year, more than 1000 students graduate from the university. After
graduation, students of TUAF mainly work in state agencies; businesses, companies, farms;
international organizations; universities, colleges, research institutes. Some start their own
business and some become becomes a part of global human resources.
The training output standards of the university are built based on knowledge, skills, and
attitudes, which are divided into 5 detailed contents: General knowledge, specialized
knowledge, general skills, professional skills, and autonomy and self-responsibility. Each
content will correspond to specific output standards. Depending on the contribution of the
output standards to the training program, each output standard is evaluated on three scales from
1 to 3 (1: low contribution, 2: medium contribution, 3: high contribution). The content of the
output standards is updated every two years to meet the development of the industry and the
requirements of society.
According to the training output standards of the university TUAF (2021b), in order to meet
the needs, students must have sufficient job competencies to:
– Guide, manage, supervise, handle and troubleshoot technical problems in the processes of
growing, raising, producing, and preserving products.
– Using specialized machinery and equipment such as equipment and machinery to support
agricultural production, nutritional analysis equipment, feed materials, forest fire prevention and
fighting equipment, high-tech equipment, GPS machine, and electronic total station, etc.
– Research the dosage of fertilizers, food, and drugs for plants and animals, apply advanced
technology and science to research, test, and create new varieties with higher yield and quality.
– Plan, organize production and business, improve products according to the value chain,
and develop the market for agro-forestry.
– Survey, investigate, and create plans for land use and management.
– Advise and organize the implementation of legal policies on agriculture, forestry, natural
resources, and the environment.
– Develop documents and plans for programs related to agriculture and forestry; Train,
foster, consult, and propagate on skills, production organization methods, processes, and
scientific and technical advances in agriculture and forestry; build and update industry database.
Based on job descriptions of some recruiting units MARD (2015), PM (2016), MARD
(2020), TUAF (2021a) and the school’s output standards TUAF (2021b), we have concretized a
part of the professional competency framework for students of Thai Nguyen University of
Agriculture and Forestry as follows:
Table 2. The description of the professional competency framework of students at TUAF
(Author’s compilation based on TUAF’s reports)
Competency Description
Group 1. General competency
These are the necessary knowledge, skills and qualities, which are the foundation for all professional activities of employees
NL1.1. Problem-solving Demonstrated through the following elements: studying the problem, establishing the problem
competency space, planning and implementing the solution, and reflective evaluation of the solution to solve
problems in a complex real-life context.
NL1.2. Critical thinking competency A positive thinking process and proficiency in receiving and processing information, detecting,
reviewing, and evaluating problem situations, proving a scientific or unscientific hypothesis,
forming new knowledge.
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Competency Description
NL1.3. Self-study, innovation, and – Consciously continuing to develop existing knowledge and skills;
creativity competency – Actively researching and updating developments in the professional field;
– Actively looking for ways to improve quality; proposing new ways to solve the problem.
NL1.4. Social competency The ability to communicate, present, work in groups, negotiate, promote products and develop
social awareness.
NL1.5. The competency to adapt to The ability to adapt to diverse cultures and working environments.
a changing working environment
NL1.6. Emotional intelligence The ability to understand and control oneself; perceive, respond to, and elicit a response from
competency others.
NL1.7. The competency to use IT – Grasping and updating existing IT;
– Understanding and applying IT to solve jobs;
– Understanding and actively applying IT to improve work efficiency;
– Willingly learning and sharing knowledge and skills using new technologies.
NL1.8. Language competency – Understanding text content
– Summarizing and restating basic information
– Actively using foreign languages at work
Group 2. Professional competency
The necessary competence for each job position according to each profession’s characteristics.
NL2.1. The competency in – Deeply understanding of professional knowledge;
knowledge, application, and – Being proficient in technical operations and processes in professional activities;
professional development – Applying professional knowledge to solve real-life problems
NL2.2. Technical competency – Proficiently using specialized machinery and equipment
– Applying technical devices in solving practical problems.
NL2.3. The competency in planning – Developing and implementing production and business plans.
and executing work – Consulting, transferring technical advances and agroforestry technology
NL2.4. Scientific research – Identifying research problems;
competency – Carrying out basic scientific research projects, writing articles, reports, or scientific papers.
– Researching science and technology to create new superior products.
NL2.5. Entrepreneurial competency The ability to create jobs for themselves and others. This is one of the most difficult abilities as it is a
combination of many different abilities.
NL2.6. Work ethics The ability to firmly grasp the processes, procedures, standards as well as provisions of the law on
professional activities, in compliance with the rules of work ethics, live and work according to the
constitution and the law.
2.2. Measuring and assessing the job competencies of students TUAF
Testing and assessment is an important stage of the teaching process in order to evaluate the
quality of training, to know the current status of students’ competencies, as well as the level of
satisfaction of each student’s output standards.
During the research process, we assess student’s competencies through:
– Evaluating the learning outcome of students at the end of the course;
– Summarizing the report on employment situation after graduation from the university;
– Surveying students and employers.
For employers, we designed a survey with the question: In your opinion, to what extent do
new university graduates need to meet the following competencies if they want to apply for the
position of agroforestry engineer position at your company?
In the selection panel, we use the criteria in Table 2, rated on a Likert scale consisting of 5
levels from 1 to 5, respectively: Not meeting, meeting at low level, meeting at medium level,
meeting at medium high level, meeting at very high level.
For students, we designed 3 questions:
Question 1: How do you participate in the university’s activities?
Question 2: What is your overtime status?
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Question 3: In your opinion, how do you assess your level of achieving the following
competencies?
The first two questions are designed with 2 answer options: “Never participated” and
“Already participated”.
In the third question, we used the criteria in Table 2, rated on a Likert scale consisting of 5
levels from 1 to 5, respectively: Very poor, poor, average, good, very good.
Evaluation of students’ final study results and graduate employment situation was collected
in the academic year 2019 – 2020. The results achieved were ranked according to the current
credit system.
The data collected after the survey was entered in Excel as input data on the IBM SPSS
statistics 20 software. The data was analyzed with the following contents:
– Statistics were classified according to the coded variables, average scores. The standard
deviations of the answers in the collected survey sheets were also calculated.
– We checked the reliability of the scale through Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient. This is the
method to help eliminate inappropriate variables and evaluate the reliability of the scale. The
scale is considered reliable if the correlation coefficient of total variables (Corrected Item –
Total Correlation) ≥ 0.3 and Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient ≥ 0.7.
The results after collecting and processing on the software will be used to compare, analyze
and make assessments in the content below.
3. Current status of job competencies students at TUAF
3.1. Surveying students and employers
From the design survey table in section 2.2, we collected information by submitting the link
on google docs. There obtained 135 survey questionnaires from final year students, 41 survey
questionnaires from companies specializing in the production and trading of crops, vegetables,
animal feed, and agricultural materials in Thai Nguyen, Cao Bang, and Son La province. After
processing, we get the following results:
Cronbach’s Alpha coefficients obtained after running the survey of students and employers
on SPSS software is 0.922 and 0.702. This shows that the observed variable and the scales are
highly reliable and suitable for analysis.
Work ethics is a factor that must be met at a high level in any profession. The results
obtained in the two survey groups were quite similar. Therefore, in the evaluation process, we
do not calculate the score of this factor so as not to affect the average score achieved by the
professional competency group.
The average score and the difference of each competency in the survey after running on the
software obtained are as follows:
Table 3. The statistics of average results of each competency
and the differences between the two groups
Competency Employers Students Difference
* General competency group
NL1.1. Problem-solving competency 3.71 3.27 0.44
NL1.2. Critical thinking competency 3.24 3.20 0.04
NL1.3. Self-study, innovation, and creativity competency 3.56 3.38 0.18
NL1.4. Social competency 3.61 3.47 0.14
NL1.5. The competency to adapt to a changing working environment 3.54 3.65 -0.11
NL1.6. Emotional intelligence competency 3.37 3.46 -0.09
NL1.7. The competency to use IT 3.61 3.32 0.29
NL1.8. Language competency 3.24 2.77 0.47
Average 3.49 3.32
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Competency Employers Students Difference

* Professional competency group
NL2.1. The competency in knowledge, application, and professional development 3.80 3.24 0.56
NL2.2. Technical competency 3.76 3.08 0.68
NL2.3. The competency in planning and executing work 3.46 3.13 0.33
NL2.4. Scientific research competency 3.02 3.12 -0.1
NL2.5. Entrepreneurial competency 3.17 3.21 -0.04
Average 3.44 3.16
The difference of each criterion is more clearly shown through the chart below:
Figure 1. The comparison of the average score of each ability between the two groups
As can be seen from the above statistics and chart, the average score required by employers
for 9/13 criteria is higher than the cumulative level achieved by students, in which:
The overall average score of employers’ requirements for the professional competency
group is 3.44, ranging from 3.02 to 3.8. That means those requirements are at a fairly high level.
Among them, the competencies of NL2.1. (The competency in knowledge, application, and
professional development) and NL2.2. (Technical competency) are put more highlight.
Some of the student’s competencies have basically met the requirements of employers such
as the competency to adapt to a changing working environment, emotional intelligence
competency, entrepreneurial competency, and scientific research competency. This result shows
the operational efficiency of the Center for Technology Incubation and Startup Support in the
university. With the idea of creating a premise for undergraduates to start and have a successful
business, many courses on finding startup ideas, pitching skills, innovation, intellectual
property, etc. were held successfully. In addition, activities on searching for creative ideas and
scientific research by students at all levels are always organized and encouraged by the
university. These meaningful activities have created opportunities for students to learn, practice,
and accumulate necessary skills and experiences.
The remaining competencies did not meet the requirements with scores ranging from 0.04
to 0.47 for the general competency group and 0.33 to 0.68 for the professional competency
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group. The competencies with a large difference as: Problem-solving competency; the
competency to use IT; language competency. Due to economic conditions, infrastructure, and
regional characteristics, foreign languages and information technology are two of the common
weaknesses of students at Thai Nguyen University of Agriculture and Forestry. Most of them
have no or few chances of studying the two subjects in high school. Some students still use their
ethnic language as their first language in daily communication, while others just started learning
how to type when starting their first year of university. Limited study time, scattered foreign
language subjects in different semesters, not having a favorable environment to participate in
training are the reasons why students’ foreign language ability is only at a low level (2.77). Poor
IT and foreign language competency not only causes difficulties in the learning process but also
greatly affects the student’s success in applying for jobs in the current trend of employment.
The figure below provides a general comparison of the difference between employer
requirements and student accumulation:
Figure 2. The differences between the employer’s requirements and the cumulative level of students
While the score difference between the employer’s requirements and the cumulative level
achieved by students in the group of general competencies is 0.17, it is 0.28 in the group of job
competencies. Thus, according to the general assessment, both of the above two groups of
competencies have not met the needs of employers. The highest difference in the group of job
competencies is in criterion NL2.2. technical competency, which shows that the practical ability
of students is still low. Currently, a lot of equipment and machinery related to the university
training professions are old, outdated, and have not been invested. Therefore, when exposed to
modern equipment at agencies and businesses, most students are confused and do not know how
to use it.
The generality students are aware of the importance of general competencies. Among the
surveyed students, 56.6% of students rate these competencies at Very Important level, 40.4% at
an Important level. Student’s accumulation of the general competency group is better than that
of the professional competency group. According to the survey on the status of participating in
movement activities and part-time work, 89.7% of students have ever participated in movement
activities and 67.4% of students have worked part-time. This is one of the useful ways for
students to hone and improve their presentation skills, teamwork, self-control, and social
awareness, and accumulate necessary skills and experiences for life and future career.
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3.2. Evaluating the learning outcome of students at the end of the course
According to TUAF (2020b), the learning and training results of students graduating from
the academic year 2019 – 2020 are listed in the following chart:
22.14 16.89
Figure 3. Learning and training results of final year students

In the survey on the professional competency group, the percentage of students who self-
assessed their professional competency at Very Poor level ranged from 3% to 6%, and the rate
of Poor level was 3% to 11.4%. This is also close to the ratio of Poor students in the above
statistical chart. Thus, the self-assessment results of students are quite commensurate with the
results obtained in reality.
3.3. Summarizing the report on employment situation after graduation from the university
According to the university’s statistics on the employment situation of graduates TUAF
(2020a), the rate of students having jobs after graduation in 2018 was 71.5%, in 2019 was
70.8%. Among 29.2% of students who did not have a job in 2019, 7.9% of them continued to
study to improve their qualifications. The reason why the rest could not be employed was that
the job they applied for was not suitable for the major they studied or they had no experience for
the job. In fact, the number of unemployed students after graduates is still at a high level. Many
students have to work in unspecialized fields due to a lack of experience and not meeting the
requirements of employers.
In recent years, the trend of looking for jobs in the agriculture and forestry sector
has also changed dramatically:
Figure 4. The change in employment sectors in 2018 and 2019

Employment in the state sector dropped sharply while the private sectors increased
considerably because the labor market is mainly concentrated in industrial zones and private
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enterprises. A prominent trend in recent years is to self-employ or join career-building groups,

join traditional occupations, or existing family careers.
The change in employment sectors also leads to a change in required competencies. Jobs in
private sectors or foreign joint ventures require students to self-study, innovate, create, adapt to
a changing working environment, cope with high pressure in the workplace, be proficient in
professional work and ability in foreign languages. In addition, ability in information
technology has a great influence on choosing a better job position.
For the trend of self-employment, professional competency, entrepreneurial competency,
problem-solving competency, social competency, self-learning, innovation, and creativity play a
significant role. However, according to the above assessments, the level of those competencies
is still limited.
CONCLUSION
The above analyses have shown that the job competency of a part of students is still limited,
especially for the problems related to understanding the operating principles and operating
equipment in agriculture. Besides, the job fields and positions of students are increasingly
diverse, leading to the professional competency that needs to be developed for students must
also be updated, while the student’s output standards have not changed much, with the high
proportion of academic knowledge. Some of the reasons for these limitations are raised here.
The input quality of students is still low. There is a huge difference in awareness as well as the
ability to absorb knowledge between the group of students in remote areas, foreign students, and
students from delta areas. The awareness of learning and practicing of a part of students is still
low. Some students are distracted by other hobbies rather than study. The development of the
training program has not kept pace with the development of society; therefore, it could not
create a favorable environment for students to improve skills, especially soft skills.
In our opinion, TUAF should 1- Invest in the development and evaluation of training
programs; renew training methods to equip students with knowledge and skills to develop their
job competencies; 2- Focus on training soft skills, technology skills, etc for students; 3-
Diversify training forms to create a lively and practical environment for students to accumulate
knowledge and practical skills to develop job competencies. On the other hand, the university
should regularly evaluate the job competencies of students in order to promptly have
synchronous solutions: Developing training programs, innovating training methods to ensure
qualified human resources who could meet the needs of the field as well as social needs in the
trend of the 4th industrial revolution.
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About the authors

– Hua Thi Toan is a Ph.D. student majoring in theory and teaching methods of Informatics
at Hanoi National University of Education. She works at the Thai Nguyen University of
Agriculture and Forestry. Her main research direction is teaching methods to improve the ability
to apply information technology in professional practice for students.
– Assoc.Prof.Dr Trinh Thanh Hai is head of training at the Thai Nguyen University of
Sciences. He obtained Doctoral degree in Education in 2007 and was promoted to Associate
professor in 2011. His main research directions include Methods of teaching Mathematics –
Information in high schools and application of ICT in training high school teachers.
325
MUSIC EDUCATION IN MULTIDISCIPLINARY UNIVERSITIES

IN VIETNAM
Nguyen Thi My Liem*1
Abstract: Music education is organized into a conservatory system, a separate education system
in European countries. However, it is organized like any other human sciences, in specialized
“faculties” (Faculty or Department) in multidisciplinary universities in North American countries.
In Vietnam, this form of education has also begun to be established. Several Faculties of Arts or
Faculties of Applied Arts to train music majors have been deployed at some universities in
Vietnam, creating new development directions for music education and training. However, the
number of people studying music at these schools is not very high yet, and the quality of the
training program still has many issues to consider. There are no breakthroughs in the training
organization for some majors that will become social needs in the future as musicology (music
analysis, critic), music production and technology, and song writing. Not many students of the
natural sciences and social sciences have chance to exploit their artistic potential and become
musicians without undergoing the rigorous enrollment and costly training of conservatory
program. The article analyzes and introduces university-level music educating and training
models of the education systems from several countries. These analyses can help to build an
effective education model that can exploit not only the artistic potential of students but also the
benefits of music education in multidisciplinary universities. Moreover, this can create a new
perspective in higher education, meet the goal of global citizenship education and demonstrate
the inclusiveness in university-level education.
Keywords: music education, multidisciplinary universities, education model
INTRODUCTION
The music market requires a large number of human resources, even though the workforce
quality of this profession has been quite intricate. The promoters and media effect have made
this market increasingly distracting by the self-proclaimed titles such as singer, musician, and
diva with poor quality and inadequate artistic skills (Pham, 2019). Meanwhile, dozens of singers
and musicians have not had any impressive achievements in their musical careers even though
they are well-trained and graduated from conservatories and music institutes.
Based on the assessment of the actual state and the needs of this market in the future, many
multidisciplinary universities have opened music faculties for good training (Pham, 2021). In
recent years, multidisciplinary universities have begun to open professional music education.
However, the training programs at these universities still focus on specialized majors such as
piano and vocal music. There are no training programs on essence specialties such as
musicology, ethnomusicology, music production and technology, songwriting, and popular
music. A few universities have art as an optional subject for students of other majors such as
Vietnam National University and Hanoi National University of Education. However, this is not
prevalent. Moreover, we have not yet realized the foundation and sustainability of general music
education, so we have not spent much attention and have not taken advantage of specialized
music human resources in music education in high schools.
This article aims to show an overview of music training in the world, analyze the
backwardness and shortcomings in music training programs in Vietnam, and suggest solutions
for the problem of music education and music training in Vietnam in two aspects: widespread
education and vocational training (professional training in multidisciplinary universities).
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Thi My Liem; Email Address: ntmliem@sgu.edu.vn

1 Sai Gon University
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CONTENT
1. Music training and music education in the world
In the framework of the article, the multidisciplinary university is a term that refers to
regional and local universities that have organized many training courses in many different
scientific fields such as natural sciences, social sciences, humanities, and even arts, for example,
public universities such as Saigon University, Tra Vinh University, Thu Dau Mot, and
independent universities such as Van Lang, Van Hien, and Nguyen Tat Thanh.
In Europe, most professional music training or education programs are organized under the
Conservatoire system – a system for performer training. This system also trains musicians and
composers, and it only trains up to the master level (Conservatoire Royal de Bruxelles, n.d.;
Conservatoire Ville de Luxembourg, n.d.; Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique et de
Danse de Paris, n.d.; The Royal Danish Academy, n.d.). For theoretical, academic, and highly
research majors, learners who pursue research of music or musicology often study at the system
of music training universities such as in France only Sorbonne University, or other universities.
Only a few conservatories open doctoral training in performance and research (musicology) in
Eastern Europe, for example, Kracov of Poland (Academy of Music in Kraków, n.d.), Gnesin of
Russia (The Gnesin Russian Academy of Music, n.d), and Chopin University of Music (Chopin
University of Music, n.d.).
Unlike Europe, in North America, music education is taught in specialized faculty like
teaching other human sciences and natural sciences in the multidisciplinary university. Some
universities in North America have music departments that educate and train all majors in music
such as composition, conduct, instrumental performance, vocals, and musicology from
undergraduate to doctoral levels. In particular, some of those are the world’s leading
universities, for example, UCB (University of California, Berkeley) is famous for Light music
and music technology education; BU (Boston University) with strength in Music Composition
and Performance of Piano, String Instruments, Flute; UCLA (University of California, Los
Angeles) with a major in Composition, Musicology and especially Music Ethnology; UDM
(Université de Montreal) with Musicology, Ethnographic music, Piano performance, trumpet,
Vocal music; McGill University and University of Toronto with strengths in Composition,
Musicology, Instrumental Performance (Faculty of Music, 2021; McGill, 2021). In general,
music education in universities in North America follows two patterns: (1) popular education –
for all students including students persuade non-music majors and choose music as a module (an
educational activity) and (2) professional education related to the conservatoire system which
trains performers, composers, music educators, research, theory, music critics, etc. This
professional education has undergraduate and graduate levels.
On the other hand, general music education programs in some US states and many European
countries also accept the grade high school students get from music schools (regional conservatories)
or other music centers as the grade of the course score in the high school programs. This
procedure is an effective and flexible way of general music education. In Vietnam, this
procedure has not been applied. High school students cannot utilize the grade they scored from
other music centers or regional conservatories. They have to obligately pass music subjects of
the high school programs. Transferring music study results is permissible only in universities.
The North American program demonstrates that students can be professionally educated
and trained, especially in light and popular music. This program also exploits the strengths of
technical majors. In addition, some universities have music education programs with high
requirements. Graduates have to learn to play many instruments if they want to pursue teaching
popular music even though they are not performers. They also have to acquire skills in
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conducting and building a variety of musical repertoires (including orchestras and choirs) and
musical programs.
In Southeast Asia, in recent years, we have witnessed the rapid and strong development of
music training in some countries such as Singapore, Thailand, and Malaysia. Thailand has
Chulalongkorn University with Faculty of Fine and Applied Arts (Chulalongkorn University or
Royal University ranked 1st in Thailand and top 50 in Asia) (Chulalongkorn University, n.d.)
and Mahidol and Mahasarakham universities with the Faculties of Music, both are prestigious
music training faculties in the region. Thailand’s music education programs have been
organized referencing the model of North American universities since the 70s of the twentieth
century. In Singapore, there is Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music established after 2003
with a team of lecturers from famous superpowers in music training such as Russia, Poland,
France, Australia, the USA, and China (Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music, n.d.). Although
Yong Siew Toh Conservatory is an independent education system, it is a prestigious music
training campus of Southeast Asia and the world. In general, there has reliable universities and
conservatories which provide high-quality education and training programs in the Southeast
Asian region (Ngo, 2021). Human resources provided by those universities and conservatories
can serve well the domestic musical demand and even be eligible for the many world-class
musical talents. Therefore, universities that have not had music training previously, such as
some Southeast Asian universities, can still organize training and provide high-quality human
resources in the shortest time by using the education program and the team of experts from
abroad.
Summarily, professional music training is organized not only for music academies or
conservatories but also for multidisciplinary universities. Multidisciplinary universities in the
world have taken advantage of the inherent scientific, technological, and technical conditions to
develop professional music training in depth, form new majors, and meet the needs of the future
music education in its entirety.
2. The limitation in Music Education and Training in Vietnam
Currently in Vietnam, in addition to the system of Conservatories and music academies,
universities also open music training departments at the university level to train human
resources for the music industry at the university level such as Van Hien University, Van Lang
University, Nguyen Tat Thanh University, Saigon University or Military Art University (Ho
Chi Minh City campus) (Applied Arts Faculty, 2019; Art Faculty, 2015; Art Faculty, 2021). The
training programs of these universities are referenced to the music training program of
multidisciplinary universities in North America. However, these universities mainly provide
human resources specialized in Vocal and Piano for the music market, and piano and vocal are
still the two main training trends in the future, without opening other music majors. The training
contents of these universities are compiled almost similar to the training contents of domestic
conservatories and music academies. The teaching staff at these universities also graduate from
domestic conservatories and music academies. However, the human resources provided by these
universities do not meet the quality criteria and cannot meet the quality of the human resource
provided by conservatories and national music academies, especially Classical music
performance. Notably, students have to pass a rigorous selection round in terms of talent from
the enrollment stage to pursue training programs in domestic conservatories and music
academies (Huynh, 2021).
Currently, there are many shortcomings in the training of music majors at multidisciplinary
universities in Vietnam. The training program is not suitable for learners. Most of the learners
are amateurs, learning according to their interests. Meanwhile, the training program is designed
to suit gifted students and long-term training from childhood such as in conservatories and
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music academies. These programs have not taken advantage of the strengths of light music,
popular music, and pop music, while these majors are the trend of the music market and are
suitable for learners’ abilities.
Van Lang and Thang Long University have made some changes to their training program
that represents a new orientation in training – singer training. Both universities hold a
Department of Applied Music that represents the viewpoint and direction of music training for
today’s entertainment market. They train some music majors such as Vocal, Music Production
and Producer. They have started to implement the applied music category, using the curriculum
and training direction of Seoul Art and Woosong Universities of Korea (Thang Long University,
n.d.). Besides, they also combine the training required by the music market with the current
trend of Korean-style entertainment music, which has been very popular and contemporary. Van
Lang University has promptly included performance activities such as singing with light music
bands in the training program. However, no specific results have been collected so far (there are
no recorded talents or names of artists trained from these schools in the music market).
In 2006 and 2007, Ho Chi Minh City Conservatory of Music cooperated with the Utrecht
Collège of Music and Technology – the Netherlands to organize two training classes and issue
Studio Technical certificates for professionals of three conservatories and academies music1.
From 2011 to 2016, Ho Chi Minh City Conservatory of Music and Vietnam National Academy
of Music cooperated with Norway – Transposition to organize many exchange classes on
recording, Stage Performance Techniques, and music CD-making techniques. However, the
result was limited to associate classes that grant certificates for music technology, music
production, audio, and video making techniques and still cannot organize a training program for
undergraduate degrees like some universities in other countries in the world.
Undergraduate programs at multidisciplinary universities often reference conservatory
programs but do not modify them adequately. For example, Musicology is a crucial major, but it
has not yet been considered for inclusion in a training program in a multidisciplinary university.
This major provides theoretical training such as research of music, theory of music, the harmony
of music, and Orchestration. Graduates can be teachers of music theory subjects; editors for
radio stations, newspapers, publishers; music critical theorists; music researchers. Currently, the
demand for human resources from this major has been very high. On the other hand, this major
possesses up to the doctoral degree, but almost no people are studying at the undergraduate or
graduate level. In Vietnam, many students are doing their Ph.D. degrees in this field, but they
lack the basic knowledge of the subject at the undergraduate level (Nguyen, 2017). On the other
hand, Musicology in Vietnam is currently only trained in conservatories and music academies,
and the number of candidates entering the field is a few and decreasing (Conservatory of Ho Chi
Minh City, 2021; Hue Academy of Music, 2021; Vietnam National Academy of Music, 2021)
because students lack their interest in this field. It will lead to a shortage of young human
resources, while the working human resources are aging and still have no successor.
Composer training programs at conservatories and music academies are mainly
instrumental in composing, but it is difficult for students to produce new works and almost no
works that make their mark in the professional musical life. There is no training for song writing
in the multidisciplinary university program. Many people create this genre through self-study,
self-expression, and self-introduction, so the works are often poor quality, easily forgotten, or
neglected. Meanwhile, in the world, a music product in the hands of listeners passes a process
with many stages. This process is performed by many experts from many different majors such
1 Class “Technology Studio I” was held from April 3, 2006, to May 7, 2006, according to Decision No. 45/DT-
NVHCM dated March 28, 2006, and Class “Technology Studio II” was held from April 8, 2007 to May 11, 2007
according to Decision 62/DT-NVHCM dated March 3,2007
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as music production and technology, songwriting, composition techniques (light music), studio
techniques, and program production techniques. Educating and training in these majors is still
very novel in Vietnam.
Ethnic music performance is less and less studied while the requirement of conserving the
national culture is increasingly urgent. Based on the human resource needs and capacity of
people trained, this field has become potential and essential in both the present and the future.
Graduates of ethnic music performance can be the nucleus for the movement to preserve and
promote ethnic music art in localities; they can teach in high schools from Primary to High
School if they acquire pedagogical skills. Ethnic music performance education is a sustainable
music education trend for the conservation of national culture and is also consistent with the
content of the 2018 music education program of the Ministry of Education and Training –
MOET (MOET, 2018, p. 5-45). On the other hand, with a background in ethnic music training,
graduates can be ethnic music researchers who know how to compose with ethnic music
material due to their previous long-term learning (MOCST, 2016).
Regarding general music education, the current music pedagogy is still the strength of the
pedagogical universities, but the methods and content of programs have not been updated and
have not brought the expected effect. High school students in cities today have also begun to be
exposed to music through the mass communication system and the explosion of the internet.
Therefore, in many places, high school teachers feel that they are behind their students.
Widespread communication and convenient transportation pour a mass of information to
children, whereas teachers’ level in aesthetic education and music culture is not strong enough.
So the teachers cannot educate students to orient and select information to perceive and
comprehend music properly. Therefore, to have a generation of high-quality students, the
teaching staff must be trained and equipped with up-to-date and highly specialized knowledge.
The thinking, methods, and content of the teachers need to be renewed and prepared. Therefore,
music pedagogy needs a more updated and innovative program. In addition, this is also an
effective way to meet the requirements of educational innovation under the 2018 Education
Program issued by the Ministry of Education and Training to orient students from 10th – 12th
grade in high schools (Implied from 2022 to 2023).
It is necessary to have an overview of the reality of music arts training and music education
in Vietnam and then compare it with the needs of human resources, in general, to see that there
are still many gaps that need to be filled. There are conflicts between human resource needs and
training needs, between the actual quality of the workforce in the industry and trained human
resources. It has been prevalent that graduated students do not work jobs aligned to the major
they have studied in universities. For example, students graduate from performance but work as
editors of newspapers and radio stations; students graduate from music pedagogy but work as
singers and musicians in music tea rooms, or students who have a university degree in
performance but only teach and have never stepped on stage even though they have not passed
the class of pedagogical skills (specialized or general). Therefore, it is necessary to promote
education programs that align with the needs of the music market, investing in the training of
high professional competence and the supply of human resources suitable to the music labor
market. It is necessary to catch up with the current trends and apply methods of organizing
music training in the world. That helps to come up with strategies and develop appropriate
training programs.
3. Some proposals for developing music education and training in Vietnam
In the music labor market in developed countries, it is easy to see that graduate of
professional music colleges and intermediate schools in these fields are also an input source for
music pedagogical training. Graduated students can be music teachers in high schools. These
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people may only need to participate in a course to acquire pedagogical skills to have enough
elements to participate in general teaching.
Most of the technical disciplines, using technology and information technology into the
music industry such as Music producers, Audio network Production music, Orchestration,
criticism – music editing or criticism – music analysis has become imperative for the labor
market. However, training in these majors has not been established at music academies and
conservatories in Vietnam. Most people working in these fields have to study abroad or self-
study with materials on the internet.
In Vietnam, multidisciplinary universities do not have the tradition or advantage of training
musical performers, especially classical music, compared to music academies and
conservatories. However, in terms of majors such as Technological Music, Program Production,
Computer Music Composing, and Light Music, the Conservatory and the Academy of Music do
not have the strength as the multidisciplinary universities because the multidisciplinary
university possesses the conditions of facilities, engineering, technology, informatics, and
available expert team as well as research tradition, technology practice advantage.
Indeed, investment in facilities to develop these majors is very costly and always kept
updated with the development of technology, so these majors are not an option for training
institutions. However, these interdisciplinary majors can be trained in multidisciplinary
universities by leveraging existing facilities and program content of the information technology
and engineering disciplines. Therefore, the model of intensive training in music majors at
multidisciplinary universities should start from the mentioned majors above. These majors are
novel in Vietnam, but they have been taught prevalently for many years in other countries.
Cooperation with foreign countries to train specialists for technology-related music
industries is a short and achievable path. Music technology is a very necessary specialty to
provide professional human resources who are capable of working from concept development,
editing to producing a complete music program with advantages such as moderate funding,
training half time in Vietnam, and half time abroad or buying simulation software in training.
In addition, professional training in several key specialties has both provided a good supply
for the labor market, foundational development, and industry sustainability. We can learn how
the University of Berkeley in California (USA), for example, can only focus on training in light
music, pop music, rock or technology music, and program production. At the same time, the
multidisciplinary university also trains students in Musicology to prepare lecturers of music
knowledge subjects for the university itself and to provide human resources for the society by
the conditions of research and association interdisciplinary such as Ethnomusicology, socio-
musicology, organology (not only orchestration but also the study of materials, structure, and
musical instrumentation), and music education. For Vietnam, in the future, this major will
become the spearhead of the research university model because it is a theoretical major and the
first step for professional and in-depth development in music education and promote music
science research.
Based on the human resources of the Musicology major, the school moved to build a Music
Research Institute (currently, Ho Chi Minh City does not have a music research institute or a
culture and art research institute, only the Vietnam Culture and Arts Institute is located in
Ho Chi Minh City). Depending on capacity and investment trends, multidisciplinary universities
can establish applied research institutes for the arts and culture industry. This is the basis for
training human resources as well as a team of experts, a place to train high-quality human
resources in the final training levels of the system (postgraduate students). The Institute will be
a music research place, a place to advise the government on policies related to music life, a
place to study and work for researchers, scholars, graduate students, students, students, and
post-graduate and post-doctoral training.
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It is possible to open other music majors such as songwriting, Western musical instrument
performance, and traditional ethnic musical instruments that align with social needs, university
conditions, and development requirements of the university. For the major of performing
Western Musical Instruments, the first is guitar, piano, electronic organ instruments, followed
by other musical instruments if there is a need. Major in Ethnic Musical Instruments can also
start with potential fields, for example, zither, gourd, flute to serve the educational reform, the
upcoming popular music program requires the introduction of ethnic musical instruments into
teaching at level III and especially the orientation of preserving – promoting the national
cultural identity of the Party. The expansion of performance majors will facilitate reciprocity in
university music education; Music majors have become the chosen subject of many students and
are activities – aesthetic education of higher education, according to the criteria of
comprehensive education in modern universities.
Human resources in these performing majors can quickly become the nucleus for high-
quality general music education after being equipped with certificates of pedagogical skills such
as circulars 11 and 12/2021/TT-BGDĐT (validated since April 5, 2021) issued by the MOET.
This is the way of countries with advanced music (MOET, 2021). They use high-quality musical
human resources who know how to play musical instruments and have pedagogical skills for
general music education. This is the foundation to have a good mass education team.
Developing graduate and doctoral training can help to leverage the strengths of the major in
Music Pedagogy. In some North American universities, the music pedagogy is organized only at
the master and doctoral levels. They require music teachers in high schools to study a 5-year
program to get a master’s degree because they must have master’s qualifications. Candidates
must be excellent, master the profession and have the pedagogical capacity to be able to apply
and be trained in this labor profession. This may be a feasible development direction and is
consistent with the current strengths of public pedagogical universities. Creating a breakthrough
in training, increasing prestige and motivating development in learners, and promoting scientific
research in pedagogical education. This orientation of training requires exchanges and links
with foreign universities, requires learners to improve themselves and public universities that
enhance the quality of pedagogy, develop the education system, and professionalize modern
music education.
To expand music education in breadth, we should concentrate on students from different
disciplines in a multidisciplinary university. Nowadays, many universities in Vietnam that offer
art training have not actively allowed students to choose art or sports subjects as an optional
subject or a main course activity like universities in North America and Australia still
implement. Thus, Vietnamese universities may allow students of other majors to choose music
courses and semi-professional or professional music activities to integrate into the total credit-
based training load with content relevant to the main specialization as universities in other
countries have carried out. This allows students from other majors in the university to access the
music industry, and they may become music professionals without the requirement for long-
term training. Therefore, Vietnamese universities can prefer the mass education model of North
American universities. The university’s mission is to develop a training program that meets the
comprehensive training requirements that enable learners to participate in cultural, physical, and
aesthetic activities and receive music education. Playgrounds for students that are usually
organized by the Student Union, Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union, and the Student
Affairs Office should combine with art and music majors to provide expert support. Those
playgrounds can be a part of the work of the art department.
It can be implemented due to the flexibility of the training program and the interconnection
of the faculties to offer the music modules as an option for students from many different majors.
Various models of music education can be organized, for example, the choir could be organized
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as a student activity and as an outstanding activity of the universities; setting up the choir that
operates regularly and students can score marks from this activity as part of undergraduate
education; organizing cheering groups for physical training and sports competitions; organizing
a fanfare team to specialize in performing rituals or collective activities for the universities;
organizing an interdisciplinary research group such as a consortium of social sciences
combining literature and music, or ethnography incorporating music, or engineering technology
combined with music performance. In particular, it is possible to establish a model of a music
program staging team, in which the problem of stage design, lighting, and sound by technology
would produce a creative game that the youth are very interested in. Indubitably, this
cooperation may be only suitable for multidisciplinary universities because of operating
conditions, diversity of professions, and a large number of students that can organize diverse
joint activities.
CONCLUSION
The development strategy not only serves the 10 to 20-year vision but also has to go further
so that the Vietnamese music industry can inherit between generations and develop more widely
and deeply. Music education in multidisciplinary universities can connect with different
sciences, especially information technology and engineering, to create highlights and strong
branches. At the same time, music majors can participate in creating aesthetic activities for the
comprehensive education of the universities. Music education can also be an outstanding
activity of the school, an activity to gather students, and an activity to serve political activities
and provide a professional human resource in the community. Music education also needs to be
carried out from high school to university (specialized or non-specialized students) to train a
public who can be both an audience and a creator of music.
In-depth and advanced training, professionalization for fields such as Music Program
Production, Studio Technique, Mixing – Arrangement, Music Criticism – Editing, and Music
Pedagogy will create quality human resources as the basis for building a national, popular and
modern music scene.
Today, a musical product is not just a work performed by a performer. A musical product
today, starting from an idea to the birth of sound, must go through many stages of a process
done by a team of many industries. The members of this team need to be trained thoughtfully,
professionally, and creatively.
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About the author

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Thi My Liem is a lecturer at the Department of Arts, Saigon
University (2017 – present). She was the vice director of Hochiminh city Conservatory of Music
(2006 – 2016), and she has hold some other working positions such as a member of the
Executive Committee of the Vietnam Musician’s Association (2010 – present), member of the
Executive Committee of The HoChiMinh Music Association; member Vietnamese Folk Arts
Association. She has published over 60 papers in music education, musicology and
ethnomusicology journal; two books, and three university-level curriculums. She has 5 Research
Music Awards of the Vietnam Musician’s Association. She is also a đàn tranh (zither 16 cords)
and đàn bầu (monochord) musician.
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DESIGNING CORE SKILLS TRAINING MODEL FOR ENGINEERING

STUDENTS TO ADAPT TO CHANGING CONTEXT
Nguyen Thanh Thuy*1, Vo Phan Thu Huong2
Abstract: Core skills are common, indispensable skills for anyone who wants to participate in
learning and working in the changing context. Modern industry requires specialized skills that are
constantly changing to keep up with technology, while core skills or general skills are almost
unchanged. Core skills are important for engineering students because they make the technical
skills more effective. In this article, we analyze the structure of technical students’ core skills, then
we design models to train core skills for engineering students base on behavior skills training
methods and DACUM (Development a curriculum) method. Three core skills were added to model
include technical communication skills, creative problem-solving skills, technical system thinking
skills. Main methods were used in this paper are document research, analysis, synthesis of studies
and publications in the world and Vietnam and case study.
Keywords: core skills, models of training core skills, technical communication skills, creative
problem-solving skills, technical system thinking skills
INTRODUCTION
In World Bank report (2014), Christian & Magnusson stated that “A worker’s skill set
consists of different domains of skills: cognitive, social and behavioral, and technical.”
“Cognitive skills include the use of logical, intuitive, and creative thinking and problem solving
using acquired knowledge”, “Social and behavioral skills capture personality traits that are
linked to labor market success: openness to new experiences, conscientiousness, extraversion,
agreeability, and emotional stability. Social and behavioral skills capture personality traits that
are linked to labor market success: openness to new experiences, conscientiousness,
extraversion, agreeability, and emotional stability” and “Technical skills range from having the
manual dexterity to use complex tools and instruments to occupation-specific knowledge and
skills in areas” (Christian & Magnusson, 2014, p. 6). These skills must be formed and
developed throughout the training process. In higher education, these skills are key to students’s
success as workers in the future. Pham & Tran (2013) said that “Teaching and learning
initiatives which support the development of employability skills contributes to preparing
graduates for the demand to compete and perform effectively in national and global knowledge
economies” (Pham & Tran, 2013, p. 6). Generic skills as cognitive, social, and behavioural
skills are known as “core skills”. According to Bowman (2010) “Generic skills development is
the collective responsibility of schools, vocational education and training providers and
universities, as well as businesses and the broader community and governments” and “These
skills enable an individual’s potential to be realised in all aspects of life. The skills are required
to perform all kinds of tasks” (Bowman 2010, p. 6). Bowman (2010) also emphasizes that “The
term implies comprehensiveness: other terms used in some conceptualisations, such as key
skills, core skills, basic skills or fundamental skills, are specific subsets of a broader set of
generic learning outcomes” (Bowman 2010, p. 10). It can be said core skills are non-technical
skills. According to Scotland qualification assessment (2013) “The importance of core skills is
widely recognized in education and the professional world. Lifelong learning based on
everyone’s core skills is essential for individuals to fulfill their individual needs and meet the
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Thanh Thuy; Email Address: thuynt@hcmute.edu.vn

1 HCMC University of Technology and Education
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needs of society. Individuals who can analyze and solve problems, communicate well, use
information technology and work with others effectively” (SQA, 2013, p. 1). Employers and
industry have identified the core skills requirements for successful participation in the
workforce. Therefore, the core skills training model clearly defines the generic underpinning
skills and knowledge needed to meet these requirements. The training providing to learners and
job seekers use relevant elements in the development of customised products The training
model for engineering students needs to combine core skills and technical skills and can be
embedded in any subject in the engineering field. This paper examines the issues related to the
core skills development model in Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology and
Educaion was chosen to examine the model. The students’ skill was measured when teachers
applied this model to teaching. The measurement method is Likert scale and the measuring tool
– rubric criterion was used. This model focuses on technical field and apply to the teaching
process for technical students. The paper suggests three model for three skills: technical
communication skills, problem solving skills creative topics and technical systems thinking
skills and evaluate the effectiveness of applying the model in teaching.
CONTENT
The origins of core skills in the UK was mentioned in vocational education and training,
with the earliest work on core skills leading to the influential 1985 report Core Skills in YTS.
Investigations into core skills was part of the UK Employment Department’s (Manpower
Services Commission’s) attempt to respond to the challenge of changing economic and
technological conditions which were rapidly bringing about huge changes in the labour market
and requiring millions of Britons to improve their skills, learn new skills, or change their
occupations entirely (Hart, 2008). Myers (1992) argued that “Demand for a versatile and
flexible workforce means these schemes aim to equip trainees with skills in a way that does not
restrict them to the context for which they were trained, but enables them to apply their skills in
a whole range of novel work situations which were unspecified at the time of training” (Myers
1992, p. 625). Canning (2006) pointed out that “Core Skills are conceptualised as context-bound
and collectively formed, then employers would play a central role in developing them within a
workplace environment” (Canning 2006, p. 14). The term “core skills” in the definition of
Mohd & Azman (2007) consists of both discipline – based skills and generic skills; and refers to
those skills necessary for an individual to develop their fullest potential in an area of study,
context or workplace” (Mohd & Azman 2007, p. 14). According to Dunne et al (2006) “core
skills are the key to personal development” (Dunne et al 2006, p. 511). Carr and Fhloinn (2009)
said that “core skills must become compulsory skills for students throughout the training process”
(Carr & Fhloinn 2009, p. 20). We synthesized that core skills help individuals apply problem
solving in everyday work, so it is important to attach core skills core into the workplace. It can
be said that developing core skills is the preparation for engineers in future jobs.
2. Core skills’ components of technical students
According to Male (2010), general skills (core skills) of engineers are related to social
context and technical environment, it is more useful to integrate technical skills and general
skills together instead of separating into two groups (Male, 2010). Marks (2006) pointed out
that increasing employability requires a holistic approach that integrates knowledge, work
experience, and technical and interactive skill development (Markes, 2006). Integrating the
concepts of “Core Skills” and “Technical Skills” will model respect for both aspects of technical
competence: general skills and specific technical skills, overcoming the situation. relatively low
level of general skills in engineering education. Thus, the term “Technical Core Skills” will
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integrate general skills and technical skills to reflect the diverse and flexible application of skill
groups in engineering activities. Technical core skills are necessary skills of engineering
students that are specific to the engineering profession. Besides, based on the operating
characteristics of an engineer, we believe that the integration of skills in a learning activity is
necessary thus we integrate core skills and technical skills in training students to perform
engineering functions more effectively. Based on an extensive review, we recommend three
core technical skills: Technical communication skills, technical systems thinking skills, Creative
problem-solving skills.
Technical communication skills
According to Mitchell (1962), technical communication consists of eight important
elements: (1) content, (2) form, (3) audience level, (4) subject matter, (5) usage accepted and
arranged predictions, (6) conventions, (7) inner forms, and (8) scientific techniques and values.
Technical communication can be classified into two categories: oral presentation skills and
social reading comprehension skills. Oral presentation skills include the ability to: (1) obtain
relevant information from multiple sources related to a topic, (2) collect and organize
information for easy understanding, (3) distinguish main ideas with supporting details, (4)
introducing and concluding a plan for the presentation, (5) planning and developing the content
of the presentation, (6) operating technology tools that can help collect and communicate
information, (7) gain awareness of technology tools to help promote social interaction and work
collaboration, and (8) plan and prepare online tools to support the delivery of content
(Brinkman, 2003). Training methods including hands-on instruction, cooperative learning
activities, field training, communication modules, integration of technical communication
between engineering subjects and activities contextual learning (Lappalainen, 2010). Based on
these viewpoints, we suggest structure of technical communication skills include five
component skills: Technical object analysis, Information organization, technical report writing,
technical problem presentation, Technical graphic communication (See Table 1).
Table 1: Structure of technical communication skills and manifestations
Core skills Component skills Manifestations
Technical object analysis Specify the exact composition of the object
Information organization Search for information and information processing
Technical report writing Write the structure of the technical report
Technical graphic communication Proficient in the use of graphic software
Technical problem presentation Logical presentation, attractive
– Technical object analysis skill: Breaking down a technical whole into individual
components and clarifying the relationship between them. For example, analyze a technical
drawing or a technical system.
– Information organization skill: Arranging, classifying, dividing technical problems or
topics according to space or importance. Information classification is the process of classifying
information items into categories. For example, in the feasibility study report on construction of
a facility, construction sites are classified into 2 categories: domestic and foreign. Division is the
process of dividing a unit into its components. For example, a system of audio-visual equipment
can be divided into components: televisions, amplifiers, speakers...
– Technical report writing skill: Taking notes, writing reports such as progress reports,
research outlines clearly according to the report structure.
– Technical graphic communication skill: Performing technical graphics by hand or by
computer to produce clear, detailed technical drawings with standard conventions and symbols.
Objects can be represented in 2D or 3D. Sketching technical drawings will avoid costly mistakes in
manufacturing. Technical drawing is the basic document of a product made by an accurate
representation method, showing correctness and according to national or international standards.
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– Technical presentation skill: Creating a dialogue between the speaker and the listener
about a technical topic. For effective technical presentations, presenters can use graphical
objects to clarify presentations.
Systems thinking is a way of thinking including understanding the structure of systems
from a holistic framework by understanding the relationships between systems components,
feedbacks and the way systems behave, in their own context by taking into consideration of
change and dynamism (Arnold, 2015; Meadows, 2008; Sweeney, 2000).
Technical systems thinking skills
Systems thinking skills are mentioned to be as higher order thinking skill and to be related
to scientific thinking, problem solving, and critical thinking by many researchers (Assaraf,
2009; Hung, 2008). Assaraf & Orion (2010) sunmarized the eight emergent hierarchic
characteristics of system thinking:
– The ability to identify the components of a system and processes within the system.
– The ability to identify relationships among the systems components.
– The ability to identify dynamic relationships between or among the systems components.
– The ability to organize the systems’ components, processes, and their interactions, within
a framework of relationships.
– The ability to identify cycles of matter and energy within the system– the cyclic nature of
system.
– The ability to recognize hidden dimensions of the systemto understand natural
phenomena through patterns and interrelationships not seen on the surface.
– The ability to make generalizations to solve problems based on understanding systems’
mechanisms.
– The ability to think temporally: retrospection and predictio (Assaraf O. B., 2010).
In enginerring fields, we sugessed four skills of techinical system thinking skills: Technical
systems analysis, technical system synthesis, technical system generalization, compare
engineering systems (See Table 2).
Table 2. Structure of Technical systems thinking skills and manifestations
Technical systems analysis Accurate system splits into parts
Technical system synthesis
Technical systems thinking skills Design new systems
Technical system generalization
Find out exactly the similarities and differences
Compare engineering systems
between systems
– Technical system analysis skill: The intellectual act of breaking down the engineering
system into its attributes, parts, relationships, and relationships for a deeper understanding of the
engineering system.
– Technical systems synthesis skill: The Intellectual action brings the attributes and
components that have been analyzed into a technical system for broader perception.
– Technical system generalization skill: The Intellectual action covers many different
technical systems into a group, a category on the basis that they have some common properties,
nature, regular relationships.
– Technical systems comparison skill: The intellectual act of determining the similarities
and differences between engineering systems or between attributes, relationships, and parts of
an engineering system.
Creative problem-solving skills
Shaw (2001) expresses the idea the profession of engineering demands that engineers
recognize, validate, and solve problems on their own or through teamwork. More importantly,
they must demonstrate original and critical thinking, as well as innovative features in their
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methodology (Shaw, 2001). Creative problem-solving skill is a skill that students need in
addition to theacademic field to be more successful and excellent (Leisian, 2015). Besides that,
creative problem-solving skills refer to individuals’ability to solve problems by generating
thoughtful and creative ideas (Halizah, 2008). Teaching pedagogy is not only focusing
on transmitting knowledge but also this mechanism can produce better students in learning
process and improve their achievement (Sri, 2013; Chang, 2013). This process will help
students understand and master knowledge and be able to configure creative thinking in solving
a problem. Nonetheless, using a pedagogical approach integrated with teaching creative
problem-solving skills can develop students’ minds to be more creative.
From this discussion, this paper considers the component skills of creative problem-solving
skills in engineering fields include three skills: Technical problem identification; Information
and planning; New and optimized solution execution (See Table 3).
Table 3: Structure of Creative problem-solving skills skills and manifestations
Technical problem identification Accurately identify technical issues
Creative problem -solving skills
Information and planning Data collection and planning
New and optimized solution execution Solve problems in a new way
– Technical problem identification skills: Finding out the “problem” in the problem, what is
the situation we face, the scope, the legitimacy. The difficulty level, the “complexity” of the
problem is within what limit. After identifying the technical problem and the complexity of the
problem, students need to state the goal when solving the problem. The objective will guide the
subject to develop a problem-solving plan, which is the basis for the subject to evaluate the
effectiveness of the problem-solving process.
– Information and planning: Searching for information and processing information to
collect enough missing data of a technical problem is a job that requires technical students to be
proficient. Sufficient information and necessary data are the basis for devising a plan to solve a
technical problem. The more detailed the plan, the easier it is to implement and control.
– New and optimized solution execution: The solutions or problem-solving solutions may
have been applied to solve similar problems, but the nature of the problems is always associated
with the context and the context changes over time, so the application of computer Advailable
experience will not bring optimal effect. Each complex problem is associated with a specific
context, so the proposed solutions must be new and diverse. In the process of finding a solution
to solve a technical problem, students must use technical thinking to analyze, synthesize, and
generalize information and data. This process involves continuously deducing the missing facts
of the engineering problem. Assumptions in inference are manifestations of higher order thinking, in
engineering research, assumptions are the foundation for the engineer to take next steps.
3. Model of core skills training for technical students
3.1. Model building method
Behavior Skills Training (BTS) is the method for teaching students. Dr. Miltenberger
defines BST as one that includes instruction, modeling, behavior rehearsal and feedback to
teach new behavior or skills (Miltenberger, 2004). BST is a teaching package that includes a
combination of methods, when used together these methods, create an effective technique for
individualized teaching. Horner & Sturmey (2012) stated that “an effective training package that
consists of instructions, modeling, rehearsal, and feedback” (Horner & Sturmey 2012, p. 75).
We used the BST method to build a model of skill training and inherit the four steps of this
method in organizing learning activities to form core skills for engineering students.
DACUM (Development a curriculum) method in design model of core skills training
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The curriculum development process begins with a Needs Analysis which can be conducted
in a variety of ways. In a college setting, the goal of a needs analysis is to determine which
career areas have sufficient employment opportunities and will attract enough students to justify
a curriculum. In most cases, the next component of curriculum development is a Job/Career
Analysis. Job/career analysis involves figuring out what to teach students. Occupational analysis
consists of four steps: (1) job description, (2) determination of the list of task areas and
corresponding jobs, (3) job analysis, (4) determination of skill standards. DACUM job analysis
methods used in vocational and technical analysis. Theoretical knowledge, practical skills, and
personal behavior are discovered through the DACUM process to assist one in fulfilling a
profession (Zannella, 1999). According to the DACUM handbook by Norton (1997), DACUM
is based on three principals including:
– To define or describe a job, experts’ workers in that position are the best ones.
– Competent/successful workers, who perform the tasks, can effectively describe them.
– To perform each task, particular attitudes and knowledge are required (Norton R. E., 1997)
According to Norton (2008) the duties, tasks, and supportive enablers identified in the
DACUM process provide a solid foundation for any college course or company training
program. In addition, involving expert workers from the company or from the larger community
generates strong support and buy-in from those stakeholders. The DACUM process can be used
to analyze duties or occupations at all levels, from semiskilled workers to skilled technicians to
managers and professionals (Norton R. E., 2008). Applying DACUM method in designing core
skills training model for engineering students will divide requirements into tasks, subdivide
tasks into duties, thereby identifying skills to be embedded in each task.
3.2. Developing the model of training core skills for technical student
Dreyfus (1985) expresses that the core skills training encompasses five stages of
performance – Novice, Advanced Beginner, Capable, Proficient and Expert. Practical
experience, reflection, motivation, and support influence the degree and rate of progress through
the stages. when an individual moves into a new context (a new role, organisation, or
industry/field, or from study into paid employment) while they will not ‘lose’ their skills, their
ability to apply them will be diminished until they understand the new context (Dreyfus, 1985)
Performance is not automatically transferrable to new contexts, as application of skills,
knowledge and understandings in a new context requires an understanding of that context.
Hence, an individual who has only ever applied their skills in a classroom setting will need to
learn about the protocols and expectations of a work situation and gain practical experience in
applying their skills in a work environment before they can demonstrate their skills at the same
stage of performance within that work context. Based on Dreyfus’ skills performance level, we
suggested five level of core skills: unformed, primitive, formed, proficient, expert (See Table 4).
Table 4. Level of Core Skills
Unformed – Previous knowledge, skills, and experience have little relevant with new skills.
skills – Receive instructions and descriptions according to the available procedures. Follow and depend on the instructions.
Primitive – Basic knowledge, skills and experience are relevant and helpful for learning new skills.
skills – Perform operations such as sample manipulation, become familiar with procedures and instructions.
– Have enough practical experience on new skills.
Formed – Apply operations related to familiar situations flexibly.
skills – Take a systematic analytical approach to tasks, especially unfamiliar situations. Offer a systematic analytical approach
to tasks, especially unfamiliar situations.
– Having practical experience in skills in a variety of situations.
Proficient – Organize to perform skills fluently and proficiently, regardless of instructions.
– Be able to evaluate the entire process of skill formation and skill products.
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– Having a lot of practical experience in skills, working fluently and flexibly in complex situations.
– Analyze new knowledge, new experiences in different situations.
Expert
– Regularly re-evaluate methods and practices to produce more effective results, and recognize which rules and
principles always apply.
There is a need for a new model of skills assessment and training process to integrate and
properly assess the two sides, one such model would be able to view the interdependence of
these skills. According Yim and Seong (2015), integrating model of two skill groups embedded
in individual and group teaching is a good fit for engineering groups. Non-technical skills or
core skills are completely inseparable from technical skills in the learning process of engineers
(Yim, 2015) (See Figure 1).
Yim & Seong (2015) integrated skills training model integrates teamwork and technical
skills of the nuclear technology industry in the teaching process. We referenced Yim & Seong’s
model, and we designed the training core skills model for engineering students based on the
BST method and DACUM method (See Table 5).
Technical skills (science) Non-technical skills (sociology)
Identify Identify training

training needs needs
Set training Set training
objectives objectives
Review and analyze Review and analyze

Plan training
Implement training
Analyze and assess

performance
Figuge 1. Model of two skills (Yim, 2015, p. 3)
Table 5. Model of training core skills

Tasks Duties
Understand engineering objects / Dividing a technical system into separate components and clarifying the relationship between
Engineering system. them.
Classify items of information into Sorting, classifying, dividing technical issues and topics according to space or importance
categories.
Engineering object design Using technical symbols, names of components of an engineering system, technical regulations
Write report and presentation Performing technical graphics by hand or by computer to produce technical drawings
describing clearly and in detail with conventions, standard symbols. Objects can be represented
in either 2D or 3D. Writing reports such as progress reports, research outlines clearly according
to the structure of the report. Doing a presentation in front of class.
Self assessment Learning product, level of Technical commucation skills.
Creative problem-solving skills
Accurately identify technical issues Find out the “problem” in the problem, what situation he must face, the scope and legality.
Data collection and planning Finding information and processing information to collect enough missing data of the technical
problem.
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Tasks Duties
Solve problems in a new way Choose the optimal plan. The problem can be solved by many solutions, but whichever creative
and effective solution, students will consider and choose after performing the creative
inference methods.
Implement the plan Implement the selected optimal option after consideration. The implementation process may
require the assistance of a trainer.
Evaluate Re-evaluate the entire process and created product, find out the advantages and limitations of
the product or the potential for future product development
Technical system thinking skills
Accurate system splits into parts Using previously equipped technical knowledge and technical languages to determine the
structure of the technical system.
Design new systems Analyze the technical system into each part, each part, each single function then consolidates
the single elements of a given system and design a new system based on that platform.
Find out exactly the similarities and Find the difference between technical systems in the same frame of reference.
differences between systems
Presentation Summarize the main information about a given technical system, the new technical system
design, presentation.
4. Findings and Discussion

The core skills training process for engineering students can be embedded in the teaching
process for skills subjects and internships. With general skills courses for the university
students, the process of forging core skills is integrated into the teaching of general skills,
contribute to achieving the learning outcomes of the course. With specialized internships, the
process of forging core skills when embedded in the teaching process and not expected to be
able to simultaneously train all three identified core skills including: technical communication
skills, technical systems thinking skills and creative problem-solving skills. Depending on the
subject content, the teacher can enhance one of the three core skills for students according to the
instructions of the process.
We applied the model of training creative problem-solving skills to the teaching organization in
the subject “Learning skills” at Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology and Education. The
subject “Learning skills” is a common subject for students of all majors. The subject equips
learners with knowledge of university study methods so that students can apply training to form
university study skills to apply these skills in the learning process and research. The table
illustrating the tasks and duties of the “Learning Project” for students is described as follows
(See Table 6):
Table 6. Tasks and Duties of Creative problem-solving skills training model
Skills Tasks Duties
Technical Building a smart learning corner in the Identify the learning corner in the university, the “smart” factor, get
problem University. an idea of how to design. Write a goal to build a smart learning corner
identification according to SMART criteria.
Information and Provide some suggestions for smart learning Search for information about a learning corner bearing technology
planning corner. element and can connect.
Set tasks Use mindmaps to set up tasks
Planning Use the 5W1H2C5M principle to review the plan.
New and
Write project draft.
optimized
Propose new solutions. Mounting the idea to find a new point of intelligent learning corners
solution
compared to the self-learning areas available.
execution
Building a model of a smart learning corner. Sketch the entire project on paper, make a model of the project.
Self-evaluation and lessons learned Evaluate ideas, solutions, and products (project drafts, models)
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Results
Criteria for evaluating products according to the skill level of Creative problem-solving
skills includes 5 criteria, 5 levels: Level 5 (8.5 – 10), Level 4 (7 – 8.4), Level 3 (5.5 – 6.9),
Level 2 (4 – 5.4), Level 1 (<4)
All criterias after score, the total point:
Reach level 1: No skills: < 56 points
Reach level 2: Beginner: 56 – 75.6 points
Reach level 3: Skilled: 77 – 96.6 points
Reach level 4: Proficient: 98 – 117.6 points
Reach level 5: Expert: 119 – 140 points
Table 7: Rubric of Creative problem-solving skills assessment
Skills Level Descriptions Score
Identify Students correctly identify all the key elements of a smart learning corner. Offering unique
5 (8.5 – 10)
problems, ideas.
generate ideas Students correctly identify the key elements of the “smart learning corner”, can give some
4 (7 – 8.4)
ideas.
Students have possible minor errors in identifying the elements of a smart learning corner.
3 (5.5 – 6.9)
If teachers help students, students can think of some ideas
Students demonstrate minimal understanding of the intelligent learning angle. Students
2 (4 – 5.4)
just think about a problem from one point of view.
Students have not found the problem and do not understand the problem to be solved. No
1 (<4)
ideas related to the problem.
Search and 5 (8.5 – 10) Students accurately identify all the information needed to design a Smart learning corner.
information 4 (7 – 8.4) Students correctly identify most of the information about the Smart learning corner”.
processing 3 (5.5 – 6.9) Students correctly identify some information about Smart learning corner.
2 (4 – 5.4) Students identify some information about Smart learning corner.
1 (<4) Students use limited search methods.
Selecting the 5 (8.5 – 10) Students outline a detailed plan and demonstrate creativity in sketches.
optimal solution 4 (7 – 8.4) Students outline the plan relatively fully, clarifying the idea.
with novelty 3 (5.5 – 6.9) Students outline the plan is sketchy and not clear the idea.
2 (4 – 5.4) Students have not yet outlined a detailed plan.
1 (<4) Students have not been able to clarify their ideas and have no products.
Implement the Students correctly implemented the smart learning corner model as the idea in the design
5 (8.5 – 10)
solution draft. Present the manuscript fluently.
Students build a smart learning corner model to express ideas. Present the manuscript
4 (7 – 8.4)
fluently.
3 (5.5 – 6.9) Students build a sketchy model, presenting the draft plan is not fluent.
2 (4 – 5.4) Students imitate existing models. Presentation is confusing.
1 (<4) Students rely on the performance of others.
Total
The products obtained from 3 classes 20109CLC1A, 20119A, 2015A in the second
semester of the academic year 2020-2021 at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology
and Education, including 35 draft design “Smart study corner” of 35 groups (each group of 4
students). The evaluation results are as in Table 8.
Table 8: Evaluation results
Level Description Frequencies Percentage
Reach level 1: No skills: < 56 points 0 0
Reach level 2: Beginner: 56 – 75.6 points 8 22.9
Reach level 3: Skilled: 77 – 96.6 points 23 65.7
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Level Description Frequencies Percentage

Reach level 4: Proficient: 98 – 117.6 points 4 11.4
Reach level 5: Expert: 119 – 140 points 0 0
Total 35 100
Students reached level 3 accounted for the majority with 65.7%. This is the level that shows
that the group of students solved the problem in a new way, but the selected solution is not the
most optimal solution. The new solution is not comprehensive but acceptable. Level 2 is the
beginning, just at the idea and students also unfamiliarity with the problem, not the solution
proposed is innovative, with 22.9% of students achieving group levels. These data point out the
limitations of the skills students for creative problem solving. Students need to practice more to
become proficient with this skill, only 11.4% of the group of students had good results,
proposed creative, new, and feasible solutions, suitable for the university.
DISCUSSION
The results of this application tend to suggest that students develop their core skills within
the context of design project. The evaluation results highlight concerns about the reliability and
aceptability of assessment in relation to core skills and the relative emphasis placed on skills
and subject content within the diploma programme. Having made application the model of
training core skills in teaching, it also clear that the assessment results from teacher were
support the core skills approach in general. Give the complex nature of developing and
instituting a coherent core skills training model within the context of higher education
university, the success of model depends fundamentally on student participation in activities.
Students have demonstrated the ability to perform the component skills of the core skill at
skilled level and a few have become proficient. This is very meaningful for the 2nd year students
and shows the effectiveness of the skill training model which we have proposed. Skills are
divided into tasks that must be completed without pressure on students, skills are formed
naturally through personal experiences. Students who completed the task with proficiency
demonstrated both core and technical skills well. Therefore, it should be emphasized that the
core skills training model can develop core skills for students by performing specific tasks and
duties. It is necessary to observe students’ attitudes when performing tasks to assess students’
interest and students’concerns, this helps teachers to adjust tasks and duties in the model
accordingly. It could be argued that model of core skills training would be likely to increase
student skills level. A major problem for the core skills training is the student perceptions that
teamwork relative to achievement in subject so that some student may reliance on others. In
particular, the student cohort responded well to group work exercises, although it was noted that
some students with poor social skills needed extra encouragement. Therefore, the supervision of
the lecturer during the student’s performance on the task will help reduce this concern.
CONCLUSION
Task and Duties in the core skills training model contributes significantly to the
achievements of students in learning. Core skills of technical students are composed of technical
and non-technical skills and evaluation methods for both skills have been developed. The core
skills model for engineering students can be embedded in any subject based on the instructor’s
teaching strategy. This model can enhance the effectiveness of skills training for students
through teaching. There should be synchronous development between core skills and technical
skills in the process of training engineering students.
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About the authors

– MA Nguyen Thanh Thuy is a lecturer and Phd student working at the Center of
Teaching Technology, Institute of Technical Education, HCM University of Technology and
Education. The author’s research includes Psychology, Education, Learning skills, Professional
skills. The main topics and domestic publications and international seminars are innovation
teaching method, core skills, professional skills. The author also researches on the relationship
between University and Industry.
– Dr. Vo Phan Thu Huong is a lecturer at the Faculty of Preschool Education, Saigon
University. The author’ studies mainly focus on Education, Psychology, Age psychology,
Psychology of higher education. The author’s publications focus on student learning, classroom
management, and curriculum development.
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FORMATIVE B-ASSESSMENT – A NEW CONCEPT

IN HIGHER EDUCATION. CASE STUDY AT UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE
AND EDUCATION, THE UNIVERSITY OF DANANG, VIETNAM
Pham Duong Thu Hang 1, Nguyen Hoai Nam2
Abstract: Learning outcomes in Vietnam higher education are increasingly becoming deciding
factors in curriculum design and student learning. The focus on better educational results has
rapidly pushed the teaching community to widen its methodologies over the last decade.
Topping the list is blended learning, largely thanks to the advancement of technology. The
importance of blended learning has been further emphasized during the COVID-19 pandemic
and now is an indispensable teaching component. Regardless of the current challenging
situation, learning must still be carried on, and more than ever, the learners need motivation
from teachers or peers to self-progress and satisfy the expected learning outcomes. The paper
proposes a new concept called Formative b-Assessment (FbA). This concept is based on
assessment for learning and assessment as learning. In this model, learners receive feedback from
teachers to make suitable adjustments, and at the same time, they also perform self-assessment
and then self-regulate.
Moreover, by connecting with the continuous PDCA (Plan – Do – Check – Act) cycle, the paper
proposes implementation steps and forms of FbA. From there, FbA classifies learners and comes
up with suitable solutions and recommendations for each group of learners, supports them in
reaching their aims. The experiment and evaluation of FbA were conducted on students studying
Information Technology, Faculty of Information Technology, University of Science and Education
– The University of Danang, Vietnam. The experiment results of FbA showed that most learners’
progress had improved through each learning outcome measurement. FbA is also an appropriate
activity corresponding to the capability of the faculty members and existing facilities of the
studied university. This can be a feasibility indicator to apply FbA in other similar settings in
higher education.
Keywords: blended learning, formative assessment, higher education, active learning, teaching
technology, learning outcomes, PDCA
INTRODUCTION
The education programs in higher education institutions are increasingly being focused and
invested with regular review and update. Currently, these programs are designed and
implemented in a competency-oriented approach to develop learners’ capability, ensure the
quality of the teaching and learning process outputs, development of professional ethics, and
focus on the ability to apply knowledge in practical situations and problem-solving skills
(Nguyen, 2003; Maher, 2004). The learning competencies are specified into required program
outcomes, often known as “POs”.
Assessment is one of the essential structural elements, an integral part of the teaching and
learning process (Nguyen, 2017). Assessment is a measure to check if learners have achieved
the course’s required objectives or learning outcomes and help consolidate, direct, or promote
the competencies needed for learners in their whole learning process. Only by monitoring the
teaching and learning process we can detect, adjust and promote learners’ competence close to
 Corresponding Author: Pham Duong Thu Hang; E-mail Address: hangpdt@ued.udn.vn

1 University of Science and Education, The University of Danang, Vietnam
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the desired competencies of the course (Black, 1998). Formative assessment (FA) is one of the
best ways to promote learners’ competence and enhance the quality of teachers’ teaching
(Angus, 2009; Connie, 2009).
Blended learning (BL) – the combination of traditional face-to-face and technology-
mediated instruction, is increasingly being adopted in higher education worldwide. Based on
their literature review and independent research, Vo et al. (2017) conclude that teaching and
learning in BL have more positive impacts on student outcomes than face-to-face teaching in
traditional classrooms. Similarly, a series of researches also confirm the positivity and relevance
of BL for teaching and learning in higher education: enhancing learning efficiency, creating a
flexible, dynamic, creative environment, pushing learners motivation, improving self-study
discipline (Nguyen, 2017; López-Pérez, 2011; Boelens, 2018; Graham, 2006). BL is also a
suitable learning mode for higher education in Vietnam in the digital age (Vu, 2019; Nguyen,
2015; Nguyen, 2019). It mainly fits for conducting large classes (Hoang, 2019; Pham & Ton,
2018; Bati, 2014).
This paper suggests a combination of the above trends in higher education, including the
essential competence-oriented teaching with formative assessment playing an essential role in
supporting and motivating learners to obtain the best performance. Blended learning is an
effective model in higher education in the digital age, especially in the COVID-19 global
pandemic. The paper proposes a new assessment tool used in BL with different ‘blended’ levels
as formative blended assessment (FbA). FbA aims to monitor, support, and motivate learners
and progress in each course learning outcome (CLO) step by step.
The research questions are:
– What is Formative blended-Assessment (FbA)?
– How is the FbA implemented?
– How effective is the implementation of FbA on learners?
CONTENT
1.1. Formative assessment
Formative assessment is a process that provides feedback and support during instruction,
such that teachers and students can adjust ongoing instruction and learning to improve students’
achievement of planned instructional outcomes (Wiliam, 1998). Macfarlane‐Dick (2006) further
interpreted formative assessment as an integral part of instruction and an essential source for
students and teachers to make reflections on. It can be the compass to guide students towards
learning and academic achievement.
The principle behind FA is simply contributing towards learners’ progress by providing
information on their evaluated results along the way (Yorke, 2003) or providing feedback and
guidance (Bloom, 1969) at each stage of the teaching and learning process. FA is a systematic
process that continuously collects evidence and provides feedback while performing lessons.
With FA, learners actively interact with the instructor by sharing learning goals, mastering the
learning process, the implementation roadmap, and the way to go. According to Ahmed’s
research (Ahmed, 2008) on FA in higher education, it was concluded again that FA was most
related to feedback. Feedback here concerns both learners and teachers. Continuous feedback
benefits not only the learner but also the teacher (Shute, 2008). Teachers use FA as a tool to
tailor their teaching methods in mapping to the specific learning needs of each learner.
Therefore, when each learner’s ‘gaps’ are ‘filled and fix in’ by regular interaction, receiving
feedback, the learner’s motivation and effort will increase significantly. Learners will feel less
anxious because their learning process is not just about grades. They become more confident
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and capable learners, motivated to learn, more persistent to complete tasks, and attempt to self-
regulate their learning when they face new learning challenges (Moss, 2009).
D. Wiliam (2007) pointed out three typical questions need to be established and defined in
FA design, as depicted and generalized by Pham & Nguyen (2018) in Figure 1:
(1) Establishing where the learners are in their learning;
(2) Establishing where they are going;
(3) Establishing what needs to be done to get them there.
Figure 1. Demonstration of a formative assessment (Pham & Nguyen, 2018)

Besides this, FA design needs consisting of five key strategies:
(1) Clarifying and sharing learning intentions and criteria for success: show in detailed
course curriculum;
(2) Engineering effective classroom discussions and other learning tasks that elicit evidence
of student understanding: demonstrated through active interaction of methods and techniques
through teaching and learning process;
(3) Providing feedback that moves learners forward: expressed via the types of feedback
collected;
(4) Activating students as instructional resources for one another: demonstrated through
cooperative learning, teaching each other, peer-assessment;
(5) Activating students as the owners of their learning: visible in metacognition, motivation,
interests, allocation, and self-assessment.
1.2. Blended learning
“Blended learning means different things to different people. The word ‘blended’ implies a
mixture or combination” (Picciano, 2007). There are numerous definitions of blended learning
(BL). Blended learning can be defined or conceptualized as a wide variety of technology/media
integrated with conventional, face-to-face classroom activities, divided into four quarters and
four levels, as shown in Figure 2 below:
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Figure 2. Conceptual Model of Blended Learning (Picciano, 2007)

The use of BL has accelerated unexpectedly in the age of the COVID-19 global pandemic.
According to UNESCO statistics, in early April 2020, the pandemic affected nearly 1.5 billion
learners, and 173 countries had schools being closed. With schools closed and classes unable to
be conducted face-to-face, online learning instantaneously dominated the teaching and learning
landscape worldwide. However, there is much to be investigated in evaluating the rapid
deployment of online learning. The research by Bozkurt et al. (2020) is one of the early studies
reporting the impact of education disruptions due to the Covid-19 pandemic in 31 countries. The
research highlighted the critical demands often incurred – appropriate assessment methods and
the necessity to enhance FA through synchronous and asynchronous forms. The research of
Hjelsvold et al. (2020) is also one of the first to investigate educators’ responses in training
during the COVID-19 lockdown. The survey was conducted on 303 students and 56 educators
in Norway. According to the survey results, the main factors influencing learners are feedbacks
to and from the instructor, engagement in discussion forums, using online tutorials, and
participating in group work.
1.3. Formative assessment in Blended learning
Many studies have researched assessment and FA in the context of BL. The work by Duarte
(2014) applies FA in BL as self-assessments of learners. They self-assessed their learning
outcomes in the learning process. As a result, students who took the self-assessment had higher
average scores on the final exam than those who did not. Le (2020) researched the influence of
FA on students’ learning motivation in BL. The article uses seven scales to identify factors
affecting learners’ motivation. As a result, it is possible to conclude that including FA in
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teaching activities sends clear signals to students’ learning activities. Especially when this
activity is carried out in BL, it has had positive effects on students’ learning activities and an
impact on students’ learning motivation. The use of FA tools in BL is increasing because of the
improvement of the quality of learning. The work of Febriani (2018) demonstrates that
technology is an integral part of education because it has significantly transformed assessment
methods from manual to automated assessment. This is a significant transition from the
traditional method to the modern assessment method, saving time and reducing the workload for
lecturers in the assessment process.
Many studies have shown the effectiveness of implementing FA in BL. However, there is
no strong relationship between them, and all implementations are fragmentary. Although the
research works on BL, the evaluation forms used in BL, including FA, mainly introduce
assessment tools in the online phase, such as often describing electronic assessment tools. If the
research works on FA, the FAs often focus on deployment but not on data collection and
analysis to make necessary adjustments toward the teaching and learning process. This paper
proposes BL models according to blend levels, and a new tool, FbA, is used to perform FA
corresponding to BL models.
2. Methodology
This work analyzes the overview studies on FA in higher education and finds that FA has
increased effectiveness when deployed in BL. Thanks to the active support of technology, BL
creates a favorable environment to connect learners – educators – peers together. Similarly, FA
is also advocated by many studies as a valuable tool in helping learners achieve their desired
learning goals. Hence, the study proposes an assessment method is FbA. Approaching for FbA
design are:
Firstly, FbA is designed based on the CLOs.
Program outcomes (POs) can act as benchmarks for assuring quality and efficiency in
higher education. Universities publicize them to describe their education program
unambiguously to demystify education to a broader audience. POs are contributed from the
course learning outcomes (CLOs) in the program. Benefits of CLO are: putting the student at
the center of the learning experience: from teaching to learning; accreditation of learning:
recognizing student achievement outside of the class; enhancing employability: benefits for
employers and students; a more open educational system: public information, quality and
accountability (Maher, 2004). CLOs must be measurable and observable to meet the goals and
objectives of the course. Therefore, CLOs are necessary standards and criteria to measure how
well the instruction has been designed (Allan, 2006).
Inheriting the FA design requirements above, which identifies the three questions and
responses five strategies, plus based on the CLOs, the article proposes a FbA design
corresponding to the number of CLOs of the course. Therefore, FbA is in relationship with the
teaching and learning content.
Secondly, FbA is designed based on the blended level of the BL.
Once again, early findings above echoed the notion that BL needs to be effective in
implementation, either in normal conditions or in a pandemic context. In the context of this
paper, there must be a seamless combination as a consolidation to meet the course’s goals
and objectives. BL also needs to be appropriate to specific characteristics of learners and
teaching-learning environment, based on which to determine the suitable blend level of BL to be
implemented. Accordingly, the design of FbA needs suitable with the level of blended that has
been designed in the instruction to identify assessment activities associated with teaching and
learning activities of the respective teaching and learning form. So, FbA is in relationship with
the organizational structure of teaching and learning.
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Thirdly, FbA is designed to assess as “assessment for learning” or “assessment as learning”,

embedded in the PDCA cycle.
If we want to encourage our learners to become more autodidactic, it would focus on
assessment for learning and ultimately get to assessment as learning. Both of them are referred
to as ‘formative assessment’.
Assessment for learning involves teachers using evidence about students’ knowledge,
understanding, and skills to inform their teaching. It usually occurs throughout the teaching and
learning process to clarify student learning and understanding.
Assessment as learning occurs when students are their own assessors. Students monitor
their learning, ask questions, use a range of strategies to decide what they know and can do, and
use assessment for new learning.
The PDCA (standing for Plan – Do – Check – Act) cycle has been researched by many
studies across various fields, including education. This continuous process introduces small
incremental changes to improve quality and efficiency (Mergen, 2014). The PDCA cycle
depends on data collection and analysis. Brown and Marshall (2008) define the four stages of
PDCA as:
Plan = Define goals and objectives; Collect data.
Do = Determine the need; Proposed changes; Implement deployment.
Check = Monitor, evaluate and analyze change; Compare old and new data.
Act = Adjust strategies for improvement; Refine and replace.
Deemed as a process of continual adjustment to help learners progress, FbA should be a
type of assessment that works as a tool to ‘detect’ whether learners are keeping up with the
overall progress of the teaching process or not. Furthermore, FbA needs to help regulate learners
and let learners self-regulate to improve their learning performance. Very relevant to the above
aims of FbA, this study embedded them in the PDCA cycle. Hence, FbA is in relationship with
the teaching and learning methods.
To evaluate the effectiveness of FbA implementation, a case study at the University of
Science and Education – The University of Danang was conducted.
The experiment of the FbA was implemented in the “Database” course in the 2020-2021
academic year, on 144 students, mainly the second year cohort studying Information
Technology at the Faculty of Information Technology. The survey data obtained from the
experiment evaluate the effectiveness and feasibility of the model and make some suggestions
and recommendations to be widely applied in higher education.
3. Result
3.1. Formative blended-Assessment in blended learning
Following approaches in methodology, the work recommends the FbA tool as below:
Formative blended-Assessment (FbA) is a CLO-oriented assessment activity that
conducting with blended learning in higher education. It aims to monitor learners’ performance
regularly and promote their learning motivation; focus on assessment for learning and
assessment as learning.
Hence, FbA’s role in the teaching and learning process are:
(1) Monitor learner performance through each CLO progress;
(2) Engage different agents (instructor, peer, learner) in the classroom;
(3) Create positive learning motivation for learners;
(4) Help learners meet 21st-century learning skills;
(5) Orient individuals (towards personalization) have favorable conditions for self-
reflection and self-regulation.
The FbA implementation process is shown in Figure 3 as below:
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Figure 3. The implementation process of FbA in BL (Authors’compilation)

Implementation of FbA tied to the CLOs of the course. This process begins with the first
CLO and repeats until the last CLO of the course. For each loop, its suffix information will be
the prefix information for a new loop to serve as the basis for more significant adjustments
involving the redesign of the instruction. Each FbA represents in the form of a diagram, clearly
showing the execution steps, the results obtained from each step, and its method and
participants. Implementation of FbA divides into three regions corresponding to the three
questions of FA design mentioned earlier. The activities within the FbA also appear to fulfill the
five key strategies required for FA. The steps in the PDCA cycle are also mapped into FbA
operations.
As mentioned above on the recommendations while designing and implementing BL, it is
necessary to consider how teaching and learning context and environmental conditions are.
Based on Figure 2, the paper proposes the following levels of blend that might deploy in higher
education recently:
Table 1. Blend levels recommendation
Blend level Meeting Technology Suitable for
Courses which resources for
Use simple technology in class such as digital documents; outclass such
B1 F2F teaching and learning are
as e-mail, web,…
limited.
Use technology in class such as interactive simulations, digitally Most of the courses,
controlled experiments, practical devices; outclass such as content especially in technical
B2 F2F
management system, learning management system, social networking, education.
electronic bulletin boards, quizzes, poll, forum, chat,…
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Blend level Meeting Technology Suitable for

Use asynchronous technology such as content management system, Self-paced courses depend
B3 Online learning management system, social networking, electronic bulletin on the time and place of
boards, quizzes, poll, forum, chatting … learners choosing.
Use both asynchronous like above and synchronous technology such as
Covid-19 pandemic
B4 Online virtual classroom, live presentation, live text chat, instant messaging, live
situation.
audio or video chat, live quizzes, live polling, videoconferencing,…
With the blended levels proposed by the article above, there will be a FbA design to suit the
corresponding blended level depending on which level is chosen. In other words, the design of
FbA depends on what teaching and learning form is used in its process, which is reflected in the
course’s instruction.
The proposed FbAs are divided into two groups with the purpose of assessment for learning
– involves improving learning and assessment as learning – involves deeper learning and
learning how to learn. Moreover, with its ‘upward’ trend, the PDCA cycle shows a ‘going up’
continuous cycle, even it is slow. In response, benchmarks for improvement will also need to be
reviewed and adjusted higher to cater to the cycle’s upward movement. FbA can be potentially
applied to this PDCA cycle design to create a tool that helps learners progress in each learning
outcome, as Table 2 below:
Table 2. Types of FbA implementation
FbA types Plan Do Check Act
The instructor finds out
The instructor detects
Collect data of learner the reason, returns the
Focus on feedback, the learners who do not
participation (attendance, quick assignment need to be
support, and regularly participate in
tests,…), efforts/ paces done to the learner,
collaboration. learning activities such
(completion of assigned encourages, reminds,
Instructor and peers as class attendance,
assignments, task on time), motivates the learner to
FbA for learning check progress and completing assigned
learning results (observation; complete the task.
learning to help learners tasks on time, etc.
quizzes; exercises;…) to give Instructor and peers
to determine how to Instructor and peers
ongoing feedback to learners, clarify learner learning
improve. find out issues or
inform the planning of future and understanding
mistakes of learners in
learning. following each
the topic.
identified group.
Focus on collaboration,
Gain experience, metacognition,
reflection, and self- Learners and peers
motivation, interests for learners
evaluation. decide what they know Learners understand
through peer-assessment,
Learners take and can do. the next steps in
FbA as learning co-assessment (forum discussion;
responsibility for their Learners explore how learning, self-reflect
peer-assessment sheet; group
learning, ask questions to use assessment for and self-regulate.
presentation;…),
about their learning and new learning.
or self-assessment.
explore how to improve.
Thus, at the beginning of the course, a specific FbA implementation scenario with a tight
relationship between teaching and learning content, organizational form teaching and learning,
and teaching and learning method is designed and built. FbA design ensures that FbA is a
continuous assessment activity associated with the PDCA cycle, embedded in BL as a
consolidation, becoming a non-separated component in the teaching-learning process,
supporting learners to achieve their expected CLOs.
3.2. Experimental results
Some primary conditions need to be met to implement FbA in higher education. They are:
(1) The detailed course curriculum should be introduced in detail and clarify, especially the
CLOs that learners need to achieve.
355
(2) The detailed assessment of the course (rubrics) should be provided to the learners in
advance. The criteria table needs clearly and expresses measurement levels for each CLO.
(3) Study materials should be provided fully before and during the learning process. They
are also explicitly introduced.
(4) Self-study instructions, task requirements that need to be prepared by the learners
should be complete and detailed. Make sure learners do not have difficulty and ambiguity in
determining what they need to do.
(5) Conditions on facilities are fully met, ensuring face-to-face and online learning
deployment.
The “Database” course is performed in BL. There was an adjustment in the BL course
design. Compared to the initial design, which was at level B2, the course was separated into two
BL levels, the first half of the course is B2, and its remains is B4 due to the impact of the Covid-
19 pandemic. Throughout the course, attendance control of learners is recorded by semi-
automatic tools and sometimes manual forms. Efforts tracking of each individual or group, such
as fully completing assigned tasks (maybe on time or not), are analyzed to detect existing issues,
feedback in time to learners, and encourage them to be more active in their learning. The learner
issues were also consulted by asking learners to list three things that a fellow learner might
misunderstand about the topic. Besides some FbAs conducted regularly during the course as
above, other FbAs focus on the course’s CLOs that learners need to achieve. These FbAs are
implemented in Table 3.
Table 3. The Database course with some FbAs implementation
CLO Plan Do Check Act
CLOs BL Design
Content
FbA as learning Assignments about The instructor shows the Based on these
focuses on relational entity diagrams exercises that have been comments and
collaboration, are submitted in an online done so that everyone can orientations,
Design a
reflection, and form for data collection. comment, give learners can
CLO1 relational B2
self-evaluation. suggestions, and clarify self-reflect and
database.
the mistakes that learners self-regulate.
often encounter in general
and individually.
FbA for learning, Learners do quizzes about Collect data on learners’ Scores are
focuses on using integrity constraints performance. If there are provided to
feedback, in database creation. any abnormalities in the learners as a
Use data support, and results, the instructor gives source of
CLO2 integrity B2 collaboration. feedback to learners, helps encouragement
constraints. them realize the mistakes. as well as
The instructor also needs motivation for
to review and adjust their learners to
instruction if necessary. strive.
FbA for learning, Instructors and learners They give comments and For learners who
focuses on designated as facilitators feedback immediately have not
feedback, observe and support each during that session. In completed the
support, and learner during F2F addition, learners who tasks, they must
collaboration. sessions on data querying have the same pace will be find a way to
Query data
CLO3 B2, B4 practices. Toward online gathering in a group for complete them.
using SQL.
sessions, learners are visible support. The
required to practice and instructor tracks the
reinforce on progress and performance
https://www.khanacade of learners.
my.org/.
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FbA as learning Learners perform Learners detect problems Learners

focuses on exercises about using by themselves. The recognize
Apply
collaboration, relational algebra to verify instructor confirms these mistakes and
CLO4 relational B2, B4
reflection, and the query statements on problems by giving adjust.
algebra.
self-evaluation. the general discussion feedback on a forum.
forum of the class.
FbA as learning Learners do a composite The group’s performance Comments and
focuses on exercise about database is presented and co-assess orientations are
collaboration, administration with a with the instructor. instructions for
Optimize reflection, and designated group (make Thereby, members do learners to
queries self-evaluation. sure that each group has a self-assessment and self-reflect and
CLO5 during SQL B4 leader who has good peer-assessment via the self-regulate.
statement- academic performance). online form.
making. Group members support
each other to perform the
requirements of the
exercise.
FbA as learning Learners do the exercises Randomly select pairs to Learners and
focuses on related to normalizing the present the result of the peers find
Normalize
collaboration, relation schema and exercises with the whole mistakes first
relation
reflection, and compare their results in class. and then the
schema
self-evaluation. pairs via an online instructor.
CLO6 based on B4
classroom. Finally, they
database
correct them
design
together and
theory.
identify core
points.
Focusing on CLOs of the course, FbAs are implemented as above. The work obtained
experimental results below by monitoring, analyzing, statistics, and feedback to learners using
automatic and semi-automatic tools.
The progress of learners after each FbA implementation is shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4. The percentage of learners with growth in academic performance

Figure 5 shows the learners’ evaluation of the effectiveness of the strategies when
implementing the FbAs in the course.
357
Figure 5. Learners’ evaluation of the effective rate of strategies during FbAs implementation
The research compared the average final exam scores of the “Database” course with the
previous academic year (19-20), which has 227 students, mainly the second year cohort
studying Information Technology at the Faculty of Information Technology. Students had the
same initial input score in the previous “Database” course as the current one. However, the
previous one did not apply the entire FbA in instruction, teaching, and learning activities. Some
FAs deployed but in a usual way. The result shows that the average score of the course in this
academic year is higher, nearly 1 point, than last academic year, as can be seen in Figure 6.
Figure 6. The comparison of the average final result of Database course

in academic years 2019 – 2020 to 2020 – 2021
4. Discussion
With a limited number of test samples, the research has not shown a more considerable
different effect than the courses which did not implement the FbA. It can be explained that the
previous courses also had some activities like FbA, but it was not systematic and according to
specific processes as suggested by the work. So, the difference in average results of the database
course in two academic years is not too significant. In addition, learners have been
uncomfortable and still have many apprehensions while performing activities assessment with
FbA as learning.
However, the experimental implementation of FbAs in the “Database” course obtained
work results, prove this deployment has performed with a specific efficiency. The courses at the
358
University of Science and Education have designed the FA in each course. However, these FAs
are mostly routine assessments that do not emphasize the true meaning of FA. They also do not
operate throughout the course as a unified whole related to the teaching and learning content,
form, and methods to support and complete each other. Thanks to the FbAs designed right from
the beginning of the course with the appropriate teaching and learning content, form, and
method, the instructor, actively implemented related activities with this “Database” course to
track and grasp information about their status students in each module. Not only that, when
implementing FbA methodically and detecting errors that learners often encounter to correct,
some comments about attitudes and learning results, both positive and negative, about students’
learning were also discovered. These findings, partly communicate to learners for self-reflection
and self-regulation, retained for the instructor to adjust for the subsequent implementation steps
of the course, also proposed to the institution if needed. Thus, the implementation of FbAs
throughout the course has kept the course stable and created an environment of cohesion and
mutual learning towards self-discipline to promote learners’ motivation.
Besides, when asked about how FbA affects students, the study received some comments
from those students. Regarding advantages, some students commented as follows:
“It is teamwork. The interaction between students and the instructor is excellent. The
enthusiastic instruction from the instructor in the learning process helps students’ attitude and
learning spirit to improve and be more motivated to do the exercises” (Nguyen, T.H.A)
“Help us to communicate, thinking by ourselves and come up with solutions toward
problems that need to be discussed. The classroom atmosphere is comfortable, funny, without
pressure, boring” (Tran, T.B.N).
“Help us to be more self-disciplined, eager to learn and solve the questions/problems posed
in the lesson” (Vo, V.A).
“Many diversity tasks and assignments assigned in clear instruction. Students can express
their personal opinions as much as possible, learn new things from friends, work in groups,
so that students help each other to progress together, especially those who don’t study well”
(Le, H.Q).
“We access knowledge from different ways. This helps us to think better” (Nguyen, H.T.D).
In terms of existence and challenges, most students said that many did not have the
self-discipline and good self-study to actively explore the content that the instructor and peers
responded to them. They also stated that teamwork skills are lacks in some students.
Although FbAs conducted with the corresponding CLOs of the course mentioned in the
article above, some feedback activities to learners have not been thoroughly addressed to every
individual learner but only to representative groups. It means that the close follow-up of each
learner has not been collected comprehensively and systematically by research. If this can be done
by using an e-portfolio, this will become a data source to use data mining for grouping learners,
which is advantageous in feedback and adjustment for learners automatically; or use statistical
models to find out the key factors impacting learner performance when implementing FbA.
CONCLUSION
The authors of the work have proposed FbAs to be implemented in the BL environment in
higher education. These FbAs are learner-centered, let learners depend not only on the
instructor’s instructions for guiding their learning but also on self-directed, self-motivated, and
academically prepared learners. These learners will have more chances to succeed in any
learning environment because they know how to learn and assess the quality of their work.
Depending on each educational institution’s potential, each course may have appropriate
BL designs and implement corresponding FbAs. The conditions for implementing the FbAs that
the work proposes are suitable for any educational institution, even if they do not have their
359
learning management system. However, to widely deploy the design and implementation of
FbA, each educational institution must have a unified direction and organization. These reduce
the workload for instructors and create a significant learning environment where giving learners
a choice, ownership, and voice through authentic learning opportunities.
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About the authors

– M.Sc Pham Duong Thu Hang works at the Information Technology Faculty, University
of Science and Education, is a member of The University of Danang (UED) – a leading
educational universities group in Vietnam. She attained a Bachelor of Mathematics and
Informatics in 2003 and a Master of Computer Science in 2008 at The University of Danang. As
the Vice Dean of Information Technology Faculty, she has been recommended to participate in
a leadership role for several projects in the field of education and training, such as using
technology in education, creating an e-book for STEM learning, etc. She also contributes to
many training courses on education methodology for teachers. Her research areas are database,
testing, teaching methodology, and teaching technology. Currently, she is a Ph.D. student in
Technology Teaching Methodology at the Faculty of Technology Education, Hanoi National
University of Education (HNUE), Vietnam.
– Dr. Nguyen Hoai Nam is an Associate Professor of Education of Hanoi National
University of Education (HNUE). He is currently working as Vice Dean of the Faculty of
Technology Education (FTE), HNUE. With 50 historical years of development, FTE is one of
the leading Vietnamese institutes for Philosophy and Methodology of Technology Education at
the graduate level. He also works as a visiting lecturer for the Faculty of Primary Education,
HNUE. His research publications are in areas related to ICT in education, technology education,
and STEM education. He contributes to the graduate education of FTE as a lecturer and
supervisor for Master Thesis and Doctorate Dissertation in Philosophy and Methodology of
362
THE ROLE OF FOREIGN LECTURERS AND HUMAN RESOURCE

MANAGEMENT PRACTICES: A CASE STUDY
IN HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS IN VIETNAM
Nguyen Thi Nhai*1, Duong Thi Hoang Yen1
Abstract: In the era of globalization, the number of foreign lecturers (e.g., the academics working
outside of their home countries) has been increasing significantly. Vietnam’s higher education
institutions (HEIs), as a result, have become destinations of choice for many foreign lecturers in
recent years. However, the comprehensive understanding of foreign lecturers’ role and related
human resource management (HRM) practices in Vietnam’s HEIs is still limited and
under-researched. In this paper, we therefore seek to identify the existing status of foreign
lecturers and their roles in HEIs in Vietnam. Our study is based on the data on foreign lecturers
who have been working at 17 HEIs in Vietnam for the last 3 years (2017 – 2019). The data is
presented either in their internal reports or on their websites. First, we collect information of
foreign lecturers. We then interview the managers of universities where they are working to clarify
the role of foreign lecturers and how universities conduct the practices of HRM on recruitment
and selection; training and development; and pay and reward schemes. The findings of this study
are useful information for aligning HRM with the characteristics of foreign lecturers for better
HEIs’ performance.
Keywords: foreign lecturers, human resource management (HRM), higher education institutions
in Vietnam (HEIs), HRM practices
INTRODUCTION
After over 30 years of renovation, Vietnam has made significant achievements in various
fields of economy and social affairs, as well as education. In response to socio-economic
development, national education development plans and strategies have been adopted to meet
the demands of the labor markets. Since 2000, the Vietnamese Government has committed
15% – 20% of its public expenditure to education, the highest rate amongst all other ASEAN
countries (EU-Vietnam Business Network, 2018). According to the data from Vietnam Ministry
of Education and Training (MOET) for the 2019 – 2020 academic years, the total number of
universities in Vietnam is 237 (universities and institutes under the National Defense and
Security sector are not included), where 72.5% are public universities (i.e., 172 universities),
27.4% are non-public universities (i.e., 65 universities) (MOET, 2021).
Internationalization of higher education (HE) has become a common trend as it is a
powerful method to promote competitiveness and improve the quality of domestic universities
in response to the changing needs of economic development and workforce capacity building
(Lane, 2015). In Vietnam, internationalization of HE is an efficient way to not only improve the
quality of the education system but also encourage international cooperation and integration in
education. As a result, many forms of international relations and cooperation have been
established such as founding 100% foreign-funded education institutions or cooperating on
higher education, vocational training, distance education, short-term training courses, etc. There
are approximately 300 joint and twinning programs provided in cooperation with 32 countries
(Tran & Marginson, 2019). Collaborating with overseas partners of equal or greater status can
improve the reputation and ranking of a university, perceiving it as an international university.
* Corresponding author: Nguyen Thi Nhai; E-mail Address: nhaint21@gmail.com

1 VNU – University of Education
363
Offering a joint or twinning program with an international partner is also a way for the
university to ensure that its study programs are on a par with the international standards.
Internationalization of HE is the main reason for the significant increase of foreign lecturers
in Vietnam’s HEIs. Foreign lecturers contribute to university internationalization thanks to their
experiences of research and teaching brought from different academic systems. However, the
understanding of the role and management of foreign lecturers in HEIs in Vietnam is still
limited and not well explored. Therefore, this study aims at exploring the existing status of
foreign lecturers and their roles in HEIs in Vietnam, as well as investigating the adoption of
HRM practices related to them. Accordingly, the research questions of the study are:
1) What are the roles of foreign lecturers in HEIs in Vietnam?
2) How are HRM practices related to foreign lecturers implemented in HEIs in Vietnam?
Foreign lecturers, which are also known as international faculty, refer to academics that
hold appointments in countries where they were not born and/ or where they did not receive
their first post-secondary degree (Altbach & Yudkevich, 2017; Huang & Welch, 2021). In most
cases, they are not citizens of the country in which they hold their academic appointments.
Among the two most common approaches to definition of the international faculty, by place of
birth (foreign-born) and by citizen-ship (nonlocal citizens), Kim, Wolf-Wendel and Twombly
(2011) realized that much prior research used the former one as the indicator of the international
faculty. This approach yields the largest pool of the international faculty, particularly owing to
the fact that a large number of immigrants cross national borders after they were born.
In U.S universities such as Washington University, Cornell University, and Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, international scholars might be faculty members, research associates,
and postdoctoral research fellows, visiting scholars or physicians. Often, individuals assume that
“international” means “people from other countries” while it actually refers to visa status,
non-U.S. citizens and those with non-permanent resident status (Lomax, 2018). According to
QS World University Ranking, foreign lecturers are academic faculty staff who contribute to
teaching or research or both for a minimum period of at least three months and who are of
foreign nationality (QS, 2019). In Vietnam, pursuant to the Decree No. 152/2020/ND-CP dated
December 30, 2020, providing regulations on foreign employees working in Vietnam and
recruitment, management of Vietnamese employees working for foreign organizations and
individuals in Vietnam, there is no specific definition for foreign lecturers, but foreign teachers
are generally understood as expatriates and belong to the group of foreign experts (The
Government of Vietnam, 2020).
In this study, we specifically define foreign lecturers as foreigners who are invited or
contracted to teach or research or both at Vietnam’s universities. Their qualifications must meet
the criteria of a faculty member at a university complying with the Education Law of Vietnam
and their working experience needs to fit the requirement of Decree No. 152/2020/ND-CP to
apply for a working visa.
The rest of the paper begins with a research context in Section 2, which focuses on the
educational policies related to university internationalization and the existing status of foreign
lecturers in HEIs in Vietnam. Section 3 introduces research methods, and Section 4 presents our
findings of the role of foreign lecturers in HEIs in Vietnam and how HRM practices related to
foreign lecturers are implemented. Finally, Section 5 concludes the paper.
CONTENT
1. Internationalization of HE
As previously stated, internationalization of HE is an effective strategy to boost
competitiveness and improve the quality of native universities in a time of change in economic
development and labor capacity demands (Lane, 2015). Internationalization helps HEIs stay
364
relevant at both the national and international levels and also grow in a sustainable manner.
Activities that HEIs can take to implement their internationalization include developing
international academic programs, implementing international research projects, setting up
branch campuses, mobilizing students and staff, recruiting international students and scholars,
etc. (Knight, 2012).
In the era of globalization, there are growing numbers of academics including foreign
lecturers working outside of their home countries. Although the global percentage of
international academics is not large, this group is quite important. It is considered that foreign
lecturers are an increasingly crucial part of the global academic environment of the twenty-first
century (Altbach & Yudkevich 2017), and hiring international talent has become an important
strategy for maintaining and improving university competitiveness (Cantwell, 2011; Bunt-
Kokhus, 2000).
Many countries and universities implement initiatives to attract foreign lecturers. This is
especially true in the cases of China, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. All
these countries and societies have made huge efforts to boost the level of internationalization of
HE, strive for academic excellence, and encourage the international competitiveness of HE and
research by expanding the size of international faculty and attracting global talents to work in
their universities and colleges, especially since the twenty-first century. For instance, hiring
high-level international faculty members is an important task in building world-class
universities in China (Altbach & Yudkevich, 2017; Huang & Welch, 2021).
2. National Policy
Resolution No. 29-NQ/TW of the 8th plenum of the Communist Party of Vietnam Central
Committee on the substantive and comprehensive renewal of education and training, serving
industrialization and modernization in a socialist-oriented market economy during international
integration sets nine solutions for comprehensive renewal of education. One of its solutions is to
adopt mechanisms to encourage international organizations, foreigners, and overseas
Vietnamese to participate in activities of training, scientific and technological research,
application, and transfer in Vietnam to intensify international cultural and academic exchange
(Vietnam Central Party Executive Committee, 2013).
The Vietnamese Government has executed various reform strategies to meet the changing
local demands and global forces. The Education Strategic Development Plan 2011 – 2020 (The
Government of Vietnam, 2012) points out a need for a higher-performing education system,
where the objective of producing highly qualified human resources to meet the competition in
international markets is emphasized. Also, the Higher Education Renovation Agenda 2006 –
2020 (The Government of Vietnam, 2005) calls for universities and colleges’ action to develop
international strategies and enhance the quality of education to produce highly qualified human
resources to meet the competitiveness of both local and international markets.
In addition, the scheme for international integration with respect to education and
vocational training by 2020 specified in Decision No. 2448/QD-TTg dated December 16, 2013,
demonstrates one of the objectives and solutions to reach the general targets by 2020 as well as
the specific targets of 2014 – 2015 and 2016 – 2020 period is encouraging the expansion of
bilateral cooperation, educational association, lecturer exchange between Vietnamese HEIs,
colleges, and vocational training institutions and foreign educational institutions and research
institutes; attracting foreign lecturers, foreign teachers, and Vietnamese citizen teaching abroad
to training programs in Vietnam; introducing policies on attracting investment; and granting
institutions more autonomy (GoV, 2013).
So as to appeal to more scientists to work in Vietnam, in 2014, the Vietnamese Government
issued Decree No. 87/2014/ND-CP, which is amended by Decree No. 27/2020/ND-CP on
attracting the participation of Vietnamese people living abroad and foreign experts in science
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and technology activities in Vietnam with more priority policies on recruitment, labor, study,
and salary for those people (GoV, 2014, 2020).
According to Decision No. 40/QD-TTg dated January 7, 2016, the Government approves
the overall strategy for international integration to 2020, with a vision to 2030, in which
integration in education and training is increasingly promoted. The integration orientation and
solutions mention the establishment of mechanisms to encourage international organizations and
foreign individuals to participate in training, researching, applying and technology transferring
activities at domestic educational and training institutions; to attract foreign experts and
scientists to participate in science and technology human resources training and researching
programs and projects.
On January 18, 2019, the Prime Minister issued Decision No. 89/QD-TTg, approving the
Project to improve the capacity of lecturers and managers of HEIs to meet the requirements of
renewing the comprehensive version of education and training during the period of 2019 –
2030. The Decision alludes to the attraction, appreciation, and promotion of domestic and
foreign scientists and doctoral degree holders and encourages them to come and participate in
teaching and scientific research at HEIs in Vietnam (GoV, 2019).
Education Law 2019 No. 43/2019/QH14 was adopted by the 14th National Assembly of the
Socialist Republic of Vietnam on June 14, 2019 and announced on July 4, 2019. In this Law,
Article 71 clearly states: “Encourage inviting domestic teachers and scientists, scientists who
are overseas Vietnamese and foreigners to come and teach at educational institutions according
to the visiting teaching regime” (National Assembly of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, 2019).
From the above documents, it is clear that Vietnamese Government has acknowledged the
important role of foreign experts, scientists, and lecturers and their contribution to the education
system in Vietnam in general and to universities in particular towards speeding up the
international integration process. As a result, the Government stimulates Vietnamese
universities to attract this kind of high-quality workforce to participate in their premises.
3. Existing Status of Foreign Lecturers in HEIs in Vietnam
Under the aforementioned national policies in education, many efforts have been made to
increase the capacity for cooperation and competitiveness of universities with other foreign
partners and implement advanced programs that attract foreign lecturers. Hundreds of American
scholars have been working in Vietnamese HEIs such as National University Hanoi, National
Economics University, Hue University, Can Tho University, Hanoi University, and so on under
the Fulbright Program in Vietnam (Bui, Le, & Do, 2017). In addition, other non-government
organizations have brought hundreds of foreign volunteers and scholars to Vietnam such as
Youth Ambassadors or Australian International Volunteers, the ASIA Foundation (US), and
Japan Foundation (Japan). Some research foundations, FIRST for instance, also distribute funds
to support high-profile foreign scholars who work at HEIs in Vietnam as visiting researchers/
professors.
University-level HE is offered at three main types of institutions: multidisciplinary
universities, senior colleges, and institutes which tend to have a narrow disciplinary focus. The
five biggest and most prestigious multidisciplinary universities in Vietnam are Vietnam
National University, Hanoi (VNU); Vietnam National University, Ho Chi Minh City (VNU-
HCM); Hue University; University of Da Nang; and Thai Nguyen University. Clearly, it can be
found that many foreign lecturers have been working in these universities. According to QS
World University Ranking 2021, the number of international staff in VNU and VNU-HCM is
172 and 587 respectively. Some of Vietnam’s public HEIs that had a large number of foreign
lecturers in the academic year (AY) 2019 – 2020 are presented in Figure 1. Also, there has been
an increase of international lectures in private universities that provide high salaries and reward
366
as well as good working conditions such as Vin University (VinUni), Phenikaa University, and
Duy Tan University.
Figure 1. The number of foreign lecturers in AY 2020 – 2021 (Authors’ complilation)
4. Research methods
Our study is based on the data on foreign lecturers who have been working at 17 HEIs in
Vietnam for the last 3 years (2017 – 2019). The data is presented either in their internal reports
or on their websites. First, we collect information on foreign lecturers. We then interview the
managers of universities where they are working to clarify the role of foreign lecturers and how
universities conduct the practices of HRM on recruitment and selection; training and
development; and pay and reward schemes.
Qualitative research based on an exploratory design was undertaken for the empirical part
of this study in order to hold a more holistic view regarding the role of foreign lecturers and
HRM practices in HEIs in Vietnam. In-depth interviews with experts (i.e., international office
staff and managers) were also conducted. The content analysis was carried out following the
methodology of Mayring (2014) for qualitative data summary and categorization.
Six interviews were conducted via phone calls. The subjects of the study consisted of 02
HEIs in each of 03 main regions within Vietnam, namely the Northern, Southern, and Central of
Vietnam so that these 6 HEIs would represent basic fields of education and training such as
humanities and social sciences, natural sciences, arts, and sports.
The questionnaire was semi-structured using a predefined interview guideline allowing for
open answers. All interviews were recorded by note-taking. For each of the questions, the
expected scope of the answer was described. If the answer of the interviewees did not
encompass the full extent expected, the interviewers asked more detailed questions following
the guidelines.
The questions asked in the interviews are as follows:
(1) In the trend of increasing integration and internationalization, foreign lecturers play an
undeniable role in universities. In your opinion, what is the role of the foreign lecturers at your
institution and what do they contribute to your institution?
(2) The number of foreign lecturers at HEIs in Vietnam tends to increase, requiring
institutions to have appropriate policies and management mechanisms to effectively promote
their contribution to the institutions. How does your institution implement HRM practices
related to foreign lectures in recruitment and selection; training and development; and pay and
reward schemes?
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4.2. Data analysis

Information of the subjects: All of the 21 universities surveyed have foreign lecturers.
However, the data collected from 04 of them was inadequate due to the lack of distinction
between foreign lecturers and foreign students. Of the remaining 17 universities, 09 of them
were in Northern Vietnam, 05 were in Southern Vietnam, and 02 were in Central Vietnam.
Regarding the types of universities, 16 of them were public universities, 01 was a private
university.
There were 470 foreign lecturers who came from 24 different countries and 17 universities.
Foreign lecturers were involved in teaching all majors, including foreign languages, economics,
environment, tourism, natural sciences, engineering, and so on. Depending on the specific
training of the university, foreign lecturers had different specialties and taught different majors.
For example, foreign lecturers at HANU mostly taught foreign languages, or foreign teachers at
National University of Civil and Engineering were most likely to teach in the field related to
construction science.
They could either be invited lecturers, volunteer lecturers, or contracted lecturers, but
mostly worked short-term. The length of contract for foreign lecturers was usually below one year.
The notes of each interview were paraphrased in clear sentences. After that, these
paraphrases were assigned to specific predefined categories which had been developed
deductively from research questions. The answers of all interviewees had been sorted into
categories for the purpose of generalization. From all generalized statements, a reduction
has been defined. One example of how a paraphrase was categorized and reduced is shown in
Table 1. All reductions in one constructed category led to a summary of answers from all
interviewees.
Table 1. Example reduction of a paraphrase for content analysis
Interview Paraphrase Category Reduction
2 Foreign lecturers in our university are very strong in research. When The role of foreign Research
working in Vietnam, besides teaching, they still continue their lecturer collaboration
research activities. Vietnamese colleagues can discuss mutual
interests with them and, if possible, participate in research together.
5. Findings
5.1. The Role of Foreign Lecturers in HEIs in Vietnam
Helping HEIs to solve the shortage of high-quality labor: Like local lecturers, foreign
lecturers contribute to the workforce of HEIs. Moreover, they are unique labor with some
specific requirements that cannot be met by local lecturers. For example, specialized institutions
that focus on foreign languages like HANU need many foreign lecturers. They are capable of
directing students to think from an international viewpoint. Foreign lecturers could also
contribute a lot of innovative research ideas when they share insights into related areas
previously conducted overseas. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that some universities have
been developing and amending their recruitment policies in order to attract more foreign lecturers.
Contributing to the internationalization of HEIs: The implementation of international and
joint/twinning programs is the most obvious manifestation of internationalization of universities
in Vietnam. Internationalization of HE in Vietnam is an efficient way to not only enhance the
quality of the educational system but also facilitate international cooperation and integration in
the education context. Many forms of international relations and cooperation have been
established such as establishing 100% foreign-funded HEIs, joint and twinning programs, etc.
At present, there are approximately 300 joint and twinning programs provided in cooperation
with 32 countries (Tran & Marginson, 2019). With a flurry of international cooperation
activities in HE, the need for recruiting and hiring foreign lecturers has been increasing
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significantly. For instance, the University of Science and Technology of Hanoi (USTH), the first
university in Vietnam that adopts the excellent public university model, hires 50% of its
lecturers from universities and research institutes in France, the USA, Japan, Australia,
South Korea, and so on. International University (IU), one of six member universities of
VNU-HMC, has 181 lectures, of which 20% are foreign.
The internationalization of HEIs is also reflected in student exchange activities. However,
since 2019, when the COVID-19 pandemic broke out around the world, student mobility has
been almost impossible. Although the number of foreign lecturers at Vietnamese universities
has decreased considerably due to the entry restrictions policy, the role of foreign lecturers
becomes more evident by bringing the world to the home campus and helping Vietnamese
students to do “mobility at home”. Along with domestic lecturers and staff, foreign lecturers
have contributed to activities and services supporting and nurturing the international and
intercultural competence of students, which creates an international environment on university
campuses.
Fostering international research collaboration and broadening participation in the global
academic network: Research has been identified as an essential function of universities, aside
from their traditional teaching functions. Focusing on research will undoubtedly help
universities develop sustainably. These days, a lot of research is collaborative, and universities
with international faculty are more likely to facilitate such collaborations. Universities are
willing to grant funds for their lecturers if they undertake joint research with overseas faculty
members and researchers. However, it is difficult for domestic lecturers to find co-researchers,
especially from abroad and having common research interests to do the work together. There is
no doubt that research collaborations are usually started by individual professors. By receiving
international lecturers, universities could provide more opportunities for their own domestic
lecturers to expand the research network and collaborate with professors from overseas
universities.
Recruiting foreign lecturers with advanced research capabilities can improve institutional
quality, and their publication output in high-ranking international journals is an influential
measure of their value (Hazelkorn, 2007). In addition, high-profile foreign lecturers also help
HEIs in Vietnam boost their research productivity greatly. In Vietnam, some evidence shows
that those trained at institutions abroad are more productive in terms of their research output
than those trained in the home country. Since research output is an important indicator used in
world university rankings to measure the value of universities, institutions with larger numbers
of foreign lecturers are likely to outdo others in terms of research. That is the case with Ton Duc
Thang University (TDTU). For 5 consecutive years, TDTU has achieved impressive growth in
the number of international publications. There are more than 200 foreign scientists working
with TDTU and they contribute significantly (nearly 50%) to the total number of publications of
TDTU. Phenikaa University is another example where 260 among 636 international
publications of this university (equivalent to 41%) in the period from 2017 – 2021 are joint
publications between Vietnamese lecturers and foreign partners.
World university rankings: The number of foreign lecturers is assigned weight in world
university rankings. According to the methodology of QS World University Rankings shown in
Figure 2, the international faculty ratio is assigned 5%. Therefore, HEIs in Vietnam stand to
benefit in rankings simply by hiring foreign lecturers. In addition, if universities hire larger
numbers of foreign lecturers, it may help somewhat in attracting more foreign students to
institutions and make a favorable impact on their ranking. Obviously, all high-ranking
universities in Vietnam such as VNU, VNU-HCM and Hanoi University of Science and
Technology (HUST) have a high foreign lecturer ratio. (TDTU, whose ranking has improved
rapidly recently, has 203 international professors and experts.)
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Figure 2. QS Word university ranking methodology (QS, 2020)

Knowledge transferring: Foreign lecturers who are invited or contracted to work at
Vietnamese universities are usually highly qualified and trained in advanced education systems.
They not only meet the criteria to become a faculty member at university as the Education Law
of Vietnam but also are experienced professors or scholars. Besides teaching and researching
which are the main activities of a typical lecture, foreign lecturers also help Vietnamese
universities develop and increase professional skills and foreign languages proficiency for
Vietnamese lecturers by sharing their experiences in developing programs, testing and
evaluating, student career guidance, writing and publishing international articles, and so on. The
important thing is how universities can encourage those high-level foreign lecturers to agree to
participate in the extra activities. In other words, universities should find effective ways to
exploit foreign lecturers’ potential and advantages.
5.2. Foreign Lecturer Management Practices
The following section discusses the management practices on foreign lecturers in HEIs in
Vietnam. The practices of HRM used in this study include recruitment and selection; training
and development; and pay and reward schemes. The reason for selecting these particular
practices was based on their relevance to Vietnamese universities and foreign lecturers.
Recruitment and selection
Fundamental characteristics in recruiting foreign lecturers include academic degree, ability
to conduct high-quality teaching and research in their fields of specialization, teaching and
student supervision experience, and personality fit for the department. In addition, universities’
hiring policies state explicitly that international work and experience will be considered when
making hiring decisions. International background, experience, and interests are among the
criteria upon which faculty candidates are evaluated. Recruitment policies also give priority to
those with an educational background from advanced education systems.
One way of hiring international lecturers is to appoint them to work part-time in Vietnam.
It is common for foreign lecturers to have a primary job in a country but still get hired and
spend part of their academic year on a part-time job in another country. Similarly, short-term
foreign lecturers might be simultaneously working at several universities or organizations in
Vietnam. This hiring method can reduce the budget spent on hiring foreign lecturers compared
to hiring them to work exclusively for one university.
Recruiting foreign lecturers based on the recommendations of universities’ own lecturers or
referrals from current staff, especially those who have ever studied abroad, is also an efficient
way to find suitable and qualified candidates. On the one hand, those lecturers usually have a
wide network of foreign co-workers, researchers and professors. On the other hand, they
understand the needs of their faculties so they can introduce potential candidates to universities.
In addition, strategies to attract foreign lecturers can be implemented via teachers/staff exchange
370
programs with foreign partners through bilateral cooperation or by being members of

international projects like Erasmus+ KA2. In this way, Vietnamese lecturers have more
opportunities to teach or research abroad in advanced education systems, and universities in
Vietnam can receive international lecturers in turn.
HEIs in Vietnam, however, have been facing some challenges in attracting and hiring the
best foreign lecturers in recent years. There are many reasons attributed to these issues. First and
foremost, hiring foreign lecturers to work in Vietnam is expensive and also associated with
some financial issues. Indeed, in order to offer tenure-track and tenured positions to their
faculty, universities must be able to honor their long-term monetary commitments to these
individuals and have a stable source of funding for this type of hiring arrangement. The lack of
labor policies for foreign lecturers in Vietnam public HEIs to obtain tenure-track positions is
also a barrier.
Additionally, the reputation and working environments of HEIs in Vietnam are not good
enough to attract high-profile international scholars to work here. Last but not least, 3 years of
teaching experience required to get a working permit has narrowed the scope of selecting
candidates, especially for English medium programs.
Training and development
Most of the universities do not have a professional training plan for foreign lecturers. This
is understandable because foreign lecturers usually are not tenured lecturers of Vietnamese
universities, but mainly volunteers, visiting professors, and exchange teachers. Besides, the
working term of foreign lecturers is often short and not suitable for training. Plus, the training
process could pose many related problems for universities, especially with regard to finance.
Foreign lecturers generally fulfill the requirements of universities when they apply to work
there, and almost all of them do not need to attend professional training in a country where the
education system is lower than that in their home countries. Thus, the training is simply
integration training or orientation to help foreign lecturers quickly adapt to the environment of
the universities as well as the culture of Vietnam. To make it easier for foreign lecturers to
integrate and also to make their life more convenient in Vietnam, some universities have opened
basic Vietnamese classes for new foreign lecturers.
Pay and reward schemes
Reward management is concerned with the formulation and implementation of strategies
and policies, of which the purposes are to reward people fairly, equitably, and consistently in
accordance with their value to the organization and to help the organization achieve its strategic
goals (Armstrong, 2007).
It is clearly seen that there is a difference in salary payment for foreign lecturers between
public and non-public universities. While non-public universities are willing to pay high
remuneration to get qualified and high profile foreign lecturers, public universities often have
difficulties paying salaries for international faculty. Each university has a different regulation on
payment policy for foreign lecturers in accordance with its financial situation. To reduce the
burden of this financial problem, public universities often seek overseas lecturers who are
volunteers from international organizations, foreign partner universities or find grants for
inviting foreign lecturers. The universities can offer these foreign lecturers housing support or a
small number of living expenses, which is not considered their salary.
Specifically, in Vietnam, the list of excellent teachers is usually announced at the end of AY,
which means they have to wait until then to receive rewards for dedication. In compliance with
regulations on emulation and commendation, at the end of each AY, the departments/faculties
conduct an assessment of their lectures’ work completion levels. There are 4 rating levels,
including: (1) Complete the task, (2) Well complete the task, (3) Excellently complete the task,
and (4) Not complete the task. Each lecturer performs his/her self-evaluation based on this scale,
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then the departments/faculties where the teacher works appraise the completion and
self-evaluation of the lecturer. Finally, the University-level Committee for Emulation and
Commendation arrives at a definitive conclusion on how well the lecturer has achieved. In most
universities, foreign lecturers are not included in this process since they are not tenure staff.
Among the surveyed universities, they all answered that there were no reward schemes for
foreign lecturers like there were for the Vietnamese. In addition, the working time of foreign
lecturers, especially for professors and scholars who were working as invited or visiting
lecturers, was generally short with an intermittent work schedule. Therefore, it was not rational
to wait until the end of the AY to reward foreign lecturers. On the other hand, two out of 6
respondents said that their universities usually held an activity to express their recognition and
appreciation to the contribution of foreign teachers. Therefore, when the foreign lecturers
finished their working session before they returned to their home country, the university would
organize a meeting or farewell party with the participation of the leaders from the
university/faculty to thank the lecturers and offer them going-away gifts.
CONCLUSION
The existing status of foreign lecturers in HEIs in Vietnam has been investigated in this
research. In addition, we have studied the role and management practices of foreign lecturers.
We found that the number of foreign lecturers has been increasing with time and their role in
HEIs in Vietnam has become more important than ever. They have contributed enormously to
HEIs in Vietnam in terms of enhancing teaching quality and internationalization, fostering
international research collaborations and participation in the global academic network,
transferring knowledge, and improving world university ranking. However, it seems that the
HRM practices in HEIs in Vietnam have not caught up with their demand for recruiting foreign
lecturers. The findings of this study, therefore, set the foundation for future studies to establish
frameworks for developing this important human resource.
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About the authors

– Nguyen Thi Nhai received a bachelor’s in 2005, and a Master Degree in 2011 in Chinese
Studies from Hanoi University (HANU), formerly Hanoi University of Foreign Studies. Since
2006, she has been working at the International Office of HANU, where she is now Deputy
Director. She is currently doing a Ph.D. in Education Management at VNU University of
Education (VNU-UED), Vietnam. Her research interests include education management with a
particular emphasis on human resource management practices in HEIs.
– Assoc.Prof. Dr. Duong Thi Hoang Yen received her Ph.D. degree in psychology from
Hanoi National University of Education (HNUE). Currently, she is Dean of the Faculty of
Education Management at VNU University of Education (VNU-UED), Vietnam. Prof. Yen is
also a member of the Science and Education Council of VNU-UED. Her current research
interests focus on the area of intellectual psychology, psychology of management and
leadership, and education management. She has been a principal investigator and key member
of several national and ministry research projects. Also, she has put out many books along with
numerous scientific articles published in academic journals and presented at international
conferences.
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CURRENT USE OF TECHNOLOGY AND DEVELOPMENT

ORIENTATION FOR SMART UNIVERSITY – A CASE STUDY
AT HANOI UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Bui Thi Thuy Hang*1, Nguyen Hoai Nam2
Bui Ngoc Son1, Nguyen Thi Huong Giang1, Amrita Kaur3
Abstract: With the development of technology, the smart university model is explored and
studied in many parts of the world. This paper aimed to conduct a systematic model analysis of
the smart university. To do so, 1082 students from the first to the sixth year of Hanoi University of
Science and Technology were surveyed online about the current state of technology usage, the
level at which technology meets learners’ needs, and their perception of smart technology in
universities. The survey results were analyzed and discussed based on the V-SMARTH smart-
university model, which is suitable to the context of Vietnam. The results show that, in general,
the technological factors have met the requirements for the basic level of the V-SMARTH model,
and at the same time, met the basic usage needs of students. However, concerning the current
technology usage, some problems still need to be resolved to improve the user experience.
Depending on the user experience and practical experience, learners have different views about
smart technology, but they all understand the role and value of smart technology for learning
and research at universities. Based on the results of the analysis of the current situation, the
article has made recommendations to deploy the V-SMARTH model following the context of
Hanoi University of Science and Technology. Those are also practical experiences to approach
and research a smart university model suitable to the context in Vietnam.
Keywords: smart university, current use of technology, smart technology, V-SMARTH model
INTRODUCTION
Higher education plays a vital role in national education because it provides a highly skilled
workforce in various fields, meeting social needs (Kariappe et al., 2020). With the desire to
improve training quality, bring the best experience to learners, and focus on the creative central
role of learners, technological advances are exploited and applied in higher education. The
digital revolution has spurred new technologies that are changing the fabric of society with a
speed and scope never seen before (Kitchin, 2014). An era of intelligence is ushered in, in
which the prefix “smart” is attached to computing and/or networking-capable devices. Such
devices offer some form of intelligence because they are easy to use and designed to improve
the user’s experience during routine activities. Green, powerful, personalized, responsive,
interactive, and adaptive smart systems and smart solutions can be accessed anytime, anywhere,
from any device, following the common Internet model (Coccoli et al., 2014). On this basis, the
ideas of smart education (SmE), smart university (SmU), smart classroom (SmC), smart
learning environment (SLE), and related topics have become the main subject of various
pioneering national and international events and projects, government and corporate initiatives,
agendas and strategic plans (Heinemann & Uskov, 2017).
The smart university is a new educational structure based on emerging technologies,
developed very strongly. The ability to apply Internet of Things (IoT) and cyber-physical
* Corresponding Author: Bui Thi Thuy Hang; E-mail Address: hang.buithithuy@hust.edu.vn

3 College of Liberal Arts, Wenzhou-Kean University
375
systems (CPS) in smart universities has been looked at and proven to be successful by many
studies (Uskov et al., 2018a, 2018b; Coccoli et al., 2014). In a smart university, technology
solutions are integrated to encourage collaboration and cooperation among people. Smart
universities and smart education are rapidly appearing and developing in fields that demonstrate
the integration of (1) smart systems, smart objects, and smart environments, (2) smart
technology, various branches of computer science and computer engineering, (3) state-of-the-art
smart systems, educational agents and software and/or hardware tools, and (4) innovative
pedagogy, teaching strategies and learning methods based on cutting-edge technology (Uskov et
al., 2018a, 2018b; Daniela, 2018).
The rapid proliferation of smartphones, smart devices, smart systems, and smart technology
provides academic institutions, students, lecturers, staff, and administrators with a significant
opportunity to access cutting-edge technology to increase the quality of teaching strategies and
learning outcomes. In addition, these technological advances provide the ability to effectively
manage and operate the main functions and services of colleges and universities (Uskov et al.,
2018a). Many studies show the practical effects of SmU in higher education to bring about
better learning experiences for learners and improve learning quality (Prasolova-Førland et al.,
2017; Turuntaev, 2017). Learners’ evaluations contribute to clearly showing the reality of
technology application in universities, students’ awareness of smart technology, and the
effectiveness of using this technology (Marchis, 2021; Přibyl, Opasanon & Horak, 2018). We
hope that the results of this study will contribute to guiding the advancement of university
development policies towards a smart university.
CONTENT
1.1. Smart education & its elements
The concept of smart education appeared in the context of the proposal to build a smart city
by Harrison et al. (2010). This issue has been explored, developed, and extensively studied by
many researchers (Uskov et al., 2018a, 2018b; Coccoli et al., 2014; Heinemann & Uskov, 2017;
Marchis, 2021; Nguyen Huu Duc et al., 2020; Přibyl, 2018). In this elemental description, a
smart city represents urban development in various fields such as transportation, health care,
administration... and education.
As one of the elements of a smart city, helping the city to develop sustainably, smart
education from IBM’s point of view has eight essential contents (IBM, 2010) as illustrated in
the figure below:
Figure 1. IBM Smart Education Framework (Author’s compilation)
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1.2. Smart University

Smart University (SmU) is a new concept that quickly attracted the attention of many
researchers. Tikhomirov (2015) introduced SmU as a concept related to the comprehensive
modernization of all educational processes. When researching the application of artificial
intelligence in universities, Hayikader et al. (2015) stated that a SmU is a university that uses
technologies that can increase knowledge management efficiency. Most recently, when
researching the orientation of deploying new technologies in universities, Rico-Bautista et al.
(2021) also emphasized that SmU is an emerging concept closely associated with intelligent
technologies. In addition, Rico-Bautisca also emphasizes that organizations, including
universities, need to incorporate innovative technologies to take advantage of the ability of
intelligent technologies to transform university processes towards new organizational models.
SmU focuses on improving technology infrastructure to achieve quality educational goals. The
above statements show that SmU combines innovative concepts, ingenious technologies, and a
modern engineering foundation.
Therefore, which characteristics, functions should a university have, and what fundamental
factors should a university be based on to be considered a SmU? Those contents will be
presented in the section below.
1.3. Features and components of a Smart University
Smart universities have six characteristics: adaptation, sensing, inferring, self-learning,
anticipation, self-optimization, or restructuring (Uskov et al., 2016). They are also considered as
the six brilliant levels arranged from low to high of the smart university. However, upon careful
consideration and analysis, it can be seen that the first (adaptation) and last (optimization) levels
are the first and last points when executing any cycle.
In a study on Knowledge Management as the foundation of Smart University, Owoc &
Marciniak (2013) showed that the essential components of a smart university include five
determinants of university function: 1) human and socio-financial resources (called smart
people), 2) existing physical infrastructure (called smart buildings), 3) integrated information
infrastructure (called knowledge grids), 4) strategic decision-making processes (called smart
governance) and 5) aspects related to environmental protection (called smart environments).
The key to this approach to managing an organization is that it must be seen as a whole, a single
agency. Therefore, intelligent university decision-makers must know that making certain
investments in a particular sector might have mutual effects. Moreover, it is essential to control
all parts of the university synchronously by using readily available information solutions that
enable knowledge consolidation and effective management.
Figure 2. Components of smart university (Owoc & Marciniak, 2013)
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According to Owoc & Marciniak (2013), intelligent universities should have complex
interactions (called holistic contacts), including intelligent management of resources, equipment
and utilities, allowing to assign location of those in real-time using the ICT infrastructure.
Secondly, smart universities should be fully integrated (referred to as full integration), assuming
that the underlying scheme of the university’s heterogeneous data support system infrastructure
is fully integrated with each other. Thirdly, they should incorporate innovation promotion
(referred to as innovation promotion), includes all university activities primarily intended for
public facilities inside and outside the school to disseminate the use of new university
technology as a way to ensure the development of the university, as well as the region. Fourthly,
smart universities need to promote teamwork (so-called collaborative choice), based on
intelligent infrastructure, critical systems and collaborative users – university staff, both
administrative and scientific, will help improve university efficiency.
The vigorous development of technologies in the current era, along with new research in
the field of education and related industries, allows us to affirm that, in order to be able to
deploy and realize the six levels above of intelligence, a smart university needs to have the
support of other “smart” components. To provide an overview of the components of a brilliant
school with the characteristics of a smart system, and at the same time to support educational
researchers, administrators, system developers to identify specific tasks when planning to build
a smart university, Uskov et al. (2018) developed a relationship matrix between components and
characteristics of a smart university (see Table 1).
Table 1. Relationship matrix between components and features of a smart university
Smart University Smart University smartness levels
components Adaptation Sensing Inferring Self-learning Anticipation Self-optimization
SmU_Software
SmU_Hardware
SmU_Technology
SmU_Classrooms
SmU_Pedagogy
SmU_Curriculum
SmU_Stakeholders
SmU_Ressources
The above relationship matrix clearly shows that there should be a correspondence between
a component of a smart university and the level of intelligence that the school wants to achieve
(Table 1). It will help designers and developers of intelligent universities understand the
correspondence between the implementation of a system of hardware, software, technology, or a
specific pedagogical strategy and the level of intelligence of the university. That is also an
aspect of evaluating an intelligent school. Therefore, we also clearly see that to develop a Smart
School, the technology platforms, equipment, and accompanying software systems are an
indispensable component, which needs to be evaluated in detail to build application scenarios
suitable for each training institution, considering the desired result level of intelligence.
1.4. Smart university model & V-SMARTH
The Evaluation of the revolution in the classroom under the impact of smart education,
UNESCO (2019) focuses around a case study in Korea and points out that the characteristics of
smart universities in Korea include five essential components: 1) Self-directed: the role of the
student (Knowledge Creator) changes from knowledge receiver to primary knowledge producer,
teacher’s role changes from knowledge transmitter to the facilitator (mentor). Furthermore,
intellectual characteristics in learning activities are represented by self-directed learning
methods through an online diagnosis of academic achievement and prescription; 2) Motivated:
orientation towards experience is at the heart of the teaching process, which emphasizes
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teaching/learning methods that can reorganize knowledge by experience, transcending the topic-
based approach adopted by formalization. The problem-solving orientation aims to foster
creative problem-solving skills and process-based personal judgment; 3) Adaptive:
enhancements on the flexibility of the education system and implements customized learning
tied to personal interests and future careers; personalization, schools evolve from where
knowledge is transmitted to spaces that provide personalized learning to promote students’
abilities and aptitudes; 4) Resource enriched: rich content is developed by public, private sectors
and individuals based on cloud education services for student learning. Social networks jointly
use internal and external learning resources through collective intelligence and social learning to
extend collaborative learning; 5) Technology Embedded: allow students to learn anytime,
anywhere, through information technology and provide an educational environment in which
learners can choose different teaching methods.
Based on the Korean smart-university model, Nguyen Huu Duc et al. (2020) built an
intelligent university model for Vietnam, V-SMARTH, with six essential components: digital
resources, accessible learning materials, virtual teaching-learning environment, unique learning
needs, interactive teaching-learning methods, and digital infrastructure. These elements
converge in three pillars: digitization, digital technology-based teaching-learning model, and
comprehensive digital transformation of the system. The advantage of the V-SMARTH model is
that it lists and interprets the system and structure of SmU from the point of view of the
learner’s experience of enjoying the advancement of technology and emphasizing demand-
driven responsiveness and cooperative studying. However, compared with the proposed Korean
model, V-SMARTH lacks emphasis on the role of learners as content creators. The relationship
between the elements of the V-SMARTH model is modeled as follows:
Figure 3. V-SMARTH Smart University model (Nguyen et al., 2020)

Exploration of the current status of research on intelligent schools in Vietnam shows that,
except for some studies focusing on the definition and characteristics of smart schools at the
primary and secondary level (Vu, 2018; Nguyen & Tran, 2020), the V-SMARTH model is
considered the first smart-university model to be proposed following the context of higher
education in Vietnam.
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2. Methodology
As mentioned above, the smart university (SmU) is a learning environment supported by
technology to adapt and provide appropriate support at the right time based on students’
individual needs. The technologies oriented for building SmU (referred to as smart technology)
are based on the inheritance of the achievements of basic technology. Therefore, the first goal of
this study is to assess the status of essential technology use in the university: facilities, ICT
applications for teaching and learning are equipped in the university, their role in the progress of
studying and researching of students, how to exploit and use technology. The next goal of this
article is to assess the status of the use of smart technology in the university: students’ opinion
on what is an innovative technology, the smart technologies have been equipped in the
university, the level of use and the quality of smart technologies, suggestions of students for the
equipment and use of smart technology to improve the quality of teaching, learning, and
researching. Based on studying an overview of the SmU and surveying the current status of
technology use in the university, we will discuss and propose steps to build the SmU at Hanoi
University of Science & Technology (HUST) with a model which is suitable with the reality of
higher education in Vietnam.
2.1. Procedures and participants
In December 2020, we surveyed students of many different faculties in HUST. They
participate in a soft skill course which was taught in the form of blended learning. 1157 students
ranging from first-year to sixth-year belonging to many different majors have answered the
survey. Data was collected online via google drive. All answers in the default style, with more
than 5 consecutive similar answers will be discarded. A total of 1082 responded to the survey in
which the rate of students in 1st year is 12.8% (138 students), 2nd year is 18.0% (195 students),
3rd year is 42.5% (460 students), 4th year is 20.7% (224 students), 5th year is 5.3% (57
students), 6th year is 0.7% (8 students), the proportion of female students is 29.3% (317
students), male students are 70.7% (765 students), with the age ranges from 19 to 24, average
20.90 years.
In addition to the survey including closed-ended questions concluding many students, we
also conducted a survey that consisted of open-ended questions for a small number of students
to understand better their experience on using technology. Thereby the survey explored their
awareness of intelligent technology and took student suggestions on the equipment and use of
smart technology to improve the quality of training and research. Forty-eight students from the
second year to the sixth year of different majors have answered the survey. In which, the rate of
2nd-year students is 16.7% (8 students), 3rd-year is 43.8% (21 students), 4th-year is 27.1% (13
students), 5th-year is 8.3% (4 students), 6th-year is 4.2% (2 students), the ratio of female
students is 20.8% (10 students), male students is 79.2% (38 students), with the age ranges from
19 to 24, average 21.35 years.
2.2. Instrument
Survey 1: A survey consisting of close-ended questions, divided into two parts:
A) Survey on the current use of essential technologies, frequency, and quality
– Asking about equipping four facilities and nine information and communication
technology applications for teaching in schools. These items were selected based on essential
technologies for teaching, learning and research in schools. Students are to select the categories
equipped in the school. Selected categories are encoded as 1; those not selected are 0.
– Studying use frequency of facilities and communication technology applications
mentioned in question 1. Students are to select four options: Never (1), Sometimes (2), Often
(3), All the time (4). Unselected categories (encoded as 0 in question 1) will remain the same (stop
receiving evaluation results); therefore, they will still be encoded as 0 in the following questions.
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– Studying service quality of facilities mentioned above and communication technology

applications. Students are to select four options: Bad (1), Adequate (2), Good (3), Great (4).
B) Survey on the current use of intelligent technologies frequency, and quality
– Surveying about equipping five facilities, nine technology applications, six equipment in
smart classrooms/ function rooms, and three digital learning materials. These items were
selected based on SmU main components and main distinctive sub-components that were
described by Uskov et al. (2016). Students are to select the categories equipped in the school.
Selected categories are encoded as 1; those not selected are 0.
– Use frequency of facilities, technology applications, equipment, study materials mentioned in
question 4. Students are to select four options: Never (1), Sometimes (2), Often (3), All the time
(4). Unselected categories (encoded as 0 in question 1) will remain the same (stop receiving
evaluation results); therefore, they will still be encoded as 0 in the following questions.
– Service quality of aforementioned facilities, technology applications, equipment, study
materials. Students are to select four options: Bad (1), Adequate (2), Good (3), Great (4).
After designing, survey 1 was consulted with 5 experts and 5 teachers of the school. All the
opinions obtained were reviewed, edited and tested by the expert team on 15 students of Hanoi
University of Science and Technology.
Survey 2: A survey template consists of 4 open-ended questions for student comments
on the following contents:
– The level of fulfillment of technology which is used in the university;
– Student proposals for equipping and using smart technologies to enhance learning and
researching efficiency.
4. Results
4.1. Status of essential technology use in university
Table 2. Three most fully equipped facilities and information technology applications
and three most lack items
Three most fully equipped items Equip ratio (%) Three most lack items Equip ratio (%)
Multimedia classroom system 95.2 Digital learning material (electronic lectures, teaching 62.1
videos, teaching software, digital simulation)
Portal (website), email system 92.9 Electronic libraries providie domestic and 62.6
international documents, databases for teaching and
scientific researching
Student management software system 90.1 Exam – Review system on the computer 64.3
Three facilities and information technology applications that were most fully equipped
include a Multimedia classroom system with basic audio and screen equipment (projectors,
screens, speakers, micros); Portal (website), email system; Student management software
system (Learning Registration, Learning Results). The three most lacking items include: Digital
learning material (electronic lectures, teaching videos, teaching software, digital simulation);
Electronic libraries providing domestic and international documents, databases for teaching and
scientific researching; Exam – Review system on the computer.
The results of the comparison of the use frequency and service quality of essential
technologies across school years are described in Table 3 below:
Table 3. ANOVA test statistics of the use frequency and quality
of essential technologies across school years
School Use frequency Levene Anova Service quality Levene Anova
Years N Mean Statistic F N Mean Statistic F
1 135 32.09 1.35 3.42* 125 30.95 1.41 4.00**
2 192 28.14 187 26.88
3 449 28.24 447 26.87
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School Use frequency Levene Anova Service quality Levene Anova

Years N Mean Statistic F N Mean Statistic F
4 214 29.00 215 27.69
5 55 30.61 51 30.31
6 8 28.87 8 30.12
As the significance of Test of Homogeneity of variances > .05, there is no variance difference
between groups. The Anova test value F is 3.42 (p < 0.05), so there is a statistically significant
difference in the level of using essential technologies between groups of students classified
by school years. About the quality of the essential technologies, the Anova test value F is 4.00
(p < 0.01), so there is a statistically significant difference in essential technologies quality
between groups of students.
The results of the comparison of the use frequency and service quality of essential
technologies across majors are described in Table 4 below:
Table 4. ANOVA test statistics of the use frequency and quality of essential technologies across majors
Majors Use frequency Levene Welch Service quality Levene Anova
N Mean Statistic Statistic N Mean Statistic F
Mathematics – IT 105 27.95 2.14* 5.22** 107 26.36 1.00 3.98**
Electrical Engineering – Electronics 248 27.49 245 26.27
Chemical Engineering – Biotechnology 185 31.52 172 30.34
Mechanical Engineering – Textiles 315 29.49 310 28.35
Physics-Heat Engineering and Refrigeration 47 26.85 47 25.42
Ecnonomics – Foreign Languages –
150 28.64 150 27.40
Engineering Pedagogy
As the significance of Test of Homogeneity of variances < .05, the variance between groups
is not equal. The Welch Statistic value is 5.52 (p < 0.01), so there is a statistically significant
difference in the level of using essential technologies between groups of students classified by
majors. About the service quality of essential technologies, the significance of Test of
Homogeneity of variances > .05 so there is no variance difference between groups. The Anova
test value F is 3.98 (p < 0.01), so there is a statistically significant difference in service quality
of essential technologies between groups of students.
To better understand the current level of exploitation and use of technology, we asked
students if technology has met their needs.
The level of fulfillment of technology which is used in the university
Among the 48 students answering open-ended questions, 14 students are satisfied with the
current level of using technology, 19 students believe that the current use of technologies in
university does not meet their needs. We summarize shortcomings in the current exploitation
and use of the technology of the university as follows:
Many opinions assume that the equipment and machinery in the university’s laboratories
are too backward, old, and regularly damaged that making the efficiency is not high, cause
difficulty for students, for example:
– Most students are allowed to use “classic” devices to learn theory, almost impossible to
experience the new ones.
– The machinery of several laboratory courses cannot be used for a whole semester.
Teachers give data as homework.
– Many projectors are dim, and large lecture halls make it more difficult to follow lectures
in some positions.
Some students say that “the Internet is unstable, so technology accessing is also partly
restricted”, “some subjects have little online learning material”, “the computer test has not met
demand and does not have an optimal method yet”.
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4.2. Status of smart technology use in university

Table 5. Three most fully equipped innovative technologies and three most lack items
Equip Equip
Three most fully equipped items Three most lack items
ratio (%) ratio (%)
Digital lessons/study materials developed by school 86.9 Augmented and virtual reality technology 16.4
faculty for online courses, blended learning.
Ceiling-mounted projectors (in some cases, 3D 78.5 High-resolution internet camera system 17.8
projectors) recording classroom activities
Learning materials for smart learning applications 66.5 Smart classroom in-class activities recording 20.7
development centers systems
Survey results on smart-university development-oriented technology show technologies
that are rarely equipped in school are augmented and virtual reality technology applications,
systems of high-resolution internet cameras recording classroom activities, smart classroom
in-class activities recording systems. On the contrary, technologies that are most commonly
equipped in school are digital lessons/study material developed by the university for online
courses/blended learning, Ceiling-mounted projectors, study material development centers for
advanced learning applications (online, blended learning, etc.) including studios and professional
post-production processing system.
The results of the comparison of the use frequency and quality of smart technologies across
school years are described in Table 6 below:
Table 6. ANOVA test statistics of the use frequency and quality of smart technologies across school years
School Years Use frequency Levene Statistic Anova Service quality Levene Statistic Anova
N Mean F N Mean F
1 110 31.24 1.61 6.20** 102 34.59 1.43 8.00**
2 176 24.40 162 25.08
3 398 23.02 354 23.73
4 200 21.53 180 22.35
5 49 20.65 44 22.97
6 7 25.71 7 27.42
As the significance of Test of Homogeneity of variances > .05, there is no variance
difference between groups. The Anova test value F is 6.20 (p < 0.01), so there is a statistically
significant difference in the level of using smart technologies between 6 groups of students
classified by school years. About the quality of the smart technologies, the Anova test value F is
8.00 (p < 0.01), so there is a statistically significant difference between groups of students.
The results of the comparison of the use frequency and quality of smart technologies across
majors are described in the table below:
Table 7. ANOVA test statistics of the use frequency and quality of smart technologies across majors
Majors Use frequency Levene Anova Service quality Levene Welch
N Mean Statistic F N Mean Statistic Statistic
Mathematics – IT 100 21.34 2.05 3.30** 88 22.38 2.35* 5.34**
Electrical Engineering – Electronics 223 23.53 203 23.50
Chemical Engineering – Biotechnology 150 28.59 137 31.83
Mechanical Engineering – Textiles 283 23.53 260 24.67
Physics – Heat Engineering and Refrigeration 40 23.85 34 26.20
Ecnonomics – Foreign Languages –
141 21.34 125 21.84
Engineering Pedagogy
As the significance of Test of Homogeneity of variances > .05, there is no variance difference
between groups. The Anova test value F is 3.30 (p < 0.01), so there is a statistically significant
difference in the level of using smart technologies between 6 groups of students classified by
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majors. About the quality of the smart technologies, the significance of Test of Homogeneity
of variances < .05, the variance between groups is not equal. The Anova test value F is 5.34
(p < 0.01), so there is a statistically significant difference in service quality of smart
technologies between groups of students.
Student proposals for equipping and using smart technologies to enhance learning
and researching efficiency
When being asked about the proposal with the university in equipping and using smart
technologies to enhance efficiency in learning, researching, and career orientation, students’
opinions can be divided into some groups as follows:
The university needs to continue to invest in equipment and technologies supporting
teaching and training, with the vision to build SmU such as:
– Improve the test on the computer;
– Experiments, experiments’ student list, documents are registered online 100%;
– Use face recognition technology to check participation at university and exams automatically
– Equip smart technologies to monitor and understand the needs as well as desires, aspirations
of students to be able to make appropriate learning suggestions for students;
– In terms of online teaching through MS Teams, teachers need to equip several interactive
support devices such as touch pen to write on boards or slides. In the large lecture halls, it
is necessary to install more cameras, screens for students sitting in the last ranges to get a
better view.
Some students recommend “build open learning data systems-oriented, condensed,
friendly” and “buy databases to help students find learning materials easily”. Some students
suggest that the university should provide additional intelligent services on the university
campus such as an “automatic parking system, vending machines”. In this direction, some of the
students’ comments propose the university “equip many more smart devices to build smart
classes, smart universities”. In addition, some students recommend the university organize “soft
skills courses on using smart technology equipment to help students have knowledge platform
methodically”.
Not only to serve teaching and learning, but some students also want the university to
invest in advanced and modern equipment which are suitable for each industry, help students
get used to future careers, for example:
– Introduce new technologies in each major, and if conditions are favorable, the university
can get students to access to them;
– Equip smart technologies that help to facilitate the understanding as well as clarify future
professions;
– Invest in laboratories with smart technology and has a mechanism to encourage students
to participate.
5. Discussion and recommendation
The results obtained from the survey on the actual use of technology show that:
The essential technologies are relatively fully equipped (Table 2). There was a statistically
significant difference in the level of exploitation and quality of essential technologies for
teaching and research among students across school years and majors. When finding out if the
technology in the school has met the needs of the students, their answers revealed many
inadequacies such as old equipment, broken machinery, unstable internet.
The smart-university development-oriented technologies are still lacking (Table 5), the
level of exploitation and the quality of smart technologies have statistically significant
differences among students across school years and majors. When asked for students’
suggestions for equipping and using smart technology, the comments showed that students
wanted the school to equip more hardware and software technologies for computer-based
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learning and exams on the computer, building open learning systems and providing databases
for learning and research.
Based on the results of surveying the status of using technology and V-SMARTH model
about the SmU in Vietnam by Nguyen Huu Duc et al. (2020), we discuss and make
recommendations to build SmU as follows:
S – Online resources and learning material are the essential elements of the SmU and
online teaching. The survey about the status of technology use on students shows that: Digital
learning materials such as electronic lectures, teaching videos, teaching software, simulating
software, the digital library systems that provide digital learning material, open learning
resources, databases for learning, and scientific research are the most lacking items according to
students’ answer (Table 2). However, the university’s electronic lectures/ electronic materials
for online courses and blended learning courses are equipped quite well and are used quite
often. This result is accurate in comparison with reality at HUST. Courses in mixed forms have
constantly expanded from 2017, especially in the COVID-19 pandemic; more and more lectures
and learning materials are put on the university’s LMS-Moodle learning management system
and are exploited and used regularly by students (Bui Thi Thuy Hang, 2021). Combined with
students’ opinions through open-ended questions, we suggest that universities update and
supplement online and mixed courses. A plan should be set up to buy more databases, invest in
a digital library, digital learning material, provide students with accounts to access databases,
download domestic and international books and scientific articles, supporting learning and
research activities.
M – Open accessibility of digital resources is an important characteristic when
implementing the mission of SmU on flexible training and individualization. If there are rich
resources but not shared, the target of transitioning from traditional universities to SmU cannot
be done. Therefore, available materials, open information, Massive Open Online Courses
(MOOC), open training programs, and mobile content should be shared according to scientific
morality. However, according to the survey results, 65.1% of students said that the university
does not have available materials and MOOCs. Combined with students’ comments, we propose
that information about the course and learning materials be digitized, and students should have
permission to access it anytime, anywhere. At the same time, the university also needs to
supplement available materials, online courses and orient, guide, and encourage students to
access and register.
A – Virtual education environment applying to teaching-learning and testing activities is the
third factor in the V-SMARTH model. For teaching-learning activities to be executed in the
form of a blended (b-SMARTH) or online (remote) (e-SMARTH), it is necessary to have virtual
labs, virtual libraries, and virtual learning devices. However, the surveying results show that
83.6% of students said that the university was not equipped with Virtual Reality, Augmented
Reality applications. 35.7% of students said that the university was not equipped with high-tech
laboratories. Students who were surveyed are from many sectors, many different courses, so
their answers may depend on their industry’s characteristics or the learning experience.
Combining with students’ opinions, we propose that the university should have a strategy to
invest in high-tech laboratories and have policies for students to approach and use regularly, for
example, through the registration of teachers and students.
In particular, for each industry, there should be a mechanism to associate with enterprises in
the same field so that students can learn and become familiar with new technologies, facilitating
adaptation to the fast progress of the occupational world.
Monitoring and testing online are indispensable activities of smart teaching-learning. This
is entirely possible thanks to the smartness of the virtual-learning environment. However, the
results of surveying show that the system of filming/ recording activities in the classroom is
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infrequent, the system of teaching-learning analysis, big data analysis is still lacking (69.7% of
students said that those are not equipped yet), the test-evaluation system on computers is still
lacking. Along with the consultation of the students, we propose that online assessment should
be used more often. The university needs to equip some advanced technologies such as face
identification technology, some anti-fraud tools such as Safe Exam Browser (SEB) to ensure
fairness in the examination so that the online assessment is actively conducted, not just a
measure to deal with the current epidemic situation.
R – Individualization education strengthens the flexibility of the education system and
performs customization according to personal preferences and career orientation. Due to modern
technologies, teaching-learning is not only carried out according to the identified program but
also considers students’ characteristics such as hobby, interest, capacity, orientation...
Therefore, combined with students’ opinions, we propose the university have plans and
strategies for developing analytical technologies to understand the different needs of students,
make proposals for appropriate training programs and learning pathways. Based on the
collection and analysis of students’ data, technologies will analyze to design training programs,
predict student learning results, improve the teaching environment, support the university’s
decisions, and approach students more individualized (Suchithara et al., 2015).
T – The interaction teaching method is one of the outstanding advantages of the SmU due
to advanced technologies. Today, most universities have installed LMS-Moodle learning
management software systems that allow teachers to non-simultaneously interact with students
by uploading academic documentation to Learning Management System (LMS). In parallel with
this system, teaching software such as Zoom, WebEx, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet also
allows teachers and students to interact online simultaneously as in an offline environment
(Chiu et al., 2015). COVID-19 pandemic has caused many schools in the world to close.
According to UNICEF, in 20201, 188 countries must close their schools, affecting 1.5 billion
children and young people. In most universities in the world, online teaching has replaced the
form of learning directly in class. Combined with students’ opinions, we propose the university
create online courses on LMS-Moodle and maintain copyrighted teaching software like
Microsoft Team, Zoom for teaching-learning to take place in the form of synchronization
online.
H – Digital infrastructure is the last factor mentioned in the V-SMARTH model. The
transition from the traditional university model to the SmU is preparing legal infrastructure,
human resource infrastructure, technical infrastructure, data infrastructure, and application
infrastructure. The university needs to develop regulatory, guidelines documents, and sanctions
for digital resources, open access, online training, individualization, sharing culture, and
academic ethics for legal infrastructure. At the same time, it is necessary to pay attention to
digital capacity, digital culture, and sharing culture and plans to train and equip necessary tools
for lecturers, employees, students, and related parties to participate and effectively contribute to
the digital conversion process.
Data is a tool to optimize the process of organizing and managing training activities in the
university. Therefore, the university needs to have policies and plans to turn these data into
useful information, connect data between parts to create greater values (Nguyen et al., 2020).
Digital infrastructure is the foundation to deploy smart pedagogical activities, affecting the
quality and efficiency of training and management of the university. The investment in digital
infrastructure needs to be studied, planned. The university needs to identify and select
investment items to ensure synchronization, quality, efficiency, and sustainability. Smart classrooms,
high-tech laboratories, computers with suitable configurations, stable and high-speed internet
1
https://data.unicef.org/resources/rapid-situation-tracking-covid-19-socioeconomic-impacts-data-viz/
386
connections, teaching and training software systems, training management software systems are
items for the university to be considered to invest in at the earliest time (Vu, 2018).
CONCLUSION
Based on the analysis of the specification model of the SmU, this study surveyed 1,157
students from the first year to the sixth year of HUST. Survey results on the situation of using
technology, the level of fulfillment of technology used in the university, the conception of
students on smart technology in the university have been analyzed based on SmU model
V-SMARTH in the context of Vietnam. The results show that technology factors have met the
basic level of the V-SMARTH model and meet students’ basic requirements. However,
technology exploitation status has some issues that are needed to be adjusted to improve
students’ experience. The experiences of the learners (the number of years in school) and the
group of industries that the students study affect the assessment of the exploitation level and the
quality of technologies. Students’ opinions on the equipment and use of smart technology show
that they were aware of the role and value of smart technology for learning and research in the
university. Based on the status analysis results, the article has suggestions to implement the
V-SMARTH model following the context of HUST.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This research was funded by the Ministry of Education and Training in Viet Nam under
grant Number: CT2020.02.BKA.07
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Korea, Case study by the UNESCO-Fazheng project on best practices in mobile learning.
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About the authors

– Bui Thi Thuy Hang is Associate professor in school of Engineering Pedagogy, Hanoi
University of Science and Technology. The author is also involved in teaching and supervising
graduate students for the Master’s Program in Higher Education Pedagogical Advisor at
University of Poitiers – French. She has done many studies in the fields of students’ learning
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motivation; Teachers’s teaching style, students’ learning style; Vocational education and
training; Higher education in Vietnam and in the world; Smart pedagogy and smart schools.
– Nguyen Hoai Nam is Associate Professor of Education of Hanoi National University of
Education (HNUE). He is working as Vice Dean of the Faculty of Technology Education (FTE),
HNUE. He also works as a visiting lecturer for the Faculty of Primary Education, HNUE. His
research publications in areas related to ICT in education, technology education and STEM
education. Assoc.Prof.Dr. Nam contributes to the graduate education of FTE as a lecturer and
supervisor for Master Thesis and Doctoral Dissertation in Philosophy and Methodology of
– Bui Ngoc Son is a major lecturer in the School of Engineering Pedagogy, Hanoi
University of Science and Technology (HUST), Vietnam. He graduated from the Graduated
from the TU Dresden – Germany with a Msc in Vocational education. His researches focus on
Educational Technology, especially in eLearning, Multimedia Learning, Emerging
Technologies in Teaching and Learning, Digital transformation in Higher Education
Institutions.
– Nguyen Thi Huong Giang is a major lecturer in the School of Engineering Pedagogy,
Hanoi University of Science and Technology (HUST), Vietnam. Graduated from the Hanoi
Education University with a Msc in Vocational education Ph.D. in Educational Science. Her
researches focus on Educational Technology, especially in eLearning, Multimedia Learning,
Emerging Technologies in Teaching and Learning, Digital transformation in Higher Education
Institutions.
– Amrita Kaur is Assistant Professor of Psychology at College of Liberal Arts, Wenzhou-
Kean University, China. She teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses in psychology.
Her primary area of research concerns teaching, learning, and assessment in higher education,
students as partners, learning motivation and engagement, and cross-cultural studies for
learning. In her 22-year teaching career, she has taught in India, Thailand, Malaysia, and China.
She was also the recipient of the ISSOTL 2020 fellowship. She serves as the editorial member
for Scopus indexed journals – Malaysian Journal of Learning and Instruction and International
Journal of Students as Partners.
389
THE STAKEHOLDERS’ ROLES IN ENHANCING

UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS’ EMPLOYABILITY SKILLS
IN VIETNAM
Pham Duc Long*1, Nguyen Thuy Nga2
Abstract: Higher education institutions have constantly been criticized by public commentary for
university graduates’ unemployment in Vietnam. However, higher education institutions will not
successfully cultivate graduates’ work readiness without the engagement of other stakeholders.
The paper summarizes and classifies the stakeholders involved in building and promoting
employability skills for employment opportunities through a desk-top research study. After
revisiting the previous studies, the authors present the roles of five main stakeholders, including
employers, students (undergraduates and alumni), parents, government bodies, and higher
education institutions. Our paper is expected to contribute to the literature review relating to
measurement and assessment in education.
Keywords: higher education institutions, employability skills, stakeholders
INTRODUCTION
Employability is not only concerned with acquiring skills or attaining an official job at the
graduation period but “the ability to find, create and sustain meaningful work across the career
lifespan” (Bennett, 2019). Employment and employability are sometimes mistaken. While
employment is related to getting jobs, employability refers to university graduates’ highly
valued attributes (Bui et al., 2019). It is indicated that employability is one crucial factor
impacting employment opportunities apart from other individual characteristics and external
factors. Although employability cannot assure the perfect opportunity to obtain jobs but is “a
broader concept” and bring about significant references to higher education institutions’
educational quality (T.L. Pham, 2019).
Employability is essential because of four main reasons (L.H.N. Tran, 2019). Firstly,
continuous changes in skill demands in the employment market are made due to quickly
generated tremendous knowledge and newly invented technology at lightning speed. Secondly,
the booming number of higher education institutions (HEIs) has brought more learning
opportunities for many students to get HE degrees, contributing to the superabundance of
graduates. Thirdly, labor-market practical settings are represented by changes in career mobility.
Graduates can shift from one organization or job to another before achieving a stable job
position thanks to accumulating real-life experiences. Lastly, university credentials’ value tends
to be degraded because of natural adjustments in the world of work and practical
implementation of work (L.H.N. Tran, 2019).
Employability skills are, as above, of great importance, and the necessity of a shared view
by stakeholders is also highlighted (Smith et al., 2018). Although “stakeholders” definitions are
still in debate (Fassin, 2009; Miles, 2017), the roles of stakeholders are identified as a “starting
point” (Nwajiuba et al., 2020) to discover university students’ employability skills. To the best
understanding, the paper is expected to draw a general picture of the roles of related parties in
building up employment opportunities for university students through the development of
 Corresponding Author: Pham Duc Long; E-mail Address: longpd@haui.edu.vn

1
1 Hanoi University of Industry

2 VNU-University of Education
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employability skills. All considered, the article attempts to answer the research question “How
are stakeholders’ roles visualized in undergraduate students’ employability?”
CONTENT
1. Research methodology
The literature review is beneficial for synthesizing knowledge, fostering theory
development, and building directions for future research. The literature review is also identified
as “a research methodology” (Snyder, 2019). As a pioneer on operating the literature review
methodology since his initial article in 2005, Torraco (2016) made crucial contributions in
identifying five explicit objectives of the literature review method. The fifth goal of using the
literature review method was, as Torraco (2016) stated, exploited in our paper to address a
“specific research question about a topic” (p. 9). The present article took a literature review
approach that concentrated on summarizing relevant literature to solve its research question.
Furthermore, a thematic paper structure was developed to connect related ideas of
employability. Specifically, the authors searched the previous scholarly publications for review
and classified stakeholders associated with graduates’ work readiness into distinct groups.
As a consequence of digital transformation in education and library domains at startling
speed, academic publications have rapidly transferred to the electronic form with digital object
identifiers. Therefore, in searching materials for review, the authors took advantages of articles
and book chapters that had been published online over the past ten years to catch up with the
state-of-art research. Besides, official reports by the International Labor Organization, World
Economic Forum, OECD, Vietnamese Government, and MOLIA were also chosen to provide
organizational views of missions undertaken by related parties to stimulate employability skills.
According to Paul & Criado (2020), sourcing academic articles or scholarly books for
review is challenging. Thus, selecting relevant papers through keywords is highly encouraged. It
is worth noting that the keywords are easily found in the article titles, paper abstracts, the
writing’s list of keywords or even full article texts. The following keywords were decided to
search for potential academic works for the current paper: graduate employability,
employability skills, graduates, stakeholders, university, higher education, career development,
occupational competencies. The authors are aware that despite considerable efforts in sourcing,
the sought articles in the present paper remained limited. Thus, future studies are recommended
to keep researching with more reports.
2. Stakeholders’ roles
A stakeholder in an organization is interpreted as an individual or group that influences or
is influenced by the target completion for that organization (Freeman, 1984; cited in Caballero
et al., 2015). The stakeholders in different domains are not the same. For example, in business,
the stakeholders of a firm can include customers, communities, employees, suppliers, financiers,
and other stakeholders groups (Jones et al., 2017). Similarly, stakeholders can be classified into
some main groups in higher education (Caballero et al., 2015). The authors categorize the
stakeholders for university students’ employability skills into five categories based on the recent
academic works by Bennett et al., 2017; Clarke, 2018; Nwajiuba et al., 2020; Pham, 2021. The
intellectual abilities supplying group includes HEIs’ governors, administrative staff, and
teaching staff. The second group may involve undergraduates and alumni who get direct
benefits from the first group via the first primary function of HEIs. The next group is employers
who have influential roles in changing the nature of university education. The fourth one is the
students’ parents, which are focal among local community members. The third and fourth
groups are tightened with HEIs in developed countries, but in the developing countries, the
relationships remain relatively loose” (Nwajiuba et al., 2020). The last group is government
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bodies formed by public administration, trade unions, and media agencies. In brief, the present
article focuses on the roles of five stakeholders, including HEIs, employers, students, parents,
and government agencies.
2.1. Higher education institutions
Higher education has three primary missions: teaching, researching, and engaging with the
community (T.L. Tran et al., 2020). The first mission is to provide students with learning
opportunities to boost their higher-order thinking capacity. Higher education has been oriented
towards graduates’ employment opportunities since the accrediting educational quality of higher
education institutions was widely implemented. Accordingly, teaching university students has
recently appeared to serve customers whose feedbacks are highly valued in revising the
universities’ training programs and reconsidering higher education institutions’ operating
efficiency. The second mission which differentiates higher education from other levels of
education is research activities. Research mission first originated in the German universities in
the preindustrial German states (the 1800s), where teaching mission and research mission are
combined (Scott, 2006). Besides teaching and researching, higher education institutions have
their roles in community engagement. The university will focus more on transferring knowledge
and market-oriented teaching activities, which involve community-improving service,
consultancy activities, disseminating knowledge to students and participating in local
communities’ social and economic development (Bennett et al., 2016, T.L. Tran et al., 2020).
Based on the three main missions, higher education institutions can develop the students’
employability skills by mixing them into current curricula, supplying work-integrated learning
(WIL), implementing extra-curricular activities, and providing career development orientation
(T. Pham & Soltani, 2021).
Firstly, employability skills are proposed to mix into the training curricula (Bennett, 2018).
HEIs should be equipped with a broad understanding of employability skills before considering
developing them into their curricular and co-curricular activities. Moreover, HEIs are advised to
select a generic approach for employability development and then adjust it to the students’
needs due to differences in training majors, socio-economic and cultural background.
It is noteworthy that WIL can be implemented online or offline in the shape of field visits to
enterprises and internships. WIL activities can be organized directly (on-campus consulting),
remotely (industry-based projects), or virtually (virtual internships). Furthermore, work-integrated
learning can be actualized in international cooperation programs, including short-term visits or
even long-term exchanges. They are designed to foster language competence and intercultural
competence for undergraduates wishing to work abroad or serve foreign companies after leaving
HEIs (A. Pham, 2017). After each work-integrated learning activity, HEIs should make
considerable efforts to assess the students’ competence development. The assessment reports
should be reported frequently to student management faculties by career consulting divisions or
student affairs departments in universities to help stimulate students’ job readiness. It can be
concluded that WIL activities can supply positive results on how higher HEIs can improve
students’ employability in the labor market (Chan & Yeung, 2021).
Furthermore, extra-curricular activities which are separated from the formal curricula are
shown to be positively associated with developing employability skills in the previous studies in
Malaysia, Taiwan, and the United States (Osman, 2011; Scarinci & Pearce, 2012; Lau et al.,
2014). Extra-curricular activities can contribute to the growth of the students’ employability
skills thanks to promoting better communication skills via volunteering programs or fostering
better awareness of gender differences via gender-based clubs, or increasing independence and
collaborative working skills via non-mandatory internships or field trips. In Vietnam, to enhance
employability skills through extra-curricular activities, five fundamental problems hindering the
undergraduates, as discovered by Tran (2017), should be addressed by HEIs. Firstly, the
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students spent considerable time working part-time jobs, leading to the most substantial
obstacles to participating in fostering employability skills. Secondly, the students admitted to
experiencing the lack of information about extra-curricular activities organized by the Youth
Union and its associate or ability to access their incoming extra-curricular activities but
incapacity to adjust their schedule to participate due to the urgency of the event. Thirdly, the
students perceived that classroom-based activities were more crucial to achieving employment
than extra-curricular activities to sharpen their soft skills and teamwork competencies.
Furthermore, some extra-curricular activities by the Youth Union were too formalistic and did
not focus much on the outcomes, which disregarded the student with their engagement. Finally,
being occupied with the assignment at the end of the semester prevented the students from
participating in extra-curricular activities. Based on Tran’s study findings, higher education
institutions should change students’ beliefs about enhancing their employability skills via extra-
curricular activities. They also need to promote organization skills for the Youth Union leaders
and make good plans for extra-curricular activities organized at convenient times.
Concerning career development orientation, the World Economic Forum report is
noteworthy for HEIs. In the settings of the COVID-19 pandemic having negative economic
impacts on higher education, the top ten employment skills of the future ought to be strictly
considered by HEIs to prepare their graduates in the next five years (World Economic Forum,
2021). They are involved in problem-addressing skills, self-management skills, interpersonal
skills, and technology mastery skills.
2.2. Employers
From employers’ perspective, graduate employability is regarded as the graduates’
behavioral competencies. They would prefer to recruit workplace experience-obtaining
individuals rather than hire academic credential-earning persons without on-the-job learning
experiences. Although employers are likely to favor soft skills which are more utilizable and
generic, including resilience, commitment, communication, and teamwork (L.H.N. Tran, 2019);
HEIs, government, and students seem to put more emphasis on “vocational skills” and “subject
knowledge” (Cheng et al., 2021). This disconnection may explain that graduates’ weak
employability skills are complained about by labor users (Clarke, 2018, Nguyen, 2020). As “a
double-edged sword” (Cheng et al., 2021), employers are expected not only to engage the
students in work experience but also participate in higher education reform by making their
voices of the job market’s demands heard by HEIs.
After three decades of research on the quality of graduates, many projects for developing
graduate employability skills, namely the Tuning project, Assessment of Higher Education
Learning Outcomes, the Dearing Report, and the Mayer report, have been successfully
implemented in Europe, in some OECD countries, in the United Kingdom, and in Australia
respectively (T.L. Tran et al., 2021). Through the above projects, the benefits in the cooperation
between university and enterprise have been shed light. Therefore, employers are continuously
encouraged to familiarize graduates with job-specific skills, employer’s demands, and business
culture (Tholen, 2014; Kalufya & Mwakajinga, 2016) and help them recognize skills mismatch
between on-demand-by-industry skills and graduates’ shaped-at-university skills (Guàrdia et al.,
2021). In short, employers are the influential stakeholder in setting developmental directions for
higher education and creating opportunities for the students to explore their full potentials.
2.3. Parents
Parents are the “first and finest instructors” (Gamariel & Blaise, 2021) for their children.
They indicate that parents are likely to participate in their children’s personal and professional
choices from preschool to working period and marriage.
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Parents’ success in the job is assured of positively influencing their children’s

employability opportunities (T.Q. Tran et al., 2018). The relationship can be explained by the
theory of “dynasty hysteresis” (Bradley, 1991) or intergenerational transfer of occupation. The
study finding by Tran Quang Tuyen et al. indicates that the children whose fathers participated
in manual jobs have a 260% lower probability of selecting skilled manual jobs than those whose
fathers took the non-manual jobs.
Parental expectations can significantly impact their graduates’ choice of study majors and
early career pathways (Leung et al., 2011; Neuenschwander & Hofmann, 2021). Some parents
force their high school sons or daughters to choose training majors hoped to bring about well-
paid and secure jobs. The others persuade graduates to follow the majors and career pathways of
other family members. It is easy to observe that parents financially support their children’s
studies, so they feel to have debts to parental sacrifices and have obligations to compensate their
parents. These debts and feelings urge undergraduates to study hard to get excellent academic
results so that they could quickly find a job and return to repay their parents’ sacrifices.
2.4. Students (undergraduates and graduates)
Students are identified to be “active agents and partners” (Smith et al., 2018) in the process
of cultivating their employability skills. To get the best benefits as investors in higher education,
the students need to be well aware of current world settings, which are shaped by international
markets, unusual immigrants, unfairness in economic development, increasing ethnic and
religious attacks, and constant environmental changes (OECD, 2018). Understanding the severe
labor market can push the students to develop analytical skills to address present problems
innovatively.
When the students enter higher education, their self-reflection assessments are necessary.
Undergraduates are suggested to revise their competencies during schooling time periodically.
Evaluating their competencies at the graduation phase is also gainful to realizing challenges
relating to employment and considering their career pathways ahead of partaking in the
competitive labor market (Tuononen et al., 2019).
Students should approach some solutions to promote employability skills in the best
preparation to gain employment and build a career after graduation. Firstly, they need to try
hard to earn a degree because, in the competitive labor market, good job opportunities are
possibly obtained by higher education degree holders (T. Pham & Soltani, 2021). The students
are still assumed to expose their value via their credentials as long as university knowledge and
skills are easily qualified and assessed in different forms of a specific degree or certificate,
language proficiency, typing, or computer software competence. Besides the enormous efforts
to fulfill the academic learning tasks, the students’ earning part-time jobs can bring considerable
benefits such as interacting with people from different social and professional communities or
enhancing customer service and money management skills. However, the students should
consider selecting part-time jobs that can support their future careers or help them improve their
expertise and skills in their training majors instead of temporary employment with the sole
purpose of financial support.
Higher education institutions are getting mindful of developing work-integrated learning,
internships, and placement programs in their training programs. However, the students have
restricted time and rare opportunities to take practical knowledge and apply their academic
knowledge in workplace situations in such a short period. To actualize the advantages of
internship and placement programs, they are encouraged to carefully seek information about the
locations and activities of enterprises in preparing their field trip.
Alumni are widely accepted as valuable assets of each higher education institution. The
alumni engagement in undergraduate courses would open great chances for students to
cooperate with graduates on informal, peer-to-peer dialogues, providing students with
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challenges and broadening their viewpoints of working life orientation. It is undeniable that
equipping students with professional learning eagerness would prepare them for the design
thinking for their careers. Employability thinking can be directly perceived from this approach
(Bennett, 2019).
2.5. Government bodies
As stated by ILO (2004), cited in International Labor Office (2013), regarding skills
development, there are three primary responsibilities for governments, including “education;
pre-employment training, core skills; training the unemployed and people with special needs.”
In Vietnam, in terms of occupational development for laborers in general, the Ministry of
Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA) is a Government Ministry that performs
national state functions of labor and employment. Circular 56/2015/TT-BLĐTBXH by
MOLISA presents the structure of national occupational skills standards for laborers
nationwide. Accordingly, the laborers need to be equipped with professional, foundational, and
core skills to get them employable. Specifically, professional skills are the necessary
occupational competencies for any laborer to be recognized as a skilled one at a particular level.
Foundational skills are competencies accumulated to work in a specific industry. Core skills or
generic skills refer to general competencies which are not specific to a profession or a job
(MOLISA, 2015).
Regarding pre-employment training, a national decision No.1665/QĐ-TTg was issued on
October 30th, 2017, on supporting higher education and vocational education students with
innovative ideas to start their businesses. The general objective of project No.1665, which is to
help students form their business plans, is seen as a practical solution to bring start-up training
support opportunities for undergraduates to actualize their career objectives (The Prime
Minister, 2017). The students’ potential projects at HEIs have been selected to demonstrate in
the competitions of “SV-Startup”. Some good projects have been nurtured to go into practice
over the past four years.
Furthermore, for higher education in specific, the Ministry of Education and Training
released Circular 12/2017/TT-BGDĐT dated May 19th, 2017. The Circular on university
accreditation cover 25 criteria, fulfillment procedures, and quality management in higher
education in response to public concerns about the quality of Vietnamese higher education,
which is often criticized as a critical factor for graduate unemployment (T.L. Pham, 2019).
It is noticeable that member countries of the European Commission have collaborated
towards obtaining “a collective 82% employability rates by 2020” (Borah et al., 2021). Likewise,
Vietnamese provinces can be assigned a priory to develop employability skills for university
graduates after Prime Minster issued the strategy to foster the labor market to 2030.
CONCLUSION
In summary, the employment issue of university leavers is always under social concerns.
However, helping the graduates achieve jobs and succeed in their careers does not merely
depend on higher education institutions. It is time to identify stakeholders’ missions for
improving national human resource quality for socio-economic development (The National
Assembly, 2013). After reviewing the previous studies, the authors identify five critical
stakeholders regarding fostering employability skills for undergraduate students.
The papers also have some limitations. Firstly, by employing the desktop-research method,
the report aims at summarizing the prior studies. Future academic works could be implemented
by measuring the effects of the stakeholders on employability skills advancement at specific
HEIs in Vietnam. Secondly, stakeholders’ roles for employability enhancement can be
separately investigated in a particular training major to gain insights into the quality of
university graduates.
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About the authors
– Assoc. Professor Nguyen Thuy Nga, a lecturer of Quality Management Faculty,
VNU-University of Education, has been working in the education field for more than 20 years.
Her research interests are blended learning, language contact, and quality management.
– Pham Duc Long is a Ph.D. student at VNU-University of Education. His research
interests include university and enterprise partnership, employability development, and quality
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force’s peak vocational skills.
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UNIVERSITY LECTURERS’ COMPETENCE FOR THE USE

OF ICT IN TEACHING: THE CASE OF TRADE UNION UNIVERSITY
Bui Thi Bich Thuan*1
Abstract: The paper aims to explore the situation of Information and Communication
Technology (ICT) use in teaching at Trade Union University, thereby assessing some advantages,
challenges and solutions for enhancing lecturers’ competency to apply them effectively in the
classrooms. In the context of the Industrial Revolution 4.0, ICT strongly affects all areas of social
life, including higher education. Innovating teaching methods requires each lecturer to have a
competence to apply modern teaching media and information technology, which has opened up
great prospects in the innovation of teaching methods and forms. A total of 96 lecturers from 10
Faculties and 4 Departments at Trade Union University have been selected randomly to complete
this quantitative study survey. The article demonstrates the important role of the application of IT
in teaching through the study of standards and criteria, analyzing the current situation and
offering some solutions to improve the competency of applying IT in teaching.
Keywords: innovation of teaching methods, ICT, ICT application competence
INTRODUCTION
The application of ICT in education is an innovative direction that many researchers and
pedagogues are particularly interested in. The application of ICT has been taking place quite
popular in all academic disciplines and levels, especially in universities. Information technology
will be a practical tool to activate the operations of the students in the class lessons, develop
self-learning, self-research.
Intelligent teaching is a concept that has been mentioned since the early years of the 21st
century and is increasingly being researched and developed under diverse models, which
emphasize the transition from traditional teaching to a new teaching method new ways. The use
of ICT in teaching, E-learning and B-learning are becaming trends in university education.
When the COVID-19 pandemic is complicated, these methods become even more necessary to
help educational activities take place continuously. The university lecturers who use ICT in
teaching, marking of tests and examinations, supervising students’ learning and research
activities to be effective, they need to acquire an appreciable level of ICT competence.
However, they face many difficulties when using ICT in teaching. The difficulties identified
concerning lecturers are of two types: technical, methodological. These technical difficulties
include the lack of resources, the physical infrastructure, and the lack of preparation, knowledge
of the programmes and software. The methodological difficulties are in keeping with the
permanent updating that is required in order to use these technologies, as owing to the large
number of resources and programmes that continually appear on the market, they do not make
full use of them. These educational trends and difficulties are evident at the Trade Union
University. Therefore, the article chooses the case of Trade Union University to research on the
lecturers’ competence for the use of ICT in teaching.
The article uses both qualitative and quantitative research methods. Qualitative method of
studying documents on the application of ICT in education, innovating teaching methods;
concepts and criteria for assessing lecturers’ ICT application competence. Quantitative method
is carried out by a questionnaire. Through qualitative and quantitative research methods, the
* Corresponding author: Bui Thi Bich Thuan; Email Address: thuanbb@dhcd.edu.vn

1 Trade Union University, Vietnam
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article wants to clarify the concepts, roles and criteria framework for applying ICT in teaching;
Assessing the current status of ICT application competency in teaching of lecturers at Trade
Union University, analyzing advantages and some shortcomings, thereby proposing some
solutions to overcome limitations, developing the ICT application competence of lecturers.
Therefore, the article is divided into four main contents: Theoretical framework of ICT
application competency in teaching, assessment of the current situation, proposal of some
solutions and experiment of a solution.
CONTENT
1. ICT application competence of lecturers in teaching
There are many definitions of competence built on different approaches. Hoang (2015)
manifests that, in the world, the definition of competence is usually in the range of ability,
capacity, but both show two basic characteristics of competency, which is the ability to be
defined manifest through actions and ensure effective operations, good results. Competence is
the combination of thinking, skills, and attitudes that are available or potentially learnable by an
individual or organization to successfully perform a task (DeSeCo, 2002). Competence is the
ability to apply for knowledge, experience, skills, attitudes and passions to act appropriately and
effectively in a variety of life situations (Québec, 2004). According to Gardner (1999):
Competence must be demonstrated through performance that has results and can be measured or
measured. Weinert (2001) states that: Competences are the technical skills acquired or acquired
by an individual to solve specific situations, as well as the readiness of social motivation...and
the competency to use those skills responsible and effective problem-solving in flexible
situations. Denys Tremblay (2002), a French psychologist, defines that: “Competence is the
ability to act, achieve success, and demonstrate progress through the ability to mobilize and
effectively use a variety of positive resources individual’s ability to solve life’s problems”.
According to the Vietnamese dictionary, competence is a psychological and physiological
quality that gives people the ability to complete a certain activity with high quality, or “the
ability to do good work” (Nguyen et al., 1996). Vu et al. (2012) argue that: “Competence is a set
of characteristics or qualities of an individual’s psychology, acting as an internal condition,
facilitating the good performance of a particular type certain activities”. The Vietnam –
Netherlands Higher Education Project (2009) defines that competence as the ability to use
knowledge, skills and attitudes in a real-life situation in an appropriate manner. Competence
represents a combination of professional knowledge, skills and attitudes. Competency
development is the goal of training programs. The Dictionary of Education states: “A capacity,
ability to form or develop that enables a person to achieve success in a physical, intellectual or
occupational activity. Competence is expressed in the ability to perform an activity, perform a
task” (Bui et al., 2001).
Competency groups include: General/core competencies are required for all positions;
Group of professional capacity means the competencies in the professional field, specific to the
job position, the part that the individual needs to be able to take on that job position;
Management competencies are requirements for jobs of a managerial nature, including
planning, organizing, coordinating resources. The ICT application competence in teaching
belongs to the group of professional competencies. The ICT application competence in teaching
is the ability to use technology tools and resources to effectively communicate, create,
disseminate, store and manage information in teaching activities. Technology tools and
resources include technical equipment (computers, projectors, internet, etc.) and computer
software and online applications (Thai & Trinh, 2016). The ICT application competence in
teaching activities includes objective factors and subjective factors belonging to individuals,
which integrate together leading to proficiency in using scientific and technological methods
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and modern technical tools to organize, exploit and effectively use information resources in
teaching activities, ensuring high results for teaching activities (Nguyen, 2010).
Applying for ICT in teaching helps lecturers improve teaching quality, learners better grasp
knowledge. In addition, the ICT also helps learners in searching, learning, updating knowledge
and self-examination, improving the quality. Worldwide research has shown that ICT can lead
to students learning as well as better pedagogical practices. In addition, ICT has the potential in
preparing students for life in the 21st century. Through learning ICT skills, students are ready to
face future challenges based on a proper understanding. Bransford, Brown, and Cocking (2000)
believe that ICT use can help students to develop the competencies needed for current
globalization. This is because ICT can help students to develop their skills, boost up their
motivation and widen their knowledge and information (Grabe & Grabe, 2007; Hussain et al.,
2011). The use of technology in education contributes a lot in the pedagogical aspects in which
the application of ICT will lead to effective learning with the help and supports from ICT
elements and components (Jamieson-Procter et al., 2013). It is right to say that almost all ranges
of subjects’ starts from mathematics, science, languages, arts and humanistic and other major
fields can be learned more effectively through technology-based tools and equipment. In
addition, ICT provides the help and complementary support for both teachers and students
where it affects learning with the help of the computers to serve the purpose of learning aids
(Jorge et al., 2003). Applying ICT in quality assessment and accreditation helps to make the
accreditation work comprehensive, and the inspection results are objective and public. This
creates a motivation for universities to plan to perfect their schools to achieve student outcomes.
To achieve the above purpose, the ICT application competence in teaching plays a very
important role.
In order to develop the ICT application competence in teaching, orientation and motivation
for improving the qualifications of lecturers, it is necessary to have an ICT application
competency framework. In 2008, UNESCO launched the UNESCO ICT Competency
Framework for Teachers. This document was revised and supplemented in 2011, in which the
competency framework addresses six aspects of a teacher’s work: 1) Understanding the role of
ICT in education, 2) Curriculum teaching and assessment, 3) Pedagogical methods, 4) Information
and communication technology tools, 5) Organization and management activities, 6) Fostering
and developing professional competency. Each aspect consists of 3 levels, which are 3 continuous
levels in the process of developing the competence of the teacher.
UNESCO published ICT competency framework for teachers version 3 in 2018 (ICT CFT v3),
it addresses the impacts of recent technological advances on education and learning, such as
Artificial Intelligence (AI), Mobile Technologies, the Internet of Things and Open Educational
Resources, to support the creation of inclusive Knowledge Societies... The ICT CFT provides a
comprehensive set of competencies teachers need to integrate ICT into their professional
practice in order to facilitate students’ achievement of curricular objectives. The UNESCO ICT
CFT framework continues to cover 6 aspects with 3 levels and identifies 18 ICT competencies
to which teachers should aspire and subdivides these into 64 specific objectives. The
competencies range from encouraging teachers to understanding national priorities as identified
in national ICT in Education policies, how ICT can support the curriculum , assessment
strategies, pedagogy, school and class organization, administration as well ongoing professional
development.
In Vietnam, at present, there is no official document on competency standards for ICT
application in teaching for teachers in general and lecturers in universities in particular. In 2014,
the Ministry of Information and Communications issued Circular No. 03/2014/TT-BTTTT
stipulating standards of skills in using information technology, including standards of basic
information technology skills (understanding about information technology, using computers,
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word processing, using spreadsheets, using presentations, basic use of the Internet) and
advanced information technology skills standards including 09 modules. Individuals who meet
the standards of basic information technology skills must meet all of the above requirements.
Individuals who meet the advanced ICT skills standards must meet the basic ICT skills
standards and meet the requirements of at least 03/09 advanced modules.
In 2018, the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) stipulates that the competence to
apply information technology in teaching and scientific research for pedagogical lecturers
includes 3 levels:
Table 1: Description of the level of information technology application capacity development
(MOET, 2018, p.15)
Describe the level of capacity development
Criteria
Pass Rather Good
– Use basic informatics and internet Organize and guide learners and Continuous improvement in the use
for teaching and scientific research colleagues to apply ICT in of ICT to innovate teaching methods,
Application of ICT
– Achieve the required level of teaching and scientific research student guidance, scientific research
information technology and school administration
(Source: Ministry of Education and Training (2018),
Draft Circular on professional standards for pedagogical trainers, p. 15)
On October 7, 2020, MOET issued guidance No. 4003/BGDDT-CNTT on implementing
information technology tasks for the 2020-2021 school year, which emphasized the need to
review and continuously improve training information technology application skills for
teachers, including: Information technology skills specified in Circular No. 03/2014/TT-BTTTT
dated March 11, 2014 of the Ministry of Information and Communications; Skill in exploiting
and effectively using management software in schools; Skills in managing, exploiting and
effectively using industry databases; Skills in building learning materials, exploiting learning
resources, skills in searching for information on the Internet; skills in using presentation
software, e-learning lecture preparation software, online multiple-choice questions, simulation
software, virtual experiments, and teaching software to innovate content and teaching methods
on the class; skills to participate in online teaching activities for students.
Thai & Trinh (2016) build an ICT competency framework for students of Chemistry
pedagogy including 6 component competencies and 12 corresponding indicators, 6 component
competencies including: 1) Competency ability to analyze and evaluate problems of ICT
application in teaching, 2) Ability to use technical means, 3) Competence to apply ICT in the
design and implementation of general chemistry lessons, 4 ) ICT application capacity in testing
and assessing students’ learning outcomes, 5) ICT application capacity in classroom management
and organization, 6) ICT application capacity in professional and teacher training offense.
According to Phan (2020), assessment of information technology use compentence of
lecturers in online teaching includes 10 groups of competencies: understanding of ICT
application policy in teaching; ICT in the development of professional programs and
professions; ICT associated with pedagogy; operating computers, using basic software and ICT
equipment in teaching; ICT in the design and construction of basic digital resources; use
specialized software in developing specific expertise; ICT organizes the implementation and
evaluates the results; ICT in exploitation, use and management of digital resources via computer
networks and the internet; ICT associated with technological equipment elements; ICT
organizes and administers online courses.
With the aim of building an ICT competency framework for lecturers in teaching, in line
with educational practices and laws in Vietnam, and at the same time approaching the general
trend of the world, the author based on the the following grounds: 1. UNESCO ICT competency
framework for teachers version 3 in 2018; 2. Law on Information Technology 2006; 3. Standard
of skills in using IT of the Ministry of Information and Communications; 4. Regulation on ICT
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application in teaching of the Ministry of Education and Training; 5. Some typical research
works on competency frameworks for using ICT of lecturers.
ICT application in teaching is the use of computers, computer software and other ICT
devices in lesson preparation, teaching, testing and assessment, supporting students’ study and
research for professional development. Therefore, the building of a competency framework
must cover general competencies, professional competencies, and administrative and
managerial capabilities. Based on models and standards of technology in education, combined
with activities on the application of ICT in teaching, the author identifies the criteria to be
achieved in the capacity of using ICT of lecturers, specifically: (1) General competencies:
Lecturers must demonstrate a basic understanding of ICT and the ability to use and troubleshoot
ICT devices in teaching; (2) Professional competence: Lecturers must have the capacity to use
ICT to enhance their professional performance and practice, that is, to design and implement
lectures, and to foster professional and pedagogical skills; (3) Management and administration
capacity: Lecturers must know how to apply ICT in testing and evaluating student learning
outcomes and in classroom management and organization.
The process of building a framework for lecturers competence to use ICT in teaching is
considered on the following assumptions: selection of criteria, measurement value and
evaluation of results; addressing the main objectives: Having basic knowledge and skills in
using ICT in line with career goals; Integrate pedagogical knowledge and skills with
technology; Using ICT to store, respond to, and evaluate students learning; Using ICT to
improve communication capacity; Effectively exploit the application of ICT in teaching in
accordance with the digital era. The author proposes to build a competency framework for
applying information technology in teaching, including 6 component competencies
corresponding to 6 technologies what lecturers regularly perform in the teaching process and 19
corresponding criteria.
Table 2: The ICT application competence of lecturers in teaching
No. Ability ingredient Criteria
1. Basic computer knowledge
Understanding of computers and ICT
1 2. Basic ICT knowledge and skills
applications in teaching
3. Updating ICT knowledge
4. Skills in using information technology equipment in organizing teaching
2 Ability to use technical means
activities : computers, projectors, etc.
5. Skills in using software to compile, design lesson plans, and electronic lectures
6. Skills to look up information and materials for teaching
7. Skills to exploit and process information from the Internet for teaching
Competence in applying ICT in lesson 8. Internet skills to update teaching content
3 9. Skills in using simulation software for teaching
design and implementation
10. Skills in using combined teaching software
11. Online teaching skills
12. Skills in using specialized teaching software
13. Skills in applying ICT to create personalized teaching software products
14. ICT application skills when communicating in professional activities
Competence to apply ICT in professional
4 15. Skills to write answers, study guides on forums or share resources and
and pedagogical training
lectures on the website
16. Skills in compiling multiple-choice questions with software
Competence in applying ICT in testing and
5 17. ICT application skills to check students’ learning results
assessing students’ learning results
18. ICT application skills to assess student learning outcomes
Competence in applying ICT in classroom 19. ICT application skills to interact with students before, during and after
6
management and organization teaching activities
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The application of ICT in teaching and learning is a regular process; however, depending
on the stage and teaching task of each lecturer, the lecturer’s ICT application competency
framework must also have certain adjust accordingly. For example, in a face-to-face teaching
environment, lecturers who apply ICT mainly for the purpose of supporting and improving the
quality of their lectures will have a different competency framework than in the online teaching
environment, ICT is no longer just a support, but also a teaching model. In addition, some
competencies are essential for some subjects, but not all subjects, such as using simulation
software to teach, using specialized teaching software, applying ICT to create individual
teaching software products, or some teaching content cannot fully develop all the component
competencies, so lecturers need to have the right choice for each task.
2. The current situation of ICT application competence of lecturers in teaching at
Trade Union University
Trade Union University always focuses on investing in facilities, investing in modern
equipment to serve the application of ICT in management, teaching and scientific research.
With the mission: Training staff for Trade Union organizations and training high quality human
resources for socio-economic development; scientific research on workers, trade unions, labor
relations, occupational safety and hygiene; Participating in the development of policies on
employees, Trade Union University has issued output standards in 2010, 2015 and 2019, which
require students to achieve basic computer knowledge standards, use effectively use office
software and main services of the internet, be able to apply informatics in professional activities.
In order to meet the output standards of students, lecturers must constantly improve their ability
to apply ICT in teaching.
The author studies the current situation of ICT application competence of lecturers in
teaching at Trade Union University by conducting an online survey of 96 lecturers from 10
faculties and 04 departments of the university in many teaching specialties, including 76 women
and 20 men. The lecturers are aged from 22 to 60, of which there are 06 people aged 22-30, 37
people aged 30-39, 44 people aged 40-49 and 09 people aged 50-60. 51% of lecturers have
teaching experience of more than 20 years, 24% of lecturers have teaching years from 10 to 20
years and 25% of lecturers teach less than 10 years.
100% of the school’s lecturers have applied ICT in teaching, of which nearly 92% of the
lecturers answered that they use computers or other electronic means on a regular basis to serve
their teaching work, only 8% of lecturers use it occasionally. In addition to learning and
fostering, the lecturers have a sense of self-study to improve their qualifications, with more than
90% of the lecturers answering: ICT knowledge and skills are acquired on the basis of both
information and knowledge through training, fostering, and self-study. In addition, the author
conducted a survey to survey the level of achievement in IT application competence of lecturers
in teaching at Trade Union University on a scale from 1 to 4, in which (1) not reached, (2)
medium, (3) rather, (4) good. The summary of the survey results are as follows:
Table 3: The level of achievement in ICT application competence of lecturers
in teaching at Trade Union University (Vietnam)
Level of achievement
Criteria (1) (2) (3) (4)
not reached medium rather good
1. Basic computer knowledge 0% 13.5% 52.1% 34.4%
2. Basic ICT knowledge and skills 0% 18.8% 52.1% 29.1%
3. Updating ICT knowledge 0% 19.8% 52.1% 28.1%
4. Skills in using information technology equipment in organizing teaching
0% 12.5% 59.4% 28.1%
activities : computers, projectors, etc.
404
Level of achievement
Criteria (1) (2) (3) (4)
not reached medium rather good
5. Skills in using software to compile, design lesson plans, and electronic lectures 1% 18.8% 56.2% 24%
6. Skills to look up information and materials for teaching 0% 9.4% 46.9% 43.7%
7. Skills to exploit and process information from the Internet for teaching 0% 6.2% 45.8% 48%
8. Internet skills to update teaching content 0% 6.3% 51% 42.7%
9. Skills in using simulation software for teaching 16.7% 34.4% 36.5% 12.4%
10. Skills in using combined teaching software 5.2% 16.7% 55.2% 22.9%
11. Online teaching skills 1% 14.6% 62.5% 21.9%
12. Skills in using specialized teaching software 17.7% 31.3% 39.5% 11.5%
13. Skills in applying ICT to create personalized teaching software products 26% 33.3% 31.3% 9.4%
14. ICT application skills when communicating in professional activities 0% 9.4% 68.8% 21.8%
15. Skills to write answers, study guides on forums or share resources and
4.2% 32.3% 41.7% 21.8%
lectures on the website
16. Skills in compiling multiple-choice questions with software 16.7% 27.1% 45.8% 10.4%
17. ICT application skills to check students’ learning results 13.5% 29.2% 38.5% 18.8%
18. ICT application skills to assess student learning outcomes 13.5% 29.2% 41.7% 15.6%
19. ICT application skills to interact with students before, during and after
1% 19.8% 56.3% 22.9%
teaching activities
Through the summary of the above survey, the author found that the majority of lecturers at
Trade Union University are aware of the important role of ICT application in teaching and have a
sense of improving their qualifications, capacity, ability to apply ICT in teaching, especially basic
skills, in which a part of lecturers has a lot of experience and specialized skills in all standards.
Most of the lecturers achieved a good level in the application of familiar software/
technology tools such as using ICT equipment for teaching; using software for compiling,
designing lesson plans and electronic lectures; look up information and documents; exploit and
use the Internet to update teaching content; applying ICT when communicating in professional
activities; online teaching skills; apply ICT to interact with students before, during and after
teaching activities.
However, the percentage of lecturers who self-assess the average level of skills is still large.
In some skills, many lecturers still have not achieved or reached the average level such as:
compiling multiple-choice questions using software; applying ICT to test and evaluate students’
learning results; write answers, study guides on the forum or share resources and lectures on the
website; use simulation software for teaching; use specialized teaching software; apply ICT to
create personalized teaching software products.
The cause of some of the above limitations is that old teaching methods are difficult to
change in a short time. Some lecturers’ knowledge and skills in ICT are still limited, they are
not enough to be passionate and creative, on the contrary, they sometimes want to avoid it. The
training, retraining and self-improvement of the teaching staff only stops at basic ICT
knowledge, so the lecturers do not have enough knowledge to apply ICT in teaching, they have
to spend a lot of time and effort to effectively apply ICT in teaching, so it is easy to create a
depressed mentality, afraid to explore and apply new things. In addition, the resources for
managing the e-library are still weak and insufficient to serve the study and research work of
students, leading to difficulties in exploiting and processing information to build lectures. The
4th Industrial Revolution has an unprecedented speed of development, and the achievements of
information technology serving the cause of education are continuously created. Lecturers have
not been able to keep up with these changes in a timely manner. Some lecturers are not fully
aware of the important role of ICT application in teaching, have not really invested in research
and improved application capacity.
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3. Some solutions to improve ICT application competence of lecturers in teaching at

Trade Union University
On the basis of assessing the current situation, in order to overcome the remaining
limitations, the author proposes some basic solutions as follows:
Firstly, strengthen the facilities, organize training and foster the competence of ICT
application in teaching for lecturers
Teachers’ readiness and skills in using ICT are playing essential role in the use of ICT in
education (Ghavifekr et al., 2015). Teachers need sufficient ICT skills to implement the
technology and to have high confident level to use it in a classroom setting. Besides, teachers
require insight into the pedagogical role of ICT, in order to use it meaningfully in their
instructional process (Hennessy et al., 2005). According to Winzenried, Dalgarno and Tinkler
(2010) teachers who have gone through ICT course are more effective in teaching by using
technology tools as opposed to those that have no experience in such training.
Therefore, Trade Union University needs to promote propaganda for lecturers to clearly see
the effectiveness and indispensable requirements of the application of ICT in teaching
innovation. At the same time, the school should regularly organize training sessions, refresher
courses on computer skills and teaching support software for teachers. The training courses are
organized in the form of mutual help and exchange, focusing mainly on the above basic to
advanced skills that teachers need to use in the teaching process. Reporters can be information
technology experts inside or outside the University.
The Trade Union University needs to orient the lecturers to always have a sense of
collecting instructional materials for effective ICT application, the specialized department to
research and select photocopies or email them to the lecturers. Textbooks, lectures, technical
manuals, etc. need to be systematically edited, in order to form a data warehouse ready to meet
the needs of lecturers. Contract with the Department of Informatics to compile documents,
organize training, foster professional skills, and practice ICT application skills. The refresher
courses should be organized according to the lecturer’s wishes to match the lecturer’s work –
teaching plan. It is possible to conduct 3 to 4 courses in a year depending on the survey of the
needs of the lecturers, the content of the training must be disclosed in detail on the University’s
website.
In the two academic years 2019 – 2020 and 2020 – 2021, due to the impact of the Covid-19
epidemic, universities, including Trade Union University, have switched to online teaching.
This is a new form of teaching. The school has invited lecturers of the Department of
Informatics and specialists of the Training Department to organize training sessions for all
lecturers, regularly exchange and support lecturers during the course of teaching. As a result, the
teaching staff have successfully completed their assigned tasks, and their online teaching
competence has been enhanced. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen training sessions on ICT
application for lecturers.
Beyond basic skill training, schools had used a variety of strategies to provide further
professional development for teachers. According to Warwick and Kershner (2008) the
significance and advantages of ICT should be known by teachers in order to conduct a
meaningful lesson with the use of ICT. Indeed, teachers should be sent to attend training courses
to learn about integration ICT in teaching and learning process. A more skillful teacher in ICT
would assist and guide another teacher who has less experience with ICT along the preparation
work for teaching and learning process. There are many factors to enable the use of ICT in
classroom teaching and learning. Begin with policy, follows by the supplement of all the ICT
hardware and software facilities, continued by readiness and skills of teacher to integrate it into
pedagogical process (Agbatogun, 2012). Besides, technical support and continuous professional
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development in ICT should be conducted from time to time. However, each lecturer must
actively self-study, be willing to share, always seek progress, regularly exchange with
colleagues, create a professional learning environment, and active teaching methods. In order to
design lectures so that they are rich, lively, logical, creative, making the most of modern
equipment, each lecturer must have a process of research, self-study and self-improvement
professional qualifications, accumulated experience and really enthusiastic.
In addition, the Trade Union University needs to build an electronic data warehouse to meet
the information exploitation needs of lecturers and students. The library’s electronic learning
center has just been invested, and there aren’t still many electronic textbooks and lectures. The
University’s website has only updated the course outlines, there are no reference sources, so it is
necessary to supplement and exploit the electronic learning materials of the lecturers. The
school also needs to pay more attention to the need to buy teaching software, invest in a
computer room system, to be able to meet the teaching needs and improve the ICT application
capacity of the lecturers.
Secondly, apply ICT in multiple-choice exams and assessing students’ learning results
In the exams, there are two common types of exams: multiple choice and essay. Currently,
the organization of multiple-choice tests or a combination of multiple-choice tests and essays
(short question format) on computers is being used by universities because of the advantage of
saving costs (the school only First-time investment, in the long run, will save costs on paper and
ink, research for exam questions, assessment of exam questions, marking of exams, etc) (Gilbert
et al., 2011; Crews et al.)., 2010; Way, 2012). Multiple-choice exams help test students’ knowledge
more broadly, forcing students to learn actively, not selectively learning the necessary
knowledge to take the test, to grasp a variety of knowledge. At the same time minimize errors
and frauds in the exam, because with the feature of mixing questions from the question bank,
each candidate will have a different code, so it is difficult to copy, look at your work. Exams are
performed on software, displaying results immediately when students submit papers, thus
minimizing interference or errors in teacher grading (Crews et al., 2010; Way, 2012). Applying
ICT to multiple-choice tests helps teachers improve the quality of information exchange and
feedback for students (Crews et al., 2010; Way, 2012) to monitor and evaluate learning
outcomes students and provide analysis through multiple assessments, finding misconceptions,
what is unclear to students and addressing it before the final exam (Ellaway et al., 2008).
On the Internet, there are many online softwares that can be used to create and perform
multiple-choice tests, a combination of multiple-choice and essay (short question form),
including paid and free softwares. To perform effectively, lecturers should use free software
when testing and assessing students in small exercises, exercises to get conditional test scores,
through softwares such as Google Form, Aztest, TestOnline, Mona eLMS, TestPro, Mcmix, etc.
For the final exam, the school needs to buy copyrighted software, with high security and
network safety, and a strong transmission line. Currently, at Trade Union University, students
have taken computer-based multiple-choice exams for a number of modules, mainly foreign
language and informatics courses, and the school has a policy of replication in many modules
and various faculties. The process of organizing multiple-choice exams will help lecturers
improve their ICT application competence in testing and assessing students’ learning outcomes.
Thirdly, exploit some free softwares to improve ICT application skills in teaching
Currently, there is a lot of free softwares for lecturers to apply in teaching, but on the basis
of assessing the current situation, in order to overcome some outstanding problems and improve
the IT application competence of lecturers, the author would like to suggest some of the
following softwares:
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Use Violet software to compose lessons and share lectures: Violet stands for the phrase:
Visual & Online Lesson Editor for Teachers. It is a software tool that helps teachers build their
own computer lectures quickly and effectively. Similar to Powerpoint software, Violet has full
functions used to create lecture content pages such as: allowing input of text data, formulas,
multimedia data files (images, audio, movies, etc.), flash animation, then assemble the data,
arrange the order, align the images, create motion and transform effects, perform user
interactions. Especially for in handling multimedia data, Violet has an advantage over
Powerpoint, such as allowing display and control of Flash files or manipulating the playback of
the movie. In addition, Violet also provides many commonly used standard exercise templates
such as: multiple-choice exercises, crossword exercises, drag and drop exercises, images. Violet
also supports the use of many specialized modules for each subject, helping users to create
professional lecture pages easily such as: 2D/3D graphing, SketchPad drawing, Visio drawing,
circuit design, simulation programming, mind mapping, etc. Violet allows you to choose many
different types of interfaces for lectures, depending on the lesson, subject and the teacher’s
preferences pellets. After editing the lecture, Violet will allow the lecture to be exported into a
folder containing an EXE file or an HTML file that runs independently, meaning that Violet can
still be run on any computer, or uploaded to the server into online lectures for use over the
Internet. Besides, on Violet software, there is a huge online lecture store so that lecturers can
exploit and learn from experience; On the other hand, lecturers can share resources and lectures
on the website by selecting “Put up e-learning lessons”.
Apply Gnomio software to effectively deploy the Blended Learning model and create
personalized teaching software products: Blended Learning is a form of combined training in
learning by connecting between face-to-face training in class and online training, in order to
achieve teaching goals. This model is quite suitable for teaching at university level in the digital
era. Gnomio is a learning management system (Learning Management SystemLMS) that allows
creating courses on the Internet or online learning websites. It is the software that was
introduced in the training program for teachers under the 2020 project of the Ministry of
Education and Training. Some lecturers often use Gnomio as a tool to support teaching –
learning in class such as assigning lessons, transferring documents as well as receiving
assignments from students including images and audio easily. Lecturers only need to register a
domain name at https://www.gnomio.com. Using the Gnomio app, instructors and learners can
simultaneously attach and share documents in a variety of formats, or share free learning
resources by sharing links or downloading data directly, helping students have many resources
for self-study. Instructors can assign assignments at the Assignments tool very easily, and can
also set requirements for completion time for each assignment. Gnomio allows teachers to
create question banks through the Quizzes tool, with a variety of question types such as multiple
choice true false, short answer, paired and fill-in-the-blank questions. Except for the question
that requires a short answer, all other questions are automatically graded and the student’s score
will be updated into the system. Besides, Gnomio also has the function of discussion, forum,
meeting, news announcement, helping lecturers actively accompany students.
4. Experimenting solution: applying ICT in organizing multiple-choice exams for
students to improve the ICT application competence of lecturers in teaching
The basis for the solution: Derived from the advantages of organizing multiple-choice tests
on computers that have been analyzed in the second solution and from the requirements of
teaching innovation, improving the ICT application ccompetence in organizing multiple-choice
exams for students. At the same time, stemming from the practical situation due to the
complicated development of the Covid-19 epidemic, the University requires faculties,
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departments and each lecturer to prepare an online multiple-choice test plan if students cannot
focus on exams at school.
How to perform:
Firstly, during the teaching process, lecturers actively use free softwares to organize online
multiple-choice exams for students. In the academic year 2020 – 2021, the lecturers of the
Department of Foreign Languages, the Department of Informatics, the Faculty of Political
Theory and a number of lecturers in other faculties and departments actively used free softwares
to organize the exam online quiz for students. The lecturer builds a bank of multiple-choice
questions, discusses and agrees with other lecturers in the subject group (at the Faculty of
Political Theory, each module has 5-8 lecturers, but the lecturers unifying common exam
questions for all students in all classes), selecting software, researching how to apply, exchanging
and sharing with colleagues. The lecturers put questions on the software, create multiple-choice
questions and, through the zalo connection, send a link to students, which regulates the time to
take the test, displays the score after the student submits the question answer.
Secondly, the University organizes a multiple-choice exam at the end of the Informatics and
Foreign Language course for students in the school’s computer room. During the 2020-2021,
the University held exams for a number of modules through the intranet software
Testonline.dhcd.edu.vn on the Google Chrome browser. Lecturers teaching the modules actively
build the exam bank, log in to the software, fill in multiple-choice questions (with text and
images) according to the form, pack the question bank into a *.tol file. The Network
Administration Department is in charge of making a list of students by exam room, exam case,
exam date, exam subject, and exam time. After entering the question bank on the server, the
lecturer will issue the exam questions automatically, the system will randomly select the
question bank, creating many different question codes. During the exam, the lecturer calls the
candidate into the room, opens the software, logs into the account with the student code and
password prescribed by the exam board, and asks the candidate to check their personal
information, number questions, questions done and not done, countdown time displayed on the
screen. Instructors supervise candidates through the management function of the admin. After
the candidate submits the test, the score will appear on the screen and on the teacher’s
management list.
Evaluation results: The author evaluated the results based on the survey questionnaires for
96 lecturers, of which 56/96 lecturers (58.3%) actively used free software to organize multiple
choice exams online experience for students. 15/96 lecturers (15.6%) participated in the process
of setting up questions, organized multiple-choice exams at the end of the course on computers,
62/96 lecturers (64.5%) participated in training to consider multiple-choice exams machine. The
lecturers who have organized multiple-choice tests have the ICT application competence in
testing and assessing students’ learning results at a good and good level. In contrast, the
lecturers who have not organized multiple-choice tests self-assessed their results as either
unsatisfactory or average. Thus, this is a solution that should be promoted in the teaching
process at Trade Union University.
Discussion of results: Finding of the study shows a significant influence of lecturers’ level
of ICT competence on their efficacy in in organizing multiple-choice exams for students, the
higher the level of ICT competence of lecturers, the more efficacious they are in their job.
Majority of university lecturers in recent times have realized the importance of ICT in achieving
job efficiency because it allows them to perform their tasks more quickly and thoroughly. They
always have a sense of self-improvement in their ICT competence. However, they face many
difficulties when applying ICT, especially technical difficulties and usage methods. Therefore
this paper therefore recommends that: Management of universities should encourage lecturers to
participate in ICT training programs. Acquisition of ICT skills from such training programs
would help to improve lecturers’ job efficacy and this would lead to high productivity.
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CONCLUSION
Applying ICT in teaching – learning is an inevitable trend of the times. Therefore, ICT
researchers are constantly building and designing increasingly modern software to serve
teaching and learning. However, depending on the teaching conditions, the content of each
lesson, and the specific research object, each lecturer will have a method of applying ICT with
different levels and forms so that it is scientific and effective. The teaching staff with inherent
pedagogical ability and teaching experience, if trained and practiced in ICT, with the investment
and support of the University, are fully capable of designing lectures using technology software
to convey content well, contributing to innovating teaching methods.
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About the author

MSc Bui Thi Bich Thuan is a lecturer at the Faculty of Political Theory, Trade Union
University. Her research interests include Vietnamese history, Ho Chi Minh’s ideology,
teaching methods; economic development policies. She has over 30 research publications on the
guidelines of the Party, the policies of the State, Ho Chi Minh’s ideology, innovation in
teaching methods, etc.
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PROPOSING A PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING ORGANIZATIONAL

PROCEDURES TO FOSTER PROBLEM-SOLVING COMPETENCY
ASSOCIATED WITH STUDENTS’ MAJORS: AN ILLUSTRATIVE
EXAMPLE FOR NURSING MAJORS
Nguyen Thi Thanh Huyen*1, Do Huong Tra2, Tuong Duy Hai2
Abstract: Nowadays, at universities, the learning outcomes in training programs require

students to have the practical knowledge to solve complex problems related to the training field.
In this article, based on literature reviews, we propose problem-based learning organizational
procedures to foster problem-solving competency associated with students’ majors and gives an
illustrative example when teaching some knowledge of Nuclear Physics to Nursing students. The
article’s results help lecturer referral in teaching Physics – Biophysics, other subjects to meet the
learning outcomes, contributing to improving the quality of higher education in Vietnam.
Keywords: problem-solving competency associated with majors, problem-based learning,
Nuclear Physics, Nursing
INTRODUCTION
Along with the country’s deeper international integration, the rapid development of science,
technology, and fierce competition in many fields between countries require education to be
innovative. In essence, the competition between countries today is competition for human
resources and science and technology. Therefore, the general trend of the world when entering
the 21st century is to conduct vital innovation in education.
Educational innovation in Vietnam is an essential job in which higher educational
innovation is fundamental, based on retaining the characteristics of higher education in the
country, and at the same time approaching the general outcomes of the world. Specific
objectives of the fundamental and comprehensive reform of higher education focus on training
highly qualified human resources, fostering talents, developing quality, capacity for self-study,
self-enrichment of knowledge, creativity, and innovation created by learners.
Higher education needs to renovate the structure, requirements, and learning outcomes of
training programs to integrates with the region, with the world, and is suitable to the conditions,
circumstances of Vietnam. The contents must be closely related to the practical requirements of
the chosen majors. Allowing the use of various teaching methods according to the principle of
“taking the learner as the center,” minimizing the teaching load in class so that learners have
time to learn and research on their own. Some authors have researched higher education
innovation in many different fields, published in prestigious domestic and foreign journals and
conferences (Dang & Duong, 2019; Ngo, 2016; Dang & Tang, 2021) or doctoral theses (Dang,
2021; Nguyen, 2014; Nguyen, 2019).
To prepare and maintain a future workforce capable of dealing with these practical
demands, students need to develop important competencies. One of them is problem-solving
competency associated with majors. To foster this competency, higher educators need to
innovate teaching methods and innovate in assessing the teaching process and innovating the
examination and assessment of student’s academic achievements tablets (Keengwe & (ed), 2020).
* Corresponding author: Nguyen Thi Thanh Huyen; Email Address: tinhca0179@gmail.com

1 Ba Ria – Vung Tau University
412
Many different teaching methods have been researched and applied, such as problem-based
learning (PBL).
PBL as a pedagogical strategy appeals to many educators because it offers an instructional
framework that supports active and group learning—premised on the belief that effective
learning occurs when students construct and co-construct ideas through social interactions and
self-directed learning. (Yew & Goh, 2016). Its implementation can vary across institutions and
programs. In general, it can be viewed as an iterative process made up of first, a problem
analysis phase, a period of self-directed learning, and a reporting phase (Schmidt, 1993;
Schmidt & Moust, 2000).
In Vietnam, there are also some studies on PBL for students (Nguyen, 2015; Le, 2021).
However, researchers have not dealt with building PBL organizational procedures to foster
problem-solving competency associated with students’ majors so far. Therefore, this study aims
to propose the PBL organizational procedures to foster the problem-solving competency
associated with students’ majors. The study addresses the following research questions:
– What is the basis for proposing the PBL organizational procedures to foster the problem-
solving competency associated with students’ majors?
– What are the steps in this procedure?
– How to apply the PBL procedures to foster problem-solving skills associated with
Nursing majors?
CONTENT
1.1. Problem-solving competency associated with majors
Problems associated with majors are understood as practical problems contain difficulties
and challenges but not considered, researched, and resolved satisfactorily. Problem-solving
competency is the synthesis of knowledge, skills, attitudes, emotions, and motivations of
learners to solve real-life situations in specific contexts where solutions are not immediately
available instantly.” (OECD, 2013). “Problem solving competency is an individual’s capacity to
engage in cognitive processing to understand and resolve problem situations where a method of
solution is not immediately obvious. It includes the willingness to engage with such situations in
order to achieve one’s potential as a constructive and reflective citizen” (OECD, 2010).
From the definitions of problem-solving competency and the definition of problems
associated with majors, the article defined problem-solving competency associated with the
major is the ability of an individual to rely on the effective mobilization and combination of
internal and external resources to successfully resolve complex situations from professional
life”. Internal resources are students’ knowledge, skills, attitudes, strategies, emotions, morals,
and motivations. External resources can be friends, teachers, experts, or the support of the
community. Structure of problem-solving competency associated with majors is shown in Table 1.
Table 1. Structure of problem-solving competency associated with majors
Elements of competency Behavioral indicator
1. Learn about problem associated with majors 1.1. Learn about the context and problem situations associated with majors
1.2. Find out the problems associated with majors
2. Propose the solutions to problem-solving 2.1. Building a problem tree associated with majors
associated with majors 2.2. Identify the cause can solve
2.3. Build an objective tree to problem-solving associated with majors
2.4. Identify priority objectives
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Elements of competency Behavioral indicator

3. Implement the solutions to problem-solving 3.1. Clarify the way to achieve the objectives
associated with majors 3.2. Implement the solutions to problem-solving associated with majors
3.3. Evaluate and adjust the steps to implement solutions to problem-solving
associated with majors
4. Evaluate problem-solving activities associated with 4.1. Evaluate and adjust problem-solving activities associated with majors
majors, detecting new problems that need to solve 4.2. Find out new problems that need to solve
It can see that problem-solving competency associated with the students’ major will
develop if choosing the correct method of fostering. And PBL is one of the optimal measures
that can help foster problem-solving competency related to their major.
1.2. Problem-based learning (PBL)
In the world, PBL has been studied and applied effectively in practice by famous educators
from countries with advanced education (Hmelo-Silver & Barrows, 2006; Hussain, Mamat,
Salleh, Saat, & Harland, 2007; Savery, 2006). Several authors identified the origins of PBL in
the medical schools at Case Western Reserve University and McMaster University in the 1960s
and 1970s, intending to develop students’ problem-solving abilities in the field of diagnostics.
Clinical diagnosis. There, problems are formulated differently based on disease situations, and
then students will search and discover content in each specific context. PBL has spread to other
Universities in the USA, Canada, Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Sweden, Australia, Spain,
Mexico, and others. It has been successful and replicated not only for the medical profession but
also for many other fields and fields such as architecture, psychology, business, biology,
chemistry, science, law, physics, and engineering.
Some other authors emphasized the more simultaneous development of PBL in Europe,
Australia, and North America and tailored it to the needs of each school, country, and sector, so
it is more different definitions. PBL continues to replicate and popularize worldwide, reflected
in the regular programs of international PBL seminars and conferences, including events in
Lima, Peru (2006), in Singapore (2007), Sao Paulo, Brazil (2010), and many other events such
as fostering, training, training, or establishing projects, groups to support, practice PBL
(Harasym, Tsai, & Munshi, 2013).
Some prestigious universities globally have also established research centers to implement
PBL for their training disciplines and share them directly on the university’s websites, such as
Maastricht University, Ha Lan, McMaster University, Canada; Delaware University, Newark,
USA; Creighton McMaster, USA; Sydney McMaster, Australia. Currently, there is also an
online publishing journal specializing in PBL operating at the Halla/Newcastle PBL Center,
Cheju Halla University in Korea, with many valuable articles in science.
In Vietnam, in the early 80s and 90s, PBL first appeared at Can Tho University when
cooperating with a Dutch project. However, when designing, it mainly focused on creating PBL
in the form of tasks discovery service. In 2004, PBL was officially put into teaching by the
Faculty of Public Health (Hanoi Medical University) to catch up with the general trend of
medical schools in the world. After that, the University of Public Health implemented a pilot
application for six subjects in the master’s program of Public Health and one subject for the
bachelor’s program in the 2007 – 2008 academic year. Up to now, there are quite a few authors
who researched and applied PBL to teaching at different levels and different fields as
Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology (Nguyen, 2015; Phuong et al., 2016), and through
some initial evaluations, many positive results obtained.
414
PBL has different definitions: PBL is a process of using identified problems in a scenario to
improve knowledge and understanding (Wood, 2003); PBL is a process in which individuals are
proactive in identifying their learning needs, setting goals, determining human and material
resources, selecting and implementing appropriate learning strategies and assessment of
learning outcomes (Loyens, Magda, & Rikers, 2008); PBL is an active way of learning that
helps learners better retain knowledge, increases motivation and encourages learners to develop
skills needed for the 21st-century job market (Maastricht University). It can seem that, although
there are different definitions, PBL all have the same goal of forging skills and promoting self-
directed learning of learners. In PBL, the teacher only plays the role of a facilitator, students
self-direct, deciding how to approach the problem and what activities need to carry out to solve
real problems in the field of training.
1.3. Problem-based learning organizational procedures
The procedures of organizing activities in PBL is interested in building and applying by
many researchers and educational institutions, depending on the characteristics of the subject or
majors (IOWA University; Maastricht University). According to Maastricht University, PBL
can be carried out in seven steps, as illustrated in Figure 1.
The process of organizing activities in PBL is also divided into specific stages by some
educational institutions and researchers (Nguyen, 2015; IOWA University; Do, 2012).
According to IOWA University, organizing PBL is divided into three main stages, including:
understand the problem, explore the curriculum, and resolve the problem, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 1. Seven basic steps in PBL Figure 2. Stages in the PBL procedures
(Maastricht University) (IOWA University)
From the above studies, we find that to build a complete PBL organizational procedures,
and it is necessary to have adequate preparation, from analyzing learning outcomes, determining
teaching objectives, and selecting teaching content to match the goals relevant to the major.
Then lecturer designs learning tasks for students and identifies the resources known and
unknown to assist students in the task performance. Next, the lecturer organizes research and
performs functions with students’ participation through individual and group activities. These
activities are associated with component competencies in problem-solving competency related
to the study, and the lecturer organizes the report and evaluation after the students have
completed the task.
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2. Method
The article uses the literature review about PBL, problem-solving competency associated
with majors, and students’ learning outcomes to propose the PBL organizational procedures to
foster the problem-solving competency associated with students’ majors. At the same time, the
article illustrates some of the steps in this procedure when teaching some knowledge of Nuclear
Physics to Nursing students.
3. Result
3.1. Problem-based learning organizational process to foster the problem-solving
competency associated with students’ majors
Based on the above analysis, the article proposes the PBL organizational process into stages
and activities of lecturers and students, as described in Figure 3.
Stage 1. Preparation
Step 1. Learning outcome analysis
Based on the general requirements of the learning outcome that students need to achieve
after graduation, the majors’ learning outcome, and the subjects’ learning outcome to choose
and determine the essential competencies that need fostering for students.
Step 2. Identify teaching objectives
From the learning outcome analysis, the lecturer will determine the teaching objectives to
foster the problem-solving competency associated with students’ majors through PBL.
Step 3. Select learning contents
Based on the teaching content analysis, the lecturer decides which content is appropriate to
help foster the problem-solving competency associated with students’ majors. These contents
must be interdisciplinary to match the complexity of the subject content associated with the
majors.
Step 4. Design learning tasks
From the selected content, the lecturer learns and considers the relationship between subject
knowledge and the majors, learns about current situations, existing problems, or challenges that
the major is facing, and needs professional knowledge learning to solve, thereby designing
learning tasks for students. In addition, the lecturer may also suggest that students write their
situations for the learning task in some contexts.
Step 5. Identify resources
Based on the learning task, the lecturer identifies some available support resources for
students (such as tools, learning equipment, some books, textbooks, reference materials, links to
related websites, design of observation sheets, interviews, rubrics, or learning techniques) to
help students better problem-solving. Some unknown resources include learning plans,
modeling tools, collaboration, support from friends, experts, or the community. In this step,
students can also participate in identifying some resources with the lecturer.
Stage 2. Organizing the tasks research
Step 1. Assign learning tasks to students
From designed learning tasks, lecturer assigns learning tasks to students, guides individual-
group organization and activities, provides available resources to students, exposes students to
relevant learning techniques, and plans real-time.
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Figure 3. Problem-based learning organizational procedures to foster problem-solving

competency associated with students’ majors
Step 2. Organize students for problem research
Activity 1. Learn about the problem associated with majors
From the designed task, the teacher assigns the students to perform. The task content can be
a context or a practical situation of the majors, or it can also be informative from pictures,
photos, videos, websites, thereby giving rise to a need for problem-solving associated with the
majors through some of the following activities:
– Explain and clarify concepts and terms in the situation;
– Ask questions around the situation;
– Give the signs of problems, thereby find out problems that need to solve;
– Analyze the discovered problems through criteria or use the criteria matrix table to
identify the main problem to be solved.
Activity 2. Propose solutions to problem-solving associated with majors
Each student works according to the group’s common progress assignment, works
independently to find solutions, then meets in groups to share and unify views. Group and
individual activities are intertwined until the task is completed. The specific activities are:
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– Build a problem tree: Students identify the cause-effect of the problem and find the root
causes using the five whys technique.
– Identify the causes that can solve: From the proposed causes, the groups analyze each
cause according to the criteria, then agree to choose the reason that matches the requirements
and can be solved.
– Build the objective tree: Based on the cause and effect in the problem tree, give measures
and results of the learning goal by reversing the negative sentences in the problem tree into the
goal tree. Select more new objectives and removing unnecessary and inappropriate ones is
possible, thereby completing the objective tree.
– Identify priority objectives: Students work independently to analyze plans, then meet in
groups to agree on priority objectives to be solved. Support resources are the criteria table to
evaluate the causes and the matrix to decide the optimal solution provided by the lecturer.
Activity 3. Implement solutions to problem-solving associated with majors
The activities to be performed in this step are as follows:
– Determine the way to achieve the objective;
– Implement the solutions to problem-solving associated with majors;
– Evaluate and adjust the steps of implementing the problem-solving solutions associated
with the major.
Activity 4. Evaluate problem-solving associated with majors, find out new problem that
need solving
– Evaluate problem-solving associated with majors;
– Find out new problem that need to be solved.
Stage 3. Organizing the reports – assessments
Step 1. Organizing students for report results – discussion
After completing the problem-solving solution, the groups assign to present their products
and report to the class. Other members ask questions to the reporting group.
Step 2. Organizing students for assessments – Summary
Based on the built-in assessment tools, the lecturer and student conduct personal
assessments and group assessments. At the same time, the lecturer organizes for students to
review the knowledge and skills acquired after the problem-solving process, thereby changing
students’ attitudes and actions by ethical standards and professional ethics and know how to
condemn violations of professional ethics.
3.2. Sample
In the scope of the article, we only illustrate some of the activities in stage 2 of this
procedure when teaching some knowledge of Nuclear Physics to Nursing students.
Step 1. Assign learning tasks to students
Task: Nowadays, radiation therapy is a commonly mentioned method in cancer treatment,
but many patients are still afraid of having radiation therapy. As a future nursing bachelor, what
will you do to make patients feel secure and cooperate in care, treatment?
Step 2. Organize students for problem research
Activity 1. Learn about the problem associated with majors
Learn about the context and problem situations associated with majors
The task led to the need to find out why patients are afraid to have radiation therapy. After
going to practical experience in hospitals with radiation treatment, the groups collected
information from observation sheets, questionnaires, shared data and agreed to list the telltale
signs problem:
– Patients are afraid of complications during and after radiation therapy.
– Patients are worried that if they can stand the pain after radiation therapy.
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– Patients are worried that they and their family members will be radioactive contamination
after radiation therapy.
Find out the problems associated with majors
From the listed signs, students found out the problems:
– The patient is psychologically affected after learning that he has the disease.
– Patients are worried about side effects after radiation therapy.
From the found out the problems, the groups discuss, analyzes and agrees on which
problem are the most important, the most significant impact, and can solve. Students work
independently, give evaluation results and score points according to the criteria, then summarize
the group results and decide to choose the main problem to be solved based on the total score of
the whole group. Students identify the main issue to be solved: Patients worry about side effects
after radiation therapy.
The student stated the main problem in a question: What causes patients to worry about side
effects after radiation therapy? What are the consequences of those causes?
Activity 2. Propose the solutions to problem-solving associated with majors
Build a problem tree associated with majors
Students use the “5 whys” technique to find the exact root causes of problems.
From the identified causes and effects, the groups discuss, arrange the primary and
secondary causes and effects, then represent the contents on the problem tree diagram (Figure 4).
Identify the cause can solve
From the identified causes, the group discusses, analyzes, and agrees on which reasons are
essential and have a significant influence, then fills in the criteria table for evaluating the causes
and the decision matrix for the optimal plan.
Figure 4. Problem tree Figure 5. Objective tree

Source: Author’s compilation
Build an objective tree to problem-solving associated with majors
Students determine the corresponding result and solutions from the causes – consequences
mentioned in the problem tree. They can choose to add new goals, and remove unsuitable ones,
thereby completing the objective tree (Figure 5).
Identify priority objectives
Students work independently to analyze the objectives, then agree on priority goals to be
solved. Support resources are the criteria table to evaluate the causes and the matrix to decide
the optimal solution. From there, students identify priority objectives:
– Objective 1: Help patients understand knowledge about radiation therapy
– Objective 2: Counsel patients on how to minimize side effects after radiation therapy
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Activity 3. Implement the solutions to problem-solving associated with majors

Clarify the way to achieve the objectives
Students make a logical framework to determine how to achieve the objectives. The content
includes: general objectives, specific objectives, outputs, activities, means of verification
(support force, indicators, implementation time) (Table 2).
Implement the solutions to problem-solving associated with majors
From the logical framework matrix, team members based on the assigned tasks to perform.
The group discussed and agreed on the implemented content and presented reports and products.
Table 2: Illustrated table for the logical framework
General Specific objectives Activities Resourses Performance Indicators
objectives time
1. Help Help the patient understand State the concept of radiation therapy
patients the concept of radiation Explain when to use radiation therapy
understand therapy
knowledge Help the patient understand Describe the purpose of radiotherapy
about the purposes of radiation Explain the choice for each purpose
radiation therapy
therapy Help the patient understand Identify radiotherapy methods
the methods of radiation Describe the procedure for performing
therapy radiotherapy
2. Counseling Help the patient understand Indicate the symptoms appearing in
patients on the symptoms of side effects patients after radiation therapy in some
how to after radiation therapy diseases
minimize side Help the patient understand Identify the causes of symptoms
effects after the causes of symptoms Identify the consequences of symptoms
radiation Help the patient cope with Proposing solutions to deal with side
therapy side effects after radiation effects in patients
therapy Guidance on steps to take to deal with
side effects in patients
4. Discussion
This research proposed PBL organizational procedures to foster the problem-solving
competency associated with students’ majors and gave an illustrative example in applying the
PBL process to teaching Physics Nuclear for Nursing students.
Research results show that when lecturers want to propose a specific teaching process, they
must first pay attention to the learning outcomes in the current training programs. Based on the
analysis of the learning outcomes, the new lecturers can determine the learning outcomes in
subjects, teaching objectives, learning content, methods, resources to support learning. They
have organized an organization for students to research issues related to their majors. However,
when the training program changes to suit the general trend of higher education, lecturers must
also redefine teaching objectives in this procedure.
This study only stops at the proposal, so the reliability and validity of the procedure have
not been verified. Therefore, the following research direction of the topic is to check the
procedure’s reliability by consulting experts and check the validity by pedagogical experiment.
CONCLUSION
To bring Vietnamese higher education deeper into the international environment, then
necessary to make a complete change, both in methods, teaching means, forms of examination,
and assessment, towards the development of competency for students. The article had proposed
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a PBL organizational process to foster students’ problem-solving competency associated with

students’ majors consisting of 3 stages and 9 steps and gave an illustrative example when
teaching some knowledge of Nuclear Physics to Nursing students. The results are documents for
teachers to refer to in organizing learning activities to foster problem-solving competency
associated with students’ majors in different training fields. At the same time, it creates
favorable conditions for students to have the opportunity to practice competency according to
the requirements of the learning outcome.
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Abouth the authors

– MSc. Nguyen Thi Thanh Huyen is a lecturer in Physics of Ba Ria – Vung Tau
University (BVU). She has 16 years of teaching experience at the university, and currently,
Deputy Head of Mathematics – Physics Department at BVU, and a are Ph.D. student in Theory
and Teaching Methodology Department of Physics, Hanoi National University of Education.
Her research interests include students’ learning strategies, general competencies, modern
teaching methods for technical students. She has some works published in domestic magazines
and university-level scientific research projects.
– Prof. Dr. Do Huong Tra works in the field of training future teachers in the physical
sciences. She has many publications in the fields of physics education, the training of
pre-service teachers, educational innovation at universities, colleges, and high schools. As a
professor of the specialized Theory and Methods of Teaching Physics, she directed 13 Ph.D.
students to successfully defend a doctoral thesis. Her current areas of research include: Organize
cognitive activities to achieve the goal of developing the competency of learners in high school
and university; Develop competences assessment tools (especially scientific competences and
physics competencies); Organize cognitive activities to achieve the educational goals of
sustainable development; ...She is currently a member of the editorial board of the Journal of
Education of the Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam and the Scientific Journal of
Vinh University, Scientific Journal of Thai Nguyen University and Scientific Journal of Hanoi
National University of Education.
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– Dr. Tuong Duy Hai is a didactician of the physical sciences of HNUE. His research
focuses on environmental education, education for sustainable development, career guidance
education, student learning strategy, curriculum development, student skills assessment,
pre-service and in-service training of teachers, etc. His publication contains 88 works including
50 books and 38 articles in various languages such as Vietnamese, English, and French. These
publications concern the results of research on teacher training, didactics of physical sciences,
student learning strategies, theoretical bases of experiential learning, STEM education,
development education sustainable education, environmental education, vocational guidance
education, etc.
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USING MODEL OF BLENDED LEARNING IN VIETNAMESE

UNIVERSITIES OF EDUCATION – DIFFICULTIES
FROM PERSPECTIVE OF LECTURERS AND LEARNERS
Tieu Thi My Hong*1
Abstract: In current context, achievements in information technology have led to considerable

development, eradicated every hard borderline between classes. That results in benefits for
learning in different spaces and time periods. The model of blended learning was started, thanks
to these achievements. For the past few years, in Vietnam, the model of blended learning has
been concerned by a large number of researchers and especially, the model has been popularly
utilized during the global COVID-19 pandemic. In the changeable context, blended learning is the
way to ensure sustainable development of Vietnamese education. However, it is challenging to
apply this model at Vietnamese universities of education for both teachers and learners. Basing
on personal observation and experience, survey questionnaire in line with comprehensive
analysis and synthesis, the research is going to reveal challenges that lecturers and students at
Vietnamese universities of education encounter in applying the model of blended learning. They
may include capability of technology access, positivity, autonomy, increase in the number of
duties at the beginning stage of transforming forms of teaching (for lecturers), result assessment
and so on. These challenges are scientific basis for the author to note down several suggestions
for educational administrators to raise effectiveness of using the model at Vietnamese
universities of education.
Keywords: blended learning, universities of education, difficulties
INTRODUCTION
The development of internet in line with popular apps on smart electronic equipment has
become the critical tool that facilitates people to connect and interact together from any place
worldwide. In education, that fact leads to an opportunity to develop and extent numerous new
forms of teaching and learning including blended learning. This model of teaching and learning
has recently appeared for the past 15 years (King, 2016). A number of studies show that blended
learning in university training has been a trend. In 2004, 45.9% of educational institutions in the
USA utilized blended learning (Allen et al., 2007) and this trend is still increasing here. The
training model of blended learning is also popularly applied at university not only in the USA
but in other countries, as well (López-Pérez et al., 2011; Thai et al., 2017; Boelens et al., 2018).
This model is concerned and has become the trend of teaching and learning in the new context
since numerous research reveals that blended learning brings about positive results in terms of
learners’ awareness (López-Pérez et al., 2011; Graham et al., 2013; Vo et al., 2017), and is less
expensive than traditional classes; it even possesses the potential of cutting down on educational
expenses (Watson, et al., 2010), accessibility, flexibility and effectiveness during reusing
resources (Porter et al., 2014). Humbert & Vignare (2004) conducted a study which showed that
students were keen on the method of blended learning and believed that lecturers provided a
number of strategies and resources when applying the method of blended learning.
A survey carried out by Central University of Florida on nearly one million students’
satisfaction between 2008 and 2011 for the model of blended learning showed that, the
proportion of students who expressed satisfaction of excellent level for blended learning in
* Corresponding Author: Tieu Thi My Hong; E-mail Address: tieu.my.hong@gmail.com

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comparison with the traditional model of teaching and learning or pure online one was
comparatively high (52% compared with 48%). 4% is not a high figure of differentiation;
nevertheless, with a broad scope of survey and a total large number of students, this is
considered a noticeable figure (Moskal et al., 2013).
For the past few years, Vietnamese universities has reinforced the fact of applying the
model of blended learning in training for the appropriateness and usefulness it brings about.
Countless researchers asserted that blended learning is the appropriate form for tertiary teaching
and learning in Vietnam digital era (Vu & Nguyen, 2019) and investigated the model of blended
learning and its forms in teaching and learning at university in the specific condition and context
in Vietnam. Determining that it is necessary to apply blended teaching and learning in current
context, for diverse professional fields, numerous Vietnamese researchers discussed blended
learning in specific fields or with a specific model of blended learning: information systems,
physical, civic education, politic theory... Besides, several studies mentioned difficulties,
challenges towards Vietnamese lecturers and students, generally while using this model of
teaching and learning. Nevertheless, difficulties and challenges in blended learning are not the
major purpose of these studies. Hence, most ideas withdrawn depart from personal observation
and experience without practical survey associated with specific statistics and data analysis.
In the context that COVID-19 pandemic is becoming serious, Vietnamese universities of
education manage to apply and reinforce effectiveness of utilizing blended learning to ensure
sustainable development. However, applying this model is at the initial stage; there witness a
number of difficulties, challenges for both lecturers and students. With the methods of
consulting materials, quantitative research through investigation, survey, data analysis, the paper
is going to clarify difficulties, challenges for both lecturers and students of education university
during applying blended learning. From then, the paper is going to propose a few suggestions
for tackling difficulties while utilizing blended learning at Vietnamese universities of education.
CONTENT
1. An overview of blended learning
Definitions of blended learning
The term blended learning was initially used at the end of 20th century; there appeared a
quantity of definitions of blended learning in the early years of 21st century. Graham (2006)
argued that blended learning was defined as the combination of face-to-face instruction and
computer-mediated instruction. Garrison & Vaughan (2008, p. 5) emphasized the optimization
of students’ activities, “blended learning is the thoughtful fusion of face‐to‐face and online
learning experiences ... fundamentally rethinking the course design to optimize student
engagement”. Picciano (2009, p. 8) focused on planning and value of education, described
the process: definition of blended learning as “courses that integrate online with traditional
face-to-face class activities in a planned, pedagogically valuable manner … where a portion
(institutionally defined) of face-to-face time is replaced by online activity” (p. 8). The
Christensen Institute defined blended learning based on learner rather than instructor
perspective: “blended learning is any time a student learns at least in part at a supervised
brick-and-mortar location away from home and at least in part through online delivery with
some element of student control over time, place, path, and/or pace” (Staker et. al. 2011, p. 3).
Several authors are concerned about the online percentage to determine a blended course. These
authors asserted that at least 30% of the content must be online for a course to be considered
blended or hybrid (Watson et. al. 2010, p. 36). These authors in The International Association
of K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL) defined that “Blended learning is a combination of
face-to-face learning experiences and online learning platforms, content, and tools for
personalizing instruction. True blended learning is a modality to realize a fundamental shift in
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the instructional model toward personalized learning” (Patrick, Kennedy, & Powell 2013, p. 9).
Creating blended courses that combines flexibly online activities and face-to-face classes,
optimizing resources usage to reinforce students’ results so as to handle problems related to the
lectures (Graham, 2013). That is an official model of education that learners partly learn online
with time, location, procedure and process control and partly learn in class (Horn & Staker, 2014).
Based on different approaching ways, most of the studies stated that blended learning is
the model of teaching and learning that combines content, method and ways of organizing
teaching-learning different forms of learning. Departing from approaching the above mentioned
definitions, the author believes that, blended learning is the model of teaching and learning that
combines online teaching and face-to-face teaching with an appropriate proportion in order to
ensure that educational effectiveness obtained is the highest. Blended learning is absolutely not
the physical supplement for the weaknesses of online teaching and learning or the traditional
face-to-face teaching. In fact, that is the model of teaching and learning which is completely
new in terms of quality, changing fundamentally ideas of teaching and learning theories that
have existed up to now.
Level of blended learning
Based on secondary material analysis of journal articles for the past 10 years, since blended
learning appeared as a trend in tertiary teaching and learning, from scientific data basis such as
ACM digital library, ProQuest, Computer database, ScienceDirect, IEEE Xplore and Google
Scholar, Alammary and partners revealed that there are three levels of blended learning:
low-level blended learning (adding several activities in the form of blending with available
traditional face-to-face course); average-level blended learning (substituting a few activities of
the available traditional face-to-face course with online learning); high-level blended learning:
re-designing the whole course in the form of blended learning (Alammary et al, 2014). A study
shows that there are four levels of blended learning: activity level, course level, program level,
or institution level. Activity level blending occurs when a single learning activity combines
face-to-face and computer-mediated components. Course level blending involves a course with
distinct face-to-face and computer-mediated activities. Program level blending is a degree
program that allows or requires both on-campus and online courses. Institution level blending
includes organizational commitment, such as a requirement that all students take at least one
online course to graduate (Halverson et al, 2017).
Classification of blended learning models
The research conducted by Barbour et al (2011) is made use of the most at present. These
models were proposed in 2011 and developed in 2012 with 4 major models: Rotation model
(Station Rotation; Lab Rotation; Flipped Classroom; Individual Rotation), Flex model, A La
Carte Model, Enriched Virtual model. Materials of Intel – learning (2012) introduced six
models of blended learning: (1) Face-to-face model is mainstream; (2) Model of rotation; (3)
Flexible model; (4) Typical blended model; (5) Free blended model; (6) Online model is
mainstream.
Teaching procedure of blended learning
Margie Martin (2003) generalized with three steps: Learning in class for the first time ->
Online learning -> Learning in class for the last time. Ginns & Ellis (2007) proposed the
procedure: Lecture in class => Exchanging, discussing in class=> Individuals or groups learn
online => All the students learn face-to-face to edit learned definitions. Bitzer, Söllner &
Leimeister (2015) proposed the lecture procedure in blended learning more specifically clinging
with determining the roles of teachers and students: start with introducing lesson objectives
(teacher does) => Investigate content (in class) => Know, understand objectives (online) =>
Apply, discuss (in class with teacher) => Teacher (and students) evaluate results.
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Several strengths of utilizing blended learning

Based on previous studies to show strengths and drawbacks of e-learning and face-to-face
learning, countless researchers emphasized that blended learning is the most appropriate and
natural supplement for the teaching and learning process, is the resolution of combining
e-learning and traditional teaching and learning. Blended learning overcomes weaknesses of
face-to-face teaching and learning, e-learning and integrates resources and achievements of
science and technology. Robinson (2004) conducted a study on lecturers’ experience in
designing and teaching a blended course at Brigham Young University, and investigated
feelings of lecturers’ about key benefits of blended learning. Findings showed lecturers’
affirmation for three good points of blended learning: spending time in class more effectively,
increasing contact between students and lecturers, capabilities of meeting personalized needs of
each individual are better. Dziuban, Hartman & Moskal (2004) confirmed that blended learning
was considered as an effective approach of education, in line with socialization of classrooms,
positive and active learning abilities. The fact reinforces contact between students and lecturers,
students and students, students and contents of learning, etc. To respond to the question why to
use blended learning, Born & Graham (2005) listed three reasons: (1) Renovating pedagogical
methods (for example, teaching and learning more effectively, increasing applicability in class),
(2) Reinforcing opportunities and flexibility, (3) Decreasing training expenses.
Assessment on blended learning effectiveness basing on the K-12 model between 2008 –
2016 was revealed in 25 studies. Research findings show that contact skill, learning
achievements and students’ awareness of learning increase when participating in blended
learning. Students also develop skills through utilizing methods of blended learning, such as:
skill of self-adjusting pace and self-directing (Hess, 2017). More specifically, Bonk & Graham
(2006) proposed six reasons to choose designing or using a system of blended learning,
including: 1) pedagogical prosperity; 2) easy access to knowledge; 3) social contact; 4) learners’
autonomy; 5) effective expenses; 6) easy fixing.
From the fact that Vietnamese universities are in the process of applying blended teaching
and learning, based on the confirmation that initially lecturers are going to have numerous
difficulties, spend a lot of time on transforming, Vu & Nguyen (2019) asserted that, time and
workload in class will decrease when lecturers have successfully transformed a few direct, face-
to-face activities in class into self-study, online ones for students, from then, improving
learners’ self-study abilities, encouraging learners’ activeness in searching for knowledge in
advance and receiving teachers’ appropriate response, support (Tieu, 2021).
Some difficulties when applying blended learning
On blended learning, Bonk & Graham (2005) mentioned challenges of blended learning
with six issues: (1) The role of direct contact, (2) Students’ role of selection and self-adjusting,
(3) Model of support and training, (4) Equality between creativity and production, (5) Adapting
with culture, (6) Relation with digital equipment. In terms of difficulties, challenges associated
with level of blended learning, Vaughan (2007) pointed out that, high-level form of blended
learning requires the highest requirements towards teachers when designing courses. Teachers
design a completely new course instead of adjusting the course based on content and traditional
teaching procedure. In order to design the course and teach like this, learners must own good
understanding of technology tools to design lectures, course, test and assess the form of blended
and online learning. Teachers need to develop knowledge of theories and experience of blended
learning to design lectures and the course. Non-stopped investigating tools, technology and
methods of teaching and learning, techniques of new teaching and learning provides teachers
with foundation to design a vivid, attractive and effective course. N. Vaughan (2007) also
emphasized, it may be time-consuming to design and build such course, two to three times more
compared with designing a traditional course. Dahlstrom, Walker & Dziuban (2013) discussed
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the issue of technology and using technology, consider it a large challenge that organizations
face while implementing blended learning at present: Technological challenges are not only
technology to work online (although that is the first crucial step); instead, it is essential to be
concerned about ensuring success of the program by utilizing and supporting the appropriate
forms of technology. It is advised not to make use of technology too much; appropriate forms of
technology should be chosen. It is because if too many forms of technology are proposed,
learners will have troubles of technical issues and content is not cared about much. The study
revealed that difficulties of technical issues can lead to unsuccessfulness in teaching and
learning; learners are unable to adapt in learning with technology.
Considering Vietnam as a typically developing country, material basis and infrastructure
conditions for successful blended learning is widely concerned by a number of journal articles.
Nguyen (2014); Nguyen & Le (2017) all mentioned: infrastructure of Internet connection,
serving of the host computer which is installed the system of learning management, limited
bandwidth or difficulties in accessing the Internet, Internet dropouts, and students’ difficulties in
possessing equipment to access the Internet, etc. all these factors negatively affect applying
blended learning. Besides, that students do not manage their self-study time well influences
effectiveness of learning. What is more, blended learning is still new to Vietnamese students;
hence, students’ inactiveness is such a problem. It is because students are too familiar with the
traditional method of study which is shown in three fundamental characteristics: lack of
activeness, self-discipline and skill of effective time management. For lecturers, difficulties that
Vietnamese lecturers encounter are discussed in several studies (Vu & Nguyen, 2019; Tieu,
2020): designing courses appropriately, effectively; assessing and giving proper feedback to
corresponding learners’ activities; technically supporting learners when necessary, etc.
Therefore, what to memorize is that teachers need to have confidence and literacy with teaching
and learning tools, technology and simultaneously invest more time than the beginning period
when they design appropriate activities for teaching and learning online instead of
face-to-face teaching and learning.
2. Methodology
Data Sources
A questionnaire with 5 point Likert scale was written to allow lecturers, students at
Vietnamese universities of education to express their level of agreeing or disagreeing with
specific assessment of blended learning, and with this scale, lecturers and students self-assess
the level of difficulties that they encounter when applying blended learning in reality.
Within this study, theories of blended learning are utilized as a theoretical framework to
design topics and questions for the questionnaire. The questionnaire was written based on
thorough listening to ideas discussed by numerous other researchers on the same field before it
was used for survey. The questions in the questionnaire are specific, understandable,
measurable, and on three fundamental issues:
– Assessing blended learning basing on the points of view of the two subjects.
– Ability of lecturers, students in using a few softwares of supporting blended teaching and
learning activities.
– Difficulties that lecturers and students encounter during applying the model of blended
learning (from designing lesson plans to organizing teaching and learning activities and testing,
assessing).
All these issues are mentioned to investigate difficulties, challenges that lecturers and
students at Vietnamese universities of education face during blended learning.
Participants
This survey was carried out with the participation of:
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– 209 lecturers of the following universities: Hanoi National University of Education,

Hanoi Pedagogical University 2, Hue Pedagogical University (Hue University), Ho Chi Minh
Pedagogical University and several pedagogical departments belonging to a few universities
that used to be universities of education (Tay Bac University, Vinh University), some
pedagogical departments of polytechnic universities (Can Tho University). The universities
chosen for the survey were because of their local areas in line with geographical location,
economic-social condition. These universities have representatives in the North, in the Middle,
in the South, in mountainous areas and in delta areas; some universities belong to the nation,
some are universities of local areas, some which used to be universities of education are
changed into polytechnic universities.
Years of teaching experience is cared about; 83.8% of the participants have 10-30 years of
working as lecturers. They occupy the majority at the universities and join in the activity of
teaching at university most. The rest are lecturers of less than 10 years’ teaching experience and
more than 30 years’ teaching experience. The figure results in high reliability of the survey. The
authors also care about genders and science fields (that is, natural sciences, social and humanity
sciences, education sciences). At present, in universities of education, the percentage of female
lecturers is higher; within this survey, female lecturers outnumber the male ones. This fact
increases the reliability of the survey findings.
– 479 students from Hanoi National University of Education, Hanoi Pedagogical University
2, Hue Pedagogical University (Hue University), Ho Chi Minh Pedagogical University. Among
them, female students account for 90.6%, 8.8% is the percentage of male students, the rest
(0.6%) belong to another gender. This figure rightly reflects typical gender characteristics at
Vietnamese universities of education currently. The fact reveals that sampling suits with
specific feature of education.
Both lecturers and students who answered the questionnaires worked in different fields:
natural sciences, social sciences and educational sciences.
Data Collection and Analysis
The survey was carried out with two stages: Pilot stage (implemented in Hanoi National
University of Education) with the main purpose of testing preciseness, scientific features,
effectiveness of the questionnaire in collecting adequate and precise data from lecturers and
students of the research issue. In this stage, several questions that were written inappropriately
made lecturers and students encounter difficulties in providing precise information. After that,
the questions were deleted or edited to overcome the limitation. During the two stages,
instructions were given to lecturers and students to assist them precisely comprehend the
questions and instruct them to work with the questionnaires.
After that, the authors officially carried out the survey through Google Form with the
assistance of a few colleagues. For students’ answering the questionnaire, in order to get reliable
responses, the writers gave them some instructions of steps and general introduction about
blended learning. It was obviously confirmed that, students at Vietnamese universities in the
context of COVID-19 pandemic have experienced blended learning; however, not all of them
knew the exact scientific term for sure.
Quantitative data was analysed using SPSS 20.0. Descriptive statistics include frequency
counts and percentage distribution. Firstly, a detailed descriptive analysis of the collected data
was carried out by the author. The analysis indicated means and ranges of scores for the
variables. After that, the descriptive analysis was presented and intensively discussed several
times with other researchers from the same field as the author. In this way, the data were
validated and reliable findings were produced. From then on, discussion on difficulties,
challenges of Vietnamese universities of education was written when implementing blended
learning in current context. Qualitative data were analysed using thematic analysis.
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The Reliability and Validity of the Scale

To conduct an analysis of the correlation of each item for the entire scale, the KMO
coefficient was calculated to ensure the reliability. KMO index and Sig value of < 0.005 show
that the scale is eligible for factor analysis.
To assess the reliability of the toolkit in this study, the research used the method of
assessing the correlation between items in the same measuring domain (internal consistency
methods), using Cronbach’s Alpha correlation model (Cronbach’s Coefficient Alpha). This
model evaluates the reliability of a measurement based on the calculation of the variance of
each item in each scale, the entire measurement, and the correlation of the point of each item
with the points of the remaining items on each scale and of the whole measurement. The
reliability of each sub-scale is considered low if the alpha coefficient is < 0.40. The reliability of
the whole scale is considered low if the alpha coefficient is < 0.60. The results of factor analysis
and Cronchbach Alpha reliability coefficient are from .874 to .952 They show a believable
measurement scale.
3. Results
3.1. Frequency of usage and level of designing lectures with the model of blended teaching
and learning
Frequency of usage
When being asked about frequency of using blended learning, 209 lecturers and 490
students responded and the findings are collected as follows:
Table 1. Statistics of frequency of lecturers’ and students’ using blended learning
Frequency Lecturers (people) Percentage (%) Students (people) Percentage (%)
Usually 19 9.1 81 16.9
Often 77 36.8 242 50.6
Sometimes 76 36.4 125 26.2
Hardly ever 36 17.2 28 5.9
Never 1 0.5 3 0.4
As can be seen from the Table 1, most of the lecturers and students used blended learning.
The number of lecturers who never utilized blended learning merely occupied 0.5%; the
percentage of students: 0,4 %. Few old-aged lecturers of area universities (mainly mountainous
areas) and students with extremely difficult family conditions never used blended learning
because of lack of supporting equipment for attending blended teaching and learning. Majority
of participants said sometimes (36.8% for lecturers, 26.2% for students), often (36.4% for
lecturers, 50.6% for students), the percentage of usually using for lecturers and students are
9.1% and 16.9%, respectively.
Level of designing lectures for blended learning
In terms of level of designing lectures for blended learning, the authors based on the study
conducted by Alammary et al (2014) to determine 3 levels. Giving questionnaires to 209
lecturers, the authors collected the following findings: Low level of blended learning accounted
for 76.1%, average level: 18.2%, and high level: 5.7% (Table 2).
Table 2. Level of designing lectures with the model of blended learning
Level of designing lectures Lecturers (people) Percentage (%)
Low – level blended learning 159 76.1
Average – level blended learning 38 18.2
High – level blended learning 12 5.7
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3.2. Assessment of lecturers and students on blended learning

Hereinafter is assessment on determining strengths of blended learning. There witnessed
coincidence between questionnaire for lecturers and students; there was different assessment on
each subject – lecturers and students to figure out the most precise answers. Lecturers and
students were allowed to choose from 1 (completely disagree) to 5 (completely agree). Here are
the findings:
Table 3. Lecturers’ assessment on blended learning
No Items Mean Std. Deviation Rank
1 Blended learning absolutely suits current context. 3.8517 1.12746 1
2 It is expense-consuming to use the model of blended learning. 3.5215 1.10103 5
3 It saves time and energy to use the model of blended learning for lecturers. 3.1675 1.05871 11
4 Lecturers are active, flexible to build the plan of teaching and learning. 3.6459 1.00909 2
5 Lecturers have advantages to expand the scope of teaching and learning. 3.6124 1.04147 4
6 Lecturers spend time responding to questions related to complicated contents of knowledge. 3.6364 .99122 3
7 Lecturers have advantages to organize learning activities. 3.3541 1.01384 8
8 Lecturers are easy to control organizing learning activities of each student. 3.2249 1.08847 10
9 Lecturers have advantages to test, assess with diverse forms. 3.5072 1.00537 6
10 Lecturers are easy to assist the class, groups in learning activities. 3.4785 .97110 7
11 Lecturers are easy to assist each student in learning procedure. 3.3493 1.00838 9
As can be seen from the Table 3, majority of the lecturers agreed that “Blended learning
absolutely suits current context”, this idea got the highest Mean = 3.8517. It was followed
by the idea “Lecturers are active, flexible to build the plan of teaching and learning” with
Mean = 3.6459; the third rank belonged to the idea “Lecturers spend time responding to
questions related to complicated contents of knowledge” with Mean = 3.6364. As well, most of
the lecturers agreed that “Lecturers have advantages to expand the scope of teaching and
learning” with Mean = 3.6124, “It is expense-consuming to use the model of blended learning”
with Mean = 3.5215. All these ideas absolutely suit nature and strengths of blended learning.
The least of the lecturers agreed that “It saves time and energy to use the model of blended
learning for lecturers” with Mean = 3.1675. The second low Mean belonged to the idea
“Lecturers are easy to control organizing learning activities of each student” with Mean = 3.2249
and the third low Mean was for the idea “Lecturers are easy to assist each student in learning
procedure” with Mean = 3.3493.
Table 4. Lecturers’ assessment on blended learning
No Items Mean Std. Deviation Rank
1 Blended learning absolutely suits current context. 3.5846 1.28585 1
2 It is expense-consuming to use the model of blended learning. 3.4238 1.15256 4
3 It saves time and energy to use the model of blended learning for lecturers. 3.3069 1.18382 6
4 Students easily share, exchange and discuss through the system of blended learning. 3.1754 1.14372 8
Students are able to actively arrange appropriate time for study (actively arrange
5 3.5470 1.26813 2
time watching lecturers’ lecture videos).
Students actively study with their own competency of knowledge (watch the lecture
6 3.5344 1.27018 3
videos many times at appropriate speed).
7 Students promote creativity, activeness, positivity. 3.3090 1.12621 5
8 Students spend a lot of time exchanging and discussing. 3.2589 1.13880 7
9 Students are interested in learning with the model of blended learning. 3.1482 1.12081 9
Findings from students’ responses on blended learning are comparatively similar to
lecturers’ responses (Table 4). Majority of the students agreed that “Blended learning absolutely
suits current context” (Mean = 3.5846). Students’ activeness was also determined “Students are
able to actively arrange appropriate time for study (actively arrange time watching lecturers’
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lecture videos)” with the second highest Mean (Mean =3.5470). The third rank was for the idea
“Students actively study with their own competency of knowledge (watch the lecture videos
many times at appropriate speed)” (Mean = 3.5344). Findings for items 1, 2, 3 showed that
students understood the nature of blended learning, strengths of this model. There was complete
unity in the findings of survey for both lecturers and students when focusing on activeness in
time and appropriate plan suitable with their own competency, conditions during participating in
blended learning. Nevertheless, the item “Students are interested in learning with the model of
blended learning” got the lowest Mean (Mean = 3.1482). The second lowest Mean belonged to
“Students easily share, exchange and discuss through the system of blended learning” with
Mean = 3.1754, the third rank was for the item “Students spend a lot of time exchanging and
discussing” (Mean = 3.2589). Like the finding from lecturers’ questionnaire for item “It saves
time and energy to use the model of blended teaching and learning for lecturers”, it was not
agreed much by students (Mean = 3.3069). This is completely suitable with the fact that
universities of education are applying blended learning, which means that students recognize
lecturers’ difficulties when changing the model of teaching and learning in the current special
context to ensure sustainability of training activities in all contexts.
3.3. Lecturers’ difficulties
Utilizing several softwares to assist blended learning
To carry out blended learning, lecturers consistently have to use several softwares to assist
themselves. Hence, this is also considered one of the difficulties, challenges that lecturers at
Vietnamese universities of education to overcome in the coming time. In order to recognize
lecturers’ difficulties when implementing blended learning, this study carried out a survey on
how well lecturers utilized assisted softwares.
Table 5. Lecturers’ level of literacy in utilizing several softwares to assist blended learning
No Items Number of teachers Mean Std. Deviation Rank
Several softwares for preparing digital lectures (Microsoft
1 209 3.5167 .77890 1
Word, Microsoft PowerPoint, etc.)
Several softwares for preparing e-learning lectures (eXe, LamS,
2 209 2.7225 .78417 6
iSpring Suit, Camtasia, etc.)
Several softwares for multimedia techniques (cutting and
3 209 2.8325 .78795 4
joining video clips, audio files, recording, making videos)
Several softwares for direct interaction (Skype, Hangouts,
4 209 3.3923 .79611 2
Zoom meeting, Facebook, Instagram, Gmail, Yahoo Mail, etc.)
Several softwares for assisting testing and assessment (Google
5 209 3.0191 .84331 3
Forms, Quizzz, iSpring, etc.)
Several softwares for dealing with statistics (Microsoft Excel,
6 209 2.7608 .82636 5
SPSS, etc.)
Findings showed that only 3 over 6 items got more than 3.0, which means that students
used assisted softwares for teaching and learning quite well. Lecturers were most excellent at
“several softwares for preparing digital lectures (Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint, etc.)”
(Mean = 3.5167); it is followed by “several softwares for direct interaction (Skype, Hangouts,
Zoom meeting, Facebook, Instagram, Gmail, Yahoo Mail, etc.)” (Mean = 3.3923); next is
“several assisted softwares for testing and assessment (Google Forms, Quizzz, iSpring, etc.)”
(Mean = 3.0191). Lecturers had most difficulties in using “several softwares for preparing
e-learning lectures” (eXe, LamS, iSpring Suit, Camtasia, etc.)” (Mean = 2.7225), second rank
belongs to “several softwares dealing with statistics (Microsoft Excel, SPSS, etc.) (Mean =
2.7608), thirdly is “several softwares dealing with multimedia techniques (cutting and joining
video clips, audio files, recording and making videos)” (Mean = 2.8325). The figure revealed
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that lecturers still had numerous difficulties in storing digital learning materials for blended
learning.
Making a plan for blended learning
Table 6. Lecturers’ difficulties in making a plan for blended learning
1 Determining purpose for applying the model of blended learning 209 3.0383 .94486 5
2 Analyzing teaching and learning context 209 3.0000 .89335 8
Selecting the model of blended learning to suit the classroom
3 209 3.1770 .88917 2
context
4 Investigating the diversity of students 209 3.2727 .84197 1
5 Building the system of specific objectives 209 3.1005 .81715 3
6 Building topics on appropriate contents of teaching and learning 209 2.8660 .76664 10
7 Digitalizing contents of lectures and learning materials 209 2.9761 .90639 9
8 Making a specific plan of content topics or weeks 209 2.8612 .84060 11
Determining assessment methods to measure each objective or
9 209 3.0526 .83327 4
standard outcome
10 Designing activities, testing and assessment tools 209 3.0048 .82332 7
Selecting appropriate tools of fundamental technology that assist
11 209 3.0335 .85137 6
the procedure of teaching and learning
Findings showed that most lecturers stated they had most difficulties in blended learning
when “Investigating the diversity of students” (Mean = 3.2727), the second difficulty is
“Selecting the model of blended learning to suit with the classroom context” (Mean = 3.1770),
and “Building the system of specific objectives” (Mean = 3.1005) is the third challenge. Other
issues such as: Determining assessment methods to measure each objective or standard
outcome; Designing activities, testing and assessment tools; Selecting appropriate tools of
fundamental technology that assist the procedure of teaching and learning, etc. are also
difficulties for lecturers in the procedure of blended learning. Lecturers have fewer troubles in
“Making a specific plan of content topics or weeks” (Mean = 2.8612), “Building topics on
appropriate contents of teaching and learning” (Mean = 2.8660), and “Digitalizing contents of
lectures and learning materials” (Mean = 2.9761).
Organizing blended learning
Table 7. Lecturers’ difficulties in organizing blended learning
1 Assisting students to install softwares and sign in the system 209 3.3062 .94666 3
2 Providing specific learning materials through the system 209 2.8086 .89964 9
3 Assigning duties to each person and group 209 2.8325 .85805 8
4 Organizing interactive activities 209 3.1770 .93657 6
5 Controlling students’ learning activities 209 3.4067 .88369 2
6 Testing, assessing, following the pace of students’ learning 209 3.1962 .89054 5
7 Guiding students steps to accomplish learning duties 209 2.9617 .81363 7
8 Caring about feelings, psychology of students 209 3.5215 .89913 1
9 Collecting, dealing with feedback ideas for each student 209 3.2344 .88119 4
From the findings, it can be seen that, lecturers not only had difficulties in making plans for
teaching and learning, they also had some troubles in organizing blended learning. This is
proved obviously from the findings. There were 6/9 items with Mean ranging from
approximately 3.2 to 3.5. “Caring about feelings, psychology of students” with Mean = 3.5215
was regarded as the largest difficulty of lecturers while holding blended learning activities. The
second rank belonged to “Controlling students’ learning activities” with Mean = 3.4067; thirdly
was “Assisting students to install softwares and sign in the system” with Mean = 3.3062; it was
followed by difficulties in “Collecting, dealing with feedback ideas for each student”, “Testing,
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assessing, following the pace of students’ learning”, “Organizing interactive activities” (ranking
4th, 5th, 6th). Lecturers hardly ever had difficulties in “Providing specific learning materials
through the system” (Mean = 2.8086), “Assigning duties to each person and groups” (Mean =
2.8325) and “Guiding students steps to accomplish learning duties” (Mean = 2.9617).
3.4. Students’ difficulties
As can be seen from the findings (Table 8), when participating in blended learning, students
had the largest difficulty in “Determining learning objectives” with Mean = 3.5929, secondly is
“Building appropriate ways of learning” with Mean = 3.4593, ranking thirdly is “Training
essential skills” with Mean = 3.4342. Students also had difficulties in “Expressing viewpoints,
ideas” (Mean = 3.4217), “Interacting with lecturers during accomplishing learning activities”
(Mean = 3.2526), etc. Students hardly ever had fewer difficulties in “Noting down core contents
when watching lecture video clips” (Mean = 2.4676), “Implementing learning duties that
lecturers require to do” (Mean = 2.5219), “Using online tools to do exercises with students in
different areas” (Mean = 2.6660), “Understanding contents of teaching and learning that are
conveyed by lecturers in video clips” (Mean = 2.7850) and issues of equipment, machines,
using assisted softwares and interacting with lecturers, etc.
Table 8. Students’ difficulties during learning with the model of blended learning
Number of Std.
No Items Mean Rank
students Deviation
1 Equipment, tools, means to serve study with the model of blended learning 409 2.9311 .98389 7
2 Using machines and assisted equipment 409 2.8434 1.02608 8
3 Using working softwares 409 2.7933 .98582 9
Understanding contents of teaching and learning that are conveyed by
4 409 2.7850 .99460 10
lecturers in video clips
5 Implementing learning duties that lecturers require to do 409 2.5219 .99740 12
6 Using online tools to do exercises with students in different areas 409 2.6660 1.03147 11
7 Noting down core contents when watching lecture video clips 409 2.4676 1.02607 13
8 Building appropriate ways of learning 409 3.4593 1.00725 2
9 Determining learning objectives 409 3.5929 1.01414 1
10 Interacting with other students during accomplishing learning activities 409 3.2004 1.06755 6
11 Interacting with lecturers during accomplishing learning activities 409 3.2526 1.04545 5
12 Expressing viewpoints, ideas 409 3.4217 1.05578 4
13 Training essential skills 409 3.4342 1.08978 3
4. Discussion
In line with the traditional face-to-face method of teaching and learning, Vietnamese
universities of education utilized the model of blended learning. That the model is used has been
more and more popular especially in the context of unusual situations caused by the COVID-19
pandemic. The fact means that Vietnamese universities of education have had footsteps
appropriate with the new normal situation, making use of scientific and technological
achievements. Both lecturers and students of Vietnamese universities of education recognize
that, blended learning is absolutely appropriate and necessary in current context. This is a good
signal, the basis leading to success of blended learning. When lecturers and students realize this,
managers will easily carry out renovations in ways of organizing teaching and learning activities
synchronously throughout the system; and especially, the lecturers themselves and students will
actively implement that as a self demand with willingness and activeness.
Merely a few lecturers and students (mainly in information technology) carried out blended
learning with the department’s training program, to meet the need of the field before the general
plan of the school board was claimed. Most of the lecturers have recently followed blended
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learning. Although the frequency collected from the survey revealed high frequency but this
level of frequency has only been applied for the past nearly two years when COVID-19
pandemic has become more and more serious. That means majority of the lecturers and students
frequently applied blended learning as a measure not to interrupt training activities right from
the moment they started applying blended learning. Thus, most of the lecturers agreed with the
idea that using the model of blended learning saves time and energy for lecturers. Students had
the same idea for this item. Although the fact that blended learning makes lecturers harder, more
time-consuming, more energy-consuming is not like the nature of blended learning, it reflects
the nature of lecturers’ current work at Vietnamese universities of education when they started
applying blended learning to handle sudden situations of the pandemic. Lecturers had to start
with a large workload; the moment that they became accustom to it was also they had to apply
for not only one part, a subject but possibly numerous subjects. To deal with the pandemic, the
procedure and plan for blended learning proceeded quickly. Therefore, work pressure was
extremely large. Work pressure was reality for lecturers; learning pressure was also the issue to
bear in mind for students. As a result, most of the students recognized strengths of blended
learning; however, their interest in it was not much. Possibly, they have not adapted themselves
to this model of teaching and learning; they still had a number of difficulties in determining
objectives, ways of learning, difficulties in purchasing enough equipment, using softwares well,
interacting with lecturers and other students skillfully, etc…within a short time period.
In the current context of COVID-19 pandemic, lecturers at Vietnamese universities of
education are making effort to implement the process of transferring quickly, accomplishing the
work within limited time, even suddenly without much preparation in advance, have not been
good at technology, have not been accustom to preparing e-learning lectures and multimedia
softwares to store learning materials on LMS; therefore, when designing blended learning
lectures, lecturers only used low and average levels for blended learning. This is the problem
that managers need to care about in the following time in order to decrease low and average
levels, increase high level, so as that blended learning is not only handling unusual situations
but turns into sustainable, trendy step.
From the perspective of learners, students at universities of education have recently
participated in blended learning in unusual situations; therefore, they showed their
awkwardness. They had difficulties in determining objectives, methods, new ways of learning.
Before the pandemic occurred, nearly all of them learnt face to face; hence, when suddenly
changing to blended learning, some of them even did not have enough learning equipment,
assisted means, have not known how to use softwares, have not been good at interacting with
lecturers and students. Collaboration with other students to accomplish their duties on the
Internet is not a small challenge.
In terms of difficulties for lecturers, there is an interesting thing the study shows is that for
both making a plan for teaching and learning and organizing teaching and learning activities,
what lecturers were worried, concerned most was students (Investigating diversity of students,
Caring about students’ feelings, psychology). It means that lecturers at universities of education
considered learners as the centre, always wanted to obviously comprehend teaching and
learning subjects in order to propose appropriate ways, methods of teaching and learning. This
is the light in the current context of teaching and learning to deal with the pandemic.
CONCLUSION
Blended learning is a natural requirement in current context. Both lecturers and students at
Vietnamese universities of education recognize this and highly appreciate good points of this
model of teaching and learning. If strengths are made use of and above mentioned difficulties
for both lecturers and students are overcome, this model will be of the highest effectiveness in
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tertiary training when lecturers will be much more active in teaching and learning plans,
broaden knowledge; students will train activeness in study, improving skills, creating flexibility
in training procedure and partly save expenses. In order to use blended learning effectively and
sustainably, it must be put in the sustainable development strategy, not just a temporary
situational measure. This fact results in several issues for managers:
– Upgrading, building infrastructure, equipment for training: Supplementing information
technology equipment for Internet infrastructure, Internet line, bandwidth, electronic library,
electronic learning materials research/ production, multimedia classrooms.
– Organizing training courses to raise both lecturers and students’ awareness and
competency. Lecturers’ activeness, enthusiasm, consistent spirit for studying, exploring and
renovating plays a critical role. With determination and care for learners, lecturers will bring to
learners not only essential assistance but also enthusiasm, passion, attracting learners to actively
experience and explore. That is the key to success.
– Promoting the role of division in simultaneously experimenting, designing and building
teaching and learning contents at level 1 (low level of blended teaching and learning), level 2
(average level) so as to obtain level 3 (high level). That lecturers simultaneously build learning
contents, resources will reduce pressure for them and increase sharing, collaboration in teaching
and learning, research. Nevertheless, in order to implement blended learning at level 3, lecturers
and staff need to collect several years’ experience in carrying out blended learning at lower
levels. These experiences together with feedback collecting and learners’ usual assessment will
minimize inadequacy, weaknesses in designing and organizing teaching and learning activities
based on blended learning approach.
– Creating appropriate mechanism, policies to encourage lecturers to actively renovate,
especially in the transferring period with lots of work to do, large work pressure. At the same
time, appropriate punishments should be imposed for cases that do not satisfy requirements,
lack activeness in work.
That building regulations and policies when lecturers participate in teaching with the model
of blended learning is truly necessary provided that several issues need to be clarified such as:
Training regulations for the model of blended learning; regulations of lecture quota, coefficient/
1 period; regulations on functions, duties of each participant in the course based on the model of
blended learning; procedure of organizing electronic learning materials expertise before using, etc...
– It is advised to develop a group assisting technical issues; this group specially supports
old-aged lecturers who have a quantity of difficulties with modern technology.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
We would like to express our deepest thanks to some lecturers and students at Hanoi
National University of Education, Hanoi Pedagogical University 2, Hue Pedagogical University
(Hue University), Ho Chi Minh Pedagogical University and several pedagogical departments at
the universities that used to be pedagogical universities (Tay Bac University, Vinh University),
some pedagogical departments at polytechnic universities (Can Tho University), etc. for helping
us to accomplish this study.
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About the author
Dr. Tieu Thi My Hong has been working as a lecturer at Hanoi National University of
Education for a long time. Her major research interests include educational science, general
teaching and learning methodology, civilian education teaching and learning methodology,
testing and assessment. She has gained much experience in writing textbooks, course books,
reference materials; training on teaching and learning methodology innovation, assessment for
school teachers; supervising Master thesis on political education, teaching and learning methodology.
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PART 4: TEACHING NATURAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
PART 4
TEACHING NATURAL
SCIENCES AND TECHNOLOGY
439
AN ASSESSMENT OF PEDAGOGICAL STUDENT’S AWARENESS ABOUT

CLIMATE CHANGE EDUCATION IN VIETNAM’S UPPER SECONDARY
EDUCATION PROGRAM – CASE STUDY AT
HANOI NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF EDUCATION
Pham Thanh Hai*1, Tran Khanh Van2, Nguyen Thi Hang Nga2
Abstract: Vietnam is a vulnerable country to the impacts of climate change. Raising education
and awareness plays an essential role in increasing the community’s capacity to adapt to climate
change towards a more suitable lifestyle. As can be seen, to enhance climate change literacy for
students, the knowledge and awareness of teachers are highly crucial. As a result, they should be
appropriately formed when pedagogical students start learning to become teachers. In this
article, the authors refer to the assessment of pedagogical students’ awareness of climate change
education, thereby serving as a basis for training pedagogical students to meet the 2018 general
education program. Although the initial results were that pedagogical students showed a
somewhat limited level of knowledge about climate change, there was no significant difference
in the knowledge survey between fourth-year and first-year students. In addition, pedagogical
students had an average – good level of overall awareness about content related to climate
change education in the upper secondary education programs. However, pedagogical students
had a good awareness of their role in climate change education, and students thought they
could contribute to solving climate change problems through teaching and show enthusiasm
when participating in this activity.
Keywords: education programs, climate change, climate change education, awareness of
climate change education
INTRODUCTION
Climate change is a change in the state of the climate relative to the average according to a
certain trend and (or) variation of the climate that persists over a long period of time. Climate
change has been and will continue to cause severe consequences for countries worldwide,
affecting all socio-economic fields.
Climate change is one of humanity’s biggest challenges (Carle, 2015; Gautam et al., 2013;
Webersik, 2010, p. 1), seriously impacting production, life, and the environment worldwide.
Climate change will exacerbate existing risks and create new risks as well as affect global
development and security such as energy, water, food, society, and jobs, etc. (IPCC, 2014b,
p. 13; Webersik, 2010, p. 6-8).
Vietnam is one of the most vulnerable countries to the impacts of climate change.
According to the Global Climate Risk Index 2019, Vietnam ranked 38th in 2019 and ranked
13th in the 2000 – 2019 period in exposure and vulnerability to extreme events (Eckstein et al.,
2021). In recent years, under the impact of climate change, the frequency and intensity of
natural disasters have been increasing, causing significant losses in life, property, and
infrastructure. Estimated for the period 1995 – 2017, natural disasters such as storms, floods,
flash floods, landslides, inundation, droughts, saltwater intrusion, and others have caused losses
of 14 trillion Viet Nam Dong (VND) / year (at 2010 prices) with an increased rate of 12.7%
* Corresponding Author: Pham Thanh Hai; Email Address: pthai@isponre.gov.vn

1 Institute of Strategy and Policy on Natural Resources and Environment
440
(Government of Vietnam, 2020, p. 16). Natural disasters of 2020 in Vietnam have made more
than 379 dead and missing persons, and property damage was estimated at 39.1 trillion VND, of
which damage caused by storms and floods was 32.3 trillion (accounting for 82.8% of total
damage value) (GSO, 2020).
Vietnam has introduced several policies and implemented climate change response
activities in the last decade. These policies are focused on reducing greenhouse gas emissions
and adapting to climate change. One of the strategies being focused on is carrying on
propaganda and raising awareness for the community. In particular, these aim to develop and
implement education programs and improve knowledge on climate change in the national
education system (MONRE, 2017).
Education is an essential factor so that people are aware of climate issues. It helps people
understand the causes, impacts, and solutions of global warming, enhances climate literacy
among young people, encourages changes in attitudes and behaviors, and helps them adapt to
trends related to climate change (UNESCO, 2015). Education and awareness-raising enable
informed decision-making, play an essential role in increasing adaptation and mitigation
capacities of communities, and empower women and men to adopt sustainable lifestyles.
However, there is no particular subject on climate change in Vietnam’s general education
program despite its importance. Therefore, the content of climate change education is conducted
in extracurricular activities or integrated into normal subjects’ curriculum. Thus, increasing
responsibility for school and teachers.
Climate change education is a process of educating students to understand climate change
phenomena, their causes and effects on human lives, and measures to adapt and mitigate climate
change (Stevenson et al., 2017). In schools, climate change education is also a process that
develops students’ awareness and habits of concern about climate change issues in their locality
and global scale (IAP, 2017, p. 1; Mochizuki & Bryan, 2015, p. 14; Stevenson et al., 2017, p. 5).
It is forming students with the right attitude, awareness, and skills needed to be able to live in
harmony with the natural environment, while also working independently or in coordination to
find solutions for current climate change issues and to prevent potential future climate change
problems (IAP, 2017, p. 3; Stevenson et al., 2017, p. 1).
Climate change education plays an important role (IPCC, 2014a, p. 157) and is considered
an effective key (The Commonwealth, 2016, p. 4) to raise public awareness, increase
community resilience, adaptive capacity, and mitigate the impacts of climate change.
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Article 6 (United Nations,
1992, p. 10), Paris Agreement in Article 12 (United Nations, 2015) clearly stated that the
relevant parties would cooperate in implementing appropriate measures to strengthen education
and training, climate change awareness, the participation of the community and the ability to
public information access.
Therefore, to raise public awareness about climate change, primarily through teaching from
the general education program, the knowledge and awareness of teachers are extremely
important. As a result, they should be appropriately formed when pedagogical students start
learning to become teachers. Furthermore, education in Vietnam is transitioning from a content-
oriented program to a program towards the quality and capacity of students. Therefore, raising
awareness for students and undergraduate students about the content of knowledge related to
climate change is very necessary to transform from correct awareness into correct behavior with
the living environment. However, prior to raising awareness for pedagogical students – future
teachers about the content of knowledge related to climate change education, it is necessary to
assess their awareness of it.
Up to now, there have been some studies in the world on the perception and awareness of
pre-service teachers on climate change (Boon, 2016; Competente, 2019; Jeong et al., 2021;
441
Meilinda et al., 2017; Nayan et al., 2020). In terms of overview, studies primarily showed that,
even if pre-service teachers have a good attitude towards climate change education, the
scientific knowledge about climate change is low and often confused. Knowledge about this
field was almost unchanged during the process of teacher training. This can be explained by
many reasons such as the complexity, interdisciplinary of climate change, or the source of
information that education students receive mainly from social media, which do not have high
reliability. In Vietnam, this topic has only been emerged in research recently, especially after
the New Education Program was developed and promulgated by the Ministry of Education and
Training in 2018 and piloted in 2021. This research is one among other researches in Vietnam
that focus on education for climate change response. This research’s uniqueness emphasizes the
pedagogical students’ awareness about climate change education in upper secondary education
programs in Vietnam.
In this study, awareness of climate change education can be defined as “To be aware of
knowledge about climate change in the upper secondary education program and evaluate the
degree of integration of climate change knowledge in the content of subjects, thereby proposing the
role of climate change education in teaching to meet requirements of the general education program”.
From this definition, the author proposes components and indicators of awareness about
climate change education, especially about teaching and integrating climate change in upper
secondary education programs, as in Table 1.
Table 1. Components and indicators of awareness about climate change education
Components Indicators
Identifying climate change knowledge in – Studying the general education programs and curriculum of subjects
upper secondary education program – Recognizing and identifying knowledge related to climate change in programs
Evaluating the degree of integrating – Comparing the knowledge ratio of climate change in the program 2006 and program 2018
knowledge of climate change in programs – Evaluating the trend of integrating climate change knowledge of the program 2018
Proposing the role of climate change – Identifying the role of climate change education in the curriculum of subjects
education in teaching – Proposing the role of climate change education with the comprehensive development of
students
Hanoi National University of Education (HNUE) is the leading school of teacher training in
Vietnam and one of the national key universities in the Vietnamese higher education system.
Hundreds of thousands of teachers and education experts have studied here (HNUE, n.d.). This
research focuses on assessing HNUE pedagogical students’ awareness about climate change
education in Vietnam’s upper secondary education program, as well as identifying students’
knowledge about the fundamental issues of climate change and the student’s awareness about
their role in climate change education. From that, the authors propose recommendations to
improve knowledge and positive attitudes for pedagogical students on climate change education.
CONTENT
1. Research Methodology
1.1. Probability sampling
The study focused on first-year and fourth-year pedagogical students of 10 faculties of
HNUE as follows: Geography, Chemistry, History, Technical Education, Politics – Civic
Education, Philology, Biology, English, Mathematics-Informatics, Physics.
Collecting data, the sample size in this study is calculated by the following formula
(Yamane, 1967) with n: sample size; N: population (around 3500 students); e: sampling error (5%)
n = N / [1 + N(e2)]
Based on this formula, a total of 359 samples are required. At last, the total number of
samples collected was 741, so that the survey results can represent the population. The number
of first-year students participating is 1.75 times that of fourth-year students, 472 compared with 269.
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1.2. Surveys and questionnaires

Data is collected online through Google Survey Form, with the questionnaire is made up of
4 parts: (1) Multiple choice questions on basic knowledge about climate change; (2) Survey
questionnaire on awareness about contents related to climate change in education programs; (3)
Survey questions about students’ awareness of their role in climate change education; (4)
Questions about the student’s source of knowledge.
1.3. In-depth interview
The authors have interviewed five lecturers at HNUE to collect more opinions to clarify the
survey results obtained from pedagogical students. Most of the interview content was compiled
and rewritten into argumentative paragraphs, in addition, some opinions were presented as
verbatim quotations.
1.4. Data statistical and analysis
Research using SPSS statistical software to analyze collected data, with statistical
parameters including mean, standard deviation, most frequently occurring value in the series,
percentage hundred, etc.
– Chi-squared test to evaluate whether there is a relationship between two categorical
variables in a data set.
– One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) to compare the means of variables to see if there
is a statistically significant difference in awareness between students of faculties and academic
years. The statistical significance value at 0.05 (McLeod, 2019).
a. Assessing students’ knowledge about climate change
Students take a test on basic knowledge related to climate change. There are 15 multiple-choice
questions in the knowledge test. The questionnaires with references and synthesis from the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) quiz, studies of Boon (2016), Nation
(2017), Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) documents.
Each correct answer gets 1 point. The maximum point is 15. Based on the total score of
each student and the average score by faculty/year, the authors developed a scale to classify
levels of knowledge as follows:
Rank Weak Average Good Very Good
Total score 6 =< 7–9 10 – 12 13 – 15
b. Assessing awareness about climate change education
Based on the indicators of Table 1, the authors have built a questionnaire to find out the
level of pedagogical students’ awareness about climate change education contents in Vietnam’s
upper secondary education program.
The questions use the 5-point Linkert Scale and are all set up in the same direction of
evaluation (1 is negative – 5 is positive). Based on the mean value of each question, the author
developed a scale (Pimentel, 2019) to classify levels of awareness about climate change
education, as follows:
Interval 1.00 – 1.79 1.80 – 2.59 2.60 – 3.39 3.40 – 4.19 4.20 – 5.00
Description Poor Weak Average Good Very Good
c. Assessing students’ awareness of their role in climate change education
Two questions were asked to find out how students perceive their role in climate change
education and whether they are willing to participate in this activity. The way of designing
questions and observing and evaluating are similar to those in section b above.
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2. Results
2.1. Survey results on climate change knowledge
Using 15 multiple-choice questions on basic knowledge related to climate change (For
more details, see Appendix, Section I), we obtained the results as shown in Table 2.
Table 2. Percentage of correct answers of 1st and 4th year students
Questions Correct answers (%) (1st year) Correct answers (%) (4th year) Pearson’s Chi P value
Question 1 71.0% 77.7% 9.2 0.056
Question 2 29.0% 31.6% 6.2 0.180
Question 3 15.7% 17.8% 4.9 0.291
Question 4 70.1% 79.9% 10.9 0.027
Question 5 7.4% 11.2% 6.5 0.163
Question 6 63.1% 70.6% 7.8 0.096
Question 7 53.8% 59.9% 14.5 0.006
Question 8 42.4% 43.9% 0.6 0.877
Question 9 18.0% 26.4% 9.3 0.053
Question 10 9.1% 7.8% 1.3 0.844
Question 11 18.2% 19.0% 2.9 0.392
Question 12 66.1% 71.7% 6.6 0.085
Question 13 16.7% 15.6% 0.8 0.833
Question 14 27.3% 30.9% 4.2 0.369
Question 15 24.4% 27.1% 1.6 0.796
From statistics of the student’s answers, it can be seen that pedagogical students still do not
grasp some basic definitions, causes, impacts of climate change, as well as mitigation and
adaptation solutions. Furthermore, The P-value > 0.05 in more than 13 multiple-choice
questions indicates that students in both years have no relationship to the ability to answer
questions.
Out of all 15 questions, only Questions 4 and 7 had P < 0.05, showing statistical
significance. The other questions all have a P > 0.05, showing no statistical significance, or in
other words, it means that the school year of student is not related to the answer choices.
Fig.1. Total mean knowledge score of each faculty

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From Figure 1, the first-year of Philology Faculty has the lowest figure with a mean score
of 4.47, and the highest is the fourth year of Physics Faculty with a mean score of 6.70, there is
no faculty with a mean score that reaches the average level. Except for Mathematics and
Geography faculties, fourth-year students have a higher mean score than first-year students,
although the gap is insignificant. The result of Geography Faculty is surprising when the
average score do not outperform others.
2.2. Results on students’ awareness about the climate change education content in the
upper secondary education program
Table 3 shows the summary results of students’ awareness about climate change education
content in the upper secondary education program. (For more details about Indicators, see
Appendix, section II)
Table 3. Summary results of students’ awareness of the climate change education content
Statistically significant difference in awareness
Indicators Category Mean Score Sorting Awareness
School Years Faculties
First year 2.8581 Average
Indicator 1.1 Fourth year 3.3216 Average Yes Yes
Total 3.0263 Average
Indicator 1.2 Fourth year 3.0211 Average Yes Yes
Indicator 2.1 Fourth year 3.3779 Average Yes No
First year 3.5417 Good
Indicator 2.2 Fourth year 3.6778 Good Yes Yes
Total 3.5911 Good
Indicator 3.1 Fourth year 3.9058 Good Yes No
Total 3.7634 Good
Indicator 3.2 Fourth year 4.0012 Good Yes No
Total 3.8808 Good
Overall Awareness Fourth year 3.5644 Good Yes Yes
Total 3.4299 Good
The mean value of Indicator 1.1, Indicator 1.2, and Indicator 2.1 are half lower among the
six indicators, with an average level of awareness, while the other three indicators all have a
good level of awareness. Furthermore, ANOVA tests show a statistically significant difference
between school years for all six indicators, but there are no statistically significant differences
between faculties when examining Indicator 2.1, Indicator 3.1, and Indicator 3.2. These results
may indicate that pedagogical students have not thoroughly understood the specific contents of
the educational programs but only grasped the broad contents outside and the proper educational
trends based on statements provided.
The students’ overall awareness about the content of climate change education in the upper
secondary education program is shown in the Figure 2 below.
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Fig.2. Mean score of overall awareness of the climate change education content
Except for Politics – Civic Education, English, and Philology, all faculties have a good
overall awareness. By school year, first-year students have average awareness, and fourth-year
students have good awareness about content related to climate change education in education
programs. However, the fourth-year’s mean score value is not too superior to that of the first-year,
3.56 compared with 3.35.
2.3. Students’ awareness of their role in climate change education
Most students realize that they will contribute to solving climate change issues through
teaching if they become teachers. Students also affirm their enthusiasm to proactively remind
and propagate students about environmental protection and climate change response, even
though the subject they teach has no content related to climate change.
Fig.3. Mean score of students’ awareness of their role in climate change education
ANOVA analysis shows no statistically significant difference in awareness between school
years or between faculties. Figure 3 shows the high mean score, confirming students’
enthusiasm for climate change education.
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2.4. Student’s source of knowledge
Fig.4. Students’ sources of knowledge to respond to the survey

Figure 4 shows the sources of information and data that students perceive to gain climate
change knowledge and answer survey questions. It can be seen that the sources that students are
most exposed to are “Information on the Internet”, “Television, radio, newspapers” and “Social
networks” with the proportion of 66.8%, 64.8%, and 53.4% respectively. It can be said that
these are information sources that are familiar to not only students but almost everyone in
today’s life. However, information about climate change on the Internet, social networks, and
television may not entirely be scientific and highly reliable. Meanwhile, for the two sources
with well-founded information are “scientific conferences” and “academic journals/ science
books”, students have minor exposure, with only the ratio of 22.5% and 18.2% respectively.
2.5. Results of interviews with HNUE lecturers on some issues related to climate change
education
From the results of interviews with some HUNE lecturers on some topics such as: The role
of climate change education for students, especially upper secondary school students; How do
pedagogical students perceive their role in climate change education?; The contents and
requirements related to climate change education in the upper secondary school curriculum in
Current Program (2006) and the New Program (2018); The level of understanding of the two
upper education programs of pedagogical students; The level of awareness of students towards
the contents related to climate change education in upper secondary school programs, etc., the
authors have summarized as follows:
– All lecturers affirmed that climate change education is crucial, especially for young
students, because they are the future generation with the primary influence and decision on
climate change issues.
– The interviewed lecturers felt positive that pedagogical students are well aware of their
role in climate change education. However, the lecturer also commented that the knowledge
about climate change and the awareness of the educational program among pedagogical students
is not high. Furthermore, there were still limitations and inequalities between faculties as well as
among students in each faculty.
“I think that the pedagogical students themselves have not consulted, understood, or
mastered the general curriculum and the program of subjects. For example, in Biology and
Geography, where there is the part of climate change, and what is their role. When studying
447
subjects related to climate change, students may not be able to grasp the knowledge and also
not be able to apply that knowledge.”
– Lecturers believed that this result is due to the lack of content and knowledge about
climate change in the curriculum of each faculty. The development of educational activities and
events on climate change has not been uniformly implemented across faculties by the university.
Approaching and integrating climate change education contents into subjects of some faculties
has not been focused. An English faculty lecturer commented:
“In my opinion, students of the Faculty of English have many areas to pay attention to such
as speaking, listening, reading and writing skills, other subjects such as English language,
pragmatics, learning text analysis, translation, etc., if there are articles about the environment,
climate change, that only has the role of data. Therefore, it partly reflects the low English
department index.”
The lecturers also said that pedagogical students are not really interested and actively seek
out knowledge beyond textbooks and the curriculum:
“The score will correspond to the level of interest of the students in the issue of climate
change. I find that the interest level of the faculties is not high, especially the Philology Faculty
has a low level of interest. This is similar to whether students understand the knowledge or not.
If you are interested in learning, you will get a high score and vice versa... this also puts a
requirement on improving knowledge.”
Lecturers also made recommendations to improve students’ understanding of climate
change and their awareness of climate change education, with emphasis on the increasing
integration of this issue into HNUE’s teaching and learning activities.
3. Discussion
Firstly, pedagogical students show rather limited knowledge about climate change. There
are no significant differences in the survey of knowledge between the fourth and the first year.
The results show that, even with the faculties closely related to climate change issues, such as
Geography and Biology, students can still not grasp the common knowledge about climate change.
Analytical data shows that fourth-year students have good overall awareness, while
first-year students have an average one, although the difference is slight. However, it is still
possible to see obvious weaknesses, especially the lack of careful study of specific contents.
Students are almost only grasping the trends and general information of education programs.
For every indicator constituting overall awareness, fourth-year students show a higher level of
awareness. This also proves that there is a particular accumulation of final year students after a
4-year training process. Faculties with the best level of awareness are Physics, Biology, History,
and Geography. In contrast, the faculties with the lowest level of awareness are Philology and
English, which are purely social-oriented faculties.
Through the survey, it can be seen that students are well aware of the vital role of climate
change education, and at the same time, show their willingness to participate in this activity.
Compared with previous research results such as from Helen Boon (2016), Nayan (2020), Jeong
(2021), this similarity can be seen. In addition, the results of investigating the level of
knowledge and sources of information about climate change also show resemblances when
pedagogical students have low knowledge, misunderstandings about concepts, and students are
mainly exposed to information from the Internet, social networks, and other media.
Basically, there seems to be a contradiction between knowledge about climate change and
students’ awareness of climate change education activities. Unfortunately, having good
awareness is not always accompanied by accurate knowledge and the right action. In this study,
the overall awareness level of the surveyed HNUE students, although good, was only slightly
above the average level, and the questions with the highest scores were often the ones that are
kind of conformity bias according to the statements provided. It can be said that it is easy to
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choose the right and obvious trends, but to really know whether that awareness turns into
practical action or not, it needs more of time and future researches. However, in the case of this
study, the students showed that, at least they recognized the essential values of climate change
education, the basic trend of climate change-related content in the education programs.
To become teachers who are capable of communicating and reminding upper secondary
students about climate change, pedagogical students need to have an accurate amount of
knowledge, be able to be well aware of the content that is relevant to climate change in the
upper secondary education programs, as well as understand their essential role. The upper
secondary education program in Vietnam is changing, thus emphasizing the above
requirements. Learning about climate change content in the upper secondary curriculum is not
only necessary for final year students or faculties that have much connection with climate
change, but also for other student years and faculties in HNUE, especially when the demand for
integrated teaching is increasingly being promoted.
From the research findings, it is necessary to strengthen further the understanding of the
upper secondary education program and the knowledge related to climate change at HNUE.
Therefore, the authors propose some recommendations to raise pedagogical students’ awareness
of climate change education as follows:
– Students need to read more books and strengthen their capacity for document
research: Pedagogical students, especially from English and Philology faculties, need to read
more books, especially science books, monographs outside of classroom textbooks. Read and
understand materials deeply, pedagogical students will have accurate and extensive knowledge
about issues in real life, in this specific case, climate change. Furthermore, it is necessary to
develop the ability of researching documents for pedagogical students because it is crucial for
every teacher to teach and orient their students in the future. Especially when the mechanism of
“one program, many set of textbooks” is gradually being applied, reading and researching to
find the best teaching method is always a priority.
– Organize more events about climate change: Organizations in HNUE such as Student
Unions, Communist Youth Unions, or clubs should organize more scientific seminars on the
environment and climate change during the teacher training period. Experts and scientists with
knowledge in the field can be invited to convey accurate information, answer questions, and
emphasize the importance of climate change education. In addition, Communist Youth Unions
led by faculties such as Biology, Geography, and Physics can organize activities and events
related to environment/climate change, establish clubs such as green environment club, etc.
– Intensify climate change-related content in teaching and examining: In teaching and
examining activities at HNUE, it is possible to incorporate more topics on climate change,
encouraging students to actively research through lectures, group exercises, homework, exams.
Lecturers themselves also need to actively remind their students about climate change.
– Strengthen communication between faculties: Because climate change is an
interdisciplinary issue that includes a broad understanding of natural and social science, there
should be more communication between faculties, especially the relationship between lecturers
students. Encourage students to boldly consult lecturers in other faculties on academic problems
First is about the content of the educational program, and then into the specific contents of each
subject, especially with content that requires a multi-dimensional approach such as climate
change.
CONCLUSION
Education on climate change plays an essential role in determining each country’s level of
response to the negative impacts of climate change. Climate change education is a long-term
and sustainable approach to building resilient communities to the impacts of climate change.
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The results showed that pedagogical students had a limited level of knowledge about climate
change. In addition, the surveys showed no significant difference in knowledge between the
fourth-year and first-year students. Pedagogical students had an average – good overall
awareness about climate change education content in the upper secondary education programs.
The pedagogical students had a good awareness of their role in climate change education. They
thought they could contribute to solving climate change problems through teaching and showed
enthusiasm when participating in this activity. Therefore, it is meaningful to assess the
awareness about climate change education of HNUE students – future teachers and educators. It
contributes to the changes of the perception, attitude, and behavior of many generations of
learners on climate change and responses to climate change.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:
This article is apart from the results of the master thesis with the same title of author Pham
Thanh Hai. The authors would like to express our appreciation to the lecturers, officers, and
staff of Hanoi National University of Education, especially the first and fourth-year students
who participated in the survey.
APPENDIX
I. Questions about knowledge related to climate change
Question 1. Which gas has increased in concentration significantly in recent years and is
considered to be the main cause of the increase in the greenhouse effect?
☐ Ozone (O3)
☐ Metan (CH4).
☐ Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).
☐ Carbon dioxide (CO2)
☐ Don’t know
Question 2. Greenhouse gases in the lower atmosphere (troposphere) absorb
☐ Ultraviolet radiation
☐ Infrared radiation is emitted by the surface of the earth and ocean
☐ Solar radiation is reflected by clouds
☐ Solar radiation over the entire electromagnetic spectrum
☐ Don’t know
Question 3. The largest source of greenhouse gas emissions caused by humans comes from
☐ Transportation
☐ Buildings
☐ Industrial Processes
☐ Electricity and heat
☐ Don’t know
Question 4. Which country has the current largest CO2 emissions in the world
☐ India
☐ Canada
☐ United States
☐ China
☐ Russia
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Question 5. Which greenhouse gas makes up the most percentage in the atmosphere?
☐ Ozone (O3)
☐ Metan (CH4)
☐ Water vapor (H2O)
☐ Carbon dioxide (CO2)
☐ Don’t know
Question 6. The ozone layer is mainly depleted by the following reasons?
☐ Burning of fossil fuel
☐ Pollution from landfills
☐ Emissions of CFCs into the atmosphere
☐ The increasing temperature of the sun’s rays
☐ Don’t know
Question 7. Which of the following has the greatest effect on sea level rise?
☐ Melting of icebergs.
☐ Melting of ice in the Arctic Ocean.
☐ Melting of mountain glaciers and ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica. .
☐ The emergence of the ocean floor
☐ Don’t know
Question 8. When the global average temperature increases, then
☐ The average precipitation increases
☐ The average precipitation decreases
☐ The average precipitation remains unchanged
☐ Don’t know
Question 9. Which of the following phenomena are not associated with climate change?
☐ Forest fires are getting worse
☐ The volcano is more active
☐ Coral reefs are declining
☐ The permafrost releases CH4
☐ The storms are more intense
Question 10. Where did some of the earliest and strongest impacts of global warming
occur?
☐ In the Tropics
☐ In the North latitude
☐ The effects of global warming are evenly distributed across the planet.
☐ In the South latitude
☐ Don’t know
Question 11. Climate change mitigation is
☐ natural and human adjustment to reduce vulnerability and take advantage of opportunities
brought about by climate change.
☐ activities that reduce the level and intensity of greenhouse gas emissions.
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☐ human activities to prevent climate change from happening

☐ human activities aimed at reducing vulnerability.
Question 12. Climate change adaptation is
☐ human activities to prevent climate change from happening
☐ human activities to reduce the temperature rise on Earth
☐ human activities to reduce the level and intensity of greenhouse gas emissions
☐ human activities to reduce vulnerability and take advantage of opportunities brought about by
climate change
Question 13. What was agreed upon in the “Paris Agreement” at COP-21, held in Paris in
2015?
☐ Limit global warming to below 1oC, reduce emissions as soon as possible
☐ Limit global warming to below 2oC
☐ Limit global warming to below 4oC, evaluate the process every 10 years
☐ Pursue 100% clean, renewable energy
Question 14. Which of the following is not an example of a climate change mitigation
strategy?
☐ Alternative clean energy production
☐ Carbon capture and storage
☐ Economical use of electricity
☐ Construction of water reservoirs
☐ Signing international emissions agreements
Question 15. Which of the following is not an example of climate change adaptation?
☐ Adjust the planting time
☐ Construction of sluice gates to prevent saline water and storm surges
☐ Strengthening and upgrading infrastructure works
☐ Use electric stoves instead of coal stoves, wood stoves to reduce CO2 emissions.
☐ Planning for natural disaster prevention and production business operations
II. Awareness about climate change education in upper secondary education program
1.1. Have you learned the upper secondary education program 2006 and 2018, and to what
extent below?
Scale: 1 = Don’t know the program; 2 = Know it, but have not learn; 3 = Read briefly; 4 =
Learned, but only subject related to the field being trained; 5 = Have carefully studied the entire
program
Scale
Contents
1 2 3 4 5
The current education program (2006)
The new education program (2018)
1.2. To what extent have you identified the issues related to climate change in the two upper
secondary education programs 2006 and 2018?
Scale: 1 = Completely Unidentified; 2 = Identify very little content; 3 = Identify average amount
of content; 4 = Identify a lot of content; 5 = Identify all content
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Scale
Content
1 2 3 4 5
You have identified content related to climate change
in the current upper secondary education program
(2006).
You have identified content related to climate change
in the new upper secondary education program (2018)
You identify the change in content related to climate
change between the two programs
2.1. Comparing the proportion of climate change knowledge in the two curricula of high
education 2006 and the curriculum of high education 2018
Scale: 1 = Strongly disagree; 2 = Disagree; 3 = Uncertain/ Not sure; 4 = Agree; 5 = Strongly
Agree
Scale
Content
1 2 3 4 5
In the current upper secondary education program
(2006), the content of knowledge related to climate
change accounts for about 4%.
There are more lessons that can relate to knowledge
about climate change in the new program (2018) than
in the current program (2006).
The new program (2018) is more flexible, so the
percentage of knowledge content related to climate
change is more or less than the current program (2006)
is decided by teachers and learners.
2.2. Evaluate the shift of integrating climate change knowledge of the Program 2018
Please choose the answer that suits your thoughts
Agree
Scale
Content
1 2 3 4 5
Many subjects have knowledge related to climate change
The new upper secondary education program (2018)
focuses more on teaching integrating knowledge about
climate change in subjects
In the new upper secondary education program (2018),
Biology, Geography, Technology, and Physics are subjects
with many topics and contents directly addressing climate
change.
3.1. Identify the role of climate change education in the curriculum of subjects
Agree
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Scale
Content
1 2 4 5 3
Climate change education helps linked subject knowledge
Climate change education is very important for students to
have a broader and deeper understanding of nature
Climate change education needs to be supplemented with
extracurricular activities
3.2. Proposing the role of climate change education with the holistic development of students
Agree
Content Scale
1 2 3 4 5
Climate change education helps students to be properly
aware of the natural environment
Climate change education helps students change their
attitudes toward the natural environment
Climate change education helps students acquire skills to
respond to climate change
III. Students’ awareness of their role in climate change education
Agree
Scale
Content
1 2 3 4 5
If you become a teacher, through teaching you will
contribute to solving the problem of climate change
If the subject you teach is not related to climate change, you
will still actively remind and educate students about
environmental protection and climate change response.
IV. The sources of knowledge to climate change
From which source have you heard about climate change? Where did your ideas and knowledge
to answer this survey come from? Choose the two options that work best for you.
☐ Family, friends, relatives
☐ From television, radio, newspaper
☐ From teachers
☐ From social networks
☐ From textbooks, classroom teaching content
☐ From scientific conferences
☐ Information on the Internet
☐ Academic journal/science book
☐ Government agency notices/information
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V. Interview questions for Faculty’s Broad member/Lecturer

1. In your opinion, what role does climate change education play for students, especially high
school students?
2. How do you evaluate the content and requirements related to climate change education in the
current high school curriculum in 2006 and the new program in 2018?
3. How do teachers evaluate the level of understanding of the two upper education programs of
pedagogical students?
4. How do teachers assess students’ general awareness of climate change-related content in high
school education programs?
5. How do teachers assess students’ awareness of their role in climate change education?
6. How do teachers evaluate the information sources that students receive to answer the survey?
7. What do you think about the average score achieved by pedagogical students (your faculty
and the school as a whole) after taking the knowledge test related to climate change?
8. How do you rate the relevance of the content of the pedagogical student training program of
the faculty (of the school) with the content of the environment – climate change?
9. What recommendations and solutions do teachers suggest to increase students’ awareness of
climate change education?
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About the authors

– MSc. Pham Thanh Hai was born in 1995. He is currently a young researcher of the
Vietnam Institute of Strategy and Policy on Natural Resources and Environment. Graduating
from Hanoi University of Natural Resources and Environment in 2017, Hai’s current primary
research directions are inter-regional and inter-field environmental strategies and policies. Since
2019, he has participated in the Master’s program on Climate Change and Development of
Vietnam Japan University. The issue of climate change, especially the impact of climate change
on society and culture, is also an area that he is very interested in and is starting his first
research steps.
– Dr. Tran Khanh Van has been a researcher in environmental science, and also as a
biological lecturer for 10 years. She is also serving as one of the key selected pedagogical
teachers working in a program led by Ministry of Education and Training, providing teachers all
over the country with guidelines on the new general education program, which was issued in
December 2018. After almost 10 years of staying in Japan to study and work in the field of
agriculture and environmental science, she returned to Vietnam to fulfill her wish of working as
an educator to pass on her knowledge and research experience to her students. In addition to
regularly publishing scientific articles’ on journals, she loves to write a book about biology and
natural sciences for students and teachers.
– Dr. Nguyen Thi Hang Nga is an educational science researcher, at the same time a
biology teacher and a lecturer in the field of Theory and methods of teaching biology. She is one
of the key pedagogical teachers selected to work in the program presided over by the Ministry
of Education and Training to guide teachers nationwide on the new general education program
promulgated in December 2018. In addition to regularly publishing scientific articles in
magazines, she also participates in writing reference materials, teaching on channel VTV7,
writing scripts, and implementing sex education programs on channel VTV6, VTV2 of Vietnam
Television.
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DESIGN “WIND CHIMES” TOPIC ON THE APPROACH

OF STEAM EDUCATION TO DEVELOP COMPETENCIES
AND QUALITIES FOR PRIMARY SCHOOL STUDENTS
Nguyen Hong Duong*1, Nguyen Hoai Nam2
Abstract: In recent years, STEAM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Maths) has
been interested in elementary school by providing comprehensive development for students.
According to the general education curriculum in Vietnam in 2018, technology is included in the
primary level for the first time and is a compulsory subject in the essential education stage.
STEM/STEAM education in primary schools is often associated with the following subjects: Nature
and society in grades 1, 2, 3; Science in grades 4, 5; Informatics and Technology in grades 3, 4, 5.
With the goal of not only developing technological capacity, but also towards the comprehensive
development of students, in this study, the authors propose the process of building a STEAM topic
based on the content of the Technology section in Primary School, illustrated with the theme
“Make a wind chime”. The lesson was experimented with three classes at Tran Thanh Ngo Primary
School, Kien An, Hai Phong. The results of the progress assessment, product evaluation, and
student interviews show explicit expressions of creativity, interest, achievement of the goals of the
Technology lesson, and the goal of comprehensive development.
Keywords: STEAM education, engineering design, primary education, technology subject teaching
INTRODUCTION
STEAM education is an interdisciplinary approach that combines skills and knowledge
from all STEAM areas to solve problems that arise in learning and life (Yakman, 2008;
Winterman & Malacinski, 2015). STEAM is the original creative idea of the Rhode Island
School of Design (USA), then used by many educators and gradually spread to the whole
United States. It is a new approach to education in which Science, Technology, Engineering,
Arts, and Mathematics are used to teach and guide students. Recent studies show that STEAM
is a promising approach to positively impact student achievement and teacher effectiveness. The
impact of STEAM lessons on the learning of 3rd through 5th-grade science subjects was
investigated in elementary and middle schools in an inner-city district. Results showed that
students who received nine hours of STEAM instruction improved their science achievement
(Graham & Brouillette, 2016). In other research, secondary school teachers’ reflections show
the integrated learning is shaped by the collaboration of teachers, student dialogue to promote
critical thinking and creativity.
STEAM education bridges the gap between academic knowledge and practice. Students are
equipped with essential skills suitable to the new era’s development requirements, such as
expressing and making presentations, creative problem-solving skills, critical thinking, teamwork
skills, formative skills, and develop intelligence and creative thinking.
Experience in primary school is significant in a person’s life. During this stage of
education, the foundation of awareness, beliefs, self-esteem, and self-control takes place. Thus,
teachers should foster their students forming such foundation. A teacher is responsible for
teaching all or many subjects, except for some specialized gifted subjects; therefore, integrating
teaching is convenient. Primary teachers can solve interdisciplinary problems within a lesson
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Hong Duong; Email Address: duongnh@dhhp.edu.vn

1 Hai Phong University
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topic. Many studies have shown that integrated teaching promotes self-study, problem-solving,
and creativity (Czerniak, 2017). In addition, the intentional integration of the arts in science and
engineering lessons makes learning STEM topics soft, accessible, and engaging more
profoundly. In that way, students can see themselves as more than just future scientists or
engineers. Moreover, technology included at the primary level is a compulsory subject in the
essential education stage. Therefore, this study addresses the development of a topic of Grade 3
Technology on the approach of STEAM education and its implementation in a Vietnamese
primary school.
CONTENT
STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Maths. According to the
English – Vietnamese Bilingual Dictionary (Turnbull, 2014), the word “Art” has two
interpretations: “Art” and “Humanities and social sciences”. Therefore, the letter “A” in STEAM
can represent the liberal arts, language arts, social studies, culture, and humanities. Then, in
integrating the teaching of STEM subjects, it is possible to integrate humanities education.
STEM education has been encapsulated in the interdisciplinary integration of natural
science or STEM fields in recent years. Teachers can actively integrate cultural, social, and
human factors, literature, and art. Therefore, STEM has been developed into STEAM. STEAM
is sometimes written as STE(A)M with the A written in parentheses representing the liberal arts,
language arts, social studies, physical arts, fine arts, and music, which integrated teaching based
on STEM education (Boy, 2013). In such a way, there is room for connection between STEM
problems and social, cultural, and artistic topics. Students are encouraged to expose their
creativity in the arts, knowledge of history, and humanities to create a new, valuable and
meaningful product for society.
“STEAM education” refers to science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics
teaching and learning. It typically includes educational activities at all grade levels, from
preschool to graduate school. STEAM learning is considered learning that can integrate the
skills that children need (Ata Aktürk et al., 2017). The addition of “art” (which leads to the
acronym STEAM) will give children the opportunity to approach STEAM education in creative
and imaginative ways.
Art-related activities are effective ways to introduce children of this age to some basic
concepts in science and maths. “Integrating arts-related activities with science, mathematics, and
technology with this age group can accomplish four important goals. First, it fosters students’
growth mindset because they can produce different representations of what they are learning in
various media. Second, it helps students connect the arts and science/mathematics/technology
and view these areas as co-equals rather than another. Third, as teachers consistently incorporate
arts-related activities with STEM topics across these grade levels, students see no boundaries
between and among all these areas. When learners see no boundaries limiting fields of study,
creativity and genius often flourish. Fourth, students realize that their models, posters, songs,
and other artistic representations of the content are not always successful on the first try. If
teachers encourage their efforts, students learn persistence, a valuable trait in this age of instant
access to information. Persistence allows students to continue working to improve their projects
rather than settle for something they found on the Internet” (Pilecki, 2018). Although the
number of studies on the effectiveness of STEAM education is not much, the trend is that more
and more schools use STEAM education as a teaching method to promote the positivity of both
teachers and learners. There have been many scientists researching ways to implement STEAM
education in primary schools. According to Myint Swe Khine, Shaljan Areepa, the
implementation of STEAM education has the following ways (Myint Swe Khine, 2019):
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Approaching STEAM Through Arts Integration

There are many definitions of art integration. According to Goldberg, the term refers to
teaching the subjects through the arts (Goldberg, 2016). Different terms such as arts infusion
(McDonald, 2012) or arts-based teaching and learning (Marshall, 2014) refer to arts integration.
According to Silverstein and Layne, the concept of art integration is that students construct and
express understanding through an art form. Students participate in a creative process that
bridges the gap between one art form and another subject area while also addressing changing
goals in both. According to this view, art acts as a tool to provide knowledge (Silverstein &
Layne, 2010). From here, the most appropriate way to implement STEAM education is through
integrating art into subjects in the STEAM field.
Approaching STEAM Through Project-Based Learning and the Maker Movement
Whether implementing STEAM education emphasizing collaboration or integration,
project-based learning is rooted in John Dewey’s philosophy of learning by doing (Boss, 2011).
Project-based learning is a learning method that brings many benefits to students. Project-based
learning focuses on problem-solving, providing students with many opportunities to experience
design, manufacturing, investigation, self-study, and self-discovery through new ways of
learning, project implementation in STEAM theme (Bequette & Bequette, 2012). The role of the
arts and STEM subjects is equally important in determining the success of the STEAM subject.
Some educators see the maker movement as an opportunity for STEM/STEAM education
(Bevan et al., 2015; Peppler & Bender, 2013). Education through invention is a complementary
approach to teaching traditional subjects, helping students experience design and problem-solving
activities related to STEM fields to create specific products. Besides, the invention space will
bring a more inspiring learning environment for students, which is a favorable condition for
them to develop technical designs in line with the goals of the STEAM theme. Education
through invention activities also helps students develop creative thinking, critical thinking,
problem-solving, collaborative communication, discovery, initiative, adaptation and cultural
awareness, education (Duban et al., 2018). Implementing STEAM education includes
identifying lesson content, implementing technical designs, designing presentations, and design
implementation. Using this process at the end of the STEAM process, students in the
experimental group had an expanded knowledge base and higher average scores on tests than
the control group.
2. Orientation to deploy primary technology content according to STEAM education
method
According to the 2018 General Education Curriculum, technology is included in primary
education as a compulsory subject in basic education for the first time in Vietnam. The general
goal of the subject is to provide students with basic knowledge about science, technology, and
engineering so that primary school students can adapt to life in the 4.0 era.
STEM/STEAM education in primary schools is often associated with the following
subjects: Nature and society in grades 1, 2, 3; Science in grades 4, 5; Informatics and
Technology in grades 3, 4, 5.
“The content of technology education is wide and diverse, in many different technical and
technological fields. In teaching technology, there are basic, core, and universal contents that all
students must learn. In addition, there are specific and specialized contents to meet the
aspirations and interests of students, under the requirements of each locality and region”
(Ministry of Education and Training, 2018).
In the current general education curriculum, the thought of Technology subject in Crafts
classes 1, 2, 3 is in the art division (arts, music, crafts) without textbooks, only books, practical
and technical instruction for grades 4 and 5 with a duration of 1 period/week. According to
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Circular No.22/2017/TT-BGDDT, a student’s accomplishments must be evaluated as

incomplete, complete, and well-completed by a three-word scale. Due to the nature and
specificity of the subject, Crafts – Engineering in primary school has not received adequate
attention. Homeroom teachers often use the time of this subject to enhance their practice of
maths and literature or teach to complete tasks, but rarely invest time and effort to improve the
quality of teaching the subject, study or through this subject to develop students’ competencies
and qualities.
The Technology program inherits many advantages of the current general education
curriculum in the new general education curriculum. There are many changes in the Technology
program’s content and characteristics, in line with the orientations in the general education
program. International role and trends of technology education. These are capacity development
programs: The technology subject program has all the characteristics of an educational program
that develops students’ competencies and qualities. This approach is an overarching change,
having an overall influence on the objectives, content, methods, organization of teaching, and
subject assessment. The Technology program aims to form and develop technological
capabilities and contribute to forming and developing the essential qualities and general
competencies identified in the Master Program. Technology education at the primary school
level initially forms and develops in students technological competence based on content
circuits about technology and life, technical crafts; arouse interest in learning and understanding
technology. At the end of primary school, students can use several standard technology products
in the family safely and adequately. They can design simple technical handicraft products;
exchange some simple information about technology products within the family, school;
comment about easy technology products; recognize the role of technology in life at home and
school (Ministry of Education and Training, 2020).
The Technology section in Grade 3 – Informatics and Technology is the first technology
section in the elementary students’ educational program. The content of this section provides
elementary students with a primary and initial understanding of technology and life, technology
design, and innovation. The Technology and Life field consists of the folowing topics: Nature
and Technology; Structure and operation principle, usage of some electrical appliances in the
household; The field of design and technology focuses on the Crafts – Engineering section,
which includes: making school supplies, making traffic signs and making toys.
The primary target audience is children from 6 to 11 years old with unintentional attention.
What is new, unexpected, brilliant, unusual easily captures children’s attention without the
effort of will. Primary school students often memorize mechanically due to low language skills.
In children, visual memory is more developed than logical memory. Besides, primary school
students are still amazed by some thinking operations such as comparison, analysis, inference.
Low generalization ability, if any, can only rely on external signs (Hue, 2015). The application
of knowledge of the fields of STEM education will be very abstract and sometimes will make
students feel confused. Teachers should use active, student-centered teaching methods when
teaching. Enhance practical activities so that students have the opportunity to experience and
promote their creativity. Through this process, teachers skillfully integrate humanistic education
contents such as energy-saving awareness, environmental protection, and the sense of
conservation when using household appliances. Besides, teachers can create opportunities for
students to promote their creativity through learning activities when building STEAM topics in
3rd-grade technology as follows:
* Exploiting topics in the 3rd-grade technology section can apply the STEAM educational
model.
Based on the program distribution, the Grade 3 Technology section can group lessons with
similar content into topics to apply the STEAM education model as follows:
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– Topic 1: Structure, operating principles of some household electrical appliances (desk

lamp, electric fans).
– Topic 2: Structure, operating principle of some audio-visual equipment in the family
(radio receivers, television sets).
– Topic 3: Environmental safety technology in the home.
– Topic 4: Techniques of shaping with easy-to-find materials.
With the topics proposed above, the knowledge in the field of STEAM is as follows:
For topics 1, 2, 3:
S: When interacting with technology objects, students practice thinking and acting like
scientists to explore and learn the uses of technological devices in the home. They hypothesize,
identify and predict unsafe situations while using technology. Students can also investigate
more types of technological devices. The way students act as scientists on STEM topics is
mentioned in the work of Kelley (Kelley & Knowles, 2016).
T: Students describe and sketch with drawings on paper the structure and function of
technological devices in the home. They compare and evaluate the advantages and
disadvantages of technological products with the same function.
E: Students express personal views when evaluating the structure and operating principles
of family’s technological products. They describe, sketch, and assemble simulation models of
technological products in the home according to the correct process, ensuring technical and
artistic requirements. Aim is to complete the lesson objectives.
A: Students complete the design from a personal point of view, ensuring decorative arts and
visual arts requirements. On the sense of conservation when using technological products and
the awareness of energy-saving and environmental protection, students develop ideas to revise
the designs of information technological products through questions about satisfaction or desire
to produce current technological products with additional functions to meet user’s requirements.
Students sketch out their wishes and requirements.
M: Students list the necessary tools and equipmens in the design, modeling, and
manufacturing process. They can calculate product costs using recycled materials,
environmentally friendly materials.
For topic 4:
S: As in the above topics, students develop their skills like observing and examining the
characteristics of the crafts related to the topic of the lesson. They study the structure and
working principles of those handicraft products, then present.
T: Students conduct describing, sketching with drawings on paper the structure and
function of the crafts mentioned above, giving personal views to revise the sketches on the
crafts mentioned above. They evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of handmade products
with the same function.
E: Students complete the design and make handmade products according to the requirements
of the lesson for learning and personal needs.
A: Students design to ensure simple elements, suitable for manufacturing reality,
environmentally friendly, functional elements, requirements for visual arts, and decorative arts.
The teacher educates students with the sense of preserving and appreciating the handmade
products created by our group, saving energy, protecting the environment, encouraging students
to come up with ideas to adjust the design of the products. She/He conducts handmade products
to ensure compliance with the actual design and manufacture of that product.
M: Students calculate costs, statistics of necessary tools in the process of designing and
manufacturing products.
Based on other researches, the author proposes the process of teaching technology in
classroom for grade 3 according to the STEAM education model as shown in Figure 1.1:
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Figure 1.1: 3rd-grade technology teaching process

following the STEAM education model for teachers
Source: Authors’ compilation
The process consists of 5 steps:
Step 1: Teacher identifies issues integrated into the lesson topic according to STEAM
education:
In this step, the teacher will perform the following tasks:
– Group lessons with similar content in the program into topics;
– Identify practical problems integrated into the lesson content;
– Identify components of competence that can be formed or fostered when students
complete the topic;
– Elements of art, humanities education can be integrated when implementing the topic;
– Determine knowledge of subjects in the field of STEM education.
Step 2: Design teaching activities according to the criteria of the topic
After giving the criteria and objectives of the topic, the teacher designs teaching activities
to be carried out in that topic, ensuring the requirements for the lesson objectives, forming,
fostering, or promoting students’ technological capabilities.
Step 3: Survey the feasibility of teaching activities designed according to STEAM education
In this step, the teacher examines the feasibility of the teaching activities designed from
step 2 according to the following factors: facilities, students, and time when implementing the
topic by discussing with colleagues in the subject team as a suggestion of another study (Pilecki,
2018), polling students with questions related to the preparation to implement the lesson
content, checking the factors mentioned above. If satisfied, move to step 4; if not, go back to
adjust the criteria set out in step 2 and re-design teaching activities.
Step 4: Organize and guide students to implement the topic
When taking this step, teachers should use modern teaching means and active teaching
methods to attract students’ attention to teaching and learning activities. Especially for warm-up
activities, teachers can use pictures, projectors, models, and objects in combination with active
teaching methods to organize this activity to create curiosity and mood for the students. In that
way, students are eager to participate and study the lesson.
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Step 5: Evaluation
Teacher and students evaluate the products of groups by listening to students presenting
their solutions and products. Teacher will evaluate students’ knowledge and skills in creating
products by observing students’ activities, group activities, worksheets, combined with other
students’ evaluations. The teacher makes the most appropriate conclusions for each group and
individual students, and then students go back to adjust the design of teaching activities to suit
the actual teaching condition.
Figure 1.2: Process of teaching 3rd-grade technology

following the STEAM education model for students
Like engineering design process (Bethke Wendell, 2013; Cunningham, 2017), the procedure
is as shown in Figure 1.2:
Step 1: Students explore and learn about the content of the lesson
Students learn the structure and operating principles of the products that have existed
before. They also learn the requirements of the lesson topic. Students experience learning
through collecting information and data, observing models, experimenting, investigating
phenomena, and developing their cognitive abilities to explore new concepts. The teacher
encourages students to explore necessary background knowledge and provides tools and
materials for their experiential activities. Teacher corrects misconceptions that students may
encounter in the discovery process. Students describe the structure of those products on paper.
They think and revise those descriptions to be environmentally friendly, saving materials,
convenient use, and understanding actions in implementing the theme to form and develop a
personality.
Step 2: Select the solution, sketch the design
In this step, students choose solutions according to the criteria of the lesson topic given by
the teachers, then outline the design from their point of view.
Step 3: Share and discuss
After completing their sketch, students share with their group to unify the group’s design,
share and discuss with other groups to discover the strengths and weaknesses of their group to
adjust for suitability. Then they agree on the design of their group to prepare the necessary tools
and equipment for the product manufacturing process.
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Step 4: Make the product

Students use the tools and equipments prepared after performing step 3. They experience
practical activities, model observation, experimentation, and investigation to explain phenomena
and develop self-perception to explore new concepts. Teacher plays a role as consultants to give
students comments or correct their activities.
Step 5: Product report
Students report their group’s products, share and discuss to compare their products with
existing products and their classmates’ products according to the criteria of the lesson topic.
They draw advantages and disadvantages in their group’s products. Since then, teacher has
adjusted the design of teaching activities in step 2 in the process.
3. Method
According to the author, implementing the topic “making toys” in the 3rd-grade technology
section on the approach of STEAM education is a combination of humanities education and
principles and concepts in building engineering designs into subjects. Teachers in the STEM
field are designing a course to guide students to make wind chimes from recycled materials.
3.1. How to proceed
Trainee students of two classes K19.1 and K19.2 of the Department of Primary Education –
Preschool, Hai Phong University, conducted a pedagogical internship at Tran Thanh Ngo
Primary School, Kien An District, Hai Phong. They performed topic 4: “Shaping techniques
with easy-to-find materials,” specifically instructing students to make wind chimes. With the
permission of the school administration, six 3rd-grade classes were divided into two groups:
Class 3A1, 3A2, 3A3 is the control class, class 3A4, 3A5, 3A6 is the experimental class. The
number of students in each class is about 40 students, divided into nine groups of 4 and 1 group of 5.
Internship students in classes 3A1, 3A2, 3A3 performed the lecture “making wind chimes”
in the usual way.
Internship students in classes 3A4, 3A5, 3A6 performed the lecture “making wind chimes”
aligned with the STEAM education model.
In order to conduct a lecture on making windchimes according to the STEAM education
model, students will conduct the lecture within two lessons. Each lesson takes place in 1 week.
* To complete the topic, students perform the following steps of the process:
Step 1: Teacher identifies issues that integrate into the lesson topic according to STEAM
education
In this part, trainee teacher studies and prepares words at home. To perform step 1, teacher
needs to perform the following tasks:
– Group the making of school supplies and toys in the 3rd-grade Technology program into
the theme: “Make wind chimes with environmentally friendly materials.”
– Identify practical problems: What makes wind chimes’ sound? What are the properties of
sound? What are the structure and working principles of wind chimes? How to make wind
chimes with recycled and environmentally friendly materials? How to integrate the content of
distinguishing organic and inorganic waste and limit plastic waste into the lesson? Educating
children with a sense of environmental protection contributes to Vietnamese personalities in the
new era from an early age.
– Form or foster capacity for technology awareness, technology communication, technology
assessment, and technical design.
– The elements of art and humanities education can be integrated when implementing the topic:
+ Shaping part: Reasonable and balanced layout
+ Art decoration part: Harmonious colors
+ Humanities education part: Actions and attitudes of students in the process of implementing
the topic
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– Determine knowledge of subjects in the field of STEM education:

+ S: Explore and explain the structure and working principle of wind chimes.
+ T: Describe, sketch with drawings on paper the structure of wind chimes. Give a personal
opinion to adjust the sketches of the wind chimes’ structure to suit the actual assembly conditions
and in an environmentally friendly direction. Evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of
wind chimes that our team designed and manufactured with other wind chimes.
+ E: Finalize the design, assemble and complete the wind chimes according to the design to
ensure that students can use the product as toys and learning materials.
+ A:
– Forming part: Prepare plastic paper cups to form a rotating cylindrical bell with different sizes
of large bottoms and tiny bottoms. The wires are made by used straws interspersed with metal
particles, creating a layout that is not boring and creates an aesthetic for the wind chimes.
Decorative art: Choose metal straws and beads with different colors, alternately arrange
straws and metal beads to create vibrant colors for wind chimes.
Humanistic education part: Edit the design of wind chimes to suit the actual conditions of
the assembly process and use recycled and environmentally friendly materials, understand the
meaning of separating organic and inorganic waste, put it in the correct trash can to facilitate the
recycling process, contribute to the protection of the environment habitat.
M:
Calculate the location of the metal particles so that when the wind affects the bell wire, the
metal particles will collide with each other, creating the best sound.
Calculate the cost, make statistics of the necessary tools in designing and manufacturing
products.
Step 2: Design teaching activities according to the criteria of the topic
– Activity 1: Startup
+ Prepare video, lyrics “Sound of life”.
+ Prepare pictures and models of some types of wind chimes.
– Activity 2: Pose problems associated with the practice for students
+ “In life, there are countless sounds, and sounds make our lives wonderful, even the wind
playing under the trees makes funny sounds. And now let us see what other sounds the wind makes”.
+ Show students a video about wind chimes.
+ “Do you want to create lovely wind chimes as you have seen in the video? We will
explore the structure, how to make the wind chime sound, and think about how to design and
manufacture the group’s wind chime from environmentally friendly materials to discover the
properties of the wind chimes, properties of sound”.
– Activity 3:
+ Design a table of criteria to evaluate the sketch of wind chimes with environmentally
friendly materials.
Point
Evaluation Criteria Requirements Maximum Obtain
– Is the design easy to implement?
– Is the design suitable for actual conditions?
Design content 4
– Does the design need adjustment after having comments from
classmates and the teacher?
– Is it environmentally friendly?
– Are recycled materials used?
Materials for making wind chimes 2
– Are disposable utensils used?
– Are they easy to find?
Group collaboration and presentations – Do team members actively contribute ideas? 4
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Point
Evaluation Criteria Requirements Maximum Obtain
– Do they distinguish between organic and inorganic waste?
– Do students understand environmentally friendly actions?
– Is the presentation clear and easy to understand?
Table 1.1 Evaluation criteria for wind chimes design by enviromentally friendly materials
+ Design a test to assess students’ cognition
Group:………….. Full name:………….. Grade:…………………….
Write the group’s correct answers in the table below:
Questions Answers
What parts does a wind chime consist? What is the effect of each part?
What are the advantages and disadvantages of the wind chimes that you have known?
What are the differences between the group’s wind chimes and the wind chimes of other
groups and other wind chimes that you know?
Does the design of your group’s wind chimes ensure the following elements: simple,
suitable for installation conditions, environmentally friendly?
List the recycled materials your group used to make wind chimes.
List the actions that your group has taken to protect the environment in the process of
designing and manufacturing eco-friendly wind chimes.
List the necessary tools in the process of designing and manufacturing wind chimes.
Calculate the cost of the group’s wind chimes.
+ Design evaluation criteria for students to self-assess and teachers to evaluate students
Students rate their group’s products according to the following votes:
Report product evaluation sheet
(Used for students self-assessment – peer assessment)
School:................................................ ..................Group name: ............ Class: ........ .....
Product’s name:.............................................. ................................. .................................
Evaluation team: ..............................................................................................................
Day month Year:............................................ ................................. ................................
Circle the icon (group) you want to vote for.
Levels achieved
Criteria Vote
 Well-completed  Complete  Incomplete
1. List the List the most knowledge, skills, and List some of the knowledge, Do not list the knowledge, 
requirements to be experiences that have accumulated skills, and experiences that skills, and experiences that 
met in the process of when making wind chimes. have accumulated when have accumulated when 
making products making wind chimes. making wind chimes.
2. List the steps to be List the advantages and disadvantages Present the team’s design Do not come up with a 
taken in the process of the design of the wind chimes. process to fully ensure the process for designing and
of creating the Present the design process of the team criteria of the topic, such as assembling environmentally 
product to fully ensure the criteria of the topic environmentally friendly, friendly wind chimes.
such as environmentally friendly, feasible in the assembly 
feasible in the assembly process. process.
3. Unique and – The idea of making wind chimes is not Use the idea of making wind Do not come up with an idea 
creative ideas like the wind chimes that have been chimes that have been to make a wind chime yet. 
met before. exposed to before. 
– Simple design, suitable for actual
assembly.
4. Materials for Environmentally friendly, using recycled Environmentally friendly, do Do not use environmentally 
making wind chimes materials. Material savings. not use recycled materials. friendly materials, do not 

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Levels achieved
Criteria Vote
 Well-completed  Complete  Incomplete
Material savings. use recycled materials. No
material savings.
5. Product Harmonious, vivid colors, balanced Harmonious, vivid colors, The colors are not in 
appearance product structure. Unique, innovative balanced product structure. harmony, and the artistic 
products, applying new ideas, new Unique and creative requirements are not met. 
solutions. products, but not yet
applied new ideas and new
solutions.
6. Present the – Present the main content fully, in – Present the main content – The content presented is 
design, present the detail, logically and rigorously, relatively fully, logically, not complete and accurate,
product logically, associated with the topic. associated with the topic. not associated with the 
attractively, – Unique and creative ideas, vivid and – Have some unique, topic.
creatively attractive introductory content, creative ideas. – Not showing creativity.
meaning to express creativity.
Table 1.2. Report product evaluation sheet
Trainee teachers evaluate the results of students after implementing the topic STEAM:
Making wind chimes using environmentally friendly materials using the following table:
School:................................................ ................................. ............................................
Trainee’s name and surname: ...........................................................................................
Product’s name: .............................................. ................................. ...............................
Observation: ............................... Object:..........................................................................
Class:........... Group:..........................................................................................................
Day/Month/Year:...............................................................................................................
Assess the level of development of students
Numerical Review
Performance criteria of students after completing the STEAM topic
order
Very clear Clear Unclear
Analyze and determine the goals and tasks of the topic
1 “Manufacturing wind chimes with environmentally
friendly materials”.
Propose research-oriented questions for the design and
manufacture of wind chimes, ensuring the goal:
Discovering the properties of sound from
2
environmentally friendly bell materials. During the
assembly process, correctly distinguish organic and
inorganic waste and put it in the right place.
Discover new elements, creativity in the design of the
3
team and others.
Acquire input from teachers and friends, through the
assembly process, draw advantages and disadvantages
4
in their group’s design, revise the design, and adjust
their group’s product suitable for the future.
Compare and comment on the proposed solutions in the
5
design of the team and others.
6 Present products logically, attractively, creatively
7 Unique and creative ideas.
The product creates the proper lesson topic, ensuring the
8
technical and artistic requirements.
Table 1.3. Assessment table of student’s learning results
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Step 3: Survey the feasibility of teaching activities designed according to STEAM education
In this step, the teacher examines the feasibility of the teaching activities designed from
step 2 by consulting with colleagues in the professional group and administrators at school.
Check that the teaching facilities in the class, such as computers, projectors, the number of
desks and chairs, paper, and pens, are enough to divide groups when implementing the topic and
exploring the preparation of supplies and equipment of students. Based on the existing physical
facilities and students’ conditions, the teacher determines the time to carry out the above
activities.
Step 4: Organize and guide students to implement the topic
The teacher uses teaching aids available in the classroom and various pictures, photos, and
real-life models combined with active teaching methods to deploy the activities designed from
step 2 for students.
Step 5: Evaluation
The teacher uses the evaluation sheets to evaluate students, synthesize and draw
conclusions suitable for each individual and group of students.
* To complete the topic, students perform the following steps of the process:
Step 1: Students explore and learn about the content of the lesson
In this step, students learn the structure and operating principle of wind chimes they have
been exposed to before or wind chimes in the teacher’s video. Exchange and discuss with
classmates in the group how to make the sound of wind chimes. The team leader synthesizes
opinions on the structure, operating principle, materials for making wind chimes, and how to
make the sound of wind chimes.
Step 2: Select the solution, sketch the design
Individuals in the group come up with ideas for their group’s wind chimes design. The team
leader synthesizes ideas and agrees on the design of the group’s “wind chime made of
environmentally friendly materials”. They also have the intention of materials for the wind chime.
Following the guidance of the teacher, students have achievements as shown in Picture 1:
Picture 1. A sample of a group’s design activity and result

Step 3: Share and discuss
Each group assigns a member to present the sketch in front of the class. The rest of the
groups will listen to the presentation, make suggestions, and draw experiences for their group
based on Table 1.1 that the teacher has proposed. The group listen to other groups’ comments
and adjust their design to suit the actual conditions and lesson requirements. The teacher will
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select a few feasible designs closest to the lesson content to deploy and list the necessary
equipments to prepare for the assembly stage in the next lesson.
Step 4: Make the product
Students do this step in lesson 2. Students practice preparing their items and accessories and
assemble windchimes according to the design selected and adjusted from step 3.
– Make the base of the bell, punch small holes to attach the bell wire as shown in Picture 2.1.
Picture 2.1. A sample of products’ components

– Attach accessories to pre-prepared wire segments as shown in Picture 2.2.

– Decorate and finish products to meet the requirements of art as shown in Picture 2.3.
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– Test the product by placing it in front of the fan to make the bell sound as shown in
Picture 3.1.
Picture 3.1. Test the products’ working

– Adjust and perfect the design as shown in Picture 3.2.
Picture 3.2. Adjust the design

– Students synthesize what they need to know after finishing the lesson “Making wind
chimes with environmentally friendly materials” through a cognitive assessment test of students.
Step 5: Product report
Students compare their group’s products with existing products and their classmants’
products according to the criteria of the lesson topic and draw advantages and disadvantages in
their group’s products. They revised the design and process of creating an eco-friendly wind chime.
After completing the experimental process, based on the design records of teaching
activities of groups of students performed in the control and experimental classes, based on the
evaluation results of the reported product evaluation form (Used for students self-assessment –
peer assessment) and the reported product evaluation form (Used for students to practice
assessment of students), we have statistics for the following results:
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Table 1.4 Results of Reported Product Assessment Sheet (students self-assessment – peer assessment)
Class Well done Complete Unfinished Not reached
Criterion 1: State the goals to be achieved in designing and manufacturing wind chimes with environmentally friendly materials.
3A1 3 4 2 1
3A2 4 3 2 1
3A3 4 3 3 0
3A4 5 4 1 0
3A5 6 4 0 0
3A6 7 3 0 0
Criterion 2: Statistics of steps to be taken to design and manufacture wind chimes with environmentally friendly materials.
3A1 3 2 3 2
3A2 3 3 2 2
3A3 4 3 2 1
3A4 5 4 1 0
3A5 6 3 1 0
3A6 6 4 0 0
Criterion 3: Materials for making wind chimes
3A1 2 4 2 2
3A2 3 4 2 1
3A3 4 4 1 1
3A4 5 5 0 0
3A5 6 4 0 0
3A6 7 3 0 0
Criterion 4: Product appearance
3A1 4 3 1 2
3A2 2 5 1 2
3A3 3 4 1 2
3A4 6 4 0 0
3A5 5 5 0 0
3A6 7 3 0 0
Criterion 5: Present the design and product logically, attractively, and creatively.
3A1 4 5 1 0
3A2 2 6 1 1
3A3 4 5 1 0
3A4 6 4 0 0
3A5 6 4 0 0
3A6 7 3 0 0
From table 1.4, results show that:
– Criterion 1: State the goals in designing and manufacturing wind chimes using
environmentally friendly materials.
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– Criterion 2: Statistics of steps to be taken in the process of designing and manufacturing

wind chimes with environmentally friendly materials.
For this criterion, the number of groups that did not pass and complete tasks in the control
classes was higher than that of the experimental classes. This result accounts for the proper
implementation of STEM topics to students in the experiment group. Students have made
fundamental changes in their understanding of environmental protection issues by using
recycled materials, distinguishing between organic and inorganic wastes, and putting them in
the right places, for disposal and recycling. In addition, with the teacher’s advice, students can
express their aesthetic abilities through designs and adjust them to suit the actual conditions.
– Criterion 3: Materials for making wind chimes.
Groups of students in experimental classes 3A4, 3A5, 3A6 all chose environmentally
friendly materials, compared to 1 – 2 groups who did not choose materials in the control group.
This result proves the appropriateness of the measure of consciousness education in
implementing the topic of STEAM.
– Criterion 4: Product appearance.
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– Criterion 5: Present the design and product logically, attractively, and creatively.
For criteria 4 and 5, the experimental class proved to be superior to the control class. Such
results caused by implementing the steps in the STEAM education process, groups of trainees
have integrated art education and humanities education into teaching and learning activities.
These activities make students’ products in the experimental classes meet the requirements of
shaping and decorative arts more than those of the control classes. They felt more confident in
presenting logically due to their knowledge of relevant absorbed in learning.
As for the results of assessing the student’s development level after completing the topic:
“Making wind chimes with environmentally friendly materials” assessed by groups of students,
we obtained the following results:
Table 1.5. Results of the assessment of student’s development level
after completing the STEAM topic (Teacher evaluates students)
Assess student development after completing the STEAM topic
Class
Very clear Clear Unclear
Criteria 1, 2, 3
3A1 50% 35% 15%
3A2 55% 30% 15%
3A3 54% 34% 12%
3A4 70% 25% 5%
3A5 65% 30% 5%
3A6 75% 25% 0%
Criteria 4, 5
3A1 40% 40% 20%
3A2 45% 40% 15%
3A3 30% 50% 20%
3A4 80% 15% 5%
3A5 70% 25% 5%
3A6 75% 20% 5%
Criteria 6, 7, 8
3A1 35% 55% 10%
3A2 34% 50% 10%
3A3 34% 53% 13%
3A4 65% 35% 0%
3A5 70% 30% 0%
3A6 75% 25% 0%
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Criteria 1, 2, 3 refer to students’ ability and understanding in science, technology,

engineering, and mathematics. The statistics show that students in the experimental class have
made clear progress in self-study and self-discovery in STEM subjects compared to the control class.
Criteria 4, 5 and criteria 6, 7, 8 refer to the formation and development of students’ soft
skills. These skills are gradually formed in learning STEAM topics when teachers integrate
elements of art or humanities education. Comparing students’ development levels in the
experimental and control classes shows that the experimental class has a more explicit
expression of soft skill development than the control class. Expressed in the percentage of
“Clear” and “Very clear” of the control class is in the range of 30 – 50% and for the
experimental class, this rate is much higher than 25 – 75%. Experimental results show that
students increase their understanding of science, such as material selection, similar to the other
studies (Graham & Brouillette, 2016).
CONCLUSION
This study focuses on letting students experience the process: “Making wind chimes with
environmentally friendly materials” through building the STEAM topic in Grade 3 Technology
subject of the 2018 general school program. Adding art and humanities education elements to
teaching subjects in the STEM field creates a lively classroom atmosphere, attracting attention
and more excitement for students when studying subjects in the field since natural science is
inherently dry and unattractive. In addition, the integration of humanities education into the
teaching process contributes to forming and fostering the capacity and qualities of Vietnamese
people in the new era, as mentioned in the 2018 general education program.
Aside from the positive results mentioned above, we recognize that much work remains to
improve teaching and learning qualities in Grade 3 Technology. It is necessary to supplement
and foster qualified teachers assigned to teaching technology in primary schools (according to
the current educational program, the homeroom teacher is assigned to teach Crafts –
Engineering). If assigned to a classroom teacher or a teacher that undertake other subjects
concurrently, there should be a specific and consistent training plan from the Ministry –
Department – School – Class level. Train teachers specialized in teaching Technology in
Primary Schools. In addition, encourage students to self-study, raise awareness about STEM
subjects, and improve their soft skills.
Conflict of interests
The authors have not declared any conflicts of interests.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The authors thank for the enthusiastic support of the Faculty of Primary and Preschool
Education, Hai Phong University and Tran Thanh Ngo Primary School, Kien An, Hai Phong.
Authors’ contributions
All authors contributed equally to this work. All authors commented on the manuscript at
all stages. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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About the authors

– Nguyen Hong Duong is a master – lecturer at the Department of Primary and Preschool
Education, Hai Phong University. One of the leading Primary and Preschool teacher training
faculties in Vietnam with more than 60 years of construction and development. Her research
publications are in the areas related to Primary education methodology, Craft-Technology
teaching methods in Elementary, STEM/STEAM education. Master Nguyen Hong Duong
contributes to the training of Primary Teachers as a lecturer and as a guide for students to carry
out scientific research projects and graduation theses.
– Nguyen Hoai Nam is an Associate Professor of Education of Hanoi National University
of Education (HNUE). He graduated with bachelor, master, and doctorate degrees in Physics
from Hanoi National University of Education. Nam is working as Vice Dean of the Faculty of
Technology Education (FTE), HNUE. He also works as a visiting lecturer for the Faculty of
Primary Education, HNUE. His research publications in ICT are in education, technology
education, and STEM/STEAM education. Assoc.Prof.Dr. Nam contributes to the graduate
education of FTE as a lecturer and supervisor for Master Thesis and Doctoral Dissertation in
Philosophy and Methodology of Technology Education.
477
DEVELOPING THE COMPETENCE TO APPLY CHEMICAL KNOWLEDGE

AND SKILLS FOR 10TH GRADE STUDENTS OF SOME HIGH SCHOOLS
IN NAM DINH PROVINCE
Vu Thi Thu Hoai*1, Nguyen Thi Dung1
Abstract: The article presents the findings of research on the current situation of developing the
ability to apply knowledge and skills for students in teaching chemistry in some high schools. 24
chemistry teachers and 500 10th grade students from high schools in Nam Dinh province,
Vietnam, made up the research sample. According to the findings, the majority of students have
an average or low ability to apply their knowledge and skills. Furthermore, there are considerable
discrepancies in students’ ability to apply their knowledge and skills between groups of students
in rural and urban areas.
Keywords: competence, competence to apply knowledge and skills, 10th grade students, situation
INTRODUCTION
In recent years, competence development for students has been emphasized as an important
trend in education in countries all over the world, including Vietnam. It is critical to innovate
high school education in the direction of ability development, with an emphasis on developing
the ability to apply knowledge to address practical issues and situations. Students have the
ability to remember and grasp knowledge more profoundly through the application of acquired
knowledge and skills, as well as the ability to creatively transform knowledge and make
learning more meaningful. As a result, students will be better able to navigate and develop their
future careers. Many scientists and educators across the world, as well as in Vietnam, have been
conducting researches on how to improve learners’ ability to apply knowledge. Zhou, Shen, &
Tian (2010) conducted study and found that using task-based learning in chemistry experiment
teaching improves students’ ability to seek truth and develops their critical thinking skills. In
2012, Zhou et al. continued to investigate and propose to integrate WebQuest in teaching
chemistry to high school students in order to develop their ability and critical thinking.
According to Rasto, Muhidin, & Islamy (2021), cooperation and knowledge sharing have a
favorable and significant impact on ability development, and ability is critical for student
learning performance. Nguyen & Hoang (2013) conducted study and offered certain approaches
in Vietnam to improve students’ ability to apply chemical knowledge through utilizing practical
exercises in the Organic Chemistry part. Other authors in the direction of research to develop
students’ ability to apply chemical knowledge through the use of practical exercises, integrated
thematic exercises (Pham, 2015; Le & Dang 2018; Nguyen & Tran 2018; Ha & Do 2018, etc.).
In 2016, Pham & Hoang conducted research and proposed the use of organic chemistry
experiments in research-oriented teaching. Vu & Pham (2016) and Nguyen & Chu (2020)
defined viewpoints and processes of integrated teaching, and developed a number of integrated
subjects for teaching. Furthermore, Luu, Vu & Tran (2020) investigated the development of
students’ ability to apply knowledge and skills through STEM teaching with the topic “Vinegar
production from sugar and fruit”.
In testing and assessing high school students’ ability development and ability to apply
knowledge, the author Nguyen & Hoang (2015), Pham & Hoang (2015) conducted a research
and used questions and exercises containing “issues”, “situations”, and associated with practice.
* Corresponding Author: Vu Thi Thu Hoai; Email Address: hoaivtt@vnu.edu.vn

1 University of Education – Vietnam National University
478
Above studies concentrate on defining theoretical basis of competence, the ability to apply
chemical knowledge, practical exercises, integrated teaching, STEM teaching, and assessment
forms. The use of ability assessment to propose strategies to improve students’ ability to apply
chemical knowledge in practice yields impressive results.
The goal of teaching capacity development in high schools requires students to cultivate
knowledge, apply knowledge and skills to solve problems in learning, research and practice.
From there, students see the meaning of chemical knowledge for human life and orient their
careers. Therefore, it is necessary to form and develop the ability to apply knowledge and skills
for students right from the 10th grade. The effectiveness of teaching capacity development
depends on many objective and subjective factors. In order to clarify the current situation of
teaching high school students to develop the competence, the paper conducted a survey of 24
chemistry teachers and 500 10th grade students in some high schools in rural and urban in Nam
Dinh province in the school year 2020-2021. These results are a basis for us to propose some
measures to develop the ability to apply knowledge and skills for students in teaching chemistry
at the high school level in subsequent studies.
CONTENT
1. The concepts of competence and the competence to apply knowledge and skills
1.1. The ability
There are many proposals by scientists about the concept of competence in different
categories. The definition proposed by De Ketele (1996) mentions competence as an organized
set of capabilities (activity), acting on the contents in a certain type of situation to solve a
problem. According to this definition, competence is described as the ability to perform a
particular task or activity according to predetermined achieved standards. De Bueger-Vander
Borght C (1996) argues that competence refers to the state of having the capacity to perform an
activity, task or job function. When a person is competent enough to do something, he or she
has attained a state of competence that is recognizable and verifiable for a particular community
of practitioners. Studies of Weinert (2001), OECD (2002), and Denyse Tremblay (2002) all
agree with the concept of ability as a capability (ability, capacity, possibility). Foreign authors,
on the other hand, use the term ability to refer to the ability to “act effectively”, “respond
effectively”, and “act, to succeed and progress” and “come to a solution”.
In the paper, competence is defined as a personal attribute that is formed and developed
through inherent qualities as well as the learning and training process, allowing people to
synthesize knowledge, skills, and other personal attributes such as interest, belief, will, etc. to
perform a specific type of activity while achieving the desired result under specific conditions
(Vietnamese General Education Program, 2018). As can be seen, competence has two
characteristics: the ability to demonstrate and disclose itself through actions, and the ability to
assure efficient operation in order to achieve the desired results.
1.2. The competence to apply knowledge and skills
According to Nguyen & Dao (2014), competence to apply knowledge is the ability of
learners themselves to solve problems quickly and effectively by applying acquired knowledge
in practical situations and activities to understand the world around them and be able to
transform it. The competence to apply knowledge demonstrates human qualities and personality
in the process of operation to satisfy the need to possess knowledge. The competence to apply
learned knowledge and skills, one of the three important components of chemical competence,
is mentioned in the General Education Program in Chemistry (2018) as the ability to apply
knowledge, skills learned to solve some problems in learning, scientific research and some
specific situations in practice. Above bases, we argue that the competence to apply knowledge
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and skills is the ability of learners themselves to mobilize and use knowledge, skills,
experiences, attitudes, and interests, etc. to effectively solve problems related to chemistry in
learning as well as in real life.
2. Structure and expression of the competence to apply knowledge and skills
Based on defining the concepts of competence, competence to apply knowledge and skills,
and assessment by capacity, we build the capacity structure. Applying knowledge and skills of
students in teaching chemistry: (1) General Education Program 2018 of the Ministry of
Education and Training of Vietnam; (2) The general chemistry curriculum has identified three
core competencies that need developing for students in general chemistry teaching: the ability to
perceive chemistry, the ability to understand the natural world under chemical perspective,
ability to apply knowledge and skills learned; (3) According to the OECD, the goal of
developing the capacity to apply knowledge and skills in teaching Chemistry in high schools of
many countries around the world is determined as forming attitudes about the development of
scientific techniques, accelerate the knowledge and skills of chemistry necessary to create
products suitable for the modern technological and digital age (OECD, 2009). Based on the
above scientific bases, the article builds a capacity structure to apply knowledge and skills in the
direction of simultaneously developing competencies related to chemical thinking and chemical
perception; concretize the evaluation criteria in each high school chemistry teaching activity.
Therefore, the research team proposes a structure of high school student’s ability to apply
chemical knowledge and skills, including 5 component competencies: 1– Ability to apply
knowledge and skills to identify and solve learning challenges and practical issues; 2– Ability to
analyze, synthesize, and apply appropriate knowledge and skills to solve academic and practical
issues; 3– Ability to critique, evaluate the impact of a practical problem and propose methods,
measures, and models to solve the problem; 4– Ability to apply knowledge and skills to
recognize and solve issues in both known and unfamiliar situations; 5– Ability to orient oneself
to a job and behave in situations involving oneself, family, community, and sustainable
development of society.
To clarify the structure of the ability to apply knowledge and skills, we identify and
propose 10 manifestations corresponding to 10 assessment criteria of the component abilities
in the aforementioned structure as the basis for developing survey forms to assess
students’ability to teach chemistry.
Table 1. Criteria for assessing students’ ability to apply knowledge and skills in chemistry
(For teachers to evaluate students and students to self-assess)
Criteria Content
No.1 Identify the learning and practical issues that need to be solved
No.2 Categorize and systematize knowledge; choose appropriate chemical knowledge to solve the given issues
No.3 Gather and analyze information related to learning and practical issues
No.4 Solve situations and issues that arise throughout learning and practical activities.
No.5 Apply knowledge and skills to explain practical chemistry-related issues
No.6 Apply chemical knowledge to critique and assess the impact of a practical issues
No.7 Apply chemical knowledge and interdisciplinary knowledge to explain, assess the impact of a practical issue and offer some
solutions
No.8 Apply knowledge and skills to solve issues in both known and unfamiliar situations
No.9 Create new situations, actively discuss with friends and teachers, and proceed to solve those situations
No.10 Behave appropriately in situations involving health issues of themselves, their families and the community in accordance
with the requirements of sustainable social development and environmental protection
Based on the structure and manifestations of students’ competence to apply knowledge and
skills, teachers can use some or all of the above criteria with degree evaluation depending on
each problem, each practical situation. Depending on the object of the student to design a table
480
of criteria to evaluate the competence to apply knowledge and skills to ensure relevance,
accuracy, and science (Table 1). To construct rank of assessment, teachers can rely on the skill
scale of Dreyfus & Dreyfus (1980), SOLO’s (Biggs & Collis, 1982), or his students’ version of
Bloom’s classification, research, and repair (Anderson et al., 2001).
In this paper, the criteria for assessing the ability to apply knowledge and skills are
described at four levels: level 1 – Unsatisfactory (1 point), level 2 – Average (2 points), level 3 –
Fair (3 points), level 4 – Good (4 points). Below, we illustrate the performance description of
some evaluation criteria:
Criteria 1. Identify the learning and practical issues that need to be solved.
Level 1: Not yet identified learning issues, natural occurrences, and practical chemical
applications that need to be solved.
Level 2: Identified learning issues, natural occurrences, and practical chemical applications
that need to be solved in some simple and familiar situations.
Level 3: Identified learning issues, natural occurrences, practical chemical applications that
need to be solved in simple situations and some more complex situations.
Level 4: Identified learning issues, natural occurrences, practical chemical applications that
need to be solved in most situations.
Criteria 5. Apply knowledge and skills to explain practical chemistry-related issues.
Level 1: Not yet applied knowledge and skills to explain practical chemistry-related issues.
Level 2: Applied knowledge and skills to explain some simple practical chemistry-related
issues.
Level 3: Applied knowledge and skills to explain simple and some more complex practical
chemistry-related issues.
Level 4: Fully applied knowledge and skills to explain most practical chemistry-related
issues.
Criteria 10. Behave appropriately in situations involving health issues of themselves, their
families and the community in accordance with the requirements of sustainable social
development and environmental protection.
Level 1: Not yet behaved appropriately in situations involving health issues of themselves,
their families and the community in accordance with the requirements of sustainable social
development and environmental protection.
Level 2: Initially gave some appropriate behavior in some situations related to daily life,
food, health, medicine, environment, etc. to ensure the health of themselves, their family,
community and sustainable social development and environmental protection.
Level 3: Behaved appropriately in a variety of situations involving daily life, food, health,
medicine, the environment, etc. to ensure the health of themselves, their family, community and
sustainable development of society and environmental protection.
Level 4: Always have appropriate behavior in all situations related to daily life, food,
health, medicine, environment, etc. to ensure the health of themselves, their family, community
and sustainable development of society and environmental protection.
3. The situation of teaching to develop the students’ competence to apply knowledge
and skills in some high schools in Nam Dinh province
3.1. Purpose and content of the survey
In this study, a questionnaire survey conducted in 04 high schools (Nguyen Khuyen, Ngo
Quyen schools – Nam Dinh City, Nam Truc, Nguyen Du schools – Nam Truc district) in Nam
Dinh Province include 24 chemistry teachers and 500 students, assessing current situation of
teaching to develop the competence to apply knowledge and skills for high school students.
Survey data is analyzed to clarify the following major issues:
481
– The level of teachers’ involvement and understanding about teaching to develop

competence in general and in chemistry;
– Methods that teachers use to form and assess the development of students’ competence to
apply knowledge and skills in teaching chemistry;
– Situation of students’ competence to apply knowledge and skills through assessments of
teachers and students.
3.2. Results of teachers’ survey
The survey results of 24 chemistry teachers from the 04 high schools as follows:
Figure 1. The role of teaching to develop students’ Figure 2. Percentage of teachers using methods to
competence to apply knowledge and skills assess students’ competence
According to the results in Figure 1, 61.3% of teachers believe that teaching develops the
competence to apply knowledge and skills to help students learn effectively or even very
effectively (33.9%), help students easily understand the lesson, absorb the lesson quickly,
deepen and expand their knowledge; create a lively classroom environment, stimulate learning
for students; improve activeness in learning; train logical thinking, problem-solving skills, etc.
for students. There are 4.8% of teachers who believe that teaching to develop the ability to apply
knowledge and skills have little learning effect for students – this rate is negligible, and no teacher
denies the effectiveness of teaching to develop students’ ability to apply knowledge and skills.
The data given in Figure 2 demonstrate that more than 90.0% of teachers analyze students’
ability using the Q&A method and written test methods, with 79.2% of teachers using this
observation method and 58.3% using the assessment method using learning products. Other
methods are utilized less frequently; particularly, 37.5% of teachers use a combination of
assessment methods through academic records and student peer-assessment. The student
self-assessment method is rarely used and only 20.8% of teachers use this method. As can be
observed, teachers continue to assess students’ ability mostly using qualitative methods; there
are no assessment sheets based on criteria with defined levels of the needed ability to develop
for students. As a result, combining quantitative assessment methods is rarely used.
Table 2. The level of teachers’ involvement in the formation and development of students’ competence
Always Sometimes Rarely Never
Students’ ability Mean SD Rank
(%) (%) (%) (%)
Problem solving-creativity 66.7 25.0 8.3 0.0 3.58 0.65 3
Chemistry practice 29.2 58.3 12.5 0.0 3.17 0.64 4
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Always Sometimes Rarely Never

Students’ ability Mean SD Rank
(%) (%) (%) (%)
Chemical perception 91.7 8.3 0.0 0.0 3.92 0.28 1
Natural world understanding from a chemical perspective 25.0 54.2 20.8 0.0 3.04 0.69 5
Application of acquired knowledge and experience 70.8 29.2 0.0 0.0 3.71 0.46 2
Table 2 shows the competence to perceive chemistry and apply knowledge and skills most
interested in chemistry teachers. Thus, teachers appreciate the role of this capacity in teaching.
The chemistry curriculum in 2018 identifies: The competence to understand the natural world
from a chemical perspective is identified as a core competency that needs developing for
students. However, Table 2 shows that this capacity has not been interested in teaching
chemistry, there are 20.8% of teachers answered that they rarely care about this competence.
Despite positive teacher evaluation ratings on the significance of teaching to develop
students’ ability to apply knowledge and skills, we find the following findings when we look at
teachers’ perspectives on the ability to apply knowledge and skills, as shown in Table 3:
Table 3. Teachers’ perspectives on the concept of students’ competence to apply knowledge and skills
Competence to apply knowledge and skills Agree
The competence to apply acquired knowledge to solve questions and exercises. 12.5%
The comptence to apply acquired knowledge and skills to solve learning problems. 29.2%
The competence to apply acquired knowledge and skills to solve practical problems. 25.0%
The competence to apply acquired knowledge and skills to solve some issues in learning, scientific research and some specific 91.7%
situations in practice.
According to the result shown in Table 3, the majority of teachers (91.7%) believe that the
competence to apply knowledge and skills is the ability to apply acquired knowledge and skills
to solve some issues in learning, scientific study, and some specific situations in practice. This
is also the most comprehensive explanation of this ability. Table 3 also shows that a substantial
percentage of teachers have an inadequate understanding of the concept of competence to apply
knowledge and skills (12.5% to 29.2%). This demonstrates the need of having a strategy in
place to foster and train teachers to fully understand the theoretical basis of general and specific
abilities in chemistry.
Table 4. Teachers’ assessment of the effectiveness of teaching methods to develop students’
competence to apply knowledge and skills
Teaching methods Very effective Effective Less effective Not effective Mean SD Rank
(%) (%) (%) (%)
STEM teaching 16.6 66.7 12.5 4.2 2.96 0.69 5
Project teaching 20.8 58.4 20.8 0.0 3.00 0.66 4
Problem solving teaching 41.7 58.3 0.0 0.0 3.42 0.50 1
Group teaching 12.5 87.5 0.0 0.0 3.13 0.34 3
Four-corner teaching 8.4 58.3 33.3 0.0 2.75 0.61 7
Using practical exercises 20.8 79.2 0.0 0.0 3.21 0.41 2
Using presentations & 0.0 16.6 29.2 54.2 1.62 0.77 8
conversations
Experiential learning 8.3 66.7 25.0 0.0 2.83 0.56 6
The results in Table 4 show that teachers evaluate teaching methods to solve problems and
use practical chemistry exercises to be the most effective in developing students’ ability to apply
knowledge and skills. Then there is group teaching, project-based teaching. Teaching
presentations and conversations has little or no effect in developing students’ ability to apply
knowledge and skills. These data show that teachers appreciate the role of active teaching
methods in teaching chemistry to develop students’ capacity.
483
To determine the level of achievement in each criterion, we use the average score scale for
each criterion as follows: unsatisfactory level: from 1.0 to less than 1.8 points; average level: from
1.8 to less than 2.6 points; fair level: from 2.6 to less than 3.4 points; good level: from 3.4 to less
than 4.0 points. The results of teachers’ assessment of students’ ability presenting in Table 5.
Table 5. Teachers assess the achievement of students’ competence to apply knowledge and skills
Teachers’ assessment
Criteria Mean SD Level achieved
Good Fair Average Unsatisfactory
No.1 2 10 12 0 2.58 0.65 Fair
No.2 2 7 14 1 2.42 0.72 Average
No.3 1 4 18 1 2.21 0.59 Average
No.4 1 5 13 5 2.08 0.78 Average
No.5 0 3 13 8 1.79 0.66 Average
No.6 0 2 11 11 1.63 0.65 Unsatisfactory
No.10 0 4 12 8 1.83 0.70 Average
The results in Table 5 show that teachers’ assessment of students’ competence to apply
knowledge and skills is only good in criterion 1, criteria 2, 3, 4, 5 are at an average level, and
other criteria are unsatisfactory level. Thus, teachers mainly assess students’ competence to
apply knowledge and skills at an average level, even failing to meet many criteria. This shows
that students’ competence to apply knowledge and skills needs to be improved in teaching
chemistry in high schools.
3.3. Results of students’ survey
The survey conducted in students focuses on teaching methods, how to organize
instruction, the degree of integration, and the use of practical exercises by teachers in teaching
chemistry; Students’ competence in learning when confronted with actual occurrences and issues;
the actual level of students’ competence to apply knowledge and skills through self-assessment.
However, in this paper, we will look at the findings of a survey of students who self-assess their
competence to apply knowledge and skills in chemistry using a 10-criteria assessment form (see
more in Table 1, Section 3.1). The findings are depicted in Figures 3 and Figures 4.
Figure 3. Students self-assess their level of achievement in Figure 4. The level of achievement of rural
meeting the requirements for applying knowledge and skills in and urban students in terms of their
chemistry ability to apply knowledge and skills
484
Figure 3 depicts how students self-assessed their competence to apply knowledge and
skills, with Good accounting for 16.9%, Fair accounting for 35.6%, the average level accounting
for 36.9%, and Unsatisfactory accounting for 10.6%, the lowest proportion of the four
evaluation levels. As a result, the proportion of students who self-assess their competence to
apply their knowledge and skills at a Good level is usually low; the majority are at a Fair or
Average level. However, this result differs from the teachers’ assessment results in that the
percentage of students with Good is greater than 14.0%, Fair is greater than 18.1%, Average is
less than 14.8%, and Unsatisfactory is less than 17.2%. It can be seen that more than 10% of
students self-assessed their ability to apply knowledge and abilities at a level higher than the
teachers’ assessment.
The comparison result between 300 students living in rural areas (Nguyen Du high school,
Nam Truc high school – Nam Truc district) and 200 students living in urban areas (Ngo Quyen
high school, Nguyen Khuyen high school – Nam Dinh city) can be seen in Figure 4. We
discover that the percentage of students in rural areas compared to students in urban areas who
can apply knowledge and skills at the Good is much lower at 6.1 %, the Fair is lower than 4.4%,
but the Average is higher than 5.3%, and the Unsatisfactory is higher than 5.2%. As a result,
there is a distinct difference in the degrees of assessing students’ competence to apply
knowledge and skills in the two areas. This demonstrates that there is a substantial variation in
students’ competence to apply knowledge and skills between rural and urban areas.
4. Dicussion
The survey results at some high schools in Nam Dinh province indicate teaching to develop
the ability to apply knowledge and skill is still low; Teachers face many difficulties in teaching
and developing competence. Teachers are not good at using teaching methods. On the other
hand, they understand the structure and criteria of competence not clearly, have not paid
attention to capacity assessment; the school’s physical facilities are both lacking and weak; the
abilities of students in urban and rural schools are different. Based on the results of teachers and
students’ surveys, we realize that in teaching chemistry, it is necessary to have appropriate
measures to form and develop the students’ competence to apply knowledge and skills. It is also
one of the tasks of teaching to develop students’ competence, creating a foundation for the
training of high-quality human resources to satisfy society’s development needs.
CONCLUSION
In this paper, we analyzed the theoretical foundations of competence, the competence to
apply knowledge and skills, and methods of assessing students’ competence, thereby building
teachers’ and students’ surveys about the reality of teaching to develop the competence to apply
knowledge and skills for students in some high schools in Nam Dinh province, Vietnam. The
survey results show that the majority of teachers have a thorough understanding of competence
and ability development teaching; however, the use of active teaching methods to develop
students’ competence and forms of student ability assessment are still uncommon; the majority
of 10th graders’ competence to apply knowledge and skills is only average or low, and there are
differences between living areas. The competence to apply knowledge and skills is one of the
specific competencies that need to be developed for students in chemistry teaching. The
aforementioned results will provide an essential practical basis for us to continue researching
and proposing relevant and effective ways in teaching chemistry to assist students to acquire this
competence.
485
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About the authors

– Dr Vu Thi Thu Hoai is Deputy Head of Training Department of the University of
Education – VNU. Her research areas are Researching in the field of Educational science,
Theory and Methodology of Teaching in universities and high schools. She is particularly
interested in the issue of teaching learners’ capacity development in the context of the
technological revolution and international integration.
– Nguyen Thi Dung is a teacher with 10 years of experience in teaching Chemistry at high
school in Nam Dinh province, Vietnam. Dung had some achievements in work and is
recognized as a good teacher. Dung enjoys teaching chemistry because chemistry is interesting
and has many important applications in life.
487
DEVELOPING STUDENTS’ COMPETENCE OF APPLYING KNOWLEDGE

INTO PRACTICE THROUGH PROJECT-BASED LEARNING ON THE
TOPIC OF “ELECTRIC BATTERIES AND ELECTROLYSIS”
Vu Minh Trang*1, Bui Thi Thuy Hang2
Abstract: The socio-economic development of Vietnam in the context of international

integration has called forth new requirements for education with regards to training dynamic
and flexible human resources. Therefore, the general education curriculum needs to be reformed
to ensure integration, the application of modern science; development thinking skills, creative
logic, and practical skills. The objectives of the paper are: 1) analyzing the theory of Project-based
learning and practical skills, 2) building evaluation criteria for this skill, 3) designing and
experimentally organizing one learning project in Chemistry "Electric batteries and electrolysis" to
develop the skill of putting knowledge into practice for high school students. The study evaluates
the feasibility of the project for competence development in experiment and control 12th-grade
classes (80 students) of a high school in Hanoi. The results of the pedagogical experiment show
that teaching based on the designed projects has achieved the teaching objectives. Teaching
operated by Project-based learning not only helps students acquire knowledge but also develops
students’ practical skills competence, contributing to improving the quality of Chemistry teaching
in high school.
Keywords: project-based learning, competence of applying knowledge into practice, Chemistry,
students, high school
INTRODUCTION
The socio-economic development in Vietnam in the context of international integration has
created opportunities as well as new challenges for the education system relating to the training
of dynamic and versatile human resources. Therefore, the high school Chemistry teaching
program, as well as Chemistry teaching and learning, needs to be reformed to guarantee
integration, the application of modern scientific achievements, the suitability to students’ level
of cognitive ability while fostering thinking abilities, creative and logical reasoning; developing
practical skills, putting knowledge of Chemistry into practice.
To bridge the gap between theoretical knowledge and practice, create study motivation, and
prepare essential skills for learners in life, Project-based learning (PBL) is one of the complex
teaching – learning methods designed to solve these challenges. The purpose of Project-based
learning is to help students participate freely, thus develop independence, critical thinking and
ultimately improve overall competence and competence for each subject. During the project,
learners – by solving real-life problems, through their participation and co-operation with others
– will master the knowledge, study skills, and life skills. The pros of this teaching method have
also been proven: “One important benefit of Project-based learning is it makes schools more
similar to real-life . It (Projet-based learning) is a deep dive into real life topics and truly
deserves students’ attention and effort” (De Graaff,2007; TrettenR., 1995).
This article will present the overalls of Project-based learning, the skill of applying
knowledge into practice, and the process of building study plans to cultivate this particular skill.
The pedagogical experiment process was carried out based on the actualization of Project-based
* Corresponding Author: Vu Minh Trang; E-mail Address: trangvm@vnu.edu.vn

1 VNU University of Education
488
learning plans aiming to evaluate learners’ skill of applying knowledge into practice, using the
evaluation toolset, skills development criteria, and examinations.
CONTENT
1. Project-based learning (PBL)
PBL is an improved classroom operation model compared to a conventional classroom with
short learning time, the isolation of lessons’ content, and a teacher-centered learning
perspective. PBL’s learning activities are long-term, interdisciplinary, learner-centered, and
integrated with real-life problems. This is a teaching method that aims to enhance abstract and
intellectual learning tasks to solve complex problems. PBL helps learners deeply understand
knowledge, can self-discover, comment, analyze, and synthesize information, especially
focusing on how to learn and demonstrate learners’ knowledge (Ministry of Education
Malaysia, 2006).
PBL helps learners learn more because in most projects, learners have to do assignments
related to many fields, so they have the opportunity to work and tray their different abilities
when participating in a project (including discussing findings among learners, explaining
findings, developing understandings and discoveries, and making decisions about best
presentation). In addition, learners are also trained to think deeply when encountering complex
problems, so they have conditions to explore, evaluate, explain and synthesize information to
sharpen their ability to apply scientific and technological knowledge to practical problem-
solving.
PBL transforms teaching from “teacher says” to “student does”. Learners become problem
solvers, decision makers instead of passive listeners. They collaborate in groups, organize
activities, conduct research, solve problems, synthesize information, organize time and reflect
on their learning (including developing intermediate goals, identifying the resources that they
will refer to get the necessary information, establish task progress, establish the role of team
members and communicate the plan) to complete essential tasks of the project.
Project-based learning characteristics
Practical orientation: The project’s topic derives from situations of social reality,
professional practice, and real life. The process of project implementation requires learners to
combine theory with practice, apply learned knowledge in specific circumstances.
Consequently, the project must be attached to learners’ real life without being dogmatic
(Thomas, 2000).
 Learner’s interest orientation: PBL pays attention to the needs, abilities, and interests of
learners. A learning project can engage learners with research activities because research is a
goal-oriented project and related to information requirements, knowledge building, and
problem-solving (Thomas, 2000).
 Action orientation: During the project implementation process, students need to use a set
of Direction Questions to have self-direction when implementing projects to ensure that project
activity and products meet the set goals (Blumenfeld et al., 1991), Therefore, PBL creates
relationships between activities and background knowledge that students can master (Barron et
al., 1998) on the basis of thought-provoking problems that help to engage project goals with
learning objectives and curriculum standards.
 Product orientation: PBL must aim at solving real problems, so created products is the
result of the project, also the result of learning. Products that bring many benefits to society are
often highly appreciated and can be widely announced and introduced and put into use.
 Soft skills orientation: Working on projects will support the development of cooperation,
self-monitoring, searching, data analysis and information evaluation, etc., so learners will be
stimulated to think and relate to concepts with high practical meanings.
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 Complexity has social and practical significance: Project content combines knowledge of
many different fields or subjects to solve a complex problem (interdisciplinary) of social
realities.
 High self-reliance of learners: The project creates opportunities for learners to solve
problems and think independently, in which learners have to find information and analyze data
by themselves to come up with appropriate problem-solving. In particular, learners have to think
creatively at work rather than performing the work with the guidance of a teacher or available
materials (Thomas, 2000).
 Collaboration: Learners participate in an organized, assigned, accountable way and
coordinate with other members, instructors as well as other social forces involved in the project.
In this study, the PBL process is divided into 5 steps by Nguyen & Bernd (2014) as
follows:
 Step 1: Brainstorming ideas, identifying project topic, and purpose
– Teachers and students suggest ideas and identify project topic and purpose;
– Teachers can introduce several topic orientations for learners to choose from.
 Step 2: Constructing project outline
– Teachers instruct students to identify mission, purpose, performance methods, executive
strategy, identify necessary actions, estimated time, materials, cost, etc;
– A project outline is to have the following: project overview, purpose, content, detailed
planning, appendix.
 Step 3: Performance
– Each group assign missions to its members;
– Members accomplish their assignment;
– Students gather data from various sources then compile, analyze and accumulate
knowledge through a work process.
 Step 4: Gathering results and presenting project product
– Project product can be delivered in printed form or digital form (Powerpoint presentation,
web design, etc.);
– All students are facilitated to present their project results and achievements accumulated
through project work;
– Their products can be presented among groups of learners, in front of the class/school, or
front of a community.
 Step 5: Project evaluation
Teachers and students evaluate the project performance process and results based on the
collected products and students’ presentation performance.
2. The competence of applying knowledge into practice (CAKIP)
CAKIP is typically understood as “the process of applying theoretical knowledge into
human activities in real life in order to facilitate the existence and development of society”
(Phan & Nguyen, 2017). In a more detailed definition, “CAKIP is an individual’s ability to
master one or a series of actions based on their knowledge, experience or findings, discoveries
of new knowledge to effectively solve a practical problem” (Thomas, 2000).
According to Nguyen & Dao: “CAKIP is learners’ ability to solve a problem quickly and
effectively by applying accumulated knowledge to practical, real-life situations to test the
surrounding environment and the ability to alter it. This skill also measures human qualities and
personality in the work process of fulfilling the need of mastering knowledge” (2014).
Hence, CAKIP is one’s ability to recognize practical problems, putting relevant knowledge,
findings, discoveries into practice to solve these problems effectively.
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CAKIP is one element of a human’s natural ability to learn. Developing this skill is
an important goal to achieve in high school education and helps shape the high school
education system’s student outcome standard. The ability to put knowledge into practice
not only helps students solve practical problems in school but also aims to train learners
to approach the vast array of practical problems in real life, the production process of
physical materials, and the process of scientific research.
Developing CAKIP allows students to participate in the process of achieving
teaching goals in a manner that improves competence: teachers design learning
activities that serve educational purposes, bridging the gap between theoretical/practical
knowledge in school and real life. Thus, fostering CAKIP in students through teaching
programs will change teachers’ teaching methods and students’ learning methods in
such a way that makes learning go hand in hand with practicing, theory go hand in hand
with reality and school with society (Nguyen & Dao, 2014).
Based on the CAKIP construct (Trinh, Phan & Trinh, 2011), 5 criteria with 3 levels
of development are specified in Table 1:
Table 1. CAKIP evaluation criteria
Development level/score received
Criteria
Good: 3 Passed: 2 Failed: 1
The purpose, circumstance, Analyzed project’s circumstance, The project’s circumstance and
Recognize learning mission of the project was mission but goal was not identified mission was not clearly analyzed,
practical problem analyzed and identified clearly and thoroughly and clearly. purpose was not thoroughly
thoroughly. identified.
Research content was clearly and Certain research content was clearly Research content was not identified.
sufficiently identified. but not sufficiently identified.
Relevant knowledge was applied Some relevant knowledge was mentioned Relevant knowledge was not
Apply relevant and the relationship between but the relationship between obtained or identified. The assignment was not
knowledge and obtained or new knowledge and new knowledge and the practical understood and no knowledge was
suggest the practical problems was problems was not analyzed or established. applied.
hypotheticals analyzed and established.
Some solutions were suggested. Some solutions to the problem were Some solutions to the problem were
Appropriate solutions to the suggested and selected for the project. suggested but were not appropriate
problem were selected for the project. nor reasonable.
Relevant information sources from a Relevant information sources from Relevant information was identified
textbook, other reference materials textbook, other reference materials or and collected from textbook and
Explore and or field survey, experiment, field survey, experiment, observation, personal experience. Information
discover relevant observation, etc. were identified, etc. were identified, collected, and was not logically selected, arranged,
practical collected, and discussed with other discussed with other people. and connected.
knowledge people. Information was Information was relatively logically
appropriately, logically selected, selected, arranged, connected.
arranged, and connected.
Built a detailed, comprehensive Built a plan to solve the problem Built a plan to solve the problem
plan, ensuring necessary conditions addressed in the project though not addressed in the project though not
to accomplish the project missions. yet detailed and thorough, yet detailed and thorough.
accomplishing a few missions
Execute the
proposed by the project.
solution
Carried out said plan, accomplished Carried out said plan, accomplished Carried out said plan, accomplished
the missions both individually and the missions but collaboration was the missions but required support
collaboratively in an effective and uncoordinated. from other members.
creative way.
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Development level/score received

Criteria
Good: 3 Passed: 2 Failed: 1
Was able to adjust activities in the Was able to adjust activities in the Was able to adjust activities in the
solution execution reasonably, solution execution reasonably but not solution execution though not
recognize shortcomings in the evaluate the solution. Was able to reasonably. Was not able to evaluate
solution and apply the same apply the same solutions to similar the solution, apply in similar
solution to similar situations. situations though awkwardly. situations.
Propose a new New ideas about the addressed New ideas about the addressed Was not able to suggest new ideas
problem practical problem or relevant practical problem or relevant practical about the practical problem or
practical problems were proposed. problems were proposed but not relevant practical problem.
specified.
3. Design and host Project-based learning on the topic of “Power batteries and
Electrolysis”
I. Project – Scope of knowledge: Knowledge about electrolysis, electrochemical battery, the redox process
overview – Execution time: 4 in-class periods + 2 weeks of execution
– Research topic context:
The battery is an age-old chemical power source that has been powering many household gadgets as well as industrial
devices. Around us are countless devices that are battery-powered such as smartphones, watches, clocks, remote
controls, electric bicycles, etc. Every month, the rate of battery use is colossal due to the rapidly increasing number of
digital devices.
Despite their compact appearance, batteries play an important role in human daily life. However, used batteries are
not regular waste; it contains a mine of harmful chemicals which if not properly managed, can pose a threat to human
health and pollute the environment.
In this project, students will design and build: Vegetable powered night light that uses an electrochemical battery
system made from environment-friendly materials – vegetables.
II. Project – Knowledge:
goals + Present the definition of electrochemical batteries.
+ Name the pros and cons of electrochemical batteries being used today.
+ Describe the structure, operating principles of electrochemical batteries, and the redox process on electrodes.
+ Adress the environmental risks and the harmful effects to human health caused by electrochemical battery wastes.
+ Explain the use and role of the materials: vegetables, copper, and zinc electrode plates, electrical conductors, LED
light, pyrometer used in electrochemical battery designs.
+ Describe the power supply coupling process to create the right voltage.
– Skills:
+ Systemize knowledge through mindmaps.
+ Conduct experiments proving the ability to create electromagnetic currents of vegetables.
+ Draw the night light electrical circuit.
+ Measure the electromotive force to check the function of the battery built with the vegetable.
+ Draw the blueprint for the environment-friendly electrochemical battery-powered night light.
+ Build a night light according to the blueprint.
+ Use Powerpoint, Word, Sway, etc. to present the product.
+ Develop, practice the following skills: communication, teamwork, presentation, critical thinking, time management.
– Attitude:
+ Recognize the negative impact of electrochemical battery waste on human health and the environment.
+ Stimulate students’ curiosity about scientific discoveries and students’ interest in Chemistry.
– Skills development orientation:
+ General skills: communication and cooperation skills during group collaboration, problem-solving skills, and
creativity.
+ Subject-related skills: Chemistry perception, the skill of exploring the natural world from a Chemical perspective, the
skill of applying acquired knowledge and skills.
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+ Other skills: the skill of using Information and Communication technology in information searching and group
product presenting.
III. Project – Project mission:
content + Describe the structure, operating principles of electrochemical batteries, and the redox process on electrodes.
+ Name the pros and cons of electrochemical batteries being used today, address the environmental risks and the
harmful effects to human health caused by electrochemical battery wastes.
+ Design and build vegetable-powered night lights.
– Teaching method:
Project-based learning method combined with teamwork, case-study, problem-based, presentation teaching method.
– Teaching tools:
+ Blackboard, slideshow applications, computer/laptop, projector, etc.
+ Pyrometer
+ Raw materials: tomatoes; limes; apples; potatoes; tin, aluminum, copper electrode plates; electrical conductors,
resistors, LED lights, etc.
– Theoretical basis:
+ The concept of a redox pair
+ Electrochemical batteries: the birth of batteries, the structure, operating principle of electrochemical batteries.
+ Standard electrode potential of metal: standard hydrogen electrode, the standard electrode potential of metal
+ Electrochemical series of metals
IV. Lesson – Group 1: Design potato powered Question 1: What would it be if we did not have electricity?
orientation night lights Question 2: What is the role of batteries in our lives? Name a few pros and cons
question set – Group 2: Design lime powered of batteries today? Explore different types of electrochemical batteries being
night lights used today.
– Group 3: Design tomato Question 3: Present the concept of electrochemical batteries, their structure, and
powered night lights operating principles, and the redox process on electrodes using mindmaps.
– Group 4: Design apple powered Question 4: Present the operating principle of potato/lemon/tomato/apple
night lights powered batteries and describe the redox process on electrodes.
Question 5: Explain the role and use of the materials: potato/lemon/tomato/
apple, copper and zinc electrode plates, electrical conductors, LED light,
pyrometer used in potato/lemon/tomato/apple powered battery design.
Question 6: Study the power supply coupling methods, the material quantity
necessary to create the right voltage.
V. Project – Report progress, quest board describing project missions and members’ missions
product – Present the content according to the orientation question set
– Electrical circuit map, product design, style design
– Videos, pictures instructing on how to build the vegetable powered batteries
– The night light using vegetable powered batteries
– Presentation introducing the product
– Powerpoint presentation
VI. Learning – 10th-grade Chemistry textbook lesson 17, 10th-grade Advanced Chemistry textbook lesson 25
sources – 11th-grade Chemistry textbook chapter 1, 11th-grade Advanced Chemistry textbook chapter 1
– 12th-grade Chemistry textbook lesson 20, 12th-grade Advanced Chemistry textbook lesson 20
– 11th-grade Physics textbook lesson 7, 8, 9, 10
– 11th-grade Technology textbook lesson 8
– Journal of Chemistry and Applications, articles on electrochemical batteries on the Internet
– Videos of experiments on Youtube
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VII. Project – Product evaluation board based on criteria

evaluation – Observation sheet of the project process
tool set – Project tracking book
VII. Execution 1st period: Initiate project – Project introduction (2 minutes)
plan – Build project groups and identify each group’s topic (8 minutes)
– Conduct experiment to explore knowledge (10 minutes)
– Build project’s theoretical basis (10 minutes)
– Build project execution plan (10 minutes)
– Build product evaluation tool (5 minutes)
2nd period: Report progess (after 1 – Report progress (25 minutes)
week of working outside of class) – Question exchange (15 minutes)
– Instructions on project execution (5 minutes)
3rd period: Hand in product – Report (50 minutes)
– Evaluation (35 minutes)
– Project conclusion (5 minutes)
4. Evaluate students’ competence in applying knowledge into practice development
4.1. Research objects
12th-grade students at Nhan Chinh – Thanh Xuan, Hanoi High School, including the control
class (12A3 class) and the experiment class (12A4 class).
4.2. Experiment method
– Select control and experiment classes based on learning quality, ensuring control/experiment
class pairs match in quantity and learning quality;
+ Control class: teachers conduct traditional teaching methods;
+ Experiment class: teachers conduct Project-based learning: Design vegetable powered
night lights.
– Students take 2 tests after class. Both control and experiment classes receive the same
tests and are graded by the same teacher.
– Evaluate students’ competence in applying knowledge into practice: Based on the CAKIP
structure, the evaluation board will include 5 criteria, in which the 2nd and 4th will have 3
standards; each criterion will have 3 levels: Good (1), Passed (2), Failed (3) as in Table 1 given
to teachers to evaluate students and to students to assess themselves. The score of the CAKIP
measuring scale will range from 8 to 24.
– Grading and data processing will be done using Mathematical statistical methods.
– Survey students’ opinions after experiencing Project-based learning with 5 open questions
relating to: 1) Knowledge learned from the project; 2) Practical problems solved; 3) Knowledge
learned from peers; 4) Difficulties during the project; 5) Suggestions to improve the project.
– Collect and analyze qualitative results from the open questions.
4.3. Analyze experiment results
Test results
To evaluate the perception of students of both control and experiment classes after finishing
the lessons, we gave students of these classes test numbers 1 and 2. The quantitative
comparative analysis method based on results of the 2 tests with the score scale of 10 is as
follows:
Excellent: Marks 9, 10 Mediocre: Marks 5, 6
Good: Marks 7, 8 Poor: Marks 0, 1, 2, 3, 4
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Table 2. Summary table of the test’s characteristic parameters

Test Class X S S2 V (%) p SMD
Number 1 Control 6.93 1.73 2.99 24.96
0.02 0.43
Experiment 7.68 1.51 2.28 19.66
Number 2 Control 6.87 1.59 2.53 22.71
0.01 0.62
Experiment 7.86 1.44 2.07 18.32
Percentage of
Academic competency Academic competency
Chart 1: Test 1 results classification Chart 2: Test 2 results classification

Comment
– The percentage of students with poor marks in the experiment class is lower than that of
the control class and the percentage of students with good/excellent marks in the experiment
class is always higher than that of the control class. The average score value ( X ) of students in
the experiment class is always higher than that of the control class. This proves students of the
experiment class have a better understanding of the lesson and can better apply knowledge than
those of the control class.
– Parameters: variance S2, Standard deviation S, coefficient of variation V% in the
experiment class is always smaller than that of the control class, meaning dispersion of mean
values in the experiment class is smaller than that of the control class and the learning quality of
the control class varies more significantly than that of the experiment class.
– The p-value is lower than 0.05 in both tests, proving that the difference between the
average value of the experiment and control class is significant (the difference is unlikely
random).
– Influence level SMD in test number 1 is 0.43, which is in the 0.20 to 0.49 range, therefore
the influence level is low. The influence level SMD in test number 2, however, is 0.62, which is
in the 0.50 to 0.79 range, therefore the influence level is average. This means that the influence
is significant.
– The majority of the results of the project participants are Excellent and Good (only 2
Mediocre, taking up 5%). The average score of each group varies insignificantly, proving that in
Project-based learning, students actively participated and supported each other to improve.
These results show that the study results of students in the experimental class are higher
than that of the control class. Therefore, the project’s study results in the experiment class
reflect the feasibility and effectiveness of developing the CAKIP for students using Project-
based learning. Thus, Project-based learning is an effective, beneficial teaching method that not
only helps students have a better understanding of the lesson, broadens their practical
knowledge but also allows them to practice essential life skills.
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CAKIP evaluation results from teachers and students

Based on the criteria and CAKIP evaluation levels in Table 1, teachers observe and
evaluate students’ competence before and after experiencing the Project-based learning method.
Students also self-assess their competence before and after learning by this method. The average
score results of the students’ criteria after performing two lessons on this project are illustrated
in charts 3 and 4:
Chart 3: The results of the teachers’ evaluation of the improvment of CAKIP of each student
Chart 4: The results of the students’ self-assessment of the improvment of CAKIP of each student
Comment
Through the charts, we find that the achievement of criteria in the experimental class at the
time of post-experiment is higher than pre-experiment in all criteria. It proves that Project-based
teaching on the topic of “electrical batteries and electrolytes” helps students develop their ability
to apply knowledge in practice in a better manner. The level of ES influence over two lessons
has a large effect scale, the independent and dependent T-test values are very small, showing
that the difference in the average value is significant, not due to randomness.
In addition, the chart assessing the ability to apply knowledge in practice also shows that
this ability of students can be achieved at different levels, but in general, there is more progress
than before. The results of the teacher’s evaluation and the students’ self-assessment are quite
close, showing that most students already know how to assess their ability.
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Students’ opinion on the experiment class survey result

Aside from evaluating the experiment using tests and evaluating students’ CAKIP based on
criteria, we also surveyed students’ thoughts and feelings after experiencing class periods and 2
weeks of experiment accordingly to the Project-based learning method. The survey sheet
includes 4 open questions. Students’ answers are compiled below.
When asked about what they have learned from the project: Design vegetable powered
night lights, most students felt they have learned knowledge such as the definition of
electrochemical batteries, pros and cons of electrochemical batteries being used today, the
structure and operating principle of electrochemical batteries, the redox process of electrodes,
the meaning and use of the materials: vegetables, copper and zinc electrode plates, electrical
conductors, LED light, pyrometer used in electrochemical battery designs. They also felt that
the experiment class allow them to practice skills such as designing night lights, presenting
reports, drawing mindmaps to systemize knowledge, collecting and processing information,
teamwork, etc. Furthermore, students even showed excitement over the project activities,
actively and diligently research and design products, cooperate, support, and receive feedback
from others.
When asked about the practical problems solved, the majority of students claimed they,
through the project, have learned how to create a power source from familiar vegetables,
thereby design products that use these power sources.
When asked what they have learned from their classmates, most of them answered:
presentation and reporting skills, the skills of searching and processing information, the ability
to apply knowledge obtained from the subject into assembling the power supply, etc.
Relating to the difficulties faced while experimenting, students admitted having difficulties
with collecting and processing information, planning, group organizing, applying Information
Technology, presenting results, etc. project financial setbacks, and difficulties keeping the
project tracking notebook as well as project reports in the group.
When asked what they would suggest improving the project, their answers are: complete
the project to minimize cost and increase service life, commercialize products.
CONCLUSION
The article has achieved its purpose and research missions, contributing the
theoretical basis as well as a practical basis for the application of the Project-based
learning method in improving the CAKIP for students in Chemistry teaching in high
school, helping innovate education in a competence improving orientation.
The topic reflects three fundamental characteristics of Project-based learning: learner
orientation, practical orientation, and product orientation. Learner orientation can be seen in the
way PBL pays attention to learners’ needed abilities and interests of learners. A learning project
can engage learners with research activities because research is a goal-oriented project and is
related to information requirements, knowledge building, and problem-solving (Thomas, 2000).
Practical orientation is demonstrated in how the project’s topic derives from situations of social
reality, professional practice, and real life. The process of project implementation requires
learners to combine theory with practice, apply learned knowledge in specific circumstances.
Consequently, the project must be attached to learners’ real life without being dogmatic
(Thomas, 2000). PBL’s goal is to solve real problems with the project’s product, which is the
result of the project as well as the result of learning, defines the topic’s final characteristic –
product orientation.
Moreover, the article also suggests a way to apply Project-based teaching into the building
and host the learning project “Electrical batteries and electrolysis”, which aimed at improving
students’ CAKIP. The pedagogical experiment was conducted on 2 classes, identical in quantity
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and learning ability. The control class used the traditional teaching method while the experiment
class implemented the Project-based learning method to carry out the same lesson
“Electrochemical batteries and electrolysis”. The evaluation of students’ CAKIP is based
on an evaluation table including 5 criteria, 8 standards, and 3 levels, allowing both students and
teachers to evaluate students’ competency. The CAKIP evaluation results show that students in
the experiment class have a higher average score than those in the control class. The learning
output results also pointed out the experiment class has a higher average score and a larger
number of students with good/excellent marks compared to those of the control class. This
proves the feasibility and effectiveness of applying the PBT method into the building and
hosting Project-based learning project on the topic of “Electrical batteries and electrolysis”
aimed at improving students’ CAKIP.
Moreover, this article also suggests a way to apply Project-based learning into the building,
hosting Project-based learning on the topic of “Power batteries and Electrolysis” which aims to
improve the CAKIP for students, building the CAKIP evaluation toolset from Project-based
learning, the pedagogical experiment that seeks to assess the feasibility and effectiveness of
applying Project-based learning in building and hosting Project-based learning on the topic of
“Power batteries and electrolysis” to improve students’ CAKIP.
The quantitative analysis results of students’ CAKIP from tests at the end of the lesson and
both teachers’ and students’ evaluations have proven the Project-based learning method’s
superiority over the traditional teaching method. Furthermore, the qualitative analysis results of
students’ answers to the open questions have clearly shown the benefits they have reaped from
participating in the learning project as well as difficulties faced and suggestions to improve the
project. Students’ answers prove that the Project-based learning method helps them gain a deep
understanding of the subject, sharpen various skills: other than the skills of applying knowledge
about electrochemical batteries and the redox process into creating a product that is useful in
real-life – vegetable powered night lights, students also had the chance to practice and improve
social skills such as communication, teamwork, collecting and processing data, writing and
presenting reports. These skills help satisfy the demand of the 21st-century human workforce –
the masters of knowledge and skills, capable of creativity, critical thinking, and real-life
problem-solving.
Results gathered have confirmed the feasibility and effectiveness of the application of the
Project-based learning method in building and hosting Project-based learning on the topic of
“Power batteries and electrolysis” to improve students’ CAKIP.
REFERENCE
1. De Graaff, E., & Kolmos, A. (2007). History of problem-based and Project-based learning.
In Management of change. Brill Sense.
2. Ministry of Education Malaysia (2006). Project-Based Learning Handbook “Educating the
Millennial Learner”. Educational Technology Division Ministry of Education. Malaysia.
3. Nguyen, Cong Khanh, Dao, Thi Oanh (2014). Kiểm tra và đánh giá trong giáo dục. Đại học
Sư phạm Hà Nội. Hà Nội.
4. Nguyen, Van Cuong, Bernd Meier, (2014). Lý luận dạy học hiện đại – Cơ sở đổi mới mục
tiêu, Nội dung và phương pháp dạy học. Đại học Sư phạm Hà Nội. Hà Nội.
5. Tretten R. & Zacharion P. (1995). Learning about projet-based learning: Self-assessment
preliminary report of results, San Rafae. CA: The Autodesk Foundation.
6. Barron, B.J.S., Schwartz, D.L., Vye, N.J., et al. (1998). Doing with understanding: Lessons
from research on problem- and Project-based learning. Journal of the Learning Sciences
7(3/4), 271-311.
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7. Blumenfeld, P.C., Soloway, E., Marx, R.W., Krajcik, J.S., et. al. (1991). Motivating
Project-based learning: Sustaining the doing, supporting the learning. Educational
Psychologist, 26, 369-398.
8. Phan, Thi Thanh Hoi, Nguyen, Thi Tuyet Mai (2017). Rèn luyện cho học sinh kĩ năng vận
dụng kiến thức vào thực tiễn dạy học sinh học 11. Tạp chí Giáo dục, 411, 37.
9. Thomas, J.W. (2000). A Review of Research on Project-Based Learning. Supported by The
Autodesk Foundation 111 McInnis Parkway San Rafael. ABD. California, 1-45.
10. Trinh, Van Bieu, Phan, Dong Chau Thuy, Trinh, Le Hong Phuong (2011). Dạy học dự án –
Từ lí luận đến thực tiễn. Tạp chí Khoa học Đại học Sư phạm Tp. HCM, 28, 3-12.
About the authors

– Dr. Vu Minh Trang: Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Teacher Education, University of
Education, Vietnam National University – Hanoi. Her major is Teacher Education in Natural
Sciences. She has been participating in many scientific research projects as well as publishing
abundant works in both domestic and international scientific journals. She also has been invited
as presenter or keynote speaker in many national and international conferences in the field of
Education Sciences (Theory and method of teaching Chemistry), and Organic Biochemistry.
– Assoc.Prof Bui Thi Thuy Hang: Associated Professor at School of Engineering
Pedagogy, Hanoi University of Science and Technology. She is interested in and has done many
researches in the field of students’ learning motivation, teachers’ teaching style, students’
learning style, vocational education and training, higher education situation in Vietnam and the
world as well as smart pedagogy and smart schools.
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SELF-DIRECTED LEARNING READINESS

FOR VIETNAMESE STUDENTS IN INFORMATICS
Kieu Phuong Thuy*1, Nguyen Chi Trung1
Abstract: Self-directed learning capacity is defined as one of the core common competencies of
students in the Vietnam General Education Curriculum 2018 (VGEC). Also stated in the VGEC,
education in Informatics plays a key role to develop the skills and abilities to seek, select, receive,
and expand knowledge sources, not only in Informatics but also in other subjects. Since time used
to learn in class is limited and knowledge is limitless, self-directing learning capacity, particularly
in Informatics, is essential to develop thinking skills and students’ career. To quantify the
capacity, previous studies proposed scales for self-directed learning capacity. However, they are
not fit for the manifestations of self-study specified in the VGEC. Moreover, previous works on
self-directed learning in Vietnam mainly focus on Mathematics, Literature and Chemistry and do
not offer a specific assessment. Our work investigated the correlation between core features of
self-directed learning and manifestations of self-directed learning capacity described in VGEC.
On the basis of the correlation, we proposed a novel framework for assessing self-directed
learning capacity of high school students in Informatics. We also examined the readiness of
self-directed learning on 1170 students (from 15 provinces) and analyze the factors affecting the
capacity. The results indicated the important roles of intrinsic motivation, self-evaluation skills
and the guidance of teachers in the development of students’ self-directed learning readiness.
These findings suggested that enhancing prospective teachers’ self-directed learning and
individual motivation may promote students’ self-directed learning readiness in Informatics.
Keywords: self-directed learning, self-directed learning readiness, Informatics, Vietnam students
INTRODUCTION
Self-directed learning (SDL) has emerged and literally exploded around the world in the
last few decades under the realms of academic research and education. Research, scholarship,
and interest in self-directed learning have boosted in the academic world recently. As a
consequence, new tools and resources have been proposed to measure the SDL capacity and
help pedagogical researchers to develop programs, practices and resources for students. In
Vietnam, the VGEC (VGEC, 2018) declares the important goals of general education which are
to help learners to be more responsible for their learning, to have benefited from their
knowledge and to maintain the self-directed learning capacity not only in professional work but
also their personal lives. Particularly, in Informatics where the technology, information and
knowledge are changing rapidly, the ability of SDL should be incorporated into teaching and
learning in order to meet the changing demands in education. A challenge in Informatics
teaching is to apply innovative strategies in order to evaluate students’ progress toward
achieving SDL capacity.
The definition of SDL was first introduced in the original work of Knowles (Knowles,
1975). Knowles considers self-directed learners as proactive students who take the initiative in
their learning, actively control and influence their learning processes. Various studies have
proposed scales to measure SDL capacity in different realms. In education, the rapid increase of
informations as well as the complexity of problems emerged, in adjunction to the limit of the
time in education have increased the need to have advantageous methods to evaluate SDL and
analyze factors affecting SDL capacity.
* Corresponding Author: Kieu Phuong Thuy; Email Address: thuykp@hnue.edu.vn

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The most significant scales assessing the SDL skills of students are investigated, the first to
be encountered is the SDL readiness score, which was developed in 1977 by Guglielmino
(Guglielmino, 1977). It is designed to measure the complex of attitudes, skills, and
characteristics that comprise an individual’s current level of readiness to manage their own
learning. It is showed by McCune that SDL readiness score was by far the most frequently used
instrument after examining 67 studies of self-direction in learning done between 1977 and 1987
(McCune, 1988).
Murray (Murray J.A., 1987) proposed an SDL readiness scale assisting nurse educators to
identify student learning needs. Hence, the educators can implement teaching strategies and
plans that will best suit the students. Similarly, Ayyildiz and Tarhan introduced a valid and
reliable scale for assessing high school students’ self-directed learning skills which has a
structure of nine factors and includes 40 items in total (Ayyildiz et al., 2015). The result of this
study allowed teachers not to only determine students’ strengths and weaknesses but also match
their instructional design with students’ readiness for SDL.
In addition to the scales mentioned above, various scales that directly assess the readiness
of self-directed learning have been introduced. Examples include the work of Deng – a Chinese
version of Guglielmino’s instrument (Deng, 1995), scales for nursing students in works of
Cadorin, Bressan and Palese (Cadorin et al., 2017), Fisher, King and Tague’s SDL readiness
scale (Fisher et al., 2001), and Williamson’s self-rating scale for nurse students (Williamson,
2007). Although multiple framework scales have been proposed to measure and improve SDL
capacity across a wide range of fields, there have been few studies of the SDL readiness scales
for students in Informatics and little is known about the manifestations of SDL following the
VGEC description.
In this paper, we propose assessment framework to evaluate the SDL capacity in
Informatics which is in need after the goals of general education have been identified in VGEC
(VGEC, 2018). We also investigate the factors that influence SDL capacity of Vietnamese
students in Informatics. After investigation, a model of factors affecting is introduced. The main
contributions of this paper are as in the following:
– Propose a new SDL assessment framework to measure the students’ SDL capability on
Informatics.
– Use the proposed framework to create a survey and analyze the readiness of SDL of 1170
school students from 15 provinces nationwide.
– Build a regression model of factors that affect the students’ readiness of SDL capacity.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. After introducing a state-of-the-art SDL scale
in the literature Section 1, we present our SDL framework in Section 2. In Section 3, we
describe our analysis of the scale and introduce the factors affecting the readiness for SDL and
then subsequently show the experimental results in Section 4. Finally, we conclude this paper
with the Conclusion section.
CONTENT
1.1. SDL capacity and SDL evaluation framework
Knowles M.S has shown 5 factors structuring the SDL capacity: (1) ability to identify needs
for self-learning (or possess SDL ability), (2) self-identify the goal of learning, (3) self-identify
resources, (4) self-identify strategies and (5) self-evaluate the result of self-learning process
(Knowles, 1975).
To measure the capacity of SDL, one needs an assessment to quantify the ability of SDL.
The assessment framework fully demonstrates the components of SDL capacity. These
components are considered as evaluation criteria and are further divided into smaller criteria.
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The unit criteria, the smallest level that is not divided, are described on the basis of the
manifestations of self-learning capability. Examples of assessment frameworks include the work
of Ayyildiz and Tarhan (Ayyildiz et al., 2015), Cadorin, Bressan and Palese’s instruments
(Cadorin et al., 2017), Fisher, King and Tague’s scale (Fisher et al., 2001), and Williamson’s
(Williamson, 2007).
On the basis of approaches on the literature, we propose an assessment framework to
evaluate the SDL capacity in Informatics, which is defined as a core capacity in VGEC (VGEC,
2018). With 5 criteria, our framework is used to further develop experimental tools to identify
students’ SDL readiness level, from which teachers may promote students’ interest in enhancing
their SDL skills.
1.2. Factors that influence the SDL capacity
The factors that influence the SDL capacity are divided into internal and external factors.
External factors are related to the development of the relationship between teachers and
students, setting up a usable and appropriate learning environment. MacBeath (MacBeath, 1993)
pointed out four external factors affecting self-study including: (1) facilities (2) time spent
studying, (3) influence from other students and (4) references, instruction materials and
resources from teachers.
The factor facilities must meet the needs of a suitable and quiet space for learners. Time for
study, the second factor is measured by the time between the start and the end of a learning task,
helping learners set limits and expected improvement towards learning. Also, it gives the
learners a well-deserved break or opportunity to change direction. Moreover, it can be used by
teachers to assign students to specific learning tasks. The influence of other students is
described as a “behavior set”, which is considered as an environment created by classmates or a
study group. References are resources such as books, audio, and some online documents.
Learning resources from teachers can be knowledge, skills or some guidance from teachers to
help students find their relevant learning resources.
On the other hand, as for internal factors, Meyer (Meyer, 2010) defined all personal skills
that learners need to conduct self-study as internal factors. Those skills include cognitive skills
and metacognitive skills. Cognitive skills are the capability of the brain to think, ponder,
read, learn, memorize, reason, and pay attention, whereas metacognitive skills allow learners
to structure their thoughts and evaluate their thought process regarding learning and
problem-solving.
With the factors, the assessment scales are used to create experimental tools and evaluate
the SDL capacity. In this paper, we used our proposed framework to create a questionnaire and
evaluate internal and external factors in SDL in Informatics. The proposed framework and tools
are described in the next sections.
2. The proposed capacity framework for SDL in Informatics
Considering Informatics teaching in school, teachers need to help students to develop 5
Informatics specific competencies while maintaining 2 general competencies, including self-
control and self-study. Moreover, since Informatics is associated with computers and computer
thinking, specific abilities are mandatory to develop students’ SDL ability.
In order to develop students’ SDL capacity, measurement methods are mandatory to
quantify the SDL capacity and recognize the improvement. Evaluation frameworks are widely
used to assess SDL capacity in many fields. They include factors, which are considered the
evaluation criteria and are divided into manifestations. We propose a capacity assessment
framework to evaluate SDL capacity in Informatics. On the basis of specific ability expression
in Informatics, our framework is built from 5 factors as in Table 1 below:
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Table 1. SDL capacity framework for Informatics

Criteria Manifestations in Informatics
 Determine the right learning goals: choosing the right motivation from which learning goals are set. Examples
Ability to identify
include results achieved; teacher’s request; own needs and interests.
goals of learning
 Determine the relevant goals.
(GOAL)
 Define clear and detailed goals.
 Identify the right learning task: how much time should be used for each task; complete the assigned work before
doing the extra work; understand the lesson in class before trying to discover more privately; find out what’s
Ability to identify relevant or extended from the lesson.
learning tasks  Identify learning tasks on the basis of achievement.
(TASK)  Seriously implement assigned learning tasks: prioritize completing all assignments before doing other things; do
the exercises carefully and check the results.
 Consciously perform the learning tasks: apply knowledge to do more related exercises.
 Coordinate and properly use common digital systems.
 Use search engines to exploit information effectively, safely and legally.
 Select relevant and reliable information.
Ability to identify
 Use digital tools to organize and share data and information suitable for different learning purposes and tasks.
learning resource
 Exploit open learning resources to update knowledge.
(RESO)
 Be able to use some practical applications on the network.
 Be able to use some learning support software.
 Recognize, adapt and take advantage of learning conditions and circumstances.
 Form learners’ own learning methods.
 Record/write information in suitable forms that are convenient for memorizing, using, and supplementing when
necessary.
 Make necessary decisions to meet learning needs.
Ability to identify
 Change the direction of learning in certain conditions.
learning strategies
 Self-actualize and self-seek opportunities to develop and fulfill one’s potential.
(STRA)
 Use specialized software to evaluate and adjust the study plan.
 Self-recognize mistakes and limitations in the learning process (including assessment).
 Know how to reflect on learning processes, learn from experience and apply it to other situations, know how to
self-correct learning method (including assessment).
 Use add-on tools to self-assess the learning process, including:
 Identify how the learning is going: determine the current learning method, the knowledge concentrated,
determine whether the appropriate goals are set or not.
 Identify what needs to be improved from learning methods, knowledge understanding, goals, study schedule and
Ability to self- daily activities. For example: What parts of my knowledge and skills are still unclear or require further study? Which
evaluate parts of the lesson should be explored and discovered more; Is time for learning and for and daily activities set
(EVAL) appropriately?
 Self-assessment of learning outcomes. Be able to answer the questions how and what, as in the following:
– What are the results of learning: to know, to understand and to apply the knowledge and skills learned?
– How good is the result: at what level the learners have known, understood and applied the knowledge and skills?
 Self-assessment of consciousness and attitude.
Note that the manifestations we use in our scale are specialized for Informatics in high
school; hence, it is used for measuring students’ SDL capacity in Informatics only. To evaluate
students’ SDL capacity, one uses our proposed scale to build multiple tools and apply them to a
whole learning process. In this work, we create a questionnaire, a setting of our scale, to
measure the SDL readiness of students in Informatics. The tools are described in the next
section.
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3. Tools and patterns to evaluate

3.1. Tools
Considering the factors affecting self-study, we designed a tool to quantify the SDL
readiness of learners in Informatics, on the basis of the SDL assessment framework proposed
above. To be precise, to measure the SDL capacity, we use a survey which is a questionnaire
consisting of the following two parts:
 Part 1 is to collect the general information.
The information needed to be collected includes:
 Personal information: Full name, gender, school, class
 Conditions and learning environment: Area (city, town); learning conditions (facilities of
the school)
 Learning outcomes of Informatics
 Information on self-study: (1) How often teachers ask for self-study (2) How much
students agree with the importance of SDL (3) How much time students study on their
own, and (4) What do students do during self-study?
 Part 2 is to collect information assessing SDL capability on Informatics.
The objective of the information collected in this part is to evaluate SDL capacity based on
the concept of SDL, the perspectives of the curriculum on the self-studying ability of high
school students, studies on SDL ability and the method to quantify the capacity. The questions
on students’ readiness of SDL are divided into the following 5 groups:
 Group 1: Questions on learning goals (03 questions)
 Group 2: Questions on the learning tasks (07 questions)
 Group 3: Questions on learning resources (03 questions)
 Group 4: Questions on learning strategies (05 questions)
 Group 5: Questions on the learning process (04 questions)
Our tool is evaluated by calculating 3 indexes, discrimination, correlation and reliability, as
in the following.
3.2. Tool’s evaluation
To estimate the suitability of the survey tool before the mass survey, we took a test sample
of 115 students. The survey questionnaires were entered and analyzed using SPSS 20.0 software
and Microsoft Excel. We calculated the discriminant, correlation, and reliability score of the
criteria as in the following.
Discrimination Index
For the total of N = 115 students, the number of students with high SDL scores (greater
than or equal to 4) is NH = 34. The number of students with low SDL scores (less than or equal
to 4) is NL = 2. Hence, the discrimination index is calculated as DI = |NH – NL|/N  0.28.
Correlation Coefficient
Table 2 presents the Pearson correlation coefficient on the factors of SDL mentioned in
Table 1: GOAL, TASK, RESO, STRA and EVAL. As can be seen in Table 2, positive
relationships were found between GOAL, TASK, RESO and TASK, RESO, STRA, respectively.
In other words, as the value of GOAL, TASK or RESO increase, the value of TASK, RESO or
STRA increase as well. On the other hand, STRA and GOAL are considered as 2 independent
variables, as their correlation coefficient is 0.162.
Table 1. Pearson Correlation Coefficients
GOAL TASK RESO STRA EVAL
GOAL 1 .380** .306** 0.162 .217*
TASK .380** 1 .391** .306** .295**
RESO .306** .391** 1 .342** .196*
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GOAL TASK RESO STRA EVAL

STRA 0.162 .306** .342** 1 .376**
EVAL .217* .295** .196* .376** 1
N 115 115 115 115 115
Reliability
Table 3 presents the value of Cronbach’s Alpha test to evaluate the reliability of the main scale
SDL by a set of scales. Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient of SDL capacity is α = 0.676 which is
higher than the acceptable level of internal consistency (0.600). Therefore, the SDL scale meets
the necessary condition to measure the SDL scores. Furthermore, as shown in Table 4,
Corrected Item – Total Correlation values for each scale is greater than 0.3. As a result, the
SDL scale derives the sufficient condition to measure SDL scores. All values in the column
Cronbach’s Alpha if Item Deleted are less than 0.676. Consequently, all criteria GOAL, TASK,
RESO, STRA and EVAL have appropriate qualifications to evaluate and determine students’
SDL capacity.
Table 2. Reliability of scales
Cronbach’s Alpha Cronbach’s Alpha Based on Standardized Items N of Items
.676 .679 5
Table 3. Correlation coefficients (Item-Total Statistics)
Corrected Item-Total Correlation Squared Multiple Correlation Cronbach’s Alpha if Item Deleted
GOAL .382 .183 .648
TASK .515 .273 .589
RESO .450 .232 .616
STRA .429 .230 .626
EVAL .382 .187 .646
The analysis shows our scale meets all requirements to have a feasible accuracy to evaluate
the SDL readiness capacity of students in Informatics. With the proposed scale, we assess the
SDL readiness score of students in a sample of 1170 students. We describe samples used in our
work and show the result in the next sections.
3.3. Research samples
We conducted a survey on 1170 students from 15 provinces nationwide. Considering 4
classification criteria (grade level, gender, gifted class, area of residence), Table 4 shows
statistics of the samples on 4 criteria. As can be seen, the number of students in grade 11 has the
biggest portion of the sample (about 59%). Moreover, the percentage of students in Informatics
gifted class is 5.6 times higher than students in a normal class, at 85% and 15% respectively.
For the living area, the percentage of students living in rural areas led the way with 44%.
Table 4. Classification criteria
Grade 10 Grade 11 Grade 12 Total
Gender
male 173 325 38 536
female 192 365 77 634
Gifted class
Yes 27 146 4 177
No 338 544 111 993
Area of residence
1 – Municipality 54 148 3 205
2 – Provincial city area 99 262 29 390
3 – Rural area 163 272 76 511
4 – Mountainous area 49 8 7 64
Total 365 690 115 1170
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With determining sample size and randomly sampling strategy, the survey sample is
considered fully representative of students in the research sites.
4. Result and analysis
4.1. SDL readiness score on the SDL components
According to the self-study capacity assessment framework, students’ SDL readiness is
calculated from 5 component competencies which are showed in Table 4. For each component
capacity, the score is equal to the total score of the questions divided by the number of
questions. SDL readiness score is the average of 5 component scores. Figure 1 shows the
statistics.
Figure 1. SDL readiness score and component scores

As can be seen in Figure 1, there is a large proportion (94.7%) of students with score of
SDL’s readiness of 3 or 4. In other words, most of the students have a good perception of SDL.
Moreover, in 5 components competencies, the ability to identify learning resources has the
highest score, with 59.10% and 40.9% of the students scoring 5 and 4, respectively. No
competence has score 1, 2 or 3. On the other hand, ability to evaluate learning progress is the
weakness competence, with the rate of students scoring 4 and 5 being 51.7%.
4.2. SDL readiness scores by student classification criteria
Table 6 describes the results of SDL readiness score on classification criteria mentioned in
Table 5. SDL readiness scores are similar in grade 10 and grade 12, with 4.1% and 4.3%,
respectively. On the other hand, SDL readiness scores of grade 11 are significantly lower. For
example, the percentage of students with good readiness (score of 4 or 5) in grades 10 and 12
are 78.1% and 79.2%, respectively, while this rate in grade 11 is below 70%. So, there is a
difference in self-study readiness across grades, but not in an ascending or descending direction
from 10 to 12.
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Table 5. SDL readiness score by student classification criteria

SDL readiness score
2.00 3.00 4.00 5.00 p-value
Gifted in Informatics Yes 0.5% 26.9% 68.0% 4.6% 0.401
No 0.0% 22.6% 71.2% 6.2%
Grade 10 0.5% 21.4% 74.0% 4.1% 0.042**
11 0.4% 29.7% 64.5% 5.4%
12 0.0% 20.9% 74.8% 4.3%
Gender Male 0.6% 30.0% 64.7% 4.7% 0.047**
Female 0.3% 23.0% 71.6% 5.0%
Area of residence Municipality 0.5% 34.1% 62.9% 2.4% 0.070*
Provincial city area 0.3% 26.2% 67.4% 6.2%
Rural area 0.4% 23.5% 70.8% 5.3%
Mountainous area 1.6% 23.4% 73.4% 1.6%
The Chi-square statistic is significant at * p<0.1, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.001
Considering gender, Table 5 shows the gap in SDL readiness between male and female
students. For example, the SDL readiness scores of male and female students are 69.4% and
76,6%, for levels 4 and 5, respectively.
The SDL readiness scores of students living in the municipality area is lower than that of
students living in other areas, including the mountainous areas. There is a need to investigate the
teaching method for students in the municipality to motivate and develop their inner capacity.
We suggest that the excess of facilities causes a lack of self-reliance in studying. It also
decreases their perception of SDL capacity.
As for Informatics gifted students, their SDL readiness scores are slightly higher than the
normal students’. More than three quarters (77.4%) of the Informatics gifted students have the
score of 4 or 5, in comparison with 72.6% of the normal students.
Table 6. SDL score on intrinsic and extrinsic factors
SDL readiness score p-value
2.00 3.00 4.00 5.00
Average score in Informatics of the last semester <5.0 0.0% 37.5% 62.5% 0.0% 0.934
5.0-6.5 0.0% 24.3% 71.6% 4.1%
6.5-8.0 0.5% 29.0% 65.6% 5.0%
8.0-9.0 0.4% 23.7% 70.4% 5.5%
>9.0 0.5% 26.7% 69.0% 3.7%
Award/certification No 0.5% 25.7% 69.2% 4.6% 0.435
Yes 0.0% 28.6% 65.4% 6.0%
Facility .00 0.6% 26.6% 66.2% 6.5% 0.746
1.00 0.7% 26.0% 68.7% 4.7%
2.00 0.8% 28.3% 66.2% 4.6%
3.00 0.0% 23.7% 71.5% 4.8%
4.00 0.0% 26.5% 70.4% 3.1%
Demand for self-learning No 1.7% 46.5% 49.8% 2.0% 0.000***
Yes 0.0% 19.1% 75.0% 5.9%
Self-learning from the request from family No 0.4% 25.8% 69.0% 4.8% 0.133
Yes 0.0% 40.5% 51.4% 8.1%
Self-learning from the request from teachers No 0.5% 25.8% 68.6% 5.0% 0.646
Yes 0.0% 28.8% 67.3% 3.8%
Time spent self-learning with Informatics Less than 2 hours 0.6% 28.8% 66.7% 3.9% 0.003**
About 2 hours 0.0% 19.0% 74.8% 6.2%
More than 2 hours 0.0% 19.4% 70.4% 10.2%
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SDL readiness score p-value

2.00 3.00 4.00 5.00
Perception of the improvement of self-learning No 0.6% 55.2% 43.6% 0.6% 0.000***
activities Yes 0.4% 21.5% 72.5% 5.6%
Roles of teachers with student’s self-learning No 0.9% 33.1% 62.7% 3.4% 0.000***
Yes 0.0% 19.8% 73.9% 6.3%
The Chi-square statistic is significant at * p<0.1, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.001
Table 6 describes the results of self-study capacity by intrinsic and extrinsic factors. With
statistical significance at 95% and 99%, the following factors are recognized as significant
influences on self-study ability: Self-study from students themselves, Self-study time in
Informatics, Students awareress of the progress of self-study and the role of teachers in
students’ self-study. Students with intrinsic self-study needs have a high awareness of self-study
(4 and 5), which is significantly higher than those who do not have intrinsic needs (75.0% and
5.9% compared to 49.8% and 2%, respectively).
Table 6 also shows the significance of time students use on self-learning. The more self-
learning time, the higher the students’ awareness of self-learning. To be specific, the percentage
of students who spend more than 2 hours on self-study with self-study scores at levels 4 and 5 is
70.4% and 6.2% respectively, while only 66.7% and 3.9% of students who spend less than 2
hours on self-study get the level 4 and 5, respectively.
Compared with students who do not recognize the progress of SDL, the self-study scores of
students who know how to evaluate this progress are much higher. Particularly, the proportion
of students with SDL scores at 4 and 5 accounts for more than three quarters (78.1%) in the
student group with self-evaluation of SDL progress. On the other hand, this rate in the group of
students who do not know how to evaluate is only 44.6%.
For students who are oriented by teachers (such as providing more reference materials,
self-study guides, etc.), their self-study scores are higher than those of students who are not
guided by teachers (the ratio is 80, 2% at 4 versus 66.1% at 5).
4.3. Factors effecting SDL readiness capacity
Table 7 describes regression models of self-readiness scores on SDL by influencing factors,
including models with personal influence factors (M1), school factors (M2), family and social
factors (M3) and general patterns of influencing factors (M4).
Table 7. Regression model of SDL readiness score by factors
Independent Variables M1 M2 M3 M4
Grade (Grade 10 as reference)
Grade 11 -0.24 0.10
Grade 12 -0.56 -0.20
Gifted class 0.23 -0.37
Male student -1.83*** -1.78***
Average score (The least score <5.0 as reference)
5.0-6.5 2.55 1.03
6.5-8 3.28 1.75
8-9 3.57 1.99
>9 2.69 1.30
Awarded in competitions -0.66 -0.60
Intrinsic need to self-learning 5.64*** 5.15***
Time of self-learning (less 2 hours as reference)
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Independent Variables M1 M2 M3 M4
About 2 hours 2.14*** 2.08**
More than 2 hours 4.45*** 3.90***
Self-evaluate the progress of SDL 6.08*** 5.63***
School’s facility (least facility score as reference)
Level 2 0.48 0.02
Level 3 -0.78 -0.87
Level 4 0.33 0.00
Level 5 -0.05 -0.03
SDL requirement from teachers -1.66* -1.27
Teachers take a role to guide the students’ SDL 4.19*** 2.87***
Area (Mountainous as reference)
Municipality -0.27 -0.03
Provincial city area 1.27 0.98
Rural area 2.01 2.29
SDL requirement from family -0.51 -0.18
Intercept 71.76 82.13 82.80 71.46
R-squared 17.4% 4.7% 0.8% 19.8%
Number of observations 1170 1170 1170 1170
As for the influence of individual factors, it was found that individual factors explained
17.4% of the variability of self-study scores (R2 = 17.4%). Specifically, the self-study score
of students with self-evaluation of their progress is higher than that of students without
self-evaluate by 6.08 points, when other factors in the model are controlled. Also, self-study
scores steeply increase with the increase in the time they spend on learning. The scores of male
students are lower than that of female students, the gender correlation is also statistically
significant with p < 0.001.
Moreover, it is worth to mention the influence of two factors, grade and awards on the
result. For exemple, the students of grades 11 and 12 have lower SDL score than the scores of
students of grade 10 and students awarded in competitions reach lower scores than students
without awards or do not attend the competitions.
Regarding the factors from the school, SDL requirements from teachers (i.e., the teacher
assigns exercises and sets requirements for students) has a negative correlation with the self-
study score. In other words, pressure from teachers to self-study does not lead to students’ self-
study. However, the orientation and guidance from teachers (for example, giving resources and
suggestions) is an important factor affecting students’ SDL. For example, compared with the
student group without the teacher’s orientation and guidance, the student group with orientation
and guidance from teachers scores 4.19 points higher, if other factors in the model were
controlled. By contrast, the facilities factor did not have a statistically significant impact.
Factors from the school only explain about 4% of the variation of students’ self-study scores.
The model of family and social factors includes two factors: living area and family factors
affecting the need for self-study. However, these two factors are not enough to explain the
students’ self-study scores, the correlations are not statistically significant. More research is
needed on family influences. When all individual, school, and family factors were included in
the common impact factor model, most of the factors remained the same trend affecting
self-study scores. The model’s factors explain nearly 20% of the variation in self-study scores.
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CONCLUSION
The assessment framework developed in this paper using 5 components was found to be a
reliable and effective tool to measure students’ levels of self-directed learning capacity. With
our proposed framework, teachers will gain a clearer perception and understanding of SDL
manifestation, while being able to select appropriate methods focusing on main factors for
students’ SDL development. Our framework helps students to identify their own strengths
and weaknesses and suggest instructional strategies to help them to progress towards their
self-improvement. It is worth to mention that the factors influencing the SDL capacity will be
further analyzed and multiple self-improvement methods for students can be built based on the
analysis. We considered it as a future work.
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thesis, Pro-Quest Information & Learning).
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Strathclyde Regional Council, Glasgow, Scottland.
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Educational Research Association Annual Conference, University of Warwick.
8. McCune, S.K. (1988). A meta-analytic study of adult self-direction in learning: A review of
the research from 1977 to 1987 (Doctoral dissertation, Texas A&M University, 1988).
Dissertation Abstracts International, 49, 3237.
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Curriculum.
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learning readiness scale for nursing education. Nurse Education Today, 21, 516-525.
11. Murray, J. A. (1987). The effect of a clinical internship on the self-directed learning
readiness of baccalaureate nursing student students. Doctoral dissertation, The University
of Iowa. Dissertation Abstracts International, 49, 1036.
12. Williamson, S.N. (2007). Development of a self-rating scale of self-directed learning. Nurse
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About the authors

– Kieu Phuong Thuy was born in Haiphong city, Vietnam. She is a lecturer in Teaching
Methodology, Hanoi National University of Education, Vietnam. She received the B.S. degree
and master’s degree in Informatics education from Hanoi National University of Education and
from King Mongkut University of Technology North Bangkok, Thailand, respectively. She has
9 papers on pedagogical and education and joins the committee for the new set of Informatics
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textbook for Elementary students. She is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree in Teaching
Methodology at Hanoi National University of Education. Her research interests include applied
Information Technology in teaching and self-directed learning capacity.
– Nguyen Chi Trung was born in 1971. He graduated from the Faculty of Mathematics
and Informatics at Hanoi National University of Education in 1993, graduated with a master’s
degree in Information Technology in 2000, graduated with a doctorate in Teaching
Methodology in 2015. At the moment, he is a lecturer of the Faculty of Information
Technology, Hanoi National University of Education. His current fields of teaching and
research are algorithmic thinking development and competence development teaching.
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DESIGNING STEM ROBOTICS TOPIC FIRE ALARM SYSTEM

FOR 8TH-GRADE STUDENTS TO ENHANCE STUDENTS’
PROBLEM-SOLVING COMPETENCE
Vu Quoc Thang1, Dang Dong Phuong1, Le Hai My Ngan1
Abstract: Educational robotics is one of the most prominent curricula to implement STEM
education activities in school due to its positive impact on students’ STEM knowledge and skills.
The purpose of this article is to develop an integrated STEM robotics topic for 8th-grade students –
a simple automatic Arduino fire alarm system in which students experience, acquire knowledge
from practical problems, and develop their problem-solving competence. The topic was designed
based on the engineering design process, a model that focuses on problem-solving factors in
STEM-oriented education, and we involved 15 8th-grade students in a robot-designing activity.
The observational results showed that students improved their knowledge in robotics and
positively expressed their problem-solving skills. This research proposes a brief course for
secondary school students to help them enhance their problem-solving competence.
Keywords: Arduino, robot, robotics, STEM robotics, STEM education
INTRODUCTION
In recent years, STEM education has attracted much attention worldwide, such as in the
United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, India, Malaysia, etc. (Takeuchi et al., 2020). Vietnam is not
out of such context. The Vietnam General Education Curriculum 2018 has pointed out the vital
role of STEM education in school. STEM education is an integrated approach for such subjects,
including science, technology, informatics, and mathematics in the Vietnam curriculum. This
approach aims to help students develop the essential competence for the rapid technological
growth of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (Ministry of Education and Training, 2018).
In STEM education, robotics is currently being advocated as a creative field to implement
in the school curriculum due to its high integration. Many studies have shown that STEM
robotics education has a substantial influence on students’ learning outcomes in the STEM
disciplines (Castro et al., 2018). In STEM robotics education, robots are regarded as an effective
tool (Myint Swe Khine, 2017) and an innovative way (Zeidler, 2014) to deploy STEM activities
because of the following characteristics: (1) linked to the authentic problem; (2) adapted STEM
education characteristics; (3) assisting students in the acquisition and consolidation of practical
STEM knowledge (Atmatzidou, 2012; Eguchi, 2015; Benitti, 2012; Alimisis, 2013) as well as
STEM-related skills such as computational thinking and problem-solving skills (Durak et al.,
2019; Jojoa et al., 2010; Nugent et al., 2010; Williams et al., 2007). Several papers have
revealed that STEM robotics education is increasingly gaining attention in school programs. In
this sense, it is crucial to develop STEM robotics activity based on practical pedagogical
approaches (Alimisis, 2013; Angel-Fernandez & Vincze, 2018). For example, Ching’s research
(2019) developed an integrated STEM robotics curriculum combining project-based learning to
enhance primary school students’ attitudes and learning outcomes aged 4 to 6 (Ching et al.,
2019). Chen and Chang (2018) clarified the approach to STEM robotics through an integrated
robotics STEM course about sailboat for 10th-graders to design and create autonomous sailboats
(Chen & Chang, 2018). In this line of STEM robotics research, such studies have shown
positive performance on students’ knowledge and related skills. A specific distinction of STEM
* Corresponding Author: Le Hai My Ngan; E-mail Address: nganlhm@hcmue.edu.vn

1 Ho Chi Minh City University of Education, Vietnam
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robotics activities is the intimate connection with robotic toolkits (Rahim & el Mouhamad,
2019). The robotic toolkits, which provide extensive possibilities for constructing and
programming, enable students to engage in activities and enhance their creativity and problem-
solving competence (F. Sullivan & Moriarty, 2009; A. Sullivan & Bers, 2015). In this study, the
Arduino-based robotic platform is utilized in compiling STEM robotics activity. It is an open-
source electronics prototyping platform with high flexibility that allows users to flexibly design
and build a prototype according to their own ideas rather than being constrained by predefined
instruction (Junior et al., 2013; Arduino, 2018).
According to Mohr-Schroeder (2014), middle school age is regarded as an adequate period
to adapt to STEM activities (Mohr-Schroeder et al., 2014). A survey on middle school
Vietnamese students’ awareness and interest in robotics found that students expressed their
curiosity and desire to learn about robotics activities. However, limited opportunities for
practical experience in the contemporary curriculum make students quite unconfident about
STEM robotics education (Le et al., 2020). Nevertheless, the research subjects are secondary
school students, who still lack experience with programming and robot construction. Therefore,
it’s necessary to design and develop more teaching topics that are practical, topical, and relevant
to such students. Without a doubt, the new curriculum in Vietnam with emphasis on
Technology and Informatics field is a timely opportunity to carry out STEM robotics activities
in school (Ministry of Education and Training, 2018). Therefore, this study introduces a STEM
robotics topic for 8th-grade students which is a simple automatic fire alarm system using
Arduino UNO R3. The topic allows students to exploit and manipulate the knowledge of
science, technology, informatics, and mathematics to solve practical problems and enhance their
problem-solving competence in STEM robotics education.
CONTENT
1.1. STEM robotics education
According to Angel-Fernandez and Vincze (2018), educational robotics is a discipline
designed to enhance students’ learning experience through establishing, implementing, and
improving pedagogical activities, specific tools, and technology, in which robots play an active
role (Angel-Fernandez & Vincze, 2018). An educational robotics learning environment may let
students explore modern technological solutions for real-life problems (Myint Swe Khine,
2017). Many recent researches in this field perceived STEM robotics education as a discipline
to learn about robotics itself, with tangible learning tools (Jung & Won, 2018). Accordingly,
STEM robotics education, in an integrated approach, is defined as a field in which students
utilize their scientific, mathematical knowledge as well as associated skills to design,
manufacture, assemble and program robots to solve authentic problems (Doerschuk et al., 2016;
Di Lieto et al., 2017).
1.2. Engineering Design Process
Engineering Design Process (EDP) is a procedure for engineers to solve problems based on
developing an idea or product that requires systematic thinking. It includes six main steps:
identify a problem, imagine solutions, design plan, create prototype, test and improve products
(Barry Hyman, 1998; Eide, 2018). EDP is a potential pedagogical approach to identifying and
resolving problems since it has the following advantages: (1) highly iterative, (2) open-ended, in
which a problem may have many possible solutions, (3) providing a meaningful context for
acquiring scientific, mathematical, and technological concepts, and (4) encouraging the abilities
to think, model and analyze creatively (Katehi et al., 2009). EDP paves the way for students to
solve problematic situations by synthesizing and applying their STEM knowledge and skill to
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create optimal solutions (Mangold & Robinson, 2013). In Vietnam, the Ministry of Education
and Training has recently concretized the teaching-learning process in accordance with the
engineering design process, which is outlined in Dispatch 3089 “On the implementation of
STEM education in the school curriculum”, demonstrated explicitly in Figure 1 (Ministry of
Education and Training, 2020).
Figure 1. Engineering design process (by Ministry of Education and Training, 2020)
1.3. Problem-solving competence in STEM robotics education

According to PISA 2012 results, problem-solving competence is defined as “an individual’s
capability to engage in cognitive processing to understand and resolve problem situations where
a method of solution is not immediately obvious” (OECD, 2014). The analysis results of PISA
in 2012 demonstrated the problem-solving process through the four cognitive processes
following: exploring and understanding, representing and formulating, planning and executing,
monitoring, and reflecting (OECD, 2014). In this study, we approach problem-solving
competence in the context of STEM robotics education according to the competence framework
proposed by Nguyen and Le (Nguyen & Le, 2020). This framework is based on problem-
solving competence presented in the Vietnam General Education Curriculum 2018, and it also
has a strong connection with robotics education. Accordingly, problem-solving competence in
STEM robotics education includes six components. Each component is demonstrated through
the indicators of student behavior. There are 12 behavior indicators in total. Figure 2 shows the
behavioral indicators of problem-solving competence in STEM robotics education. According
to the framework, students need to recognize the features of the problem and propose solutions
utilizing robots to solve the problem. Then, through the activities involved in acquiring
fundamental and robotics-intensified knowledge, students know how to construct and choose
potential solutions. As a result, students plan to create a robotic product capable of solving
problems.
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Figure 2. Problem-solving competence framework in STEM robotics education

(by Nguyen & Le, 2020)
2. Research questions and method

The purpose of this research is to clarify the following main objectives:
1. Designing and evaluating the effectiveness of the topic “Fire alarm system”.
2. Evaluating the students’ adaptation towards the topic on their problem-solving skills.
To accomplish these objectives, we utilized the method of theory analysis and synthesis for
STEM robotics education to develop a topic of Fire alarm system. Qualitative and quantitative
analysis method was conducted through observation to analyze the students’ behavior following
the problem-solving competence framework in STEM robotics education (Nguyen & Le, 2020).
3.1. STEM robotics topic “Fire alarm system”
In this topic, we implement STEM robotics education as a learning environment, which
entails applying STEM concepts via the construction and programming of robots to solve real-
world problems. In such a learning environment, learning is driven by solving a problem.
Students will be provided with a realistic, relevant, and topical problem (fire and explosions),
from which they will suggest solutions and use pertinent knowledge to address the problem via
the creation of a fire alarm system.
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Figure 3. The connection between the STEM disciplines in the topic

Figure 3 shows the connection between the STEM disciplines in the topic (Kelley &
Knowles, 2016; Yata et al., 2020). Technology and Engineering serve as the fundamental
disciplines that students must grasp to design and construct a robot. These are engineering
design thinking and integrated technology knowledge in STEM robotics education. The
fundamental knowledge about electronic signals and programming enables students to create
block diagrams and program robots to execute the required tasks properly. Science and
mathematics support platform knowledge that enables students to propose ideas and develop
thinking processes for robots. Science knowledge (infrared light, thermal radiation, and basic
electricity) helps students understand how robot’s components work. Based on the thinking
process “If the sensor receives signals about fire, the fire alarm system will activate the buzzer
and water pump to extinguish it”, students need to comprehend knowledge of infrared radiation
to explore the sensor’s functioning and know how to install it into the system properly.
Additionally, students need to determine the characteristics of electric circuits and power
supplies in the operation of electrical equipment. While exploring robot parts, students engage
in the consolidation of mathematics knowledge (basic measurement and comparison) and skills
by measuring and comparing the voltage signal of the sensor, investigating the operation of the
water pump with different power supplies. Specific italicized learning objectives in figure 3
(basic electricity, basic measurement, and comparison) refer to the knowledge incorporated
within the topic but is not intended to create students’ understanding. Students have acquired
this knowledge throughout their schooling. They have to consolidate them during the problem-
solving process.
In line with the above theoretical basis, we compiled a STEM robotics course according to
the engineering design process. The course is associated with the fulfillment of a project to
solve a real-life problem, “How can we prevent a fire from occurring while no one is around?”.
The main objective is to enhance students’ STEM robotics problem-solving competence.
Students have to manipulate EDP to solve the problem by constructing an automatic fire alarm
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system. The learning tasks compiling in the activities are designed with the basic level of
requirements, as well as the teacher’s scaffolding instruction. Students are expected to utilize
their STEM knowledge and skills to accomplish assigned tasks, then create robotic products
primarily by themselves. Table 1 illustrates the procedure of the course.
Table 1. The procedure of implementing the Fire alarm system topic
Learning objective Students’ activities Learning outcomes
Activity 1. Define and analyze the problem
– Students recognize the importance of – Watch videos, discuss in groups, and present the – Group lecture notes present
automatic systems in fire prevention. information on the dangers of fire and its remedies. information about the risks,
– Students propose ideas to create an – Present fire prevention ideas using automatic causes of fire, and ideas to
automatic fire alarm system. systems. prevent fire.
Activity 2. Explore background knowledge and propose solutions
– Students describe the structure of the – Discuss and answer questions about the structure – Individual lecture notes
system. and function of the automatic system under the present information about the
– Students present knowledge of infrared teacher’s guidance. structure and function of the
light, thermal radiation, and basic electricity. – Install electric circuits and program robots automatic system, knowledge,
– Students program using mBlock software. following the requirements to explore the function of and practical results.
the system.
Activity 3. Choose the solution
– Students propose suitable system devices. – Utilize the tablecloth technique to sketch the – Design drawing of the
– Students draw a circuit diagram of the design, which consists of four parts: automatic fire alarm system.
system. (1) List of needed tools and materials;
– Students create the system’s information (2) Electric circuit diagram;
processing diagram. (3) System’s information processing diagram;
– Students sketch and describe the system (4) Design drawing of the fire alarm system.
prototype.
Activity 4: Create, test, and evaluate
– Students program the system based on the – Prepare necessary tools and materials. – Initial fire alarm system
defined block diagram. – Program and conduct robotic products in groups. product.
– Students construct the system according to – Test product, document the construction process
their design and plan. and difficulties encountered.
Activity 5: Share, discuss, and improve
– Students test and evaluate the results of – Operate and test products, evaluate the results of – Final fire alarm system
the operation. operation and compare them with the requirements. product.
– Students identify errors and offer solutions – Present the system to the class and receive
to improve the system. feedback from teachers and peers.
– Fix the errors and improve the products.
3.2. STEM robotics topic experimental practice
3.2.1. Research design
We conducted a five-day course (10 school periods) with fifteen 8th-grade students of Hoa
Sen High School (District 9, Thu Duc City) to assess the relevance and feasibility of the course.
These students voluntarily participated in the course with the school’s permission and worked in
groups of three. The participants are still novice in robotics, and the majority of them do not
have much programming experience. The student’s grade point average reflects that the
students’ learning capabilities are on average level. All of the datas, including individual and
group notes, students’ responses, conversations, learning journals, and products were collected
and documented by observation, note-taking, video-recording, and photographing. We adopted
a qualitative approach to analyze the obtained data for each student to facilitate monitoring and
assessment. The analysis results will be summarized and discussed in the following section.
Each student is given a code in the format: S.[Group].[Number]
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3.2.2. Students’ learning progress in problem-solving competence

(1) Students’ performance in terms of asking questions, suggesting ideas and exploring
knowledge
In the beginning, teachers aroused students’ interest by showing some pictures and videos
that depicted real-life fire and explosions. Most students were well aware of the fire risks. S5.1:
“Because fire is dangerous to humans, we should be well-prepared with knowledge about fire
prevention and fire fighting, as well as have sufficient fire fighting equipment at hand to deal
with it promptly”. From then, the teacher triggered students’ problem-solving competence via
questions on real-life situations: How can we prevent a fire from occurring while no one is
around?. Students offered ideas related to an automatic system. S5.1: “Install a type of device
that can detect fire and automatically spray water to extinguish it”; S1.1, S2.3, and S4.3:
“Install an automatic fire alarm and fire fighting system”. Additionally, students S3.1 and S3.2
suggested other ideas to use automatic systems such as: “Set up an automatic system that will
close the door and remove all the oxygen from the room so that the fire cannot occur”.
However, when teacher and friends pointed out the impossibility of such ideas, these students
returned to the option of automatic fire alarm and fire fighting system. The utilization of
authentic context in compiling the topic gives students opportunity to propose creative ideas and
solutions to the problem. In addition, realistic and topical problems which are familiar to
students can pique their interest and attitudes, when they could actively identify the dangers and
causes of fire and present reasonable precautions to protect themselves and others.
Figure 4. Students worked in groups and their results

In the task of exploring background knowledge and proposing solutions students learned
about robotics-intensified knowledge by determining the system’s mechanical structures and
working principles. The observation results show that students had a positive attitude in learning
about robots, quickly completing the tasks without the teacher’s guidance, and actively
expressing their opinions about the robot. S2.3: “The automatic system is composed of 3 major
components: sensor, brain, and actuator”; S3.1: “The sensor will receive information about the
fire and send it to the system’s brain, thereby activating the actuator to perform fire alarm and
fire fighting tasks”. From there, based on basic knowledge of robotics, students demonstrated
how to solve the problem by searching for and selecting the components required for their
robotic solution. Most students identified the necessary components for the system’s brain and
actuator under the teacher’s instruction: Arduino UNO R3, water pump, and buzzer. However,
just about 60% of students proposed utilizing a flame sensor for the system because they
identified the correct keyword for their internet search as “signals of fire”. Other students did
not read the handout and thus suggested other sensors such as a smoke sensor, a temperature
sensor, etc. S2.1: “Because the fire alarm system receives signals of fire, we decided to choose
the flame sensor”. These results reveal that by providing students with robotics-intensified
knowledge (physical parts of robots, function of robots, etc.), students may have a better
understanding of the robotic solutions they have come up with. This knowledge serves as the
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basis for students to develop the design and computational thinking. The research by Jung and
Won (2018) has also shown that robotics-intensified knowledge is essential and should be
developed for students in robot design and manufacturing activities (Jung & Won, 2018).
Additionally, students who are new to STEM robotics may struggle with identifying the
required components for robots. Teachers should provide appropriate orientation to students by
asking them questions regarding the robot’s parts.
Figure 5. Students presented robotics-intensified knowledge
Figure 6. Students explored the system’s parts

(2) Students’ ability in designing and creating robots
In the activity of sketching fire alarm system design, students were assigned to present the
following four contents: (1) list of necessary devices, (2) electric circuit diagram, (3) system’s
information processing diagram, (4) design drawing of the fire alarm system. Most of the
students correctly identified the necessary device in the minimum condition, just including
1 sensor, 1 Arduino controller, and 1 water pump. It is the most basic system to solve the
problem. In the task of identifying the system’s information processing, most students used the
block diagram to demonstrate the system’s operation, and there are two groups clearly showing
the signal information that the sensor will receive through programming language. S3.3: “The
flame sensor will send signals to the Arduino: If the signal is 0 (there is fire), the system will
activate the buzzer and water pump. If the signal is 1 (there is no fire), the system will not
function”. These results reveal that students have exhibited algorithmic thinking, which
coincides with Durak’s (2019) conclusions that students develop problem-solving competence,
especially in computation thinking, via robotic activities (Durak et al., 2019). In the task of
designing product drawings, students were able to interpret the fire alarm system’s designs and
identify the position of each component on the system. S4.2: “I will put the flame sensor and
water pump on the ceiling. When a fire occurs, the sensor can easily detect it, and the water
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pump will spray water to extinguish it”. In addition, S1.2 and S1.3 suggested: “The electric
circuit and the water pump should be placed far away from each other to prevent water from
entering the circuit and causing system damage”. However, when students presented their
designs to the class, they could not explain where the system would get water and how to set up
the system’s water source. When the teacher provided ideas by asking students several open-
ended questions regarding the water source and the drainage part, S2.3 quickly suggested: “We
should install a water container next to the system as a water storage compartment”. Student
S5.1 proposed more solutions after receiving ideas from S2.3: “We need to drill holes in the
floor to allow water to drain, and we need to locate the water source at the bottom of the house
so that drained water may flow directly into the water container”. Due to the fact that the
teaching process was developed in conformity with the EDP model, students may struggle when
participating in such activities. As Crismond (2013) pointed out, individuals who are new to the
engineering design process often encounter many difficulties, which can be mentioned as
having a lack of design basis and creativity, as well as inaccuracy in design sketching
(Crismond, 2013). Therefore, teachers’ guidance and orientation in performing assignments are
essential. Additionally, the robotics-intensified knowledge acquired via exploration of the
robot’s structure had a positive impact on students’ design and computational thinking, as shown by
their ability to demonstrate the system’s working principle in a programming language, as well
as sketch the design quite clearly and precisely in a short amount of time. With a teaching
approach centered on engineering design, the activity of presenting the design sketching is
necessary and assists students in thinking about and navigating the manufacturing process, from
connecting components to designing the robot’s thinking to completing the final product.
Figure 7. Student’s design drawing of fire alarm system

Students were assigned to create fire alarm system by themselves, then test and improve
products during 2 periods, about 90 minutes. In connecting circuits and programming tasks,
most students utilized the same programming blocks as in Activity 2 to design the system’s
thinking. According to observational results, students could quickly recognize the suitable
blocks to apply but remained perplexed and made mistakes when utilizing mBlock to arrange
the blocks and construct the program. This led to a lengthy trial-and-error process for testing the
initial product. In designing the house model, three groups of students began by measuring the
length and width of the house based on the water container they suggested before. Therefore,
the process of building up the house model ran smoothly and without any difficulty. However,
groups 4 and 5 started building the house model according to their personal preferences without
using technical measurements; hence, they had difficulties attaching the model to the water
container afterward. Students carried out testing throughout the wiring and programming
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process to promptly fix and analyze the system’s errors. The findings show that groups 1, 2, and
4 could complete their final product, and their fire alarm systems appropriately operated
according to the requirements. Groups 3 and 5 paid too much attention to the system’s
aesthetics. Thus they just completed their products on time without testing and evaluation.
Nevertheless, several student groups created the fire alarm system based on their intuition and
feelings when the product did not match the group’s design sketching. The reason is partly that
the students were still unfamiliar with these types of activities, and therefore easily
got disoriented and misunderstood when doing assignments. Another factor to consider is the
inappropriate allocation of robot-constructing duration when many students spent too much time
on the house-model design or the programming task. As Chevalier (2020) points out, when
students engage in programming activities, they frequently spend a great deal of time on the
trial-and-error process (Chevalier et al., 2020), which may have a significant effect on the
group’s total manufacturing time. In addition, the factor that the students conducted products
based on their intuition and feelings without being in accordance with the design sketching are
partly the reasons which wasted time and materials. The aforementioned findings indicate that,
although the activities are created with the aim of self-reliance in task performance, the
teacher’s intervention and assistance are still essential. Teachers should provide reasonable time
for robot-constructing activities and encourage students to finish the assignment according to
the defined requirements.
Figure 8. Student’s fire alarm system product

(3) Students’ adaptation in robotics activity
The assessment results of students’ problem-solving competence while being guided and
supervised by the teacher in the course are shown in Figure 10.
As shown in Figure 9, students show good performance at indicator DP1 Present the
real-world problem. It should be noted that the familiar and practical context of fire and
explosion engaged students to easily recognize the problem necessary to be solved. Despite
defining the problem well, some students did not analyze the situation clearly or provide the
necessary reasons for adopting robotics solutions, showing via lower expressions on the
indicator DP2 Describe the context that necessitates the robotics solutions. Therefore, it is
necessary to provide students with suitable guidance to help them analyze problems and
approach robotic solutions better and more clearly, thus promoting the improvement of
students’ critical thinking abilities.
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Figure 9. Students’ overall performance in problem-solving competence

Following student’s performance are relatively stable at an average level around 1 and 2 in
three behavior indicators as exploring knowledge, including AP1, ES1, ES2. For the indicators
on analysing basic structure of the system, most students revealed positive performance in
learning about the system’s structure and function. Nevertheless, when proposing component
devices, several students got in trouble suggesting relevant devices, opting instead to search
intuitively and unsure which sensor to utilize. For the indicators exploring parts of a robot,
teachers organized teaching by guiding students to explore and acquire knowledge of the robot’s
components. For students, the knowledge of robot’s components (sensor, water pump, Arduino)
and thinking process was a new field to them. Therefore, teacher had particular orientation, such
as asking open-ended questions that required students to actively think and debate to provide
appropriate answers, guiding students in hands-on activities to explore the working principle of
robot parts. The teacher’s support for this activity positively impacted students’ acquisition of
robotics-intensified knowledge, as shown by their ability to utilize this knowledge in robot
design and construction activities effectively.
The majority of students in this research lacked programming experience so this learning
process has enhanced students’ abilities to identify the robot’s properties, shown as what they
have done in sketching design. Through the teacher’s prompting questions, some students
expressed positively their problem-solving competence in this stage such as S5.2 by explicitly
proposing to the class how to set up the water storage system for the water pump. These results
reveal that the students’ design thinking ability is still in its infancy, teachers should have
suitable impacts to help students achieve higher levels of self-reliance.
At the stage of testing and improving the products, the result indicates that although
students were capable of completing the products and evaluating the results quite well, many of
them struggled to provide suitable improvement solutions. Students had few opportunities to get
acquainted and were still confused in expressing their improvement ideas into words. This is a
new kind of engagement for students when approaching the engineering design process.
Students may have a lack of experience in testing and evaluating the final products as Crismond
has revealed (Crismond, 2013). Teachers should organize active learning activities and have
specific instructions so that students may comfortably present their products and improvement
ideas.
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CONCLUSION
In this research, we introduced a STEM robotics topic “Fire alarm system” in accordance
with the engineering design process. The main purpose of this study was to develop students’
problem-solving competence. The topic was effective in terms of its practicality and feasibility
of the implementation. In addition, this topic demonstrated the characteristics of STEM
robotics, notably the high level of integration when constructed on the Science, Technology,
Informatics, and Mathematics curriculum. The teaching approach based on the engineering
design process positively impacted students’ capabilities to synthesize, analyze, build, test,
evaluate, and improve the solutions to solve problematic situations. Students had positive
attitudes toward effectively utilizing robotic solutions to solve problematic situations, indicating
that the topic successfully triggered students’ problem-solving competence. However, the
research has just been done on a small group of purposive sampling. Besides, the research
design didn’t in experimental with control and experimental group, so that the results just
showed some aspects on students’ behaviors. It is necessary to have further research to make the
topic more adaptive to students for developing problem-solving competence.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
To conduct this study, the research team would like to thank the students who voluntarily
and actively engaged in our pedagogical practices and Hoa Sen High School teachers for their
meaningful support in implementing this topic in the school curriculum.
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About the authors

– Le Hai My Ngan is a Ph.D. candidate in Physics Department of Hanoi National
University of Education (HNUE). She is currently working as a lecturer in Physics Department
of Ho Chi Minh City University of Education (HCMUE). Her major is Physics Education
Research (PER) and her Ph.D. study focuses on STEM-robotics education especially for
secondary students. She has participated in some STEM education projects of HCMUE and
Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam. She has published some publications consisting
of Journal papers, International Conference Papers, National Conference Papers.
– Vu Quoc Thang and Dang Dong Phuong are bachelors of Physics Education.
They graduated with honors from Ho Chi Minh City University of Education (HCMUE) with
well-regarded graduate theses on STEM robotics topics. While studying at the university, they
engaged in research and published two articles related to STEM robotics in the HCMUE Journal
of Science.
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WHAT DO I CARE ABOUT STUDENTS’ CONCEPTIONS?

TEACHERS’ SUBJECTIVE THEORIES ON STUDENTS’ IDEAS
IN GEOGRAPHY CLASSES
Kati Barthmann*1
Abstract: In their daily teaching practice, geography teachers may sometimes experience that,
despite dedicated preparation and implementation of a lesson, learning outcomes may fall short
of expectations. One possible reason for this could be that learners’ everyday ideas are not yet
adequately taken into account in the planning and implementation process of the lesson.
Therefore, the focus of this study is the reflective disclosure of geography teachers’ subjective
theories on student conceptions in order to be able to understand the resulting patterns of
instructional action. BAUMERT AND KUNTER’S (2006) model of professional action competence
provides the theoretical research framework, as it is assumed that professional knowledge is the
most explanatory aspect of teacher expertise. Professional didactic knowledge is particularly
relevant for this study. In 17 guided individual interviews of the explorative interview study,
insights were gained into the conceptual worlds of geography teachers regarding theory and the
practical handling of students’ conceptions. According to MAYRING (2002), the interview analysis
was occurred in an interpretative method of qualitative content analysis. The results of the study
indicate a close connection between the teachers’ professional didactic knowledge of student
conceptions and their individual conceptions of their relevance in the context of teaching
geography. Regardless of seniority, teachers’ professional knowledge about student conceptions
is not sufficiently developed to be able to identify their relevance for sustainable geography
teaching. The results of the study can be incorporated into training and further education
concepts in the sense of a closer link between subject didactic research and school practice. A
central concern here may be the stimulation of reflection and learning processes.
Keywords: teacher conceptions, teacher professionalization, teacher expertise, student
conceptions, conceptual change
INTRODUCTION
In the course of the global developments of the last 20 years, the demands on geography
teaching in schools have changed. Today, the core task of the geography teacher is to enable
students to actively participate in the design processes for a globally livable future with
sustainable geographic knowledge and skills throughout their lives. To this end, it is necessary
to build up sustainable, actively usable, networked geographical knowledge and to develop
competencies that enable learners to recognize and solve problems. On the part of the teachers,
the ability to understand student conceptions as essential learning prerequisites for the design of
modern geography lessons and to use them constructively is an important component of the
professional action of teachers. In this study, we investigated how 17 active German teachers of
geography in secondary schools in the Federal state of Bavaria think and act in this regard.
Their perceptions of this problem allow for individual subject-specific professional action
competence. The results of the study can influence the development of professional competence
as hints and suggestions for action. Thus, they represent a contribution to geographic didactic
teaching-learning research and to professionalization research. First, the central theoretical
foundations and then the research design are presented. Subsequently, a selection of results is
presented and a final conclusion is drawn.
* Corresponding Author: Dr. Kati Barthmann; E-mail Address: Kati.Barthmann@uni-bayreuth.de

1 University of Bayreuth, Germany; Chair of Didactics of Geography
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CONTENT
1. Theoretical framework
1.1. Teachers´beliefs as a dimension of professional action competence
The professional competence of teachers is considered a central prerequisite for the success
of teaching and the learning success of students (Richter et. al. 2014, p. 181). The model of
professional competence according to Baumert & Kunter (2006), which forms the theoretical
framework in this thesis, is based on the theories of the American teaching researcher Lee
Shulman on the professional knowledge of teachers. In his taxonomy, Shulman (1986, 1987)
identifies a total of seven areas of teacher professional knowledge, of which the three areas of
content knowledge (CK), pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), and pedagogical knowledge
(PK) are considered particularly relevant to teaching (Baumert & Kunter, 2006). Pedagogical
content knowledge (PCK) helps the teacher to create learning opportunities for teaching subject
knowledge. For this study, within PCK about subject-specific student conceptions and student
errors is relevant. In their model, Baumert & Kunter (2006) consider a well-connected and
extensive knowledge base as a prerequisite for successful teaching.
Despite many efforts to define the term teacher conceptions, it remains a “messy construct”
(Pajares, 1992, p. 307). Many parallel terms still exist, such as beliefs (e.g., Aguirre & Speer,
2000), conceptions (e.g., Cheng et. al., 2009; Boulton-lewis et. al., 2001), or subjective theories
(personal theories). In addition to professional knowledge, Baumert & Kunter (2006) consider
beliefs, values, goals, motivation and self-regulation as elements of professional competence.
They are closely linked to professional knowledge (Baumert & Kunter, 2013, p. 28; Dubberke
et. al., 2008, p. 193f.). The core aspects of teacher beliefs are their epistemological status, their
affective and evaluative charge, and their formation and mental anchoring. In this study,
the understanding of teachers’ beliefs is based on the following definition: “Teachers’ beliefs
are subjective, relatively stable, although experience-based changeable, partly unconscious,
context-dependent cognitions of teachers. They comprise the theory-like, though not
contradiction-free, thoughts on various interdisciplinary and subject-specific subject matter
areas of teachers’ profession” (Kirchner, 2016, p. 100).
1.2. Teachers’ beliefs and teacher action
In the scientific discourse, it is becoming clear that there are connections between teachers’
beliefs and their actions (e.g. Greoben, et. al., 2007). Perceptions influence teaching actions;
however, feedback effects of actions on teachers’ beliefs are also suspected (Blömeke et. al.,
2017, p. 223). A close connection with professional experience is assumed. These connections
are seen in both lesson planning and implementation. A distinction must be made between
action-guiding cognitions and actual instructional action. Teachers’ beliefs can, on the one hand,
influence the mental scripts that are anchored in the cognitive deep structure, and, on the other
hand, they can sometimes exert a situation-related, direct influence on classroom action. This
happens, for example, when quick, unplannable decisions have to be made within the teaching
process and suitable action patterns cannot be called up ad hoc. Patterns of action thus reveal
themselves at the level of the visual structure of the teachers’ instructional scripts. They can lead
to the development of so-called prototypical routines, which Linsner (2009, p. 63) defines as
“short, routinized subject-specific sequences of teacher actions with an essential function within
the subject-specific teaching and learning processes of a lesson”.
1.3. Studentsćonceptions
Students’ conceptions, in parallel also called pre-conceptions, everyday conceptions or
subjective theories, are understood as individual thought patterns of learners to be able to
explain phenomena of the physical or social world from earliest childhood (Reinfried, 2007).
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Everyday conceptions are formed through the active assimilation of information that is
integrated into pre-existing knowledge. Other information that is perceived as insignificant or
inappropriate is passed over. In this way, the learner creates his/her own subjective reality.
These thought patterns are not misconceptions, because they have proven themselves in
everyday life. A typical example from geography lessons is the idea that different distances of
the earth to the sun are responsible for the development of the seasons (Raber, 2015). A sustainable
change of such pre-concepts through teaching is often difficult because they cause learning
difficulties and are also extremely persistent. If teachers design their lessons according to the
constructivist paradigm, which knowledge cannot be transferred but is constructed individually,
then they must be aware of the differences between their students’ preconceptions and concepts
of expertise and systematically take them into account when designing lessons.
1.4. Conceptual Change
According to Duit (1996), learning means changing concepts of thinking. For very abstract
topics, where the students’ conceptions clearly deviate from the scientific view and which
usually cause learning difficulties due to their complexity, the conceptual change approach is
recommended as a teaching strategy to change everyday conceptions (Reinfried, 2007). It is to
be understood as a gradual change rather than an abrupt change of conceptions. According to
Duit (1996, p. 146), a direct exchange of concepts is usually not feasible. Through conceptual
change, thought structures change gradually, in that parts are supplemented and expanded,
others fundamentally revised and restructured (Posner et. al., 1982; Duit, 1996, p.147f.). Posner
et al. (1982) formulate in their classical conceptual change theory four conditions that have to be
fulfilled in order to induce a change in the learner’s conceptions: 1. The learner must be
dissatisfied with his old conception; 2. The new conception must be understandable; 3. It must
be plausible; 4. It must be fruitful. Widodo and Duit (2005, p. 135) suggest a sequence of steps
for a Conceptual Change learning process:
Phase 1 (Orientation) is the introductory and motivational phase, in which learners should
come into contact with the learning object and become aware of their ideas.
In phase 2 (Detect), the students’ ideas are activated. The learners are given time and
opportunity to exchange their ideas in order to determine whether there are different ideas about
a topic. This exchange can have a motivating effect on the individual examination of the subject
matter, since the learners may be interested in finding out to what extent their everyday
conception shows references to the scientific view or whose everyday conception corresponds
most closely to it.
Phase 3 (Restructure) is the core phase of Conceptual Change. Triggering a cognitive
conflict is a suitable way to stimulate learning processes (Duit, 1996; Reinfried, 2007) by
triggering dissatisfaction with the previous conception. Learners should realize that their
everyday conceptions are not sufficient to explain the new phenomenon. In order to make the
new idea understandable and above all plausible for the learners, constructivist-oriented learning
opportunities must be provided. These ideally contain descriptive materials that make it possible
to create experiences (models, experiments) and suitable analogies or metaphors that contribute
to the understanding of the subject-specific content. Ideally, complex, cognitively challenging
tasks are provided that enable active, situational, autonomous, self-directed learning. Too many
foreign technical terms should be avoided in this phase, because they can also lead to learning
difficulties.
In phase 4 (Apply the new conception), the new conception must be applied in other
contexts with the aim of consolidation and practice in order to prove fruitful. The conceptual
change is successful only if the learner can apply the new conception, or at least parts of it,
helpfully in problem-solving in another context (Posner et. al., 1982).
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The Conceptual Change is initially concluded with Phase 5 (Revue and evaluate the new
conception) by an individual reflection on the conceptual change. Witzel (2000, p. 98) points
out that the meaningfulness of a concept change only becomes apparent to the student when he
has successfully gone through it. Only then are the four conditions for a successful conceptual
change (Posner et. al., 1982) fulfilled.
1.5. State of research
The topic is still very little researched; accordingly, there are almost no research results.
Internationally, there is a study by Lane from 2014. He explored geography teachers’
epistemological beliefs (teacher beliefs) about learning and teaching, as well as their awareness
of students’ common preconceptions. Lane examined how experienced geography teachers use
their knowledge of student conceptions to inform instruction. The results show the complexity
and diversity of the interplay of professional knowledge with teachers’ subjective theories. A
main finding is that geography teachers who are aware of the persistence of student conceptions
are most likely to develop a deeper subject didactic knowledge of student conceptions and thus
be more adept at dealing with them. Teacher beliefs about student beliefs were investigated in a
German study by Wilhelm (2008). In a questionnaire for physics teachers at the Gymnasium,
teachers were asked about students’ preconceptions about the rainbow. The main finding of this
survey was that physics teachers “[...] have hardly any ideas about students’ conceptions, [...]
but find it very important when they hear about it” (ibid., p.8). Jelemenská (2012) investigated
in a case study the beliefs of a biology teacher about topics from the field of evolution as well as
the development of the teachers’ beliefs during the “Subject Didactic Coaching – Didactic
Reconstruction”. The study shows how coaching can support teachers in thinking about the
design of learning environments from the perspective of student conceptions.
In the context of teacher action, studies by Blömeke et. al. (2010) as part of the TEDS-M
study (Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics) found that there are two
main types of teachers at the end of training: the constructivist-oriented teacher and the
transmissive-oriented teacher (Kaiser et. al., 2012). The former view learning as an active,
self-directed, situational, and social construction process in which student conceptions of
learning play a central role. Transmissively-oriented teachers hold that the essence of the
teaching-learning process is largely the transmission of knowledge from experts to laypeople
(students). All students are taught the same subject matter at the same time. The teacher guides
and controls the processes of work, interaction and communication. The activity of the students
remains rather low in frontal teaching.
1.6. Research Questions
The epistemological interest of this study is focused on both professional didactic knowledge
and cognitive-psychological influencing factors, especially on action-guiding beliefs.
The central research question is:
What beliefs do German geography teachers have about students´ conceptions and about
how to deal with them in classroom practice?
Sub-questions:
1. What beliefs do German geography teachers have about students´ conceptions?
2. What is the significance of student conceptions for them in their teaching practice?
3. To what extent can the strategy of conceptual change be found in the ideas about
teaching practice?
While sub-question 1 mainly refers to professional knowledge about student conceptions,
teachers´ beliefs play a role in sub-questions 2 and 3 insofar as they enable conclusions to be
drawn about how student conceptions are dealt with.
530
2. Methodological Design
The qualitative research design was chosen for this study. It is based on the interpretative
paradigm as the methodological starting point of an object-oriented research process. The aim is
to describe, decode, understand and interpret unknown phenomenal (Witzel, 2000). The research
approach is suitable to find out and understand complex information about teachers’ still
unknown beliefs about geographical pre-concepts of their students as comprehensively
as possible. Through the individual interviews, individual patterns of action in dealing with
pre-concepts can also be uncovered. From the explicit utterances, it is hoped to draw conclusions
about implicit thought structures. The problem-centered, guideline-supported individual
interview (Witzel, 2000) was used as the data collection instrument. Following the theoretical
framework (Ch. 1), four main questions were asked in the interviews:
– The professional knowledge about the theory of student conceptions;
– The meaning and evaluation of student conceptions;
– Teachers’ beliefs on how to deal with student conceptions in teaching practice;
– Basic didactic attitudes.
Basic didactic attitudes are not a criterion of their own in the evaluation. This is, for
example, open questions about beliefs about what good geography teaching is or which learning
theories underlie the design of geography lessons. It is assumed that these statements could have
an explanatory character for the interpretation in the evaluation phase.
The interview structure should be comprehensive for the interviewees and support their
narration. Flexibility in the course of the interview is given, for example, by situational
questions or by intervention questions.
For the interviews, the teaching topic “The Origin of the Seasons” was chosen. Since it is
taught in all types of secondary schools, it is assumed that the interviewees are familiar with the
widespread everyday conception such as “In summer, the earth is closer to the sun than in
winter”. The guide was tested in a multi-stage pilot phase (Mayring, 2002, p. 194) with several
teachers in order to optimize it.
Selected interview guide questions:
– In the past few years, the term student expectations has come up more and more, are you
familiar with it? If not, please describe what you understand by it.
– Where do you think students get the everyday conceptions that the distance of the Earth
from the Sun is less in the summer than in the winter?
– Is it important to you to find out and reveal everyday ideas of your students?
– On what does your decision depend?
– Please describe how you work with student ideas in this lesson. (Report also possible for
other lessons)
– What are your reasons for dealing with student representations in this way and not
otherwise?
– In what ways has your strategy worked for you?
– What is important to you that the students learn in the lesson about the origin of the
seasons?
– How do you rate the place value/importance of student representations overall in your
classroom?
– How do you feel about it: Are student conceptions learning opportunities or rather
barriers and why do you see it that way?
– To what extent do student conceptions play a role in your lesson preparation?
– Do you have conversations with your peers about student conceptions?
– Would you like to explore the topic in more detail?
531
2.2. Sampling
The study was conducted in secondary schools in the German State of Bavaria. The
selection of subjects was criterion-guided (Kelle & Kluge, 2010) and based on the principle of
theoretical saturation (Mayring, 2010; Pat-Ton, 2002). This was achieved in 17 interviews.
The seniority of the interviewees is considered the most important criterion. In order to
obtain maximum dispersion in terms of the research subject, faculty with less than five years,
with five to fifteen years, and with more than fifteen years of experience were selected for
interview. The classification is roughly based on the stage model of Dreyfuß and Dreyfuß
(1980). The stages follow a progression from rigid adherence to rules to an intuitive way of
thinking based on experiential knowledge. The model assumes that professional competence
develops in five stages: Novice, Advanced Beginner, Competent, Proficient, and Expert. In this
study, due to the relatively small number of subjects, there are three stages: Novice (0-5 years of
service, 3 teachers), Advanced Beginner, Competent (6-15 years of service, 10 teachers), and
Proficient, Expert (16 and more years of service, 4 teachers).
Furthermore, it can be assumed that the combination with the teacher’s other sub-subject
also influences their conceptions (Schlichter, 2012). Both the maximum spread of subject
combinations and the equal distribution between natural science and social science subjects are
limited by institutional requirements of the Bavarian Ministry of Education. The Bavarian
teacher training for grammar schools provides for the subject combinations of Geography with
Chemistry, Physics, German, English, French (Bstmuk, n.d.) in the Realschule geography can
be studied in combination with Economics, German, English and French (Bstmuk, n.d.).
Gymnasium and Realschule are secondary schools in Germany. In the end, seven teachers with
the other subject German, four with English, one with Social Sciences, one with Physical
Education, one with the combination physics and three with economics were willing to be
interviewed. Of these, nine were male and eight were female.
The interviews were conducted at the subjects’ school. It was felt to be advantageous for an
open, trusting conversation on both sides that the interviewer was still a teacher/colleague in the
school service at the time of the interview. All interviewees agreed to the recording of the interview.
2.3. Data analysis
For the data evaluation, the qualitative content analysis according to MAYRING (2002)
was chosen. The software program MAXQDA was used for this purpose. The evaluation
process fulfills the quality criteria of qualitative research because it was carried out step-by-step,
rule-guided, procedure-documenting, and appropriate to the subject matter. Thus, it was
guaranteed that an “[...] information base different from the original texts was created, which
only contains information that is relevant for answering the research question.” (Gläser &
Laudel, 2010, p. 200). The audio files were transcribed in a comprehensible manner, taking into
account goal-oriented transcription rules. The editing of the statements was carried out very
cautiously because there were strong regional dialects and general linguistic smoothing of
statements would have possibly distorted the meaning. All data and references that might have
provided information about the interviewee were anonymized. The classification grid necessary
to answer the research questions is based on the development of a deductive-inductive category
system, which was successively differentiated inductively based on the text material.
Table 1. Excerpts from the category system (own representation)
Name of category Description of category Anchor example
Top category 1 Teacher´s presentations on the didactic All statements concerning the
theory about student´s presentations didactic knowledge of pupils’
(for Sub-question 1 with focus ideas
Professional knowledge)
532
Name of category Description of category Anchor example

Subcategory 1.3 Knowledge of the term pupil’s orbits All statements that offer a “Everyday wisdom maybe or what they
lions scientific explanation or observe and then explain themselves
contain it in their own words independently, whether it’s right or
wrong, but that it just makes sense for
them.“ (17, 24-24)
Top category 2 Evaluation of student performances All statements that include
(For Sub-Question 2 with focus on ideas about whether students
importance and evaluation of pupils’ see ideas as an opportunity, a
ideas) barrier, both or none of them
Subcategory 2.1 Students’ representations as both an “It’s a good starting point to say that
opportunity and a barrier your knowledge is expandable here and
because I’ve been working on it, I’ve
read that these ideas still remain, even
though they were done in class. I think
it’s precisely these ideas of deserts,
even though other forms of deserts and
oases have been spoken about, but that
remains of course.“ (1, 22-22)
Top category 3 Concepts on how to deal with SV in All statements about ideas
teaching practice (For Sub-question 3 that describe, explain, analyse,
with focus on ideas about how to deal justify the handling of SV from
with SV in teaching practice) an individual point of view, etc.
Subcategory 3.1 Learning opportunities on the Teaching strategies to achieve “That sounds a bit negative now, but I
development of the seasons changes in learners’ think I confront them with the facts that I
imagination think are correct, [...], confront them by
asking them questions.“ (7; 64-64)
Subcategory 3.3 Metar Reflection on Strategies for All statements give reasons “If I see that they’re going in the wrong
Dealing with SV why which strategy is being direction, then I’ll go into it on the spot,
used because otherwise it might be already
fixed and they’ll still think in those
imaginations.“ (14,32-34)
“Because I’m afraid that because of
little steering, this will still be possible
in spite of everything.“ (11, 68-68)
During the work on the material, it became apparent that a fourth supercategory had to be
established in order to be able to record meta-reflexive statements of the teachers about their
basic attitude towards teaching and learning in geography lessons in a more differentiated way.
This concerns, for example, statements about good geography teaching.
In the first step of the summarizing content analysis, the very detailed and detailed
statements were edited, compressed, and pointed. They were then sorted, given subheadings,
and for reasons of comprehensibility, the section number from MAXQDA. The subsequent brief
explication serves the overall understanding of the individual interview. The individual
explications can reveal connections and/or asynchronies within a report. The subsequent horizontal
comparison of the individual explications serves the intrapersonal conceptualization of the ideas,
which were transferred into generalized statements and subsequently into thinking concepts.
3. Selected results
Referring to the research questions (Ch. 1, para 1.6.), selected central concepts of thinking
are now presented, which can be derived from the generalized statements.
What beliefs do German geography teachers have about students’ conceptions (Sub-Question 1)?
533
Table 2. Teachers’ thinking patterns about student conceptions theory

Thinking patterns Students’ performances are naive Students’ performances are not naive
Statements by the Student´s conceptions are based on non-institutionalized Student´s conceptions are based on school
interview partners knowledge, they arise from life-worldly, personal experiences. knowledge.
Exemplary typical “Unrealistic”, “Prior knowledge”,
statements “Images in the head that are in there”, “Everyday knowledge”, “Basic knowledge”,
“Intrinsic knowledge”, “Basic knowledge networks”
“Fundamental suspicions”,
“Images that they have somehow made for themselves, where
school doesn’t necessarily have an influence on them”
Table 3. Teachers’ thinking patterns about student conceptions theory
using the example of a lesson on the formation of the seasons
Thinking patterns Students´ conceptions are misconceptions Students´ conceptions are not necessarily wrong
Statements by the Wrong pupil ideas are especially present in When it comes to human geography, they are not directly
interview partners physical-geographical subjects. wrong.
Exemplary typical “Misconceptions”, “Vagant”, “Gender”, “Simplifying”, “Little differentiated”,
statements “Misunderstandings”, “Clichés”, “Prejudices”, “Train-table opinions”
“Mistake”,
“Completely wrong”
Table 4. Teachers’ thinking patterns about students’ conceptions theory
Thinking patterns Students’ conceptions must be eliminated Students’ conceptions must be used
Statements by the interview partners With false preconceptions at physical-geographic In Human geography, it is possible to work
topics cannot be worked on. The teacher’s job is to with no directly false ideas. You can pick
teach the right idea. them up from time to time in class.
Exemplary typical statements “Counteract”, “Connect”,
“Replace”, “Seize”,
“Correct”, “Develop”,
“Eradicate”, “It has to be changed in part.”
“You have to clean up with them. “
What is the significance of student conceptions for them in their teaching practice (Sub-
Question 2)?
Table 5. Teachers’ thinking patterns about the importance
of studen’s conceptions for their instrutional practice
Thinking patterns Teaching preparation Execution of lessons (here the origin of the seasons)
Relevant “in the mental advance planning”, “to remove curiosity”,
“to check what kind of previous knowledge is “to connect with it”, “to use correct ideas”, “usually only at
available”, “to be able to take into account the beginning”
interdisciplinary aspects”
Not relevant “[…] they are not relevant.“, “I’ll do it We have so little time in geography lessons anyway.
spontaneously.“, “It depends on the subject”, “The workload is already very high.”, “That depends on the
“The workload is very high. “ class. “
Table 6. Whether students’ conceptions are seen as an opportunity, a barrier, or both
Meaning
Students’ conceptions as an “So definitely as an opportunity. Because I believe that I can also grab the student. They present
opportunity something to me – a theory about the origin of the seasons, for example – and then realize, whoops,
that’s not my idea at all, what it’s really like. So, I can perhaps pack a little bit on my own interest, on my
curiosity”. (5, 44-46)
As a barrier “No, because I think that it may not be the right thing to do, how it works scientifically, and if I now
write it down, then they will have it in front of their eyes again, then they will remember it even better.”
(1, 90-90)
Both opportunity and barrier “Can be both, I think it depends on the student”. (11, 40-40)
534
To what extent can the strategy of conceptual change be found in the beliefs about teaching
practice (Sub-Question 3)?
Table 7. Implementation of Conceptual Change in the classroom
(modified according to Posner et al., 1982; Widodo and Duit, 2016)
Fulfillment of the conditions
Phase Procedure in class
according to Posner et. al.
Detecting Recording of students’ conception is an integral part:
Start of lesson
– Social form/media, methods/strategies;
– Classroom teaching, mostly teacher-student discussion;
– Simple questioning;
– Common brainstorming or/and mind-mapping, imagination journey, visual stimuli,
drawings
– With a lot of teaching experience: offering student ideas by teacher himself/herself.
Restructure I. Concept of passing on knowledge by the teacher:
1. Inducing a cognitive conflict:
– Problem-oriented questions by hypothesizing the students, by contrasting the
students’ conception vs. the scientific conception, creating real-life references.
2. Development of the scientific point of view Condition of dissatisfaction is
(social form/media, methods/strategies): fulfilled.
– Classes, short pairphases, questioning-developing class discussion, small-step, partly
loosened up by action-oriented methods;
– Flashlight, globe, worksheets, film; Condition of intelligibility and
– No cognitively challenging tasks. plausibility not met
II. Concept of the (rudimentary) construction of knowledge)
1. As in the other concept, with the addition of stimulating a mutual exchange among
learners about their student ideas)
2. Development of the scientific point of view (social form/media, methods/
strategies):
– Station learning in groups, cooperative learning, experimentation with model in
groups;
– Room for individual discussion in discourse and alone possible;
– Cognitively stimulating thought-provoking impulses by the teacher. Conditions of intelligibility and
(joint) reflection phase planned for evaluation of the change of ideas plausibility are met in basic
terms.
Apply An application of the new idea in other contexts does not take place in both concepts. The condition of fruitfullness is
not fulfilled.
Review and I. Concept of passing on knowledge by the teacher:
evaluate No review and evaluation of the change of conception, no reflection phase.
II. Concept of rudimentary construction of knowledge:
rudimentary review and evaluation in class through discussion of group results, no
individual reflection
All but one of the teachers reported that they had never heard of the Conceptual Change
approach prior to the interviews (Barthmann, 2018).
4. Discussion of the results
In contrast to the scientific theory (Ch. 1), teachers distinguish in their understanding of the
term student conceptions on the basis of their teaching experience between everyday
conceptions (naïve) and prior knowledge from the classroom (non-naïve). They attribute the
former to learning in everyday life outside school. Here, their understanding coincides with
theory. Teachers´beliefs about their characteristics also show similarities to the theory.
535
One finding of this study is that geography teachers, as subject experts in geography,
differentiate the characteristics in a subject-specific way. They distinguish between
studentsćonceptions in physical geography and human geography. They characterize student
conceptions in the physical geography context more vehemently as “wrong” compared to
human geography topics where they are “not so wrong.” It is possible that this distinction is due
to the fact that physical geography studies the structure and dynamics of our physical
environment, and thus the subject matter is viewed as quasi-“indisputable” factual knowledge.
Human geography deals with the spatiality of human activity. Dynamics and interactions that
occur here are much more frequently the subject of scientific and socially controversial
discourse; opinions, convictions, attitudes, norms, and values play a central role. It is therefore
understandable if student ideas are categorized by teachers as “not so wrong” in this
professional context. As a consequence, teachers’ beliefs differ, here in the sense of beliefs
about how to change students’ conceptions in the respective subject-specific context. “Wrong”
conceptions should simply be replaced or exchanged with the correct knowledge in teachers’
beliefs. On the other hand, “not so wrong” student conceptions could be addressed in the
classroom, worked with, and gradually changed. These convictions, which have obviously
developed through teaching experience, thus lead to a differentiation within the pedagogical
content knowledge (PCK) on the basis of the content l knowledge (CK). This confirms the
interactions between all its components presented in the model of professional action
competence developed by Baumert and Kunter (Ch. 1, para. 1.1) (ibid). This is also made clear
by the findings on conceptions of how to work with student conceptions in the classroom. The
concept of thinking that the teacher as a subject matter expert is suited to convey her knowledge
to laypersons is clearly more present in physical-geographical topics than in human-
geographical topics. Reports on the ideas about the didactic-methodical preparation and
implementation of individual lessons support this (see Tab. 7). The strategy of conceptual
change (Ch. 1, para. 1.4) is not yet applied in teaching because of the “concept of passing on
knowledge by the teacher” (see Tab. 7).
The interview content on the design of the lesson on the emergence of the seasons makes it
clear that the teachers try to replace the everyday ideas of the students through the didactically
small-step approach, together with classical media. The methodical implementation is the same
for almost all subjects. A strategy in the sense of Conceptual Change is at best recognizable in
the Detecting-Phase and at best at the beginning of the Restructure-Phase. At the latest after
“inducing a cognitive conflict” at the beginning of this phase, the “Concept of passing on
knowledge by the teacher” (Tab. 7) is applied to replace the student conception. Missing
professional knowledge about conceptual change is, with one exception, replaced by the
respective teaching experience in relation to the individually existing subject didactic
professional knowledge. Regardless of which category of seniority (Ch. 2, para. 2.2) the
teachers belong to, change in teachers’ conceptions about routines of action, how geography
lessons are prepared and conducted, are not recognizable. This finding does not conform to the
progression Dreyfuß and Dreyfuß (ibid) describe in their model. Experiencing teaching
strategies that are perceived as successful leads to the permanent consolidation of ideas about
this “successful” routine of action. Even if the “concept of passing on knowledge by the
teacher” is not suitable from a scientific point of view to bring about a lasting change in student
perceptions, it is hardly ever questioned in the course of professional activity. The reason for
this is again the lack of further development of professional knowledge in the course of
professional life. The PCK of the combined subject also has no influence on the
teachers´beliefs. Only one teacher with the other subject physics does not see herself as a
536
knowledge mediator, but as a learning guide whose task is to create constructivist learning
opportunities that enable conceptual change (see Tab. 7). She belongs to the concept of
beginning conceptual change. This teacher (novice) explains her beliefs about dealing with
student conceptions by saying that she had already dealt with the topic of student conceptions
during her studies of physics teaching. All other interviewees report that they had learned little
or nothing about student conceptions before the interviews. However, in the interview
discussions, a sensitization for the topic as well as a willingness to learn and reflect is evident.
This attitude goes along with the teachers’ beliefs to value students’ conceptions as an
opportunity for good, sustainable geography teaching.
The results of the study fit Kirchner’s (2006) definitional approach (Ch. 1, para. 1.1)
according to which teachers’ beliefs are theory-like, context-dependent stable cognitions.
Kirchner’s view that they should change over the course of a professional life due to teaching
experience as detail – and functional knowledge becomes greater and more interconnected cannot
be shared by this study.
Based on the model of professional competence (Chap. 1, para. 1.1), the study was able to
show that there are close interactions and feedbacks between professional didactic knowledge
and teacher beliefs/conceptions:
– Missing detailed and functional knowledge about student conceptions is replaced by
individual convictions formed from teaching experience. Central finding: Student conceptions
are not yet an integral part of the professional knowledge of geography teachers.
– Increasing professional experience through many years of teaching does not automatically
lead to a professional approach to student conceptions in geography teaching in the sense of
conceptual change. Key findings: The professional competence of geography teachers is
determined to a not insignificant degree by their experience in dealing with student conceptions
in the geography classroom. However, the professional experience of teachers is not sufficient
to deal with student conceptions in geography lessons in a constructivist way. This is only
observable in rudiments (see Tab. 7).
Thus, teachers’ conceptions are in fact experience-based constructs that represent a mixture
of knowledge and action routines.
Limitations of the study are that its aim was to explore unknown phenomena and it did not
intend to produce quantifiable results. The sample size of 17 subjects does not allow for
conclusions or generalizations to the totality of all geography teachers.
CONCLUSION
It is illusory to assume that only the theoretical acquisition of professional didactic
knowledge about student conceptions is sufficient to optimize geography teaching in the sense
of conceptual change. In addition to the expansion of the professional didactic knowledge about
student conceptions, a culture of sensitization and reflection in dealing with student conceptions
must take place. It is also important to put teachers’ learning-theoretical convictions to the test.
Within the professional didactic knowledge, the diagnostic competence of geography
teachers with regard to student conceptions must be improved. In specific, at best multi-level
advanced training concepts, the transmissive didactic basic attitude can be reflected upon. The
goal should be to consciously and willingly put one’s own learning theory convictions to the
test. Only then will it be possible to change the concept of passing on knowledge in the sense of
the Conceptual Change approach. Examples of what learning opportunities can look like should
be developed, practiced, and experienced as successful in one’s own teaching. This structure of
this procedure should already be a subject of the subject didactic education in the study.
537
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resolving.de/urn:nbn:de: 0114-fqs000122.
* Liste der Abbildungen und Tabellen:
Abb.1: Ein (Referenz)Modell zum Verlauf konstruktivistischer Lehr-Lern-Sequenzen
(verändert nach Widodo & Duit 2015, 135)
Abb.2: Interviewleitfadenfragen, eigener Entwurf Tab 1: Auszüge aus dem Kategorien
system (eigene Darstellung)
Abb.3: Auszug aus den geordnete Aussagen, Interview 17 (eigene Erhebung)
Tab. 1: Excerpts from the category system (own representation)
Tab. 2: Teachers’ thinking patterns about student conceptions theory
Tab. 3: Teachers’ thinking patterns about student conceptions theory using the example of a
lesson on the formation of the seasons
Tab. 4: Teachers’ thinking patterns about students’ conceptions theory
Tab. 5: Teachers’ thinking patterns about the importance of student’s conceptions for their
instructional practice
Tab. 6: Whether students’ conceptions are seen as an opportunity, a barrier, or both
Tab. 7: Implementation of Conceptual Change in the classroom (modified according to
Posner et al.,1982; Widodo and Duit, 2016)
About the author

Kati Barthmann have worked as a teacher of Geography and Economics in the Bavarian
school system for seventeen years. Fourteen of these years, she accompanied student trainees in
the second stage of their training in her function as a seminar teacher for the subject of
Geography. In addition to her core duties at school, she regularly worked on various teaching
and examination formats at the Chair of Didactics of Geography at the University of Bayreuth
from 2005 – 2017. Since 2017, she has been contributing her professional knowledge and
experience to the education of future teachers in the first university education stage. In addition
to her teaching activities, her research interests include the development and implementation of
constructivist teaching concepts in geography teaching and teacher professionalization research.
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THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE 5E INSTRUCTIONAL MODEL

IN DEVELOPING SCIENTIFIC COMPETENCY
OF PRIMARY STUDENTS
Nguyen Thi Hao*1, Truong Hoang Thong1
Abstract: Forming and developing the scientific competency is one of the core goals in Vietnam
2018 Science Curriculum at the primary level and therefore, the selection and use of appropriate
active teaching methods and teaching models to organize teaching activities are of great
significance, contributing to the achievement of the objectives of this subject. International
researches have shown that the 5E instructional model is one of the dominant teaching models in
science teaching and STEM teaching, some applied research in Vietnam has begun to show the
effectiveness of this teaching model in developing students’ competencies and meeting the
requirements of the 2018 Science Curriculum. The aim of this study is to find out the impact of the
5E instructional model on fostering students’ scientific competency at the primary level in
Viet Nam. Based on the scientific basis and characteristics of the 5E instructional model, the
psycho-physiological characteristics of primary students, the specific teaching methods in science
at primary schools and the contents of the 2018 Science Curriculum, we designed 5 Science lesson
plans on the Water content of the topic “Substance”, Grade 4 based on the 5E instructional
model. The pedagogical experiment was conducted on 65 primary students at K.M primary
school in Ho Chi Minh City in December 2020 showed that the scientific competency of the
experimental group is better than that of the control group. 5E instructional model makes a great
contribution to the scientific competency of primary students, especially helping them to deeply
understand scientific concepts, using science process skills, applying the knowledge to the
real-life and reinforcing trust and interest in science. This study’s result is the basis to provide a
solution for teachers in applying the 5E learning cycle to suit the practical conditions of
Vietnamese education, thereby improving the quality of science education, and meeting the
requirements of the innovative program.
Keywords: scientific competency, Science curriculum, 5E instructional model, primary
INTRODUCTION
In the General Education Curriculum, Science is a compulsory subject that focuses on
arousing scientific curiosity, initially allowing students to learn and explore the natural world,
apply the knowledge and skills learned in practice, learn how to maintain health and well-being,
and behave under the surrounding living environment. (MOET, 2018b).
The process of learning science is a process of inquiry-based learning, going from factual
observations to evidence-based reasoning and argumentation (Nguyen, 2019; Nguyen, 2019).
Therefore, the organization of learning activities in science should create conditions for learners
to participate in the experience, practice, and scientific inquiry activities. From then, students
establish the new knowledge based on the connection with their own experience and known
knowledge. Through scientific learning activities, students develop appropriate skills to explain
common problems in nature. Therefore, studying science in elementary school is extremely
necessary, laying the foundation for higher education levels, developing children’s basic science
skills, problem-solving skills, and critical thinking later.
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Thi Hao; E-mail Address: haont@hcmue.edu.vn

1 Ho Chi Minh City University of Education, Vietnam
541
The 5E instructional model proposed by Dr. Rodger W. Bybee and his colleagues in 1987 is
considered one of the most advanced and modern Science instructional models, applied and
deployed in many countries around the world (Australian Academy of Science, 2018; Hu et al.,
2017; Poon et al., 2012). The 5E instructional model was initially deployed in Vietnam after 2010.
Learning activities in the 5E instructional model encourage students to mobilize their
previous knowledge or experiences, thereby serving as a basis for self-building a new
knowledge base (Bybee et al., 2006). In recent years, at the primary school level, the research
and application of the 5E instructional model in teaching have received the attention of
researchers. Duong (2017) put forward the point of view that “there needs to be an adjustment
in the lesson objectives, lesson content, and ways to assess students’ learning results
appropriately. For primary school students, it is necessary to patiently provide time for them to
participate in the activities in the 5E instructional model” (Duong, 2017, p. 120). In the process
of evaluating the positive points brought about by this teaching model, Ngo (2019) found that
students receive knowledge in a more systematic and effective way; they find it easier to follow,
to participate in each learning phase and to remember knowledge more easily. Lai (2020) has
tested the 5E instructional model in Grade 4 Science to develop students’ ability to apply
knowledge and skills into practice. Research results on the case of 5 students show that the
ability to apply knowledge in practice is initially formed and developed when learning under the
5E instructional model. In addition, the author believes that the fields of scientific knowledge
associated with practice will bring the most practical effects in the teaching process under the
5E instructional model to improve the ability to apply knowledge and skills to practice for
students. Through the overview of the research problem, the application of the 5E instructional
model in teaching Science in primary schools has initially received attention and attention, but
mainly researches in terms of theory, more applied research is still needed on the application of
this model in teaching a specific subject in primary schools, especially in the process of
implementing this model.
Overall, applying the 5E instructional model to foster students’ scientific competency is
considered by the educational researcher. We firmly argue that applying the 5E instructional
model in science subjects is likely to enhance scientific competency for primary students.
Consequently, this study is conducted to use the 5E instructional model to develop scientific
competency for primary students. To lay the foundation for this study, we proceed to research
related background knowledge about scientific competency, the 5E instructional model. From
there, we present the design of the five Science lesson plans based on the 5E instructional model
and introduce an illustrated lesson plan “What are the properties of water” (Topic “Substance”,
Grade 4). We have conducted a pedagogical experiment with five 5E lesson plans on 32
students of class 4/3 at K.M Primary School, Ho Chi Minh City and analyzed the activities to
clarify the development of primary students’ scientific competency, compared with the control
group of 33 students by Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS).
CONTENT
1. Theoretical basis
1.1. Scientific competency
Based on the definition of competence in the General Education Curriculum (Ministry of
Education and Training, 2018a, p. 37), the components of the scientific competency in the 2018
Science Curriculum include awareness of natural sciences; learning about the natural world,
applying knowledge; learned skills (Ministry of Education and Training, 2018b, pp. 4-6) and
referencing the definition of the term scientific literacy of the OECD (2017), we define
scientific competency in the article as follows: The student’s scientific competency, individual
attributes allow learners to mobilize the aggregate of knowledge, skills and other psychological
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attributes such as beliefs, attitudes, etc. to present and explain core knowledge. The core of the
structural composition, diversity, systematicity, laws of motion, interaction and change of the
world from a scientific perspective; explore and explore the surrounding natural environment;
apply scientific knowledge and skills to participate in science-related situations and solve the
problems posed by this situation with a ready motivation and will. (Truong, 2021, p. 19)
In Science Curriculum at the primary level, the scientific competency framework consists
of 3 components and 15 behavioral criteria (MOET, 2018b, pp. 4–6). Regarding the structure of
that scientific competency’ components, we designed the assessment levels to be able to
confirm the impact measure on the development of each behavioral criteria (see more in Truong
& Nguyen (2020)).
1.2. 5E instructional model
1.2.1. Features of the 5E instructional model
The 5E instructional model builds on the constructivist theory of learning and inquiry –
based learning (Bybee et al., 2006) whereby through understanding and reflecting on past
activities, both personal and social, learners can harmonize their knowledge and understanding
and connect new knowledge with previously well-known concepts.
The 5E instructional model includes 5 phases (Bybee et al., 2006, p. 2):
– Phase 1: Engage: Stimulate students’ interest in the lesson, combined with considering
students’ existing understanding of the problem.
– Phase 2: Explore: Students perform experiential and discovery activities in many ways to
learn the necessary knowledge related to the problem of the lesson.
– Phase 3: Explain: Students explain the results from the Discovery activity through
communication and group work, and at the same time, the teacher explains the students’ unclear
issues. From there, the teacher guides students to generalize themselves into the knowledge they
need to know and correct new knowledge and concepts.
– Phase 4: Elaborate: Students consolidate their newly learned knowledge by applying
knowledge to solve similar problems in learning or new problems related to real life.
– Phase 5: Evaluate: Students and teachers jointly evaluate the learning process. From
there, the teacher records the teaching results and adjusts for the next lessons.
1.2.2. The response of the 5E instructional model in developing students’ scientific competency
Based on the analysis of the structure of natural competence (MOET, 2018b, p. 4-6),
in-depth analysis of the characteristics of students’ learning activities corresponding to each
component of competence and comparison with the characteristics of the phases of the 5E
instructional model (in section 1.2.1), along with reviewing some documents of Duong (2017);
Ngo (2019); Nguyen & Nguyen (2020), the article presents the response of the five phases in
the development of the primary students’ scientific competency as follows:
A. Developing perceiving natural world component: Students need to be given
opportunities to mobilize existing knowledge and experiences to participate in forming new
knowledge. Teachers need to organize self-study activities, in which students observe pictures
and specimens; search and read documents; carry out practical exercises; etc., through which to
analyze, compare, synthesize, and systematize knowledge; simple problem-solving. After that,
students can present and discuss their self-study knowledge with other students and teachers,
thereby connecting new knowledge with the knowledge system. Teachers strengthen students to
self-assess and evaluate each other.
In the “Engage” phase, the teachers, through organizing activities to arouse interest and
curiosity for students, will help students present the core knowledge about structural
composition, diversity, systematicity, and rules of operation movement, interaction and change
of the natural world. After the “Explore” and “Explain” phases, through the requirement to
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present, explain and analyze the phenomenon, the results help students deepen their knowledge
such as: Recognizing and naming objects and phenomena, concepts, laws, processes of nature;
Presenting things and phenomena; the role of natural things, phenomena and processes;
compare, classify and select natural objects, phenomena and processes according to different
criteria; analyze the characteristics of a natural thing, phenomenon or process according to
certain logic; connecting information in meaningful logic, outlining when reading and
presenting scientific texts; explain the relationship between objects and phenomena.
In the “Evaluate” phase, students realize their mistakes and correct them; make critical
comments related to the topic of discussion.
B. Developing the exploring natural world components: Teachers need to design
learning activities to create conditions for students to self-investigate, discover knowledge, and
practice skills such as asking questions, finding problems. understand; proposed hypothesis;
develop and implement a plan to test the hypothesis; Collect data, analyze, the process to draw
conclusions, evaluate the results obtained. Besides, teachers create conditions for students to
exchange and discuss with other students about their own learning process; presentation and
self-assessment, mutual evaluation of the results obtained. In the “Explore” phase, under the
direction of the teacher, students are given the opportunity to self-reliance to perform some
basic skills to understand and explain things and phenomena in nature and life, prove their
practical problems with scientific evidences, through which students improve skills such as:
proposing problems, asking questions about problems; making judgments and build hypotheses;
making an implementation plan; implementing the plan; writing and presenting reports and
discussions; and making decisions and make suggestions.
C. Developing applying knowledge and skills into practice opponent: Students need to
be given opportunities to propose or approach real-life situations or students have practical
experience at production facilities, testing departments, etc. In which, students participate in
solving practical problems, proposing scientific measures to protect health, environmental
protection, sustainable development, or students can design and analyze public technology
models through which students can apply the knowledge and skills they have learned. It is
necessary to create opportunities for students to relate and apply the combination of knowledge
and skills from different fields in the subject as well as with other subjects to solve real-life
problems. In the “Elaborate” phase, students are allowed to apply their knowledge and skills
learned about natural science to explain common phenomena in nature and life; issues of
environmental protection and sustainable development; behave appropriately and solve simple
problems related to self, family, and community.
Through the above analysis, it can be clearly seen that the 5E instructional model creates
favorable conditions for the development of the natural science components of high school
students through teaching the subject of the 2018 Science Curriculum.
2. Designing a lesson plan for Science in Primary School based on the 5E instructional
model
2.1. Designing process
To design a 5E lesson plan, we follow the following steps:
Step 1: Determining teaching content and characteristics of students
Step 2: Determining the objectives for the lesson and the expected duration of the
organization
Step 3: Determining the content, sequence of activities and learning tasks in each phase of
the 5E instructional model
Step 4: Selecting methods, forms, and spaces of teaching organization
Step 5: Evaluating student learning outcomes.
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Teachers can design lesson plans based on the 5E instructional model flexibly. In each
learning activity, the teachers clearly determine the objectives of the activity; teaching methods,
techniques, and forms of organization; how to proceed; expected learning products of students
and evaluation. To ensure the continuity between activities, in the process of forming new
knowledge for students, phase 2 (Explore) and phase 3 (Explain) can be appeared
simultaneously in the same learning activity; phase 5 (Evaluate) may not need to be developed
as a separate activity if the formative students’ assessment is interwoven throughout the
activities from phase 1 to phase 4.
2.2. Illustration of lesson plan “What are the properties of water?” in the topic “Substance”
(Science 4) based on the 5E instructional model
WHAT ARE THE PROPERTIES OF WATER? (2 periods)
I. Learning objectives (Scientific competency)
– Name some properties of water (colorless, odorless, tasteless; having no definite shape;
flowing from high to low, flowing in all directions; permeating some objects and dissolving
some matter).
– Observe and conduct experiments to discover the properties of water.
– Apply some properties of water to explain some applications in real life.
II. Teaching equipment and learning materials
– Record of test results.
– Help ticket at each station.
– A3 papers to draw mind maps.
– Experimental instruments: water; bucket or small basin for water; salt, sugar, cooking oil,
construction sand (washed), milk, bottled soft drinks, vinegar; clean cotton towels; plastic bags;
leaves with large leaf blades (blade leaves, banana leaves, lotus leaves...); tablecloth.
– Video overview of the application of water in life: https://bit.ly/3n7Nihy
– Tables and chairs and classroom space are conveniently arranged for the Station teaching
method.
III. Teaching process
Table 1. Teaching and learning activities in lesson “What are the properties of water?”
Expected learning products and
Phases Objectives Organizing learning activities
assessment
Phase 1: Create Teaching methods/ techniques: oral method. – Answer: water
Engage excitement – Students think and solve the following puzzle:
(10 mins) for students “What is clear?
before Baby drinks every day
lessons Take a cool shower and wash your hands
started. Clean is clean!”
– Teacher exploits students’ understanding: We use water in
most daily activities and production. Do you know what
properties water has?
– Teacher suggests the lesson: To learn more about other properties
of water, let’s come to today’s lesson: What properties does water have?
Phase 2: Observe and Teaching methods/ techniques: Cooperative Learning; Experimental report
Explore conduct experimental method; observation method; station teaching method.
(25 mins) experiments – Teacher uses the station teaching method to organize students’
to discover activities.
the property – Teacher organizes for students to divide into groups of 5 – 6
of water. people, and guides groups to elect a group leader and secretary,
make a list of group members, name the group, and then write it on
the group list card.
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assessment
– Teacher raises the problem of learning at the stations, practical Supporting materials:
tasks at the stations and agrees with the whole class on some
classroom rules.
– Students perform experiments with tools already arranged at the
stations, combining observations, taking notes, debating, and
agreeing on ideas to complete the learning tasks at 5 stations:
+ Station 1: What is the color and smell of water?
+ Station 2: What is the shape of water?
+ Station 3: What substances can be dissolved in water?
+ Station 4: What is seeped or not penetrated by water?
+ Station 5: How does the water flow?
Figure 1. Students conducted experiment at each station

Phase 3: Name some – Teaching methods/ techniques: Cooperative Learning; oral Teacher evaluated through the
Explain properties of method. criteria table to evaluate the
(20 mins) water – Teacher organizes for students to discuss and report back the process of conducting experiments,
experimental results at each station in front of the class. The based on experimental worksheets,
remaining groups listen, comment, and ask questions to the and observing the experimental
reporting group. process of groups.
– Teacher summarizes, comments and guides students to draw
scientific conclusions before each group’s report: Water is a
colorless, odorless, tasteless liquid; no definite shape; can dissolve
some substances, seep through some objects; flows from high to low
and spreads in all directions.
Criteria for evaluating experimental activities
(Using for Phases 2 and 3)
Contents Level 1 Level 2 Level 3
(0 – 5 scores) (6 – 8 scores) (9 – 10 scores)
1. Manipulation Experimental Able to use laboratory Using experimental
of using instruments that instruments quite equipment that is structured,
laboratory have not been used at proficiently; The neat, and technically correct;
instruments. the stations of the experiment took place The experiment took place
operation is still successfully and safely. successfully and safely.
awkward, the
experiment is not
successful
2. Observe the Not been observed Observe the Fully and in detail observe
experiment phenomena in the phenomena occurring the phenomenon occurring
progress experiment. but not fully detected to in the experiment and
detect some properties accurately and fully detect
of water. the properties of water.
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assessment
3. Record Not complete Complete 50% – 75% Complete 100% of the
information from worksheet. of the study sheet content of the study sheet.
the experiment content as in summary
on the form.
worksheet.
4. Draw scientific Draw scientific Draw a part of scientific Draw scientific conclusions
conclusions from conclusion or the conclusions from the fully and explicitly from
experiments. stated content but experiment exactly. experiments.
not appropriate.
Phase 4: Apply some – Teaching methods/ techniques: oral method Students’ answers about the
Elaborate properties of – Students observe the sample and answer the situational properties of water and its
Objectives water to questions: application in life.
(15 mins) explain
some
applications
in real life.
+ Whenever it rains, my mother often tells me to wear a raincoat or
cover an umbrella for what? Then, what property of water did we use?
+ What will you do when you accidentally spill water on the table?
Why do you do that? (Or in the above situation, what property of
water did you use?)
Figure 2. Students speak in front of the class about the

application of water properties in life
– Students watch a video clip about applying the properties of
water for human activities and recall some of the properties of
water and how people have applied it to life.
Phase 5: Review Teaching methods/ techniques: cooperative learning; Mind maps
Evaluate properties of mind-map technique
Objectives water – Teacher calls 1-2 students to repeat 5 properties of water.
(10 mins) Apply some – Teacher organizes for students to discuss in groups, redraw the
properties of mind map to reinforce the lesson. The teacher announce the criteria
water to for evaluating the mind map.
explain – Representatives of the group’s report and present their group’s
some mind map (in case there is enough time).
applications – Teacher summarizes and gives points to groups of students based
in real life. on announced criteria.
Criteria for evaluating the mind maps [KHTN1.1]; [KHTN1.3]
Contents Scores
1. List fully, concisely, and accurately the properties of water using keywords. 3
2. There are drawings, diagrams, icons with eye-catching and vivid color illustrations. 2
3. Balanced, harmonious layout, large clear letters, easy to follow. 2
4. Group, class, subject, member information is complete and creative. 1
5. Fascinating and fluent presentation. 2
Total 10
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3. Pedagogical experiment
3.1. Objectives and study design
Evaluating the feasibility and effectiveness of five 5E lesson plans in fostering primary
students’ scientific competence, we selected an experimental study, in which the experimental
group and control group were randomly selected from.
3.2. Research instruments
(1) Five 5E science lesson plans in the topic “Substance” (Science 4)
Table 2. Five 5E science lesson plans
No. Five 5E science lesson plans Periods
1 What are the properties of water? 2
2 The transformation of water 1
3 Water cycle in nature 1
4 Water and our life 2
5 Pollution and protection of water resources 2
Students’ learning products after the lessons; questionnaires, interviews with students and
teachers after the experiment.
A pre – test of 8 multiple choice questions, matching questions, and 2 explaining questions
about content “Nutrition”; a post – test of 7 questions, including 4 multiple choice questions and
3 explaining questions, done in 40 minutes about content “Water” (Belonging topic
“Substance”)1. The questions in the tests are designed to ensure that they match the
requirements to be met and the specific manifestations of the competency components of the
subject (perceiving the natural world, exploring the natural world, and applying knowledge and
skills into practice) (see more in Appendix 2, 4 of link https://bit.ly/3oyVF9Z). Test results are
calculated on a 10-point scale and divided into 3 categories:
– Good grade: score 9 to 10;
– Fairy grade: score from 7 to below 9;
– Average grade: score 5 to less than 7.
(4) Criteria for assessing scientific competence, including 15 behavioral indicators, 3
competency components with 3 expression levels of quality criteria (Truong, 2021, p. 52-56;
Truong & Nguyen, 2020).
3.3. Sampling
The study selects a control group of 33 students of class 4/4 and an experimental group of
32 students of class 4/3 of K.M Primary School in District 1 of HCMC. The pre-test results
show the scientific competency of the two groups before the pedagogical experiment are similar
(shown in Table 5). Sample selection criteria of the control group and experimental group have
the equivalence of size; scientific competency; facilities and facilities in service of learning
activities; the normal development in terms of psychology and physiology, under the
characteristics of the 4th graders. Then we conducted a case study of 3 students (2 males and 1
female) to deeply study the expression of behavioral indicators as well as the development of
scientific competency in five 5E lessons.
1 See more Pre-test and Post-test included in the following link: https://bit.ly/3oyVF9Z
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3.4. Data collection procedure

Table 3. Data collection procedure before, during, and after the pedagogical experiment
Before the experiment process During the experiment process After the experiment process
Pre-test Five 5E lesson plans 1. Post-test
Test content: Nutrition, Humans, and + Control group participate in five Test content: Water (Belonging topic “Substance”)
Health. lessons about Water in traditional (7 questions, 40 minutes)
(8 questions, 40 minutes) teaching methods. All the questions related to assessing 3
All the questions related to assessing 3 + Experimental group participate 5E components of scientific competency (see more in
components of scientific competency (see Science lessons about Water with a link: https://bit.ly/3oyVF9Z)
more in link: https://bit.ly/3oyVF9Z) total of 10 periods in 4 weeks. 2. Post-Survey:
+ On students to evaluate the students’ interest
level during learning five 5E Science lessons
+ On teacher to evaluate the effectiveness of
learning activities during five 5E Science lessons
3.5. Data analysis

Scores on the expression level of behavior of component competencies shown in scale in
Truong & Nguyen (2020), which were collected through worksheets, answers, group products,
experimental manipulations, etc., on a scale of 10, scores of pre-test and post-test. In addition,
the scores of the two tests were described and analyzed by SPSS.
4. Results
4.1. The results of pre-test and post-test between the experimental and control groups
Average scores of Pre-test and Post-test to assess the scientific competency of students in
Experimental group and Control group are shown in Table 4.
Table 4. Mean of Pre-test and Post-test of Experimental and Control groups
Independent Samples Test
Pre-test Post-test
Experimental Control Experimental Control
Mean 5.6641 5.6136 7.9375 5.3106
Std. Deviation 1.50082 1.14750 0.97757 1.87711
Sig. value in Leneve’s test 0.138 0.000
t 0.152 7.107
Sig. value in 0.879 0.000
t-test
Table 4 shows that average scores of the pre-test of the experimental and control groups are
slightly different with 5.6641 and 5.6136, respectively. Independent Sample T-test in SPSS was
used to compare the difference in average scores of competencies -test achieved by the students
through the Pre-test between the experimental and control groups. The result shows that Sig. of
Leneve’s Test for Equality of Variances is p=0.138 (>0.05), so the variances of the two study
populations are not different. Sig. of t-Test is p=0.074 (>0.05) which means there is no
difference in terms of the average value between the experimental and control group. That leads
to the conclusion that the scientific competency of the 2 groups is similar. In the Post-test,
average scores of the post-test of experimental and control groups are clearly significantly
different with 7.9375, and 5.3106 respectively. The Sig. value of Leneve’s Test is p=0.000
(<0.05), so the variances of the two study populations are different. The Sig. in t-Test is p=0.000
(<0.05) which means there is a remarkable difference in terms of the average value between the
experimental and control group.
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Table 5. Results of grading the test scores of two groups before and after the experiment
Pre-test Post-test
No. of students % No. of students %
Ex. Con. Ex. Con. Ex. Con. Ex. Con.
Good 0 0 0 0 6 0 18.80 0
Fair 7 5 21.9 15.2 21 9 65.60 27.30
Average 17 19 53.1 57.5 5 10 15.60 30.30
Bad 8 9 25 27.3 0 14 0 42.40
Total 32 33 100 100 32 33 100 100
Chi – Square df 2 2
Sig 0.783 0.000
Table 5 shows the results of grading the test scores of two groups before the experiment are
not different. The result of the Chi-square test before the experiment shows the Sig. value is
p=0.783 (>0.05), resulting in that there is not a difference in classification in both groups before
the experiment. After the experiment, the results of grading the test scores of the two groups are
different. The result of the Chi-square test after the experiment shows the Sig. value is p=0.000
(< 0.05); hence, the classification results of the two groups are different and the result of the
experimental group is better than that of the control group.
4.2. Case study
The research conducts a deep assessment of the learning process by selecting 3 students as
a case study through five 5E Science lessons. Based on the structure of scientific competency,
the assessment scale of scientific competency, we conduct the score assessment corresponding
to the behavioral indicators of scientific competence through five 5E lessons. The results of
the assessment of the formation and development of scientific competency of these 3 students
(KM-43-8, KM-43-25, KM-43-13) are shown in Figures 3, 4 and 5, respectively:
Figure 3. Learning assessment of student KM-43-8

KM-43-8 is an agile boy, absorbing lessons well. However, he is quite shy in expressing
my opinions and has not really focused on activities. Therefore, the researcher guided him step
by step to present his personal views and learn measures to attract attention and arouse interest
in studying Science in him. From the assessment results in Figure 3, the assessment scores of
the scientific competency components 1 and 2 of students KM-43-8 have increased significantly
from lesson 1 to lesson 5. Competency component 3 despite many changes in the learning
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process, is still at the “completed” level. This shows that participating in five 5E Science lessons
makes him bold and confident in expressing his views and his interest in studying Science.

KM-43-25 is an agile, and active boy in almost all learning activities, especially science
experiments. From the assessment results in Figure 4, the scores of the scientific competency
components 2 and 3 have increased significantly after five 5E lessons. However, component 2
has significantly decreased because the amount of knowledge and activities in the following
lessons is increasing day by day, requiring higher requirements. This shows that participating in
five 5E Science lessons also makes him bold and confident in expressing his views and his
interest in studying Science.

KM-43-13 is an active girl in almost all learning activities; enthusiastically speaks up and
expresses their opinion in class. In particular, she is confident and has good problem-solving
skills. From the assessment results in Figure 3.5, the scores of all three components of the
child’s ability have increased significantly after 5 lessons. This shows that when participating in
science lessons according to the 5E teaching model, she was brave and confident in expressing
her views, loving learning Science, and promoting her talents.
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5. Feedback of students and form teacher after the experiment process

After teaching five 5E Science lessons, we received and analyzed the feedback from the
teacher of the experimental group through feedback form followed by a list of questions
investigating the evaluation of the teacher. The feedback is as follow:
– The class hours created excitement for students, helping them experience and derive
lesson content through activities of engaging, exploring, explaining, elaborating, and evaluating.
Students know how to make real connections and apply lessons in practice. Thereby helping
students develop their ability to communicate, cooperate, and solve problems in learning and life.
– The class hours helped them explore, discover, and draw out the properties of things and
phenomena. Thereby, they have faith and love in science.
Besides, we distributed questionnaires to assess the level of interest, difficulty, and favorite
activities of 32 students of class 4/3. The survey results stated that they did not encounter any
difficulties during the learning process. However, the remaining students found it difficult to
conduct experiments (6.3%), not keeping up with the teacher’s instructions (9.4%) and not
enjoying teamwork activities (3.1%).
– Painting, designing mind map activity was the most favorite among students of class 4/3
(43.8%), higher than the activity of observing, conducting experiments (34.4%). In addition,
9.4% of students surveyed said that they gain more useful knowledge about science after
learning Science according to the 5E instructional model.
6. Discussion
Research results show that most of the students in the experimental group have the
remarkable development of scientific competency after learning five 5E Science lessons which
is clearly reflected in the increase in assessment scores of the pre-test and post-test, along with
the formative assessment scores through the five 5E Science lessons. The research results allow
us to confirm that the Science lessons based on the 5E instructional model have fostered
students’ scientific competency.
From teaching practice, through noting the evolution of experimental lessons and survey
results of students, we find that the application of the 5E instructional model to teaching science
in elementary schools has some advantages: (1) the process of organizing teaching and learning
from reality and closeness has stimulated the students’ interest in the subject by diverse and rich
learning activities; (2) Students are really interested and engaged in scientific experience
activities, such as observing, investigating, conducting experiments, drawing diagrams to model
scientific knowledge, and doing scientific activities, draw pictures calling for environmental
protection, etc.; (3) Good and excellent students have more opportunities to express themselves
in activities, while average and weak students also have more opportunities to study and give
their own opinions, judgments, and participation. participate more actively in learning activities;
(5) Students know how to make practical connections and apply lessons in practice, thereby
helping students develop their communication, cooperation, and problem-solving abilities in
study and life. These findings one more time emphasize the effectiveness of the 5E instructional
model in teaching Science as Duong (2017), Lai (2020), Ngo (2019). Through clear and
in-depth analysis of the response of the phases in 5E in the development of the scientific
competency’s components, we show the effectiveness of the 5E instructional model in
developing students’ science competency in Vietnamese context.
However, to organize a successful 5E lesson, teachers need a lot of time to find ideas for
cohesive activities, design appropriate teaching activities according to the characteristics of each
phase of the 5E instructional model; prepare learning materials, classroom space; classroom
management capacity, cooperative teaching organization; prepare assessment plans suitable for
each lesson. Due to the short experimental period and limited research scope, we have not yet
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fully evaluated the long-term effects that the 5E instructional model has on primary school
students. In the future, the results of this study must be tested on many different subjects. If
assessed as a whole, the 5E instructional model is a feasible teaching model at the primary
school level, helping students to acquire knowledge, promote positivity, initiative, and creativity
in the learning process. In addition, the researchers found that at the primary level, the training
for students to become familiar with the scientific method should be more focused than the
formation of scientific content to create a solid and long-term premise for students for the
fostering of scientific competencies at higher education levels.
CONCLUSION
In this study, we have established a solid theoretical basis for the 5E instructional model,
the structural framework, and the rating scale for scientific competency, the process of
developing a science lesson plan based on the 5E teaching model. Through the experimental
lessons, we realized that when learning Science according to the 5E teaching model, students
are the active people, the center of the learning process: from the existing knowledge, students
carry out scientific experience activities such as observation, experiment, document research or
investigation, group work, etc., so that the students themselves can find the answers to the
problems posed in real life and have space to apply knowledge and skills they learned in the real
situation, thereby creating opportunities for students to develop the competency components of
scientific competency. Through the survey of students after the experimental lessons, we also
realize that their curiosity and imagination have developed, and their problem-solving ability,
their ability to cooperate day by day have been more enhanced. That proves that the application
of the 5E scientific model in Vietnam is feasible and suitable to the conditions of the
organization of Science teaching at the primary level and at the same time meet the goals of the
General Education Program 2018.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The result of this article is a part of Truong Hoang Thong’s undergraduate thesis in year
2020 – 2021, under the scientific guidance of supervisor MSc. Nguyen Thi Hao, namely
“Applying 5E instructional model in teaching Science at primary level (The 2018 General
Education Curriculum)”.
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[Applying the 5E model in teaching the topic of light in Science subject at grade fourth].
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“gas” (physics 10) in high school]. Viet Nam Journal of Education, 492 (2-12/2020), 34-39.
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order to foster scientific competency for secondary school student (Phd. diss. Ha Noi
National University of Education).
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9789264281820-en.
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theory: Developing a pedagogical framework with elementary school teachers. Research in
Science Education, 42(2), 303-327. DOI: 10.1007/s11165-010-9199-9
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trình giáo dục phổ thông 2018) [Applying 5E instructional model in teaching Science at
primary level] (Bachelor’s Thesis., Ho Chi Minh University of Education).
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About the authors

– MSc. Nguyen Thi Hao is a young lecturer at the Physics Department of the Ho Chi Minh
City University of Education, Vietnam (HCMUE). Currently, she is a first-year student in the
Ph.D. program about Theory and Methods in Teaching Physics at Hanoi National University of
Education. Her research areas are Educational Science, Theory and Methods of teaching Physics
and Science in universities, high schools, and primary schools. Recently, she is particularly
interested in researching trendy and modern teaching methods, and about developing
competencies of students both at high schools and at universities.
– Truong Hoang Thong is currently a teacher at Wellspring Saigon International Bilingual
School, Ho Chi Minh City. He has just graduated in June 2021 from the Ho Chi Minh
University of Education (majoring in Primary Education), one of the standardized educational
systems ranked on top in Ho Chi Minh city. He commenced pursuing a scientific research path
when he was studying in the second year. His undergraduate thesis is under the scientific
guidance of MSc. Nguyen Thi Hao. With a firm academic background, passion, and
considerable efforts during 4 university time, he will become an inspiring teacher soon.
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EFFECTIVENESS OF TECHNOLOGY-ASSISTED LABORATORY

EXERCISES IN TEACHING AND LEARNING OF THE CONCEPTS
OF DIFFUSION AND OSMOSIS TO SECONDARY
THREE BIOLOGY STUDENTS
Gilbert Tan Wei Beng*1, Shit-Fun Chew1
Abstract: Two fundamental concepts, diffusion and osmosis, are needed to understand life
processes. However, it has been proven that these concepts are difficult to teach in a way for
students to understand and appreciate their significance. Many students harbour certain
misconceptions on diffusion and osmosis. Thus, science educators have taken an interest in
studying and designing effective pedagogies to teach diffusion and osmosis more accurately to
secondary school students. Some of these pedagogies include the use of technology as outlined
by the technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPCK) model. Hence, this study aims to
ascertain the misconceptions that secondary school students have on the concepts of diffusion
and osmosis and to apply the TPCK model to rectify their misconceptions. Using the TPCK
framework, a diffusion and an osmosis lessons were designed and implemented to a group of
secondary three biology students. A modified version of the osmosis and diffusion conceptual
assessment (ODCA) was administered to students before and after implementing the two lesson
packages. Misconceptions of the candidates were identified through the pre-test. Paired t-test
showed that the post-test scores were significantly higher than the pre-test scores for most of the
diffusion questions. However, there was no significant difference for the osmosis questions. The
findings showed that hands-on activities with the use of technology during the lessons can
indeed help students to understand the diffusion and osmosis concepts. Information obtained
from this study can potentially be utilized in developing lessons that help correct students’
misconceptions in diffusion and osmosis.
Keywords: diffusion, osmosis, lesson package, osmosis and diffusion conceptual assessment,
technological pedagogical content knowledge
INTRODUCTION
Diffusion and osmosis are two fundamental concepts that have been proven to be difficult
to teach in a way for students to understand and appreciate their significance (Christianson &
Fisher, 1999). However, these concepts are needed to understand many life processes (Odom,
1995). In Singapore’s education system, these concepts are first introduced at the secondary one
level across the three Sciences – Biology, Chemistry and Physics. The biology textbooks used
in Singapore schools defined diffusion as “the net movement of particles from a region of
higher concentration to a region of lower concentration, down a concentration gradient” (Lam &
Lam, 2013). Osmosis, on the other hand, is defined as “the net movement of water molecules
from a solution of higher water potential to a solution of lower water potential, through a
partially permeable membrane” (Lam & Lam, 2013). Many misconceptions on diffusion and
osmosis have been found to exist in secondary school students (Odom, 1995; Zuckerman,
1998). This has led to science educators taking an interest in studying and designing effective
pedagogies to teach diffusion and osmosis more accurately to secondary school students
(Zuckerman, 1998; Odom & Barrow, 2007; Fisher et al., 2011).
* Corresponding Author: Gilbert Tan Wei Beng; E-mail Address: NIE184349@e.ntu.edu.sg

1 National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
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The sudden onset of COVID-19 has impelled the introduction of personal learning devices
(PLD) by the Ministry of Education (MOE). In addition to home-based learning (HBL) to curb
the spread of the virus, blended learning was promoted and is supported by the National Digital
Literacy Programme (Ministry of Education, Singapore, 2020). This has made it even more
imperative to redesign lessons which utilize the affordances of technology to transform content
and pedagogy for learners. The Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPCK) model
proposed by Koehler et al. (2007) integrates technology into teaching and learning. This is
possible only with the understanding of the dynamic and transactional relationship between the
technological, pedagogical and content knowledge components.
According to Odom and Barrow (2007), diffusion and osmosis are challenging concepts as
the understanding of these concepts requires students to apply the knowledge learned in biology,
chemistry and physics to visualize the movement of individual particles at a cellular level and
predict the directionality of osmosis. Students require the foundational knowledge of solutions,
particulate nature of matter, and permeability of membranes to understand diffusion and
osmosis. Thus, representations can provide students with concrete models to support the
visualization of abstract processes. Laboratory activities provide hands-on and visual
representation of the concepts learned by allowing students to make and test predictions, solve
problems and integrate new understanding with their existing knowledge (Roth et al., 2005;
Cook, 2006). The use of multiple modalities, such as macroscopic and molecular
representations, aid learners in the interpretation of information and construct new connections
between them (Cook, 2006; Lankford & Friedrichsen, 2012).
The objectives of this study are: (i) to analyse the pedagogical strategies and challenges
faced by a secondary school teacher that has taught diffusion and osmosis to a group of
secondary three Pure Biology students (participants); (ii) to investigate the existing
misconceptions in diffusion and osmosis among the participants; and (iii) to determine the
effectiveness of two designed lesson packages developed using the TPCK model in
communicating these two concepts.
The “Diffusion and Osmosis Diagnostic Test” (DODT) (Odom, 1995; Odom & Barrow,
1995) and “Osmosis and Diffusion Conceptual Assessment” (ODCA) (Fisher et al., 2011) are
two established diagnostic tests to assess students’ understanding of diffusion and osmosis. As
the ODCA is recent and more relevant to the Singapore Biology syllabus, the questions of the
ODCA were used in this study.
CONTENT
1.1. TPCK Framework
TPCK is a framework introduced by Koehler and Mishra (2008) which equips educators
with a way of thinking about the knowledge needed to integrate technology effectively in their
classrooms. TPCK comprises knowledge of content, pedagogy, and technology, in addition to
the complex interactions between these knowledge, forming a distinct body of transformative
knowledge. Thus, the growth in a particular knowledge base does not readily progress TPCK as
a whole (Angeli & Valanides, 2009). However, high quality and effective integration of
technology, pedagogy, and content as part of the teaching and learning experience can be
achieved when teachers can expertly understand and integrate the three knowledge bases
(Hechter et al., 2012). Hechter et al. (2012) also suggested that the TPCK model can be widely
adopted into all learning levels and curricular areas.
The TPCK framework poses significant implications for teacher education and teachers’
professional development (Koehler et al., 2007). Koehler et al. (2007) offered the possibility of
learning technology by design, where teachers participate in the design of a technological
artifact to explicitly foreground the connections of technology, subject-matter, and pedagogy.
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This allows the teachers to be sensitive to the particular requirements of the subject matter, the
instructional goals to be achieved, and the possibilities with technology. Chuang et al. (2015)
has expanded on the possibilities with technology by proposing several medium: (1) ICT tools;
(2) social media; and (3) graphic and dynamic visualizations. Chuang et al. (2015) reported that
teachers’ practice with ICT tools and graphic and dynamic illustration tools is vital in
determining how teachers assess their TPCK. Thus, contributing towards the teacher’s
professional development and the holistic evolution of the TPCK knowledge.
Angeli and Valanides (2009) proposed five indicators for the assessment of TPCK as a
basis for designing instruction through technology: (1) identify topics to teach with technology,
such as topics that students have difficulties learning or topics that teachers find challenging to
teach effectively, so that these ICT tools add value to the lesson; (2) identify ways to represent
the content in forms that learners can easily comprehend and are difficult to support by
traditional means; (3) identify teaching strategies that are difficult to implement using traditional
means; (4) select the appropriate technology tools and their effective pedagogical uses; (5)
identify student-centred strategies that are appropriate for infusing technology into the
classroom. Collectively, these criteria illustrate the transformative nature of TPCK.
The understanding of the TPCK framework can be extended beyond the interactions
between the three knowledge bases. Angeli and Valanides (2005) argued that the principles of
TPCK should be discussed with broad contexts such as school environments, teacher’s
experiences, and epistemological beliefs about teaching and learning. Thus, there is a
compelling need to address the issue of successful technology integration, and personal beliefs
about pedagogy and technology for the development of TPCK.
The affordances of adopting the TPCK framework encourage teachers to consider the co-
constrains and connections between the different knowledge bases. Additionally, as teachers
design lessons using the TPCK framework, a coherent and nuanced understanding of the basis
of designing instruction through technology can be achieved.
1.2. Diffusion and Osmosis
In Singapore’s education system, the concepts of diffusion and osmosis are first introduced
in the secondary one general science syllabus before it is studied in detail in the secondary three
biology syllabi. In the ‘Biology Matters 2nd Edition’ textbook, Lam and Lam (2013) define
diffusion as “the net movement of particles from a region of higher concentration to a region of
lower concentration, down a concentration gradient” and osmosis as “the net movement of
water molecules from a solution of higher water potential to a solution of lower water potential,
through a partially permeable membrane”.
The concepts of diffusion and osmosis are fundamental to the understanding of biological
processes (Odom, 1995), albeit being challenging concepts due to the applications in different
science disciplines (Odom & Barrow, 2007). The concepts of diffusion and osmosis also help
students understand future chapters in the biology syllabus such as ‘Nutrition in Humans’,
‘Nutrition in Plants’, ‘Transport in Humans’, ‘Transport in Plants’, ‘Respiration in Humans’,
‘Excretion in Humans’, and ‘Homeostasis’. Additionally, science teachers find these concepts to
be a challenge to teach students (Christianson & Fisher, 1999). Thus, science educators
developed diagnostic instruments to assess students’ understanding and prevalent misconceptions
on these concepts. The DODT (Odom, 1995; Odom & Barrow, 1995) and ODCA (Fisher et al.,
2011) allow science educators to assess students’ understanding at the concepts of diffusion and
osmosis and surface the prevailing misconceptions that exist in students.
Fisher et al. (2011) and Odom (1995) had reported that secondary school students harbour
misconceptions on the concepts of diffusion and osmosis. This then led science educators to
study and design effective pedagogies for the instruction of diffusion and osmosis to secondary
school students (Zuckerman, 1998; Odom & Barrow, 2007; Fisher et al., 2011).
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2. Materials and Methods

2.1. Approval of Study
This study was approved by the National Institute of Education, Natural Sciences and
Science Education Ethics Review Committee (NSSE ERC) and was assigned the study number
NSSEERC2020/001. The collection of data for this study was approved by the Ministry of
Education, Research and Management Information Division and was assigned the approval
number RQ66-20(09). The participants involved in this study include one teacher and 31
students.
2.2. Teacher’s Questionnaire
A questionnaire was designed to understand the strategies used and challenges faced by the
teacher that taught the topic of “Movement of Substances” to the participants in this study. The
questionnaire aimed to determine the teacher’s frequency of using technology and laboratory
activities when teaching the concepts of diffusion and osmosis and understand the advantages
and disadvantages of these pedagogical strategies. The questions in the questionnaire include
1. Number of years in service and number of years teaching Biology
2. What are the strategies used to teach the concepts of diffusion and osmosis?
3. On a scale of 1-5, how familiar are you with the TPCK framework?
4. What are some challenges faced when teaching the concepts of diffusion and osmosis
and how do you overcome them?
5. How often is technology or ICT used when teaching a biology class and how confident
are you in using these tools?
6. Is technology or ICT used when teaching the concepts of diffusion and osmosis?
7. How are the ICT tools used to teach diffusion and osmosis?
8. What are some advantages and disadvantages of the ICT tools used?
9. On a scale of 1-5, how effective are these tools in teaching the concepts of diffusion
and osmosis and would you use them again in the future? Why?
10. What are some concerns that prevent the use of these tools in teaching the concepts of
diffusion and osmosis?
11. On a scale of 1-5, how likely would you use these tools to teach the concepts of
diffusion and osmosis if the concerns are addressed?
12. How often are laboratory activities conducted when teaching a biology class and how
confident are you in using laboratory activities to teach biology concepts?
13. Are laboratory activities used when teaching the concepts of diffusion and osmosis?
14. How are the laboratory activities used to teach diffusion and osmosis?
15. What are some advantages and disadvantages of conducting laboratory activities to
teach biology concepts?
16. On a scale of 1-5, how effective are laboratory activities in teaching the concepts of
diffusion and osmosis and would you use them again in the future? Why?
17. What are some concerns that prevent the use of laboratory activities in teaching the
concepts of diffusion and osmosis?
18. On a scale of 1-5, how likely would you use laboratory activities to teach the concepts
of diffusion and osmosis if the concerns are addressed?
The teacher’s responses on the effectiveness of these pedagogical strategies and the
likelihood of using them for future classes were also recorded. The responses collected were
considered during the design of the lesson packages.
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2.3. Modified Osmosis and Diffusion Conceptual Assessment (ODCA)
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Figure 1. Modified ODCA

The ODCA was adapted from Fisher et al. (2011) and modified to the language and
cognitive ability of secondary three students (Figure 1). The modified ODCA consisted of nine
two-tiered paired multiple-choice questions. Questions 1/2, 3/4, 5/6, 9/10, 15/16 were
considered diffusion questions and Question 7/8, 11/12, 13/14 were osmosis questions.
Question 17/18 was classified under “dissolving and solutions”. The classification of paired
questions into the three categories was not mutually exclusive and dependent on the nature of
the first-tier item. The first-tier item would require participants to analyse a situation and make a
prediction on what will happen in a situation with specified conditions. The second-tier item
would require the participants to provide an explanation for their choice in the first-tier item.
Item distracters were adapted from prevalent misconceptions identified by Odom (1995) and
Odom and Barrow (1995). The same modified ODCA was administered to the participants
before (pre-test) and after (post-test) the completion of both lesson packages.
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2.4. Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Tools
A B
C D
Figure 2. Virtual simulations and laboratory experiments used in the lesson packages
Various ICT tools such as virtual simulations, animations and videos were used in the
lesson packages (Figure 2) which provided a multimodal representation for the movement of
particles. LabXchange simulations (https://www.labxchange.org/library/items/lb:LabXchange:
4c98ff11:lx_simulation:1; https://www.labxchange.org/library/items/lb:LabXchange:b336eb0e:
lx_simulation:1) and various animations were used to show the movement of particles at a
particle level. A video from YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbudKs-49jo) was
also used to demonstrate an osmosis experiment and the movement of particles at a physical
level. Padlet was used to consolidate the discussion output from the participants which also
function as a forum for participants to read and comment on the responses of their peers.
2.5. Lesson Packages and Laboratory Experiments
The lessons were designed on the Student Learning Space (SLS), an online learning portal
that permits both synchronous and asynchronous learning. Two one-hour lesson packages on the
concepts of diffusion and osmosis were designed. Participants were tasked to follow the
instructions in the lesson packages and complete the activities in the SLS. The investigator
provided general instructions prior to the commencement of the lesson package to ensure that
participants were provided with sufficient information to commence the lesson packages. The
role of the investigator was to facilitate the activities in the SLS and laboratory experiments and
explain certain concepts that were highlighted in the lesson packages. The investigator also
helped the participants to pace themselves in the one-hour session. Upon completing a particular
activity, participants were free to move on to the next activity. Activities that assessed the
participants’ learning were interspersed in the lesson packages. A summary was included at the
end of each lesson package to consolidate students’ learning.
Three laboratory experiments were conducted with two in the first lesson package and one
in the second lesson package. In the first laboratory experiment, participants were required to
add a drop of dye into two Petri dishes containing water of different temperatures and observe
the rate of diffusion of the dye in water (Figure 2B). Prior to conducting the experiment,
participants used the LabXchange simulator to observe the movement of particles when the
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temperature of the solution was changed. Participants were also instructed to make a prediction
of the outcome of the experiment before conducting it. After completion of the experiment,
participants recorded their findings and answered the questions on the SLS. A video of the
experiment performed by the investigator was available on SLS to allow the participants to
compare their results.
In the second laboratory experiment, participants observed the process whereby Elodea
cells were immersed in concentrated salt water under a light microscope (Figure 2C). Prior to
the experiment, participants were required to watch a video on the changes in red blood cells
morphology when subjected to isotonic, hypotonic, and hypertonic solutions. After the
experiment, participants recorded their findings and uploaded photos of their results on the SLS.
Pictures of Elodea cells before and after the addition of concentrated salt water was made
available on SLS for participants to compare their findings.
Figure 3. Sample results for Orbeez® experiment in the Microsoft Excel template
In the third laboratory experiment, participants submerged the Orbeez® spheres to varying
concentrations of salt water so as to determine the solute concentration of the Orbeez® spheres
(Figure 2D) using the graph generated on Microsoft Excel (Figure 3). Firstly, participants
recorded the weight of the Orbeez® spheres before and after they were immersed in salt water
into the prepared Microsoft Excel sheet. A graph of change in weight of the Orbeez® spheres at
different concentrations of salt water was then generated. Participants then determined the x
value at the point when y equals to zero, which was the average solute concentration of the
Orbeez® spheres. The participants then uploaded the Microsoft Excel sheet with the recorded
and calculated values into SLS.
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In the second lesson package after the third laboratory experiment, participants watched a
video of an experiment that involved a dye solution and water in a U-tube apparatus that was
separated by a partially permeable membrane. Participants were required to discuss and provide
explanations for the change in water level in the U-tube apparatus in SLS. A LabXchange
simulation and animations on the partially and selectively permeable properties of the
membrane were available in SLS to help participants reinforce their understanding (Figure 2A).
2.6. Data Collection
The responses to the questionnaire were collected through Google Form on 20th November
2020. The responses collected were from the sole teacher that taught the topic of “Movement of
Substances” to the participants. The modified ODCA pre-test and the first lesson package was
administered on 1st March 2021 and the second lesson package and modified ODCA post-test
were administered on 8th March 2021.
2.7. Data Statistical Analysis
Misconceptions of the participants were surfaced from the modified ODCA pre-test. Paired
t-test was used in the comparison of the pre-test and post-test. Data were expressed in
percentage for comparative analysis.
3. Results
3.1. Pedagogies Used by The Teacher in Teaching Diffusion and Osmosis
Information on the use of technology and laboratory activities by the teacher responsible for
teaching diffusion and osmosis to the participants was obtained from the questionnaire. The
teacher used ICT resources from Marshall Cavendish Online, ASKnLearn™ by Wizlearn
Technologies Pte. Ltd. and Khan Academy. Demonstrations were also used in addition to ICT
resources to help students draw on their learning and apply the concepts to novel context. The
use of ICT resources and demonstrations had helped the teacher to assess the participants’
understanding of abstract concepts such as “concentration gradient”. Both technology and
laboratory activities were moderately used by the teacher. ICT resources used were mainly in
the form of videos whereas experiments performed include Visking tubing experiments and the
use of salt solutions and distilled water to induce a change in mass or length to a potato. The
teacher also commented that the use of laboratory experiments may be time-consuming and may
not have the intended effectiveness at times.
3.2. Participants’ Responses to Individual Questions
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Figure 4. Percentages of correct responses from the participants in (A) diffusion, (B) osmosis, and (C)
dissolving and solutions questions of the modified ODCA pre-test and post-test
In the modified ODCA, 10 questionss were diffusion questions (Figure 4A), six were
osmosis questions (Figure 4B), and two were dissolving and solutions questions (Figure 4C).
The percentage of correct responses was highest in dissolving and solution questions (77.4% to
93.6%; Figure 4C), followed by diffusion questions (45.2% to 96.8%; Figure 4A), and was
lowest in osmosis questions (29.0% to 80.7%; Figure 4B). From the pre-test, the percentage of
correct responses for questions 1, 4, 7, 8, and 12 were less than 50% (Figure 4A and 4B).
Questions 1 and 4 were diffusion questions while questions 7, 8, and 12 were osmosis
questions. In the post-test, only questions 4, 11, and 12 had a percentage of correct response of
less than 50% (Figure 4A and 4B). Most students were able to answer the dissolving and
solutions questions correctly as the percentage of correct response for these questions were
more than 75%. In paired questions 1&2, 5&6, and 17&18 of both the pre- and post-test, a
higher percentage of participants answered the second-tier item correctly as compared to the
first-tier item (Figure 4A and 4C).
3.3. Participants’ Misconceptions
Table 1. Specification table that lists misconceptions based on the participants’ responses to the
modified ODCA pre-test. Misconceptions were identified based on participants selecting the incorrect
response(s) in the pre-test.
Misconceptions Response option in the pre-test
1. The dye tends to break down in solutions with higher temperatures. 10a
2. Particles move through solutions or gases only until they are evenly distributed, then they stop. 4c, 15a, 16a
3. Temperature changes the size of the molecules, altering the rate of diffusion. 10d
4. All cell membranes are semipermeable. 1a
5. Water moves from a high to low solute concentration. 8a, 13a, 14a
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Misconceptions Response option in the pre-test

6. When solutes in a water-based solution a cross a partially permeable membrane, they alter the 7b, 11c, 12c
heights of the liquids on each side but the movement of water molecules across the membrane
does not warrant consideration.
7. Only water molecules can move through a partially permeable membrane. 12b
8. Dissolved substances will eventually settle out of solution and settle at the bottom if remained 5a, 6a, 6c
untouched.
9. A solution with higher concentration of solute particles has a higher water potential and 7b, 17b
vice-versa.
Analysis of the modified ODCA pre-test responses showed that the participants had
misconceptions involving the concepts of diffusion, osmosis and dissolving and solutions
(Table 1). Despite having only six osmosis questions, as compared to 10 diffusion questions,
more misconceptions on osmosis were identified from the participants as compared to
misconceptions of diffusion.
3.4. Participants’ Responses to Paired Questions
Figure 5. Percentages of participants’ response accuracy for each paired question

of the ODCA pre-test (A) and post-test (B)
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Participants that had both tiers of the paired questions correct showed that they have
understood the concepts well without developing any misconceptions while participants that had
both tiers of the paired questions wrong showed that they have existing misconceptions or
do not have sufficient knowledge of the concept. Having the first-tier item correct and the
second-tier item wrong showed that the participants may be able to apply the concepts but were
unable to provide an accurate explanation. Conversely, having the first-tier item wrong and the
second-tier item correct showed that the participant may have an accurate understanding of the
concept but was unable to apply them. Generally, participants had adequate knowledge of the
concept of diffusion and osmosis as the percentages of participants who had items of both tiers
correct was higher than the percentages of participants who had at least one tier of the paired
questions wrong (Figure 5).
In the pre-test, more participants answered both Questions 7&8 wrongly than correctly
(Figure 5). Similarly, there were more participants with partially correct answers for Questions
1&2 and 3&4 than fully correct answers (Figure 5A). The percentage of participants answering
both Questions 11&12 correctly was the same as participants answering both questions wrongly
in the pre-test (Figure 5A). In the post-test, more participants answered both Questions 11&12
wrongly than correctly (Figure 5B). Similarly, there were more participants with partially
correct answers for Questions 3&4 (Figure 5B). After the lesson packages, more participants
developed misconceptions for concepts in Questions 11&12 whereas the ratio of correct to
incorrect participants’ responses for Questions 3&4 remained the same in both the pre-test and
post-test (Figure 5).
3.5. Effectiveness of Lesson Packages
Table 2. Percentage change in the number of participants of pre-test and post-test getting both the first-
and second-tier items correct. Negative values denote that more participants had both the first- and
second-tier items correct in the pre-test than post-test. (*) denotes a significant difference in scores for
each paired question (min=0, max=2) using one-tail paired t-test (P7&8=0.0296, P15&16=0.00688)
Paired Questions Percentage change
Diffusion
1&2 19.35
3&4 -3.23
5&6 0.00
9&10 16.13
15&16 * 19.35
Osmosis
7&8 * 16.13
11&12 -16.13
13&14 -9.68
Dissolving and Solutions
17&18 -3.23
There was a statistically significant increase in the participants’ scores for paired questions
7&8 and 15&16 (Table 2). The participants’ scores for paired questions 1&2 and 9&10
improved by more than 5% after the lesson packages despite not being statistically significant
(Table 2). The participants’ scores for paired questions 11&12 and 13&14 decreased by more
than 5% after the lesson packages (Table 2).
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Figure 6. Mean number of correct-correct paired questions (maxdiffusion=5, maxosmosis=3, n=31). Paired
question 17&18 was excluded. (*) denotes a significant difference in the number of correct-correct paired
questions between the pre-test and post-test using two-tail paired t-test (Pdiffusion=0.0238, Posmosis=0.598)
The number of correct-correct responses to the diffusion paired questions was significantly
higher in the post-test than the pre-test (Figure 6). There was no significant difference in the
number of correct-correct paired questions between the pre-test and post-test in the osmosis
questions (Figure 6).
4. Discussion
4.1. Challenges and Pedagogical Strategies in Teaching Diffusion and Osmosis
TPCK is the knowledge base required by teachers to incorporate technology into teaching
and learning (Guzey & Roehrig, 2009). The use of the TPCK model in this study involves the
amalgamation of the use of videos, animations, and simulations (technology), laboratory
activities (pedagogy), and the concepts of diffusion and osmosis (content). It was evident from
the questionnaire that the use of ICT resources by the participants’ teachers dominates the
conduct of laboratory experiments as the latter is laborious and time-consuming, given a packed
curriculum schedule. Additionally, the greatest challenge in teaching and learning diffusion and
osmosis could be due to that diffusion and osmosis are brought about by the constant, random
motion of invisible particles and not many students can comprehend such abstract ideas (Fisher
et al., 2011). Similarly, the teacher faced great difficulty in helping students understand such
abstract concepts.
The inadequate use of laboratory activities by the teacher may have led to the lack of
understanding in the concepts of diffusion and osmosis in some participants. According to
Tobin (1990), the meaningful implementation of laboratory activities allows students to
construct their knowledge of phenomena and related scientific concepts. This is made possible
through interaction and manipulation of equipment and materials, which allows students to
construct knowledge of scientific phenomena and concepts. Studies have suggested that
laboratory activities play a distinctive role in science education despite the lack of evidence to
show a simple relationship between experiences in the laboratory and learning (Hofstein &
Mamlok-Naaman, 2007). The teacher also commented that laboratory activities may not have
the intended effectiveness at times. Hence, laboratory activities should be well-designed and
intended to allow students to solve problems and construct knowledge of science. In addition,
teachers should facilitate learning in the laboratory by maintaining an environment for students
to learn scientific concepts and receive challenges and assistance when required (Tobin, 1990).
The use of ICT resources, such as videos and recorded animations, was employed by the
teacher at a much more frequent basis than conducting laboratory activities. Visual
representations play a critical role in the communication of science concepts. They are capable
of presenting both visual and auditory information in contemporary science education (Cook, 2006).
Meir et al. (2005) showed that inquiry-based dry labs at a molecular level helped students
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overcome misconceptions in diffusion and osmosis. Despite the use of ICT resources to
supplement the teaching of the two concepts by the teacher and the investigator, several
misconceptions still existed in the participants which is evident in both the pre- and post-tests.
In addition to well-designed education technology tools, at the heart of good teaching with
technology lies the understanding of mutually reinforcing relationships between content,
pedagogy, and technology to develop appropriate, context specific strategies and representations
(Koehler et al., 2007). Perhaps, a variety of teaching methods is best suited for teaching
diffusion and osmosis as different students will respond to different techniques. Teachers should
also not emphasize the acquisition of facts but to teach for the comprehension of diffusion and
osmosis concepts (Odom, 1995).
4.2. Misconceptions in Secondary School Biology Students
In Singapore, students are exposed to the concept of diffusion at an earlier phase of their
education as compared to the concept of osmosis. Students are introduced to the concept of
diffusion in the General Science curriculum in lower secondary under the chapter of ‘The
Particulate Nature of Matter’ and ‘Transport Systems in Living Things’. The concept of osmosis
is a non-compulsory learning outcome under the chapter of ‘Transport Systems in Living Things’
where students are only required to state that it is involved in water absorption in the roots.
Additionally, the frequency of exposure to the concept of diffusion increases in students taking
Chemistry as diffusion is taught in kinetic particle theory under the chapter of ‘The Particulate
Nature of Matter’. The advance and frequent exposure to the concept of diffusion as compared to
osmosis could therefore provide more opportunities for students to rectify their misconceptions.
Certain misconceptions in Table 1 may stem from the unfamiliarity in the terminologies
that are involved in the concepts of diffusion and osmosis. For instance, the subtle differences in
the term ‘semipermeable’, ‘partially permeable’, and ‘selectively permeable’ were not well
understood by the participants prior to the lesson packages. Additionally, some participants
were also unsure of the difference between concentration and water potential of a solution. The
usage of these terms and ultimately the understanding of these concepts would be challenging
for students when taught using traditional didactic modes of learning (Fisher et al., 2011). The
teacher-centred teaching orientation rarely permits successful learning of scientific knowledge
(Bransford et al., 1999; Randler & Hulde, 2007) and rote learning should be discouraged.
Rather, teachers should actively inquire into students’ initial conceptions and thinking.
Participants also harboured inaccurate preconceptions such as the breaking down of dye with
higher temperature and dissolved substances settling out of solution as time passed. Hence, the
curriculum should be designed in a way that allows teachers to recognize, draw out, and work
on the preconceptions that students have (Bransford et al., 1999).
4.3. Effectiveness of Lesson Packages
An improvement in the participants’ scores for most paired questions, with the exception of
paired questions 3&4, 11&12, 13&14, and 17&18, can be observed. In paired questions 3&4,
the lesson packages were not effective in helping participants explain the movement of
substances in diffusion. Many participants still harboured the misconception that particles
continue moving until they are uniformly distributed before they stop moving. This may be
possibly due to the lack of engagement in the concept of equilibrium during the lesson
packages. Odom (1995) also reported that this misconception was detected in secondary school
biology students, nonbiology majors, and even biology majors through the Diffusion and
Osmosis Diagnostic Test (DODT). In paired questions 11&12, participants were unable to
predict and explain the changes in water levels in a U-tube apparatus set-up that was similar to
the one shown in the video during the second lesson package. However, in this set-up, the
colour of the blue dye solution became paler while the water gradually became blue. It is likely
570
that participants thought that dye molecules diffused from the dye solution to the arm containing
water, across the partially permeable membrane, which resulted in the changes in colouration.
However, participants failed to account for the movement of water molecules across the
membrane which led to the level of the liquids in both arms remaining the same. Thus, many
participants predicted that the liquid level in the arm containing the dye solution would
decrease. The failure to account for osmosis is evident from the participants’ responses to the
second-tier item. Several participants also responded to the second-tier item by indicating that
the dye moves more slowly than water as it passes through the membrane. It is also possible that
these participants did not have full comprehension of the question which resulted in many
getting both tiers of the paired questions wrong. In paired questions 13&14, some participants
still had the misconception that water molecules move from higher concentration of dissolved
particles to lower concentration of dissolved particles. It is likely that some participants are still
unsure of the difference between concentration and water potential. Similarly, in paired
questions 17&18, the uncertainty in this concept is resurfaced. This misconception was also
reported in the participants in the study of Odom (1995) and Fisher et al. (2011). Perhaps the
lack of using an activity to clarify this misconception led to it still existing among the participants.
The lesson packages were more effective at rectifying the misconceptions in diffusion than
in osmosis. This is interesting to note as more activities were catered to the concept of osmosis
than diffusion. However, as participants were allocated more time for discussion and interaction
with the simulation during the diffusion activities, this could have led to the participants doing
better in the diffusion questions in the post-test. According to Odom (2007), both social and
physical interaction are essential in the construct of scientific knowledge and understanding of
the nature of science. Thus, it is equally important for students to communicate their
understanding of the concept with their peers and the teacher, as compared to completing the
designed activities.
5. Limitations
The entire duration of the lesson package was two hours, conducted in two 1-hour sessions.
Hence, the short amount of time the investigator spent with the students may not have built
sufficient rapport between the two parties. According to Yunus et al. (2011), the quality of
teacher-student relationship influences academic achievement and student motivation. Thus, a
better performance by the participants can be expected if the designed lesson packages were
implemented by the teacher instead of the investigator. The teacher had more teaching
experience and better knowledge of the students’ learning profiles. Therefore, the teacher would
be able to better tailor the lesson packages to suit the needs of the students. To meet the
intended learning outcomes, more activities were included in the lesson packages. This resulted
in both lesson packages being fast paced. As the entire duration of the lesson packages were
only two hours, more lesson packages with well spaced-out activities can be designed to fit into
the school’s curriculum. Thus, the lesson packages that were conducted in this study only
represent a portion of what could be achieved in the school’s curriculum. Due to the relatively
small sample size (n=31), this serves as an exploratory study to understand the misconceptions
that may exist among secondary school students.
CONCLUSION
Misconceptions on the two fundamental yet important concepts in Biology, diffusion and
osmosis, prevailed in the participants of this study. The modified ODCA can be used to assess
the students’ understanding of these concepts and identify the existing misconceptions.
However, these misconceptions can stem from numerous sources, and it can be difficult to
identify the root causes of such misconceptions. Additionally, Biology teachers are challenged
with teaching these abstract concepts in a way that can be understood by the students. As such,
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the use of the TPCK approach to design lessons with virtual representations and laboratory
activities in this study showed some effectiveness in rectifying the participants’ misconceptions
of diffusion. Specially designed instructional approaches that encompass different modalities in
teaching and representing scientific knowledge should be considered when designing the
secondary school curriculum for teaching diffusion and osmosis.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to acknowledge the funding support from Nanyang Technological University –
Undergraduate Research Experience on Campus (URECA) Programme for this research project.
I would also like to express my gratitude towards A/P Chew Shit Fun for the opportunity to
work on this study and her support and guidance throughout the study, and towards the school,
the coordinating teacher, and the participants for their involvement in this study.
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About the authors
– Mr. Gilbert Tan Wei Beng is currently a pre-service teacher pursuing his Bachelor of
Science in Education at the National Institute of Education, Singapore. His first teaching subject
is Biology followed by Chemistry. He has also attained a Diploma in Biomedical Science in
Temasek Polytechnic in 2016. As a biology student, he has investigated the function of
Decapentaplegic signalling pathway in the development of Drosophila ovary and is currently
seeking opportunities in science content research. In addition, he has taken an interest in
using educational technology to enhance his teaching and his students’ learning in biology in the
current age of technology.
– Dr. S.F. Chew is an Associate Professor in the Natural Science and Science Education
(NSSE) of the National Institute of Education, Singapore. She is currently the Deputy Head
(Research and Postgraduate Matters) of NSSE. She has taught many Biology courses of the
Diploma in Education, BSc (Education), Postgraduate Diploma in Education and In-service
Programme. She is a biologist working on Nitrogen metabolism and Ammonia Toxicity of Air-
breathing fishes and has published over 100 articles in this area of research. In addition to
science content research, she has taken an interest in using educational technology to enhance
her teaching and her students’ learning in this new learning paradigm.
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THE IMPACT OF ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING ON LEARNER

PERFORMANCE IN INFORMATICS AT HIGH SCHOOL
Dang Ngoc Tuan*1, Ngo Tu Thanh2
Abstract: This study investigates the impact of assessment for learning on student achievement
in informatics at high school. With simple random sampling, six schools in Quang Binh Province
were selected to participate in the study. The design of an experimental group and a control
group was conducted for pre- and post-test comparisons involving six schools, three of which are
the “experimental group” and the others of which act as the “control group”. In total, 240 Grade
11 students participated in the study. Three teachers were instructed to use ‘assessment for
learning’ (AfL) as a teaching method, while other three teachers used their usual teaching
method. Data were analyzed with SPSS (V20) and 2-factor ANOVA with repeated measures. The
results showed that those who took the AfL instructional approach performed better statistically
than those who followed the instruction in the regular classroom. The findings of this study are
significant for policy, further research as well as the instruction and assessment approaches used
in the process of teaching informatics in Vietnam in general and Quang Binh Province in
particular.
Keywords: assessment for learning, informatics, high school, performance, testing, teaching
INTRODUCTION
Assessment plays a significant role in improving the quality of training. The results of
testing-assessment are the basis for adjusting teaching, learning and educational management
activities. Realistic, accurate and objective testing – assessment will enable learners to be
confident, enthusiastic, and improve their creativity in learning (Fleming & Chambers, 1983).
For a long time, educators have regarded assessment as a means of measuring learning
outcomes, and this is mainly realized through what is known as summative assessment (Black &
William, 1998). This approach has put teachers at the center of the teaching-learning process,
where they play an important role in teaching and assessing student performance. This approach
tends to ignore and disregard the learning needs or performance of poorer students who are not
capable of learning at the same pace and time frame as others. If the focus is only on regarding
outcomes as an end-of-term product of the teaching and learning process, then students
concentrate only on what the teacher reviews and emphasizes, or even for the types of exercises
given, students just need to change the number in the sample problem, imitate the sample
sentence, to achieve the maximum score. Thus, testing-assessment is no longer in its sense.
Assessment must first of all be for the progress of the students, which helps students realize
where they are on the way to achieve the lesson objectives/standards of knowledge and skills.
Assessment should not frighten or make students get hurt or lose confidence. Assessment must
take place throughout the teaching process, helping students to continuously receive feedback to
know where they make mistakes, what they lack or what their weak points are so that both
teachers and students can adjust teaching and learning activities together. Assessment must
create development, improve the capacity of learners, ie encourage them to form the ability to
self-assess, or conduct peer assessment to develop self-study capacity (Nguyen, 2012).
* Corresponding Author: Dang Ngoc Tuan; E-mail Address: dntuan@quangbinh.edu.vn

1 Hanoi University of Science and Technology, Department of Training and Education of Quang Binh
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 This article aims to study the impact of assessment for the Vietnamese education context
learning, which is gradually transforming testing-assessment from the content-based
assessment to competence-based assessment.
 Research results show that using AfL significantly improves student performance and
promotes a positive relationship between teachers and students.
 This is also a groundbreaking empirical investigation in the new field of research when
there are not many similar studies in Vietnam.
Research questions:
1. What is the purpose of the assessment?
2. What is the process (sequence of steps) for conducting the assessment for learning?
3. How can teachers improve the quality of the teaching and learning process without the
feedback from students?
CONTENT
Definitions
Assessment for learning is the process of collecting and interpreting evidences about each
student’s learning in order to determine “where” the student is (what knowledge and skills
he/she has acquired), where they need to “go” next (Nguyen, et al., 2018) (what knowledge and
skills need to be learned) and what the best way is to get to the “destination” (the best way to
learn new knowledge and skills). The evidences about learning are collected mainly from three
sources: observation, question and answer and learning products for each student. By using
multiple sources of evidences, teachers can increase the reliability and validity of assessment
information. So with this assessment, teachers play a key role in the learning assessment, but
students are also involved in the assessment process. Students can conduct self-assessment or
peer-assessment under the instruction of teachers, through which they can make self-assessment
of their learning to better adjust their learning activities.
Another concept of AfL: Assessment for learning or formative assessment is defined as a
process used by instructors and learners in the instruction that provides feedback to adjust the
teaching and learning process continuously to improve student achievement towards intended
instructional objectives (Sadler, 1989). For Pophan (2008), assessment for learning is a planned
process in which evidence of a student’s condition is used by teachers to modify their ongoing
instructional processes or used by students to adjust their existing learning strategies (Mehmood
et al., 2012).
Assessment for learning (AfL) is an approach to the teaching and learning process that
generates feedback and then uses this feedback to improve student learning outcomes. Students
are more involved in the learning process and thereby gain confidence in what they are expected
to learn and what standards are.
The roles (advantages) of AfL
Duckett (2005) believed that AfL plays an important role because of the following three
factors: (a) improving classroom practice, (b) contributing to a personalized learning program
whereby learners are empowered to participate actively in their own learning, and (c)
developing learners’ confidence to undertake peer assessment and self-assessment. AFL enables
students to become more active in their learning and start to ‘think like a teacher’. They think
more positively about where they are now, where they are going, and how to reach the goal.
Teachers integrate AFL into their lessons as part of their teaching and choose to use this
assessment more or less. AFL can be tailored to the ages and abilities of the learners involved.
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Fig 1. The relationship of the three factors

Table 1. The five key strategies of assessment for learning (Black & Wiliam, 2009)
Where the learner is going Where the learner is right now How to reach the goal
Teacher a. Clarifying learning intentions and b. Engineering effective class-room discussions, c. Providing feedback that moves
criteria for success questions, and learning tasks that elicit evidence learners forward
of learning
Peer Understanding learning intentions d. Activating students as instructional resources
and criteria for success for one another
Learner Understanding learning intentions e. Activating students as the owners of their own learning
and criteria for success
In this context, curriculum reform should enable all students to be able to improve student
achievement if some appropriate measures to promote optimism, self-confidence and
perseverance are applicable to all students without distinction. Accordingly, all students must be
motivated to believe that they can succeed academically if they put in adequate effort.
(Oluwatoyin et al., 2019).
Factors affecting AfL
Current studies on AfL (Abdul et al., 2018,) indicate that if students’ performance is
assessed through actions continuously, along with the instructions on the teaching-learning
process through teachers’ providing timely feedback and teachers’ giving instructions to handle
and correct possible deficiencies that may arise (Leanne Owen, 2016), it will help students
improve their academic achievement.
In order to ensure the quality and effectiveness of assessment for learning, it is necessary to
apply a modern perspective of student assessment. That is, students’ competences are formed,
trained and developed during the course of teaching the subject. In contrast to periodic
assessment, for AfL, students are assessed according to an individualized learning model.
Assessment as part of classroom activities is a fundamental process to promote learning and
academic achievement. Therefore, to determine a student’s level of competence, assessment
should not be conducted only through a timed end-of-term test, but conducted regularly during
that process. The assessment should be closely integrated with teaching, considering assessment
as a learning activity to form and develop students’ capacity. Teachers plan and develop specific
assessment strategies and processes (Wang, Sun & Jiang, 2018). These assessment strategies are
directly related to improving student performance through periodic tests and exams. The
research shows that these strategies especially help low-achieving students improve their
academic performance.
2. Research Methods
This study was carried out at six high schools in Quang Binh province for 8 weeks. Six
grade 11 teachers were selected after the test on their equivalent awareness of computer literacy
through multiple choice tests had been performed. The purposes of pre-testing were to detect
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initial differences, if any, and compare the groups such that the differences are observed after
treatment. After the classes were tested, the tests were graded directly by six teachers along with
the author of the study. The test was verified with its content and reliability, which is
Cronbach’s alpha = 0.932 (determined from the previous test in the study itself), meeting the
criteria for a reliable test (Neuman, 2011). The same test was administered to all learners in the
usual way as a test in the classroom before and after the interventions.
A design of an experimental group and a control group was conducted for the pre-test and
post-test comparisons involving six schools of which three were the “experimental group” (EG)
and the other three acted as the “control group” (CG). In total, 240 (122 EG and 118 CG) grade
11 students participated in the study. Three teachers were instructed to use teaching and
‘assessment for learning’ (AfL) as a teaching method towards five specific steps as shown in
Figure 2, while three teachers of the control group used their usual teaching and assessment
methods. The data were analyzed using SPSS (V20) and independent T-test for variables.
Experimental time for the next 8 weeks of the second semester of 2020-2021. The
experimental content includes 16 periods (2 periods per week) chapter V: Files and
manipulating files and chapter VI: Subroutines and structured programming (11 periods).
A test to measure students’ cognitive levels was administered after 8 weeks of experience.
The analysis results are shown in chart 1, table 6 and table 7.
Fig. 2. The process of carrying out AfL in the study

Findings
The results of the pre-test on the equivalent cognitive ability are given in Table 1 of three
paired samples in grade 11.
The pre-test reliability of 3 pairs EG1 and CG1; EG2 and CG2; EG3 and CG3 were .932
(EG1; CG1), .907 (EG2;CG2) and .946 (EG3,CG3); and simultaneously they had p value (.sig)
of .113, .046; .895 respectively greater than .005. The variables of the experimental and control
classes had reliability higher than 0.6 (Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient ≥ 0.6 means that the
reliability of the scale is evaluated good), so they meet the requirements of reliability.
Table 2. Paired Samples Test
Paired Differences
95% Confidence Interval Sig.
Std. Std. Error t df
Mean of the Difference (2-tailed)
Deviation Mean
Lower Upper
Pair 1 EG1 – CG1 .16250 .63435 .10030 -.04038 .36538 1.620 40 .113
Pair 2 EG2 – CG2 -.1667 .5044 .0808 -.3302 -.0032 -2.064 39 .046
Pair 3 EG3 – CG3 -.01282 .60139 .09630 -.20777 .18213 -.133 39 .895
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The results in Table 2 showed that:

For Pair 1: (EG1 và CG1) the pre-test mean difference between experimental group 1 and
control group 1 is 0.16 and Sig. is .113>.005.
For Pair2: (EG2 và CG2) the pre-test mean difference between experimental group 2 and
control group 2 -.1667 and Sig. is .046 > 0,05.
For Pair 3: (EG3 và CG3) the pre-test mean difference between experimental group 3 and
control group 3 is -.01282 and Sig. is .895 > 0,05.
Therefore, in all three cases, the pre-test experimental group and control group have
Sig. > .005 and mean differences are small, not significant and just random. This proves that the
three pairs are equivalent in terms of cognitive level of the two groups eligible to participate in
the study.
Table 3. Comparison of means after implementation of treatment (n= 240 =122EG+118CG)
Paired Differences
95% Confidence Interval
Group Std. Std. Error t P- Value df
Mean of the Difference
Deviation Mean
Lower Upper
Pair 1 EG1 -CG1 .93750 .44126 .06977 .79638 1.07862 13.437 .000 40
Pair 2 EG2 -CG2 .32051 .33418 .05351 .21219 .42884 5.990 .000 39
Pair 3 EG3 - CG3 .53846 .65277 .10453 .32686 .75007 5.151 .000 39
Table 4. Comparison of means and p of Control Group
before and after implementation of treatment (n= 118)
Paired Differences
Deviation Mean
Lower Upper
Pair 1 CG1(pre) - CG1(post) -.1750 .5133 .0812 -.3392 -.0108 -2.156 .037 40
Pair 2 CG2(pre) – CG2(post) -.3205 .6229 .0997 -.5224 -.1186 -3.213 .003 39
Pair 3 CG3(pre) – CG3(post) -.3205 .7564 .1211 -.5657 -.0753 -2.646 .012 39
Table 5. Comparison of means and p of Experimental Group
before and after implementation of treatment (n= 122)
Paired Differences
Deviation Mean
Lower Upper
Pair 1 EG1(pre) - EG1(post) -.9268 .5310 .0829 -1.0944 -.7592 -11.175 .000 41
Pair 2 EG2(pre) – EG2(post) -.7927 .5474 .0855 -.9655 -.6199 -9.272 .000 41
Pair 3 EG3(pre) – EG3(post) -.8500 .4114 .0650 -.9816 -.7184 -13.068 .000 40
Table 6. Comparison of means and p of Experimental Group before and after implementation (n=240)
Time Comparison Means Std. Deviation p-value
Before Experiment - control 7.185-6.950 .3615 >0.05
After Experiment - control 7.877-7.335 .4413 <0.05
Case 1: EG1-CG1
Thus, the mean difference between pre-test CG1 and post-test CG1 was -.1750. For the
experimental group, the mean difference between pre-test EG1 and post-test EG1 was -.9268.
That proves the research is effective in helping students increase their performance results.
Although there was a difference between the pre-test and post-test mean values of control
group 1, the result of T-test for control group1 in the pre-test and post-test phase was pCG 1=0.37
(p>0.05). Therefore, this difference is not significant, that is, the increase in the mean value of
control group 1 after the treatment is completely random. In contrast, the pre-test and post-test
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results of pEG 1 were 0.00 (p<0.05) ,so the post-test difference of this group is significant, that is, it is not
a random occurrence but must be under the magnitude of directional effects. The result of the effect
size between experimental group 1 and control group 1 was t =13.437, which is at the large
level, so the difference between the two groups is significant.
Case 2: EG2-CG2
Through the table on the difference in mean values and effect size between EG 2 and CG 2
before and after the treatment, the mean difference of EG 2 after the treatment compared to CG2
was.32051. T-test results of EG 2 before and after the treatment were 0.000 (pEG2 < 0.05), so the
post-test difference of this group is significant, that is, it is not a random occurrence but rather
by the effectiveness of the methods. For CG 2, pCG 2 was .003 (pĐC2 < 0.05), there was a
difference and an effect. However, this difference is not significant but can be random. The
formula was used to calculate the effect size after the treatment between the two groups. This
means that the effect on the mean difference is very large, on the other hand, the difference is
significant, practical and reliable.
Case 3: EG3-CG3
Similarly, the results of independent T-test of experimental group 3 before and after the
treatment were 0.000 (pEG3 < 0.05), so the post-test mean difference of this group is significant,
that is, it is not a random occurrence but rather by the effectiveness of the methods. For CG 3,
pCG3 was 0,12 (pCG3 > 0.05), so even though the mean value of this group increases, this
difference is not significant but can be random. The difference between EG3 and CG3 after the
treatment was .53846 and t=5.151 was a large value. This means that the effect on the mean
difference is enormous, on the other hand, the difference is significant, practical and reliable.
Fig. 3: Results of the assessment test between three experimental classes and three control classes
Table 7. Experiment – control
Sum of Squares df Mean Square F Sig.
Between Groups 198.865 13 15.297 311.760 .000
Within Groups 5.103 104 .049
Total 203.968 117
Table 5 showed X EG > X CG of the three experimental classes EG(pre) and EG(post)
respectively and at the same time, the absolute values of EG and CG were: (|t Stat| = 11.175,
5.990; 5.151 >1,96) greater than the standard value z (1,96), rejecting H0. This allows us to
confirm the difference in mean test scores of experimental class and control class is statistically
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significant. Next, the article tests the variance of the experimental group and the control group
with the hypothesis H0: “The difference between the variances in the experimental group and
the control group is not significant”. To confirm that the result is statistically significant, the
characteristic parameters of the samples are obtained from SPSS20 software. Table 6 and
diagram 1 showed that the mean difference between the experimental group and control group
after the treatment was 0.542 (7.877 - 7.335) and the variance was .4413, meanwhile T-test had
p=0.000<0.05 rejecting H0. That means “The difference between the variances in the
experimental group and the control group is significant”. Specifically, those who followed the
AFL approach had better results than those who followed the regular classroom instruction.
Therefore, on the basis of this result, it can be concluded that the AfL method is much more
effective than the traditional method. Table 7 shows the results of a 2-factor ANOVA performed
on the data to confirm the results shown in Table 6.
Next, to assess the satisfaction level of 122 students in informatics grade 11 with the
guidance of teachers with AfL method, we conducted a survey with 10 questions at the end of
the study (Abdul Majeed Al-Tayib Umar, 2018). The results are given in Table 8.
Table 8. Students’ attitudes towards assessment for learning
Strongly Not Strongly
No. Response Agree Dis-agree Mean
agree sure disagree
1 Assessment for learning has motivated me
0 (0%) 74 (60.7%) 41 (33.6%) 7 (5.7%) 0 (0%) 3.55
to learn
2 Assessment for learning has helped me to
1 (0.8%) 59 (48.4%) 53 (43.4%) 8 (6.6%) 1 (0.8%) 3.42
improve my performance in informatics
3 Immediate feedback helps me to know my
1 (0.8%) 61 (50.0%) 39 (32.0%) 21 (17.2%) 0 (0%) 3.34
mistakes before it’s too late
4 Self-assessment has given me the chance
to understand my own weaknesses to 0 (0%) 51 (41.8%) 52 (42.6%) 19 (15.6%) 0 (0%) 3.26
overcome them
5 Self-assessment has increased my self-
0 (0%) 66 (54.1%) 37 (30.3%) 19 (6.6%) 0 (0%) 3.39
confidence and autonomy
6 Peer assessment has helped me to practice
0 (0%) 76 (62.3%) 36 (29.5%) 8 (6.6%) 2 (1.6%) 3.52
team work and learn from my peers
7 Assessment for learning activities and
0 (0%) 69 (56.6%) 44 (36.1%) 8 (6.6%) 1 (0.8%) 3.48
techniques are varied and colorful
8 Assessment for learning allows us enough
3 (2.5%) 58 (47.5%) 54 (44.3%) 7 (5.7%) 0 (0%) 3.47
time to think and to learn
9 Assessment for learning helps us become
17 (13.9%) 57 (46.7) 34 (27.9%) 14 (11.5%) 0 (0%) 3.63
more responsible for our learning
10 Assessment for learning helps to reduce the
12 (9.8%) 49 (40.2%) 42 (34.4%) 19 (15.6%) 0 (0%) 3.44
tension of final exams
Table 8 showed that: Students highly appreciated the teacher’s implementation of this
assessment, specifically: in questions 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, up to 76% of students agreed with “Peer
assessment has helped me to practice teamwork and learn from my peers”(Mean = 3.52) and
74% agreed and strongly agreed with “Assessment for learning helps us become more
responsible for our learning” (mean=3.63). 69% of the students agreed and 44% were not sure
about “Assessment for learning activities and techniques are varied and colorful” (mean=3.48).
For the question on “Assessment for learning has helped me to improve my performance in
informatics”, nearly 60% of the students agreed. However, there were still 20% of the students
disagreeing with “Self-assessment has increased my self-confidence and autonomy”
(mean=3.39), and 21% disagreeing with “Immediate feedback helps me to know my mistakes
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before it’s too late. 19% disagreed with “Self-assessment has given me the chance to
understand my own weaknesses to overcome them”(mean=3.26).
Students in the experimental group also acknowledged that these assessment activities and
techniques were varied and colorful. This was the case for (70%) students in this group.
Furthermore, (58%) students admitted that this form of assessment allowed them enough time to
think and study concentrately. Obviously, this will give them a chance to correct the mistakes
before it is too late. Furthermore, (74%) students believed that assessment helped promote their
learning while self-assessment gave them the chance to understand their own weaknesses in
order to overcome them, increasing their confidence and autonomy. Peer assessment helps them
practice teamwork and learn from their peers.
Thus, Table 8 shows the level of learners’ perception of the meaning and effects of AfL in
the item “Assessment for learning helps us become more responsible for our learning” has the
highest value (mean=3.63). The lowest value is for the item “Self-assessment has given me the
chance to understand my own weaknesses to overcome them”. This also makes sense because it
is difficult for students to self-assess themselves in order to find their weaknesses and help them
improve and overcome themselves. Many students are still unable to clearly perceive and
control themselves in specific situations that are difficult to deal with. They can still be
subjective in re-evaluating themselves in some cases but in other specific situations, it is
difficult for them to overcome their weaknesses to help them develop themselves. Also, in
Table 7, from question 1 to question 10, all mean values are from 3.26 to 3.63 belonging to
(3.24-4.00) which shows the students’ agreement and complete agreement and their positive
attitudes.
3. Discussions
Through quantitative analysis of the results of three experimental and control classes with
MeanPost  MeanPre XEG  XCG
the effect size ES ( ES   = 0.81>0.8 obtained by Cohen’s
Standard Deviation Pre SCG
criteria (1998) confirmed that the mean of the experimental variable compared to the control
variable with the effect gave a better result in terms of the magnitude of the effect.
With 95% reliability, the difference in the results between the three classes EG1,2,3 and
three classes CG 1,2,3 has clearly shown: “The Impact of Assessment for Learning on Learner
Performance in Informatics at high school” with positiveness and experiential activities helping
students to be creative and flexible.
The findings of the study are similar to the studies made by Condie, et al., (2005), DfES
(2007), and the researches by Oluwatoy & Sitwala (2019) on “The Impact of Assessment for
Learning on Learner Performance in Life Science”. This study investigates the impact of AfL
on the subject of Life Science. The sample included four schools from King Cetshwayo District
of KwaZulu Natal Province, South Africa. 160 grade 11 students participated in the study. The
study found AfL to be effective in South Africa and this result is consistent with those reported
by other researchers (Hayward & Spencer, 2010; Kellard et.al, 2008; Webb & Jones, 2009).
These authors often attribute these positive outcomes to the implementation of AfL, which,
in essence, encourages teachers and learners to clearly understand what need to be learned, how
to achieve it, and the evidences when the desired goal has been reached.
The research by Herman (2013) indicated that AfL plays an important role in supporting
students in their learning.
“Assessment for learning is now viewed as an integrated part of the teaching and learning
process, rather than as a separate activity taking place after a phase of teaching (Achieve Inc,
2013). The process of Assessment for learning includes classroom interaction, questioning,
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structured classroom activities, and feedback geared at helping students to bridge the learning
gaps”( Abdul Majeed Al-Tayib Umar, 2018).
The study made by Heritage (2013) proved that teachers received feedback from
assessment during the learning process; used that feedback to adjust and improve their teaching
methods and teachers gave students feedback to enable students to know how they could
progress in their learning. By this way, teachers also had the flexibility to teach and provide
direct feedback for students depending on the evidence generated during the teaching process.
So far, the use of AfL has been implemented by many countries around the world.
However, each country has different conditions and school environments, so AfL has been
tailored to each country and each locality, even to each school, class, and student. Therefore, it
can be said that the model used in this study has been quite effective. However, it is important to
note that the transition from what has been called ‘normal’ instruction to implementing an AFL
integrated strategy is not easy. Both learners and teachers have to work harder to understand
what this approach expects of them. Performing AfL many times will help them get used to the
approach and both the teaching and learning will be flexible, effective and purposeful.
This study was conducted within the limit of high school students in one of the 63
provinces in Vietnam. However, the remarkable thing in the study is that similar results can be
recorded in the context of developed countries. Therefore, it can be said that the model to apply
AFL in this study has been quite effective. However, to carry out large-scale studies like this, it
may depend on many factors, each locality and the level of awareness of each student when
assessment is transformed from summative assessment to AFL. Both learners and teachers must
make an effort when conducting research to understand how to approach a particular process in
order to achieve the goals expected
CONCLUSION
Assessment is an essential element of any educational process. Currently in Vietnamese
high schools, the most common assessment method is summative assessment. Summative
assessment is used to measure what students have learned at the end of the course in order to
move on to higher grades. To be allowed to move up to the higher grade, they have to meet
required standards such as periodic tests (midterm and end-of-term) to obtain satisfactory
outcomes. However, recently Vietnam has gradually approached AfL and at the same time
combined all three types of assessment such as: Assessment of learning, Assessment as learning
and Assessment for learning (AfL). AfL refers to regular, interactive assessment of student
progress and understanding to identify learning problems and help teachers tailor their
instruction to student needs.
Although AfL is not new to advanced education like in the US, Russia, Japan, the United
Kingdom, Finland, etc., it is still a less familiar and popular approach in Vietnam. In the near
future,Vietnamese education is gradually moving towards competence-based learning, so AfL
will be expanded in lots of provinces and cities across the country, especially in high schools,
Afl brings lots of such as: Communicating confidence that every learner can improve;
Empowering learners to take an active part in their own learning; Developing learners’
confidence in peer and self-assessment; Adjusting our teaching in response to our
observations or assessment results; Sharing learning objectives with learners; Sharing
success criteria with learners; Using questioning; Giving specific and useful feedback;
Introducing peer feedback and Introducing self-assessment. Indeed, in this study, AFL is
seen as an approach that not only motivates learners to expect lessons, but also promotes
positive teacher-student relationships. In specific cases of several high schools with similar
levels of students in learning and awareness, the adoption of AfL is proposed and
recommended.
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About the authors
– MSc. Dang Ngoc Tuan is currently the Director of Quang Binh Department of Education
and Training. He holds a Master of Science degree in Computer Science from University of
Technology (University of Da Nang). Currently, he is a Ph.D student at the School of
Engineering Education, Hanoi University of Science and Technology (from 6/2020). His
research focuses on evaluating the learning outcomes of high school informatics students
according to their access to competency.
– Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ngo Tu Thanh is currently working at the School of Engineering
Education, Hanoi University of Science and Technology. His main research areas are application
of ICT in teaching towards constructivist – interactive teaching, building architecture of
E-Learning system according to cloud computing model, building ICT interdisciplinary science
and education relevant to the industrial revolution 4.0, applying artificial intelligence to
innovate teaching methods, etc. In the last 5 years, he has published 35 scientific articles in
scientific journals, proceedings of domestic and foreign seminars on the above research
directions.
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EXAMINING PRESCHOOL PRINCIPALS’ AND TEACHERS’ AWARENESS

OF STEAM EDUCATION IN HO CHI MINH CITY
Dang Ut Phuong*1, Dinh Lan Anh1, Lai Hai Ha2
Hoang Quy Tinh3, Tran Hong Nhu Le4
Abstract: Although there are few studies in the world and in the country on STEAM education for
preschool children, STEAM education is considered a new direction to help preschool children
develop comprehensively, especially their creativity and problem-solving abilities. Studies on the
perception of managers and preschool teachers in Vietnam about STEAM education are limited.
To organize effective STEAM education activities, it is crucial to mention the awareness of
managers and preschool teachers regarding this. This article presents the results of a survey on
the awareness of 266 teachers, including 46 managers and 220 preschool teachers about STEAM
education. Quantitative and qualitative research methods are used in this study with two basic
techniques: questionnaire survey and in-depth interview. From the results of this study, we offer
some suggestions to improve the awareness capacity of STEAM education for preschool
managers and teachers in the Ho Chi Minh City area.
Keywords: managers, preschool teacher, STEAM education, Ho Chi Minh City
INTRODUCTION
In the context of the 4th technological revolution, early childhood education, which lays the
foundation for the comprehensive development of Vietnamese people as the first level of
education in the national education system (Quoc hoi, 2019), also needs to be prepared in
advance to meet the challenges of the times. There are many approaches set out when
considering modifying and renovating early childhood education programs. Among these
approaches, the STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics) approach is
being considered as a predominating direction in education, that brings efficiency and meets
practical needs. STEAM education emphasizes the practical aspect of learning, linking theory
with practical activities and practical experiences for children, training children’s thinking
capability, creativity, and problem-solving abilities (Tabiin, 2020). Preschoolers do not absorb
all the vague concepts or knowledge in a theoretical fashion, instead, they memorize through
what they see and what they do (Rasmani et al., 2020).
To organize STEAM education activities to suit children, schools, and regions, it is crucial
to mention the extremely important role of managers and preschool teachers. Managers need to
have a strategic and generalized vision, to give directions for the development of this
educational sector. Currently, it is necessary and important that preschool teachers not only
must have pedagogical skills, flexibility in application, but also have a clear and complete
awareness of STEAM education. However, there are very few articles and studies on STEAM
education in preschool in general and very little awareness about STEAM education of
managers and preschool teachers in Vietnam in particular. (Dang, 2020).
In this article, we introduce a questionnaire about the awareness of managers and preschool
teachers and use the questionnaire to investigate the current state of awareness of managers and
preschool teachers in Ho Chi Minh City about STEAM education. From the results, this study
 Corresponding Author: Dang Ut Phuong; E-mail Address: duphuong@daihocthudo.edu.vn

1 Hanoi Metropolitan University
2 National College for Education
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gives some suggestions to improve the awareness of STEAM education for managers and
preschool teachers in this region.
CONTENT
1. Studies on STEAM Education and the meaning of STEAM Education for preschool
children
STEAM is understood as the integration and harmonization of 5 elements: Science,
Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics. It emphasizes practice-based learning rather
than traditional education with theoretical knowledge (Henriksen et al., 2019). STEAM does not
turn children into scientists or great people, but STEAM provides children with necessary skills
in many fields, helping children understand better the theories they learn, the relationship
among different knowledge, and how to apply it well in real life. STEAM encourages children
to build knowledge of the world around them through observation, investigation, and questions.
Teachers and educators believe that with such ways of learning, students are more active and
able to think more critically in building their knowledge (Aktürk & Demircan, 2017). STEAM
is the original creative idea of Rhode Island School of Design (USA), then later used by many
educators, gradually spreading to the whole United States and other countries with the goal of
building a generation of workforce that has rich and practical knowledge and skills (Yakman &
Lee, 2012; Tabiin, 2020).
STEAM education is considered as learning the composite skills (hard and soft) that
children need. There have been many studies around the world showing that STEAM education
plays an important role and has a positive impact on the awareness and orientation of children in
preschool age (Boston Children’s Museum, 2011; DeJarnette, 2012; Bybee, 2013). According to
Kropp, it is not difficult for preschool children to access STEAM, because children are always
persistent and show their interest when giving ideas, always trying to overcome difficulties that
arise unexpectedly (Kropp et al., 2017). STEAM activities provide preschoolers with a natural
environment for cooperation and communication. There, children experience various forms of
learning and cultivate their ability to solve problems in their lives (De Jarnette, 2018;
Mengmeng et al., 2019).
In another research direction, De Jarnette (2012), Moomaw & Davis (2010) conclude that
teachers are the ones who have a great influence on the integration of STEAM elements in the
development of the school’s educational program. If teachers are trained in STEAM education,
they will be able to positively impact their students through what they have learned in the
training (De Jarnette, 2012; 2018; Moomaw & Davis, 2010). In her research, De Jarnette (2012)
made the following statement: Middle and high school teachers receive specialized training in
STEAM subjects, however, at the elementary and preschool levels, teachers have little or no
instruction in how to approach STEAM. When faced with the new STEAM education approach
in elementary grades, teachers are often under pressure, lack self-confidence, and show negative
tendencies due to lack of training. When they feel inadequate with certain content areas, they
tend to spend less time teaching STEAM content to their students (Jamil et al., 2018).
In Vietnam, STEAM education has been applied in recent years at the high school level.
Nguyen, Tran H.H. & Tran T.T. (2017) also conduct studies to find out about the awareness of
teachers and students about the importance of the artistic element in STEAM education in
Vietnam; or Nguyen (2019)’s “Current approach to teaching STEAM in general education”, in
this article, the author has shown the relevance of STEAM to the innovation of content,
organizational form and teaching methods in general education in our country (Nguyen, 2019;
Nguyen, Tran H.H. & Tran T.T., 2017).
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Referring to the STEAM education for preschool children recently, in 2020, there have
been scientists interested in researching this such as author Hoang (2020), who deeply analyzes
the importance of STEAM education for preschool children, the basic characteristics of STEAM
education for preschool children together with the ability to access elements in STEAM of
preschool children, the integration of STEAM elements in children’s activities. The author
makes the statement: “With cognitive limitations, children cannot receive these elements like
adults or high school students, therefore, preschool educators need to determine the level at
which children approach the above elements in accordance with their ability, and at the same
time do not reduce the correctness of scientific concepts, laws or technological processes, etc.”.
The author also emphasizes that “there is no fixed or mandatory sequence to perform when
integrating STEAM components”. The author also provides steps to design STEAM educational
activities for preschool children, the possibility to integrate STEAM with the current preschool
program (Dang, 2020). Tran, Nguyen T.V. & Nguyen B.T. (2020) make suggestions on the
content and form of fostering STEAM educational capacity for preschool teachers, they also
affirm the similarities between STEAM education and the cross-cutting point of the current
Vietnamese Early Childhood Education program, therefore it can be applied in preschools to
enhance the effectiveness of comprehensive education for children. Dang & Hoang (2020) make
a survey on the awareness status of preschool teachers in Cau Giay and Hai Ba Trung districts,
arguing that preschool teachers are still very vague about components of STEAM, they do not
know the characteristics of STEAM education in early childhood education, and have difficulty
in finding references. In the above studies, although each author goes in-depth about a specific
issue in STEAM education, the common point of these authors is that STEAM education for
preschool children is necessary to help preschool children acquire the skills that are necessary
later in their life. Hoang (2021), and Van & Chu (2021) also agree with this opinion.
In conclusion, the above studies all emphasize the importance of STEAM education for
preschool children’s development, even though studies and documents on STEAM education
for preschool children around the world and in Vietnam are still few and far between
specifically Quigley & Hero (2016) and Nguyen (2019) research on the awareness of managers
and preschool teachers about STEAM education in Ho Chi Minh City is not available.
2. Research results
2.1. Research method and area
To find out the current state of awareness of managers and preschool teachers in Ho Chi
Minh City, we used the combined quantitative and qualitative research methods in this research
with two basic techniques which are questionnaires and in-depth interviews.
The content and structure of the questionnaires include: (1) Awareness of managers and
preschool teachers about acronyms in STEAM; (2) Awareness of managers and preschool
teachers about the necessity of features in STEAM education for preschool children; (3)
Perception of managers and preschool teachers about activities with the closest characteristics
related to STEAM education activities; (4) The reality of difficulties in finding and organizing
STEAM educational activities; (5) Teachers’ wishes to improve their understanding of STEAM
education. Items (1), (2), (3), and (4) are rated on a 3-point scale. The lowest score is 1, the
highest score is 3, corresponding to the increasing level from “Not necessary”, “Easy”; “Not
related” to “Very necessary” “Closely related”, “Hard”. Item (5) is evaluated in percentage,
where the teacher chooses the most desired option.
The questions were designed into electronic questionnaires and distributed to preschool
teachers and managers in Ho Chi Minh City. 266 answers (46 answers from managers, 220
answers from preschool teachers) and analysis were collected from respondents who are
working as preschool teachers at preschool educational institutions.
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In-depth interview method: A qualitative research technique that involves conducting

in-depth personal interviews with a small number of people. Respondents will express their
personal views on that issue. In this study, we interviewed 28 preschool teachers in-depth with
three questions: (1) Why do you understand E in STEAM as Experiment? (2). How do you
understand the engineering element in STEAM for preschool children? (3). How do you
understand the technology element in STEAM for preschool children?
The process of conducting in-depth interviews of the topic includes: (1) Determining the
content and issues to be interviewed; (2) Design the content of the question to be interviewed;
(3) Conduct interviews; (4) Record the interview (recorder); (5) Analysis of the respondents’
answers; (6) Verify the reasonableness of the answers.
2.2. Research results on the awareness status of managers and preschool teachers in Ho
Chi Minh City about STEAM education
The study conducted a survey to collect opinions from 266 managers and preschool
teachers in 21 districts in Ho Chi Minh City. There are 46 managers (principals, vice-principals)
and 220 preschool teachers with an average age of 32.56 years old; average work experience of
8 years (minimum 1.5 years and maximum 33 years) working in public school (51.13%) and
private schools (48.87%); their qualifications include 4 managers with master’s degrees,
accounting for 1.5%; 124 teachers, including 42 managers and 82 preschool teachers who have
university degrees, accounting for 46.6%; the remaining 122 pre-school teachers have college
degrees, accounting for 45.9%; 16 preschool teachers are at intermediate level accounting for
6%. 100% of managers and preschool teachers have a major in early childhood education.
The first question we asked in the questionnaire was the level of understanding of STEAM
education of 266 managers and preschool teachers in the survey, we obtained 36 opinions
choosing the option “haven’t heard and understood nothing about STEAM” accounting for
13.5%; 39.1% chose “have heard but haven’t learned about STEAM education”; 27.8% chose
“have heard and learned a little bit, but still vague”. 12.8% answered “have heard and learned a
lot but do not know how to organize STEM/STEAM activities for preschool children”. Only 4
out of 266 managers and preschool teachers, accounting for 1.5%, chose “have heard, learned,
understood and know how to organize a STEM/STEAM activity”. From these results, it can be
assumed that STEAM education is still very new to most preschool teachers. This is also a
perfectly reasonable reason because in the questionnaire, we asked managers and preschool
teachers to answer a question about the respondents’ understanding of the acronyms that make
up the word STEAM and the importance of organizing STEAM-oriented activities for preschool
children. The results obtained are as follows:
Chart 1. The understanding of managers and teachers about the acronyms of STEAM
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From the chart, we can see that there are only 88 managers and preschool teachers correctly
selected the acronyms that make up the word STEAM accounting for 33%. The remaining 67%
of managers and preschool teachers do not understand correctly the words constituting STEAM
(of which the popular choice accounting for 33% is that STEAM stands for Science,
Technology, Experiment, Art, Math; 26% chose STEAM as the abbreviation for Science,
Teach, Experiment, Art, Math; 8% think that STEAM is an abbreviation of Science, Teach,
Engineering, Art, Math – mistaking 2 / 5 factors that make up STEAM). Out of 266 managers
and preschool teachers, 136 teachers said that STEAM is a teaching method, accounting for
51.1%; 54 managers and preschool teachers choose STEAM as a form of teaching
(group/individual, conversation/monologue...) accounting for 20.3%. The remaining 76
managers and preschool teachers understand STEAM as a direction, approach, accounting for
28.6%. If we consider the origin of STEM education and then STEAM, STEM/ STEAM is an
educational development policy at all levels from preschool to university to attract learners and
develop resources related to STEM occupations in the US, but when it comes to Vietnam,
STEM/STEAM is understood in many ways. We should understand that STEAM education is
not only a specific teaching method, nor just a specific teaching model, but simply STEAM
education is an approach to educational development and learner capacity development.
According to the results of the knowledge survey of the managers and preschool teachers,
STEAM education has been included in the early childhood education program of Vietnam, but
it is still very small, accounting for 34.6%; 28.6% of teachers believe that STEAM elements are
present in the preschool programs, but teachers do not know how to exploit and organize them.
35.3% believe that there are STEAM elements and STEAM-oriented activities, but they did not
know that it was a STEAM activity. Only 1.5% of teachers said that there is no STEAM
element in the Early Childhood Education curriculum in Vietnam.
Although the awareness regarding S, T, E, A, M elements in STEAM education is still 67%
inaccurate, when asked about the importance of organizing STEAM-oriented educational
activities for preschool children, 82% of managers and preschool teachers chose important (of
which 21.1% teachers considered it very important and 60.9% considered it important); Only
15.8% rated the organization of STEAM-oriented educational activities for preschool children at
a normal level. In particular, there is one manager who thinks that whether it is important or not
depends on the organization and approach of teachers, accounting for 0.8%; there is one
preschool teacher who did not evaluate because of her lack of knowledge and experience in
STEAM education, accounting for 0.8% and one teacher who answered that she did not know,
accounting for 0.8%. In addition, we also conducted in-depth interviews with 28 preschool
teachers in Ho Chi Minh City: (1) Why do you understand E in STEAM as Experiment?
(2) How do you understand the engineering element in STEAM for preschool children? (3) How
do you understand the technology element in STEAM for preschool children? The results
obtained in question (1) had 100% of the teacher’s answers focus on the factor that they heard
that STEAM is about teaching practice and experience. So when they see the experience choice
in question (2), 12/28 teachers (accounting for 42.85%) had the correct answer and understood
the nature of the problem, Miss N.T.M replied, “It emphasizes the technical design process.
Children must identify a problem, think about it, come up with solutions, and implement those
solutions.” The remaining 16/28 teachers (accounting for 57.14%) could not give an answer or
gave the wrong answer, they mostly are teachers with more than 15 years of experience and are
in charge of teaching nurseries and kindergartens, who just heard of STEAM education. In
question (3), 5/28 teachers (accounting for 17.9%) understood that technology is the equipment
and utensils around the children and the children can use those devices effectively according to
their purpose. 14/28 teachers said that the technology in STEAM MN meant children can
control and use robots, which accounted for 50%. 9/28 teachers said that the technology in
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STEAM, which is TV, computer, and iPad that children can use in the learning process,
accounted for 32.1%.
When studying the awareness of managers and preschool teachers about the characteristics
of STEAM education for preschool children, we obtained the following results:
Table 1. Awareness of administrators and preschool teachers about the necessity of features
in STEAM education for preschool children
Level
No. Characteristics of STEAM education Average Rank
Very necessary Necessary Not necessary
1. Applicability and practicality 51.13 27.07 21.80 2.29 5
2. More children’s experience 58.65 24.06 17.29 2.41 4
3. Provide a lot of scientific knowledge 81.95 10.53 7.52 2.74 1
4. Focus on group activities and creativity 75.19 15.79 9.02 2.66 2
5. At the end of the activity, children must 32.33 14.29 53.38 1.79 7
clearly identify right and wrong
6. There is a technical product at the end of 33.83 15.04 51.13 1.83 6
the lesson
7. Problem-solving capability 71.43 16.54 12.03 2.59 3
8. Cross subject thinking 24.06 13.53 62.41 1.62 8
Table 1 shows that managers and preschool teachers choose “Providing a lot of scientific
knowledge” (average = 2.74) as “Very necessary”. This choice can be explained that STEAM
education will provide children with a lot of knowledge about science, and this is very
necessary. Through STEAM education activities, children will acquire more basic scientific
knowledge, but for preschool children, it is not necessary to have a lot of scientific knowledge.
Ranked number 2 is “Focus on group activities and creativity” (average = 2.66). It is
undeniable that STEAM educational activities will help children strengthen group activities,
organize groups, and develop children’s creativity through activities. However, this
characteristic has not really been seen as necessary as evaluated.
We agree with the managers and preschool teachers on the assessment of “Problem-solving
capability” (average = 2.59) as “Very necessary”. In STEAM educational activities, children
will have to deal with situations that occur during the activity on their own, these situations can
be friend relationship, objects, and children will have to be flexible and come up with an
appropriate way to deal with them. Therefore, improving problem-solving capability is also an
essential element in the characteristics of STEAM educational activities.
In addition to the characteristics assessed by managers and preschool teachers as “Very
necessary”, in our opinion, “More children’s experience” (average = 2.41) and “Applicability
and practicality” (average = 2.29), which only received assessment at the level of “Necessary”,
are the two characteristics that are considered essential in STEAM education.
Table 2. Awareness of managers and preschool teachers about activities with characteristics
that are most related to STEAM educational activities
Level
No. Activity Average Rank
Closely related Related Not related
1. Math familiarization activities 72.93 18.80 8.27 2.65 2
2. Scientific discovery activities 90.98 7.52 1.50 2.89 1
3. Shaping activities 50.38 26.32 23.32 2.27 3
4. Musical activities 33.83 23.31 42.86 1.91 5
5. Literary works familiarization activities 43.61 32.33 24.06 2.20 4
6. Alphabet familiarization activities 16.54 32.33 51.13 1.65 6
7. All learning activities 15.04 24.06 60.90 1.54 7
8. Others 0 0 0
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The survey results in Table 2 show that, for managers and preschool teachers, all activities
have characteristics that are related to STEAM educational activities. However, the managers
and preschool teachers believe that “Scientific discovery activities” is ranked 1 because
scientific discovery activities are highly scientific, can be exploited in many aspects, have
interesting and intriguing content and are close to the definition of S, T, E, A, M. Second to
“Science discovery activities”, “Math familiarization activities” (ranked 2) was rated by
teachers as “Closely related” to STEAM education activities because Math is one of the
components of STEAM. Other activities are also highly evaluated by managers and preschool
teachers, but mainly focus on the level of “Related”. Thus, most of the managers and preschool
teachers are aware of the relevance of activities to STEAM education.
Table 3. The reality of difficulties in searching and organizing
STEAM educational activities
Level
No. Content Average Rank
Hard Normal Easy
1. Searching for references 80.45 11.28 8.27 2.72 1
2. Facilities 57.89 32.33 9.77 2.48 5
3. Number of children 75.19 15.79 9.02 2.66 2
4. Come up with ideas 67.67 24.06 8.27 2.59 4
5. Understand STEAM educational content 72.18 19.55 8.27 2.64 3
6. Excitement for children in the process of 52.63 37.59 9.77 2.43 6
organizing activities
7. Others 0 0 0 0
Almost all surveyed managers and preschool teachers agree with “Searching for references”
(ranked 1), “Number of children” (ranked 2) being the most difficult problems encountered.
Finding the document is one thing, its quality and reliability is another matter. In addition, when
asked, teacher N.T. Mai shared that with many children, teachers will face many difficulties in
covering all children. During the day, teachers must do many different jobs of the class and
must keep up with the time, so organizing activities is still superficial and the effectiveness of
STEAM activities in classes with many children is not guaranteed.
“Understand STEAM educational content” (ranked 3) and “Come up with ideas” (ranked 4)
are also of interest to teachers. It can be explained that because teachers have difficulty in
finding reference sources, it is very difficult for teachers to understand the content of STEAM
education properly and fully, thereby drawing up ideas and lesson plans that are attractive,
interesting, and right for children is a difficult problem for preschool teachers.
In addition, “Facilities” (ranked 5) and “Excitement for children in the process of
organizing activities” (ranked 6) are also assessed by managers and preschool teachers as a bit
difficult because it is necessary to prepare enough materials to organize activities as well as to
interest children right at the beginning of the lesson.
Through the above analysis, it is shown that in the process of organizing STEAM education
activities for children, preschool teachers face several difficulties. However, for reasons such as
“Facilities” or “Excitement for children in the process of organizing activities”, teachers can
overcome with flexibility and ingenuity in organizing for children, in accordance with actual
conditions of schools and classes. That will bring effective education results in organizing
STEAM activities for children.
Table 4. Teachers’ expectations to improve their understanding of STEAM education
No. Expectation Number %
1 Receive specific, clear, and detailed training on STEAM education 176 66.17
2 Provided with documents and referenced resources 134 50.38
3 Actual application at school 68 25.56
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No. Expectation Number %

4 Clarified how to organize STEAM activities for children to enjoy and achieve results on children 96 36.09
5 Fully equipped with educational facilities 136 51.13
6 Attending demo STEAM educational activities 174 65.41
The results of Table 4 show that managers and preschool teachers have certain
expectations, but they all have the same purpose to improve their understanding of STEAM
education. However, there are expectations that most managers and preschool teachers choose is
“To receive specific, clear, and detailed training on STEAM education” (66.17%); The second
most popular expectation is “To attend demo STEAM educational activities” (65.41%). The
desire to receive specific, clear, and detailed training on STEAM education is to understand the
basic theoretical foundations of STEAM education, to have trustworthy, quality reference
sources for reference and learning. Additionally, the desire to participate in demo STEAM
educational activities will help preschool teachers have the most comprehensive view on how a
standard STEAM educational activity will be organized to bring high efficiency for children.
There are also other expectations such as “Fully equipped with educational facilities”
(accounting for 51.13%); “Provided with documents and reference sources” (accounting for
50.38%). Thereby, the desire to learn to improve the qualifications and knowledge of the
managers as well as the preschool teachers is clear to see.
3. Some suggestions for raising awareness about STEAM education for managers and
preschool teachers in Ho Chi Minh City area
The managers and preschool teachers have a very important responsibility that is the quality
of care and education which preschool children receive. They lay the first bricks in building the
personality of preschool children. Therefore, improving the awareness capacity of this team is
extremely necessary, it is an important task in the strategy. Through the results obtained when
investigating the situation, we found that although managers and preschool teachers are aware
of the importance of STEAM education for preschool children, the understanding of managers
and preschool teachers is still limited: not knowing the elements that make up STEAM, being
vague about the characteristics of STEAM education, having difficulty in finding documents
and not knowing how to organize STEAM educational activities for preschool children. The
reason for these limitations is that teachers have not been trained in STEAM education for
preschool children. Therefore, the first thing to do is:
Organize training courses to provide and expand knowledge for preschool teachers about
STEAM education for preschool children: This is one of the activities that play a very important
role in the process of improving the awareness capacity of managers and preschool teachers
about STEAM education for preschool children. In fact, many teachers are enthusiastic about
their work and want to promote their abilities in innovating care-education methods with new
educational contents and approaches, but they do not know how to innovate and whether
innovation will bring good results or not. And in particular, not all teachers can understand
which STEAM education content is suitable for preschool age. Therefore, it is very necessary to
organize training on knowledge about STEAM education. The regular and cyclical training is a
form suitable to the professional characteristics of preschool teachers: Teachers are trained at
school, learners do not have to meet lecturers often, kindergartens become the training base.
Participating regularly in training helps teachers to be updated with accurate information about
the basics of STEAM education: elements, importance, objectives, content, characteristics, and
STEAM education topics, as well as appropriate methods and forms of STEAM education
approaches for children. This will improve not only teachers’ professional qualifications but
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also practice skills. In the process of training, lecturers provide resources for teachers to read,
refer to and build programs suitable for the children in the class and the local situation. It is also
important to note that when building a training program for teachers, there should be many
specific and practical teaching activities so that teachers can directly observe, which will help
teachers’ comprehension process better.
Create a positive (physical and mental) environment for teachers and children to express,
practice and develop new and unique ideas in the process of building STEAM educational
topics and activities.
One of the difficulties teachers face in the process of educating STEAM for children is the
facility factor. A common fact is that classrooms are too crowded with children, have limited
equipment while teachers themselves do not have enough economic conditions and time to
equip these items themselves. Therefore, the strengthening of facilities, supplies and equipment
will create favorable conditions for teachers to have the opportunity to show and promote their
abilities. This will expand the choices of STEAM educational content and activities for teachers
and children, creating conditions for teachers and children’s activities to be much more diverse
and attractive. Creating a positive working environment is creating a spacious and airy working
and playing space, with diverse, rich, new, and attractive equipment, utensils, tools, toys as well
as the atmosphere of friendliness, equality, intimacy, and love. This is an extremely important
and necessary job.
A good environment will increase the attention and interest of both teachers and children in
activities. It also helps teachers have more motivation and creative ideas, thereby designing and
organizing attractive activities, which are suitable for children’s development, and stimulate
children to actively express themselves and actively experience the activities. The immersive
experience in that rich, engaging environment gives children the opportunity to get closer to the
real world of adults. It is here that children’s knowledge and skills are formed.
Creating a positive environment includes a physical environment and a psychological one,
so building diverse and attractive activities together with a friendly atmosphere between
teachers and children plays a huge role.
CONCLUSION
From the researches of domestic and foreign scientists, the authors found that STEAM
education is an inevitable trend in the process of educational innovation and development
towards learner capacity development to meet social needs. STEAM education emphasizes the
process of learning through experience, practice based on the integration of the fields of science,
technology, engineering, math, and arts, associated with solving real-world problems. This is
consistent with the cognitive characteristics of preschool children and the Vietnamese preschool
education program. Through the survey results on managers and preschool teachers in Ho Chi
Minh City, it shows that most of the managers and preschool teachers do not have a full
understanding of STEAM constituent elements as well as the nature of the elements, and basic
characteristics of STEAM education. Thus, the planning, implementation, and organization of
STEAM educational activities for preschool children still have difficulties in finding references,
the number of children in the class, understanding the content of STEAM education.
The above theoretical and practical studies are an important basis for the authors to propose
some suggested solutions: (1) Organize refresher courses to provide and expand knowledge for
preschool teachers about STEAM education for preschool children; (2) Create a positive
working environment (physical and mental) for teachers and children to express, express,
practice, and develop new and unique ideas in the process of building STEAM educational
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topics and activities, aiming to help managers and preschool teachers flexibly and effectively
apply STEAM education activities to the care and education of children. Despite certain
contributions, this article only briefly summarizes the research on STEAM education for
preschool children in Vietnam, and the current case study sample is still limited to 266
managers and preschool teachers. This is because the sample collection took place during the
covid epidemic, we could only send survey links to teachers via email.
In the future, STEAM education for preschool children will certainly continue to receive
great attention from researchers and the whole society, this issue needs to be studied on a larger
sample, in addition, we can promote research about: Develop a STEAM education program for
preschool children in line with Vietnamese reality, a competency framework on STEAM
education for preschool teachers, refresher courses and training courses on STEAM education
for preschool teachers, methods to organize STEAM education activities for Vietnamese
preschool children, new solutions to improve the cognitive capacity of preschool teachers about
STEAM education, bringing more values and promoting more effectively in the process of
program development and organization of educational activities for children in preschool.
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cho trẻ mầm non. Kỷ yếu hội thảo quốc tế lần thứ nhất về khoa học giáo dục, Giáo dục sớm
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About the authors
– MSc. Dang Ut Phuong works as a lecturer at Pedagogy Faculty of Hanoi Metropolitan
University and studying Phd program in STEAM education for Preschool children at Hanoi
National University of Education. Her research fields are in Early Childhood Education, Science
for preschool, STEAM education, life skills education , Sex Education for Preschool Children.
She has 14 research publications in areas relating to children. She has been teaching the STEAM
method at clubs in the Vinschool system since 2017.
– MSc. Lai Hai Ha is a lecturer at the Scientific Management and International Relations
Department National College for Education. Her research fields are in Early Childhood
Education, English for preschool. She has many international topics submitted at the Singapore
International Foundation, Victoria University, University of Graz.
– MSc. Dinh Lan Anh is currently working at the Faculty of Pedagogy, majoring in
Preschool Education, Hanoi Metropolitan University. She received a Bachelor’s and Master’s
degree in Early Childhood Education from the Faculty of Preschool Education, Hanoi National
University of Education with excellent thesis scores. The fields that she is researching are
related to preschool education, preschool teacher education, preschool psychology, STEAM
education. Currently, she has published a number of specialized scientific articles in prestigious
journals on the list of journal of the Board of Professors such as the Vietnam Journal of
Education of the Ministry of Education and Training.
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– Hoang Quy Tinh is Associate Professor working in the Faculty of Preschool Education
of Hanoi University of Education. His research fields include early childhood education,
Children Nervous Physiology, preschool English. He has published seventeen articles published
in domestic journals, articles Foreign newspapers and seminars and conferences. In addition, he
also chaired many subjects at the State and Ministry levels and were all ranked with excellent
grades. He also attend on 40 Post-graduate Thesis Boards and published many textbooks.
– MSc. Tran Hong Nhu Le has worked at the Faculty of Early Childhood Education,
Saigon University since 2009. Her research fields are in Early Childhood Education, Preschool
teacher education. She has 6 research publications in areas relating to children. She has been in
charge of the Theory and Method of Forming Mathematical symbols for preschool children
from 2013 to present. She has been the one in charge and professional manager for Alpha Kids
Bilingual Preschool since 2019.
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DEVELOPING STEAM TOPICS FOR TEACHING BIOLOGY 8

TO DEVELOP PROBLEM – SOLVING COMPETENCY
FOR STUDENTS AT LOWER SECONDARY LEVEL
Le Thi Phuong1, Do Thuy Linh*
2
Abstract: STEAM has been widely recognized as a pivot to promote not only education in fields of
Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics, but also interdisciplinary approaches in
order to comprehensively develop learners’ capacity and quality. In the new 2018 Vietnam
General Education Curriculum (GEC), besides “core” subjects such as Mathematics and Natural
Science, Arts, Computer Education and Engineering Education are gaining more serious and
deserved attention to help learners be fully prepared for challenges of education 4.0.
In this article, we examine relevant literature review and in-depth analysis of Biology 8 program
and textbook, it would form the basis for developing processes and principles, and design topics
for teaching in STEAM model. STEAM could be implemented in a variety of ways such as training
activities, science-technology competition, and festival, etc., but there is still a small percentage
of teachers who are knowledgeable in integrating the STEAM approach into the teaching
process.
Biology is an experimental subject that is associated with real-life and requires integrated
knowledge from all STEAM disciplines to effectively solve problems. Biology Grade 8 contains a
significant amount of integrated topics on morphological and structural characteristics of the
human body, which leads to students’ knowledge on taking care of a healthy body. We have
suggested 12 STEAM topics in Biology Grade 8 with the specific process of lesson design, the
process of teaching, and a variety of appropriate STEAM experiments. Through adapting
extensive experience and expertise from STEAM disciplines to real-world problems and projects, it
is proven to be effective at developing students’ competency, including problem-solving
competency. We have also proposed pertinent assessment criteria for problem-solving
competency in teaching STEAM topics.
Keywords: STEAM Education, competency, problem-solving competency, Biology 8
INTRODUCTION
In 2018, the Ministry of Education and Training unveiled the new General Education
Curriculum which focuses on students’ activities to develop their competence. In the General
Education Curriculum, it was clearly stated: “STEM education is an educational model based on
an interdisciplinary with the aim of helping students apply their knowledge of Science,
Technology, Engineering and Mathematics to solve practical problems in specific contexts”
(MOET, 2018). In the context of recent education reform in Vietnam, it is necessary to unify the
understanding and implementation of STEM Education, continuously improve education in
Technology and Informatics, strengthen integrated teaching by topics related to Math, Science,
Technology, Informatics, etc., in order to contribute part of renovating the teaching process and
bringing STEM activities into the current general education curriculum (Ngoc Thong, 2014).
The goal of STEM education is similar to that of the new general education program. One of the
strongest arguments for STEAM derives from the view that creativity is the most important
ability in the 21st century. Accordingly, the arts offer an important way to cultivate creativity.
* Corresponding Author: Do Thuy Linh; Email Address: dothuylinh.1804@gmail.com

1 University of Education, Vietnam National University
2 University of Education, Vietnam National University, Hanoi
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However, the introduction of STEAM into general education is facing some difficulties. There
are many documents dedicated to STEAM education, but we still have not reached a consensus
on the awareness and approach to STEAM education (Vinh Hien, 2019). There are very few
works and articles on the theoretical and practical basis of STEAM education and its application
to teaching in K-12, especially for middle school level.
Biology is an experimental science associated with real life, with the existence and
development of human society itself. It requires teaching and learning to support learners in
thinking, creativity, knowing how to work and do scientific research, and improving the
acquisition of knowledge. Biology subject has integrated elements, so the promotion of STEAM
education research in Biology teaching is completely consistent with the orientation of
fundamental and comprehensive innovation in Vietnamese education in order to develop
learners’ abilities to meet the requirements of modern society.
Because of above reasons, the authors do believe that there should be studies on building
STEAM Integrative Biology topics in order to develop competencies, especially problem-solving
capacity, which is very necessary.
CONTENT
1. Theoretical foundation of the research
1.1. STEAM in general
The teaching landscape is rapidly changing with the rise of integration of multiple subjects
in order to help students solve practical complex problems in reality. International concerns for
advancing integrated teaching, especially STEM education have escalated in recent years and
show no signs of abating. STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and
Mathematics, while STEAM is the combination of STEM fields and Arts. STEM integration
research is still in its infancy in terms of enhancing curriculum development and varied student
outcomes (English, 2016). Students’ grasp of how things operate and their ability to use
technology should grow as a result of a proper STEM education. During precollege education,
more engineering should be introduced to STEM education as engineering has a direct role in
problem resolution and innovation, two topics that are high on everyone’s mind (Bybee, 2010).
STEM focuses on 21st-century abilities such as inquiry methods, problem-solving, critical
thinking, creativity, and invention, as well as a heavy emphasis on discipline knowledge
(Marginson, Tytler, Freeman, & Roberts, 2013).
STEM explicitly focuses on scientific concepts whilst STEAM investigates the same
concepts, but does this through inquiry and problem-based learning methods used in the creative
process. Despite the fact that STEAM has become a popular educational approach for improving
students’ creativity, problem-solving abilities, and interest in STEM areas, the definitions and
goals of STEAM education are still widely debated (Perignat & Katz-Buonincontro, 2019). By
combining studies in the arts, humanities, and STEM fields, this multidisciplinary approach
intends to foster creative thinking along with other STEM skills (Hunter-Doniger & Sydow,
2016; Liao, 2016; Madden et al., 2013). Integrating arts into study in classroom encourages
students to come up with their own ideas, take acceptable risks, learn from their errors and
experiment with new materials (Runco, 2014; Shaheen, 2010). The notion of STEAM education
is gaining traction as a paradigm for breaking down barriers between conventional academic
topics and integrating science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics into a single
curriculum (Yakman, 2008).
1.2. Defining “Arts” element in STEAM
STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics. The and
“Arts” element in STEAM could be identified in three categories: and Arts Education, Arts as
any non-STEM discipline, Arts as a synonym for project-based learning, problem-based
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learning, technology-based learning, or making (Perignat & Katz-Buonincontro, 2019). Art

education is described as the inclusion of visual or performing arts, design or creative processes,
techniques of a medium, and/or critiques of work and exhibiting final products. On the other
hand, other authors indicate that the “A” in STEAM stands for “other non-STEM subjects, such
as liberal arts, humanities, and interest areas such as environmental studies and community
participation”. In some other articles, Arts can be conceived as being more technological. Arts is
used as a synonymous phrase for project-based activities, basic drawing or painting chores,
technology-based activities and digital literacy, or any degree of final project construction or
completion in which children do not explicitly learn about the arts. There is a difference
between “Art” in singular form as visual, musical, and performance art, while “Arts” in plural
form refers to the liberal arts disciplines (Quigley, Herro, & Jamil, 2017).
1.3. STEAM education and problem-solving competency
STEAM education combines the arts with STEM courses to increase student’s engagement,
creativity, innovation, problem-solving competency, and other cognitive advantages (Liao,
2016). STEAM education is defined as a method of involving students in STEM learning, and
improving problem-solving abilities in real-world situations. Teachers in cross-curricular
STEAM settings frequently observe their students creating new and interesting connections
between topics and solving problems (Bertrand & Namukasa, 2020). STEAM integrated
teaching is often associated with practical tasks, so it requires the use of knowledge, skills, and
methods in a flexible and integrated way. Moreover, because it comes from situations that are
close to learners, it requires learners to have a need to solve by posing problems, presenting
problems, proposing, implementing solutions and giving results (Huy Hoang, 2017).
The STEAM teaching model in countries around the world is mainly taught through
Natural Science subjects. The content of these subjects is delivered in the form of STEAM
topics. STEAM topics can be taught in a single subject or taught in multiple disciplines. In
which, teaching STEAM through a subject is the simplest. The topic is formed through the steps
of problem formulation, method design, information gathering, and conclusion (Huy Hoang,
2017). In Biology, STEAM is integrated mainly through a system of experimental and practical
lessons and some other science subjects in the form of a club.
STEM education in Vietnam can be organized in the following forms (Van Bien & Duy Hai,
2019):
– Teaching subjects in the field of STEM;
– STEM experiential activities;
– Scientific and technical research activities.
Currently, teaching subjects in the field of STEM/STEAM is the main form of educational
organization in Vietnamese high schools. In this way, STEM/STEAM lessons are implemented
right in the process of teaching STEM/STEAM subjects in an interdisciplinary approach
through teaching topics. These topics follow the curriculum of the component subjects and do
not require extra learning time. Moreover, when building STEM/STEAM teaching topics,
teachers always start with practical problems to be solved; there is a close connection between
practical problems and subject knowledge to solve those problems.
2. Principles for designing STEAM topics
When designing STEAM topics, teachers need to pay attention to the following principles
(Vinh Hien, 2019):
(1) STEAM lesson topics are closely associated with practical problems.
The issues chosen for the topic’s content must be relevant to students’ daily lives and force
them to utilize all of their multidisciplinary knowledge in order to solve these problems and
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develop creativity. Students have to explore and research related knowledge to the problem and
are forced to apply that knowledge to the reality. Therefore, STEAM is both a requirement and
an opportunity for integrated teaching. STEAM will provide people with practical ability in the
working environment, with high creativity in jobs that require competencies of the 21st century,
and with efficient competencies to make a living in conditions of the 21st century.
The teachers need to pay attention to these principles when choosing problems to include in
STEAM topics:
– The problem is solved when applying the subjects’ knowledge in the STEAM fields.
– The contents of STEAM education implementation need to be suitable for the students’
learning competence, and the infrastructure conditions of the school.
– The content ensures students’ experience and practical applicability, which can be
extended to other contents that will generate good results.
(2) The topic of STEAM directs students to participate in group activities, create, explore,
discover, be action-oriented, experience, and create learning products.
In the STEAM topic, students’ activities are carried out in an open direction within the
range of facilities that students are used to. Students are proactive, self-disciplined, and become
confident, bold, and open to the outside world. Students learn and exchange information on their
own to share ideas, expand and refine their knowledge, adapt their ideas, and design their
exploration and discovery activities to suit problem situations. It is important that the products
or solution must be made by the students themselves and must be new, contributing to solving
the problems posed in the topic. Teachers will design open-ended questions to stimulate
students’ imagination, encourage students to ask questions, and explore the problem thoroughly.
Learning results can only be achieved based on individual efforts and synergistic effects through
interactions inside and outside each group. That will be highly effective if the school builds
autonomous classes, allowing students to interact widely with many people in society, peers in
public, and at school to support their students in learning activities.
(3) STEAM topics have content built mainly from natural sciences, social sciences –
humanities, engineering, technology and mathematics that students have been learning.
STEAM topic must be closely associated with the students’ subject knowledge level, and
request them to connect their existing knowledge and living capital to suggest new tasks. At the
same time, due to the requirements of the current learning task that students have a need to find
new knowledge, teachers will through that teach new knowledge, accompany, support, and
guide students to explore and discover things. To teach STEAM topics, teachers need to create a
rich learning environment and opportunities for students to participate in STEAM activities.
However, it is not necessary to have too much modern equipment to teach STEAM topics,
besides computers and other modern devices, it is advisable to pay attention to use recycled
items such as bottles, boxes, straws, lanyards, paper bags, etc. and other easy-to-find materials
to contribute to environmental protection. Teachers need to be skillful so that teaching
objectives can be integrated in a topic and help students understand the fact that science,
technology, math and art are not independent subjects, but they are linked to each other to solve
complex problems.
In particular, it is noted that A – Art in STEAM represents liberal arts, language arts, social
studies, physical arts, fine arts, music, culture, and humanities. Therefore, STEAM topics are a
connection of scientific subjects to solve practical problems and aim at humanity and creativity
when solving those problems.
(4) STEAM topics are assessed according to multiple goals, taking into account multiple
correct answers and considering failure as a necessity of the learning process.
A research question can propose many scientific hypotheses; a problem can offer many
solutions and choose the optimal one. STEAM topic doesn’t necessarily have one right
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outcome. This principle shows the important role of problem solving and creativity in STEAM
lessons. Let students observe and perform scientific experiments, try, redo, and do more
operations and procedures; focus on asking questions to tell themselves changes and phenomena
that they realize through their senses. STEAM is a transition from the traditional way of
education, based on results for assessment, to a modern educational method in which the
learning process and learning outcomes are equally valued. In addition to the science,
technology, engineering, and math requirements, STEAM lessons need to be assessed regarding
readiness, participation, collaboration, and skills required by students in the 21st century
includes problem-solving competence, critical thinking, cooperation skills, communication
skills, dialectical thinking, evidence evaluation and solution giving, career guidance, etc. As a
result, the assessment needs to be objective, putting no pressure on students; and it is necessary
to encourage and motivate them to explore and develop their competencies.
3. The process of designing some STEAM topics to develop problem-solving competence
STEAM process focuses on solving a problem by deconstructing it (breaking it into smaller
parts), analyzing data and creating solutions by using a series of ordered steps. These steps are
(Bertolini, 2019): (1) Empathize – develop a deep understanding of the challenge; (2) Define –
clearly articulate the problem to be solved; (3) Ideate – brainstorm potential solutions, select and
develop a solution; (4) Prototype – design a prototype (or series of prototypes) to test all or part
of the solution; (5) Test – engage in a continuous short-cycle innovation process to continually
improve the design.
Some other authors have also suggested the following STEM theme design processes:
(1) Choose a topic; (2) Identify the problems to be solved in the topic; (3) Identify the
necessary knowledge to solve the problem; (4) Develop the subject’s teaching goal of the topic;
(5) Develop the content of teaching activities of the topic; (6) Make a plan to teach the topic;
(7) Organize teaching and evaluate the topic (Van Bien & Duy Hai, 2019).
(1) Practical problems; (2) STEM topic ideas; (3) Identify STEM knowledge to be solved;
(4) Define STEM topic goals; (5) Develop a set of guiding questions STEM topics (Thanh Nga, 2019).
We have found that the STEAM theme design process is not too different from the STEM
theme design processes, here only expanding the Art element, emphasizing the artistry and
humanity Literature. Therefore, the process of designing some STEAM topics to develop
problem-solving competence can be carried out through the following steps (see Figure 1):
Figure 1. Process of designing some STEAM topics to develop problem-solving competence

The following is an explanation of the steps of the process and specific examples for the
topic “Hearing organ”:
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Step 1. Identify practical problems to be solved

Practical problems are understood as situations that are problematic for students of a
technical nature. It can be applications in daily life, or a requirement of career orientation, etc.,
motivating students to learn and solve.
For example, applied to the above topic: Where do the sounds we hear come from? Why do
we hear those sounds?
Step 2. Define STEAM topics
The topics of STEAM will be built from the practical problems associated with the content
of Biology knowledge set out above. For example, with the practical problem identified above,
it is possible to teach “Hearing organ” with a system of experiments on hearing organ, and
theoretical product development.
The teacher will determine the main content to solve the topic, thereby giving related
questions to guide learning activities for learners, which specific criteria and requirements may
accompany to solve.
Some illustrative and oriented questions for the topic “Hearing organ” are as follows: What
is sound? Where does sound come from? How is the structure of the ear suitable for the function
of receiving sound waves? How to prevent ear diseases?
Step 3. Identify the STEAM knowledge needed to solve the problem
To answer the core questions of the topic posted in step 2, the teacher needs to develop
some core knowledge of Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and the Arts. Once
the main content circuit of the topic has been built, the teacher needs to connect that content
with real products and applications and identify the knowledge of STEAM subjects to solve the
problem. The essence of this step is to identify specific knowledge content in subjects related to
the STEAM topic.
The content of STEAM knowledge under the topic “Hearing organ” is defined as follows:
– Science:
+ The structure of the ears that is suitable for the function of receiving the stimulus of
sound waves;
+ Prevention of diseases of the ears;
+ Hearing threshold of the human ears;
+ The source of the sound.
– Technology:
+ Do some science experiments on sound.
– Engineering:
+ Make a model of the human ears using some life-familiar materials.
– Art:
+ Propose as many as possible models of human ears using life-familiar materials with
different scales;
+ Decorate human ears model with multiple colors, shape, activities, sound, etc.;
+ Contribute to solving problems for people with hearing impairments.
– Mathematics:
+ Calculate appropriate proportions and sizes of models of human ears.
Step 4. Develop the teaching objectives of the topic
Objectives are defined as the basis for assessing the quality and effectiveness of the lesson.
Therefore, learning objectives must be clearly defined, which can serve as a basis for evaluating
the level of achievement of learners’ goals.
Example of teaching objectives of the topic “Hearing organ”:
– Knowledge:
+ Analyze the suitability of the structure to perform the function of receiving sound waves
of the ear;
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+ List measures to prevent ear diseases;

+ Perform some experiments on the source of the sound;
+ Create a model of the human ear.
– Skill:
+ Practice skills in doing experiments, observing things and phenomena, comparing
skills, etc.;
+ Practice calculation skills, compare quantities, and make products.
– Attitude:
+ Have a sense of connection and explanation of actual mechanisms and phenomena;
+ Have a sense of taking care of your health and that of the community;
+ Have an understanding of hygiene and prevent ear diseases.
– Competence development:
+ Self-study competence: Read and analyze documents to solve problems;
+ Cooperation competence: Cooperate with friends in the group to conduct experiments and
build models;
+ Problem-solving competence: Identify problems in practice and find solutions.
Step 5. Develop the content of activities and design lesson plan of the topic
Teacher needs to combine teaching forms of capacity development such as integrated
teaching, project teaching, problem-solving teaching, etc. Assessing the level of learners’
knowledge acquisition is learning products. In this step, the teacher needs to be clearly orient
the learners to the products that need to be performed with the same specific evaluation criteria.
As a result, learners can orient the process of creating products and the quality of products.
In this step, teachers need to design learning activities for learners based on content and
teaching objectives. The assignment of tasks should pay attention to the orientation of capacity
development for learners.
The theme “Hearing organ” includes two main STEAM activities:
– Activity 1: Fun experiments on sound
+ Experiment 1: Connect two ears with a cannula, no difference was found between the
sounds received in both ears when tapping in the middle of the tube. When typing at the
deviation point to either ear, you will notice a distinctly different audible sound.
+ Experiment 2. Place a bowl of water on top of a speaker, turn on the speaker at various
levels to see the movement of the water in the bowl. Colored water can be added to the
experiment for a more beautiful phenomenon.
+ Experiment 3: Make a phone from a paper cup. Speak at both ends and listen to the sound.
– Activity 2: Make a model of the human ears
+ Make a model of a human ear from recycled items.
Step 6. Assess the relevance of the topic
Teacher needs to evaluate topics based on aspects such as time relevance; satisfaction level
of the student; students’ interest; feasibility level with facilities, etc.
4. STEAM topics in Biology subject
Based on the Biology 8 curriculum, textbook content, and the topic design process above,
our research has suggested some of the following STEAM topics (see Table 1):
Table 1. Some STEAM topics in Biology 8 curriculum (Authors’ compilation)
Practical problems to
STEAM knowledge to solve problems STEAM activities
be solved
Topic 1. Understanding the cell – The structural and functional unit of life
A house is made of – Biology: Match between cell structure and function; Concept of tissues, – Observe the structure of
small bricks, so what some main types of tissues. cells and tissues under
are our bodies made of? – Chemistry: The basic chemical components of cells. the microscope.
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be solved
– Mathematics: Use the unit of length measurement and calculate the – Fabrication and
appropriate size to design and manufacture the model. presentation of cell
– Technology: Manipulate microscopy to observe the structure of cells and models.
tissues; Design, assemble, and present the cell structure model.
– Art: The size of the nucleus and the organelles in the cell have a
correspondence and harmony; Matching color.
Encourage students’ creativity when making models with different materials
and methods.
Topic 2. Exploring the motor system
What parts and organs – Biology: The importance of the locomotors system for life; Developmental – Experiment to learn the
help people to stand process and characteristic properties of the human skeleton. composition and
and move? How to – Chemistry: Composition and physicochemical properties of bone. properties of bones.
keep the motor system – Physics: Force, dynamometer. – Experiment to
safe? – Mathematics: The relationship between the magnitude of the force with determine the strength of
factors such as mass, the point of placing the force, etc.; Use the unit of frog bones
length and calculate the appropriate size to make the product.
– Technology: Perform some experiments related to bone properties; Perform
bandages for people with broken bones; Design and manufacture simple
dynamometer.
– Art: The dynamometer model has the proportions corresponding to the
accurate model and ensures the aesthetic requirements.
Models and experiments help students deepen their understanding of the
motor system and become more conscious of protecting the motor system.
Topic 3. Blood and principles of blood transfusion
Why is it important to – Biology: Coagulation phenomenon, meaning, and application; Principles of – Fabrication of blood
be very careful when blood transfusion ensure safety; The process of circulation and transportation transfusion models.
transferring blood to of blood in the body; Self-determination of blood group. – Blood group test.
receive the correct – Technology: Design and assemble blood transfusion models; Perform blood
blood type and avoid group testing.
blood-borne diseases? – Mathematics: Measurement and calculation to design a blood transfusion
model.
– Art: Use appropriate colors to show the aesthetics of the products.
Emphasize human factors in blood group determination and blood
transfusion.
Topic 4. Understanding the respiratory system
The daily exchange of – Biology: Meaning of the respiratory process; General understanding of the – Lung capacity test.
air between the body respiratory system (structure, breathing movements, coordination of – Experiment to simulate
and the surrounding breathing muscles, deep breathing, regular breathing, gas exchange the harmful effects of
environment is done mechanism, respiratory hygiene, etc.); Lung capacity during deep breathing; tobacco.
through which organ Learn about the harmful effects of smoking.
system? – Chemistry: The concentration of O2 and CO2 in the blood; Chemical
The pollution level of composition of tobacco.
cities is increasing, so – Mathematics: Make a chart and state the relationship between lung
how should we capacity of people who regularly exercise and those of ordinary people; Use
maintain respiratory units of mass, volume, length, etc.
hygiene and protect – Technology: Experiment on harmful effects of tobacco, experiment to
health? measure lung capacity; Fabrication of lung models from recycled materials.
– Art: The respiratory system model has shapes and colors that ensure
accuracy, similar to the prototype.
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be solved
Topic 5. Biocatalysts (Enzymes)
To speed up reactions, – Biology: General concept of enzymes; Learn about enzymes in saliva; Factors – Experiment on the effect
we need catalysts. What affecting enzyme activity. of enzymes in saliva.
are the agents that help – Mathematics: Make a comparison chart of enzyme activity under different – Design a chart to
catalyze complex conditions; Use units of mass, volume, length, etc. compare enzyme activity
biochemical reactions in – Chemistry: Use units of measurement of concentration. under different conditions
an organism? – Technology: Experiment on factors affecting enzyme activity; Experiment on the (temperature,
effect of enzymes in saliva. concentration, pH, etc.).
– Art: The chart is drawn accurately with the right colors, easy to distinguish.
Clarify the role of the respiratory system in the body and contribute to
preventing smoking, which is harmful to the respiratory system.
Topic 6. Vitamins for our body
– Biology: How to establish a diet of sufficient quality and quantity; Certain – Experimental extraction
How should we build a vitamins and minerals are needed by the body. of carotenoids in plants.
quality diet to avoid – Chemistry: Formula and chemical composition of some vitamins and – Prepare a nutritious
obesity and mineral salts. diet plan.
malnutrition? How – Mathematics: Use measurement quantities and calculate reasonable portions. – Practice being a chef.
should we cook to keep – Technology: Carotenoid extraction experiment; The food processing process
the maximum ensures the nutritional content of the food.
nutritional value of – Art: Ensure color and form when decorating dishes.
food? Understand the role of biological catalysts and have a suitable lifestyle to promote
the role of biological catalysts in the body.
Topic 7. Understanding the structure and function of the excretory system
– Biology: Structure and role of the kidney; Mechanism of action of urinary – Design, manufacture,
excretion. model excretory system
What is the role of the – Mathematics: Use the unit of length measurement and calculate the – Make a statistical chart
excretory system in the appropriate size to make products. of diseases related to the
body? How should we – Technology: Make models of the excretory system from simple items; Make excretory system
keep the excretory reports and presentations about products.
system healthy? – Art: Models and diagrams ensure aesthetics.
Understand the role of each type of food in the body and have an appropriate
diet.
Topic 8. Skin hygiene
Polluted environment, – Biology: Structure and function of the skin; Skin hygiene; Vitamin and – Make handmade
improper diet, and mineral content of some plants. sanitizer
activities lead to an – Mathematics: Calculate the appropriate ratio between ingredients when – Make a mask from
increase in skin making masks, making antiseptic water; nature that is safe for the
diseases. So how do – Technology: The process of making masks, lotions, and natural beauty face.
you keep your skin products that are safe for facial skin; Handmade hand sanitizer making process.
clean? – Art: The color of the product attracts users.
Understand the structure and function of the excretory system helps students
have a healthy lifestyle and protect the excretory system.
Topic 9. Hearing organ
Where do the sounds – Biology: Structure and function of receiving sound waves of the ear; How to – Fun experiment on
we hear come from? prevent diseases and diseases of the ear. sound.
Why do we hear those – Physics: Human hearing threshold; Sound sources. – Making a model of the
sounds? – Mathematics: Use units of measurement and calculate appropriate human ear.
proportions and sizes when making products.
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be solved
– Technology: Design the human ear model; Perform some scientific
experiments on the properties of sound.
– Art: Design models to ensure standard proportions, harmonious colors.
Orient students in protecting the skin from environmental agents.
Topic 10. Reflex arc – Brain
How can we simulate – Biology: The role and significance of the nervous system for life; Structure – Manufacturing reflex arc
parts of the brain in the and relationship between the parts of the brain (cerebellum, brainstem, model.
most understandable medial brain); Concept of reflexes and reflex arcs. – Designing models of brain
way? – Mathematics: Use units of measurement and calculate appropriate structure.
proportions and sizes when making products.
– Technology: Manufacture hat model to simulate brain structure;
Manufacture reflex arc model.
– Art: The brain and reflex arc model are in the right color and size.
Contribute to solving problems for people with hearing impairments.
Topic 11. Hormones and metabolism regulation
– Biology: The concept of hormones and the role of hormones; Endocrine and – Fabrication of working
exocrine glands and their combination. models of endocrine
– Chemistry: The chemical composition of hormones. glands.
How do hormones in – Technology: Make models of endocrine glands; Build a simple hormone – Creating a simple
the body work? model based on chemical composition. hormone model.
– Art: Model of endocrine glands and hormones ensure aesthetics.
Understand about the nervous system to have a suitable lifestyle, and do no
harm to the nervous system.
Topic 12. Sex education and reproductive health
What does – Biology: The basis of safe contraceptive methods; Sex education and age – Learn some common
reproductive health psychology. methods of contraception.
mean in life? – Technology: Some methods of safe contraception; Use information – Use information
technology to develop reports and presentations on topics. technology to develop
– Mathematics: Making a statistical table of diseases affecting reproductive propaganda products
health. against sexually
– Art: Propaganda products with beautiful pictures to attract readers. transmitted diseases.
Promote students’ creativity when creating models of subjects. – Make a list of diseases
affecting reproductive
health.
5. Development of problem-solving competency through teaching STEAM topics in

Biology subject
STEAM education prepares students for life, regardless of the job they choose to pursue.
These disciplines teach students how to think critically and solve the problem of what
competency that they may apply throughout their lives to help them get through difficult times
and seize opportunities as they arise. Based on the structure of problem-solving competency in
the 2018 General Education Curriculum (MOET, 2018), here we suggest a way to evaluate
problem-solving competency in learning STEM topic in Biology subject at middle school level
with six component skills (Identify the new problem, Define and analyze the problem, Generate
possible solutions, Select solution, Plan and implement the solution, Independent thinking) and
their particular expression. Each skill is evaluated in three levels from Weak to Excellent (see
Table 2).
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Table 2: Component skills of problem – solving competency through teaching STEAM topics
Skills Expression
Identify the new Identify and clarify new information and ideas on practical problems; analyze and summarize relevant information
problem from a variety of sources.
Define and analyze Analyze the situations, identify and address practical problems arising in situations and categorize into STEAM fields
the problem (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics).
Generate possible Find new and positive elements in the opinions of others; form ideas based on given information sources; propose
solutions solutions to improve or replace solutions that are no longer suitable; compare and comment on the proposed
solutions with a consideration of integration of humanities, language arts, dance, drama, music, visual arts, design
and new media, etc.
Select a solution Identify and learn information related to the problem; propose a solution to the problem that is composed of STEM
fields elements partially or completely and Art element.
Plan and – Make an activity plan with appropriate objectives, content and form of activities.
implement the – Know how to assign appropriate tasks to members participating in activities.
solution – Evaluate the suitability or non-conformity of the plan, solution and the implementation of the plan and solution.
Independent Know how to ask different questions about an object, phenomenon, or problem of STEAM – related problems; listen
thinking attentively and receive information and ideas with consideration and selection; pay attention to the evidence when
recognizing and evaluating things and phenomena; assess problems and situations from different perspectives.
For example, in the topic of “Hearing Organ” in Biology lesson, we could use the table of
component skills and their expression below to examine problem-solving competency of 8th
grade students (see Table 3).
Table 3: Component skills of problem – solving competency through teaching “Hearing Organ”
topics in Biology grade 8 (Authors’ compilation)
Skills Expression
Identify the new problem Identify and clarify the information that is associated with structure, function and ear problems (diseases)
from the textbook, internet and other sources.
Define and analyze the Analyze the situations, identify and address practical problems arising in situations and categorize into
problem STEAM fields (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics).
Analyze the situations, identify and address the problems relating to the human ears as:
– Science:
+ The structure of the ears that is suitable for the function of receiving the stimulus of sound waves.
+ Prevention of diseases of the ears.
+ Hearing threshold of the human ears.
+ The source of the sound.
– Technology:
+ Do some science experiments on sound.
– Engineering:
+ Make a model of the human ears using some life-familiar materials.
– Art:
+ Propose as many as possible models of human ears using life-familiar materials.
+ Decorate a human ear model with multiple colors, shape, activities, sounds, etc.
– Mathematics:
+ Calculate scale to build models of human ears.
Generate possible Based on given information of analyzed problems relating to human ears, propose solutions to make a model
solutions that simulate the shape and function of human ears with the integration of music, visual art and media.
Select a solution Among possible solutions, pick the solution that has the highest feasibility to build a human ear model.
Plan and implement the – Make an activity plan with appropriate objectives, content and form of activities.
solution – Know how to assign appropriate tasks to members participating in activities.
– Evaluate the suitability or non-conformity of the plan, solution and the implementation of the plan and
solution.
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Skills Expression
Independent thinking Ask different questions about an object, phenomenon, or problem of human ears models; listen attentively
and receive information and ideas with consideration and selection from other students groups; pay
attention to the evidence when recognizing and evaluating things and phenomena; assess problems and
situations from different perspectives of human ear models.
CONCLUSION
STEAM education is not a new concept. People like Leonardo Da Vinci have demonstrated
the value of combining science and art in his discoveries. STEAM is integration of STEM
principles with the arts for a more holistic understanding of our world. STEAM topics in
Biology subject would help students enhance their critical thinking skills and recognize the
intersection of art, science, technology, engineering, and math to explore new and creative ways
of problem – solving. It is a new development of teaching theory and practice towards training
people with skills of the 21st century: to be dynamic, discover and solve creatively and
effectively practical problems, adapt to the constantly changing life of the new era. These broad
skills are essential for developing a future-ready workforce that recognizes the value of “what
if” scenarios for tackling real-world challenges.
While STEAM programs may integrate problem-based learning, the design process, or
hands-on activities, teachers frequently ignore essential components of arts education such as
critique, self-expression, and meaning communication. As such important features of arts
education, it is critical to include these elements of arts education in STEAM education to
effectively enhance student learning. For our further study, we would clearly define the
structure (component skills, development level) as well as expected developmental effects on
problem solving competency in teaching and learning Biology grade 8. Furthermore, we would
also implement an experiment to see if the designed STEAM topics with obvious Arts element
were effective in improving 8th graders’ problem-solving skills.
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Sư phạm Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh.
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About the authors

– Dr. Le Thi Phuong is a Director of the Center for Anthropology and Mind Development
(CAMD), University of Education, Vietnam National University, Hanoi. She is currently a
senior lecturer at the Faculty of Pedagogy, University of Education. She earned a Ph.D. in
Biology from Hanoi National University of Education and pursues research directions on the
education science, environment, ecology and environmental education, sustainable development
in schools, etc. She has also published 20 reference books and textbooks for students and has
more than 40 domestic and international scientific papers, including papers related to the field
of education science, ecology, and environment.
– MSc Do Thuy Linh is a PhD Candidate at Hanoi National University of Education,
Vietnam. She got her Bachelor degree in Biology Education at VNU University of Education,
Hanoi, and Master degree in Biotechnology at Korea University. She got a full scholarship from
Pony Chung Foundation which belongs to Hyundai Corporation to study her Master program in
Korea. She is interested in Biology education, especially STEM, competence-based teaching
and learning, teaching Genetics, education for sustainable development, etc. She has been a
former lecturer at Faculty of Pedagogy, University of Education, Vietnam National University,
Hanoi, Vietnam.
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APPLYING BLENDED LEARNING MODEL

IN TEACHING BIOLOGY GRADE 12 FOR IMPROVING
STUDENT’S SELF-STUDY COMPETENCE
Nguyen Thi Thuy Quynh1, Nguyen Hoang Trang1, Le Thi Quy2
Abstract: Model Blended Learning (BL) is a combination of online teaching models (e-learning)
with face-to-face teaching (F2F). With the strong support of digital technology tools and
solutions, BL is multi-modal, multi-format, and multi-tool teaching that helps students
experience in various learning environments, promotes the students’ activeness and initiative as
well as improve self – study ability. Options in the organization of blended teaching, as well as
analysis and discussion of the characteristics of levels and phases in blended teaching, have been
proposed. This study has proposed a 5-step process of applying BL in teaching Biology using
Microsoft office 365 software. An illustrative example in teaching Biology 12 using the Microsoft
office 365 software is conducted. The pedagogical experiments were carried out with 340
students at Phan Huy Chu – Dong Da and Nguyen Gia Thieu High School. The research results
have confirmed the effectiveness and feasibility of integrated teaching, contributing to improving
the quality of biology teaching as well as developing student’s self-study competence.
Keywords: blended learning, biology 12, self-study competence, Microsoft Office 365
INTRODUCTION
Blended learning (BL) is one of the modern teaching models and has been proven effective
in many countries around the world. BL can meet the teaching requirements by combining
e-learning with traditional learning methods (face to face, F2F). BL helps orient students to use
information technology for the learning process and to create an attractive learning environment
that supports learning. In recent years, BL has dominated teaching at training institutions
worldwide. However, in Vietnam, there is no consensus on how to combine e-learning and F2F.
Research results of Owston & York (2018) show the necessary in determining the correlation e-
learning and F2F in BL. The article focuses on proposing a number of BL options based on the
flipped classroom model, in which learning activities such as discussion, knowledge
consolidation, group cooperation to solve problems, and self-study through online applications
or learning materials provided by teachers (Gariou-Papalexiou et al., 2017). This research
proposed the 5 steps process for applying BL in teaching Biology 12 using Microsoft Office 365
software. These are: (1) Determining the aim, (2) Developing a teaching plan, (3) Designing
tools, (4) Implementation B, and (5) Testing, evaluation, and improvement. The steps are
concretized in the illustrative examples that support teachers to understand and apply in the
design of BL teaching activities. In order to test the effectiveness and feasibility of blended
learning that contributes to improve the quality of teaching biology as well as improve students’
self-study competence, the authors conducted a pedagogical experiment with 340 grade-12
students of Phan Huy Chu and Nguyen Gia Thieu high schools.
 Corresponding Author: Nguyen Thi Thuy Quynh; E-mail Address: quynhntt-bio@vnu.edu.vn

1 VNU – University of Education
2 Yen Hoa High school
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CONTENT
1. Blended learning model
1.1. Concept
Blended learning (BL) model is essentially the integration of information technology
application into the teaching and management process of a classroom (Garrison & Kanuka, 2004).
According to Singh et al., BL is a combination of information technology and traditional
learning media to personalize learning at a suitable time to get the highest learning efficiency.
Many studies have suggested that BL is a blend of e-learning and face-to-face (F2F) in which
learners control their learning time (Reay, 2001; Rooney, 2003). BL is a combination of e-
learning teaching and traditional teaching, between online teaching and face-to-face, that
combined with the use of technology (media), a combination of different learning spaces (Oliver
& Trigwell, 2005). This form has successfully met the four basic requirements of active teaching,
such as teaching through student activities, self-study based teaching, enhancing collaborative
learning, combining the teacher’s assessment with student’s self-assessment.
According to Singh (2003), BL has three approaches to the learning process: face-to-face
teaching (F2F), online learning (e-learning), and self-learning. Face-to-face teaching has
characteristics such as direct interaction, performing learning tasks related. Meanwhile, e-
learning is characterized by virtual classrooms, live broadcast of lectures and notification of
learning tasks. Therefore, e-learning brings flexibility, initiative in learning and responding in
special situations. The form of BL organization depends on the learning needs of learners,
educational goals of training institutions, infrastructure, and technology platforms.
1.2. The current situation of blended learning in biology at high schools
We have conducted surveys from 102 biology teachers in 38 high schools in the northern
regions, in which we are especially interested in biology teachers in Hanoi. The survey has been
designed on the Microsoft form system. The investigation results indicated that:
(I) Most teachers appreciate the importance of designing and applying blended learning
model in teaching biology (Figure 1a).
(II) Teachers already know the features and utilizing the Microsoft Office 365 system and
online tools. This proves that the awareness of the majority of teachers has updated the
inevitable trend of the new era (Figure 1b).
(III) However, there are some free online interactive tools that teachers have not yet
accessed and used, such as: Flipgrid, Weebly, ThingLink, DrawChat, Loom.
The results of the student survey showed that 100% of students are interested and very
eager to apply modern teaching tools in the learning process.
Figure 1. Teachers’ awareness of the importance

(a) and proficiency of online tools (b) used in blended learning
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1.3. Plans to organize blended learning

Alammary et al. (2014), Oliver & Trigwell (2005) also recommended that BL has three
levels as below:
(i) Level 1. The teachers play a leading role and are active in designing teaching activities
under the form of integrating the information technology application activities. IT application
activities can be discussions on forums when performing group learning tasks, delivery of study
materials in e-learning form, websites for students to learn and practice on their own at home,
and performing learning tasks, etc. This requires teachers to strengthen their exploratory and
creative learning tasks.
(ii) Level 2. Teachers need to redesign and replace some F2F activities with e-learning
activities. This requires teachers to determine which traditional teaching activities are suitable
for e-learning in addition to flexibly combining different teaching methods such as flipped
classroom or project teaching. In particular, practical activities, practical experiences or
learning-oriented activities such as instructions, reports, and question-answering will be suitable
for F2F teaching. Activities that provide learning information, related to the structure, content of
lessons or tests and assessments will be suitable for e-learning teaching.
(iii) Level 3. BL is implemented in the most systematic and complete way. The design of
the BL course needs to follow the output standards and expected learning outcomes of the
learners. To design a course at level 3, the course needs to be newly designed from the outset
according to the BL. In order to design an effective BL course, teachers need to have solid
professional experience and skills in combining online teaching tools as well as choosing the
right online activities to ensure that course output standards.
Moskal et al. (2013) indicated that a BL model is not the most effective, can be not applied
in all cases, and does not have enough practical basis for the optimal ratio between e-learning
and F2F. Horn et al. (2014) showed 6 models for organizing BL including: i) face – to – face
driver, ii) rotation, iii) flex, iv) online lab, v) self – blend, vi) online driver. It is very important
to choose and use a combination of different teaching methods and based on the selection of
levels appropriate to the content of knowledge in BL. Active teaching methods can be used in
BL such as: flipped classroom, station-based teaching, project-based teaching, small-group
teaching, etc. (Nguyen et al., 2020). In this study, we found that the two most appropriate
models of BL in teaching biology are the project-based BL and flipped classroom model.
– Project-Based Blended Learning: This is a student-centered teaching model, developing
knowledge and skills through learning tasks, encouraging students to explore and realize what
they have learned in the process of implementing and creating their own products. Overview of
the project implementation steps in BL are proposed in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Project teaching – based blended learning model

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– Flipped classroom: Students self-learn knowledge through learning tasks provided by

teachers through digital platforms. In the classroom, students participate in discussions,
problem-solving and practical learning activities, in which the teacher acts as a mentor. After
school, students continue to master and learn knowledge through online applications. Therefore,
this is a teaching form suitable for BL (Figure 3).
Figure 3. Flipped classroom – based blended learning model

2. Self-study ability
2.1. Concept
Many authors have introduced the concept of self-study competence. Competence is the
ability to successfully and responsibly perform tasks, solve problems in defined or changed
situations that base on the platform for synthesis of knowledge and skills (Bern & Nguyen, 2016).
According to the authors Nguyen & Dao (2019), “Capability is the ability to master systems of
knowledge, skills, attitudes, and operate (connect) them logically into the successful performance
of tasks or effectively to solve life’s problems”. Self-study is defined as brainstorming, thinking,
using intellectual abilities (observing, comparing, analyzing, synthesizing, etc.), and even
muscles (when have to use tools) with their own qualities such as motivations, feelings, human
outlooks on the world (such as honesty, perseverance, patience, passion for science, etc.)
to occupy a certain field of human knowledge (Nguyen, 2002). Dang (2012) believes that
self-study is an individual learning strategy, learners decide and voluntarily conduct learning,
including purpose, content, method, means, environment and learning conditions. In summary,
competence and self-study are two concepts mentioned very early, often used in the sense of the
learner’s ability to think and create, and the learner to be self-disciplined and active in learning
activities. Self-study capacity is a concept used with the meaning of the ability to think and
create for learners, actively carry out their learning activities in order to take knowledge for
themselves. Similar to lifelong education, self-study capacity has an important role as well as
the key to entering the 21st century in the context of the Industrial Revolution 4.0 with an
internet – based online learning platform (Le & Phan, 2020).
Biology is an experimental subject, in parallel with the process of acquiring and researching
the theoretical basis, learners also must directly observe or do visual experiments that they are
approaching in order to detect and explain phenomena, nature and reaffirm the scientific basis.
Self-study ability in biology that can be understood as the ability to research biology materials
to affect the basic elements of a biology subject. Students identify learning goals, make study
plans and individual efforts to achieve them. Students know how to search and use biology
materials to solve problems in biology. At the same time, students can self-check and – adjust
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their learning activities to suit the requirements of the biology subject and general requirements
of education.
2.2. Assessment scale of self-study competence
Self-study competence is a mandatory component of self-directed competence in the 2018
General Education Program of the Ministry of Education and Training, Vietnam. Based on the
research of authors Mai & Phan (2020), we have researched and built the assessment scale for
evaluating a student’s self-study ability through teaching Biology 12. The scale consists of 4
levels from 1-4: level 1 (0-25%), level 2 (26-50%), level 3 (51-75%), level 4 (76-100%); with 5
specific performance criteria are: (1) Identify the lesson objectives; (2) Orientation of activities
to accomplish the lesson objectives; (3) Active learning on Microsoft Office 365 system with a
personal account; (4) Identify unreached goals and have the plan for adjustment; (5) Learn from
experience and adjust the way of learning.
3. Design blended learning process with Microsoft Office 365 tool
3.1. Introducing Microsoft Office 365 tool
Microsoft Office 365 is a powerful software designed for teachers and students to access
anytime, anywhere from common devices. This software has applications such as an effective
online teaching support platform, lesson design, management of learning materials and
classroom management, etc. (Figure 4). The use of Microsoft Office 365 and online tools in the
BL model is reasonable and necessary because it has basic and essential functions.
In addition, Microsoft Office 365 has the following utilities: Not limited by space and time;
Attractiveness; Ease of access; Up-to-date calculation; Available collaborative learning;
Examination and evaluation with high accuracy and systematics; Resource sharing; for students;
Create and join multiple classes simultaneously; Synchronization with Microsoft Drive;
Reminder about submission deadlines; Synthesize students’ scores by themselves; Invite other
teachers to participate in classroom management.
Figure 4. Microsoft Office 365 tools

3.2. Designing blended learning teaching process

In order to maximize the qualities and self-study capacity of students, we have designed a
model consisting of 5 stages of applying the BL model for developing students’ self-study ability
(Figure 5). The steps are illustrated in detail below.
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Figure 5. Process of blended learning teaching

Step 1. Determine the lesson goals
This is a very important first step when implementing the BL model. It is also the basis to
confirm the necessity and appropriateness of applying BL model to knowledge content, help
learners overcome current difficulties, and create opportunities to develop skills and abilities
and subject-specific competence. Determining the lesson objectives include knowledge, skills,
attitudes and competencies. These requirements closely follow the requirements of the textbook.
Step 2. Develop a teaching plan
During the study of the Biology 12 program, we built and designed 12 topics. In this article,
we propose an example of BL with the topic “Populations and communities”. The learning
process is presented as follows:
Face to face E-learning
40% 60%
Topic
Organize discussion and select Groups agree to choose Survey student’s
selection Conduct the survey
topic and project names topics and projects needs
Construction 30% 70%
and Answer support Interact with each other or with
implement Orientation content, main tasks online (Team, teacher to make a project that
plan and requirements of each task learning website carried out by online tools (sway,
system) team, email, learning website, etc.)
20% 80%
Perform the
Support, evaluate Read documents, do exercises, share
plan Support students Create product
students information, create product
50% 50%
Evaluation
Feedback detail on
and Evaluate students’ products
Present products individual or group Self-assess products
Feedback based on established criteria
activities
Step 3. Design tools
According to this lesson’s content, we used the integrated system of Team tools, Forms,
Flipgrid and Clicker tools to organize teaching.
Step 4. Implement deployment
A. E-learning activities
Stage 1. Organizing for students to study at home
Activity 1. Students complete the task of the previous lesson, teachers supply the test in the
form of multiple choice or essay on Microsoft Office 365 (Flipgrid or Team or Forms...):
https://flipgrid.com/fbc177b8.
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Ask students to carefully study the required instructions (Figure 6). Click on the (+) sign to
make a presentation video directly on the app/web and submit it. Students do exercises on the
form according to the built-in link on the web Flipgrid.
Figure 6. Guide students to study on Microsoft Office 365 system

Activity 2. Students can know the results immediately after completing the interaction on
the system. Students can record content that they do not understand, either ask teachers when
they come to class or can post questions on Microsoft Office 365.
Based on specific learning tasks, teachers divide into small groups in accordance with the
students’ abilities and interests. Students actively choose suitable groups and participate, while
teachers will support groups. In particular, with the provided of the integrated tool system in
Microsoft Office 365, students can improve their quality and capacity.
B. Activities in class
Activity 1. Organize for students to self-assess themselves in the self-study process.
Besides, the teachers help students to re-establish quality learning goals. Teachers announce the
results of students on the Microsoft Office 365 system and comment on the student’s strengths
and weaknesses and things to learn.
Activity 2. Use the method of pair discussion/group discussion, combined online tools with
active teaching methods under the guidance of teachers.
Activity 3. After participating in classroom learning activities, the teachers summarize
important knowledge in the lesson, at the same time assign homework for students. Teachers
monitor, support and accompany students on online interactive resources.
Step 5. Test – Improve – Complete
In the process of learning orientation, based on content according to learners’ needs and
career orientations, teachers are conscious of the ultimate teaching goal for improving the
student’s strengths and skills, as well as their learning efficiency.
4. Pedagogical experience
The pedagogical experiment was carried out at Phan Huy Chu – Dong Da and Nguyen Gia
Thieu high schools, with 340 students in grade 12 as shown in the diagram in Figure 7. The
study was conducted in parallel with the form of teaching organization as well as test questions
to ensure objectivity when conducting research for the experimental and control groups.
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Figure 7. Diagram of pedagogical experiment (Authors’ compilation)
4.1. Quantitative analysis

Data of student scores were statistically processed using SPSS 20.0 software. The results
showed that the frequency and mean scores of the tests were significantly different between the
experimental and the control groups. In the experimental group, the good score in tests was
higher than the weak and medium scores (Figure 8). The mode value and the mean of the
experimental class are higher than that of the control class, which proves that the teaching-
learning efficiency in the experimental class is better than in the control class, students in the
experimental class master and self-study ability is better than in the control class. This
result demonstrated that using the BL model in teaching improves the education quality in
experimental classes. To prove whether the results of the tests were random or due to the actual
effect of the experiment, pairwise t-test was used in this research. The T-test results in a p-value
smaller than the comparison value of 0.05. This means that the average value of the
experimental class and the control class is significantly and significantly different. BL is
becoming an inevitable trend in the teaching context of the 21st century. Along with the
development of educational technology, BL has been making an important contribution towards
the goal of forming and developing quality competence for learners. At the same time, as a
“technology process” of future education, BL is seen as a lifelong learning opportunity for
everyone (Nguyen et al., 2020). The experimental results of the application of the Microsoft
office 365 software has improved the effectiveness of teaching biology according to
the BL model that towards developing quality and competence, and personalizing learners.
Figure 8. Test score frequency distribution (Authors’ compilation)

Table 1. Comparison statistical parameters of control and experiment classes
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Parameters Control class Experimental class

N 172 168
Mode 6 7
Mean 6,5 7,5
SE 6,23 7,51
SD 1,31 1,23
T– test 0,003
4.2. Qualitative analysis
Observing results of classes applied with Microsoft Office 365 system and online tools
under the BL model indicated that most students interact well, confident and excited (Figure 9).
In addition, with the support tools of Microsoft Office 365, students can self-assess themselves.
The survey results show that 91.6% of students in the experimental classesare very interested in
learning by BL method with online applications (Figure 10). The self-study ability of students in
the EC before and after conducting the pedagogical experiment was analyzed and evaluated
(Table 2). The results show that the development of cognitive ability of students has a
significant change, especially expressions 1 and 2. That affirms the effectiveness and feasibility
of using the Microsoft Office 365 system and online tools under the combined teaching model
in developing self-study capacity for students at Phan Huy Chu – Dong Da and Nguyen Gia
Thieu high schools.
Figure 9. Some activities in the experimental classroom (Authors’ compilation)
Figure 10. Student’s assessment of the effectiveness of online tools (Authors’ compilation)
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Table 2. Evaluation of self-study ability of students in experiment class
Average
Scale Expression
Before experiment After experiment
1 Identify lesson objectives 1,04 2,04
2 Orientation of activities to accomplish the lesson objectives 1,47 1,91
3 Active learning on Microsoft Office 365 system with personal account 2,3 2,4
4 Identify unreached goals and have the plan for adjustment 1,36 1,81
5 Learn from experience and adjust the way of learning 1,18 1,46
Average 1,47 1,924
P (T-Test) 0,04
Infulence level (ES) 0,79
CONCLUSION
The blended learning model combined with the support of Microsoft Office 365 software
and online tools promise to open up flexible, active and effective learning opportunities for
students. The general principle of this model is that students will explore lesson content at home
by themselves through the learning resource that designed and uploaded on Microsoft Office
365 by the teacher. In the classroom, students will interact with the teacher and other students to
promote their creative thinking abilities, critical thinking abilities, problem-solving abilities.
The accompaniment interaction with students, especially for students in grade 12, the more we
realize the value of BL, the more useful for both teachers and students. Research results also
indicated that the BL support students to have positive attitudes towards the subject, have more
interest in learning materials, more self-study competence such as students actively receiving
knowledge and performing the tasks proposed by the teacher.
Although teachers have to spend more effort and time in designing BL lessons, however,
this will be a completely appropriate and effective teaching model in today’s digital age.
Therefore, this study proposes options to improve the quality of blended learning as below:
– Promote the topic teaching in the direction of developing learners’ capacity. Create long-
term learning resources for students and colleagues in order to improve the quality of education.
– Effectively exploit and use the Microsoft Office 365 tools such as Powerpoint, Sway,
Team, Form, etc. to improve the quality of teaching and learning in high schools.
– Support to students to build learning materials, summarize knowledge with mind maps.
REFERENCES
1. Alammary, A., Sheard, J., & Carbone, A. (2014). Blended learning in higher education:
Three different design approaches. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 30(4),
440-454.
2. Bernd, Meier, Nguyen, Van Cuong (2016). Lý luận dạy học hiện đại: Cơ sở đổi mới mục
tiêu, nội dung và phương pháp dạy học (Modern teaching theory, basis for innovation in
teaching objectives, content and methods). NXB Đại học Sư phạm, Hà Nội (University of
Education Publisher).
3. Dang, Thanh Hung (2012). Nature and conditions of self-study. Journal of Education
Science, 78, 4-7.
4. Garıou-papalexıou, A., Papadakıs, S., Manousou, E. (2017). Implementing A Flipped
Classroom: A Case Study of Biology Teaching in A Greek High School. Turkish Online
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Journal of Distance Education, 18(3) , 47-65.

5. Garrison, D.R., & Kanuka, H. (2004). Blended learning: Uncovering its transformative
potential in higher education. Internet and Higher Education, 7(2), 95-105.
6. Horn M.B., Staker H. (2014). Blended: Using disruptive innivation to improve schools,
Jossey – Bass.
7. Le, Dinh Trung, Phan, Thi Thanh Hoi (2020). Teaching in the direction of forming and
developing learners’ capacity in high schools. University of Education Publisher.
8. Mai, Xuan Dao, Phan, Dong Chau Thuy (2020). Building and using e-learning materials
based on flipped classroom to develop the self-study ability for high school students in Tan
Uyen, Binh Duong province. Ho Chi Minh City university of education journal of science,
17(8), 1421-1429.
9. Moskal P., Dziuban C., Hartman J. (2013). Blended learning: A dangerous idea?
The Internet and Higher Education, 18, 15-23.
10. Nguyen, Canh Toan (2002). Learning and teaching how to learn, University of Education
Publisher.
11. Nguyen, Cong Khanh, Dao, Thi Oanh (2019). Curriculum testing and assessment in
education. University of Education Publisher.
12. Nguyen, Hoang Trang, Mai, Van Hung, Nguyen, Thi Thuy Quynh (2020). Potential of
Blended Learning at High Schools in Hanoi. VNU Journal of Science: Education Research,
36(2), 77-87.
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Digital Media, 2(1), 17-26.
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Does the proportion of time devoted to online activities matter? The Internet and Higher
15. Reay J. (2001). Blended learning: A fusion for the future. Knowledge Management Review,
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About the authors

– Dr. Nguyen Thi Thuy Quynh is lecture at University of Education – Vietnam National
University. She has more than 10 years of experience in teaching and research in the field of
education. She has over 30 publications in areas relating to biological education and teaching
innovation in higher education. She also chairs and participates in many valuable national and
international projects.
– Dr. Nguyen Hoang Trang is lecture at University of Education – Vietnam National
University. She has more than 4 years of experience in teaching and research in the field of
education with over 10 publications in areas relating to teaching innovation in higher education.
She is an expert in the field of research and application blended learning in teaching.
– MA. Le Thi Quy is currently a teacher at Yen Hoa high school in Ha noi, and also is a
graduate student at the University of Education. Mrs. Quy is passionate about researching and
applying technology tools in biology teaching at high school.
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PART 5: TEACHING SOCIAL SCIENCES AND LIVING SKILLS
PART 5
CHILD PSYCHOLOGY,
TEACHING SOCIAL SCIENCES
AND LIVING SKILLS
621
GOING BEYOND TEACHER-CENTEREDNESS

AND STUDENT-CENTEREDNESS: AN EXAMINATION AND PROPOSAL
Shihkuan Hsu*1 
Abstract: Debates about what teaching is and what it should be are never-ending. On one hand,
teaching is thought to be imparting knowledge, and the typical format is lecture; on the other,
teaching is thought to be coaching or guidance for students’ self-learning, and a typical format is
an inquiry or exploratory learning. While the lecture is often criticized for the teacher’s
dominance, inquiry cannot proceed without the teacher’s guidance and scaffolding. It is hard to
determine how much teacher talk there should be, and where teaching ends and where learning
begins. Furthermore, what criteria should be used to qualify a student-centered class has no clear
answer. Moreover, if the goal of teaching is student engagement and higher-level learning
outcomes, which format is better to achieve this goal? This study goes beyond the didactic
oppositional view of teacher-centeredness and student-centeredness. Using a literature review
and two case studies, the process of teaching is analyzed, and teachers’ consideration of students
is highlighted. The literature includes both modern literature and ancient Chinese literature such
as Record of Learning. The interview of two experienced high school teachers reflects on the idea
that teaching and learning are connected and not separated entities.
Keywords: teacher-student relationship, teaching formats, high school teachers, qualitative
studies, Records of Learning
INTRODUCTION
Recent reform in Taiwan advocated student-centered approach to teaching and learning
(Ministry of Education, 2014). The curriculum is proposed to cater to the needs of all
individuals and to develop talent in every student. To encourage students to become
spontaneous and motivated learners, the guidelines emphasize the importance for students to
take inititives in learning and inquiry. As part of the new curriculum, inquiry-based courses are
added to the list of required courses, espeically for science and social science areas. The
underlining assumption is that inquiry-based course format is more suitable to encourage
students’ active thinking and help them become motivated learners. This paper challenges
such assumptions by examining the problems in the dichotonmy of teacher-centerness and
student-centerness in teaching and learning.
CONTENT
1. Research background
1.1. The differentiation between teacher-centeredness and student-centeredness
The debate about what teaching is and what it should be has no clear answer (Krahenbuhl,
2016). Because of the explanatory power of constructivist perspectives, student-centered
approach has been advocated to encourage students to construct knowledge, make inquiries,
solve problems, and learn independently (Hannafin & Land, 2000). On the contrary, teacher-
centered format such as lectures or direct instruction has been regarded as traditional,
knowledge transmission and therefore to be discarded or moved away from (Wang, 2011).
Teacher-centered and student-centered are terms and concepts that have been widely used and
provided as a direction to chart reform efforts (Nair, 2019).
* Corresponding Author: Shihkuan Hsu; Email Address: skhsu@ntu.edu.tw

1 Center for Teacher Education, National Taiwan University
622
While such differentiation of teaching styles is convenient and useful at times, the
assumption that there is a separation between these two sides of teaching is still open for
discussion. The first assumption is that in teacher-centered formats, such as lectures or direct
instruction, teachers do not speak to the needs of the students. The main focus is to deliver the
content, and thus teachers are not student-centered. The second assumption is that in student-
centered formats, such as inquiry or problem-solving, the teachers’ role is not essential, the
activities are not directed by teachers, and lectures should be minimized. An examination of
these assumptions is not only theoretically important but also culturally essential, as for so many
teachers in Asian countries or Chinese-heritage cultures lectures are the main means of
instruction at schools (Cortazzi & Jin, 2001).
1.2. The differentiation of teaching and learning
The support of student-centeredness has a root in constructivism. Although direct
instruction does not have a clear theoretical root, it is a common instructional format. The
literature about effective instruction indicates that teacher-centered lecture formats are the most
efficient way to deliver the content (Morrison et al., 2019). In designing lectures, teachers need
to understand the curriculum goals, the core concepts of the content, and the level of students
(Orlich et al., 2012). Teachers adjust the lectures according to students’ situations. Lecture
formats provide flexibility for teachers to switch quickly from explaining concepts, giving
examples, referring to literature or material, raising questions, and adding stories that connect to
students’ experiences (Hsu, 2021).
While the lecture is often criticized as a dominant mode, inquiry cannot be used without the
teacher’s guidance and scaffolding (Klahr & Nigam, 2004). Studies have found that the lecture
or direct instruction component is still a very crucial part of the inquiry or exploratory activities
(Kirschner et al., 2006). In addition, designing inquiry-based activities requires selecting the
problems, devising the task, providing relevant literature, setting up the environment, examining
the results, revising the report. The teacher has a hand in the process at every step along the way
from designing, to supervising, and to solving students’ problems.
The above discussion raises questions about the differentiation between teaching and
learning. During the process of teaching, whether it is lecture or inquiry, it is hard to determine
how much teacher’s talk, direction, dominance, and control there should be, and where teaching
ends and where learning begins. The separation of teaching and learning seems to be artificial
and confusing. Yet, it may be helpful to examine the relationship between teaching and learning
from a different perspective.
1.3. Teaching and learning as connecting
The close connection between teacher and students has been noted in several areas of
inquiry. One of the notable topics is the teacher-student relationship. In the study of the learning
environment, for example, a positive teacher-student relationship has been seen influencing
students’ achievement, and such influences can be contributed to several theoretical
orientations, including social systems theory, attachment-based theory, self-determination
theory, and interpersonal theories (Wubbels et al., 2016). While the teacher-student relationship
is a helpful concept in understanding the emotional attachment or relatedness, the relationship
between teacher and students can easily include that of academic achievement.
In the study of science teacher education, for another example, when attending a
professional development activity, teachers can often immediately tell which part of the lessons
or material presented is suitable for their students (Fore, 2015). After professional development
activities, many of them would soon engage in lesson adjustment and adaptation to transform
the lesson or material into something their students can use (Debarger, 2017). The phenomenon
that teachers have rich knowledge about their students and are constantly adjusting the lessons
for them is worth more attention. While the importance of teachers obtaining sufficient content
623
knowledge and pedagogical knowledge has been acknowledged, how that knowledge is
manifested in the classroom, and not in quasi-experimental settings, is still under exploration.
Record of Learning, sometimes translated as Record on the Subject of Education, or
verbatim as Xueji, is an ancient Chinese writing about teaching, learning, and education. In
reviewing the Confucian conceptions of learning from Xueji, Tan (2015) proposed an idea of
“Teacher-Directed and Learner-Engaged” as an alternative framework to view the relationship
between teaching and learning, departing from the dichotomy of teacher-centeredness and
student-centeredness. In her proposal, Tan extracted three principles from Xueji: 1) The
principle of power relationship in which there is an interdependence and mutual respect
between the teacher and learner; 2) The principle of choice, where the learner is given increased
responsibility and accountability, and a sense of autonomy through the process of learning; and
3) The principle of doing, in which active learning and deep understanding are expected of the
learner, as the outcome of teaching and learning. These principles proposed by Tan indicated in
the “Teacher-Directed and Learner-Engaged” framework, there could be a relationship or
connection between teacher and students which were not sufficiently studied.
1.4. The proposal from the Record of Learning
It should be noted that in ancient Chinese characters, the character for “learning” is the
same as the character for “teaching”. Record of Learning, thus can also be considered as
Record of Teaching. Although Record of Learning was written about 2000 years ago, and the
author is unknown, its concepts and phrases are still very much alive today in Chinese cultural
heritage countries. For example, it uses uncut jade to exemplify the unlearned man, and
emphasizes the importance of learning as a way to make a person useful:
The jade uncut will not form a vessel for use; and if men do not learn, they do not know the
way (in which they should go). (Translation by Legge, 1861)
In another section, Record of Learning directly addresses the relationship between
teaching and learning. In the following prose, it compares learning to tasting, and
proposes that people are most likely to notice their own problems when they are
learning; and most likely to know how hard it is to learn when they are teaching. Once
teachers understand the difficulty of learning, they will study how to improve it, so in a
way they are learning. Once learners realize their own problems in learning, they will
reflect and make changes to their own way of doing things, so in a way they are
teaching. Teaching and learning enhance each other and thus are inseparable, and thus
can be viewed as one half to each other.
However fine the viands be, if one does not eat, he does not know their taste; however
perfect the course may be, if one does not learn it, he does not know its goodness. Therefore,
when he learns, one knows his own deficiencies; when he teaches, he knows the difficulties of
learning. After he knows his deficiencies, one can turn round and examine himself; after he
knows the difficulties, he can stimulate himself to ther effort. Hence it is said, ‘Teaching and
learning help each other;’ as it is said in the Charge to Yueh, ‘Teaching is the half of learning’.
Regarding the instructional process, more specifically, Record of Learning pointed out
several types of teaching behavior or process that could have potentially harmed learner’s
learning. In the following two types, the order in which the lesson was presented and the timing
which was given to the students is of great importance.
Instruction given after the time for it is past is done with toil and carried out with difficulty.
The communication of lessons in an undiscriminating manner and without suitability produces
injury and disorder and fails in its object. (時過然後學，則勤苦而難成；雜施而不孫，則壞
亂而不修)
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The above quote explains that teachers need to be aware of the situation of the students,
knowing when it is time for them to learn, and not teaching when the time has passed.
Furthermore, teacher needs to present the lessons in an organized manner and follow the right
order that suites the students, or students would be feeling distressed, confused, and unable to
learn the subjects.
In summarizing the above passages from Record of Learning, teaching and learning
connect in multiple ways. First, for the learner to be able to learn, the teacher needs to organize
the content in a way that is suitable to students. Second, teachers need to be aware of the
learner’s situation while teaching and know the timing about when to teach. Third, learners are
learning more about themselves during the teaching process, and have a chance to reflect on
their own to improve themselves. This last point follows the claim that teaching and learning are
inseparable and learners are teachers to themselves as well.
It is, therefore, the purpose of this study to use examine the experience of current school
teachers to see how teaching and learning are connected and even synchronized. Two cases of
teachers are examined. One teacher used the lecture, and the other teacher used the inquiry
method of teaching. These two cases will be analyzed to see if the hypotheses from the Record
of Learning exist or can be used to describe the process of teaching and learning.
2. Research questions
1. Where and how the teaching and learning are connected?
2. Can the half-half theory of teaching and learning be used to describe the process of
teaching as reported by the current teachers?
3. Methods
This study took the phenomenological orientation in qualitative method (Creswell & Poth,
2017). Two pairs of teachers and students were interviewed about their experience and
perceptions about the process of teaching and learning of a particular class. The interview
questions for teachers included their course design considerations, the teaching process and
material, the interaction with students, and the goal of teaching. The interview questions for
students included how they felt about the teacher’s instruction, what they did outside the class
time, in what ways they felt they have learned or changed. For each teacher-student pair, the
teacher was first interviewed individually for an hour and a half, and their students were
interviewed as a group for another hour and a half.
The two teachers are both history teachers in two different high schools. Teacher Chuang
taught at a prestigious urban public high school. He used lecture format for teaching in a regular
history course for the third-year senior high school students in a large-size classroom.
Teacher Wang, on the other hand, taught in a remote district where many families were
economically-challenged. She used the inquiry method to design exploratory tours for the local
historical sites and culture in an elective course. For Teacher Chuang, two male students were
interviewed; and for Teacher Wang, three students were interviewed, with two males and one
female. Both of the teachers have been teaching for more than 15 years, and the students ranged
in age between 16 and 17. Two of Teacher Wang’s students were interviewed one more time
after they graduated from senior high school and became first-year university students. A more
detailed account of Teacher Chuang’s case has been reported in another paper (Hsu, 2021).
4. Results
The results of the interviews of the two teachers were organized according to the three
points of connection.
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4.1. Teacher prepares and organizes the content suitable to students prior to class
Teacher Chuang. Teacher Chuang knew that his students had various backgrounds in
history in the previous two years. Many of them had chosen to be in the science track but
decided to switch to the social science and humanity track during the last year of senior high
school. He had to design the class to accommodate the students’ diverse knowledge and
interests in the subject of history. In introducing the topic of East Asian countries, he used
political framework, a topic which most of the students were familiar with. He gradually
explained the relationship of the royal family to the surrounding lords of the kingdoms so the
students could follow easily. He would then add the stories of the important figures, such as a
prince or princess, to link to the cause of wars and to add depth to the story. The gradual
expansion and deepening of the topics would complete the lesson before the students knew it.
Teacher Wang. For their class project, students in this local culture elective course acted as
tour guides for younger students at local junior high schools. Knowing that her students had
little knowledge about their local history and cultures, Teacher Wang collected literature,
stories, poems, and songs to make handouts for students to provide them with the necessary
background at the beginning of class. In order to teach the students to conduct tours, she went
through all the local sites herself and divided the tour into four routes. She then took the
students with her during the weekends to go through all four routes. This process allowed
students to choose which path they wanted to conduct a tour for. She also found an educational
website designed specifically for their local culture and history, and she designed a worksheet to
go through some questions for selected points of interest.
4.2. Teacher is aware of learner’s situation during teaching and the time to teach
Teacher Chuang. Teacher Chuang carefully chose the questions he asked the students. At
the beginning of the topics, he would only ask some basic questions to understand if his
assumptions about the students’ level were correct. After some time, when the students started
to “join in” his narratives and became interested in the stories, he would then pose questions for
students to reflect and summarize what they have already learned. To build students’
confidence, he would first ask the students he had taught before in the previous semesters.
Because those students had rapport with him so they could answer easily. Later in class,
Teacher Chuang would invite questions from students. He would also start from his old students
because he knew that students need to trust the teacher in order to ask a question. He would also
entertain students’ questions even he has already moved on to another section because he
wanted the students to know that they could ask questions at any time.
Teacher Wang. After the students reviewed the handouts and completed the worksheet,
they chose one of the four routes. In each group of eight students, they had to further choose one
of the two roles, the tour guide, and the station guides. The tour guide needed to prepare the
speech for the whole education tour, and the station guides need to develop activities for the
stops on the tour where the students would see the sites. After every student has taken a role in
the route group, they had to work on their speeches and activities. The teacher only gave them
very brief guidelines and an empty classroom to work in. Students worked in groups at recess
time and even after school. The tour guides collected material, asked the teacher for more
references, debated on which material to include, wrote and revised the scripts. The station
guides discussed activities that may interest their young tourists, thought of the content of their
mazes, questions, or games, found recourses to devise their pictures, posters, and equipment for
their activities. Many of them had to utilize their talents to thein max or discover the talents they
never knew they had. They also needed to be active in asking for help from the people around
them. At some points, they had to present their results to the teacher. The teacher mostly asked
them questions or points for clarification. They had to the revision themselves.
626
4.3. Learners learn more about themselves and have a chance improve
Teacher Chuang. Both students felt that their history textbooks only provided a skeleton
and the materials were dispersed and disassociated and that the text was hard to digest and had
no feeling in it. One student pointed out, with Teacher Chuang’s lecture, he felt that the names
and events started to “glue” together and he gradually see the relationship between things. He
began to see why certain things happen that way because there are precedents and reasons. He
could also recognize the difficulties and emotions that people may have when making decisions
at the moment of a crisis. Because of the questions the teachers raised during the class, they
would also ask themselves what they would do if they were the person in that situation. Another
student, who had had Teacher Chuang for two years, recalled at the beginning of last year, he
was unable to know what to write down in his notes. He would spend a lot of time writing notes
and feeling tired but was still unable to understand the material. During Teacher Chuang’s
lessons, he began to see the relationship between the textbook, the lecture, and his own
thoughts. He then decided to take down only names and dates from the textbook, but use the
teacher’s conceptual framework and interpretation of events, and at the end, he added his own
thoughts on the side.
Teacher Wang. Teacher Wang’s students felt very good that they overcame so many
hurdles, developed the shows and activities, conducted the tours successfully, and won the
approval of the younger students. Two students noticed that they developed a taste for chasing
down answers for questions, evaluating the credibility of the material, synthesizing answers
from literature, and capturing the core concepts from the text. They only discovered that he had
gained such ability when preparing for the high-stakes university entrance examinations. While
other students followed the answer from the reference book when answering a question wrong,
they found that he could not accept the answers given by others easily. They wanted to ask why
by searching relevant information on their own and discussing possible answers with others.
The third student related to the lessons he learned from the teacher about working with others.
He said that one should not work with a person that he has doubts, and should not doubt the
person he had chosen to work with. According to the teacher, this student had supported his
teammates whenever there was a need during the tour activity. She felt so proud of him because
he had a kind heart and the sensitivity of caring for others. Although he was one of the lowest
achievers in class, he had an opportunity to exhibit his nature and he won the most cards from
the young junior high school participants.
5. Discussion
5.1. Connecting prior to the class: Teacher prepares and organizes the content suitable to
students
Connecting between teacher and students could start before the class session. The
connection between teacher and students starts when teacher begins to prepare and organize the
content in course preparation. It is interesting to note that although course preparation is a
common task in teachers’ everyday lives, it has yet to receive systematic research attention.
Course preparation is far more than writing a lesson plan. According to the theory in Record of
Learning, it is an essential step to teaching. If teachers were to connect to students and provide
proper instruction, they have to know how to organize the content in a way that their students
would understand. Therefore, first, they have to know the content they teach, and second, they
have to know about how their students learn such content.
Despite the popularity of the concept of Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) and the
emphasis on teacher’s development of such knowledge, it was still unclear how teacher PCK
affects classroom teaching (Barendsen & Henze, 2019). The focus of PCK is still on the content
knowledge and the content-specific pedagogical knowledge, but not on how students learn
627
about such content knowledge. More recently, attention has been given to other components of
PCK, especially in light of the sustainability of innovative teaching. By studying teachers who
could continue to implement innovative science teaching approaches, Suh and Park (2017)
found two other components of PCK, including Knowledge of Student Understanding and
Knowledge of Instructional Strategies and Representations, mutually interact with the
sustainability of the implementation.
The connection between teacher and students could include but is not limited to emotional
attachment (Wubbels et al., 2016). In the above cases of Teacher Chuang and Teacher Wang,
their understanding of the students expanded several areas, including their previous learning
situations, their potential problems in entering the disciplinary subjects, the framework to
prepare them for the beginning of class, the organization of material for easy understanding, and
the addition for deepening the conception, and finally the building of a pathway that the students
could walk together. The teachers, in the theory presented by Record of Learning, would have to
know a lot more than PCK in advance.
5.2. Connecting during the class: Teachers are aware of learners’ situations and have
appropriate instructional timing
The connection between teacher and students also can be seen through teacher’s awareness
of students’ reactions during teaching. In Teacher Chuang’s case, he was aware of what type of
question he could ask when students are at which level of state of understanding, a process
which might be called instructional timing during class sessions. At the beginning of the class,
he would ask surveying questions to detect students’ level; at the middle of class, after he has
weaved the threads, he would ask summarizing and reflecting questions; and at the later stage of
the class, after he has already built a path for students to walk with him, he would ask questions
to consolidate their own independent thinking or address their own questions. Teacher Chuang
was very clear about where he was and where his students were at every point of connection.
The same kind of connection can be seen in Teacher Wang’s class. At the beginning of the
class, Teacher Wang prepared sizable but reasonable material and rich in variety for students to
quickly become acquainted with the background history of the local history and culture. She
then led the students on a walk through the sites for which they were about to design the tour.
After her introduction, she asked the students to explore the website and go through a worksheet
to write down their understanding and choices of the sites or culture that interested them the
most. Based on their interests, she provided the framework of the four routes but students were
encouraged to add or drop the points easily to design their own tours. At this point, the teacher
gave the floor to the students for them to work on their own, provided feedback on their work,
and provided help as necessary. She did not intervene in directing what type of information to
include in the tour nor what type of activity to design for the station. The teacher invited some
seniors to demonstrate their previous activities, but students had to think hard and work hard to
create their own work. Once again, Teacher Wang is very clear about where the students were
and what she needed to do to help them make progress and move forward. Both teachers
orchestrated the teaching and learning experience, and conducted what Tan (2015) described as
the “teacher-guide and student engaged” process, but revealed much more detail in the
dynamics.
This type of mid-class connection and dynamics, however, is less studied, perhaps due to
difficulty in methodology. Pre- and post-tests would totally miss this process, and correlational
studies do not capture the moment-to-moment interaction. Observational studies during the class
can be helpful (Barendsen & Henze, 2019), but this type of connection can expand to the entire
course and may not be easily observed. Interviews of teacher-student pairs, as used in this study,
perhaps is a method that provides a method to understanding this process.
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5.3. Connecting after the class: Learners learn more about themselves and have a chance
to improve
In the half-half proposal of teaching and learning in Record of Learning, the learners’
responsibility in the learning process is emphasized. The learners’ own practice with the
material taught, exchanging with or learning from others, and realizing their own problems and
drawbacks to improve upon are considered essential in learning the material.
In the format of inquiry-based, project-based, or hands-on activities, such as in Teacher
Wang’s class, it is more obvious that students have the opportunity to be engaged in the project,
explore the topic of interests, and create their own work. Such active learner participation is less
noticed, but equally possible, in lecture classes (Hsu, 2021). During Teacher Chuang’s class, the
students were encouraged to reflect and summarize what they had learned, and also to respect
their own emerging thoughts and questions. One student recognized that he was able to
overcome his inability to take notes and created his own way of organizing his note to integrate
the detailed information from the textbook, the conceptual framework from the teacher, and his
own thoughts and questions.
There has been debate about whether or not, and how much, teacher support is needed in
inquiry-based learning (Kirschner et al., 2006), but less is known about how much learners’ own
effort matters in contributing to the learning outcome. Once again, methodological issues could
be preventing this aspect of learning from being uncovered. Learners’ effort sometimes is
occluded, even to the learners themselves. In this study, it was only after a year, when the
students recalled and reflected on their learning experience that they have discovered that they
had overcome their problems and gained new abilities. It is therefore important to have multiple
interviews that span this time.
In both teachers’ cases, the students achieved remarkable progress and made headway in
developing high-level cognitive abilities, such as synthesizing, problem-solving, and crucial
thinking, as well as effective abilities, such as historical empathy, collaboration, and sympathy.
These students’ improvements could not have been achieved without both the teachers’ and
students’ efforts.
CONCLUSION
The relationship between teaching and learning, as proposed in the Record of Learning,
should be seen in tandem rather than in opposition. In this process, there is no differentiation of
teaching and learning, because one could not have been accomplished without another. This
paper proposes that regardless of the teaching formats teachers and students are connected
throughout the entire teaching and learning process.
Through the cases of the two teachers, Teacher Chuang and Teacher Wang, it can be
observed that the teachers started to design the class based on students’ needs, guided and
adjusted instruction to their needs during the class, and opened the floor for students to come
forward with their own thinking and production. At every step of teaching, teachers are closely
connected to the situation of their students. In a way, the teachers are constantly learning about
the subject, the students, and themselves.
Through the remarks of their students, one can see that under the guidance of the teacher
going through the instructional procedure, they were able to understand the material, gradually
synthesize the content, and eventually grow to understand how to handle the subject matter and
produce their own independent thinking about it. In a way, they became teachers themselves.
What is often neglected, however, is how much teaching has to go into the process before
learners can be mastering new content on their own.
This interdependent relationship between teachers and students is a much more
sophisticated process than scaffolding. It can be seen through the cases how teachers were
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carefully building students’ confidence in themselves and increasing the student trust in the
teacher. The close connection of the teacher-learner relationship and the support from the
teacher may be critical to the learners to develop their independence as learners.
Studying this type of connection between teachers and students presents methodological
challenges. This study suggests that interviewing teacher-student pairs offers a way to explore
the same phenomenon from a different perspective. If at all possible, multiple points in a longer
term would be even more favorable to explore the experience gained by the students. Historical
interpretations of the contribution of ancient Chinese literature to education point the way to a
deeper understanding of teaching and learning (Tan, 2015). Without the differentiation between
teacher-centeredness and student-centeredness, more progress can be made in analyzing the
connection between teacher and students.
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About the author

Shihkuan Hsu is a professor at the Center for Teacher Education, National Taiwan
University, with a research focus on educational technology and teacher education.
631
DEVELOPING CRITICAL THINKING AMONG VIETNAMESE

HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS THROUGH LITERATURE LESSONS
Hoang Lan Anh*1
Abstract: Developing critical thinking for learners is one of the most important educational goals
in many developed countries. However, in Vietnam, teaching this essential competence for
students is still unfamiliar among almost Vietnamese schools. Therefore, in this conceptual
paper, we focus on discussing methods to cultivate critical thinking among high school students,
particularly through Literature subject in Vietnamese national education curriculum. Based on a
focus of considering different perspectives in critical thinking, the methods concentrate on
restructuring the curriculum, adjusting teaching methods to develop learners’ critical thinking.
The research aims to fill the gap in teaching critical thinking in Vietnamese education.
Keywords: critical thinking, different perspectives, literature, Vietnamese education
INTRODUCTION
Critical thinking, which is one of the most important competencies, provides opportunities
for humans, particularly in the 21st century (Casserly & Megan, 2012; OECD, 2018). Therefore,
it has become the core goal of national education policy in many developed countries. There are
many studies about critical thinking both in itself and in education. John Dewey (1910),
Bertrand Russell, Robert Ennis (1991, 2016), Sharon Bailin (1987, 1999, 2009) and many other
researchers studied to unpack this vital competence and provided many significant results. In
pedagogy, educators examined methods and strategies to develop critical thinking for students.
Kong (2001) focused on the training of critical thinking dispositions to help Singaporean pre-
service teachers be ready for teaching these skills in their classroom after graduating. Lisa Tsui
(2002) examined the effectiveness of writing and rewriting as well as class discussion to foster
critical thinking among students in different institutions. In 2014, American Philosophical
Association (APA) proposed a large number of strategies to develop critical thinking such as
sharpening cognitive skills, approaching both to specific issues, problems and to living in
general. According to the research by Philip et al. (2015), these strategies provided good results
in both generic and specific content at all educational levels and disciplinary areas.
However, in Vietnamese education, due to various reasons, this is almost absent or not
emphasized in both teacher education programs and schooling education. To date, few studies
investigate the teaching of critical thinking in Vietnamese schools, particularly in teaching
Literature. Nguyen V.T. (2020) discusses some useful methods to develop and apply critical
thinking to learning Literature. However, the paper had some vagueness which can make it hard
to apply in practicing critical thinking such as (1) the idea that “ego” is one of the first aspects to
collapse every critical argument which may be based on the narrow perspective in evaluating
the item “ego”; and (2) the suggestion in relying on intuition to develop skeptical questions in
critical thinking, while intuition is considered as one of the misconceptions about characteristics
of critical thinking (Manalo et al., 2015). In another study, Nguyen T.A.Đ. (2020) focuses on
some teaching methods to develop critical thinking among high school students through
learning two short stories in the twelfth-grade Literature curriculum. However, the narrow point
of view in evaluating the stories as well as in applying teaching techniques made the proposed
methods become less practical. To fill the gap, this paper focuses on conceptualization of
* Corresponding Author: Hoang Lan Anh; Email Address: hoanglananh1306@gmail.com

1 Bac Giang Gifted High School
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critical thinking and how critical thinking can be developed among high school students in
Literature lessons, particularly their ability to consider different perspectives. The purpose of
this paper is to emphasize the importance and the methods of considering different perspectives
in expanding knowledge, building an open-minded attitude and approaching logical thinking
skills in developing critical thinking. Based on that, we discuss some methods to develop this
thinking competency for students in both pedagogical universities and high schools. For that
aim, the paper will start with a discussion about critical thinking, drawing on the existing
literature to provide a conceptualization of critical thinking which is more relevant in the
context of Vietnam. The paper also concentrates on how to develop thinking from considering
different perspectives and discusses some methods to determine the possible different points of
view in multiple-dimensional thinking. Next, it evaluates the challenges in developing critical
thinking in Vietnamese education and suggests several methods to develop different
perspectives for students with concrete examples. Lastly, it provides some suggestions in
developing this habit of mind among students in either Vietnamese high school or in
pedagogical universities to help them be adaptable with modern life, especially in the digital
technological era.
CONTENT
1. Critical thinking and considering different perspectives
1.1. Defining critical thinking
Hitherto, in philosophy, psychology, and pedagogy, critical thinking is an attractive term
which has been researched and defined by many scholars. The definitions of this terminology
have been written down clearly by many professors (Glaser, 1941; Ennis, 1991, 2016; Bailin,
1987; Bailin et al.,1999; Bailin & Mark, 2009), while some other scholars did not define in a
sentence but through their whole researches and dialogues (such as Socrates since 400 BC). In
the 20th century, John Dewey is named “the father of the modern critical thinking tradition”
although in his book (1910), the item “reflective thinking” was used instead of “critical
thinking” (Fisher, 2001, p. 2). In contrast, Bertrand Russell, another famous philosopher and
educator in the 20th century, was less mentioned in research about critical thinking, but “the idea
of critical thinking is a central one in Russell’s philosophy” (Hare, 2001).
In general, the definitions show the thoughtful research and consideration of scholars to
define the core characteristics of critical thinking. However, all of these definitions come from
Western scholars who matured from the regions which have long history and culture of
individual and independent thinking. Hence, developing critical thinking in their opinion is to
sharpen the independent and liberal thinking in rational and reasonable conditions. However,
with societies that have long history following collectivism and conforming norms such as
Vietnam and some other Asian countries (Yu, 2015), developing critical thinking might begin
from a different point of departure. Therefore, this paper proposes another definition of critical
thinking which might not be better than the former but might be easier to apply in Vietnamese
context to gradually establish a culture of individual liberation while developing this habit of
mind. Critical thinking is an active thinking process which analyzes, examines, and evaluates an
issue reasonably from considering different perspectives in an effort to consolidate, enlarge,
renew, or replace the previous belief, to solve related problems or create new things. Our
definition of critical thinking indeed is a synthesis and inheritance from ideas about critical
thinking from Greek philosophers to the modern scholars at one point: critical thinking is an
active journey to discover knowledge. Thinkers need to use different types of reasonable
thinking such as analytical thinking, careful consideration (Dewey, 1910), and interpreted
roughly as rationally (Ennis, 1991). We also agree with the concept that the purpose of evidence
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and reasons in critical thinking is to “overcome individual biases” (Russell, as cited in Hare, 2001;
Halpern, 2014) and to be the foundation of creative thinking (Ennis, 1991; Bailin, 1987).
However, our definition emphasizes the item considering different perspectives which were
mentioned generally in former definitions as “active […] consideration”, “freedom in mind”
(Dewey, 1910) or “attitude” (Glaser, 1941). In other research and training programs,
‘considering different perspectives” is a characteristic that good thinkers possess as well as a
skill commonly associated with critical thinking (Manalo, et al., 2015; Monash University
website). Therefore, this paper will unpack the values of this item as one of the most important
basic characteristics to build pedagogical methods in fostering critical thinking, particularly in
the context of Vietnamese education.
1.2. Different perspectives and their importance in thinking critically
What does “considering different perspectives” mean?
“Perspective” is a term which has been used in different fields with different layers of
meaning. Originated from the Latin word which means “to look through” (Green, 2000), it
refers to the way someone observes the world from their point of view to shape their reality. In
the visual arts, it suggests a geometrical method that presents a scene as perceived from a
“single fixed viewpoint” (Carter, as cited in Niederhoff, 2011) to display “an all-around space”
(Green, 2000) on a flat surface. However, in our paper, the item “single fixed viewpoint” of a
perspective is not only determined or displayed in three dimensions of space as in painting arts,
but at least in four dimensions: space-time dimension according to the Special Relativity Theory
of Albert Einstein (cited in Hawking, 2005), or even in much more multiple dimensions (such as
the position, culture, religion, personality and values, etc.) according to the definition narrative
of Niederhoff (2011). However, while Niederhoff discusses perspectives in a fictional world,
our paper examines them in real life.
“Different perspectives” is the new perspectives to observe the world compared with the
previous perspective. If paintings only have a “single fixed point” to see the world at a moment,
there are possible diverse viewpoints in real life. They are determined by the diversity of
personal experience, age, gender, race, culture, etc. As the equality of different results from
different viewpoints in physic was recognized by the Relativity Theory (cited in Hawking,
2005), the legitimacy of different perspectives as well as individual ideas in society should be
accepted by human - if human really desires to approach the intelligence of the Great Nature.
The more perspectives we observe, the more values can be discovered and measured...
The importance of considering different perspectives in developing critical thinking
A person who is adept in rationalizing and intellectualizing in argumentation to protect their
fundamental beliefs which is based on ego-centric or social-centric biases is not an accurate
critical thinker (Paul, 1981). Therefore, the first purpose of developing critical thinking is how
to think reasonably and rationally, but its real purpose is how to think multiple dimensionally
and comprehensively to own argumentative strategies, wide wisdom, neutral attitude, and open
mind. To achieve this goal, it is necessary to develop the ability in considering different
perspectives in analyzing, examining and evaluating.
First, different perspectives are useful to distinguish two vague items analytical thinking
and critical thinking (even in Vietnamese language, sometimes these two items have been
translated into the same term “tư duy phân tích”). Differentiation is used as a foundation to
examine how these types of thinking are being taught in Viet Nam. Moreover, in methodology,
it suggests some methods to develop critical thinking in Literature lessons.
On a similar side, both analytic and critical thinking are based on reasonable consideration,
evidence, and argumentation. A significant difference between critical thinking and analytical
thinking is that critical thinkers always consider the different perspectives before analyzing
while analytical thinkers do not care so much about perspectives, The norm, the habitation, the
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culture in the society where they grew up formed single analyzers’ perspective. In contrast,
critical thinkers always think based on their awareness of the different perspectives, the relative
space-time axes as well as the relative value systems that they are inside. By thinking critically,
thinkers do not only analyze objects but also display their active perspectives by
comprehensively evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of their own viewpoints. They also
can choose alternative viewpoints to analyze the issue. This example below is a practice to
analyze and think critically about a popular slogan in Vietnamese schools: “For the sake of ten
years, we must plant trees, for the sake of one hundred years, we should cultivate people” whose
author is assumed to be Ho Chi Minh.
Via analytical thinking, we always interpret some internal features of the sentence such as
the symmetric structure, the meaning of realistic and metaphor images, the comparison to
understand that: education is very important for human life not only in short term but also in
long term. By critical thinking, we start with considering which possible perspectives to analyze
the object. The two objects of the trees and the human suggest at least two viewpoints of
humans and trees. From the human viewpoint, particularly from traditional human activists who
believe that “human is the first”, the statement can be analyzed as we have analyzed. However,
from the perspective of trees, we can analyze critically the previous belief. For instance, is it
right that to plant a tree just for the sake of 10 years and to raise a human for the sake of
longevity? When a tree is considered as a 10-year-benefit, it is observed from farmers or
agricultural businessmen who plant trees just to harvest trees’ products for servicing human life.
This is a narrow vision compared with the viewpoint of nature. In nature, planting trees has
longer and more stable advantages, not only for humans but also for fungus, insects, herbivores,
carnivores, the soil, the water, the air, the climate. Planting trees is a vital solution to solve the
climate crisis and save many other species on the earth. Meanwhile, with the development of
human intelligence and technical tools, human is wiping out many other species on the earth
more quickly, even pushing the earth to the edge of the abyss (Harari, 2017a, 2017b, 2020).
Therefore, the belief of focusing on raising humans more than planting trees because of its long-
term benefit should be questioned. It does not mean we will not keep concentrating on
developing human competences by education, but we can consider a new educational policy for
stable development such as: “For the sake of ten years, we should plant trees; for the sake of one
hundred years, we should cultivate people; for the sake of thousand years, we should cultivate
people who are awake of the importance of planting trees”.
Second, different perspectives in critical thinking provide an observation and analysis that
are deeper, more extended, concrete, comprehensive and creative, particularly from viewpoints
which have never been used. From new viewpoints, critical thinkers can find new methods to
approach and solve problems. For example, based on the interpretation of the slogan from
viewpoint of trees, educators would be suggested new policies, content and methods in training
learners to contribute to solving many problems in modern life such as unstable economic
developing or climate crisis.
Third, by considering different viewpoints, critical thinkers can avoid biases or fundamental
opinions leading to conflicts and tension, while continuing to use competitions for developing.
When everyone is right from their individual observation or when the different perspectives are
realized, we can avoid conflicts, abuse and violence as six blind men in the ancient metaphor
story “Six blind men and the elephant” had done. Moreover, to consider between different
viewpoints, critical thinkers often analyze, compare and measure objectively the weaknesses
and strengths of each viewpoint in their mind, balance them to get better results in their
observation. Consequently, they have a tendency to reduce their ego-centric thinking while
learning to respect other people’s opinions and harmonize with them. Hence, we should not
worry that an ego can collapse any debate to develop critical thinking (Nguyen V.T., 2020) if
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that ego possesses the competence of considering different perspectives. Turning back to the
above example, when educators consider the slogan from both viewpoints of human and trees,
we can foster an education which raise new generations of students who balance the advantage
of cultivating human and the advantage of cultivating trees. This idea would help us solve the
problem of conflict between economic developing and natural preservation. As a result, it is the
resource for developing science and society.
Last but not least, by analyzing an issue from different viewpoints, critical thinking can
develop liberty in our mind from the ability to flip an issue (Dewey, 1910). A popular belief,
such as “for the sake of one hundred years”, was established from a dominant opinion which is
powerful enough to restrict other opinions. However, by recognizing the right of different
viewpoints, each opinion has chances of being given voices to and dialoguing with others,
resulting in equal development of every opinion (Russell, cited in Hare, 2001). For instance, the
tree has its own voice which is equal to the voice of humans in raising humans. Therefore,
critical thinking is the basis for liberal and independent societies. This is very important for
building a democratic education in Vietnam.
How to think critically from different perspectives?
In both natural and social sciences, viewing from a single perspective could be easier than
viewing from multiple perspectives, not only because the multiple viewpoints require more
knowledge and studying to determine but also because the single perspective is already chosen
for us without our own consideration, The single viewpoint is formed by a system that is so
much bigger than us such as our environment, culture, norm… where we grow up, particularly
in societies which are not a “reflective places” (Heath, 2012). In contrast, the different
perspectives are considered by individuals. Compared with a previous single viewpoint, the
different viewpoints are unlimited and able to grow up with the mature process of individual
consciousness. Therefore, we would restrain the different perspectives if we categorize them in
some thinking models. However, for conducting and training students om how to think, it is
necessary to introduce and help them practice with some thinking models first to recognize the
difference in thinking, and then to find the other perspectives by themselves. Hence, in this
session, this essay will introduce some thinking methods as clues to guide determining different
viewpoints in critical thinking. The methods rely on theories of Relativity (cited in Hawking,
2005) and Dialectics (Paul, 1981; cited in Bailin & Mark, 2009).
By applying the theory of Relativity, we can replace an absolute axis of value which is
possible to frame our vision in a single and steady perspective into relative axes with multiple
value systems. They may include axes of space, time, dignity, morals, characters, values,
purpose, process, materials, methods, etc. In the Dialectics, they could be called as diverse
aspects of context such as society, politics, history, disciplinary, even personal perspective
(Bailin & Mark, 2009). Dialectics also provide methods to consider which viewpoint is suitable
or better to analyze one issue than others. While assuming the current perspective is point A,
we would determine its different viewpoints as B, C, D by determining its “opposite sides” in
the same reference system. For example: in the reference system of time, there are some main
points which are on opposite sides such as the past – the present – the future, in the morning – in
the afternoon – at night; in the reference system of space, the points could be multiple such as
inside – outside, up – down, point – area, in front of – behind; in the reference systems of
characters, they are subject – object, observation – being observed; in the moral value system,
they could be good – bad, in the reference systems of process, they could be reason –
consequence, etc. The analyzing process to develop critical thinking based on considering
different perspectives is also able to learn from the method of Dialectics with at least three
phases of thinking: thesis – antithesis and synthesis.
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In the following Table, the author proposes the consideration between different systems,
different points of view, and three phases of thinking to analyze critically the abovementioned
slogan of Ho Chi Minh:
Formatted point of view Different point of view
In reference system of character Human Trees Synthesis: Cultivate people
In reference system of purpose Acting for human Acting for nature who awake the importance of
Thesis: cultivate people Antithesis: cultivate nature cultivating trees
2. Developing different perspectives in critical thinking in Vietnamese education

through Literature Lessons
2.1. Current landscape of critical thinking education in Vietnamese program of Literature
Until now, there has not been a study which provides an overview of developing critical
thinking in Vietnamese education. In this paper, our research is just limited to some associated
researches as well as my own teaching experience in an attempt to provide a glimpse of the
current landscape of critical thinking education in Vietnam, particularly emphasizing Literature
learning. Literature is one of the subjects that is not only possible to provide knowledge but also
to help students gain thinking competences. However, in reality, Vietnamese students are
lacking many chances to develop thinking competences, particularly critical thinking from
different perspectives. This is demonstrated from the curriculum to pedagogical methods and
evaluation in current Vietnamese education.
Curriculum
Because the curriculum of the Reforming National Education Program 2020 is still being
designed and has not been completed, in this session, we just focus on examining the program
2006 – 2020. The general goal of the 2006 – 2020 educational program is to train students to
establish characteristics of Vietnamese socialist citizens to build up and protect their nation.
Therefore, in the Reading section of Literature subject, the curriculum was designed for
developing the dignity of Vietnamese citizens which is relevant to Vietnamese culture and
humankind such as love (human, nature, life), loyalty, persistence, braveness against injustice,
etc (MOET, 2006a, 2006b, 2007a, 2007b, 2008a). For example, in the story “The Kieu’s tale”
(Nguyen Du), Ms. Kieu was a woman whose life and characteristics are the symbol for inner
Vietnamese beauty: talented, compassionate, loving parents, self-esteem, desired liberty in
love… The poems and stories which belonged to Revolutionary Literature such as “Viet Bac”
(To Huu), “A Phu’s spouse” (To Hoai) praise the traditional beauty of Vietnamese people such
as loyalty with hometown, nation and Communist, desiring for living and liberty… The foreign
Literature works such as “Odysseus” (Homer), “I love you” (A. Pushkin), “Romeo and Juliet”
(W. Shakespeare) also are the works that praise the highest value in humanity and be a
resemblance to the Vietnamese culture. However, the Reading curriculum tended to choose
Literature works or cited documents which focus on praising the moral values or communicable
dignities of characters more than their thinking skills, particularly their critical thinking. For
example: in the curriculum, the lesson about Dam San hero (Highland epic) was studied for his
communicable characteristics, but the chapter about his single resistance to the maternal norms
to prepare for a new time in history (a sign of thinking critically) was not focused on; similarly,
lessons about Odysseus (Homer) was focused on studying his loyalty with his family and
hometown, but he is smart and critical thinking during his trip to discover the mysterious ocean
was not the centre of the lessons. The lessons about folklore funny stories and poems (which
often were created by sharpening critical thinking of common class) are introduced to provide
students with an overview of the folklore categories yet they are not put at the centre of the
curriculum. The curriculum also chose some poems or stories in the Renovation period which
observed the world from different perspectives such as “The offshore boat” (Nguyen Minh Chau),
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“Do Len” (Nguyen Duy), “A Hanoian” (Nguyen Khai). However, lessons about two of them do
not belong to the main course.
Besides, in the Writing section, the high school program focuses on teaching students how
to protect a perspective in arguments effectively from structuring to using argumentative
strategies of demonstrating, interpreting, analyzing, comparing, rejecting, criticizing, as well as
collecting and analyzing evidences relevantly. (MOET, 2006b, 2007a, 2007b, 2008a, 2008d).
However, the program has not paid attention to training students, considering different
perspectives or stimulating them to establish their own perspective when facing complex issues.
In this way, students often argue to protect others’ perspectives. They may be good at analytical
thinking but not at critical thinking or possessing and proposing their new ideas.
Methods
There is almost an exclusive and united viewpoint in Literature lessons which dominates
classes and creates “one-dimensional Education” (Marcuse, cited in Dao et al., 2021) in
Vietnam. It is a result of Confucianism that has ruled Vietnameses for centuries. Nowadays,
although our societies have changed, dogmatism about truth and knowledge still dominates the
knowledge and skills that students absorb and prevent them from thinking from different
perspectives (Yu, 2015, p.361). Our students are studying with the lack of opportunities to
dialogue with these indoctrinations to show their individual judgment or to raise up their own
voices. This education establishes a stereotype of Asian people “holistic perspective,
conforming to and dependent on an in-group” while does not support any difference or
individual thinking (Yu, 2015, p.358). What Yu (2015) analyzes about characteristics of
Chinese education: (1) examination-oriented goals, (2) insufficient contents, (3) irrelevance to
practice, (4) rote-learning pedagogy, also are characteristics of Vietnamese education.
Vietnamese educational curriculum was designed to develop the dignity of Vietnamese
citizens. However, these virtues are often taught by one-dimensional praising from a single
perspective. Because of this widely confirmed valuation, the Literature works are taught and
learnt in united minds without skepticism. Doubt is rarely encouraged. Even works which have
critical thinking are taught by praising easily and traditionally from a single-dimensional
perspective. For example, in a dissertation, for the sake of developing critical thinking through
studying a story “The offshore boat” (MOET, 2008d), Nguyen T.A.D. (2020) suggested a
question to require students to demonstrate a statement “Beauty itself is moral”. This statement
has been agreed for a long time by many artists, but the story stated it critically by emphasizing
that: the beauty which does not understand humans, particularly human individuals, was not
moral beauty. However, Nguyen (2020) only tried to demonstrate the right of the statement in
the answering suggestion. By keeping a previous perspective to evaluate the critical story, she
might lose her students’ opportunities to think critically. Thus, if this method continues to be
used in the Reforming National Educational Program (MOET, 2018), it will not be easy for us
to reach the goal of Reforming Education.
Evaluation
As mentioned above, one characteristic of Vietnamese education is examination-oriented
goals. The shortage of developing critical thinking in teaching and learning as aforementioned is
reflected in the lack of requirement for critical thinking in the examination. Analyzing the
requirement of the first test of the National Final exam (MOET, 2021) can demonstrate this
problem.
The test has two sections, Reading and Writing; the Writing session includes Social
discourse and Literacy discourse. In the Reading session, according to the Bloom’s Taxonomy
(1956), the first three in four questions are almost in the level of Remembering (Recall facts and
basic concepts) and Understanding (explain ideas); the last one is Applying level when asking
students for the lessons they learn from the reading. The higher skills such as analyzing,
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evaluating and creating were not required here. The question for the Social discourse asked for
students’ opinions about the necessity of Living devotedly. It would be an opportunity for
students to show their viewpoints. However, among 240 students’ answers that I scores directly,
what students mostly did was to support the idea in the question by listing mirrors of devotees
and some advantages of living devotedly. The point of extending, developing or flipping the
topic at the end of the essay is always proposed to appreciate students’ ability of critical
thinking. However, there was about 20 percent of students did not have this point. The
remaining students got bonus scores for their critical thinking competence by criticizing,
judging and condemning someone who lived selfishly, not devotedly. Criticizing and
condemning is almost the way that many Vietnamese students have been oriented to show their
critical thinking, but they are not critical thinking because they were often done from a single
viewpoint. Consequently, this thinking model contributes to establishing a bad habit of judging
and condemning other people easily without careful considerations from different viewpoints. It
is the resource of a society that judges people easily instead of supporting others. This
phenomenon shows a misunderstanding about critical thinking among Vietnamese teachers and
students. The requirement in the Literacy discourse is to ask about the understanding of Xuan
Quynh’s poem and the beauty of femininity in her art world. This requirement is very united
with the content in the Textbook (MOET, 2008a) and the workbook (MOET, 2008c) as well as
the guidance for teaching the poem in the Teacher book (MOET, 2008b), According to the
answering guidance, what students can do and need to do is gathering and repeating as much
knowledge of the poem which they were taught as possible, not doubting or flipping the topic.
Students have to analyze reasonably for other perspectives, not themselves. This demonstrates
the dogmatism as well as the examination-oriented goals and rote-learning pedagogy in
Vietnamese teaching.
Thus, the tests show the problem in Vietnamese education: the majority of students are not
trained or required to develop critical thinking. This trend should not continue and dominate our
education anymore, particularly in the time of intelligent economy and industrial era 4.0.
2.2. Fostering different perspectives among high school students through Literature
lessons
Many researchers have studied pedagogical methods related to this issue (Dewey, 1910;
Kong, 2001; Tsui, 2002). In this paper, we will develop students’ critical thinking by providing
opportunities for students to be able to think from multiple dimensions as well as propose their
own opinions in Literature lessons in the Vietnamese high school curriculum. We also instruct
students to sharpen their logical argument previously learned in Language lessons to protect
their individual opinions
Pedagogical principles
In daily life, where values are formatting and changing, critical thinking can be the method
to recognize which is true or false, right or fake news. However, in the Vietnamese educational
curriculum, values in Literature works are assessed and confirmed in history. They are the
permanent humane dignities such as love respect for the beauty of nature, inner soul, the
braveness against the bad, evil, and injustice, etc. Undeniably, these dignities are virtues that
every humane education needs to achieve. However, in the novel “Journey to the West” (Wu
Cheng’en), Sun Wukong consoled Tang Sanzang when the monk worried about the broken
paper in the Buddies sacred texts: “The sky and the earth are imperfect, why do we have to
require for the sacred texts being perfect?”. This reality suggests the first principle to develop
critical thinking for students. It is neither canceling all the true dignity of humankind nor
agreeing, obeying ideas without consideration. Critical thinking is for inquiring about the
imperfection of the truth in Literature works and recognizing the imperfection of any formatted
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belief in our life. Understanding imperfection will take us out of sticking in any single
perspective to believe for the only single truth. It opens our vision to the hidden truth under the
surface of an issue. These different perspectives can analyze an issue from opposite sides or
different levels, examine the issue in different situations, try it in different materials or methods
to consolidate the dignities, or adjust it to be more suitable with students’ positions.
Encouraging and observing from students’ perspectives could be the second principle to
develop critical thinking. The whole works chosen in the curriculum of Literature subject were
created in the past, therefore many of them are not familiar with contemporary students or
unrelated with their real life. The lessons would be tedious for students, prompting them to
believe that such lessons are helpless and irrelevant to their life. Therefore, if students have
chances to change the perspective from the viewpoint of their ancestors, grandparents, parents,
teachers in the past to their own viewpoint at the moment to analyze the works, connecting them
with their contemporary issues, even with their own issues, they will find the purpose and
motivation to study. They will also be more excited with their lessons while developing critical
thinking.
Curriculum
To develop critical thinking, the Reading section should be built equally between
developing moral values and thinking values by enhancing Literature works and cited
documents which have ideas related to critical thinking. For example, to study Odysseus’s epic,
the curriculum can consider choosing the chapter which demonstrates Odysseus’s intellect to
stimulate students inquisitiveness. In twelfth grade, the curriculum needs to balance between
works that belong to the Revolution era (one-dimensional observation) and Renovation era
(multiple dimensional observation) by transferring some Reforming works from extra-course
into the main course. Otherwise, some works which are results of considering different
perspectives – for example: “Flipped” (Wendelin Van Draanen, 2001) – should be added to the
curriculum to cultivate students’ multi-dimensional thinking.
In the Writing section, it is better if the curriculum has lessons to teach students how to
consider different perspectives before teaching them argumentative strategies to persuade or
demonstrate opinions. The lessons should be designed both in theory and practice to establish
attitude, knowledge, and skills of thinking critically.
Methods
Reforming the Literature curriculum is important, but reforming pedagogical methods is
much more vital to improving education. Because everything could be seen from different
viewpoints, teachers still can improve students’ critical thinking in the current curriculum by
focusing on discovering the critical ideas in Literature works or providing situations to observe
the works from different axes and alternative points.
First, with Literature works which have critical ideas, teachers can clarify, emphasize or
develop these ideas as a way of stimulating students’ critical thinking. For example, the purpose
of the lesson on the satire “Three generations of chicken” (Tam đại con gà) (MOET, 2006a) is
to help students understand the concept of criticism and sarcasm, especially towards people
hiding their stupidity and teachers who lack teaching knowledge. This is a critical idea that
teachers should make clear. In addition to this goal, the lesson can perform some jumping tasks
as an opportunity for developing thinking critically. In fact, the idea of criticizing unwise
teachers is not familiar with the tradition of respecting teachers in Vietnam, and teaching
students to disrespect other people for their conscious ability is not the educational goal.
Applying the first principle in developing critical thinking, teachers should not encourage
students to criticize other people. To develop critical thinking here, a bridge between the ancient
story and contemporary students can be built (the second principle in developing critical
thinking) by turning experiences of the characters in the story into the experience of students
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(choose different points of view in the axis of characters). Teachers can challenge students with
questions: “Do you think your teachers know everything or sometimes not know something as
the teacher in the story does? What should you do when you find your teachers are wrong or
limited at some points? Do you often only repeat your teachers’ words as the students do in the
story?” Students can share their own experiences about some teachers whom they did not
expect. There is another question that can provoke their thoughts: “Do you think your teachers
like me are normal people and can be stupid at many things?” By discussing, teachers help
students recognize: first, teachers are normal people, so it is normal that they do not know
everything; hence students should neither believe absolutely in their teachers’ knowledge (when
life changes, teachers’ knowledge can be old-fashioned) nor disrespect their teachers if they
know their teachers never stop learning to improve themselves. Next, what students should do
when realizing their teachers’ lack of knowledge is doubting their instructors’ words, arguing
from different viewpoints, doing more research on their own and finding new truth on their
own. To believe in themselves, students should never stop studying to find who they are and
which dignity they should follow to establish their personality. That can be one method for
students to start thinking differently and critically.
Second, with Literature works or cited documents created lacking critical thinking, teachers
can conduct students take different observations from different axes or viewpoints to expand
their beliefs, even denying what they are taught to research issues deeply or newly.
For example, these are some methods to develop critical thinking in lessons about “Kieu’s
tale” (Nguyen Du). The values of “Kieu’s tale” have been confirmed by many researchers and
readers for centuries. In the Literature curriculum, lessons about this story help students
understand these values while sympathizing with the tragedies of women in the past regime and
praising their inner beauty. The reading lesson about the chapter “Giving love” can be evidence
for this. In this scene, Kieu who had already sold herself to rescue her father and brother felt
guilty with Kim Trong – the lover who sworn with her loving forever. To compensate her lover,
Kieu asked her sister Thuy Van to replace her in the marriage with Kim Trong. In teaching this
lesson, teachers always try to orient students into believing in the pain and the beauty of Kieu at
her first tragedy. It is right, but it has been seen from the perspective of Thuy Kieu as well as
Nguyen Du. Therefore, after conducting students to discover the lesson from the author’s
viewpoint, the teacher can expand students’ viewpoints by asking them to think from different
perspectives, such as their thinking and feeling if they were Thuy Van, the forgotten character
of the author. Being provided an opportunity to play a role, students will start thinking from
Van’s perspective, for example: Van was also in much tragedy of love when getting married to
her sister’s love. To heighten the task, teachers also can ask students thinking from an outside
character such as: Why did Kieu respect her liberty in love but force her sister into a compulsive
marriage? Why did Kieu worry about the disadvantage in the love of her boyfriend but not think
about her sister’s disadvantage when marrying a man without love? Students would also be
stimulated to doubt the good characteristics of Thuy Kieu that they believed, even some of them
would quickly judge that Kieu was so selfish when only caring for her love but not concerned
for her sister’s feelings or Kieu loved her boyfriend than her sister. However, in teaching for
fostering critical thinking, teachers also need to avoid this quick criticizing, because it can be a
result of thinking without evidence or viewing from a single viewpoint. Therefore, teachers can
continue inquiring students with an experiencing question: if you were in Kieu’s situation,
whose benefit would you choose, Kim Trong or Thuy Van or Thuy Kieu? Why? Students would
give their own choices for many reasons. Based on that, teachers can begin a debate on these
different choices, and then ask students to examine and assess the advantages and disadvantages
of their individual choices This analysis would help students recognize that there were no good
choices here, because any choice included a particular pain. This discussion confirms Kieu’s
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inescapable tragedy as content in the lesson and provides students more chance to observe one
issue from different characters. Teachers also can help students recognize that judging someone
without understanding their situation or seeing from other perspectives would hinder us from
seeing the truth or sympathizing with other people. In this way, teachers remind students to
avoid a misconception that one-dimensional judgment is a sign of critical thinking.
In addition, discovering and experimenting with different materials and methods is very
important for developing critical thinking. In studying Language and Literature, teachers also
can help students approach or discover the Literature in different materials (word documents,
music, movies, plays and so on) or in different methods (writing, speaking, drawing, playing a
role, researching, experiencing, etc). Each material has its own characteristic, so by working
with them, students can be more creative and also can see the world more plenty.
There are many aspects in heightening critical thinking in education which can be categorized
in three main things: knowledge, skills and attitude. These aspects are connected and influenced
each other by one thing: perspective. When observing the world from a wide perspective,
students will expand their knowledge, open their mind, and examine skills to balance their
biases... Therefore, fostering different perspectives is very important to stimulate thinking
critically, particularly in Vietnamese society. This paper focused on unpacking the comprehension
of the item “different perspectives” such as its definition, importance in critical thinking, several
methods to practice it. Later, by analyzing that Vietnamese students lack opportunities in
developing these habits of mind, the paper discussed methods for practicing thinking critically
through Literature lessons. The important pedagogical principle here is that developing critical
thinking is not for canceling human dignities which are taught through lessons, but for
evaluating these values from different perspectives in different value axes. In this way, students
can open their mind to think more flexibly and critically as well as find motivation in their
studying. Moreover, students have chances to speak out their ideas, to be more confident to
think differently to become future liberal and independent citizens in modern society.
This conceptual paper proposed some methods to developing critical thinking. However,
these methods should be examined for their effectiveness, their possible application on a large
scale, or their advantages and disadvantages when practicing in different contexts. Moreover,
reforming evaluating standards to develop critical thinking also should be studied in the future.
Recommendation for preparing to develop different perspectives in critical thinking
in Vietnamese education
Developing critical thinking is an important duty not only in high schools but also in
pedagogical universities (Kong, 2001). If universities of education do not foster their students’
critical thinking, they will never be able to train teachers who can teach critical thinking at high
school and lower levels in education. Critical thinking is developed based on the wisdom and an
opened-mind of different perspectives. Therefore, schools and pedagogical universities should
gradually develop their students’ critical thinking by diversifying the learning contents,
pedagogical materials, methods, active forms… to enrich their viewpoints in analyzing,
examining, evaluating or assessing in order to approach the world more globally.
To develop critical thinking, besides theoretical lessons such as critical thinking concepts,
critical thinking principles, and the subject matter of the thinking (Hitchcock, 2018), students
should be trained in practicing through daily lessons. In Literature lessons, the content, method,
material, field can be expanded further than the knowledge and skills students are provided in
the national curriculum. To broaden perspectives through Literature lessons, besides reading
domestic artworks is discovering international art works, besides learning past works is
discovering contemporary works. In the learning process, besides listening to their teachers and
642
writing, students should be multiplied their learning activities such as discussing, debating, role
playing, researching, running projects, etc. Moreover, besides Literature, students need to read
more books in other fields such as History, Geography, Economy, Policy, even Mathematics,
Physical, Chemistry, Biology, etc. The world is limitless, the world in Literature books is
limitless too. Therefore, the more students understand their world, the more adept they are in
studying Literature. Furthermore, besides reading, students also need to be extended their
listening, watching, appreciating artworks, even breathing, touching experiencing by being
provided opportunities to appreciate artworks outside their classroom. Watching classical
movies, going to concerts, going to museums, visiting exhibitions, and so on are some activities
to widen the learning environment as well as learning forms. Otherwise, besides studying
academic knowledge, students should also be expanded their knowledge and skills in daily life
which can help them connect what they learnt with solving problems as well as creating new
things in reality. Besides preparing for extending knowledge and different viewpoints, students
also need to sharpen their logical argumentation and method to organize their thinking in logical
structures. All these learning activities should be organized systematically and strategically in
the national education program to achieve the best results of developing critical thinking among
Vietnamese students.
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About the author
Hoang Lan Anh is working as a teacher of Language and Literature in Bac Giang Gifted
High School. Since the last five years, she has studied Critical Thinking in the Pedagogical field
and applied it to her daily lessons. She also designs diverse extracurricular activities to develop
critical thinking among her students. In 2019, she founded the Teachers Learning Together
model to offer new professional development opportunities to colleagues and facilitate a
positive environment for teachers to exchange knowledge and pedagogical approaches.
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LEXICAL TRANSFER FROM VIETNAMESE TO ENGLISH

IN COLLOCATIONS OF ADVERBS AND VERBS
Nguyen Dieu Linh*1
Abstract: Although a variety of studies on vocabulary have been carried out, studies on
collocations in English used by Vietnamese postgraduate learners account for a small number.
This study, based on theories on transfer by Lado (1957), Odlin (1989), etc., investigates
Adverb+Verb collocations in 60 M.A. theses mainly on linguistics written in English by Vietnamese
postgraduate students to identify positive and negative transfers. Four methods are employed in
this study, namely the statistical method, error analysis, comparative-contrastive method and
interview. Firstly, the statistical method is employed to identify the frequency of cases of
language transfer based on the numbers and percentages of vocabulary and collocation
transfers. Secondly, error analysis is used to analyze errors in transfer and then find out the causes
of such transfer. Thirdly, the comparative-contrastive method is followed to figure out whether
there are semantic changes in the meaning of collocations when Vietnamese learners transfer
collocations from Vietnamese to English because of the similarities and differences between the
two languages. Finally, an interview is carried out to find out factors affecting lexical transfer
from Vietnamese to English in Adverb+Verb collocations. Preliminary results show that both
positive and negative transfers appear in these collocations and the ways Vietnamese students
use English are strongly affected by their mother tongue. The results, together with subsequent
studies on collocations, will provide significant theoretical and practical grounds for teaching
and learning English and by Vietnamese learners.
Keywords: collocation, positive transfer, negative transfer
INTRODUCTION
Transfer in the process of language acquisition has been widely researched since it is a
crucial variable that affects the learning of a second or foreign language. It is undeniable that
learners’ mother tongue exerts substantial influence on the learning of a new language (Jarvis,
2000; Odlin, 1989). The influence of native languages on second language acquisition (SLA)
can be divided into two kinds: positive effect and negative effect. The positive effect, or positive
transfer, promotes second language acquisition, while the negative effect, or negative transfer,
refers to the interference and obstruction of native languages to SLA. Language transfer
includes lexical transfer, syntactic transfer, phonological transfer,… with the affirmation that
lexical transfer is a really complex field of transfer.
In teaching English, we realize that Vietnamese learners’ process of English learning is
strongly affected by their way of thinking and culture. Therefore, in many contexts, because
Vietnameses’ English does not conform to English grammar and the norms of English
communication, their products are unacceptable to English-speaking people. To use English
fluently, Vietnamese learners need to have good knowledge of English, for example, four skills
(listening, speaking, reading, writing), grammar, vocabulary. Collocations are also crucial
criteria to assess learners’ levels of language proficiency. To communicate successfully, not
only Vietnamese learners but also EFL learners around the world have to use different methods,
including language transfer.
As mentioned above, language transfer is an unavoidable phenomenon in language
learning. It can occur at all levels of language such as lexical level or grammatical level.
* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Dieu Linh; Email Address: arrien_moon@yahoo.com

1 The People’s Police Academy, Vietnam
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However, it is impossible for us to cover all of such a large field of language as collocations.
Therefore, our effort and purpose are to conduct a research on positive and negative transfers in
Adverb+Verb collocations in 60 English M.A. theses written by Vietnamese post-graduate
learners.
This study aims to detect positive and negative transfers in collocations of Adverbs and
Verbs made by English post-graduate learners. This study focuses on finding answers to two
questions:
(1) Do positive lexical transfer and negative lexical transfer occur from Vietnamese to
English in Adverb+Verb collocations?
(2) If yes, what variables affect lexical transfer from Vietnamese to English in
Adverb+Verb collocations?
By doing so, this study contributes to clarifying how Vietnamese learners’ first tongue
affects the way they use English and consequently figuring out the similarities and differences
between the two languages in terms of semantics, scope and uses of words. As a result, writers
can improve their products in the future.
CONTENT
1. Literature review and theoretical background
1.1. Literature review
Language transfer has been received much attention from linguists in the world for a long
time. Early researches in language transfer can be traced back to the 1940s and 1950s, during
which the field of linguistics was heavily influenced by Behaviorism, which viewed learning
simply as a habit formation process. Fries (1945) and Lado (1957) stressed the important role of
the native language on the success in L2 learning. Lado then proposed the Contrastive Analysis
Hypothesis (CAH) as a way of explaining the role that L1 plays in L2 learning. According to
this hypothesis, patterns of the first language of L2 learners will influence their productive and
receptive skills, and similarities and differences between L1 and L2 are important predictors of
ease and difficulty of L2 learning. Kellerman (1977) found out that learners tend to transfer only
those structures, or lexical items, that they consider transferable because of their similarity with
structures in the target language.
In the early 1970s and 1980s, from the perspective of the cognitive approach, transfer was
seen as habits and L2 learners are those who decide what should or should not be transferred
(Gass, 2000).
With the development of transfer theory, more and more linguists began to pay great
attention to the relationship between the native language and SLA. Schachter (1983), Bialystok
(1983), Faerch and Kasper (1987) pointed out that transfer is a mental and communicative
process through which L2 learners’ interlanguage skills will be developed due to their previous
linguistic knowledge.
Although lexical transfer is an important phenomenon, not many studies in Vietnam have
been implemented in this field of English. Many Vietnamese researchers also conduct studies on
language transfer from Vietnamese to English. For example, Hoa (1965) carried out a research
on phonetic errors, Nguyen H.K. (2004) and Nguyen T.T.L. (2013) studied English errors of
intonation committed by Vietnamese learners while Nguyen. T.M. and Nguyen. M.H. (2006)
investigated negative pragmatic transfer from Vietnamese to English, etc. Most researches done
by Vietnamese authors often focus on errors caused by negative language transfer. It can be
explained that Vietnamese learners often make errors because of the differences between the
first and the second language. They drew out the same conclusion that the way Vietnamese
learners use English is affected by their mother tongue.
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There are also researches about teaching and learning collocations in Vietnam, for example,
studies carried out by Le (2017) or Phuong and Nguyen (2018). These authors shared the same
idea that in Vietnam, collocation isn’t paid much attention to in the process of teaching and
learning English. Teaching syllabus and time are rarely distributed to collocations. There are
hardly any particular parts only devoted to teaching collocations. They are only introduced as
small parts related to whole parts of units. Therefore, learners are often introduced collocations
individually or in sentences in a short time without adhering them to real situations or spending
time practicing them. As a result, learners, especially those at lower levels, don’t highly
appreciate the roles of collocations; thus, they don’t make an effort on learning collocations
which leads to learners’ habitual use of collocations or replacement of individual words or wrong
use of collocations. When they meet collocations, they often use the strategy of word-for-word
translation.
One more common thing shared by these authors is that they emphasize the lack of paying
attention to language transfer in general and lexical transfer in particular in the process of
English acquisition. They all agree that teachers often focus on developing skills by assigning
many tasks for learners to practice. However, they don’t focus on extending learners’
background knowledge thoroughly. For example, little time is spent on teaching and learning
vocabulary although they are the main parts of units. Teachers and learners often practice
vocabulary individually, not in real situations. Therefore, learners often make mistakes when
using them.
It can be seen that linguistics in the world share the same idea about the effect of learners’
mother tongues in the process of second language acquisition. Learners can have advantages in
this process if the target language has the same characteristics as the mother tongue, but they
also can face difficulties because of the differences between such two languages.
1.2. Theoretical background
1.2.1. Lexical transfer
To understand lexical transfer, it is necessary to pay attention to language transfer first.
Linguistics have different viewpoints of language transfer. Lado (1957) was the first one who
brought out the concept of “language transfer”. He mentioned that in the second language
acquisition process, individuals depend on their native language and tend to transfer the forms,
meanings and distributions of words in their first language and culture to the second language.
Following Lado, more and more linguists focused their attention on language transfer. Ellis
(2001) once defined transfer as a hypothesis that the learning of task B is influenced by the
learning of task A. According to Odlin (1989), transfer’s occurrence is due to the existence of
the differences and similarities in the target language and the other language that individuals
may have imperfectly acquired before. This concept now has been widely accepted by linguists.
The issue of transfer in lexis has also been received much attention from linguistics. Odlin
(1989) considered lexical transfer as the phenomena of loanwords, lexical borrowing, coinages,
false friends and calques. All of these occur because of the differences between learners’ L1 and
L2. Meanwhile, Hammarberg (2001) saw lexical transfer as the frequency use of L1 at the time
of L2 use.
One more important issue that attracted linguists’ attention is the types of transfer. There
are various ways to classify transfer. Working within an interlanguage theory, Selinker (1983)
presented such a mentalistic view of the role of L1 in L2 learning, which considers transferring
a major cognitive process in SLA. He distinguished two major types of transfer: positive and
negative transfers. Positive transfer refers to the processes whereby L1 knowledge facilitates the
acquisition of an L2. Negative transfer refers to the processes whereby L1 knowledge interferes
with and, thus, negatively impacts SLA.
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Simultaneously, Faerch and Kasper (1987) distinguished three types of production transfer:
(a) strategic transfer whereby the learner assigns focal attention to a communicative problem
and its solution; (b) subsidiary transfer which occurs when there is no focal awareness of the
problem or transferred L1 knowledge; and (c) automatic transfer which takes place when the
learner makes use of an L1 in a highly automatized manner, with attention completely diverted
to other aspects in the production process.
It is noticeable that language transfer in general and lexical transfer, in particular, occur in
the process of second language acquisition. Vygotsky (1962) said that the child can transfer
what he possesses in his mother tongue into a new language while Garcia (2009) stated that
what is learned in one language does not have to be re-learned in another. Therefore, the
similarities between the first and the second languages can make the learning process easier
while the differences between them can cause learners lots of difficulties.
1.2.2. Collocation
The past decade has seen an increasing interest in the studies on collocations. This has been
evident from a collection of papers introducing different definitions of the term “collocation”.
Nattinger and DeCarrico (1992) defined collocations as “strings of words that seem to have
certain ‘mutual expectancy’, or a greater-than-chance likelihood that they will co-occur in any
text.” (p. 21). In addition to that, Benson, Benson, and Ilson (1986) hold the view that
collocations are fixed, identifiable, non-idiomatic phrases and constructions.
It is also necessary to look at types of collocation. Different authors have different
viewpoints in classifying collocations. Benson, Benson, and Ilson (1986) divided collocations
into two major groups: grammatical and lexical collocations. Grammatical collocations consist
of a noun, or an adjective or a verb, plus a particle (a preposition, an adverb or a grammatical
structure such as an infinitive, a gerund or clause). In contrast to grammatical collocations, these
authors list various combinations of lexical collocations: verb + noun (e.g. start a family; keep a
secret); adjective + noun (e.g. good work, strong tea); adverb + adjective (e.g. heavily
influenced, amazingly gorgeous); verb + adverb (e.g. walk slowly, laugh nervously). Meanwhile,
Hill (1999) further divided collocations into four types: unique collocations (e.g. leg room),
strong collocations (e.g. rancid butter), medium-strength collocations (e.g. Sun reader), and
weak collocations (e.g. red wine). To make it easier and clearer when studying the effect of
Vietnamese on English, our research will follow Benson, Benson and Ilson’s classification.
Needless to say, the roles of collocation in teaching and learning second language capture
researchers’ attention. Brown (1974) was one of the first linguists to emphasize the important
roles of collocations in the EFL classroom. She stated that learning collocations broadens EFL
learners’ knowledge of collocation as well as improves their oral fluency, listening
comprehension and reading speed. Moreover, learning collocations can help students realize the
native-like styles in speech and writing; thus, they can use words naturally. Sharing the same
ideas as Brown, Nattinger (1980) affirmed that EFL learners can remember words; define the
semantic area of a word and predict the combination among words by learning collocations.
Furthermore, teaching collocations can assert learners’ fluency in speaking and writing because
learners have to study words in chunks, large structures of discourse and in real situations not in
isolation.
2. Methodology
2.1. Subjects
In this study, attention is focused on positive and negative transfers in Adverb+Verb
collocations in 60 English M.A. theses written by Vietnamese post-graduate learners. These
theses were collected from different institutes of linguistic and teaching training and were
written in different years from 2012 to 2019.
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Because of the lack of personal information, only 20 authors of these theses were contacted
to ask for their translation and understanding about negative lexical transfers found in these
60 theses. They were also required to join the interview (by calling) about variables affecting
their lexical transfers.
2.2. Research methodology
Four methods are used to carry out this study:
 The statistical method to identify the frequency of cases of language transfer based on the
numbers and percentages of vocabulary and collocation transfers;
 Error analysis to figure out the causes of transfer from the results of analyzing errors of
transfer;
 The comparative-contrastive method to find out how the similarities and differences
between the two languages affect the ways learners transfer from Vietnamese to English;
 An interview to find out what variables affect lexical transfer from Vietnamese to English
in Adverb+Verb collocations.
The target data on lexical transfer in Adverb+Verb collocation are collected by using the
Antconc software which was designed by Prof. Laurence Anthony at Waseda University, Japan.
Consequently, the statistical process becomes more convenient and consumes less time by
filtering parts of speech and collocations and accessing their contexts.
Furthermore, the percentage of viewpoints on obstacles confronted with when using
collocations by Vietnamese learners was gathered by interviewing.
2.4. Data analysis
After the phase of data collection by using the Antconc software, Oxford Collocations
Dictionary (2009) and Vietnamese-English Dictionary (2003) are used to classify and analyze
the data set. The former, based on Oxford English Corpus which consists of about 2.1 billion
words and is considered by English linguists to be designed, is used as a basement to identify
whether a collocation used by Vietnamese learners is correct or not. The latter, which is based
on Oxford Advanced Learners, explains words and gives instructions to uses of words in
different contexts. Therefore, these two dictionaries will help us to identify whether
Adverb+Verb collocations used in these theses are correct or not and if not, how they are used
differently from the native.
It is noticeable that this study experiences 3 stages: (1) statistical analysis of collocation
occurrences; (2) translation; (3) interview of different participants. In the first stage, statistical
analysis is used to find out the frequency and popularity of lexical transfers. It is useful to
identify the level of writers of theses. In the second stage, 20 out of 60 thesis writers were asked
to translate sentences that have errors in using collocations to check how they understand these
sentences in normal conditions (without any nerve or time constraint as to when they were
writing theses). It should be taken into consideration that, not all 60 authors of 60 theses were
contacted successfully due to the lack of personal information. Therefore, many sentences were
translated by their writers and those weren’t. Instead, they were translated by other learners who
were able to contact. However, results collected are still regarded as a valuable source of data
because they are necessary for us to assess the level of participants. At higher levels, learners
are baseless on their mother tongue when using target languages. In the final stage, these 20
learners were interviewed about difficulties they met when using Adverb+Verb collocations.
This stage would provide information for us to give suggestions for better teaching and learning
English collocation in general and Adverb+Verb collocations specifically for Vietnamese learners.
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3. Findings and discussions

3.1. Findings
3.1.1. Positive and negative transfers in English collocations used by Vietnamese learners
Among the 60 theses, we found 158 collocations with a total number of 1685 occurrences.
Most of the adverbs are used at least 3 times (accounting for 4/5 in total) and about 1/5 are used
less than 3 times. Among them, 32 adverbs are used in collocations. These adverbs are divided
into 3 groups based on the frequency:
Group 1 (≤ 2 times) includes 4 adverbs: hardly, originally, predominantly, seriously;
Group 2 (3-4 times) includes 12 adverbs: definitely, explicitly, normally, commonly,
perpetually, closely, gradually, adequately, slightly, basically, deeply, simultaneously;
Group 3 (≥ 5 times) includes 16 adverbs: generally, successfully, necessarily, differently,
strongly, greatly, positively, entirely, rapidly, highly, widely, fully, considerably, well, totally,
mainly.
The frequency of these adverbs mentioned above will be shown in the figure below.
Figure 1. Frequency of adverb occurrence in Adverb+Verb collocations

From the Figure 1 above, it can be seen that adverbs in group 1 are used least (12%),
followed by group 2 (38%) and those in group 3 are used most (50%). It is noticeable that these
adverbs belong to adverbs of manner and degree.
3.1.1.1. Positive transfer in Adverb+Verb collocations
In 158 collocations, authors of M.A. theses use 93 collocations correctly which accounts for
58.9%.
Take these sentences into consideration:
(1) In English: The result of statement 6 revealed that 83.3 percent of the students agreed or
strongly agreed that they learned how to cooperate with others in CSR. (Nguyen, 2012, p. 55).
In Vietnamese: Kết quả câu 6 cho thấy 83,3% sinh viên đồng ý hoặc hoàn toàn đồng ý
rằng họ đã học được cách làm việc với nhau trong CSR.
In this sentence, the author wanted to express the meaning hoàn toàn đồng ý. He used the
equivalent English expression strongly agree by translating from Vietnamese to English and
creating the correct collocation because the two languages share these in both meanings and
word orders. Thus, these are considered positive transfers, and it often occurs in collocations
that are popular and identical in both languages. As a result, writers can apply their prior
knowledge in their mother tongue to the target language. Some collocations with high
frequencies of use in surveyed theses are:
 largely depends on: phụ thuộc mạnh vào
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 considerably impact: ảnh hưởng lớn

 fully understand: hiểu sâu
 completely immerse: hoàn toàn đắm chìm vào
 significantly improve: tiến bộ rõ rệt
 sharply increase: tăng mạnh.
3.1.1.2. Negative transfer in Adverb+Verb collocations
Among 158 collocations used in these M.A theses, 65 collocations are used incorrectly
which take up 41.1%. Among them, 18 collocations are committed because authors don’t
understand the correct use of Vietnamese collocations and 43 occurrences because of wrong use
of adverbs.
a. Errors caused by authors’ misunderstanding of Vietnamese collocations
This type of error consists of 22 errors which account for 29.2% of the total errors. The
authors’ misunderstanding of the correct use of Vietnamese collocations leads to this type of
error. Relying on the first tongue to translate collocations into English makes them have
different meanings from the original ones in English. For example:
(2) In English: According to Nguyen Quang, this is any kind of communicative act which is
appropriately intended to show the speaker does not want to impinge on the addressee’s
privacy, thus, enhancing the sense of distance between them. (Nguyen, 2013, p. 28).
In Vietnamese: Theo tác giả Nguyễn Quang, đây là hành động giao tiếp với mục đích để thể
hiện rằng người nói không muốn can thiệp vào sự riêng tư của người nghe, và do đó, làm tăng
lên khoảng cách giữa họ.
In this context, the meaning intended to convey is có dự định/ mục đích phù hợp để so the
author translates it into English as appropriately intended to. However, the correct use in
Vietnamese is có mục đích ban đầu. According to Oxford Collocation Dictionary (2009), the
correct combination is intended originatedly. The reason can be explained as the author of the
thesis doesn’t master the use of expression in Vietnamese, so he, personally, translated it into
the target language. Therefore, we consider this type of error is an interlingual error.
Another example:
(3) In English: As the opposite of white, movies, books, print media, and television
typically depict the good guy in white and the bad guy in black. (Nguyen, 2012, p. 30)
In Vietnamese: Đối lập với sắc trắng, phim ảnh, sách, các ấn bản và tivi miêu tả một cách
sinh động hình ảnh một người tốt trong màu trắng và kẻ xấu trong màu đen.
According to English-Vietnamese Dictionary (2003, p. 1904), the word typically is explained as:
Tiêu biểu cho một kiểu người hay vật riêng biệt; điển hình: typically, American hospitality:
lòng mến khách tiêu biểu của người Mĩ.
Đặc trưng cho một người hay vật riêng biệt, đặc thù, đặc trưng: Typically, she had forgotten
her keys again: Cô ấy lại quên chìa khoá rồi, thành đặc tính rồi.
In this sentence, the author wants to convey the meaning miêu tả một cách rõ ràng, sinh
động, ấn tượng, đáng nhớ. According to Oxford Collocation Dictionary (2009), the correct
combination is vividly depict because according to English-Vietnamese Dictionary, one of the
meanings of vividly is tạo ra những hình ảnh rõ ràng và sâu sắc trong trí nhớ; sinh động.
Therefore, in this context, the meaning that should be express is a clear description which
makes a strong impression on someone.
It can be seen that in these collocations, the authors misunderstand the uses and the
meanings of collocations in their mother tongue. Therefore, they commit errors when translating
these collocations into English.
b. Errors caused by wrong choices of adverbs
This type of error occurs in many Verb+Adverb collocations. It takes up 70.8% of total
incorrect Adverb+Verb collocations (43 errors). For example:
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(4) In English: Elicitation techniques were tremendously believed to be the most effective in
increasing cadets’ vocabulary learning time and helping cadets remember the vocabulary better.
(Nguyen, 2015, p. 39).
In Vietnamese: Kĩ thuật diễn giải được rất nhiều người tin rằng là cách hiệu quả nhất để
nâng cao thời gian học từ vựng của người học và giúp họ nhớ từ tốt hơn.
According to English-Vietnamese Dictionary (2003), the word tremendously is used to
convey the meaning of describing someone or something good or at ease. Therefore, the
combination between tremendously and believe is not suitable because the meaning that the
author wants to express is a lot of people believe that [...]. According to Oxford Collocations
Dictionary (2009), the correct collocations are firmly/ really believed.
Another instance is:
(5) In English: In terms of indirectness, it is remarkably preferred when communicating
with best friend and colleague (Nguyen, 2013, p. 53).
In Vietnamese: Người ta thường hay sử dụng phương pháp gián tiếp với bạn thân hoặc
đồng nghiệp.
The author uses the collocation remarkably preferred to express the meaning “something
favourable”. However, the English-Vietnamese Dictionary (2003) explain remarkably as
something should be taken into consideration; exceptional. Therefore, the combination
remarkably preferred is incorrect. According to Oxford Collocations Dictionary (2009), the
correct collocations are greatly/ much/ strongly preferred.
In these sentences above, the authors translate the meanings from Vietnamese to English by
combining adverbs and verbs. They depend on the habits of using their mother tongue to
translate, thus, create incorrect collocations.
This type of error often occurs in many collocations such as:
Incorrect collocations Correct collocations (according to Oxford Collocations
Dictionary)
strongly convinced: được thuyết phục mạnh mẽ rằng deeply/ firmly/ absolutely / completely / full/ totally convinced
strongly approved: hoàn toàn đồng ý overwhelmingly approved.
thoroughly analyzed: được phân tích hoàn toàn fully analyzed
thoroughly described: được miêu tả hoàn toàn, đầy đủ fully describe
profoundly analyzed: phân tích sâu sắc, thấu đáo carefully/ critically/ fully/ in depth/ detail/ painstakingly analyzed.
particularly considered: xem xét một cách cẩn thận, nghiêm túc, kĩ càng carefully/ seriously considered.
completely believe: hoàn toàn tin tưởng firmly/ really/ seriously believe
3.1.2. Variables affect lexical transfer from Vietnamese to English in Adverb+Verb collocations
Results from the interview show a number of factors affect lexical transfer from
Vietnamese to English in Adverb+Verb collocations.
95% of the interviewees agree that L2 proficiency is the most important factor when
English collocations are used. Besides the fact that the similarities between English and
Vietnamese can help learners easily use collocations correctly which means positive transfer
occurs, it is undeniable that L1 influence decreases as experiences with the language and
proficiency increases. They say that the more knowledge about English collocations they obtain,
the fewer mistakes they commit; thus, the less negative lexical transfer occurs and vice versa.
An example is that, in Vietnamese, it is common and correct to say hoàn toàn nhất trí/ hoàn
toàn đồng ý. This expression is equivalent and similar to the English one totally agree.
Therefore, it is easy for learners to correctly transfer and use collocations like this. Moreover, if
learners gain the knowledge on the replacement of strongly for totally which means that they
have deep understanding of the use of the verb agree, they can use different adverbs in the
combination with agree interchangeably and correctly. However, it also should be borne in
mind that Vietnamese learners often meet difficulties when they use Adverb+Verb collocations
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whose elements can have quasi-synonyms or which are polysemic. For example, learners often
make mistakes when they use thoroughly analyzed instead of the correct combination fully
analyzed (Oxford Collocations Dictionary, 2009). The reason is they can’t distinguish the
differences between the two adverbs. They explain that in the learning process, they are just
introduced adverbs without any notification of the differences between synonyms, polysemy or
meaning senses and the Vietnamese meanings of these words are often introduced generally or
with one meaning. Moreover, teachers don’t encourage them to use dictionaries to check the
similarities and differences among those lexical items. Therefore, they just use them as habits. It
is noticeable that the participants of the interview are postgraduate students so their English
level is high but they still admit that they often use Adverb+Verb collocations as habits. If they
have deep knowledge of adverbs and verbs, when they meet unfamiliar collocations, they often
compare the uses of different adverbs and verbs, then combine them. However, their
combination is still based on word-for-word translation. Therefore, negative lexical transfer
often emerges in these situations. Taking the example thoroughly analyzed into consideration
again, the translator explained that she thought thoroughly has a deeper meaning than fully so
she often used it as a habit without any checking or being introduced about those words.
The second factor emerged is learning contexts (agreed by 80% of the interviewees). The
explanation is that positive lexical transfer occurs when learners use collocations in classroom
contexts (focused contexts) but the negative transfer is favored in unfocused contexts (contexts
outside the classroom). According to the participants, it is difficult for them if collocations are
just introduced individually or in sentences without any context. They can remember these
collocations in the classroom when the learning process occurs in a quiet environment with little
impact from other elements. Nevertheless, when they are in real situations with lots of effects
from surroundings, it is difficult for them to concentrate and analyze the situation to choose
correct collocations. Again, they use collocations as habits, randomly combine adverbs and
verbs and use the method of word-for-word translation; thus, negative lexical occurs. For
instance, the adverb profoundly is introduced as “deeply/ extremely” and a learner said that she
often met this word in reading texts. Consequently, when she wanted to express the meaning
“được phân tích một cách kĩ càng, cẩn thận, đầy đủ”, she used the combination profoundly
analyzed although according to Oxford Collocation Dictionary (2009), the correct choices are
carefully/ critically/ fully/ in depth/ detail/ painstakingly analyzed.
The L1 background is also emphasized as a key factor affecting the use of English
collocations by 40% of the interviewees. They explain that English and Vietnamese have some
common structures such as SVO or language chunks, for example: Verb+Adverb chunk so it is
easy for them to translate from Vietnamese to English and create correct collocations. However,
they also admit that chunks like Adverb+Verb cause them difficulties because they can use
adverbs and verbs randomly or sometimes, they don’t know which combination is correct,
Adverb+Verb collocation or Verb+Adverb collocation when they meet unfamiliar ones.
Therefore, learners often base on their mother tongue and transfer collocations from Vietnamese
to English. For example, if learners need to use expressions like strongly agree (hoàn toàn đồng
ý), it is easy for them to remember and use correctly because these chunks are similar and
equivalent in both languages. However, when they encounter verbs like believe and they want to
express the meaning hoàn toàn tin tưởng, sometimes, they don’t know which combination is
correct, firmly believe or believe firmly.
Other factors mentioned are learners’ motivation, age or gender but with a small percentage
of the interviewees.
3.2. Discussions
The results of this study answer two questions of the study.
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To answer the first question, the results indicate that positive lexical transfer and negative
lexical transfer from Vietnamese to English occur in Adverb+Verb collocations. Positive
transfer occurs when learners use familiar collocations or those with adverbs that don’t have
synonyms or polysemy. If Vietnamese expressions are equivalent to those in English, learners
can use them correctly by word-to-word translation. The positive effect occurs in popular and
easy-to-remember collocations. Nevertheless, negative transfer emerges in unfamiliar
collocations or ones which contain adverbs with lots of semantic relations. In many contexts,
authors commit interlingual errors because they apply their prior knowledge on the expressions
in the mother tongue and translate them into English, thus, create wrong combinations without
taking care of the differences between two languages. Lacking of the understanding of English
and Vietnamese expressions and meanings leads to this type of errors. The habit of using
common combinations in their first tongue makes authors translate them into English without
researching carefully at correct collocations before using. Moreover, it is noticeable that adverbs
used frequently belong to adverbs of manner and degree. It shows that at high levels,
postgraduate learners tend to use more adverbs to express their ideas successfully and
beautifully because adverbs can expand meanings of expressions and Adverb+Verb collocation
is one of the most popular combinations in English and Vietnamese. This finding affirms the
importance of collocations as well as lexical transfer in the process of teaching and learning
English. The more learners master the target language which is English, the less negative lexical
transfer occurs. Therefore, teachers and learners should adjust their teaching and learning
strategies to focus more on collocations and other elements related to them such as synonyms or
polysemy to help learners increase their knowledge of correct English collocations; thus,
decrease the occurrence of negative lexical transfer.
For the second research question, L2 proficiency and learning contexts are selected as the two
most important factors affecting the use of English collocations by Vietnamese learners. It is
noticeable that these two variables are interrelated. When learners are taught collocations
carefully in real situations, they can have deep knowledge of collocations; thus, use them correctly.
Therefore, L2 proficiency in teaching and learning English collocations is not just about how
many collocations are taught and learned but also how deeply learners understand collocations.
CONCLUSION
1. Recapitulation
To sum up, it is evident that lexical transfer is a very common strategy which Vietnamese
learners adopt when they produce collocations in L2 English. When the learners are unable to
find the appropriate lexical items, they will depend on L1 equivalents which often causes
collocation errors in L2. The result of the study supports for Koya (2003), Laufer & Waldman
(2011), who stated that no matter how good L2 learners are, they still resorted to L1 in selecting
possible collocations for L2. As clearly shown in this paper, the learners’ mother tongue plays a
crucial role in their L2 collocation acquisition. In other words, most of the students’ collocation
errors are attributed to L1 transfer.
The results of the study indicate that Vietnamese teachers and learners should adjust their
teaching and learning strategies to focus more on collocations and their elements. The more
carefully collocations are introduced, the more correct learners use collocations; thus, the less
negative lexical transfer emerges.
2. Limitations of the Study
The data of this study are collected from 60 English M.A theses written by Vietnamese
post-graduate learners. The results might be different if data from English Ph.D. dissertations or
essays are gathered, too.
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Moreover, the study focuses only on Adverb+Verb collocations. The research results based
on other collocations may differ from this present study.
3. Pedagogic suggestions
Indeed, lexical transfer exists in second language learning and has a strong influence on
Vietnamese learners’ English from grammatical level to lexical level. Although the similarities
between English and Vietnamese promote the learning process, the differences between two
languages can make learners commit errors. Therefore, based on the results of the study, we
would like to give some pedagogic suggestions to help Vietnamese learners overcome the problem:
Firstly, teachers and students should bear in their minds the importance of teaching and
learning English collocations. Although the materials for this subject have been changed and
updated over time and English is received more and more attention at all levels, time for this
language aspect in class is still limited, except for those whose major is English. Therefore,
teachers often skip time for teaching collocation carefully because they have to distribute time
for other activities and knowledge in an English lesson. It leads to the fact that many teachers
and learners don’t appropriately appreciate the importance of English collocations. Although
there are books about or having parts about collocations, they are often introduced as references.
Teachers often skip time for them by briefly introducing them. Therefore, teachers should spend
more time teaching this aspect, assigning tasks or organizing games relating to them.
Secondly, collocations should be introduced as lexical units, not as individual words.
Usually, teachers pay attention to giving the grammatical collocation of phrasal verbs or
prepositional phrases as lexical units while lexical collocations such as Adverb+Verb
collocations are often presented as a part of the combination or the collocationality of the word
combination is not emphasized. It should be noticed that raising advanced-level students’
awareness and sensitivity of word collocationality is very important. When collocations are
learned as chunks or sequences of words, they will be kept in learners’ long-term memory
instead of memorizing their constituent elements separately.
Thirdly, when students look up new words in their dictionary, they should be encouraged to
also look at words that usually collocate with them.
Last but not least, learners’ input should be provided essentially. It is necessary for students
to be supplied with a list of common, frequent English collocations that are incongruent with L1
counterparts, which can hopefully raise their awareness of a mismatch between L1-L2
collocations (Nesselhauf, 2003). Moreover, when teaching collocations, teacher should also
mention synonyms or polysemic words which can help students know the differences between
them and can use them correctly in different combinations. Language transfer in general and
lexical transfer in particular often occurs when learners lack L2 language and knowledge. There
are lots of L2 multi-word unit which has no L1 equivalent needed “to be met and remembered”.
Therefore, when learners are provided with essential knowledge, they will not rely on the first
tongue to transfer collocations and commit errors.
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About the author

MA. Nguyen Dieu Linh is now an English teacher at the Department of Foreign
Languages – People’s Police Academy. She has been teaching English for 12 years and now is
doing a Ph.D. dissertation at the Faculty of Linguistics, Vietnam National University –
University of Social Sciences and Humanities. Her research focuses on the lexical transfer from
Vietnamese to English in the collocations of various parts of speech, for example, between
Adverbs and Verbs. She has authored nearly 10 papers in teaching English skills and lexical
transfer.
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ENHANCING THE COOPERATION BETWEEN FAMILIES

AND SCHOOLS IN THE EDUCATION OF SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL
SKILLS FOR 5- TO 6-YEAR-OLD PRESCHOOLERS
Phan Thi Thuy Hang*1
Abstract: This paper is conducted to study the practical issues and propose suggestions to
develop the family and preschool cooperation in social-emotional skills education for
preschoolers aged 5-6 years old. The study findings show that the acquisition of social-emotional
skills critically enhances children's development in many aspects, enables children to develop
better cognitive and academic skills, and fosters positive social behaviors and limits negative
ones. These skills also help young children build sound relationships with their peers and families,
and quickly adapt to their schooling commencement. The review of several studies also claims
that a close relationship between family and preschool is essential to achieve efficiency in the
education of social-emotional skills for preschoolers. However, an in-depth survey of 120 teachers
and 340 parents exposes negligible supports and several limitations on the thread. As a result
of this study, the author suggests developing a research on the education of children's
social-emotional skills.
Keywords: cooperation between families and schools, early childhood teacher, 5- to 6-year-old
preschoolers, social-emotional skills
INTRODUCTION
Early Childhood Education is the first level of education in the national education system. It
aims to nurture, care, and educate children aged from three months to six years old, which is the
primary foundation for developing children’s personalities in their early years of life. For that
reason, regarding fully forming both mental and physical development in children, the
relationship between families and schools plays an essential role. Acknowledging the
importance of these counterparts’ relationships, President Ho Chi Minh emphasized that
“School education is solely one of many integral parts in which the education in family and
society is also required to complement with school for the well-rounded education. No matter
how good the education in school is, the final outcoming could not be completed without family
and society’s education” (Ho Chi Minh, 1957).
According to CASEL Foundation, social emotions are crucial aspects to help children attain
self-awareness, control their feelings, build good relationships, and consequently impact
children’s later cognitive and behavior skills. Furthermore, these social-emotional skills also
bring a positive and safe learning base for preschool students and foster their possibility of
academic and social success. If one can acquire social-emotional skills, for humans in general and
children in specific, he/she will be able to deal with their own emotions and others’ more positively
and successfully as well as handle different social situations in daily life (Housman, 2017).
As for preschoolers from 5 to 6 years old, the education of social-emotional skills
significantly contributes to promoting their development in thinking and learning activities,
increasing positive social behaviors, controlling negative ones, and reducing stress. These skills,
moreover, stimulate children’s enthusiasm to go to school, excitement, respect, and sound
relationship establishment with peers and seniors. These social and emotional skills are
correlated to help children’s well-being and mental growth to quickly adapt to their primary
* Corresponding Author: Phan Thi Thuy Hang; Email Address: phanthithuyhang.hs@gmail.com

1 Nghe An College of Education
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schools. Dung L. T. (2015) indicated that social and emotional skills help children easily adapt
and successfully socialize with others, connect and maintain social relations and achieve good
performance at school. As a result, the development of their social and emotional skills is of
great importance for preschoolers at the age of 5-6 to prepare them prior to formal schooling.
However, it is noted that achieving the effectiveness of educating these skills requires close
collaboration between the family and preschool.
There have been some studies conducted on both national and international scales on the
topic of the cooperation between schools and parents in nurturing and educating preschoolers
such as Bercnick & Devijak (2017); Cohen & Anders (2019); Lai (2019); Hoang (2018), etc.
This research paper investigates practical issues and suggests approaches to improve the
collaboration between family and school in the education of social-emotional skills for
preschoolers aged 5-6 year old. This aims to help meet the current education requirements for
children who are going to become global citizens to the company with the following
characteristics: flexibility, creativity, positivity, proactivity, and adaptability to changes.
CONTENT
1. Views on social emotion
Social emotion is an academic phrase that has recently drawn many Western scholars’
attention for a variety of explanations. Based on the review of some national and international
studies, social emotions are concluded to consist of the following basic understandings.
According to Godon et al. (2011), “social emotions are the process that children or adults
gain essential skills to succeed in school, work, and social situations; establish healthy bonds
with others and improve personal development”. Zin (2004) defines “social emotions as a
process through which humans learn to acknowledge and control their feelings, care for other
people, make the right decisions and take responsibility, as well as build a positive relationship
and lessen negative behavior aspects”. CASEL Foundation (2015) also considers “social
emotions as a stage that helps children or adults effectively acquire and apply their knowledge,
attitude, and skills which are to understand and manage their emotions, to set aims and
implement positive goals, also know how to empathize with others to establish and maintain
healthy connection, and finally make up responsible decisions”.
According to CASEL Foundation, social emotion consists of five fundamental components,
which are:
– Self-awareness: The ability to accurately identify one’s own feelings, thoughts, and
reflective behaviors.
– Self-management: The ability to control one’s feelings, thoughts, and behaviors in
different social situations.
– Social awareness: The ability to acknowledge others’ critical opinions, empathize, take
care, help, and share with others in daily life; the ability to apprehend ethical standards and
social norms and from that, to recognize the resource to support family, school, and community.
– Relationship skills: The ability to establish and maintain profound links with different
individuals and groups. It includes communication skills and the ability to listen, cooperate, and
effectively resolve conflicts, and the ability to seek and ask for help as needed.
– Responsible decision-making: The ability to make decisions based on social and ethical
standards. The ability to know how to evaluate the consequences of different actions and
consider their own and others’ happiness.
In this research, CASEL’s views on social emotion are used as a base for researched terms.
Social emotions are of great importance to children of all ages. As to preschoolers aged 5-6
years old, social emotions help children improve following aspects:
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Firstly, children at the age of 5-6 years old are to develop many skills of which social and
emotional skills enable them to express their own feelings and communicate to others around
them. The capability in expressing and recognizing feelings is to assist children in
understanding others’ emotions, knowing how to care and share with others, engaging socially,
and building a foundation of moral qualities and personalities. It is also seen to develop their
capabilities and equip children with essential life skills to integrate into the community.
Secondly, about boosting positive behaviors, social-emotional skills enhance the development
of mental abilities, but these skills also help children manage their negative feelings like sadness,
worry, anger, scare, and jealousy. The ability to control their emotions helps kids diminish
negative attitudes such as aggression, stubbornness, shyness, impatience, and inappropriate
verbal and nonverbal expressions. Also, the positive emotions which involve happiness,
confidence, patience, and concentration are more likely lifted. Curby et al. (2015) corroborated
that “children who know how to control their emotions will behave in a positive manner that is
beneficial in establishing relationships and cooperating with others to complete all tasks”.
Thirdly, social and emotional skills help children establish and maintain relationships with
others. Preschoolers often find many difficulties in establishing and maintaining their
relationships with others, especially with their peers. Their innate actions are sometimes
expressed instinctively, which may lead to their limited ability to control their feelings or to
keep close bonds with their friends. To cite an example, as they see their friends have a nice toy,
kids often try to take it or even overexpress it inappropriately to overtake the toy from others or
cry over it unreasonably. However, young children who possess academic social-emotional
skills are intuitively aware of the situation and others’ feelings to manage their communication
with others to achieve their goals. Additionally, these kids tend to have close positive bonds
with parents and teachers that help their relating adults find it easy to identify and understand
their problematic emotions through verbal and non-verbal expressions, accordingly timely
delivering encouragement and support to them as needed.
Last but not least, thanks to social and emotional support, children find it easier to engage
in a friendly learning environment in primary school at their later ages.
Therefore, social-emotional skills are affirmed to play an essential role in children’s
development, especially 5- to 6-year-old preschoolers. However, a solid collaboration between
family and school is necessary to develop these skills profoundly for children. This relation is
significantly essential in the education of children’s social-emotional skills for the following
reasons.
Preschool and kindergarten are fundamental to children’s development which set the
foundation for preliminary knowledge about social-emotional skills for kids; meanwhile,
families nurture the environment to train and develop these skills. Living in their family,
children are likely to be exposed to many situations in which they could acknowledge and
practice social-emotional skills such as expressing their emotions, controlling negative feelings,
sympathizing, and taking care and supporting other family members. Family members serve as
role models for children to learn to recognize and express social-emotional skills in their own
way. At the same time, a family is a natural place for children to demonstrate social-emotional
expression most gently and naturally.
The proper bond between family and preschool will help increase children’s positive
outcomes and limit their weaknesses. Via communicating to collaborate the education for
children’s social-emotional skills, families and schools are likely to work on more opportunities
to share their thoughts and experience on the ongoing development of their kids in regards to
social-emotional skills in family and at schools. This occasion not only facilitates families and
schools to keep updated with children’s improvement thanks to the skills, but it also provides
teachers the key to timely adjustments on curriculum and activities that suit the individual
661
characteristics and the current level of social-emotional skills of each child. Cohen & Anders
(2019) claimed that “parents’ participation in educating children combined with teachers’ efforts
would help parents have a deeper understanding of their children’s curriculum, making the
teaching process at home a lot easier”. Bercnick & Devijak (2017) illustrated: “The cooperation
between family and preschool has a special meaning for children, especially for young children
who just started learning at the preschool and are preparing to move to primary school”.
2. The practical issues of the cooperation between family and school in the education
of social-emotional skills for 5-6 years old preschoolers
The survey on the current situation of the family and school relations in improving
children’s social and emotional skills was conducted with the participants of 120 preschool
teachers and 340 parents in Nghe An and Ha Tinh Province. The teachers are from 22 to 50
years old, and their working seniority is from one to 31 years. Most of the participating teachers
achieved a preliminary Bachelor’s degree in Early Childhood Education. Also, all involved
parents of children attending the preschool classes for 5 to 6 years old in the local areas. The
primary methodology used in this study is the quantitative research method and the secondary
data analysis method to reveal the percentage of research aspects:
(1) Teachers’ and parents’ awareness of the importance of family-school cooperation in
social-emotional skills for 5- to 6-year-old children.
(2) The cooperation level of the contents of social-emotional skills education for 5- to
6-year-old preschool children.
(3) The level of various forms of cooperation with parents to educate social-emotional skills
for 5- to 6-year-old preschool children.
After collecting and analyzing data, the study findings present the following insights:
Figure 1. Awareness of teachers and parents about the importance of family-school cooperation in
social-emotional skills for 5- to 6-year-old preschool children.
Looking at Figure 1 details, it can be seen that teachers and parents have been aware of the
importance of their cooperation in the education of children’s social-emotional skills. 100% of
parents and teachers agree that the relationship between parents and schools is essential to educate
young children’s social-emotional skills. None of them considers this issue as “unimportant”.
A general study of national and international research works on “the cooperation between
schools and families in preschool children’s care and education” reveals that 100% of teachers
and parents recognized the importance of the cooperation between schools and families in
preschool children’s care and education. Cohen & Anders (2019) stated that the cooperation
between parents and preschools plays an important role to promote children’s social emotional
development during their childhood and maturity. Thus, the findings of this study and some
other research works on the cooperation between families and schools in preschool children’s
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education and care, in general, and education of social emotional skills to children, in particular,
reconfirms the importance of this cooperation.
Table 1. The cooperation degree on the contents of social-emotional skills education
for 5- to 6-year-old preschool children
Teachers (n=120) Parents (n= 340)
Degree Degree
No. Component Frequently Sometimes Never Frequently Sometimes Never
3 2 1 X S.D 3 N 1 X S.D
N % N % N % N % N % N %
1 Self -Awareness 78 65 42 35 0 0 2.6 0.48 120 35.3 213 62.6 7 2.1 2.3 0.51
2 Self- Management 26 21.7 54 45 40 33.3 1.9 0.74 16 4.7 281 82.6 43 12.6 1.9 0.41
3 Social Awareness 114 95 6 5 0 0 2.9 0.22 181 53.2 97 28.5 62 18.2 2.3 0.77
4 Relationship Skills 12 10 37 30.8 71 59.2 71.5 0. 67 21 6.2 236 69.4 83 24.4 1.8 0.52
Responsible
5 13 10.8 57 47.5 50 41.2 11.7 0.59 17 5.0 281 82.6 42 12.4 1.9 0.41
Decision Making
Concluding from the table figures, the given data illustrate the following:
– In terms of “Self-Awareness”:
+ Teachers who “regularly” cooperate with parents to educate children about self-aware
skills account for 65%. Meanwhile, 42% of the “sometimes” do this, and none of them “never”
connect with parents about teaching these skills to kids.
+ There are 213 parents who “sometimes” cooperate with teachers in training their children
about self-awareness (62.6%). Only 35.3% of parents “regularly” coordinate with teachers, in
contrast with teachers whose figures show their “regularly” concern numbered nearly 30% more
than parents. Likewise, 2.1% of parents “never” do this before, whereas no teachers will do
“never” interaction with parents. Consequently, it can be inferred that most parents have not
paid enough attention to cooperating with schools to educate their children’s social-emotional
skills. As recorded in the interviewees’ answers to the question, “Do you frequently coordinate
with teachers to educate your children for social-emotional skills?”. Many parents admitted that
even though teachers had instructed them how to help kids gain more self-awareness skills, they
did not have time to implement what they had been told, just on some occasions. Parents mainly
taught children to spell their names or learn their house address instead of other knowledge like
self-awareness.
– In terms of “Self-Management”:
+ The number of teachers who “regularly” cooperate with parents accounted for 95% while
only 5% of teachers “sometimes” work with families to educate children. It is exerted that
teachers are increasingly concerned about “self-management” education for kids.
+ On the other hand, the proportion of parent attendants “regularly” and “sometimes”
cooperate with teachers is witnessed at 53.2% and 28.5% respectively, and around 18.2%
interviewed parents “never” assist teachers in teaching “self-management”. In comparison with
other terms of social-emotional skills, it is positively affirmed that the most concerned attention
of parents is active in educating their children’s social-emotional skills regarding empathy,
caring, sharing, helping, and respecting others.
– For other terms: Social Awareness, Relationship Skills and Responsible Decision
Making.
The figures indicate that most teachers and parents “sometimes” cooperate in educating
these skills to children; minorities of them “regularly” do this. However, many parents and
teachers “never” teach their children these skills.
In consequence, five components of social-emotional skills have not been fully addressed
by parents and teachers. They mainly focus on two components, “self-awareness” and
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“self-management”, while the others are underestimated. It is also worth noting that the number
of teachers and parents who “never” collaborate to educate children is considerable. Otherwise,
in addition to the percentage of responses, the mean value and standard deviation showed a
frequent implementation of “self-awareness” and “social awareness” by teachers and parents. In
details, the mean value of factors “self-awareness” and “social awareness” reacted by teachers
and parents is always higher than other factors (for teachers, the mean value of self-awareness is
2.6 points, that of social awareness reached 2.9 points); for parents, the values of these factors is
2.3). The difference of mean values between self-awareness and social awareness compared to
the remaining factors namely self-management, relationship skills and responsible decision
making for teachers and parents varies from 0.5 to 1.4 points.
Although the cooperation between families and schools has an important role in the
education of children has been shown in previous studies, the cooperation between families and
schools to educate social-emotional skills for preschool children still draws little attention of
research in Vietnam. Research works mainly focus on assessing the effectiveness of the
cooperation between families and schools in developing children’s socio-emotional competence
(for example, Smith et al. (2019); Harpaz & Grinshtain (2020); Lang et al. (2020), etc.) These
studies all concluded that the cooperation between families and schools is highly efficient in
educating social-emotional skills for children.
Thus, the difference in this study is to show the reality of school-parents cooperation level
to educate the five component skills of social-emotional skills for preschool children aged
5-6 years old. Therefore, this study not only contributes to improving the understanding of
parents-school cooperation to develop children’s social-emotional skills in general but also
demonstrates the fact that the components of social-emotional skills chosen by teachers and
parents to work together to educate preschool children aged 5-6 years old are not similar.
Table 2. The extent to which teachers use parent-teacher collaboration
to teach social-emotional skills to preschool children aged 5-6 years old
Inplementation level (n=120)
Frequently Sometimes Never
No Cooperation forms
3 2 1 X S.D
Quantity % Quantity % Quantity %
Discussion with parents after the child’s health and
18 15 93 77.5 9 7.5 2.1 0.47
1 development index check.
2 Discussion with parents at parent meeting. 116 96.7 4 3.3 0 0 2.8 0.16
3 Discussion with parents during children’s pick-up. 89 74.2 28 23.3 3 2.5 2.7 0.51
4 Discussion with parents by telephone. 3 2.5 27 22.5 90 75 1.3 0.50
Discussion with parents through Facebook and
6 113 94.2 4 3.3 3 2.5 2.9 0.36
other applications texting.
Discussion with parents through the organization
19.
7 of festivals and events under the direction of the 0 0 97 80.8 23 1.8 0.40
2
school.
Discussion with parents through contact book (or
8
written documents) given to students to take back 5 4.2 113 94.2 2 1.7 2.0 0.24
home at weekends.
Analyzing the research figures, it is apparent that the highest interactive form between
teachers and parents is at parent meetings with 96.7%. Teachers also “regularly” use techniques
via online applications (5) and at the times of pick-up and drop-off (3) to communicate with
parents about educating children on social-emotional skills. Other communicative forms
accordingly at the time of health check (1), via direct phone calls (4), at school festive events
(6), and in written form (7) are not “regularly” conducted by teachers to work with parents.
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As for the teacher’s comments, these forms facilitate less time to discuss with parents about
social-emotional skills and the importance of educating children at home.
In addition, the study reveals several challenges that limit teachers’ and parents’
coordination in educating social-emotional skills.
From teachers’ perspective, many teachers (76%) share the view that “parents attain high
expectations of teachers” in the education of children’s social-emotional skills, while 82% of
teachers agree that “parents who cooperate with teachers only implement a part of the plan”.
Moreover, 83% of parents “do not directly take kids to schools,” and 78% of parents have
“limited understanding about social-emotional skills”. The latter also supposes that “preschoolers
do not have to study; they just need to play nice”. All of those create many obstacles in
teachers’ cooperative process with parents to train children about social-emotional skills.
As for parents, 87% of them “do not have time for kids,” other 89% “have limited
awareness of social-emotional skills,” and 64% of them have “limitation in using technology,
therefore, they hardly communicate with teachers”.
Thus, the results of this study demonstrate that the cooperation between teachers and
parents in the education of social-emotional skills involves many difficulties and has not been
well-addressed from counterparts.
On the other hand, the index of mean values between forms once again confirms that the
“discussions at parent meetings” ( X = 2.8) is frequently used by teachers to collaborate with
parents in the education of social-emotional skills for children, followed by the “discussion with
parents through Facebook and other applications texting” ( X = 2.9), the “discussion with
parents during children’s pick-up” ( X = 2.7), while other methods (1), (3), (7), (8) are less
commonly used by teachers. The mean value differences between the forms selected for the
study ranges from 0.1 to 1.7 points.
In the study “The coordination between schools and families in the care and education of
5-year-old children in preschools in Binh Chanh District, Ho Chi Minh City” (Lai, 2019).
Compared with Lai’s study (2019), the “discussion between teachers and parents” was used the
most (“very frequently” accounted for 75.5%, “frequently” accounted for 26.5%), followed by
the “discussion with parents via emails, phone and text message”, these are more regularly
chosen by teachers than other methods in the current research (discussion with parents via
contact book, good child certificate; information published on the noticeboard for parents;
discussion with parents after the child’s health and development index check; at festivals
and events; on school websites). Thus, the findings of the present study once again confirm
the reality of using forms of cooperation between schools and families in the education
of social-emotional skills for 5-year-old children, in particular, and in the care and education of
5- to 6 -year-old children, in general.
3. Proposing suggestions to improve the coordination between family and school in
the education of social-emotional skills for 5-6 years old preschoolers
From analysis on social emotion and survey results, we now propose several suggestions
to improve the efficiency of the cooperation between family and school in the education of
social-emotional skills for 5- to 6-year-old preschoolers as following approaches.
Firstly, raise awareness among teachers and parents of social-emotional skills and the
importance of social-emotional skills in children’s development.
* Objective: To assure parents and preschool teachers thoroughly understand the
importance of social-emotional skills in children’s mental and physical development, especially
at the age of 5 to 6 years old. From that, preschool teachers and parents will have the inclusive
consciousness to develop these skills for children jointly.
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* Procedure: To facilitate different approaches to raise awareness among teachers and

parents about social-emotional skills’ role in children’s development.
– As for preschool teachers: At periodical school meetings, the school leadership should
explain and enhance preschool teachers’ understanding of the importance of social-emotional
skills in the development of children. At the same time, teachers must acquire knowledge
through materials such as books, magazines, or the Internet. Also, teachers are encouraged to
use different forms and pedagogical techniques flexibly and creatively to regularly educate
children on social-emotional skills. The school leadership is supposed to set a plan for
examination schedules and assessments to teacher performance on their teaching activities for
social-emotional skills to promptly recognize rewards or execute any adjustment to the teaching
plan for the teacher. On the other hand, when implementing topics (a topic usually lasts 4-6
weeks), teachers can design social-emotional skills education content appropriate to that topic
and send it to parents. Teachers suggest parents guide children at home. This not only helps
parents better understand social-emotional skills but also helps them practice those understandings
on their own children.
– As for parents: Based on different occasions, such as regular parent meetings, festive
school events with parent attendances, online social groups on Zalo, Facebook, and others,
schools and teachers are likely to communicate and collaborate with parents to comprehend the
content and importance of social-emotional skills for 5- to 6-year-old children. They should also
emphasize the importance of these skills in children from 5 to 6 years old in the transition from
preschool to elementary school. At the same time, the headteacher is supposed to encourage and
provide parents documents and measures to strengthen and practice these skills for children at
home quickly.
* Requirements:
– School leadership is to attain the required knowledge and resources to train teachers and
provide them with social-emotional skills. Also, it is likely to create sharing environments and
measures to encourage and motivate teachers to regularly create and integrate educational
components of social-emotional skills in children’s daily activities.
– Teachers actively learn about the educational content of social-emotional skills in
different channels to accumulate knowledge about these skills, and at the same time, know how
to engage parents in cooperation with teachers.
– Parents acknowledge the importance of their participation in teaching children about
social-emotional skills.
Secondly, prepare plans, goals, and content for social-emotional skills to cooperate with
parents in specific periods.
* Objective:
– Raise the sense of initiative in parents and teachers in cooperating to educate social-emotional
skills to children from 5 to 6 years old.
– Avoid using multiple contents simultaneously, which can reduce the education effect of
these skills.
– Make sure this education achieves the highest outcome.
* Procedure:
Teachers prepare plans and goals and identify the components of social-emotional skills
essential to form and develop in each stage.
– Teachers instruct specific approaches to teach these skills to children at school and
suggest alternative measurements for parents to practice for children at home.
– Teachers inform parents of the plan to train children’s social-emotional skills jointly.
– Teachers are in active discussion with parents about the assessment method to evaluate
children’s social-emotional development. After that, they are both to adjust their plans and
contents to achieve the following goals.
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Example: With the topic: Self (usually done within 3 weeks)

Step 1: The teacher determines the goals and content of social-emotional skills that need to
be formed and trained for children.
The main socio-emotional skills to train children in this topic include self-awareness skills,
social awareness skills and self-management skills.
Goals:
– To support children to express their sense of self.
– To help children recognize emotions (happy, sad, scared, angry, surprised, embarrassed...)
through pictures, facial expressions, gestures, voices of themselves and others.
– To help them express emotions: happy, sad, scared, angry, surprised, embarrassed.
– To help children control emotions: sad, scared, angry, surprised, embarrassed.
– To help children know how to console relatives and friends and share the joy with them.
– To help children know how to show affection to people and things around them.
Step 2: Teachers give specific forms and measures to educate these skills for children at school
and suggest forms and measures for parents to practice these skills on their children at home.
Suggested forms and measures for teachers to implement in this topic include Exchange
and talk with children about themselves; Use self-themed games; Organize for children to see
pictures and videos about activities and images showing emotions (happy, sad, scared, angry,
surprised, embarrassed); Create problem situations for children to express consolation, share the
joy with others… Forms that can be done in class comprise the creation of conditions for
children to implement their project individually (drawing pictures of emotions); to work in
small/large groups; to carry out indoor and outdoor activities.
Step 3: Teachers inform parents of the plan to cooperate in training social-emotional skills
for children.
Step 4: Teachers discuss with parents forms, methods, and assessments of the results of
social-emotional skills that have been practiced on children.
Step 5: Teachers evaluate and adjust the plan and goals for the content of social-emotional
skills education in the next topic.
* Requirements:
– Teachers have sufficient knowledge and documents about social-emotional skills and
identify the appropriate content and method in children’s every specific activity.
– Teachers understand the child’s current level of social-emotional skills to provide appropriate
social-emotional skills education contents.
– Teachers know how to involve parents in the process and follow through with their
proposed plan.
Thirdly, family and school cooperate flexibly in different forms in the education of
social-emotional skills for children.
* Objective: Facilitate teachers and parents to quickly come to consent and work together to
educate children’s social-emotional skills in a wide range of selective forms. Meanwhile, this
will be time-saving and reasonably save travel costs for teachers and parents.
* Procedure:
– Teachers select different platforms to exchange information with parents about
social-emotional skills education, such as face-to-face communications at regular parent
meetings, phone calls, and messages on Facebook, Zalo, and other online social applications.
– Depending on the specific time, teachers use appropriate forms to discuss the plan of
educating social-emotional skills in children with parents.
– Regularly encourage and remind parents to educate their children on social-emotional
skills through such selective forms.
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* Requirements:
– Teachers acquire adequately how to flexibly apply selective forms to coordinate with
parents in educating children’s social-emotional skills.
– Parents enthusiastically respond and cooperate with teachers.
CONCLUSION
Social-emotional skills are important for preschool children, especially 5-6 years old.
Social-emotional skills not only help children become aware of themselves, recognize the
emotional states of others, manage their own emotions, show their care, help others, etc., but
also create favorable conditions for children to study in primary schools. Alzahrani et al. (2019)
stated that social-emotional skills make the transition from preschool to primary school more
favorable and create more success in learning and relationships in children’s new environment.
Helping children form and develop these skills sustainably and stably requires the
cooperation of many social forces, especially the cooperation between families and preschools.
Previous studies have confirmed that the cooperation between schools and families is highly
effective in educating social-emotional skills for preschool children, in general, and preschool
children aged 5-6 years old, in particular.
The results of the survey show that the cooperation between parents and preschools to
educate social-emotional skills for preschool children aged 5-6 years old is still limited and has
not been focused. The combination of the contents of social-emotional skills education for
children is not equal, such as self-awareness and social awareness on which teachers and parents
focus on to coordinate with children more than other contents (self-management, relationship
skills, and responsible decision-making). Forms of cooperation between teachers and parents
also focus on some forms such as parent meetings; direct discussion with parents at pick-up
time; discussion with parents via messages on Facebook, Zalo and other applications, etc. The
remaining forms are less focused on by teachers. Based on theory and practice, the article
proposed some solutions to improve this cooperation.
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About the author
MA. Phan Thi Thuy Hang is currently working as a lecturer of the Department of Early
Childhood Education at Nghe An College of Education. The author has 11 scientific research
works in the field of early childhood education published in a number of distinguished journals
in Vietnam, international and national seminars such as Journals of science – Hanoi National
University of Education; ICTER International Conference – Thai Nguyen University; Educational
Journals, Scientific Journals – Hanoi National University of Education 2 and 01 reference book.
Currently, the author is doing researches as a doctoral student at the Department of Early
Childhood Education – Hanoi National University of Education, with the topic “Educating
social and emotional skills for preschool children aged 5-6 years old through play activities”.
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TEACHING COMMUNICATION SKILLS TO CHILDREN WITH MILD

INTELLECTUAL DISABILITIES IN MOUNTAINOUS PRESCHOOLS
Ho Sy Hung*1
Abstract: Children with mild intellectual disabilities have many impairments in communication
and social interaction that make it difficult for them to establish relationships with peers in
preschool. Therefore, teaching communication for them is an important goal in inclusive
education. The purpose of the article is to investigate the status of teaching communication skills
to children with mild intellectual disabilities in mountainous preschools. A survey was conducted
of 10 kindergartens with 105 preschool teachers about activities used to teach communication to
children with mild intellectual disabilities, methods used to teach communication skills to
children, and difficulties faced by preschool teachers in improving communication skills for
children with mild intellectual disabilities. The study uses four case exercises to assess the
communication of 8 children with mild intellectual disabilities aged 5-6 years old. The study
selects the research area to be kindergartens in mountainous districts in Thanh Hoa Province. The
main research method is a mixed method through a survey by questionnaires and observation of
activities organized in classrooms with the participation of children. Research results have shown
that children with mild intellectual disabilities have many difficulties in communicating in the
classroom, especially using gestures, social interaction, and appropriate emotional expression to
interact with their peers. Besides, the research findings also revealed that preschool teachers in
mountainous areas have many difficulties in finding effective methods to teach communication
skills to children in schools. These findings are the foundation for proposing solutions to teach
communication skills to children with intellectual disabilities studying in normal kindergartens.
Keywords: communicative support, intellectual disability, preschool teacher, mountainous
kindergarten
INTRODUCTION
As the number of children with intellectual disabilities is increasing, many studies have
shown that it is estimated that approximately 3 million Americans have intellectual disabilities
(Larson et al., 2001). Previously known as “mental retardation”, the terms used to identify this
condition have changed over the years, mainly because of the heavy stigma associated with
bearing its label (Mourad & Adel, 2019). The two major diagnostic and classification systems in
the U.S. American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (AAIDD) and the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual on Mental Disorders (DSM) use the term “intellectual
disability” and agree on defining intellectual disability as a developmental condition that is
characterized by significant deficits in both intellectual functioning and adaptive behavior,
including conceptual, social and practical skills (American Psychiatric Association (APA), 2013;
Schalock et al., 2010).
Most children with intellectual disabilities have disabilities in communication and social
interaction, which make it difficult for them to establish social relationships with their peers (De
Bildt et al., 2005; Erik & Carolyn, 2005). They often tend to be passive and have some
inappropriate behaviors in communication situations. In addition, they also exhibit limitations in
non-verbal communication, in which the most noticeable is that eye contact is not steady and
they rarely use gestures to express needs to others. On the other hand, they use words in
conversations with many difficulties including limited vocabulary, the use of words not suitable
* Corresponding Author: Ho Sy Hung; E-mail Address: hosyhung@hdu.edu.vn

1 Hong Duc University
670
for communicative content, some of them have expressions such as impatience, anxiety, easy
irritability, impulsiveness, poor tolerance, and lack of social skills (Kaiser, Hester, & McDuffie,
2001; Kalliopi, Angeliki, & Efrosini, 2013). Participating in preschool activities will help
children with mild intellectual disabilities improve their social communicative skills, develop
friendly relationships through cooperation and listening, take turns, and use language to interact
with each other (Bergen, 2002; Raman & Lin, 2015; Sameena, 2011; Sunish, 2013). Using play
activities to encourage communication among children with mild intellectual disabilities.
Role-play helps children with mild intellectual disabilities learn speech and non-verbal
communication (Bergen, 2002; Raman & Lin, 2015; Sunish, 2013). Using storytelling to teach
communication to children with intellectual disabilities. Preschoolers are big fans of stories, and
educational lessons will help them develop a comprehensive personality (Russu, 2017). Using
stories will provide opportunities for children to develop language skills and non-verbal skills
(Ho, 2019a). Interactive activities at home are good for teaching communication skills to
children with mild intellectual disabilities, they often interact with family members,
experiencing daily activities that will create a positive language environment that stimulates
children’s communication (Pelin & Kayhan, 2016). Other researchers highly appreciated the
role of the educational environment at home which is of great significance for the development
of communicative of children with disabilities such as the parents’ care for the child’s
development, understanding the child’s communication, and supporting methods in activities
(Harel et al., 1996). The daily activities at home are an opportunity for children to practice and
improve their communication. Therefore, it is necessary for preschool teachers to regularly
communicate with parents about the child’s development and ways to develop communicative
skills at home. Other studies discussed that with the increasing proportion of children with
speech and language disorders, providing therapeutic solutions to all children with intellectual
disabilities is extremely necessary (Memisevic & Hadzic, 2013). There must be coordination
among speech therapists, teachers, and parents. Preschool teachers must provide necessary
information about the development of children’s communication to help professionals grasp the
children’s development to adjust therapy in a timely manner (McIntosh et al., 2007).
Teaching communication skills to children with intellectual disabilities is done through
many different activities, either through individual educational activities or groups. Each activity
is intended to support children with intellectual disabilities to know how to communicate and
interact better when participating in activities with their peers (Wilkinson & Hennig, 2007)
(Marc et al., 2013). Previous studies have also shown the communication deficits of children
with intellectual disabilities, on the basis of which suggest some ways to support children in
school activities (Jacob et al., 2015; Memisevic & Hadzic, 2013; Pelin & Kayhan, 2016). The
situation of inclusive education for children with disabilities in general and children with
intellectual disabilities, in particular, has shown that preschool teachers have tried to apply their
own experiences to improve communication skills for children with intellectual disabilities.
However, they are still facing many difficulties in teaching children with intellectual disabilities
in preschool. It is the most obvious that in mountainous preschools, they want to have ways to
support children with intellectual disabilities in preschool activities. Preschool teachers are still
confused in the process of teaching children to learn with normal children because of limitations
in cognition, communication, and social skills. This leads to many difficulties in teaching
communication skills in inclusive classrooms with children with mild intellectual disabilities. In
addition, there are not many studies on supporting children with intellectual disabilities in
preschools in mountainous areas, leading to teachers’ lack of methods to support children.
Therefore, this article investigates the situation of teaching communication skills to children
with mild disabilities in mountainous preschools of Thanh Hoa Province. This study
investigates the following contents: 1) Methods of teaching communication skills to children
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with mild intellectual disabilities; 2) Educational activities are used to teach communication
skills to children with mild intellectual disabilities; 3) Communication skills of children with
mild intellectual disabilities in inclusive classes in mountainous preschools. These findings of
this study are the foundation for other studies to propose ways to teach communication skills to
children with intellectual disabilities in preschools in mountainous areas.
CONTENT
1. Research Method
Thanh Hoa Province is selected as the research area. Participants include 105 preschool
teachers of different ethnic groups (Thai, Muong, Giao, H’mong, Kho Mu, and Tho).
Respondents have qualifications of at least Bachelor’s degree, with the highest number of years
of preschool work experience of 21 and the lowest number of years of 4. Mixed research
methods including qualitative and quantitative research methods are the main research methods,
data collection tools including interviews, observations, and surveys of teachers in preschools
mountainous areas. Survey on activities supporting communication skills for children with mild
intellectual disabilities applied by teachers with main activities. The answers of preschool
teachers are recorded and evaluated at 5 levels, the highest score is 5 and the lowest score is 1.
Surveying preschool teachers on 8 methods of teaching communication skills to children
with mild intellectual disabilities in an inclusive classroom, teacher’s assessment scores are with
5 levels, score from 1-5 in which the highest is 5 and the lowest is 1. Surveys of children’s
communication skills were conducted through four case studies, including playing roles as a
doctor, as a seller, in a family, and in a birthday party. The researchers observed, recorded, and
evaluated communication skills such as: using verbal language; listening skill; using gestures;
social interaction; and showing the right emotions. Each criterion includes 5 items (30) at 5
levels: “1” for “Poor”, “2” for “Weak”, “3” for “Average”, “4” for “Fair ”, “5” for “Good”.
Survey data is processed by mathematical statistical method and using SPSS 20.0 software.
Ethical considerations were applied by obtaining consent from the local authorities,
research assistants, and parent participants. They were informed about research objectives, time
and privacy, and confidentiality restrictions prior to data collection. Participants agreed to take
part in the survey and their participations were volunteering. They were free to withdraw their
participations or refuse to answer any questions if they were uncomfortable. All participants
who answered questionnaires were de-identified and stored securely.
2. Research Findings
2.1. Survey findings on teaching communication skills to children with intellectual
disabilities through educational activities
Table 1. Survey findings on teaching communication skills
to children with intellectual disabilities through educational activities
Responses (N = 105) Mean
Activities
1 2 3 4 5 (SD, range)
Learning activity 0 16 47 32 10 3.34 (.853, 2-5)
Indoor play activity 0 16 45 32 12 3.38 (.881, 2-5)
Outdoor activity 0 36 62 7 0 2.72 (.580, 2-4)
Labor activity 0 42 57 6 0 2.66 (.586, 2-4)
Festival activity 0 45 57 3 0 2.60 (.548, 2-4)
The survey findings showed that teachers have taken advantage of the strength of each
activity to teach communication skills to children with mild intellectual in preschool. Indoor
play activity (Mean = 3.38) and learning activities (Mean = 3.34) are used the most, as they
have many advantages of teaching communication skills to children. When children with mild
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intellectual disabilities participate in these activities, they will have opportunities to practise
communication skills such as verbal and non-verbal communication (gestures, facial
expressions). Outdoor activity (Mean = 2.72), labor activity (Mean = 2.66), and festival activity
(Mean = 2.60) are still applied to teach communication skills to children with mild intellectual
disabilities, but the frequency of use is not as good as learning activities and indoor play activities.
2.2. Methods of teaching communication skills to children with mild intellectual disabilities
Table 2. Methods of teaching communication skills to children with mild intellectual disabilities
Activities Responses (N = 105) Mean
1 2 3 4 5 (SD, range)
Creating a positively communicative envirnoment in the class 0 22 44 31 8 3.24 (.872, 2-5)
Supporting children with IDs to improve communication skills all time 0 10 37 39 19 3.64 (.889, 2-5)
Encouraging interaction between children without ID and children with IDs 0 22 42 33 7 3.24 (.861, 2-5)
Using games to teach communication skills to children 0 25 54 20 6 3.07 (.812, 2-5)
Attracting children’s attention in each activity 0 23 47 28 7 3.18 (.852, 2-5)
Practising communication skills to children with intellectual disabilities 0 42 39 21 3 2.86 (.837, 2-5)
Cooperating with families to teach communication skills to children with
0 23 44 32 6 3.20 (.848, 2-5)
intellectual disabilities
Making individual education plans to teach communication skills to children
0 39 42 20 4 2.90 (.843, 2-5)
with intellectual disabilities
The above research findings show that in mountainous preschools, teachers have also
applied a few methods to teach communication skills to children with mild intellectual
disabilities in preschool activities, including: Supporting children with IDs to improve
communication skill all time (Mean = 3.64); Creating a positively communicative environment
in the classroom and encouraging interaction between normal children and children with IDs
(Mean = 3.24) are applied the most; Practising communication skills to children with intellectual
disabilities (Mean = 2.86) and making individual education plans to teach communication skills
to children with intellectual disabilities to communicate (Mean = 2.90) are rarely used by
preschool teachers. The teachers have not really paid attention to planning individual education
for children with mild intellectual disabilities. This lack of planning affects the whole process of
educating children in general and teaching communication skills to children with mild
intellectual disabilities in particular.
2.3. Difficulties in teaching communication skills to children with mild intellectual disabilities
100 94
90
90
80
70
60 55
50 45
40
30
20
10
0
There are too Communicative Children’s play Teachers'
many children in environment in environment in teaching
the classroom kindergarten classroom methods
Figure 1. Difficulties in teaching communication skills to children with mild intellectual disabilities
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It can be seen from the above findings that teaching communication skills to children with
mild intellectual disabilities still faces many difficulties. However, the lack of methods for
teaching communication skills to children with IDs and children’s play environment in the
classroom have many difficulties equivalent to 94% and 90%, as shown in Figure 02. Most of
the surveyed teachers said that they had a dearth of knowledge about children with IDs.
Observing teachers organizing in class, we can see the difficulties that preschool teachers are
facing: common characteristics of classes are large numbers of children (up to 50 children). This
exceeds the number of children in the regular class (30-35 children for kindergarten), with an
inclusive class decreasing by 5 children with 1 disabled child (25-30 children). Thus, the large
number of children in a classroom will greatly impact the effectiveness of the method to teach
communication skills to children with mild intellectual disabilities. The survey findings show
that to achieve the goal of teaching communication skills to children in preschools, it is
necessary to overcome difficulties to take advantage of an inclusive educational environment in
teaching communication skills to children with IDs
2.4. Survey findings on communication skills of children with intellectual disabilities
Figure 2. Survey findings on communication skills of children with intellectual disabilities

The findings of the survey on the communication of 8 children with IDs show that the
children’s communication skills still have many limitations. Among the 5 skill groups surveyed,
verbal language skill is considered better than other skills (Mean = 2.44), followed by listening
skill (Mean = 2.39). Using gestures, social interaction, and appropriate emotional expression
was still insufficient in all children surveyed. This finding clearly shows the difficulties and
limitations that make it difficult for children to learn and interact with their peers.
3. Discussion
The study found that most early childhood educators are aware of the importance of
teaching communication skills to children with IDs in normal kindergartens. They have
difficulties in communicative and social interaction (Inge et al., 2011; Nguyen, 2014). It is the
foundation for teaching communication skills to children with ID in inclusive preschools.
The survey findings of 105 early childhood educators on the use of educational activities to
teach communication skills to children with intellectual disabilities showed that these activities
play an important role in a child’s development. However, indoor playing and learning activities
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are considered the most advantageous for stimulating children to communicate and interact with
peers. Early childhood educators revealed that these activities will give children more
opportunities to integrate with their peers, but teachers also need to pay more attention to
children with mental retardation if they are mentally retarded, have unusual manifestations,
especially communication deficits such as limited interaction, inappropriate use of language and
impaired attention. The findings of this study also show that although preschool teachers in
mountainous preschools, where there are more difficulties than urban areas in terms of
educational environment for children, they also perceive the important role of educational
activities in preschool in the development of language and communication skills for children
with intellectual disabilities. This finding also indicates that some other activities such as
festival activities, labor activities, and outdoor play activities are rarely used to teach
communication skills to children. Some preschool teachers of the Muong ethnic group have
explained why they often use learning and indoor play activities because in these two main
activities, teachers often spend a lot of time making plans and implementing children’s
educational goals. Other authors have also affirmed the important role of play in the
development of verbal and non-verbal communicative skills of children with mild intellectual
disabilities in the inclusive classroom (Sunish, 2013; Vygotsky, 1967).
The survey findings of 8 methods of teaching communication skills to children with mild
intellectual disabilities in kindergartens showed that preschool teachers have also applied a
number of methods to encourage children to communicate with their peers such as: creating a
friendly and open communication everywhere, supporting children with intellectual disabilities
when they have difficulties in using language, and at the same time encouraging children in
class and playgroups to communicate and support children with intellectual disabilities. A
number of methods are currently considered by researchers to have many advantages in
supporting communication skills for children with intellectual disabilities such as: Making an
individual educational plan to teach communication skills to children with intellectual
disabilities and training children’s communication skills. In in-depth interviews with some
teachers in Muong Lat and Ba Thuoc District, they said that they have not developed an
individual education plan for children with mild intellectual disabilities, besides teaching
communication skills to children in schools, mainly based on their own experiences, they also
do not have access to many materials on care and teaching of children with disabilities in the
classroom. Many teachers believe that creating opportunities for children with disabilities to
participate in learning and playing activities in the classroom like other children is essential, but
teaching communication skills to children by these methods is rarely done. This is one of the
very recognizable characteristics of mountainous preschools. Coordination with students’
parents is also difficult due to limited understanding of students’ parents, some parents with
children with intellectual disabilities do not know about children with intellectual disabilities,
some people have disadvantages. Therefore, they do not have time to take care of their children,
some ethnic minority children in disadvantaged areas often go to school irregularly, some
children do not even go to school, preschool teachers have to encourage their parents to take
children to school to help children to integrate with their peers. Therefore, teaching
communication skills and some basic living skills to help them integrate with friends and
society often face many difficulties.
The survey findings on the difficulties of teachers in teaching communication skills to
children with IDs also show that preschool teachers still lack knowledge about the development
of communication skills for children with IDs. Despite a module on inclusive education for
children with disabilities in the preschool teacher training program, they still do not have
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enough knowledge to organize activities to support children to integrate with people around them.
There is especially a lack of methods to improve communication skills to children with IDs in
normal preschool classes.
This study also shows a common situation for preschools in Vietnam with too many
preschool children in a classroom, which greatly affects the quality of child care and education.
Most preschool teachers believe that a large number of children makes it difficult for them to
organize educational activities for children, especially for classes with children with special
educational needs such as intellectual disabilities, language disability, and autism. This study
also shows an approach to the research problem that previous studies in Vietnam have not done.
The findings of this study help preschool administrators consider reducing the number of
children in the classroom, especially those with children with disabilities who study with other
children. These findings also provide important information for kindergartens that have children
with intellectual disabilities studying in class with other children. Preschool teachers need to
participate in many training courses about the education of children with intellectual disabilities
in kindergartens. In addition, other factors such as the communicative environment in preschool,
classroom play environment, and the number of children in each class need to be adjusted
accordingly to provide opportunities for children to demonstrate positively communicative skills.
The assessment of communication skills in children with mild intellectual disability is done
with four exercises which are games with different topics, including playing the role as a doctor,
playing the role as a seller, playing the role in a family, and playing the role as an organizer of a
birthday party. Research on data collection of indicators to evaluate five groups of
communicative skills showed that children with IDs have limited communication skills in group
interaction such as showing right emotions, which affects participating in activities with
non-disabled children in preschools. Observing children participating in the doctor role-playing,
there are three children with very little interaction while playing, only using toys as they want
and separating themselves from the group. Teachers often talk and use compliments to
encourage the child to engage in interactions with their peers. Some children rarely use gestures
and eye contact to interact with members of the group, not actively performing their play tasks.
In general, the findings of the survey on assessing the communication skills of children with IDs
in role-playing showed that they have many defects in communication skills and interaction
with their classmates that negatively affects the child’s development.
The purpose of the survey on teaching communication skills to children with mild
intellectual disabilities has shown that activities directly affect the development of
communication skills of these children. Previous studies by some researchers have also shown
the important role of play in educating children (Bergen, 2001, 2002). Preschool educators have
applied many ways to teach communication skills to children with IDs in normal preschools.
However, the findings also show that some specific methods to teach communication skills to
children with IDs are still limited, so they have not yet applied the best playing environment in
preschool to teaching children to communicate in different ways. While teaching
communication skills to children with IDs is an important goal in preschools today, the survey
findings also show the difficulties of teachers to educate children in preschool classes, normally
in Thanh Hoa Province. Therefore, this survey finding will be the foundation for the next
studies to propose methods to help children with IDs communicate better through activities in
preschool.
The survey findings have revealed much important information about the situation of
teaching communication skills to children with IDs. However, this study also has some
limitations. It is not possible to survey all kindergartens in Vietnam. The study was only
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conducted at some mountainous preschools in Thanh Hoa Province. In addition, the research
has only focused on surveying teaching communication skills to children. However, the findings
of this study are also the basis for early childhood educators to clearly see the current situation
of teaching communication skills to children with IDs.
CONCLUSION
Research findings on teaching communication skills to children with intellectual disabilities
in mountainous preschools have shown that the education of children with special educational
needs has been paid attention by preschools, teachers are well aware of the important role of
educational activities in the development of children with intellectual disabilities, however, the
use of these activities still has some difficulties that directly affect the education of
communication skills to children with intellectual disabilities. In addition, the survey findings
on methods to teach communication skills to children with intellectual disabilities also reveal a
lot of important findings about the difficulties and limitations that preschool teachers in
disadvantaged areas are facing. If teachers can apply specific educational methods based on the
characteristics of children with intellectual disabilities as well as an inclusive classroom
environment, it will stimulate children’s communication skills more. The situation of teaching
communication skills to children with mild intellectual disabilities shows that they have many
deficits in communication skills such as using appropriate gestures, social interaction, listening,
using speech with many limitations, making it difficult for children to integrate into activities
with their peers in preschool. The findings of this study are only based on the situation of
preschool education in the mountainous areas of Thanh Hoa Province, it is not representative of
all preschools in Vietnam, however, these findings are the foundation for proposing methods to
teach communication skills to children with intellectual disabilities for community integration
and their peers.
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About the author

Dr. Ho Sy Hung is currently a lecturer at Hong Duc University, Vietnam. He has been
teaching in the education field for more than 10 years. His main research is early childhood
education, training for early childhood educators, and developing skills for preschoolers.
Besides, he has been also researching in the field of inclusive education for children with
disabilities in preschools. He has published more than 30 papers in prestigious journals in
Vietnam and international journals. He has participated in many international conferences on
higher education and special education held at universities and institutes in Vietnam. He has
been invited to speak at national and international conferences such as the Early Childhood
Voices 2020 Conference, Charles Sturt University, Australia, and SEED Institute, Singapore.
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LIVING VALUES PRACTICES AND RECOMMENDATIONS

TO IMPROVE LIVING VALUES EDUCATION FOR PRIMARY STUDENTS
Tran Thi Le Thu*1, Bui Bich Lien2, Bui Thi Nga2,
Bui Thi Diem My2, Phung Thi Nam2, Cao Thi Lan Nhi2
Abstract: This research analyzes the practice of living values based on students’ and parents’
assessments. Six living values studied in this research are included: Love, Respect, Responsibility,
Honesty, Safety, and Creativity. The research sample includes 218 students and 183 parents
whose children are in grades 4, 5. The major research method is survey; questionnaires are
verified for reliability. It is indicated that students practice living values in school and at home at a
relatively high level; in which the value of Love is the highest, the value of Creativity is the lowest;
the other values are evaluated and ranked differently by children and parents. Students in grade
4 practice the value of Respect at a higher level than ones in grade 5; students with excellent
academic performance practice the values of Respect, Safety, Honesty, Creativity at a higher level
than the ones with good academic performance. The living values are positively and strongly
correlated. The research also proposes recommendations to improve living values education for
primary students in the context of educational renovation.
Keywords: living value, life skill, primary students, living value education, educational renovation
INTRODUCTION
Living values are understood as meaningful, important, and necessary things in each
person’s life, having the potential to orient and motivate individuals to work, and influencing
their perceptions, attitudes, emotions, feelings, behaviors in everyday situations (Khanh, 2012b;
Tillman, 2008; Tu, 2017; Hac, 2010).
Living values education is a process in which children are involved in a variety of
purposefully experimental activities to transfer socially recognized values into their personal
values helping them develop positive, appropriate awareness, attitudes, and behaviors and meet
a society’s expectations (Hai, 2011; Khanh, 2012a; Tillman, 2008; Tu, 2017).
Around the world, there are many living values education programs. UNESCO Living
Value Education Program, for example, has been implemented in more than 80 countries.
Research shows that school-based living values education has a positive influence on children’s
social, emotional, and intellectual skills development (El-Hassan & Kahil, 2005), improving
children’s at-school interactions, surrounding environment, happiness, and academic attendance
(Lovat et al., 2009).
In Vietnam, five qualities corresponding to five living values (i.e.: patriotism, compassion,
diligence, honesty, and responsibility) were selected in the regular education curriculum issued
by the Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) in 2018 (Ministry of Education
and Training, 2018). Many schools so far have included living values and life skills education
into their curriculum. In which, it can be said that Nguyen Binh Khiem High-quality
Educational System, Cau Giay, is a pioneer. A living values and life skills educational program
was implemented in 2012 – 2013 by the school to strengthen the MOET-issued regular
curriculum. This program was built based on psychological, pedagogic approaches as
introduced in the publication of Living Values Activities for Children Ages 3-7, 8-14, and
young adults by Diane Tillman & Diana Hsu, and the “iMind Education” program by the
* Corresponding Author: Tran Thi Le Thu; E-mail Address: thuttl@hnue.edu.vn

2 Nguyen Binh Khiem Educational System – Cau Giay District, Hanoi
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Psychological and Pedagogic Talents Fund. After approximately ten years since the school
started implementing living values and life skills education activities (Thu et al., 2020), effects
have been observed in its children.
Currently, there is a dearth of studies on the practice of living values in Vietnam. This
research, therefore, investigates living values practices by primary students and proposes a
number of recommendations to maintain and strengthen the practice of living values by primary
students.
CONTENT
1. Materials and methods
Participants of the study
The research is carried out on 218 students and 183 parents whose children are in grades 4,
5 at Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School – Cau Giay District, Hanoi. The school, parents, and
students all consented to this research.
The participants of the study were selected randomly out of 218 students in grades 4, 5
including 99 students in grade 4 and 119 in grade 5; the quantity of boys is like that of girls. The
quantity of students with excellent academic performance is higher than that of students with
good academic performance (15% higher).
Table 1. Participants of the study
Values Total Grades Gender Academic Performance
Grade 4 Grade 5 Boys Girls Completed Good Excellent
Students N 218 99 119 116 102 18 80 112
% 100 45.4 54.6 53.2 46.8 8.6 38.1 53.3
Parents N 183 92 91
% 100 50.3 49.7
Research tools
A questionnaire is designed in a three-stage process. Specifically, in stage 1, we drafted the
tool based on theoretical research, literature review; referred to scales used in previously
published research, and existing living values education programs; interviewed 16 students and
11 teachers/staff on certain living values so as to make amendments and additions to the
designed questionnaire. In stage 2, we investigated and interviewed 14 students to make
appropriate amendments to the questionnaire. In stage 3, we carried out interviews and analyzed
the questionnaire for reliability.
The questionnaire is structured with 02 parts: part 1 – general information; part 2 – living
values practices (the draft questionnaire includes 44 items).
In the reliability analysis, items with variable-sum correlations less than 0.3 are removed,
therefore all remaining items have Cronbach’s alpha coefficient greater than 0.6. We remove 01
item in the value of Respect, 02 in the value of Safety, 03 in the value of Honesty, and 01 in the
value of Responsibility. The number of matching items in each value after the reliability test
ranges from 5-8 items (Table 2). Cronbach’s alpha reliability of the whole scale is 0.92.
Table 2. Details of the surveying tool
Sections Suitable items Coefficient of Cronbach’s alpha Levels and Scoring
Love 8 0.772 Highly correct: 4 points
Living Respect 6 0.634 (remove item A9) Correct: 3 points
values Safety 5 0.620 (remove items A18, A22) Partially correct: 2 points
Honesty 5 0.699 (remove items A23, A26, A29) Not correct: 1 point
Responsibility 7 0.714 (remove item A38)
Creatativity 6 0.752
Total 37 Remove 07 items
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Statistical analysis
The research adopts SPSS version 22.0 to collect and process qualitative data.
After being collected and analyzed, questionnaires are verified on a 1-4 point scale (highly
correct – 4 points, correct – 3 points, partially correct – 2 points, and incorrect – 1 point).
In this research, mean score and standard deviation are used to describe living values
practiced by primary students; Person’s correlation coefficient is used to analyze living values
interactions in primary children.
2. Results and discussions
2.1. The practice of living values by students in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School – Cau
Giay District
The survey results of the practice of living values by primary students are in presented
Table 3.
Table 3. The practice of living values by primary students
No. Living values MS SD
1 Love 3.37 0.46
2 Respect 3.14 0.53
3 Safety 3.04 0.59
4 Honesty 3.22 0.54
5 Responsibility 3.24 0.62
6 Creativity 2.89 0.66
Note: N = 218, Min = 1, Max = 4, Mean Score = MS, Standard Deviation = SD
Table 3 indicates that MS of the practice of living values lies in the range of 2.89-3.37
points meaning students in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School – Cau Giay District perform
six living values in their everyday activities at a relatively high level and clearly. In which, the
value of Love is practiced the highest (MS = 3.37), followed by the values of Responsibility
(MS = 3.24), Honesty (MS = 3.22), Responsibility (MS = 3.14), Safety (MS = 3.04), and the
value of Creativity is practiced the lowest (MS = 2.98).
Thus, primary students in the sample group show up more clearly in aspects such as loving
themselves, their family, teachers, and friends; demonstrating responsibility in protecting school
supplies, voluntarily doing homework and assignments as required, following school and
classroom rules. The aspects performed at a lower level are in the value of Creativity such as
expressing new ideas, suggesting ways to help friends, making new products.
For primary students, making acquitted with new friends, interacting with friends, as well
as developing habits in learning activities, following class and school routines are always
centers of personality development emphasized by schools and teachers. At the same time, the
value of Creativity is gradually developed at the beginning of the regular education level, this
can explain why the practice of this value is lower than that of the other values.
2.1.1. The practice of the value of Love by students in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School – Cau
Giay District
The survey results of the value of Love practiced by primary students are presented in
Table 4 below:
Table 4. The practice of the value of Love by primary students
No. The practice of the value of Love MS SD
1 I love myself 3.59 0.64
2 I love my family members 3.67 0.59
3 I care about and take care of my family members (when they are tired, happy, sad, on their birthday…) 3.35 0.74
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No. The practice of the value of Love MS SD

4 I love my friends 3.34 0.73
5 I love my teachers 3.64 0.62
6 I care about, show encouragement to my friends 3.20 0.80
7 I help my teachers with some tasks in class 3.07 0.88
8 I know how to share with people in difficult circumstances 3.09 0.89
Note: N = 218, Min = 1, Max = 4, MS = Mean Score, SD = Standard Deviation
Tables 3 and 4 indicate that the practice of specific aspects in the value of Love is scored in
the range of 3.07-3.67, with MS = 3.37, which means that students show the value of Love most
clearly. In which, they practice more clearly in attitudes and feelings (e.g.: loving family
members, friends, and teachers) than in words or actions (e.g.: helping, encouraging, caring,
sharing, etc.). The rarely observed aspects are in helping teachers and sharing with people in
difficult circumstances. This can be explained that because students in grades 4 and 5 do not do
housework and involve in school things actively enough so they can’t help teachers much,
additionally they may not interact with or participate in many community activities, they,
therefore, have few opportunities to show their sharing with people in difficult circumstances.
2.1.2. The practice of the value of Respect by students in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School – Cau
Giay district
The survey results of the value of Respect practiced by primary students are shown in Table 5.
Table 5. The practice of the value of Respect by primary students
No The practice of the value of Respect MS SD
1 I am not ashamed or afraid of my differences (interests, appearance, temperament, etc.) 2.74 1.06
2 I do not tease and criticize my friends for their and my differences 3.05 0.90
3 I listen when my friend is sharing 3.29 0.74
4 I listen when my teacher is presenting 3.35 0.76
5 I do not violate school, class rules 3.49 0.68
6 I am respectful to adults 2.90 0.91
Tables 3 and 5 show that the value of Respect is practiced in the range of 2.74-3.49, the
mean score of the subscale is 3.14, which means that students at Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary
School – Cau Giay District practice the value of Respect at a relatively high level. In which the
aspect of “I do not violate school, class rules” has the highest mean value (MS = 3.49), while
the aspect of “I am not ashamed or afraid of my differences” (MS = 2.74) has the lowest. The
data shows that students’ practice is high in the aspect of respecting school, class rules.
However, the aspect of respecting yourself, friends, and adults is shown at a lower level.
It can be seen that students grades 4 and 5 in the sample group are relatively shy about their
differences, they gain the lowest mean score in this aspect. This may be because students are at
primary education level, they gradually develop communication skills, interactions, and
self-understanding. During primary school years, they are often reminded about and taught to
listen to teachers and follow school, class rules, that’s why these two aspects are practiced the most.
2.1.3. The practice of the value of Safety by students in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School –
Cau Giay District
The survey results on the practice of the value of Safety are shown in the table below:
Table 6. The practice of the value of Safety by primary students
No The practice of the value of Safety MS SD
1 I’m not worried or afraid to admit mistakes 2.75 1.01
2 I’m not afraid to show my weakness 3.06 0.96
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No The practice of the value of Safety MS SD

3 I dare to ask and express my opinion 2.88 1.00
4 I actively share personal stories with my family members 2.94 0.99
5 I feel comfortable, secure at school 3.57 0.71
Tables 3 and 6 show that the practice of the value of Safety gains a mean score of 3.04, in
the range of 2.75-3.57. That proves, students at Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School – Cau Giay
District have a relatively high level of the practice of the value of Safety. In which, the practice
of the value of Safety gains the highest mean score in “I feel comfortable and secure at school”
(MS = 3.57) and the lowest mean value in “I am not worried or afraid to admit mistakes”
(MS = 2.75).
Nguyen Binh Khiem School always pays attention to developing and maintaining the
school environment based on positive living values; especially promoting 06 core values of the
school, including the value of Safety; possibly in such an environment, students may feel
comfortable and secure at school and they are not afraid to express themselves, they feel safe
when asking what they don’t know yet.
2.1.4. The practice of the value of Honesty by students in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School –
Cau Giay District
The survey results of the practice of the value of Honesty are presented in Table 7.
Table 7. The practice of the value of Honesty by primary students
No The practice of the value of Honesty MS SD
1 I recognize and correct mistakes 3.27 0.74
2 I tell the truth 3.14 0.84
3 I keep my promise to everyone 3.10 0.81
4 I do not arbitrarily take other people’s things and money 3.46 0.72
5 I am consistent between words and actions 3.14 0.79
Tables 3 and 7 show that the practice of the value of Honesty has a mean score of 3.22
points, in the range of 3.10-3.46. It indicates that students at Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary
School – Cau Giay District practice the value of Honesty at a relatively high level. In which, the
aspect they practice the highest is “I do not arbitrarily take other people’s things and money”
(MS = 3.46), and the lowest is “I keep my promises to everyone” (MS = 3.10).
The value of Honesty is also one of the six core values of Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary
School, which is highly valued and is one of the values taught directly to students in grade 4;
Because they are taught of the values since grade 1, students have mastered the values; The
value they practice the highest is the value of Respect, not arbitrarily taking other people’s
things, recognizing and correcting mistakes; It also corresponds to the practice of the values of
Respect and Safety.
2.1.5. The practice of the value of Responsibility by students in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School
– Cau Giay District
The survey results of the practice of the value of Responsibility are shown in Table 8:
Table 8. The practice of the value of Responsibility in primary students
No The practice of the value of Responsibility MS SD
1 I protect my school supplies, personal belongings 3.30 0.77
2 I have a habit of cleaning and taking care of myself 3.48 0.66
3 I protect other people’s belongings 3.19 0.84
4 I follow class, school rules 3.44 0.70
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No The practice of the value of Responsibility MS SD

5 I encourage my friends to complete group, class assignments 3.11 0.90
6 I complete assigments 3.41 0.75
7 I am willing to do housework 2.81 0.96
Tables 3 and 8 show that the performance of the value of Responsibility gains a mean score
of 3.24, in the range of 2.81-3.48. It demonstrates that students at Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary
School – Cau Giay District show the value of Responsibility at a relatively high level. In which,
the most clearly observed aspect is “I have the habit of cleaning and taking care of myself”
(MS = 3.48) and the least observed aspect is “I am willing to do housework” (MS = 2.81).
Students express they take responsibility for themselves, follow class rules, school rules, and do
homework. However, for “housework”, they do not practice much.
As the values of Love, Safety, Respect; the value of Responsibility is also one of the 06
values that students learn during primary school years, especially this value is focused on in
grade 3. Value-related lessons are provided repeatedly in new forms, with expansions every
year. Therefore, this may facilitate students’ practice of this value.
2.1.6. The practice of the value of Creativity by studens in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School -
Cau Giay District
The survey results of the value of Creativity by students are presented in Table 9.
Table 9. The practice of the value of Creativity by primary students
No The practice of the value of Creativity MS SD
1 I think of good ways when doing homework or conducting activities 3.00 0.90
2 I offer new, interesting ideas in class or at home 2.96 0.94
3 People say I make strange and beautiful products from handicrafts and scraps 2.62 1.03
4 I suggest many new ways to help friends solve problems 2.91 0.95
5 I don’t like doing things in a way that is too familiar and boring 2.98 1.04
6 I decorate my home, my learning corner, or my private room 2.87 1.13
Tables 3 and 9 show that the practice of the value of Creativity has a mean score of 2.89,
which ranges from 2.62 to 3.00. Although among the 6 values, the value of Creativity has the
lowest mean score, MS = 2.89, it also shows that students at Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary
School – Cau Giay District show a good level of Creativity. In which, the aspect with the
highest mean score is “I think of good ways when doing homework or conducting activities”
(MS = 3.00) and the lowest is “People say I create strange and beautiful products from
handicrafts and scraps” (MS = 2.62). Students demonstrate the value of Creativity in coming up
with new ideas, new ways of doing things, and problem-solving ideas, whiles the value of
Creative associated with ingenuity, spatial arrangement, and decoration is shown at a lower level.
As the value of Creativity is also one of its core values, it is focused on in all subjects and
educational activities at Nguyen Binh Khiem school; however, there are no separate lessons for
this particular value.
Differences in the practice of living values by demographics
The practice of the living values by students at Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School – Cau
Giay District by gender is shown in Table 10.
Table 10. The practice of the living values by gender
Boys Girls
No Living values Sig.
MS SD MS SD
1 Love 3.33 0.50 3.41 0.40 0.173
2 Respect 3.11 0.53 3.17 0.47 0.425
3 Safety 3.09 0.63 2.97 0.54 0.128
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Boys Girls
MS SD MS SD
4 Honesty 3.24 0.56 3.19 0.48 0.444
5 Responsbility 3.21 0.52 3.28 0.48 0.295
6 Creativity 284 0.72 2.84 0.59 0.241
The table above introduces sig. coefficients > 0.05 meaning there are no gender differences
in the practice of each living value between boys and girls.
Table 11 shows the value of Respect, with a sig. coefficient = 0.046 smaller than 0.05
meaning students in grade 4 (MS = 3.21; SD = 0.48) show more clearly than ones in grade 5
(MS = 3.07, SD = 0.56).
Table 11. The practice of the living value by grade
Grade 4 Grade 5
MS SD MS SD
1 Love 3.39 0.44 3.34 0.48 0.423
2 Respect 3.21 0.48 3.07 0.56 0.046
3 Safety 3.05 0.59 3.03 0.60 0.832
4 Honesty 3.29 0.50 3.16 0.54 0.063
5 Responsibility 3.29 0.44 3.21 0.54 0.243
6 Creativity 2.90 0.61 2.87 0.71 0.757
To test variances, a one-factor ANOVA is used to clarify academic performance differences
regards the practice of living values. Through the Test of Homogeneity of Variances, it is shown
that the values of Love, Safety, and Honesty have sig. coefficients > 0.05, which means that the
variances of these values are identical.
Table 12. Test of Homogeneity of Variances by academic performance
No Living values Levene Statistic Sig.
1 Love 1.862 0.158
2 Respect 4.591 0.011
3 Safety 1.912 0.150
4 Honesty 1.231 0.294
Bonferroni test is used to determine how different living values are practiced according to
academic performance in these 3 values (Love, Safety, and Honesty). It is found that there are
no differences in the practice of the value of Love by students with different academic
performances. The differences in the practice of living values in terms of academic performance
regard the values of Safety and Honesty are shown in Table 13.
Table 13. The practice of the living values of Safety and Honesty by students with
academic performance differences
Living values Academic performance MD Sig.
Excellent performance
(MS = 3.15, SD = 0.54)
Safety 0.496* 0.002
Good performance
(MS = 3.01, SD = 0.59)
Excellent performance
(MS = 3.33, SD = 0.49)
Honesty 0.203* 0.023
Good performance
(MS = 3.13, SD = 0.52)
Note: MD = Mean Difference, MS = Mean Score, SD = Standard Deviation
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Regarding the value of safety, differences are observed in the practice of students with
academic performance differences (MD = 0.496*, sig. = 0.002). This is statistically significant,
meaning that students with excellent performance (MS = 3.15, SD = 0.54) practice the value of
Safety at a higher level than students with good performance (MS = 3.01, SD = 0.59).
Regarding the value of Honesty, significant mean differences are also found among
students with academic performance differences (MD = 0.203*, sig. = 0.023 < 0.05); students
with excellent performance (MD = 3.33, SD = 0.49) also practice this value at a higher level
than students with good performance (MS = 3.13, SD = 0.52).
The values of Respect, Responsibility, and Creativity have sig. coefficients < 0.05, which
means that the variances of these values are not the same. By using Welch’s test, we obtained
the sig. value of these three values smaller than 0.05, that is, there is a significant mean
difference in the practice of living values between students with academic performance
differences. Tamhane’s T2 test is used to determine specific differences between academic
performance levels in these three values.
Table 14. Differences in the practice of the values of Respect, Responsibility,
and Creativity by students with academic performance differences
Values Academic Performance MD Sig.
Excellent performance Good performance
Respect 0.302* 0.000
(MS = 3.30, SD = 0.44) (MS = 3.00, SD = 0.47)
0.245* 0.002
(MS = 3.38, SD = 0.45) (MS = 3.14, SD = 0.49)
Responsibility
Completed performance
0.352* 0.049
(MS = 3.03, SD = 0.54)
Creativity 0.224* 0.048
(MS = 3.01, SD = 0.59) (MS = 2.79, SD = 0.65)
Note: MD = Mean Difference, MS = Mean Score, SD = Standard Deviation
Table 14 shows that, in the value of Respect, students with excellent performance
(MS = 3.30, SD = 0.44 ) practice better than students with good performance (MS = 3.00,
SD = 0.47). Similarly, in the value of Responsibility, students with excellent performance
(MS = 3.38, SD = 0.45) practice better than students with good performance (MS = 3.14,
SD = 0.49) and students with completed performance (MS = 3.03, SD = 0.54). In the value of
Creativity, students with excellent performance (MS = 3.01, SD = 0.59) also practice at a higher
level than students with good performance (MS = 2.79, SD = 0.65).
Table 15. Correlation in the practice of living values by primary students
Love Respect Safety Honesty Responsibility
r = 0.643**
Respect
sig. = 0.000
r = 0.543** r = 0.623**
Safety
sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000
r = 0.582** r = 0.715** r = 0.575**
Honesty
sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000
r = 0.637** r = 0.642** r = 0.522** r = 0.683**
Responsibility
sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000
r = 0.542** r = 0.521** r = 0.476** r = 0.511** r = 0.552**
Creativity
sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000 sig. = 0.000
Studying the correlation of the practice of living values in the sample group shows that the
living values are positively correlated with each other. In which, the closest correlation is seen
in the values of Honesty and Respect, followed by the values of Honesty and Responsibility.
Those correlations show that when students practice one value at a high level, they also practice
other values at a high level too, and vice versa.
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2.2. Parents whose children are learning in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School – Cau Giay
District assess their children living values practice
The study also investigates 183 parents on what they think of how their children practice
living values with a tool that has been tested for reliability. The survey results are summarized
in Table 16.
Table 16. The practice of living values by primary students
according to their parents’ assessment
No Living values MS SD
1 Love 3.41 0.46
2 Respect 3.04 0.49
3 Safety 3.03 0.54
4 Honesty 3.19 0.53
The mean score of the practice of living values is ranged from 2.71 to 3.41, which means
that parents rate their children’s practice of living values in everyday activities, especially
at home quite high. In which, the value of Love is practiced the highest (MS = 3.41), followed
by the value of Honesty (MS = 3.19), the value of Respect (MS = 3.04), the value of Safety
(MS = 3.03), and value of Responsibility (MS = 2.93). The least practiced value is Creativity
(MS = 2.71).
It can be seen that the ranking of living values assessed by students themselves is different
from that of their parents, as shown in Table 17.
Table 17. Living values ranked by students and parents
By Students Ranked By Parents
Love 1 Love
Responsibility 2 Honesty
Honest 3 Respect
Respect 4 Safety
Safety 5 Responsbility
Creativity 6 Creativity
It is indicated in Table 17 both parents and children have assessed the value of Love at the
highest and the value of Creativity at the lowest. There are distinct differences in their
assessments regards the value of Responsibility. Table 18 introduces the practice of the value of
Responsibility from the perspective of parents.
Table 18. The practice of the living value of Responsibility according to parents’ assessment
No The practice of the value of Responsbility MS SD
1 Protect school supplies, personal belongings 2.71 0.77
2 I have a habit of cleaning and taking care of myself 3.03 0.75
3 I protect/preserve other people’s belongings 2.97 0.68
4 I am willing do housework 2.50 0.68
Children take actions to protect the environment (dispose of garbage in the right place, limit
5 3.21 0.66
the use of plastic bags, save electricity/water ...)
Tables 8 and 18 show that, both children and parents see the value of Responsibility
practiced most clearly in the item of taking care of themselves. In addition, children assess that
they practice the value of Responsibility in the classroom more clearly than they do at home,
their parents make the same assessment.
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Many primary students are taken care of like they were in kindergarten; they are rarely
required to do housework; this can be a factor influencing the practice of the value of
Responsibility according to parents.
2.3. Recommendations to improve living values education for primary students in the
context of education renovation
It is found that students in Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School, Cau Giay District practice
the living values in school-based daily routines at a relatively high level. In which, the value of
Love is practiced the highest, while the value of Creativity the lowest among the researched
values; There is a positive correlation in the practice of the living values; There are also
differences in the assessments, rankings made by children and parents. Children in grade 4
perform the value of Respect more frequently than children in grade 5 do. Regarding the values
of Respect, Safety, Honesty, and Responsibility, students with excellent performance practice at
a higher level than those with good performance.
Therefore, in order to improve the practice of living values for students in the sample
group, the school should develop appropriate solutions based on the research results; because
the quality of living values education is one of the important factors that directly affect students’
living values practices. It is especially important to maintain and promote the training of the
qualities and values as specified in the regular education curriculum. It is described clearly in
the regular education curriculum that there are five qualities and values primary students should
achieve, specifically: patriotism, love, diligence, honesty, and responsibility (Ministry of
Education and Training, 2018).
It is necessary to study measures on how to organize living values, life skills education to
be in line with Circular No. 04/2014/TT-BGDDT by Ministry of Education and Training, aiming
to help students develop positive, healthy habits, behaviors, and attitudes; thereby, orientate
their self-development based on living values (Ministry of Education and Training, 2014).
According to the afore-mentioned research results and discussions, in association with the
regular education curriculum and the circular on living values education, Nguyen Binh Khiem
Primary School as well as other primary schools should refer to the following specific measures
to improve their living values education programs:
(1) Educate all qualities, values regularly; Depending on priority period (s), emphasize
specific values. Conduct periodical assessments of the practice of living values in order
to timely adjust the educational contents.
(2) Place a higher focus on the education of the values of creativity, safety, and respect.
Focus on training the practice of behaviors/skills belonging to each value. Promote both
living values education and life skills education.
(3) Pay more attention to quality and value education for groups of children with lower
academic performance.
(4) Coordinate with teachers and families in the process of educating and training qualities
and living values for each student.
(5) Diversify living values education activities, facilitate and support primary students in
practicing a number of tasks such as: being on duty, doing housework, learning about
and interacting with children with difficult circumstances around where they live... in
order to increase the performance of the value of Love and Responsibility, especially in
words or actions such as “help”, “share”, “encouragement.”
(6) With the value of Safety, specifically psychological safety, teachers should avoid
“publicizing” a student’s mistakes in front of the class, instead they hold private talks
with the child, creating opportunities for him to “correct” and make progress. With the
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value of Honesty, parents and teachers can gently remind and guide students through
steps to increase the practice of this value.
(7) Organize training courses for teachers, staff, parents on living values – life skills and
how to build a positive living value-based atmosphere at home and school; organize
networking activities, awareness increasing seminars so that parents, teachers, and staff
will take part in living values, life skills education activities held by schools.
(8) Conduct research on how values and qualities are practiced by primary students at
grades every school year, especially investigating the factors affecting living values, life
skills education to take more specific measures to improve students’ practice of living
values, life skills.
CONCLUSION
It is indicated in the research that students in grades 4 and 5 of the sample group from
Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School make a clearly high living values practice. The practice in
each aspect is also high. It can be explained by many reasons, however, there is a group of
factors that can positively affect this outcome, which is the educational environment in Nguyen
Binh Khiem Primary School as it is built based on positive living values and life skills. All
teachers and staff were trained on positive living values, life skills, and they exposed to living
value education methods. Many parents also attended seminars on how to accompany the school
to develop living values for their children. The most important aspect is that all students in
Nguyen Binh Khiem Primary School start learning living values, life skills at grade 1. The
research results also help confirm the school’s orientation of quality development education for
primary students in the right orientation and an effective manner (Thu & et al., 2020; Trang, 2011).
In practice, it is necessary to conduct further studies on a larger sample group to have more
practical evidence to make more specific recommendations for the development and
implementation of living values education programs being appropriate for primary students,
schools, and families; contribute to realizing the goals and outcomes of qualities and
competencies education for primary students according to the regular education curriculum
(Thu & et al., 2020; Ministry of Education and Training, 2014; Thu & et al., 2021)
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11. Tillman, D. (2008). Living value activities for young adults. Health communication.
12. Tran, Thi Cam Tu (2017). Living Value Education for Pedagogical Students (Doctoral
Thesis of Educational Sciences). Hanoi National University of Education.
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(2021). Correlations between living values and life skills of secondary school students in
Vietnam. European Journal of Contemporary Education, ISSN: EISSN-2305-6746, 10(1),
148-158. DOI: 10.13187/ejced.2021.1.148.
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Nguyen, Hai Dang (2020). Living values and life skills practice by junior high school
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About the authors

– Assoc. Prof. Tran Thi Le Thu is a training Specialist in Educational Psychology and
School Psychology. She has 79 articles published domestically and internationally, 20 books
have been published. With over 22 years of experience in research, practice and training, Prof.
Tran is currently the Head of Applied Psychology Section, Department of Psychology and
Education, Hanoi National University of Education. Prof. Tran regularly conducts training
courses and workshops for teachers, parents and education managers at schools, education
departments, NGOs on School Psychology, Educational Psychology, Living values – Life skills,
Parenting skills, Happy schools. Prof. Tran used to be a psychology counselor at Koto Vietnam;
special education consultant at private special education centers; Psychology supervision of 20
counseling rooms at 20 schools of the “Safe, friendly and equal school” project of Plan
International. Currently, she is involved in psycho-education counseling for many high schools
and national television programs on education (Teacher changed, Parents changed, Grew up
with children). She is also a member of the World Association for Personality Psychology
(WAPP); International Association of Research on International Education (IISP); member of
The Consortium to Advance School Psychology – International (CASP-I).
– Bui Bich Lien is a school psychologist. She has approximately 10-year experience
practicing school psychology, building living values – life skills education programs,
developing prevention programs in educational psychology, vocational training, school-based
individual psychological support. She gained her master’s degree in school psychology at Hanoi
National University of Education and is a member of the Foundation for Young Talents in
Psychology and Education. She was the author of two papers published in domestic journals and
the co-author of living values – life skills books for teachers and primary students. She was
awarded certificates for having completed training courses on vocational training, iMind
Education Program, Implementation Science Program, Positive Education Program, Effective
Parenting Program named Tripple – P, socio-psychological support programs for Covid-19
patients and families, etc.
– Bui Thi Nga earned her bachelor’s degree in school psychology in 2012, and her
master’s degree in psychology in 2017. She is a school psychologist in Hanoi-based education
system. She has 10 years of experience working in schools, teaching living values – life skills,
building educational psychology programs, and vocational education programs in schools. In
addition, she is a member of the Foundation for Young Talents in Psychology and Education.
She is the co-author of two articles published in domestic journals and co-author of the
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educational book series of Living values – life skills for teachers, 3rd and 4th-grade students.
She worked as a volunteer for the Psychotherapy Association to provide community support for
people with psychological difficulties due to the Covid-19 pandemic. She attended training
courses on psychology, education and vocational orientation: Positive Discipline for Parents,
Career Specialist, Living Values and Life Skills Education for Teachers, iMind education
program, etc.
– Bui Thi Diem My is a Bachelor of School Psychology with an excellent degree at Hanoi
National University of Education. Currently, she is a school psychologist at High-Quality
Education System Nguyen Binh Khiem – Cau Giay districst. She is a co-author of 2 articles
published in domestic journals. Diem My volunteered in a non-governmental organization to
support disabled children and international volunteers in Vietnam. She also participated in
psychological courses and workshops: Positive Educational Practice, Social-Emotional
Learning, Psychological Support for Healthcare Professionals, Google application for teaching
online, and so on.
– Phung Thi Nam graduated with a good degree in School Psychology at the Department
of Psychology and Education in 2018. Currently, Nam is studying a Master of School
Psychology program at Hanoi National University of Education. In addition, she is working at
Insight Life Skills Center with a position to build content and teach life skills to students. She is
a member of the Fund for Young Talent in Psychology & Education. She joins the research
team in a project named Happy teachers will change the world. She is participating in many
seminars such as seminars on teaching methods, promoting learning motivation for students,
paying attention when working with suicidal patients, sharing sessions with content on how to
become a talented school psychologist. She is participating in Let’s Talk 8 Consultation courses
of Core Community NGOs as a tutor. And she also participated as a volunteer at the 6th
International Psychology Conference at Hanoi National University Education.
– Cao Thi Lan Nhi was an excellent graduate from the Educational Psychology Program
provided by the Deparment of Psychology and Education, Hanoi National University of
Education in 2019. Lan Nhi is currently attending a Master’s program in School Counseling at
Hanoi National University of Education. She is a member of the Foundation for Young Talent
in Psychology and Education. She is working for various school psychology units in Hanoi.
She teaches Living Values - Life Skills, designing prevention programs for students. She used
to be a volunteer to support children with special circumstances at Social Welfare Center No. 8,
teaching living skills to children at Sakura Montessori preschool, teaching in CMSEdu
thinking – skill education program. Nhi participated in training courses on psychology,
education, teaching methods, and support skills for the Positive Education Program,
Psychosocial support for Covid-19 patients and families.
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SUPPORT FROM HOME FOR EARLY LEARNING

AND DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN UNDER FIVE YEARS OLD
FROM ETHNIC MINORITIES IN VIET NAM
Bui Thi Lam1, Ben Phạm1*, Tran Thi Kim Lien1,
Nguyen Thi My Dung1, Ho Sy Hung2
Abstract: The first five years of the child’s life is one of the most critical time periods for
development and learning. Support provided for children’s early learning and development is one
of the core goals in early childhood education. In Vietnam, children from ethnic minorities, living
in remote areas are usually from a low social economics status background. Limited studies are
conducted to examine support Vietnamese children from ethnic minorities. This study aimed to
investigate the support provided from home for early learning and development of children from
ethnic minorities in Vietnam. Participants (n = 205) were parents of children (n = 255) under five
years old from H’Mong, Dao, and Lu ethnic minorities living in Lai Chau and M’Nam and Sedang
living in Kon Tum. Data were collected by a survey questionnaire. Results revealed that parents
had little knowledge and provided little support at home for children’s early learning and
development. Support provided included activities such as playing, telling stories, singing and
providing different learning materials. Results also revealed significant differences between the
support from home and parent participants’ age, regions, gender, and ethnic minorities, and
children’s age and sex. Children who were under 36 months received less support than those who
were older. Girls received less support than boys. The quantity of support also depended on the
types of activities that parents involved with their children at home and types of learning
materials and resources children accessed. Findings from this current study provide an
understanding of the reality of supporting early learning and development for children in ethnic
minority areas, and serve as the foundation for developing strategies, plans, and specific
activities in promoting early learning and development for children from ethnic minorities in
Vietnam.
Keywords: early learning, development, support, ethnic minority, children
INTRODUCTION
Child development refers to the sequence of changes occurring from birth to adolescence.
Changes occur in all areas of development including physical growth and communication,
intellectual, cognitive, behaviour, social, and emotional skills. All of these changes are
undergone at different paces at specific age ranges as the changes depend on the context and
opportunities of the child. The first five years of a child’s life is one of the most critical periods
for child development and learning. Support provided for children’s learning and early
development is crucial to lay down the foundation for children’s comprehensive development
and to bring long-lasting essentials for children and the community. Goal 4.1 in the Sustainable
Development Goal (SDG) in education states that “By 2030, ensure that all girls and boys have
access to quality early childhood development and early childhood education to be ready for the
transition to primary education” (Prime Minister, 2017). Children’s learning and development
are considered a priority in Viet Nam. Different investigations and strategies indicate that a
comprehensive approach applied in child education for minority ethnic populations is essential
(Prime Minister, 2018).
* Corresponding Author: Ben Phạm; Email Address: ben.phamthi@hnue.edu.vn

2 Hong Duc University, Vietnam
693
There are a number of studies reporting on support for learning and early development for
children under five years old at home. Firstly, studies broadly indicate the important role of
providing support for early development of children under 5 as it lays down the foundation for
children’s lifelong health, wellbeing, and overall trajectory (Landry, 2014). The second theme is
the influence of family support on children’s development (David, et al., 2003; Evangelou, et
al., 2009; Mathers, et al., 2014a). Within this theme, the majority of studies report that support
from family stimulates developmental areas including physical, social and emotional, speech
and language, and cognitive skills. The number of studies reporting on children under 3 years
old is less than that reporting for older children (Mathers, et al., 2014b).
Vietnam is a multi-ethnic country, in which ethnic minorities account for 14.7% of the
population. The main living areas of ethnic minorities are the Northern midlands and mountains
and the Central highlands (Central Population and Housing Census Steering Committee, 2019).
Lai Chau and Kon Tum are two provinces in which many ethnic minority groups live. The
ethnic minority groups living in Lai Chau include the Mong, Dao, and Lu groups. The
proportion of the Mong group is 1,393,547 persons accounting for 1.4% of the country’s
population, the Dao group is 891,151 persons accounting for 0.9%, and the Lu group is 6,757
people accounting for 0.007%. The ethnic minority groups living in Kon Tum province include
the Se Dang and Mo Nam groups. The number of the Se Dang and Mo Nam groups is 212,277
persons accounting for 0.2% of the country’s population (Central Population and Housing
Census Steering Committee, 2019).
Research reports the support for learning and early development for children under three
years old in home and educational settings; however, there is a lack of the information about
children living in Viet Nam (David, et al., 2003; Evangelou, et al., 2009; Mathers, et al., 2014),
and especially in areas that include ethnic minorities. A study reporting results of the Early
Development Instrument (EDI) assessment in Viet Nam shows that children living in ethnic
minority areas have developmental deficits and provides recommendations for solutions to
support these children’s development (Ministry of Education and Training, 2013).
There is a lack of comprehensive research on support for early learning and development
for ethnic minority children in different settings including at home, school, and in the
community in two provinces representing the northern mountainous and the central highland
regions of Vietnam. The government of Vietnam has issued a number of policies and programs
to support learning and development for ethnic minority children. These policies and programs
include: Project on strengthening Vietnamese language for preschool children and primary
school students in ethnic minority areas for the period 2016 – 2020 (Ministry of Education and
Training, 2016); Policies to develop early childhood education in the period 2011 – 2015 issued
by the Decision No. 60/2011/QD-TTg dated October 26, 2011, of the Prime Minister (2011);
Project on Education Development for Ethnic Minorities for the period 2010 – 2015 approved
by the Decision No. 2123/2010/QD-TTg dated November 22, 2010, of the Prime Minister
(2010a). The project of 5 million mothers raising good children in the period 2010 – 2015 was
run by the Vietnam Women’s Union providing activities to support children’s parents in
general, and parents of ethnic minority children in particular in supporting their children’s
development (Prime Minister, 2010b).
Policies and programs generally focus on supporting children at school; whereas, policies
and programs supporting children and parents in the community are limited. Practical activities
to support development for ethnic minority children are carried out mainly through projects run
by different international non-government organizations, for example, Plan International, Save
the Children, or Aide et Action. Projects run by these organizations also provide assessment and
evaluation reports that convey situations of supporting children from ethnic minority groups in
disadvantaged areas before and after implementing projects’ activities.
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The overarching aim of this study was to investigate support provided by parents at home
for the early learning and development of their children younger than five years old from ethnic
minority groups. The overarching aim was targeted by three following concrete aims: (1)
parents’ knowledge about supporting learning and development for children under 5 years old;
(2) rate of children under 5 were participated in activities together with their parents for learning
and development; and (3) rate of children who were accessed to learning materials at home.
CONTENT
1. Research methods
1.1. Participants
Participants were 205 parents living in Lai Chau (n = 113) and Kon Tum (n = 92), Vietnam.
All participants were from ethnic minorities including H’Mong (n = 53), Dao (n = 27), Lu (n = 33),
M’Nam (n = 45), and Sedang (n = 47). All participants spoke their ethnic minority languages as
the first language and a number of participants spoke their first language and Vietnamese as the
second language. The majority of participants were mothers. The age of participants ranged
from 16 to 35 years old (M = 25.05, SD = 5.22). The majority of participants had one child
(n = 157, 76.59%), followed by participants (n = 46, 22.43%) who had two children, and two
participants had three children (0.98%). The number of children under 36 months old
(n = 147, 57.65%) and from 36-59 months (n = 108, 42.35%) was approximately equal
(see Table 1).
Table 1. Demographic information of the parent participants (N = 205)
Parent participants Lai Chau (n=113) Kon Tum (n=92) Total (N=205)
Age 24.69 25.48 25.05
Mean (SD, range) (5.05, 16-35) (5.82, 17-35) (5.05, 16-35)
Father 25 10 35
Mother 88 82 170
Ethnicity H’Mong 53 0 53
Dao 27 0 27
Lu 33 0 33
M’Nam 0 45 45
SeDang 0 47 47
Language spoken
ethnic language 25 20 45
ethnic language and Vietnamese 88 72 160
Having children < 5yrs 155 100 255
Having 1 child 73 84 157
Having 2 children 38 8 46
Having 3 children 2 0 2
Children < 36 months 92 54 147
Children 36-59 months 63 46 108
1.2. Instrument
This study collected data by a questionnaire distributed to parent participants in 8 villages.
The questionnaire comprised 15 questions including questions about general information
(questions 1 to 9), activities and materials parents used at home to promote their children’s
learning and development (questions 10 and 11), and parents’ knowledge on children’s
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development areas, care and nutrition, safety and importance of early learning (questions 12, 13,
14, and 15). The questionnaire was validated for the content validity by a Delphi method. A
pilot test was undertaken to examine the relevance of the survey questions and the language
used. The survey questionnaire was sent to staff who worked at the Women’s Association in the
8 village sites for their comments and feedback on linguistical and cultural appropriateness with
potential participants. Another purpose of the pilot test was to estimate the answering duration.
Internal consistency of the questionnaire was acceptable (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.79).
1.3. Procedure
Participants were recruited from 4 communes (i.e., Lang Mo, Ta Ngao, Ta Phin, and Mai Quai)
in Sin Ho district, Lai Chau province and 4 communes (i.e., Bang But, Mang Canh, Xa Hieu,
and Dak Tang) in Kon Plong district, Kon Tum province. Using population-based sampling, all
parents who had children under 5 years old living in two villages in each commune were invited
to participate in the survey. Inclusion criteria for selecting two villages in each commune was
one village was the least disadvantaged and another one was the most disadvantaged village in
the commune based on socio-economic status reported by the commune authorities.
The first step was to recruit and train research assistants. The commune authorities were
contacted by the author team to obtain permission and collaboration on data collection at the 8
research sites. A data collection package, including an information letter, a consent form, and
the survey questionnaire, was distributed to commune staff working at the commune women’s
association who were invited to involve in data collection as research assistants. There were 8
research assistants for 8 commune sites. Staff working at the commune women’s association
was recruited because of several reasons. Firstly, these staff spoke both the ethnic language and
Vietnamese so they translated and/or interpreted the questionnaire from Vietnamese into the
ethnic languages of potential participants who did not speak Vietnamese. Secondly, these staff
had a good relationship with the locals so potential participants were comfortable sharing
information with them. Thirdly, these staff had information about parents of children under 5 in
the villages so they could distribute the survey packages to eligible families. All 8 research
assistants were trained in two hours to be confident to undertake the questionnaire with eligible
participants. All 8 research assistants practiced how to conduct the questionnaire with the
research team and with the parents who participated in the pilot study.
The second step was to conduct the questionnaire with eligible participants in the villages.
The research assistants visited participants’ homes with the research team, distributed
questionnaires to participants and collected filled questionnaires. If needed, the research
assistants provided assistance by explaining questions that participants did not understand;
reading and writing answers for participants who could not read and write Vietnamese; or
interpreting questions verbally to participants then listening to their responses and writing on the
forms for the ones who did not speak Vietnamese.
The third step was to de-identify and code the returned questionnaires. Questions 1 to 11
were calculated by the frequency of participants’ responses. Questions 12, 13, 14, and 15 on
parents’ knowledge were calculated by 3 levels: (1) “Do not know” accounting for 1 point for
no responses, incorrect responses, or less than 4 correct items for all 4 questions; “partly know”
accounting for 2 points for responding at least 1 correct item for each question or 4 correct items
for all 4 questions; and (3) “completely know” accounting for 3 points for responding correctly
to all items of each question or having only one incorrect response for one item in all four
questions. These data for each participant were transferred to the Statistical Package for Social
Science (SPSS) version 20.0. Descriptive statistics and frequency of distributions were used for
data analysis.
Ethical considerations were applied by obtaining consent from the local authorities,
research assistants, and parent participants. They were informed about research objectives, time,
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and privacy and confidentiality restrictions prior to data collection. Participants agreed to
participate in the survey and their participation was volunteering. They were free to withdraw
their participation or refuse to answer any questions if they did not feel comfortable. All
returned questionnaires were de-identified and stored securely.
2. Research results
2.1. Parents’ knowledge on support for children’s learning and development
Parents’ knowledge was measured by 4 categories including: (1) children’s development,
(2) appropriate nutrition in every meal, (3) safety, and (4) methods supporting learning and
development. Questions on parents’ knowledge were calculated by 3-point levels. Participants
rated their knowledge on support for children learning and development for level 2 at the
highest scores, accounting for 59.51% (n = 122), compared to 38.54% (n = 79) for the level 1
and 1.95% (n = 4) for the level 3. Two third of participants (n = 70, 76.09%) in Kon Tum rated
as level 2; whereas, nearly a half of participants in Lai Chau rated as level 1 (n = 60, 53.10%)
and level 2 (n = 52, 46.02%). A half of father participants in two provinces rated themselves as
“do not know” (51.43%) and “partly know” (48.57%); whereas, one third of mother participants
rated themselves as “do not know” (35.88%) and the remainders were “partly know” (61.74%).
Mean scores on parents’ knowledge for participants in Kon Tum was higher than that in Lai
Chau and mothers had higher ratings than that of fathers (see Table 2).
Table 2. Parents’ knowledge on support for children learning and development (N = 205)
Knowledge level Lai Chau Kon Tum Sex (N=205)
(n=113) (n=92) Father (n=35) Mother (n=170) Total (n=205)
Do not know (n, %) 60 (53.10) 19 (20.65) 18 (51.43) 61 (35.88) 79 (38.54)
Partly know (n, %) 52 (46.02) 70 (76.09) 17 (48.57) 105 (61.76) 122 (59.51)
Correctly & completely know (n, %) 1 (0.88) 3 (3.26) 0 (0.00) 4 (2.35) 4 (1.95)
Mean scores
(SD, range) 1.47 (0.51, 1-3) 1.82 (0.45, 1-3) 1.49 (0.50, 1-3) 1.66 (0.52, 1-3) 1.63 (0.52, 1-3)
Correlation analysis was conducted to consider the relationship between parents’ age and
their level of knowledge to supporting children’s learning and development. There was a
negative correlation (r = – 0.01) between parents’ age and their knowledge, indicating that
younger parents had better knowledge than older parents regarding supporting children’s
learning and development.
There were differences in parents’ knowledge on children’s development areas, nutrition,
learning support and safety (see Table 3).
Table 3. Parents’ knowledge of different areas (N = 205)
Knowledge Development areas Nutrition Learning support Satefy
level LC KT Total LC KT Total LC KT Total LC KT Total
Do not know 55 22 77 35 15 50 47 22 69 33 20 53
(n, %) (48.67) (23.91) (37.56) (32.74) (16.30) (25.37) (41.59) (23.91) (33.66) (29.20) (21.74) (25.85)
Partly know 53 62 115 74 68 142 65 68 133 78 67 145
(n, %) (46.90) (67.39) (56.10) (65.49) (73.91) (69.27) (57.52) (73.91) (64.88) (69.03) (72.83) (70.73)
Completely
know 5 8 13 2 9 11 1 2 3 2 5 7
(n, %) (4.42) (8.70) (6.34) (1.77) (9.78) (5.37) (0.88) (2.17) (1.46) (1.77) (5.43) (3.41)
Mean score
(SD, range 1.56 1.70 1.69 1.69 1.78 1.80 1.59 1.64 1.68 1.73 1.69 1.78
1-3) (0.58) (0.55) (0.58) (0.50) (0.50) (0.50) (0.51) (0.46) (0.49) (0.48) (0.49) (0.49)
Note: LC = Lai Chau, KT = Kon Tum
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The mean score of parents’ knowledge was the highest for nutrition (M = 1.80 out of 3.00)
following by safety (M = 1.78/3.00). Knowledge of children’s development areas and learning
support was rated equally, accounting for 1.69 out of 3.00 points. There was a moderate positive
correlation between parents’ knowledge on children’s development areas and learning support
(r = 0.63).
2.2. Parents’ use of activities to promote children’s learning and development at home
Parents’ practice to promote children’s learning and development at home was measured by
two types of activities. The first type of activity was parents’ participation together with their
children in daily activities at home. Within this type, activities included: reading books together
with their children; telling stories to their children; singing for or with their children; going out
and teaching their children about surrounding environments; playing toys with their children;
and naming, counting, and drawing together with their children. The second type of activitily
was parents promoting access to different materials for children’s learning at home. These
materials included: books at home; books at preschools, from community libraries and clubs of
Playing and Book Reading; toys at home; toys at preschool, community and clubs; outdoor
playing toys at home; outdoor playing toys at preschools, in community and clubs. Table 4
summarises the mean scores of parents’ ratings for each activity.
Table 4. Mean scores on parents using activities to promote children’s learning
and development at home
Parents Sites Children age Children sex Total
Activity Father Mother LC KT <36mths 36-59mths Boy Girl (n=255)
(n=35) (n=170) (n=155) (n=100) (n=147) (n=108) (n=120) (n=135)
Participating 2.59 2.92 2.66 3.18 2.47 3.40 2.99 2.75 2.86
together with (1.28, 1-5) (1.63, 0-6) (1.48, 0-6) (1.69, 0-6) (1.54, (1.49, 0-6) (1.64, 0-6) (1.53, 0-6) (1.56, 0-6)
their children, 0-6)
M (SD, range)
Letting their 1.34 0.91 1.05 0.88 0.73 1.31 1.12 0.86 0.98
children access (1.31, 0-4) (0.99, 0-6) (1.15, 0-5) (0.89, 0-5) (0.92, 0-4) (1.53, 0-5) (1.18, 0-5) (0.92, 0-3) (1.06, 0-5)
to learning
materials,
M (SD, range)
Total Mean 1.96 1.91 1.85 2.03 1.60 2.36 2.05 1.80 1.92
(SD, range) (1.42, 0-5) (1.68, 0-6) (1.55, 0-6) (1.77, 0-6) (1.53, 0-6) (1.69, 0-6) (1.71, 0-6) (1.57, 0-6) (1.64, 0-6)
Parents’ mean score on activities to promote their children’s learning and development was
1.92 points out of 6.00 points. Parents’ mean score in Kon Tum was higher than this score for
parents in Lai Chau (M = 2.03 and M = 1.85, respectively). Parents did more activities with
children from 36 to 59 months (M = 2.36) than did with children under 3 years old (M = 1.60).
Mean score for mothers was higher than that for fathers (M = 2.92 and M = 2.59, respectively).
Mean score for parents’ activities with male participants was higher than did with female
participants (M = 2,05 and M = 1.80, respectively).
Parents in Kon Tum had a higher mean score (M = 3.18) on parents’ participation than
parents in Lai Chau (M = 2.66). Regarding the type of accessing learning materials, parents’
ratings were low (M = 0.98 out of 6.00) and this score for Kon Tum was 0.88 and Lai Chau was
1.05. Correlation analysis measured the association between parents’ knowledge and practice.
There was a positive correlation between two these variables (r = 0.41), which means that
parents who had more knowledge also used more activities in practice to promote their children
learning and development. However, there was a negative correlation (r = – 0.04) between
parents’ age and their use of activities in practice to stimulate their children learning and
development. Younger parents used more activities supporting their children’s learning and
development than older parents.
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Parents (n = 205) participating in this study had in total 255 children under 5 years old,
including 146 children under 36 months old and 109 children from 36 to 59 months, and 120
boys and 135 girls. Parents provided information on each activity they participated in with their
children at home in Table 5.
Table 5. Parents participating in activities with their children at home
Site Age group Sex Total
Activity Lai Chau Kon Tum <36 months 36-59 months Boy Girl (n=135) (n=255)
(n=155) (n=100) (n=146) (n=109) (n=120)
Reading books together with 24 46
their children (n, %) 24 (15.88) 22 (22.00) 16 (18.33) 30 (17.78) 22 (10.96) (27.52) (18.04)
Telling stories to their children
(n, %) 48 (30.97) 42 (42.00) 9 (6.16) 81 (74.31) 48 (40.00) 42 (31.11) 90 (35.29)
Singing for or with their children
(n, %) 82 (52.90) 73 (73.00) 66 (45.21) 89 (81.65) 80 (66.67) 75 (55.56) 155 (60.78)
Going out & teaching their
children about surrounding
environments (n, %) 67 (43.23) 45 (45.00) 22 (15.07) 90 (82.57) 52 (43.33) 60 (44.44) 112 (43.92)
Playing toys with their children
(n, %) 119 (76.77) 87 (87.00) 109 (74.66) 97 (88.99) 97 (80.83) 109 (80.74) 206 (80.78)
Naming, counting and drawing
with their children (n, %) 70 (45.16) 49 (49.00) 31 (21.23) 88 (80.73) 60 (50.83) 59 (43.70) 119 (46.67)
Total (n, %) 410 (44.09) 318 (53.00) 253 (28.88) 475 (72.63) 359 (49.86) 369 (45.56) 728 (47.58)
Approximately half of parent participants (n = 728, 47.58%) reported that they participated
in activities with their children at home to promote early learning and development. Parents in
Kon Tum (53.00%) participated in more activities with their children compared to parents in Lai
Chau (44.09%). Two third of parents participated in activites with their children who were from
36 to 59 months; whereas, only one third joined in activities with their younger children. Boys
had more activities with parents at home than girls. Playing toys with their children (80.78%)
was the most frequent activity that occurred, followed by singing for or with their children
(60.78%); whereas, book reading was the least frequent activity. Three out of 6 activities were
organized with the children at home. There was a weak positive correlation (r = 0.15) between
parents’ knowledge and their participation in children’s activities. However, there was a
negative correlation (r = – 0.05) between parents’ age range and their participation. Older parents
participated less in activities with their children at home compared to the younger parents.
Information that parents reported on resources and/or materials that their children accessed
at home was summarized in Table 6.
Parents (22.22%) reported that they created opportunities for their children to expose and
access different learning materials at home to promote their children’s early learning and
development. Parents in Kon Tum (29.67%) provided more materials to their children compared
to parents in Lai Chau (17.42%). Children from 36 to 59 months were reported to have access to
materials twice as much as those under 36 months (31.50% versus 15.40%). Boys were reported
to have access to materials more than girls, accounting for 31.11% and 19.26%, respectively.
The most common materials children accessed were toys at home (n = 123, 48.24%),
followed by toys at preschools, in community and clubs (n = 67, 26.27%). Materials for outdoor
activities and for pre-literacy skills had the smallest number of children access to
(n = 12, 4.71% and n = 21, 10.59%, respectively). There was a moderate correlation (r = 0.39)
between parents’ participation in children’s activities and materials children accessed.
Correlations between parents’ knowledge and materials for children (r = 0.06) and between
parents’ knowledge and their implementation of activities with their children (r = 0.18) were
weak. However, there was a negative correlation (r = – 0.01) between parents’ age range and
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their participation. Older parents provided fewer materials for their children at home compared
to younger parents.
Table 6. Children under 5 exposing and accessing materials at home
Site Age group Sex Total
Activity Lai Chau Kon Tum <36 months 36-59 months Boy
Girl (n=135) (n=255)
(n=155) (n=100) (n=146) (n=109) (n=120)
books at home (n, %) 17 (10.97) 10 (10.00) 9 (6.16) 18 (16.51) 15 (12.50) 12 (8.89) 21 (10.59)
books at preschools,
community and clubs of
23 (14.84) 28 (28.00) 21 (14.38) 30 (27.52) 29 (24.17) 22 (16.30) 51 (20.00)
Playing and Book Reading
(n, %)
toys at home (n, %) 59 (38.06) 64 (64.00) 61 (41.78) 62 (56.88) 68 (56.67) 55 (40.74) 123 (48.24)
toys at preschools, in
community and clubs 34 (21.94) 33 (33.00) 22 (15.07) 45 (41.28) 34 (61.67) 33 (24.44) 67 (26.27)
(n, %)
outdoor playing toys at
7 (4.52) 5 (5.00) 4 (2.74) 8 (7.34) 9 (7.50) 3 (2.22) 12 (4.71)
home (n, %)
outdoor playing toys at
preschools, in community 22 (14.19) 38 (38.00) 17 (11.64) 43 (39.45) 29 (24.17) 31 (22.96) 60 (23.53)
and clubs (n, %)
Total (n, %) 162 (17.42) 178 (29.67) 134 (15.40) 206 (31.50) 184 (25.56) 156 (19.26) 340 (22.22)
2.3. Discussion
The majority of ethnic minority children in Vietnam live in remote areas and experience
difficulties accessing quality education services; therefore, home support is very important for
their learning and development process. Currently, studies on parents’ knowledge and practice
in supporting the development of ethnic minority children in the northern mountainous region
and the central highlands of Vietnam are limited. This study contributes to practical evidence on
the knowledge and practice of parents at home in supporting learning and development for
children in ethnic minority areas. Parents reported their knowledge on the importance of support
for children learning and development and on different areas of children’s development. They
also reported their practices on participation in activities with their children at home and
learning materials for their children to promote their children’s learning and development. This
study’s findings are supported by studies on the importance of the home environment and
parents’ practice to support children’s development (Iruka, et al., 2018; Kavousipor, 2019;
Poehlmann-Tynan, et al., 2015; Sameroff, 2010; Shah et al., 2015).
Parents’ knowledge to support children’s development in this study was found to be
associated with different factors. Ethnicity was found to influence parents’ knowledge level
regarding support for children’s development. Within the study, there was a difference in
parents’ knowledge between parents from Hmong, Lu, Dao groups, and Sedang and Mnam
groups. These results in this study were lower than that reported from parents from Kinh,
Muong, Cao Lan, Tay, Nung, and Thai ethnicities in Phu Tho and Thai Nguyen provinces
(1.95% versus 9.9%) (Nguyen, et al., 2014; 2016). Similarly, differences are also found in
studies between Caucasian parents and parents from Asian, African, and Latino roots
(Sonnenschein, 2016). Second, parents’ knowledge of children’s learning and development was
different between fathers and mothers. Mothers had higher scores than fathers. This finding was
explained by the local women’s association staff that in the village, some activities and
programs provided for training mothers in caring and education of their children and these
programs may help to enhance mothers’ knowledge. Third, parents’ knowledge was also
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associated with parents’ age. Younger parents had better knowledge than older parents. Younger
parents accessed resources and information about child care printed in Vietnamese more easily
than older parents because younger parents spoke Vietnamese well as a second language
showing higher levels of literacy across both languages.
Parents’ activities implemented for their children at home to promote children’s learning
and development depended on several factors related to parents, children, and the environment.
Regarding parents’ characteristics, parents’ knowledge was positively associated with activities
they did for their children; mothers participated in more activities with their children than
fathers did; and younger parents participated in more activities with their children at home than
older parents.
Regarding children’s characteristics, parents participated in more activities at home with
their children who were from 36 to 59 months than those under 36 months and with boys more
than with girls. These findings are similar to findings from Bui et al. (2017) and Nguyen (2007)
with an additional explanation that parents thought that children under 36 months needed more
care and feeding than other needs and they were not ready for learning yet.
Regarding the environment’s characteristics, parents’ participation with their children at
home depended on the types of activities and materials provided. In general, parents’
participation with their children in daily activities for early learning and development was
sparse. This finding is similar to findings of the study by McCoy et al., (2018) that investigated
children from low- and middle-income countries. Particularly, activities that related to literacy
skills (i.e., storytelling and retelling and book reading) were the least undertaken with their
children at home compared to other activities (i.e., playing and singing with children). These
findings are similar to findings from Sonnenschein and Sun’s 2017 study about low frequency
of using these activities related to pre-literacy skills at home with their children in association
with outcomes of children’s pre-literacy skills. In addition to activities, parents also reported
that children accessed little materials at home for children’s learning and development,
particularly materials promoting pre-literacy skills for children. These findings are similar to
findings from a study conducted in Thailand (Bradley & Putnick, 2012) who reported that
13.9% of families had over 10 books, 16.7% had role-playing toys, 11.1% eye-hand coordinator
toys, and 5.6% music toys. Accessing different materials at an early age is important for
children’s development because it is positively associated with children’s capacities and
achievement (Bradley & Corwyn, 2005). Difficulties in accessing materials and toys during
emerging language development may negatively influence language acquisition (Rock &
Stenner, 2005) and limit vocabulary size and diversity (Hart & Risley, 1995). In addition to low
socio-economic status, other parents’ characteristics in this study were: illiterate parents had
little printed materials available and little knowledge on support for children’s learning and
development.
CONCLUSION
The influence of the home environment on children’s development is widely recognized.
Support from the home environment promotes the development of children. The current
research shows that the percentage of parents of children in ethnic minority areas who have little
knowledge about child care and education was high. The children received different levels of
support from home depending on the parents’ characteristics (i.e., age, regions, gender, and
ethnic minorities), and the child’s characteristics (i.e., age and sex). Children under 36 months
of age received less learning and development support from their parents than children from 36
to 59 months. Support provided for them such as playing together with parents and accessing
materials including toys at home, school, and in the community. There were also differences in
providing support for learning and development for boys and girls at home.
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The current research results support an understanding of the reality of supporting learning
and development for children in ethnic minority areas. These findings are served as the
foundation for developing strategies, plans, and specific activities in improving parents’
knowledge and awareness and schools’ and communities’ resources. In particular, the results
indicate that raising knowledge for parents about care and education for children under 3 years
old should be one of the priorities for ethnic minority areas. Besides, knowledge dissemination
on activities for parents also needs to be integrated into different programs to raise their
awareness about the role of early education for children and of avoiding gender stereotypes.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This research is a part of Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training research project
titled “Promoting Vietnamese language skills for H’Mong children by the use local cultural
works” under grant number: B2022-SPH-05.
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About the authors
– Assoc. Prof. Bui Thi Lam, PhD, Dean of Early Childhood Education Faculty, Ha Noi
National University of Education, Viet Nam. Her research interests are supporting teachers and
parents in the care and education of children from ethnic minority groups and disadvantaged
areas.
– Dr. Ben Phạm is a senior lecturer at Division of Speech-Language and Hearing
Impairment, Faculty of Special Education, Hanoi National University of Education, Viet Nam,
and an adjunct research fellow at Charles Sturt University, Australia (2018-2021). She is a
committee member of the Child Speech Committee of the International Association of
Communication Sciences and Disorders (IALP) and the International Expert Panel on
Multilingual Children’s Speech. Her main research interests are on children’s speech and
language acquisition, disorders and disparities.
– Tran Thi Kim Lien, is PhD candidate and lecturer working at Faculty of Early
Childhood Education, Ha Noi National University of Education, Viet Nam. Her major research
interests are supporting children to adapt in transition from home to kindergarten.
– Dr. Nguyen Thi My Dung is lecturer at Faculty of Early Childhood Education, Hanoi
National University of Education, Viet Nam. Her main research interests are health care and
safety skills education for preschool children.
– Dr. Hung Ho is a lecturer at Hong Duc University, Vietnam. He has been teaching in the
education field for more than 10 years. His main research interests are early childhood
education, training for early childhood educators, developing skills for preschoolers, and
inclusive education for children with disabilities in preschools. He has published more than 30
papers in prestigious journals in Vietnam and international journals. He has participated in many
international conferences on higher education held at universities and institutes in Vietnam.
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HOW TO USE STEAM APPROACH TO DISCOVER VALUES

OF THE CULTURAL HERITAGE OF HUE ANCIENT CAPITAL
FOR TEACHING HISTORY IN VIETNAM’S HIGH SCHOOLS
Nguyen Thi Bich*1, Nguyen Thanh Nhan2, Tran Thi Hai Le2
Abstract: The 4.0 Industrial Revolution has created many challenges for preparing human
resources. From the viewpoint of interdisciplinary perspective, STEM education is popular in
many countries as it can connect learning with practicing and schools with society in order to
prepare labour force for social demands. However, STEM has regularly been applied in disciplines
of natural sciences in schools and it is rarely used with disciplines of social sciences and arts.
Because the subject of History has interdisciplinary knowledge and cultural contents, it has
advantages to apply STEM and Art (STEAM) in teaching activities. The heritage of Hue ancient
capital with great cultural and historical values is highly possible to be exploited in teaching
activities under STEAM. This article focuses on discussing four main issues: 1) Conception of
STEAM education; 2) Values of the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital; 3) Proposals to exploit
values of Hue heritage under the STEAM education to teach History in high schools in Thua Thien
Hue Province.
Keywords: STEAM education, cultural values, Hue ancient capital, teaching history, Vietnam’s
high schools
INTRODUCTION
Vietnam’s new general education program of 2018 officially highlights the role of STEM
education in the comprehensive development of students to serve demands and skills in the 21st
century. STEM’s characteristic is that students are organized to learn by doing, or applying
interdisciplinary knowledge and skills to deal with social issues and demands. This learning
process requires students to make real learning products with a connection between schools and
society. It means that students have to cooperate in studying, and in completing all learning
tasks creatively and actively. Aims of STEM education are not only to help learners to have
fundamental knowledge and skills but also to have arguable thinking, abilities of team-building,
discussion and presentation, finding information, and using well all IT and interdisciplinary
knowledge to address all social demands. Moreover, STEM education can also expand learning
environment and establish creative classrooms to encourage learners’ interest in studying. As a
result, STEM education can be seen as a good way to train and prepare labour force for the 4th
Industrial Revolution. Some researchers argue that STEAM can be applied in teaching themes
of social sciences and humanities including the subject of History effectively because content
knowledge of those disciplines has a close connection and integration. Towards disciplines of
social science, STEAM is an adaptation.
As a political, economic, and cultural centre of Vietnam from the 17th to the 19th century,
Hue ancient capital keeps both tangible and intangible cultural and historical heritages. They not
only present deeply the history of Vietnam in the early modern period but also provide world
cultural and historical values. It is an advantageous condition to apply STEAM (STEM and Art)
to teach History in special themes or contents under the direction of Vietnam’s general
education program of 2018. Accordingly, how to exploit Hue cultural heritage well in teaching
* Correspoding Author: Nguyen Thi Bich; Email Address: bichnt@hnue.edu.vn.

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History in high schools is an urgent question for all scholars, teachers, and policy-makers in
Vietnam. Previous studies about teaching History in Thua Thien Hue Province provide us with
both theory and practice to propose methods to exploit values of the heritage of Hue under the
STEAM education. In this article, we argue that applying STEAM is an effective approach that
can create students’ learning interest and therefore complete targets of Vietnam’s historical
program of 2018 to improve students’ experimental and practicing activities.
CONTENT
STEM is a broad term of a group of academic disciplines: Science, Technology, Engineering,
and Mathematics. The conception of STEM was firstly used and adopted by scholars in
National Science Foundation (NSF) in America in 2011. It was then applied popularly in
developed countries such as Australia, Canada, Japan, South Korea, and countries in Europe.
Previous researchers argue that the recent problem of schools is that educationists and educators
have no connection between content knowledge of disciplines. Students only receive separated
information of inter-subjects and they have no skills and blended knowledge to address a social
problem (Frykholm & Glasson, 2005; Wicklein & Schell, 1995). That teaching and learning
STEAM is based on previous research and is supported by digitalizing students’ assignments.
As a result, students have chances to transfer their acquired knowledge to practical society to
address social problems creatively and effectively. Their successful integration will encourage
students’ creativeness, and teamwork skills (Robert, 2012).
Ghanbari (2015) argues that applying STEM in disciplines of Social Science and Arts is
suitable to coexist with four STEM scientific pillars. He explains that via the development of
Arts in STEAM education, a competency is introduced to develop students’ creativeness,
knowledge, and emotion. STEAM, therefore, is an educational approach to teach and learn
History in which students can integrate with other learners and educators to make their own
learning products. Plageras and other authors in “Understanding Ancient Greek Civilizations: A
STEAM Teaching Perspective” (2020, pp. 45-57) apply STEAM to instruct learners to discover
information and knowledge about the Greek ancient civilization. The results of the article show
that applying STEAM and Problem-based learning (PBL) can upgrade the quality of knowledge
transfer and increase learners’ level of understanding and improve learning results. This paper,
therefore, highlights the value of both PBL and STEAM in teaching and learning
interdisciplinary subjects.
In Vietnam, on 07/01/2016, the Ministry of Education and Training decided the Plan 10 to
experiment STEM at 15 high schools in 5 provinces (Hardman & West, 2016). The main
contents of this plan are training teachers about the innovation of teaching methodologies
(fundamental skill of teaching with STEM), examination, evaluation (focus on practising
skills/abilities, and on observing students’ learning process, and on students’ products and their
skills to present learning results). This program experimented to teach STEM in both internal
and outside lessons in several high schools as a fundamental comparison to have data for
analysing and evaluating STEM’s effects. Moreover, MOET also trained to use STEM
curriculum in high schools in 2018 (MOET, 2018), or trained educational officers and teachers
about building and designing STEM’s themes in high schools (MOET, 2019). Results of those
experiments show that students can obtain knowledge well, and have more skills while teachers
can develop their professional abilities, and innovate their ways of examination and evaluation,
and have a comprehensive and true understanding about STEM. Accordingly, in 2018, MOET
decided to apply STEM in high schools in Vietnam popularly.
In fact, STEM is still in its experimental period in Vietnam and is mostly applied in natural
science and rarely in social sciences. As such, the understading of Vietnam’s society about
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STEM, resources to support STEM, or society’s involvement in STEM education is quite

limited. They are huge challenges for applying STEM popularly in high schools in Vietnam in
both natural and social sciences under the direction of Vietnam’s new education program of
2018. Some high schools experimented to apply STEAM in disciplines of social sciences. Their
results show that STEAM can help to create learning products to link acquired knowledge in
classrooms with practical society and to establish and develop their skills and abilities to
develop a comprehensive education. However, they still had several disadvantages because
applying STEAM is only at the level of linking different knowledge to help students to discover
and understand a practical problem. Students’ knowledge is not enough to understand all social
problems and there is a gap between the learning environment and social demands.
There are many researches about the heritage of Hue ancient capital (Phan, 2011; 2015; Do,
2000; Ho Chi Minh Museum, 2013, 2017; Department of Culture and Sports Hue, 2019). Other
studies focus on exploiting the heritage of Hue in teaching History in high schools, especially in
Thua Thien Hue Province (Nguyen, 2008, 2011; Tran 2020). However, the above researches
mostly focus on teaching Vietnamese History in the 20th century rather than using the heritage
of Hue for teaching a special theme or subject. Moreover, all previous studies have not
exploited the cultural heritage of Hue under STEAM in teaching History.
2. Research methods
This article applies the following methods:
– Researching all theories about STEAM to build a suitable theory and direction for
practical research;
– Social investigation: this article invests and creates a survey for 20 educators and 200
learners at 10 high schools in Thua Thien Hue Province1. Via this investigation, the research
discovers the level and effectiveness of exploiting the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital
under STEAM in teaching History in high school (this result is a quote from the PhD dis. (Tran
Thi Hai Le, 2021) is protected). The investigation’s results are fundamental for authors to 1)
evaluate the fact of using the cultural heritage of Hue in teaching History under STEAM, 2) find
out reasons for its limitations, and 3) propose teaching methods.
– Observing method: researchers observe the teaching and learning process of both teachers
and learners to understand the fact of teaching History in general, and of exploiting the heritage
of Hue under STEAM in teaching History in high school.
– Pedagogical experiment: to exam the effectiveness of proposed methods, we apply
pedagogical experiments in some high schools in Thua Thien Hue Province. Both quantitative
and qualitative results of this experiment present a fact that exploiting values of the heritage of
Hue ancient capital under STEAM is an effective method to help teachers and students to use
interdisciplinary knowledge to understand historical contents deeply, and then partly contribute
to developing students’ general competences and specific competency relating to History.
3. Results
3.1. Conception of STEAM
In fact, there are many conceptions of STEM and STEAM. Tsupros (2009) argues that
STEM education is an interdisciplinary approach during the learning process, in which all
academic conceptions are the combination between learning lessons and outside society, and
students can apply all knowledge of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics to
work in specific conditions. STEM helps to connect schools with society, workplaces, and
1 They are Hue National Gifted high school, Hai Ba Trung, Thuan Hoa (in Hue city), Phan Dang Luu (Phu
Vang district), Dang Huy Tru (Huong Tra town), Huong Thuy (Huong Thuy town), Nguyen Chi Thanh (Phong Dien
district), Quang Dien (Quang Dien district), A Luoi (A Luoi district), Nam Dong (Nam Dong district).
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global organisations to develop learners’ abilities in all disciplines of STEM. As a result, STEM
supports students to have interdisciplinary knowledge and arguing ability to solve all social
problems and develop their comprehensive capacities. STEM, therefore, becomes the new
teaching trend in many countries to reform education and to serve society’s demands of labour
in the 21st century. Merrill has defined STEM education as a meta-discipline without boundaries
between content knowledge of different disciplines (Merrill, 2009).
In Vietnam, STEM is considered as an educational model with interdisciplinary viewpoint
to help students to use their knowledge of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics to
solve specific social problems (MOET, 2018). STEM is applied in secondary schools to teach
disciplines of STEM, experiment STEM activities, and research science.
There are several variations of STEM with different modifications: 1) just STEM with only
four academic disciplines (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics); 2) open STEM
with the existing four academic disciplines and extra other subjects such as Arts, Humanities,
and Robot, Innovation...; 3) vacant STEM with less than four academic disciplines; 4) STEAM
is the combination of STEM education with Arts and Humanities; 5) STEM and Scientific –
Technological Innovations. Accordingly, teachers can apply open STEAM to teach disciplines
of social sciences and to create teaching plans about cultural, historical, and scientific contents.
In this research, we apply STEAM to exploit the values of Hue ancient capital in teaching
History in high schools.
3.2. Values of the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital
Cultural heritage is Vietnam’s valuable property and a part of world culture. They are both
mental and physical products with high historical, cultural, and scientific values which are
passed to the next generations of Socialist Republic of Vietnam (National Assembly of The
Socialist Republic of Vietnam, 2013). There are two types of cutural heritage: tangible and
intangible. Tangible cultural heritages refer to physical artefacts produced and passed in
Vietnam’s society with high cultural, historical, and scientific values. They are products of both
natural beauty spots and human creativity such as historical sites, architectural buildings, and
relics. Intangible cultural heritages indicate mental products relating to community and
individuals with high historical, cultural, and scientific values produced, maintained, and passed
intergenerationally by oral presentation, performance, and other forms. Vietnam’s intangible
cultural heritages have seven forms including word of mouth, language, and scripts; folklore;
folk performing arts; social customs and religion; traditional festivals; traditional hand-crafts;
and folk knowledge (Government of Socialist Republic of Vietnam, 2010).
The cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital, which belonged to the Thuan Hoa – Phu Xuan
– Hue region, is a special site of Vietnam’s history. It was centre of Cochinchina (1687 – 1774),
and then the capital of Great Viet under the regime of Nguyen Tay Son (1788 – 1801), and
finally the capital of the last Vietnam’s dynasty, the Nguyen regime (1802 – 1945). This place
demonstrates Vietnam’s cultural diversity and it witnessed an interaction and convergence,
connections of many cultural lines, civilizations, especially the combination of Confucianism,
Buddhism, Southeast Asian natural characteristics, and then Western influences. Hue maintains
both tangible and intangible cultural heritages with great values of Vietnam’s knowledge and
traditional skills.
The most interesting and remarkable tangible cultural heritage in Hue is the complex of
Hue monuments including all historical sites relating to the Nguyen dynasty. This complex
locates in and around Hue City, and other districts of Huong Tra, Huong Thuy, Phu Vang, Phu
Loc in Thua Thien Hue Province. Those cultural heritages are noticeable examples for a
combination of Vietnamese traditional architecture under Oriental ideologies and Western
architecture and for the harmony between human buildings and natural spots of the Ngu Binh
Mountain (the Royal Screen), the Perfume River, Gia Vien, and Boc Thanh hillocks, and Hen
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sand-bank. There are many historical sites such as Imperial City, Forbidden Purple City, Temple
of Literature, Esplanade of Sacrifice to the Heaven and Earth, Royal Area, Temple of the
Roaring Elephant, Celestial Lady Pagoda. They also include royal mausoleums of the Nguyen’s
kings, An Dinh Palace, Hon Chen Temple, Binh Dai, and Hai Thanh Fortress, Hai Van Gate…
Besides the above buildings with high values of national, regional, and global standards, the
complex of Hue monuments also keeps historical relics such as potteries, porcelain, and pieces
of art. It maintains intangible cultural heritages as local customs, royal culture, royal festivals,
traditional folk festivals, Hue’s court music, and hand-crafts.
UNESCO recognized five world heritages under three different types in Hue ancient
capital. They are the Complex of Hue monuments (1993), Court Music or Vietnamese Royal
Music (2003), Woodblocks of Nguyen dynasty (2009 – documentary heritage), Documents of
Nguyen dynasty (2014), and Royal Literature on Hue Royal Architecture (2016). Hue maintains
the shapes and values of an ancient capital and it can provide great values of history, culture,
education, and economy for Vietnam.
– Regarding history: Historical relics of Hue ancient capital reflect the historical process of
the Nguyen dynasty with specific political, economic, cultural, and social conditions with
detailed individuals and historical events. Via ideologies, cultural trends, types of arts, and court
music from the Nguyen dynasty’s period, the cultural heritage of Hue provides a lot of historical
values.
– Regarding science: It provides knowledgeable values. Hue ancient capital heritage is a
“special material” with diversified information and data of different academic disciplines. They,
therefore, are interesting for both social and natural scientists. Heritages in Hue provide
invaluable sources to present Vietnamese historical events, individuals in the Nguyen dynasty
and therefore they help scholars and learners to understand Hue and Vietnam’s history, culture,
arts, customs, religions, and sciences in the period of 1558 – 1945 deeply and precisely.
– Regarding culture: Hue is the only site to maintain all tangible and intangible heritages
intactly. Hue is still a “masterpiece of urban architecture” with fortress, palaces, temples, and
royal tombs, combining both national values and the beauty of natural landscapes. Besides, Hue
has a diversified system of intangible cultural heritages. They are language and scripts, local
customs, religion, food culture, traditional fashion, crafts transmitted intergenerationally. All the
above heritages contribute to creating Hue’s cultural characteristics with specific identification,
and partly present Vietnam’s culture and provide a world cultural heritage.
– Regarding education: Most heritages in Hue are artefacts presenting human creativity and
transmitting intergenerationally. It, therefore, creates individuals’ consciousness about national
characteristics and inheritances and builds their responsibility to connect history with recent and
future societies. Heritage can contribute to connecting different societies, educating and
directing learners’ behaviours, consciousness, and responsibility to protect and exploit all
cultural heritages and national values. Under this viewpoint, heritages in Hue are invaluable for
the education of history, culture and value of Vietnam.
– Regarding economy: Thua Thien Hue Province locates in Central Vietnam, on the main
way from North to South and on the East-West economic corridor. It is significant in the
strategic economic area of Central Vietnam. Both tangible and intangible cultural heritages are
advantageous for Hue to develop local, regional, and Vietnam’s tourism as a leading and
significant economy. Under the direction of the Vietnam Communist Party in the Decree
54-NQ/TW, Thua Thien Hue will become a city festival, cultural, educational, touring, and
medical centre of Asia by 2045.
Vietnam’s general education program of 2018 in History provides many chances to build
specific themes and topics relating to the heritage of Hue ancient capital. They are Topic 10.2:
Maintaining and developing values of Vietnam’s cultural heritages (in grade 10); Theme:
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Revolution and wars for independence of Vietnam before the August 1945 Revolution; Topic
11.1: History of Vietnam’s traditional arts; Topic 11.3: Vietnamese worthies in history (in grade
11); Topic 12.1: History of Vietnam’s belief and regions. Teachers can apply STEAM education
to exploit values of the cultural heritage of Hue to teach the above topics and themes, especially
in content relating to culture. Teachers can organize different practical activities to help students
to understand the characteristics of Hue culture in a general idea of Vietnam’s culture.
3.3. Exploiting values of the heritage of Hue ancient capital under STEAM in teaching
History in high schools
3.3.1. Investigating the fact of using STEAM in teaching History in Hue
In this research, we make a survey with the participation of 20 teachers and 200 students in
10 high schools in Thua Thien Hue Province.
Questions for teachers investigate their awareness of STEAM; ability to apply STEAM in
teaching History, especially contents relating to cultural and historical heritages; forms and
methodologies to teach lessons of cultural heritages under STEAM; advantages and
disadvantages of using STEAM in teaching cultural heritages. A questionnare for students
focuses on evaluating their feeling and ability to join learning activities under STEAM.
Asked the question: “What is your notion about STEAM?”, only 8 teachers (40%) provide
precise understanding. Their lack of knowledge about STEAM, therefore, prevents teachers’
applying STEAM to exploit values of cultural heritages in teaching History, including ways to
choose types of heritage and ways to clarify characteristics and process of teaching under
STEAM.
Most of teachers in the investigation replied that they have not applied STEAM in teaching
contents of cultural heritages in History discipline (90% with 18 answers). Only two teachers
have instructed learners to investigate Hue ancient capital to serve another aim of joining the
competition namely “Science – Technology Innovation”. It means that all teachers in the
investigation have not applied STEAM in teaching History as an internal lesson in the
educational program. Accordingly, this investigation reflects the limitation of applying STEAM
in teaching History in Vietnam’s high schools, although the Ministry of Education and Training
has decided to reform education and develop STEAM in high schools.
Towards students, most of them want to study and discover cultural heritages in History
lessons as 198 students (99%) said Yes to the question: “Do you like to study local and national
cultural heritages?”. They understand that it is an effective and interesting way to know
Vietnam’s history precisely to respect traditional intergenerational values and then develop their
love towards their country. 132/200 students (66%) provide information that their teachers have
exploited cultural heritages in organizing experimental activities. However, only 60 students
answered that their teachers used cultural heritages to teach internal lessons (30%) and 8
students (4%) noted that teachers used those contents as scientific research.
The investigating results show that:
– Teaching History under STEAM to exploit values of Hue ancient capital in high schools
of Thua Thien Hue Province is quite new and rare. Both teachers’ theory and practice about
STEAM are quite limited.
– Most teachers have difficulty in teaching History under STEAM as they have little
knowledge to choose forms and methodologies to teach contents of the cultural heritage of Hue.
It is more difficult in combining lessons between social sciences and arts.
– There is a difference between recent ways of examination and evaluation and STEAM’s
examing methods. Vietnam’s education has recently applied multiple-choice questions to test
learners’ knowledge and skills while STEAM focuses on evaluating all products during
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students’ learning process. It is the most difficult to apply STEAM in disciplines of social
sciences and arts.
– That exploiting values of the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital under STEAM to
teach History, organize experimental activities and instruct students to do research requires
careful and full preparations of expense, technology, and cooperation between schools and other
professional officials of maintaining cultural heritage, and society, and abilities of both teachers
and students. All those requirements are difficult for not only teachers in Thua Thien Hue but
also for all teachers and Vietnam’s educational system.
3.3.2. Methods to use the cultural heritage of Hue in internal lessons
Teachers can instruct learners to apply interdisciplinary knowledge to investigate contents
of the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital during their learning activities about historical
figures and events in national history, or contents of local history under the direction of
developing students’ abilities.
To exploit well values of Hue ancient capital under STEAM, teachers can organize students
with learning activities to allow them to self-discover and address all problems when they
combine historical and social knowledge. By doing so, STEAM is used as a way of blended
learning in which students perform the following activities:
– Investigating real society and finding out learning problems. By using STEAM, teachers
require students to complete learning tasks or to propose solutions to address a social issue. In
order to complete these tasks, learners need to collect information, analyze social situations, and
explain ways to apply technology to address learning questions.
– Investigating fundamental knowledge: Students are ordered or instructed to find, research,
and obtain useful knowledge and skills to address learning requirements. They are foundational
knowledge and skills of Vietnam’s History program in high schools. Rather than receiving that
knowledge objectively in a face-to-face classroom, students self-learn with STEAM. Students’
activities are to study scientific materials such as text-book, references, and journals to observe,
practice, and solve learning tasks.
– Dealing with social tasks to encourage students’ scientific and technological creativeness
to establish and develop necessary behaviours and abilities. Students raise research hypotheses
and experiment this theory in society, and then propose scientific solutions. As a result, they
create two new products of “new knowledge” (scientific project) and “new technology”
(technological project). These products can be introduced and exhibited in various competitions.
For example, the Nguyen dynasty’s history related closely with the French invasion and the
changes of Vietnamese history in the context of interactions between East and West. Therefore,
the Nguyen dynasty included both national, traditional cultures and Western values. In order to
help learners to evaluate cultural values of the Nguyen dynasty’s arts, teachers instruct students
in project-based learning to research Hue citadel area under STEAM as they learn the content
“the Nguyen’s arts” (Topic 11.1: History of Vietnam’s traditional arts, Vietnam’s historical
program of 2018).
In order to research Hue citadel area, teachers require and instruct students to create a
learning project with different tasks:
– Groups 1 and 2: Describing the most remarkable and unique points of the architecture of
Hue citadel.
– Groups 3 and 4: Explaining the unique points of sculpture and arts of Hue citadel.
All groups have creative ways to present their learning products such as combining
presentation and simulation, making introduction papers, or using PowerPoint slides.
In order to complete this task, students need to read various materials, investigate Hue
citadel, and collect interdisciplinary knowledge of natural sciences, social sciences, and arts.
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– Regarding history: Identifying values of historical buildings of the Nguyen dynasty and
noting their historical timeline and their relations with important events and historical figures
in Hue.
– Regarding mathematics: Clarifying the architectures’ age, time of building, and also
information about shapes, squares and ratios.
– Regarding geography: Clarifying buildings’ location, characteristics of the landscape, and
natural conditions.
– Regarding arts: Evaluating values of noticeable architectures and sculptures with the
unique style and model in a specific historical period.
– Regarding physics: Understanding technology and materials to build cultural buildings.
– Regarding information technology: Exploiting online materials and creating a video to
introduce and present architecture, sculpture, or arts of Hue citadel.
Picture 1. Learning products of group 3 – 3D images of Hue citadel area

Results of applying STEAM in teaching internal lessons of History are potential. Students’
learning products are diversified and creative with posters, videos, photo books, or models. For
example, the above picture is a learning product of Group 3 from Thuan Hoa High school.
Students applied softwares of Sketchfab, MeshLab, Kolor Panotours, and 3DVista Virtual Tour to
digitalize historical and cultural sites and relics. STEAM is useful to help students to blend
interdisciplinary knowledge to address specific learning tasks.
3.3.3. Applying STEAM to perform experimental learning activities
Experimental learning is “an educational activity suitable with students’ age directed,
designed and instructed by schools to provide chances for students to connect with society and
present their positive feeling, exploit existing experience and using interdisciplinary knowledge
and skills in order to complete learning tasks or address problems of family, school, and society.
Beyond experiential learning activities, students transform existing experience into new
knowledge and skills and then partly develop their creative potential and ability of adaptation
with society, environment and future job” (MOET, 2018).
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The advantages of experimental activities, especially in STEAM in teaching cultural

heritages are to help students to have chances and conditions to experiment and connect with
many cultural heritages and beautiful natural landscapes. By doing so, students upgrade their
skills of observing, collecting historical data, researching the history, and creating suitable
consciousness about traditional heritages and love towards Vietnam’s history and national
values. Teachers can perform many types of experiential learning activities such as field visits with
instruction, research doing (as an archeologist or historian), and role-playing in different conditions.
For example, literary works on Hue’s Court architecture have their own and unique style in
decorating Royal buildings. All poetries at temples or palaces are unique and interesting
evidence about the Nguyen dynasty’s literature. It transforms historical, cultural, and artic
messages intergenerationally. In 2016, UNESCO recognized Literature on Hue royal architecture
as world documentary heritage at the Memory of the World Committee for the Asia-Pacific
region. In order to help students to understand those materials and cultural royal heritage deeply,
teachers can organize experiential learning activities to learn a topic: “Literature on Hue royal
architecture – world documentary heritage” under STEAM with the combination of five
academic disciplines: History, Philology, Language, Arts and Information Technology.
This project can be conducted in one week or more depending on the conditions of schools
and students. Students are divided into small groups and they join a learning project with many
activities such as discovering real information about Hue citadel and interviewing scholars
(historians or officers working for Hue Monuments conservation centre) to investigate and
understand interdisciplinary values of Literature on Hue royal architecture under teachers’
instructions.
– Group 1: Role-playing as a historian – to discover values of historical documents.
– Group 2: Role-playing as a poet – to discover literary values.
– Group 3: Role-playing as an architect – to discover values of decoration on architectural
buildings.
Noting that all groups produce and present their learning products in both Vietnamese and
English to develop their creative potential. Students can design and exhibit posters, photo
books, introducing videos to advertise Literature on Hue royal architecture and short-film of
interviewing tourists’ opinions and feeling about this cultural heritage.
For example, after joining experiential learning activities, students of Thuan Hoa High
school in Hue City used Canva and Photoshop softwares to design a poster to introduce
outstanding characteristics of Literature on Hue royal architecture as the following picture.
Picture 2. Poster of students in Thuan Hoa High school to introduce

Literature on Hue royal architecture
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As a result, via experimental learning activities under STEAM, students learn to apply
interdisciplinary knowledge to exploit values of the cultural heritage of Hue citadel. They create
various learning products to encourage and promote learners’ interest and desire to research and
understand cultural and historical sites deeply. Beyond that, it is effective to educate students’
consciousness and improve their love and respect for national cultural heritages. Their learning
products can advertise and develop values of the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital and
partly promote Vietnam’s beauty and culture popularly and broadly.
3.3.4. Applying STEAM to do research
Values of cultural heritage are diversified knowledge for students to exploit in order to
complete the research project, or discover local culture or join the competition of Innovations on
Science and Technology. Doing research firstly establishes and develops students’ ways of
thinking, their creativity, and ability to apply knowledge to address social problems. Secondly,
it educates learners’ consciousness about understanding and maintaining values of cultural
heritage. Thirdly, it partly changes teaching methods and improves the awareness and quality of
teachers. Teachers can suggest several projects to study cultural values of Hue ancient capital:
– Researching high and great values of the cultural heritage of Hue and proposing solutions
to transfer those values to Vietnam and the world’s societies.
– Building a model to present Hue ancient capital at local, national, and international
festivals, conferences, and seminars relating to the Nguyen dynasty’s culture and its influence.
– Creating clubs in high schools to investigate Hue culture under STEAM.
– Applying IT to create website, virtual historical and cultural sites, posters, photo books
and leaflets to introduce and advertise cultural heritages of Hue ancient capital.
– Proposing solutions to improve students’ consciousness and responsibility to maintain,
develop and pass values of the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital.
Moreover, instructing students to understand cultural heritage in order to join the
competition of Innovations on Science and Technology is a new learning form via
experimental activities. This competition is not popular, but it provides students with wonderful
ability and quality to research and apply IT and interdisciplinary knowledge to deal with social
demands. Teachers need to design special plans with different types of learning models to
encourage students’ interest in researching and developing their research abilities and skills
gradually. Besides, high schools can encourage clubs of “Young Historians” to organize
experimential learning activities and research STEAM. Schools can also establish a “Scientific
Advisory Council” to suggest, support, and instruct students to maintain and perform
experiential activities regularly and effectively.
With the STEAM curriculum, students have chances to experiment as historians and
scholars to self-research, investigate diversified references of books, journals, and the Internet to
learns history of the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital. By then, learners self-create their
interdisciplinary knowledge and skills to apply them in schools and society. Each student can
develop their own advantages on different disciplines and they use their ability and skills to
co-operate to produce learning products. That applying STEAM in teaching History to exploit
values of the cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital in high schools in Thua Thien Hue
Province is quite effective and potential. The research, therefore, suggests that this learning
form and methodology can apply popularly in Vietnam’s high schools as teachers can order and
instruct learners to investigate and exploit local cultural heritages when they have similar
conditions of cultural heritage, teachers’ ability and quality, and students’ interest and
involvement. The paper argues that applying STEAM in teaching History with interdisciplinary
knowledge of social sciences and arts partly changes the awareness of society, teachers, and
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learners about characteristics of history from a theoretical and academic discipline to a subject
of application. This fact partly contributes to the success of Vietnam’s popular education
program of 2018.
Via successful pedagogical experiment of applying STEAM to exploit the value of the
cultural heritage of Hue ancient capital in teaching History in high schools in Thua Thien Hue
Province, the research argues that it is possible to use STEAM in teaching History and other
social sciences. Teachers in other provinces in Vietnam with similar conditions as Hue can
experiment to exploit local heritage to teach History. Therefore, performing STEAM education
to teach History partly contributes to changing social awareness, especially teachers’ and
students’ viewing about this subject. However, in order to apply STEAM well in teaching
History in Vietnam’s high schools, there are some noticeable points:
– Blending the STEAM with innovating in examination and evaluation: It means that
teachers need to focus on evaluating students’ learning products regularly to encourage learners
to create high-quality learning results.
– Training Vietnamese teachers on how to understand STEAM and know how to conduct
STEAM in teaching. In STEAM, several teachers of different disciplines co-operate to build a
lesson plan to help students to have comprehensive and interdisciplinary knowledge to address
social problems. As a result, it is required to train teachers in pairs or groups about STEAM and
the way to apply STEAM in teaching social science and humanities. By doing in well this step,
Vietnam’s education will have high-quality educators to serve new requirements in the 4th
Industrial Revalution and complete Vietnam’s educational aims.
– Investing and equipping satisfactory equipment to apply STEAM in teaching and
learning. As applying STEM in education, it is required to have full preparation of equipment to
perform STEAM in teaching social sciences and arts. Due to this requirement, that applying
STEAM in rural places and poor areas in Vietnam is limited. It takes time for Vietnam to apply
STEAM comprehensively and broadly.
– Increasing the connection and cooperation between Vietnamese and foreign educational
organizations. That researching, exchanging lecturers, training teachers, and inviting
international experts to train Vietnamese educators are necessary to help Vietnamese education
to have qualitative resources for applying STEAM in teaching.
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About the authors

– Dr. Nguyen Thi Bich is working at the Faculty of History, Hanoi National University of
Education. She focuses on researching Examination and Evaluation in teaching History; Forms
to teach History; Theories and Methodologies on teaching History in high schools. She is the
author and co-author of more than 30 academic articles and papers in national and international
conferences and journals. She has published more than 30 academic and reference books. She
takes part in different training programs for teachers of high schools in Vietnam about the
Vietnam general education program 2018. She also participates in teaching and training master
and PhD students.
– Assoc. Prof. Nguyen Thanh Nhan is Vice-Chancellor at Hue University of Education.
His main research focuses on the following subjects: Theories and Methodologies on teaching
History; Applying written documents to teach History; Researching and Teaching local History.
He is the author and co-author of more than 50 articles and papers in national and international
conferences, journals; more than 10 academic and reference books. Moreover, he is also
involved in different training programs for education officials and teachers of high schools in
Vietnam about the Vietnam general education program 2018. He also participates in teaching
and training master and PhD students.
– MA. Tran Thi Hai Le is working at the Faculty of History, Hue University of Education.
Her research pays attention to subjects: Applying information technology and media in teaching
History; Exploiting cultural heritage to teach History; Performing experiential activities in
teaching History. She is the author and co-author of more than 20 academic articles and studies
published in national and international conferences and journals. She conducts several
university and government research projects. She also takes part in different training programs
for teachers of high schools in Vietnam about the Vietnam general education program 2018.
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PARENTING BEHAVIOR AS A PREDICTOR OF SCHOOL DEVIANT

BEHAVIORS AMONG ADOLESCENTS
Tran Thu Huong1, Le Thi Ngoc Lan*2, Tran Thu Huong1, Nguyen Thi Minh3
Abstract: Adolescence is a period which is accompanied by rapid and significant changes both
physically and mentally. This makes it easy for teenagers to take form at-risk behaviors that
deviate from normal behavioral standards, especially those at school. Parental educational
behaviors, or more broadly family education, is considered by many authors as an important
indicator of deviant and antisocial behavior. The study was conducted by a convenience
sampling method on 705 adolescents, and measured by two standardized scales: Child Report of
Parent Behavior Inventory (Barber et al., 2005) and Adolescent-Reported Deviant Behaviors
Checklist (Elliot, Huizinga & Agenton, 1985; Junger-Tas, Terlouw & Klein, 1994; Ni-He & Marshall,
2012). The scales and sub-scales of parental behaviors, deviant behaviors in adolescents were
significantly correlated. Strong supportive behaviors and lax psychological control behaviors of
parents predicted a reduction in deviant behaviors in adolescents, especially behavioral
manifestations from mothers. Dimensions of parenting behaviors had a predictive role for
changes in deviant behaviors in adolescents. This role was further confirmed when there was a
combination of a number of independent variables such as gender, school environment, parents’
marital status, academic performance and children’s hierarchy in the family. Solutions to reduce
school deviant behaviors should take these variables into account.
Keywords: parenting behavior, deviant behaviors, school deviant behaviors, adolescents
INTRODUCTION
Since the early years of the 20th century, researchers around the world have affirmed that
adolescence is a period of development filled with contradictions and disturbances (Hall, 1904),
with the increase of many anti-social behaviors, at-risk behaviors which peak at the end of this
period or at the beginning of adulthood (Laid & Frazer, 2019). Previous studies have shown that
adolescents are more affected by negative and at-risk behaviors. Adolescent issues are not
limited to one region, one country or one ethnic group, but become a worldwide trend with
increasing social problems every day (Snyder & Sickmund, 1995). Some researchers have
pointed out psychological difficulties, manifestations of unstable personality in adolescents such
as: irregular emotions; unstable and incomplete awareness of ethical standards; limited
self-esteem; contradictory and inconsistent personality. Therefore, adolescents are more likely
to engage in at-risk behaviors, deviant behaviors and being easily abused such as being sexually
abused, unwanted pregnancy, use of stimulants (alcohol, drugs, smoking, etc.), breaking the
law, school violence, game addiction, etc (Truong, 2013).
According to Dictionary of psychology of American Psychological Association (APA,
VanDen-Bos, 2007, p. 276, cited on Sanches et al., 2016), deviance is defined as “any behavior
that is significantly out of what is considered appropriate or typical for a given social group”.
As such, deviant behavior is considered as any behavior that does not conform to established
norms within a social group or within a society in a broad sense (Idris, 2016; Orsati & Causton-
Theoharis, 2013; Vieno et al., 2011). Deviant behavior is an act that conflicts with social norms;
it can be criminal, anti-social and unethical behaviors. In adolescents, deviant behaviors can be
* Corresponding Author: Le Thi Ngoc Lan; Email Address: ltnlan@ued.udn.vn; ngoclan25051981@gmail.com

1 VNU-University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Hanoi
2 University of Education, The University of Danang
3 Vietnam Court Academy, The Supreme People Court
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listed as aggression, attacking, smoking, bullying, violence, etc., which are caused not only by
disturbances in the family, but also by dysfunctions in society and in each country. Recent
studies on deviant behaviors in Vietnam have mostly referred to notable slices, such as school
violence, sexual violence, spreading bad news on the internet, violation of laws, abortion, unsafe
sex (Ministry of Health, 2010), bringing weapons to school, using drugs (Luu, 2005), cheating,
being rude to teachers, using drugs, bullying at schools, etc. (Hoang, 2015); in which bullying,
insulting, threatening others in public places have become more striking. According to the
general report of Vietnam Ministry of Public Security (2015), there were 24,000 cases related to
schools in Vietnam from 2010 to 2015. This report stated that deviant behaviors in Vietnam
were constantly increasing and becoming a common concern of the whole society (Report of the
Vietnam Ministry of Public Security, broadcast on Vietnam Television, on the evening of 28th
January 2018, titled “School violence – a proper perspective needed”). As such, it seems that
families, schools, and society are slowly losing control over adolescents with deviant behaviors
and the results of using educational power to solve these problems are not as expected.
School deviant behavior, therefore, is understood as an act not in accordance with school
norms specified in the Education Law and the rules and regulations set forth by the school on
responsibilities and obligations of students. According to Bolu-Steve & Esere (2017), it is often
difficult for adolescents to adhere to the “social habits” because they are in a period of dramatic
changes in intellectual, emotional, physical, sexual characteristics and sexual maturity.
Therefore, many questions are raised for researchers when treating deviant behaviors in
adolescents: Does the school fail to deal with the student’s deviant behavior? Are parents and
families partially responsible for deviant behavior in adolescents? What factors influence the
development of deviant behaviors in adolescents? Only when these questions are appropriately
answered can deviant behaviors among adolescents be reduced.
Schools as an educational institution of positive morality for young people are damaged by
the rising rate of social and behavioral problems in adolescents. Despite schools’ guidelines and
adjustments, the proportion of students with negative behaviors and truancy continues to
increase, regardless of rural or urban area (Farrington, 1989). Previous studies have shown that
the environment played a given role in adolescent development; in which, family is the most
directly important educational environment, with its core being dimensions of parental behaviors.
Therefore, the family is also responsible if the child is “spoiled” (Jacobvitz et al., 1996;
Vuchinich et al., 1992). These authors suggested that the predictor for antisocial behaviors in
adolescents is inappropriate, inconsistent or lack of discipline during childhood.
A comparative study conducted by Glueck & Glueck (2003) on 438 criminal children in
re-education school and 442 non-criminal children, based on a self-report scale of deviant
behaviors and a parental behaviors inventory reported by children has pointed out that children
who commit crimes are often from families in which parental behavior is characterized by weak
support and lax control (cited in Born, 2003, p. 110). Patterson’s research (2002) on children
from 15 to 18 years old, using the “Checklist of parent behavior” designed by Slate & Power
(1987) showed that parental relationships characterized by coercion, authority, distance, and
hostility are all signs of familial dysfunctions, leading to personal difficulties in adolescents.
Adolescents living in such environment are at risk of increasing deviant behaviors at home,
school, and society such as aggression, vandalism, theft and substance abuse (alcohol, drugs). A
model of coercive parenting behaviors produces children who are frequently angry, rebellious,
rude, disobedient, unable to connect with their parents and inadaptable with society (cited by
Born, 2003). Similarly, Farrington et al. (2003), through a self-report checklist of children’s
deviant behavior and parenting behaviors argued that excessively strict and arbitrary control and
harsh punishment are important indicators related to high level of deviant and antisocial
behaviors in adolescents.
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Many studies have shown that attachment, support and closeness to parents during
childhood and adolescence had positive effects on their development, providing meaningful
protection, and helping them cope with psychological suffering and accepting commitments to
eliminate or reduce deviant behaviors (Brook et al., 1997). On the contrary, too high
psychological control will negatively affect psychological development in adolescents and
facilitate the formation of negative behaviors such as aggressive and maladaptive behaviors
(Magnus et al., 1999, cited in Anderson, 2008). Regarding parental indifference and their low
support behaviors, Barrera and Li (1996) asserted that this would lead adolescents to some
difficulties in adulthood such as feelings of inferiority, anxiety, and social inadaptability.
A research conducted by Barber & Harmon (2002) on thousands of adolescents in the
United States of America showed that parental behavioral control was associated with negative
behaviors of adolescents, including aggression, emotional deficiency, depression, and lower
confidence. Another study realized by the authors Kim & Rohner (2002) on 700 Korean-
American adolescents, using scale of Bury (1990) (with the lowest reliability score of 0.7 on
each sub-scale), indicated a relationship between parents’ overly control, warm support and
children’s academic performance. Up to 74% of Korean-American adolescents in the survey are
dissatisfied with their parents’ behaviors, 26% of adolescents who were nourished by an
authoritarian, highly control father had a higher academic performance at school, but
encountered some problems related to oppositional behaviors and anxious feelings at school
more than those who were raised by authoritarian mothers. The results of the research also
showed that, in terms of academic performance only, authoritative/democratic fathers did not
promote children to obtain significantly more academic achievement than low supportive
fathers (permissive) or high control fathers (authoritarian).
Studies conducted by Nguyen (2014) and Le (2019) show that the conflict between parents
and children was often related to discipline and exercising discipline. Children’s difficulties in
accepting and obeying discipline are often related to parental pressure. According to these
authors, in families where parents and children have intense conflicts, parents have enforced an
authoritarian policy, imposed strict control on their children in both psychological and
behavioral aspects.
Based on the above theories and practices, the article aims to examine the role of parental
behaviors (considered in three dimensions: parental support, parental psychological control, and
parental behavioral control) in changing the level of deviant behaviors in adolescents. In
addition, a number of independent variables such as gender, academic performance, parents’
marital status, kind of school, etc. are included in the analysis to find predictive models for
deviant behavior patterns. The hypothesis of tight parental control associated with a high level
of deviant behavior in adolescents and high parental support related to a low level of deviant
behavior patterns is considered. Parental control behavior is not significantly predictive of
school deviant behaviors in adolescents.
CONTENT
1. Methods or research
Participants
This study was conducted on 705 students; in which 566 students are at a public high
school (accounting for 56.2%), a private high school (24.1%) and 166 students from a reform
school (accounting for 19.7%). The number of male students accounted for 60.1% (n=424). The
data was collected from November 2019 to September 2020. There were 65.2% of the students
who answered the questionnaire with full families, living with their parents; the remaining
34.8% of the students had parents separated, divorced or dead, parents working far away, etc.
Students’ academic performance was different: 4.8% of students with good result (n=34), 24.4%
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of students with average and weak academic performance (n=172), and 70.8% of students with
fairly good (n=499). The study was carried out in a cross-sectional manner, using the
convenience sampling method (see Table 1).
Table 1. Characteristics of participants (n=705)
Characteristics N %
Gender Boys 424 60.1
Girls 281 39.9
Type of school Public school 396 56.2
Private school 170 24.1
Reform school 139 19.7
Academic performance Average and weak 172 24.4
Fairly good 499 70.8
Good and excellent 34 4.8
Type of family Full families 460 65.2
Parents separated, divorced or dead, parents working far away, etc. 245 34.8
Research measurements
The research subject was measured based on two scales:
The parenting behavior scale includes 25 items, of which 23 items are on the scale
developed by Barber et.al. (2005) and 02 items are designed by the research team. This 23-item
scale was used in some researches in Vietnam and showed its validity and reliability among
Vietnamese adolescents (Le, 2019; Nguyen, 2014). The 25-item scale is a self-reporting tool for
adolescents, consisting of 3 subscales: Parental Support, Parental Psychological Control and
Parental Behavioral Control, with internal reliability of the whole scale describing the father’s
behaviors α=0.65 and mother’s behaviors α=0.61.
The Parental Support subscale includes 10 statements revised from the Revised Child
Report of Parent Behavior Inventory - CRPBI (Schaefer, 1965; Schuldermann & Schuldermann,
1988) with α=0.83 (for father) and α=0.79 (for mother).
The Parental Psychological Control sub-scale includes 8 statements extracted from the
Psychological Control Scale-Youth Self-Report (PCS-YSR); (Barber, 1996) and 2 additional
statements designed by the research team, based on the suggestions of many students, who
thought that these were quite familiar behaviors in their parents: “Usually makes me hurt when I
don’t obtain good results or make mistakes” and “Often saying negative things that make me
feel inferior about myself and pessimistic about the future”. The internal reliability of this
subscale for the father: α=0.71 and for the mother: α=0.81. The Parental Behavioral Control
subscale uses 5 items borrowed from research on adolescents’ families (e.g. Barber, Stolz,
Olsen, Collins & Burchinal, 2005), whose Cronbach’s alpha for fathers is: α=0.67 and for
mothers: α=0.62.
The responses are based on a 3-point Likert scale: Unlike father (mother)/Completely
unknown = 1 point; Quite similar to father (mother)/Knows a little = 2 points; Very similar to
father (mother)/Knows very well = 3 points.
The Adolescent-Reported Deviant Behaviors Checklist describes 37 problematic behaviors
among Vietnamese high school students; in which: 27 behaviors were selected from an
international self-reported scale of delinquent behaviors (eg, Elliot et al., 1980; Junger – Tas et
al., 1994; Ni He & Marshall, 2012), and 10 behaviors were designed by the research team,
based on the codes of conduct issued by the Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam,
based on consultation with experts, head teachers and students about problematic behaviors at
school. The internal reliability of the whole scale was α=0.95. This scale was described by 4
sub-scales including: 1) Violations of academic rules and other regulations at school (α=0.92); 2)
Behaviors related to communication in school (α=0.84); 3) Indirect and direct bullying
721
behaviors at school (α=0.85); and 4) Behaviors related to sexuality (α=0.78). The answers were
built on a 4-point Likert scale: Never = 1 point; Rarely (1-2 times a year) = 2 points;
Occasionally (3-5 times a year) = 3 points; Regularly (more than 5 times a year) = 4 points.
Data analyses and statistical methods
Dimensions of parenting behaviors and groups of deviant behaviors were examined and
tested by confirmatory factor analysis. Accordingly, the normal variations were extracted on the
number of explained variances, therefore, a standard variable would be the same as the one that
appeared in the confirmatory factor analysis. The loading factor was 0.40. To assess the overall
relationship between parental behaviors and deviant behaviors in adolescents, the team research
used standard correlation analyses. Linear regression model with stepwise statistics was used to
analyze the variation of school deviant behaviors in adolescents when having the impact of
parental behaviors and some other relevant factors. Missing values were excluded from the
analyses.
2. Results of research and discussions
2.1. Research results
Table 2. Mean, Standard deviation, Median and Correlation coefficients
of the scales/sub-scale in research
SF PCF BCF SM PCM BCM DB DB1 DB2 DB3 DB4
SF - -.19** .17** .53** -.32** .29** -.47** -.42** -.45** -.45** -.45**
PCF - -.19** -.26** .53** -.26** .39** .34** .41** .37** .39**
BCF - .24** -.27** .57** -.24** -.19** -.25** -.24** -.29**
SM - -.25** .25** -.60** -.55** -.61** -.52** -.60**
PCM - -.31** .40** .33** .40** .42** .41**
BCM - -.27** -.23** -.26** -.28** -.32**
DB - .96** .95** .91** .84**
DB1 - .86** .80** .72**
DB2 - .86** .80**
DB3 - .78**
DB4 -
M 17.99 17.71 8.54 17.83 22.07 8.62 70.61 35.95 15.09 11.74 7.83
SD 4.81 3.89 2.54 4.34 5.11 2.46 23.06 11.38 5.54 4.64 3.14
MD 18.00 17.00 8.00 18.00 22.00 8.00 63.00 33.00 13.00 10.00 7.00
**. Significant Correlation 0.01 (2-tailed)
SF. Paternal support; SM. Maternal Support; DB1. Acts of violating school rules; DB3. Bullying behavior in
PCF. Paternal Psychological PCM. Maternal Psychological Control; DB2. Deviant behavior related to and out of school;
Control; BCM. Maternal Behavioral Control; communication and conducts; DB4. Deviant behavior
BCF. Paternal Behavioral DB. General deviant behavior; related to sexuality.
Control;
Compared with the research results published by Barber et al. in 2005 (correlation between
sub-scales ranges from 0.30 to 0.60), the correlation between sub-scales of parenting behaviors
in this study was lower but still ensured the positive (supportive dimensions vs. behavioral
control), negative (supportive dimension vs. psychological control, psychological control vs.
behavior control) direction among aspects of parental behaviors; in which, the autonomy
support and behavior control of the father was quite closely correlated with those of the mother,
the remaining correlations were all weak but statistically significant with p<0.01 (see Table 2).
Regarding school deviant behaviors in adolescents, the participants in this study reported
significantly high levels of school deviant behavior in general (M=70.61, MD=63.00) and of
groups of school deviant behavior in particular. This result was similar to the study of Gonzalez
et al. (2014) on criminal behaviors and antisocial behaviors in adolescents in school environment.
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The following six multivariate regression analyzes were performed to evaluate predictive
ability of parental behavior variables (independent variables) for the occurrence of deviant
behavior patterns (dependent variables). In addition to the above independent variables, five
other independent variables were also analyzed including: academic performance in the school
year, type of school, gender, birth order in the family and marital status of parents.
In the first model, with the dependent variable being general deviant behavior in
adolescents, only two behavioral aspects from fathers and mothers had predictive values for
46.1% of the variation of dependent variable (with ΔF(1,700)=21.242, p=.000), including parental
support and psychological control; in which the maternal support was the most predictive in
expecting the reduction of deviant behaviors in adolescents (β=-.440, t=-13.239). The stepwise
statistics used in this model showed that the addition of each parenting behavior significantly
increased variability of deviant behavior in the sequence: maternal psychological control,
paternal psychological control and paternal support, with the rate explained from 36% (with 1
independent variable) to 46% in the final model (with 4 independent variables).
Table 3. Linear regression model with the dependent variable
being general deviant behaviors in adolescents (n=705)
Unstandardized coefficients Standardized coefficients t p
Predictive variables B SE β
(Constant) 57.181 5.470 10.454 .000
Maternal support -1.215 .148 -.229 -8.226 .000
Type of school 11.426 .764 .392 14.948 .000
Maternal Psychological control .854 .119 .189 7.185 .000
Academic performance -6.330 1.147 -.138 -5.520 .000
Paternal support -.748 .128 -.156 -5.824 .000
Paternal Psychological control .769 .155 .130 4.964 .000
Gender 2.545 1.122 .054 2.267 .024
Parents’ marital status 1.621 .705 .057 2.298 .022
Birth order 1.520 .704 .048 2.157 .031
R2 .683
ΔR2 679
ΔF(1,695) 4.654
p .031
Durbin Watson 1.906
In case of adding five other independent variables, the predictability of parenting behaviors
changed and increased the variability of general deviant behavior in adolescents. The data in the
second linear regression model (see Table 3) explained 67.9% of the variation of overall deviant
behavior (ΔF(1.695)=4.654, p=.031); in which the maternal supportive behaviors was still the most
predictive variable (β=-.229, t=-8.226, p<.05). The increase in variability of deviant behavior
ranged from 36% to 67.9% when the independent variables were added in the sequence: School
type  Maternal psychological control  Academic performance in the year  Paternal
support  Paternal Psychological control  Gender  Parents’ marital status and birth order.
Table 4. Linear regression model with the dependent variable being behavior
of violating school rules in adolescents
Predictive variables Unstandardized coefficients Standardized coefficients t p
B SE β
(Constant) 31.773 2.725 11.660 .000
Type of school 6.476 .401 .451 16.151 .000
Maternal support -.529 .080 -.202 -6.604 .000
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B SE β
Academic results -2.504 .627 -.111 -3.994 .000
Parents’ marital status .957 .384 .069 2.489 .013
ΔR2 .603
ΔF(1,697) 6.197
p .013
Durbin Watson 1.993
The change of groups of behaviors violating school rules was predicted by parental support
and psychological control along with variables of school type, academic achievement in the year
and parents’ marital status. Accordingly, these independent variables accounted for 60.3% of the
change in behaviors that violated rules and regulations set forth by the school (ΔF(1.697)=6.197,
p=.013) (see Table 4).
In the model shown in Table 4, parental behaviors were not the most and first predictor for
the change of violations of school rule behaviors. School type was the first to be included in the
model to analyze and explain 35% of the reduction of violations at school (β=.451, t=16.151,
p<.05).
Table 5. Linear regression model with dependent variable being
deviant behaviors related to communication and conducts in adolescents
(Constant) 11.603 1.339 8.664 .000
Type of school 2.744 .179 .392 15.368 .000
Gender .729 .275 .065 2.653 .008
Birth order .364 .173 .047 2.100 .036
ΔR2 .662
ΔF(1,696) 4.409
p .036
Durbin Watson 1.881
Considering the modification of deviant behaviors related to communication at school, the
data in Table 5 showed that 66.2% of variation of this behavioral group (ΔF(1,696)=4.409,
p=.036) was most predicted by high maternal supportive behaviors (β=-.261, t=-9.244, p<.05).
Table 6. Linear regression model with dependent variable being bullying behaviors
in and out of school in adolescents
B SE β
(Constant) 10.666 1.281 8.325 .000
Type of school 1.744 .168 .298 10.354 .000
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B SE β
Birth order .374 .173 .058 2.154 .032
ΔR2 .513
ΔF(1,697) 4.638
p .032
Durbin Watson 1.915
The data in Table 6 described the linear regression analysis with the dependent variable
being the group of bullying behaviors in and out of school. In this fifth model, the independent
variables explained 51.3% of variation in the degree of bullying behavior by peers and others in
and out of school (ΔF(1,696)=4.409, p=.036). In which, the weak support (β=-.190, t=-5.657,
p<.05), the tight psychological control (β=.224, t=6.926, p<.05) by mothers mostly predicted the
change of these deviant behaviors (about 35.8%). Gender and marital status of parents did not
contribute to the predictive model.
Table 7. Linear regression model with the dependent variable
being deviant behaviors related to sexuality in adolescents
(Constant) 6.391 .831 7.686 .000
Type of school .897 .116 .226 7.724 .000
Academic performance -1.030 .174 -.165 -5.907 .000
Gender .676 .171 .105 3.960 .000
Birth order .362 .107 .083 3.379 .001
Parents’ marital status .294 .107 .076 2.743 .006
ΔR2 .601
ΔF(1,695) 7.526
p .006
Durbin Watson 1.809
Finally, all nine predictors participated in the regression analysis model with the dependent
variable as deviant behavior related to sexuality among adolescents (see Table 7). The above
independent variables explained 60% of the change in this group of deviant behaviors, with
(ΔF(1,695)=7.526, p=.006). Like most of the previously analyzed groups, the maternal support
was the most predictive of the variability of deviant behaviors related to sexuality (about 36%,
with β=-.267, t=-8.620, p<.05). The three factors as school type, academic performance and
gender were more relevant variables, combined with four parental behavioral variables that
explained 59.2% of the variation in deviant behaviors related to sexuality in adolescents.
2.2. Discussions
This research radiates great potential for further studies. Future research can include other
factors to construct one that predicts more variation in adolescent delinquent behaviors. In
addition to that, cultural specifics can be investigated to determine if the findings in this study
can be replicated in other cultures where perhaps the mother does not dominate the early stages
of development. Furthermore, future studies can expand the age range and determine whether
the influence of parental behaviors continues to adulthood or terminates at the end of
adolescence. Numerous opportunities to broaden the knowledge raised in this study are available.
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One essential question that our study raises is the importance of the father and mother
separately. In Vietnamese folk culture, when it comes to family education, people often refer to
the idiom: “A child is spoiled by his mother, a grandchild is spoiled by his grandmother”.
However, the major power in the Vietnamese family belongs to the man, because they are
responsible for ensuring financial stability in the family (land, farmland, and property are all
owned by the father and “only passed on to the son” – a product of the patriarchy in the past)
(Nguyen, 1989). Thus, even if the responsibility of raising and educating children belongs to the
women, does the father actually have less significance in parent-children relationships than the
mother does?
Further consideration for predictive factors (such as academic performance, parents’ marital
status, children’s gender, birth order, educational environment) in the impact of parental
behaviors on school deviant behaviors in general, specified groups of deviant behaviors
confirmed the hypothesis of the study. That was: Strongly parental support predicted a decrease
of school deviant behaviors in general, and specific types of behavior that deviated from school
regulations, principles and norms in particular; Tight parental psychological control predicted an
increase in deviant behaviors at schools. The behavioral control of both parents did not
contribute to predicting the change of deviant behavior in adolescents. Out of the independent
variables analyzed, except for the parental supportive behavior and academic achievement
predicting the opposite, the rest (type of school, parental psychological control, gender, marital
status of parents, and order of children in the family) all predicted increased deviant behaviors
when these variables increase. This means that students who were attending reform school,
male, from separated families, family having few children had a high level of deviant behavior
in general.
Strong parental support, low psychological control, higher academic performance, family
reunification affected reducing the level of violations of school rules among students. The
appearance of independent variables predicting the change of deviant behavior level related to
communication pointed out the important role of family education, especially parents’ education
(strong support, lax control created a democratic style in terms of educating children) and
school education models as well as school achievements in forming young people’s ability of
social interaction and communication in adolescents in specific social settings/contexts.
Adolescents’ level of bullying behavior towards peers in and out of school, high level of deviant
behavior related to sexuality stemmed from tight control, weak support of both parents, among
students who had lower academic performance and did not attend public schools under the
management of the Ministry of Education and Training (mainly reported for students at reform
school).
Thus, school deviant behavior in general, specific types of school deviant behavior in
adolescents were most often influenced by mothers with a mixture of supportive behavior and
psychology control; that means: when mothers gave much support to her children, but at the
same time, had lax psychological control over her children – a liberal educational model, which
did not encourage punishment, having an explanation of family principles, allowing children to
freely regulate their own activities, with little or no impediment to their behaviors (Baumrind,
1991; Darling & Steinberg, 1993; Born, 2003), school deviant behaviors were reduced. This rate
was lower for the paternal supportive behavior and psychological control.
Compared with the study of Luu (2005) and Le (2019), it can be seen that the results of our
study were similar to the view that parents tend to treat their children in a democratic,
supportive manner. However, in fact, in terms of cultural explanations, the strong psychological
control factor of parents was still clearly shown in the large families, where the “hierarchical
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order” was always appreciated and therefore, education of parents and adults towards children
was still heavily influenced by mental control, whether strong or weak support. Barber et al.
(2005) have argued that “on behalf of love” many parents wanted to control and manipulate,
mal-treat, insult, defame, have violence physically and emotionally toward their children and
consider it the best way for helping their children become a person they wanted them to be.
However, this was an authoritarian, punishment-based education style – bringing about a sense
of fear for children. Therefore, the effectiveness that parents received was completely opposite,
causing children to become stressed, angry, resentful, able to put up resistance and take revenge
on their parents with destructive behaviors at home and at school (Born, 2003).
CONCLUSION
Studies on the relationship between parental behavior and deviant behaviors in adolescents
have revealed that negative aspects of parental behaviors such as over-control, indifference,
neglect, mixed behavior, etc. were predictors that directly affect adolescents’ behaviors such as
aggression, bullying and other behavioral disorders. These are evidences to once again confirm
that families, especially parents, aspects of parenting behavior, or parental educational model
have a strong influence on positive and negative dimension in the developmental process in
adolescents. Therefore, it is necessary to have solutions to change the behaviors of parents,
thereby reducing deviant and problematic behaviors in adolescents in general and in high school
students in particular. This study sets a first stage for more in-depth studies on the impact of
each dimension of parenting behavior on deviant behaviors in adolescents, with the participation
of a number of mediating/moderating variables.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This research is funded by Vietnam National University, Hanoi (VNU) under project
number QG.19.38.
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About the authors

– Assoc. Prof. Dr. Tran Thu Huong works as Lecturer and Researcher in Department of
Clinical Psychology, Faculty of Psychology; Director of Lab. SA, VNU-USSH in Hanoi.
Vice-Dean of Department of Psychiatry and Clinical Psychology, VNU-University of Medicine
and Pharmacy in Hanoi. Her research focuses on problematic behaviors in children and
adolescents, on mental health issues and well-being in school, families, communities and
society, through cross-sectional ou longitudinal studies, and she has authored or co-authors over
40 papers in national and international journals, conference proceedings, and another book’s
chapters with international publishers. Her recent research explores the influence of parenting
behavior dimensions on the development and maintenance of deviant bahaviors in teernagers,
the relationships between family education and the development of the personality in children.
– Ms. Le Thi Ngoc Lan is Lecturer and Researcher in Psychology, in the Faculty of
Psychology and Education at the University of Education, University of Danang (Vietnam). Her
research focuses on the school deviant behaviors of high school students and the relationship
with parenting behavior, the ways that parents educate their children in the family. And she has
authored or co-authored of 14 articles in prestigious journals in Vietnam and international
729
conference proceedings. Her research is all about prominent issues related to home and school
education affecting the behavioral development of students. These studies contribute to
determine the way and methods of parenting towards their children in a more positive direction,
in order to minimize the deviations in behaviors and cognition in children.
– Dr. Tran Thu Huong is a Psychologist, Lecturer and Researcher in the Department of
Social Psychology, Faculty of Psychology at University of Social Sciences and Humanities,
Vietnam National University in Hanoi. She has more than 20 years of teaching, researching,
training and supporting for students, individuals and organizations in the fields of Educational
Psychology, Cultural Psychology, Family Psychology, Counseling therapy, Mental Health Care
for individuals and communities, etc.
– Ms. Nguyen Thi Minh Lecturer and researcher majors in Psychology at Vietnam Court
Academy, The Supreme People Court. Her main research focuses on judicial activities, the
phenomena, the characteristics and psychological laws that manifest in the process of
committing crimes, in the investigation, prosecution, trial and execution of sentences in the field
of forensic psychology.
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THANKS TO THE CONTRIBUTORS AND SPONSORS
The 2nd ILITE Conference 2021 is co-organized Hanoi National University of Education
(HNUE), the University of Cologne (Germany), the University of Bayreuth (Germany),
National Taiwan Normal University, and York University (Canada) with its UNESCO Chair in
Reorienting Education towards Sustainability, with the generous support of the Vietnamese
Ministry of Education and Training, NAFOSTED, VIN Innovation Foundation and Jurnal
Penelitian dan Pembelajaran IPA.
The Conference brings together education professionals from over the world to share their
knowledge and practices for working towards Education for Sustainable Development and
achieving the Sustainable Development Goal 4 on Quality Education by 2030. The Organizing
Committee sincerely thanks their sponsors and partners for supporting our mission and making
the biannual Conference possible!
Prof. Dr. Stefan Leible, Prof. Dr. Charles Hopkins, Prof. Dr. Timothy Teo, Prof. Dr.
Gabriele Schruefer, Prof. Dr. Soyna Martin, Prof. Dr. Leticia Villarreal Sosa, Prof. Dr.
Sharynne McLeod, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Sandra Milligan, Prof. Dr. Shkuan Hsu, Prof. Dr. Ly Tran,
Prof. Do Huong Tra, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Hoa Nguyen, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Bien, Assoc.
Prof. Dr. Tony Loughland, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Thi Mai Huong, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Shit Fun
Chew, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Bui Thi Lam, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Hien, Assoc. Prof. Dr.
Nguyen Thuy Nga, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Duong Giang Thien Huong, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Tran Thi Le
Thu, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Nguyen Hoai Nam, Dr. Kati Barthmann, Dr. Jan Springob, Dr. Nguyen
Phuong Chi, Dr. Le Tuan Anh, Dr. Bui Thu Huyen, Dr. Ho Thi Nhat, Dr. Ngo Vu Thu Hang,
Dr. Hang Duong, Dr. Erica Russ, Dr. Trinh Tran, Dr. Ben Phạm, Dr. Ta Hoang Mai Anh, Dr.
Vu Thi Mai Huong, Dr. Nguyen Phuong Thao, Dr. Hoang Thi Kim Hue, Katrin Kohl etc. are
thanked and complimented for their enormous effort and effective contribution to patiently
reviewing and editing Conference papers, as well as building the Conference Agenda
We would like to thank our participants for your interest, great support, and for many
fruitful discussions and scientific interactions in the Conference.
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PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2nd INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

ON INNOVATION IN LEARNING INSTRUCTION
AND TEACHER EDUCATION – ILITE 2
ISBN 978-604-54-8739-6
In 250 cuốn, khổ 19 x 26,5cm, Print 250 copies, size 19 x 26,5cm, at Hop Phat Printing and
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Số xác nhận đăng kí xuất bản: 4175-2021/CXBIPH/01-191/ĐHSP Publishing registration No.: 4175-2021/CXBIPH/01-191/ĐHSP
Quyết định xuất bản số: 1421/QĐ-NXBĐHSP ngày 01/12/2021 Decision of Publishing No.: 1421/QĐ-NXBĐHSP dated 01st December, 2021
In xong và nộp lưu chiểu Quý IV năm 2021. Printed and released in the fourth quarter of 2021.
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INNOVATION FOR SUSTAINABLE EDUCATION

IN THE CHANGING CONTEXT

Hanoi, December 11th & 12th 2021

ĐỔI MỚI SÁNG TẠO TRONG DẠY HỌC

NHÀ XUẤT BẢN ĐẠI HỌC SƯ PHẠM

INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE

Prof. Dr. Valentina Klenowski (Adjunct) Queensland University of Technology, Australia

INTRODUCTION OF ORGANIZING INSTITUTIONS

Hanoi National University of Education

National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU)

York University with its UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education

The UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education towards Sustainability focuses on

Hanoi National University of Education (HNUE), the University of Cologne (Germany),

Dear distinguished delegates and participants,

Do our education systems hold a key to unlock a better world?

Changing expectations towards education

TRAINING EFFECTIVE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS:

THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE 5E INSTRUCTIONAL MODEL IN DEVELOPING SCIENTIFIC COMPETENCY

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES,

* Corresponding Author: Daniela SCHMEINCK; Email Address: Daniela.Schmeinck@uni-koeln.de

1.5. Digitization-related competencies and skills of teachers

15. Medienpädagogischer Forschungsverbund Südwest (mpfs) (2017). KIM-Studie 2016.

About the author

DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION IN VOCATIONAL EDUCATION AND

* Corresponding Author: Nguyen Xuan Tao; Email Address: taokhanhhoa@gmail.com

Areas of learning Description Application in teaching and learning Technologies used

2. Situation and problems

Chart 1. Enrollment results of vocational training levels (2020)

The survey questions Number of responses

Chart 2. The difficulties when implementing DT in VET

41. Schwertner, K. (2017). Digital transformation of business. Trakia Journal of Sciences,

About the authors

EVALUATING THE CURRENT STATE AND APPROACHABILITY

* Corresponding Author: Bui Thi Thuy Hang; E-mail Address: hang.buithithuy@hust.edu.vn

Figure 1. The elements of a smart school (Omidinia et al., 2013)

Figure 2. The conceptual framework of technology education in Smart Schools

Figure 3. The architecture of smart school (Sampebua & Mangiwa 2017)

Figure 4. Framework of smart education

3.6. Smart services

THE USE OF VIRTUAL REALITY IN DESIGNING AND IMPLEMENTING

 Corresponding Author: Dang Thi Thuy Dung; E-mail Address: dangthithuydung@hpu2.edu.vn

Diagram 1. Process of designing an application activity

Figure 2. Some pre-designed 3D Diagramics of EON-XR to be used in teaching History

Diagram 2. Steps to organize an application activity

Figure 3. A 3-D image of the Sphinx in Egypt

Figure 4. Criteria for evaluating group products

About the authors

ENHANCING ONLINE LEARNING THROUGH

 Corresponding Author: Ngo Van Thien; E-mail Address: thiencaothang@gmail.com

Designing an online course

Building an online course

Course structure Learning resource materials

Delivering an online course

Types of interactions Social and cognitive Teaching presence

Figure 1. Stage of backward design model for online learning

Table 2. Measurement scales

Extraction Sums of Squared Rotation Sums of Squared

3.4. One sample T-test

About the author

USING VIDEO IN ASSESSING AND DEVELOPING PROSPECTIVE

* Corresponding Author: Le Thi Bach Lien; E-mail Address: lethibichliendhqb@gmail.com

Subject content knowledge Pedagogical content knowledge

Figure 1. Model of mathematical knowledge for teaching (Ball et al., 2008)

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