A contrastive analysis on cohesive devices in the novel "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" and their Vietnamese translation version

Abstract

"For many people, grammar is an aspect which becomes the most challenging to learn in English. English phrase is one of the important knowledge pieces in English grammar. One of the most crucial, yet challenging, tasks of EFL students in academic settings is recognizing and producing English phrases. For first year English-majors at the School of Foreign Languages, English phrases are also considered an essential element to enhance students’ knowledge and application of English phrases in practicing, which supports other courses during their studies such as Listening, Reading, Speaking, or Writing. However, there is no denying the fact that not only students’ lack of novel English phrases’ knowledge but also the limited research related to this field are significant gaps hindering students from achieving English phrases effectively. To address this gap, this mixed-method study was conducted to investigate factors contributing to first-year English-majors’ difficulties in learning English phrases at the School of Foreign Languages and seek solutions to addressing them. An analysis of quantitative data from 138 survey respondents and qualitative data from eight semi-structured, focus interviews for those are first-year English-majors and 2 semi-structured, focus interviews for those are lecturers instructing the Applied Intermediate Grammar course (Phuong et al., 2017) revealed that studentrelated factors, teacher-related factors, factors related to specific knowledge of English phrases and other factors such as facilities and significant difference related to phrases between Vietnamese English had the most significant impact on first-year English-majors’ difficulties in learning English phrases. Several solutions have been proposed in the research with the hope that this study will serve as a valuable source of reference for students to successfully grasp English phrases in the Applied Intermediate Grammar course significantly and contribute to students’ better academic performance and finish the course with flying colours and for teachers to explore more methods to support students, and will serve as the starting point for further research on the matter in further scope and population. Keywords: English phrases, phrases, grammar, difficulties, solutions, English-majors, first-year, students, applied intermediate grammar course"