Vietnam's 'English 2020' Program in Perspective

This is a caption from the GRADE 7
government textbook, Tieng Anh.

There are many critics of one of Vietnam's most ambitious (I use that word a lot... but this example might be the most appropriate example yet) projects to date: the National Foreign Language 2020 (NFL2020) project. But to what are they objecting?

This project is a 10-year plan to modernize and build teaching and learning capacity (mainly English) and implement Government’s Decision 14001 (2008) “to renovate the teaching and learning of foreign languages within the national education system” (Article 1.1, Decision 1400).

Here's a quick summary of the project (see full English translation of decree at the end of this post):

These new policies include many aspects of teaching, assessment, and professional development, including:

• Introducing English at grade 3 or earlier
• Mapping outcomes to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) benchmarks
• Establishing proficiency and professional standards for English-language teachers

The NFL2020 desires to address these policies through: 

• Teacher assessment
• Teacher development
• Curriculum revision
• Textbook innovation (overhauling and digitalization)
• Testing and assessment improvement
• Establishment of Regional Teacher Development Centers

The decree came down from the Government in 2008, and by 2010 it resulted in the NFL2020 Project. It was immediately clear that the teaching capacity of Vietnamese teachers of English was broadly limited. While more and more teachers failed the basic English competency test (where they are required to achieve the equivalent of a 5.0/6.0 in the IELTS test), it was particularly scary that the teachers who scored the lowest were the older and most educated instructors, responsible for teaching at highly specialized and regarded schools and preparing students who went on to win national awards.

Seriously? That can't be good...

But first, some background on the education system in Vietnam.

Demo Lesson Headaches

Pull the football away one more time, I dare you.

NOTE: This will be one of my rant-y posts. I try to keep them to a minimum, but sometimes I just have to let it all out and complain in English. Skip this one if it's not your cup of tea!

First of all, what is a Demo Lesson?

An ESL Demo Lesson is a lot of things, but none of them efficient, or even very useful, that I could see. This is the basic takeaway I have from my first (hopefully only, ever again) Demo Lesson. It was a series of hoops, like many things in Education, but some of them were ablaze, and some got pulled away at the last minute, like Lucy pulling away Charlie Brown's football. I made it through successfully, but it wasn't without unnecessary frustration pitfalls.

My Experience with Today's Training Course

This is on really nice paper - a good sign?

Job training consisted of a 2.5 hour presentation, mostly about management of classrooms with 40+ kids (yikes!!) and a little bit about ESL games, some popular ones, and how to vary them.

I guess it was pretty useful. It was interesting observing and talking to the other teachers. 16 (myself included) were there and most were newly hired to this company - one guy had been in the program last year, and several of the younger teachers knew each other socially or from previous networking.

I was by far the greenest of the team, both in teaching and in Vietnam. There were four Americans - the rest were Brits, some Scots, and some Aussies. For everyone but me, this was old hat - most were teaching already, had been to multiple countries, and were already situated in Vietnam for 6 or more weeks. Some had been teaching here for several years.