Attitudes of Thai primary students toward deductive approach in English grammar teaching

The purposes of this study were to investigate 1) the primary student’s attitudes toward the deductive method of teaching English grammar and 2) the preferred ways of Thai primary students to learn grammar. The subjects in this study were 66 students of the Intensive English Program at a private school in Bangkok, and the convenience sampling technique was used to obtain each subject for the study. The research instrument was a survey questionnaire comprising of two parts: (1) general information, (2) statements on attitudes toward deductive approach in teaching grammar and exploring students’ preferred ways to learn grammar. A Likert scale was used to determine the level of attitudes. Data were analyzed and calculated using the Statistical Package for the Social Science (SPSS) database to determine the percentage, mean, and standard deviation.The results of this study showed that students had a positive attitude towards the deductive grammar teaching method. Most students agreed that learning the rules and forms helps them understand the lesson better and learn grammar faster. They understand the English lesson better, especially when the teacher teaches in Thai, and the deductive grammar teaching method helps them remember the rules and usage of the language. The findings also showed that most students prefer to learn grammar by describing the rules and examples in the beginning and then practicing. They would like the teacher to explain the grammatical structure in Thai and practice translating from English to Thai. Also, most of the students agreed that learning grammar through various activities can improve language learning.