Students’ perception on the usage of English modal verbs a case study at Hanoi Open University

Tóm tắt

The study aims at checking students’ understanding of the meanings of English modal verbs in classroom and real-life contexts. Accordingly, a questionnaire survey on a population of 100 sophomores majoring in the English language serves as the key instrument to collect data for the quantitative study. The study analyzes students’ perception on primary meanings and uses of modal verbs which are further illuminated by examples collected in real life communicative settings. By providing the research participants with situations which involve the meanings and uses of modal verbs, mismatches concerning the primary meanings and uses of modal verbs in academic and communicative settings have been found, i.e., though students perform well in tasks related to the meanings and uses of modal verbs in classrooms, they are confused by the same modal verbs used in real life contexts.