Khmer Culture Impacting Students’ English Speaking Performance in Ethnic Minority Boarding Schools

This study aims to determine main problems that hinder Khmer students’ English speaking performance. A quantitative approach was used to deeply understand which factors cause poor English speaking performance of Khmer students. In this work, questionnaires were employed as a research instrument to collect quantitative data. The sample was Khmer students, aged from 15 to 18 years old at ethnic minority boarding schools in a province in the Mekong Delta. The results from the questionnaire show that Khmer cultural factors, namely the writing system, way of communication as well as boarding school educational system could hinder students’ English speaking performance. Based on the problems found, this study gives some suggestions to help bilingual students in Vietnam improve their English speaking performance. It is believed that this research forms the basis for further studies on bilingual students learning English in Vietnam. Keywords: Khmer culture, bilingual students, English speaking performance, ethnic minority boarding schools.