Mountain boy wins second prize in national English proficiency exam, IELTS 8.0

Le Thanh Nguyen Huy, class 12A2, Duc Trong High School, Duc Trong District (Lam Dong Province) is the student with the highest achievement in Lam Dong Province in English in the recent national excellent student exam. When he was a 10th grader, Huy achieved IELTS 8.0.

Le Thanh Nguyen Huy has always been the best student at Duc Trong High School, Duc Trong District, Lam Dong for the past 2.5 years. The average score of the male student from the mountain town from grade 10, grade 11 and semester 1 of grade 12 is always 9.7 - 9.8, in which the average score of English is always 10.

Self-study English through newspapers, books, videos

This morning, March 23, on the sidelines of the 2025 Exam Season Consulting program organized by Thanh Nien Newspaper at the school, sharing with Thanh Nien Newspaper reporters , Le Thanh Nguyen Huy said that he loved English since he was little, but it was not until grade 6 that he officially learned this subject. Otherwise, since he was little, Huy mainly watched cartoons, documentaries, and watched videos in his favorite fields such as history and scientific research in English.

Le Thanh Nguyen Huy, second prize in national excellent English student contest, IELTS 8.0

PHOTO: THUY HANG

"At first, I just liked watching and listening to English videos. At first, I might not understand much, but gradually through these channels, I listened and learned pronunciation. This was really helpful for me later when I officially studied English," Huy shared.

Since grade 6, Huy started learning English with Mr. Truong Quang Nhu Huan, an English teacher at Duc Trong High School, Duc Trong district. This is the teacher who strongly inspired Huy to not only love English but also strive to achieve many achievements, nurturing the dream of becoming an English teacher in the future.

Interestingly, Huy's mother is also an English teacher at Duc Trong High School, but Huy said that she only gave him a little guidance when he was young. The rest of the time, Huy mainly studied with Mr. Huan, and spent a lot of time at home studying on his own.

"Every week I study English with my teacher about 3 sessions, each session is about 1.5 hours. The rest of the time I mainly study at home. I do not study English through any website or online English learning application, but mainly read books, read newspapers, watch movies, watch videos on my favorite topics - all in English. Teacher Huan has a principle that students must learn a lot of vocabulary, thanks to this principle, I have a large vocabulary, a good knowledge base to pass exams later", Huy said.

Summer 10th grader achieved IELTS 8.0

In grade 9, Le Thanh Nguyen Huy won first prize in English, Lam Dong province's excellent student competition. In grade 11, Huy continued to win first prize in English, also in the province-wide excellent student competition.

Notably, since the summer of grade 10, Huy took the IELTS test and achieved IELTS 8.0. Of which, reading skill was 9.0; listening was 9.0; writing was 7.5 and speaking was 6.5.

Recently, Huy was awarded by Duc Trong High School, Lam Dong right after winning second prize in national excellent student English.

PHOTO: PROVIDED BY FAMILY

In grade 12, Huy recently won second prize in the national excellent student exam in English. Huy is also the candidate with the highest achievement in the whole Lam Dong province in English in this exam. This achievement helps Huy to be directly admitted to university in the 2025 admission period, you only need to pass the 2025 high school graduation exam. Huy decided to choose to study English pedagogy at Ho Chi Minh City University of Education.

"I want to become an English teacher, like my teacher and my mother, to be able to inspire other students to learn English," said Le Thanh Nguyen Huy.

"I think that to be good at English, you need to be diligent. More importantly, you need to find the motivation to study by yourself and have the spirit of self-study. I think that technology and artificial intelligence like AI can be a tool to help you study by yourself, but they cannot replace being good at English. I often practice writing English, let AI read it so that this tool can help me score, for example," Huy added.

Not only is Huy good at all subjects, especially English, he is also a student who loves sports. He participates in many sports with his friends such as table tennis, soccer, and billiards. Recently, Huy won a bronze medal in table tennis at the Phu Dong Sports Festival of the whole province.

At the same time, although he no longer has to endure the heavy pressure of taking the high school graduation exam to get into his favorite university, Huy still tries his best to study to complete the graduation exam as best as possible, to keep the best memories of his student days.