PLEASURE READING AS a TOOL TO IMPROVE EFF EARNERS’ WRITING PROFICIENCY

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VINH UNIVERSITY NGUYEN THI MAI LE PLEASURE READING AS A TOOL TO IMPROVE EFF EARNERS’ WRITING PROFICIENCY MASTER’S THESIS IN EDUCATION Vinh, 2017 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VINH UNIVERSITY NGUYEN THI MAI LE PLEASURE READING AS A TOOL TO IMPROVE EFL LEARNERS’ WRITING PROFICIENCY Major: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 MASTER’S THESIS IN EDUCATION Supervisor: Dr Tran Thi Ngoc Yen Vinh, 2017 1 ABSTRACT The objective of the present study is to investigate the impacts of pleasure reading on EFL learners’ writing proficiency To achieve the aim, an experiment that involved 24 students at a language centre was carried out Twelve of the participants were ascribed to the experimental group and the other twelve were assigned to the control group The data were collected within a four - week period via a pre-test and a post-test designed for comparable groups The experimental group was asked to read extensively besides following the same English course as the control group Both groups did a general English test and pre-test before the treatment and post-test after the treatment It was found that pleasure reading helped the students to improve fluency and accuracy in writing Based on the findings, implications for enhancing the effectiveness of teaching and learning the writing skill have been put forward teachers ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to express my deep gratitude to Dr Tran Thi Ngoc Yen, who directly supported and encouraged me during the preparation of this study I am truly grateful to her for her professional advice, invaluable support and guidance she offered to help me carry out the study I wish to express my sincere thanks to the students of the two classes I worked with in order to gather data for my study I would also like to thank my classmates for their invaluable comments and criticism Last but not least, I owe special heartfelt appreciation to my parents, without whose unceasing support, patience and understanding I could not have been able to complete my study TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i ABSTRACT ii TABLE OF CONTENTS iii CHAPTER INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 Aims of the study 1.3 Research questions 1.4 Scope of the study 1.5 Organization of the thesis .5 CHAPTER LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 The reading skill 2.1.1 Definitions of reading 2.1.2 Types of reading 2.1.2.1 According to manners of reading .9 2.1.2.2 According to purposes of reading 12 2.1.3 The roles of reading in learning 17 2.1.4 Reading motivation and reading interest 19 2.2 Reading for pleasure 20 V 2.2.1 Definition 20 2.2.2 Benefits of pleasure reading 21 2.3 The writing skill .23 2.3.1 Definitions .23 2.3.2 Assessing writing ability .25 2.4 Fluency and accuracy in language performance 26 2.4.1 Fluency 27 2.4.2 Accuracy 27 2.4.3 Fluency vs accuracy 28 2.5 Teaching EFL writing .29 2.5.1 Approaches to teaching the writing skill .29 2.5.2 EFL learners’ difficulties in learning to write .33 2.5.3 Developing EFL writing proficiency .34 2.5.3.1 Factors affecting EFL writing proficiency 34 2.5.3.2 Methods and techniques to develop writing proficiency 37 2.6 Reading in writing proficiency development 40 2.6.1 Receptive vs productive in language learning .40 2.6.2 Connecting reading and writing .43 2.6.3 Benefits of pleasure reading for writing development 45 CHAPTER METHODOLOGY .47 3.1 Research questions 47 3.2 Participants .47 3.2.1 The control group 48 3.2.2 The experimental group 48 3.3 Instruments .49 3.3.1 The general test 50 3.3.2 Pre - test 50 3.3.3 Post - test .50 3.4 Procedures 51 CHAPTER FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS .53 4.1 Results and findings 53 4.1.1 The general test results 53 4.1.2 Pre -test results 54 4.1.3 Post -test results .57 4.1.4 Comparison of pre-test and post-test result 60 4.1.5 Comparison of the experimental group and the control group .63 4.2 Discussions and summary 65 5.1 Pedagogical implications 66 CHAPTER CONCLUSIONS 66 5.2 Conclusions 66 5.3 Limitations of the study 66 5.4 Suggestions for study 67 REFERENCES 69 APPENDIX A 74 APPENDIX B 79 APPENDIX C 80 APPENDIX D 81 CHAPTER INTRODUCTION The English language has rapidly become the most popular foreign language in Vietnam, especially at schools, colleges and universities For learners of English, the English language surely brings about a better career prospect Frankly, writing is among the most prominent skills that EFL learners need to learn as an essential component of their academic practice and later in their professional life Teaching and learning how to write successfully gets even more complicated and challenging for both language teachers and students when it comes to ESL/ EFL environments compared with teaching L1 writing For many Vietnamese students, presenting written work is a substantial challenge They may have little experience of writing after leaving schools, and may be very anxious about having to write essays They have a lot of mistakes about vocabulary, syntax, semantics, etc Of the four skills, writing, in general, is considered the most difficult one for every student The four language skills (reading, speaking, listening and writing) are taught regularly at most of schools now, among which the writing skill is very important because it is a productive skill It is also because of the fact that besides speaking, people frequently have to communicate with each other via writing The ability to write in English for various purposes of communication is becoming increasingly more and more essential in our modern life Writing is known as an important skill for multifarious reasons in education and business According to Brown (2004: 218), writing is a skill that is the exclusive domain of scribes and scholars in educational or religious institutions Writing is important as teaching speaking, reading, and listening because the learners can express their ideas, feeling, and experiences in certain place, time and situation in written form According to the Zemach and Rumisek (2005: 54), the teaching of writing is important because of the reasons: the first reason is writing reinforces the grammatical structure, idiom and vocabulary that teacher has been working within the class The second reason is when the student writes, she or he has a chance to be adventurous with the language Finally, the student becomes involved with the language, with himself or herself and with his or her readers However, most language learners realize the learning to write fluently and expressively are difficult It is because writing needs simultaneous control of number variables This argument is supported by Zemach and Islam (2004: 12), that there are some aspects included in writing such as control of content, rules of syntax, format sentence, grammar, punctuation, vocabulary, and spelling Unfortunately, the students’ skills in writing are still far from what is being expected Many students cannot write grammatical sentences, spelling, punctuation, and limited vocabulary It makes the students fell bored and they not interest in joining the lesson In fact, many students fail to reach the standard score for the midterm tests and final tests in a course These problems are caused by some factors, such as: first, the implementation of teacher central learning Students have a little chance to express their opinion because the teacher only speaks all the time They get knowledge just from the teacher’s explanation The students focus all attention upon the teacher and discourage communication among students All that they have to is just listen to their teacher and take notes for useful information The students only receive the knowledge from their teacher; they not explore the knowledge themselves Second, students still lack of vocabularies which make them difficult to compose any writing text Third, the students have lack interest in English Therefore, many students consider it as the hardest subject to learn Because of those problems, researchers have found many techniques and methods for both learning and teaching writing skill Many previous research mentioned to how extensive reading affects writing skill They pointed out the connection between reading and writing This thesis explores the effects of pleasure reading on writing and examines two factors’ development in students’ writing ability: accuracy and fluency after a month reading their interesting texts 1.1 Rationale With the phenomenal spread of English as global lingua franca, the need for a master of this language has heightened With four skills of English, writing has always been seen as an important skill in language acquisition In both English as a foreign language (EFL) and English as a second language (ESL) programs, the students’ development of writing skills is now emphasized However, many elementary EFL students often struggle with their writing accuracy and fluency English has been run like blood through the veins of nations all over the world To have good communication skills in English is burning desire for most people Communicative competence in the target language is more demanded now than ever before The ever growing need for good communication skills in English has created a huge demand for English teaching around the world The worldwide demand for English has created an enormous demand for quality language teaching and language teaching materials and resources (Rechards, 2006, p5) The worldwide increasing demand for good communication in English language has increased the responsibility of the English language teachers The application of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) has faced problems and resistance in the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) context (Ellis, 1996) Teacher’s activities Students’ activities Time I WARM UP -T asks students to work in groups - Students work in and list all kinds of books they know groups -The winners is the group which has - Write on a piece of paper kinds of books more correct answers II PRE - WRITING Activity 1: mins 10mins - Teacher asks the following questions: - Students work in Do you like reading books? pairs to answer the What kind of book you like best? Why? questions How much time you spend on reading everyday? 20mins Tell your friend about a book that you read or you like Activity 2: -Teacher divides the class into -Students work in groups -T gives instruction: groups to arrange the paragraphs to make a “2 groups will arrange the complete essay paragraphs I give you on the floor to -Answer the questions have a complete essay Which one who finishes first and has a correct 8mins answer will be the winner ” -Teacher gives feedback -Teacher helps students to work out -Students work in the form of an essay by answering the pairs to make their following questions How many paragraphs are there? outline for the essay What you write in each -Students work paragraph? individually to write -Teacher writes on the board an esay using what Paragraph 1: Introduction: mention to they have just learnt the topic (reading books) Paragraph 2: the first benefit from reading books Paragraph 3: the second benefit from reading books Paragraph 4: Conclusion: summaries the ideas in the body paragraphs Activity 3: 40mins -Students read and notes on the portfolio what they learn from 5mins -Teacher asks students to make an outline about benefits from reading books III WHILE- WRITING Activity: -Teacher asks students to write an essay individually using the outline IV POST- WRITING -Teacher collects all papers and corrects some common mistakes Homework -Teacher gives students reading texts; ask them to read at home and note on the portfolio what is new with them the text SESSION CLASS BOOK: SOLUTIONS UNIT 7: WRITING SKILL: AN ESSAY Descriptions of learners: learners are at the age of 12 - 14 years old, their English level is Pre- intermediate A OBJECTIVES: By the end lesson, students will be able to: - write a complete essay reasons why the news is necessary - arrange ideas in each paragraph logically - express opinions to persuade readers B TEACHING AIDS: Textbook, board, markers, laptop, TV C PROCEDURE 92 Teacher’s activities Students’ activities Time -T asks students to work in groups - Students work in mins -Teacher shows on slide pictures of some groups to answer the famous MC of the news program on TV program I WARM UP -The winners is the group which answers correctly first II PRE - WRITING 10mins Activity 1: - Students work in - Teacher asks the following questions: Do you update the news everyday? pairs to answer the questions How you get the news? On TV or on the Internet? 3 In your opinion, is it important to update the news? Why? Activity 2: 20mins -Teacher divides the class into groups -T gives instruction: “2 groups will arrange the paragraphs I -Students work in give you on the floor to have a complete essay Which one who finishes first and groups to arrange the paragraphs to make a has a correct answer will be the winner.” complete essay -Teacher gives feedback -Answer the questions -Teacher helps students to work out the 8mins form of an essay by answering the following questions How many paragraphs are there? What you write in each paragraph? -Teacher writes on the board Paragraph 1: Introduction: mention to the -Students work in pairs to make their outline 40mins for the essay topic (update the news) Paragraph 2: reason -Students work Paragraph : reason individually to write an Paragraph 4: Conclusion: summary essay using what they have just learnt Activity 3: -Teacher asks students to make an outline about reasons why we need to update the news III WHILE- WRITING -Students read and Activity: notes on the portfolio -Teacher asks students to write an essay what they learn from the text individually using the outline IV POST4 WRITING 5mins -Teacher collects all papers and corrects some common mistakes Homework -Teacher gives students reading texts; ask them to read at home and note on the portfolio what is new with them SESSION CLASS BOOK: SOLUTIONS UNIT 8: WRITING SKILL: AN ESSAY Descriptions of learners: learners are at the age of 12 - 14 years old, their English level is Pre- intermediate A OBJECTIVES: By the end lesson, students will be able to: - write a complete essay about how to protect rare animals - arrange ideas in each paragraph logically - express opinions to persuade readers B TEACHING AIDS: Textbook, board, markers, laptop, TV C PROCEDURE Teacher’s activities Students’ activities Time -T asks students to work in groups - Students work in mins -Teacher shows on slide pictures of some rare animals groups - Name the animals I WARM UP -The winners is the groups which has higher score II PRE - WRITING 10mins Activity 1: - Students work in - Teacher asks the following questions: pairs to answer the Where can you see these animals? questions Are there many of them in the world? Why are they less and less? How to protect them? Activity 2: 20mins -Teacher divides the class into groups -T gives instruction: “2 groups will arrange the paragraphs I give you on the floor to have a complete -Students work in essay Which one who finishes first and has a correct answer will be the winner.” groups to arrange the paragraphs to make a -Teacher gives feedback complete essay -Teacher helps students to work out the -Answer the questions form of an essay by answering the following questions 8mins How many paragraphs are there? What you write in each paragraph? -Teacher writes on the board -Students work in pairs Paragraph 1: Introduction: mention to the to make their outline topic (how to protect rare animals) 40mins for the essay Paragraph 2: solution Paragraph : solution -Students work Paragraph 4: Conclusion: summary Activity 3: individually to write an essay using what they -Teacher asks students to make an outline have just learnt about solutions to protect rare animals III WHILE- WRITING Activity: -Students underline their friend’s mistakes -Teacher asks students to write an essay individually using the outline IV POST- WRITING -Students read and -Teacher asks students to exchange their notes on the portfolio what they learn from the text 5mins essays and underline mistakes -Teacher corrects some common mistakes Homework -Teacher gives students reading texts; ask them to read at home and note on the portfolio what is new with them SESSION CLASS BOOK: SOLUTIONS UNIT 8: WRITING SKILL: AN ESSAY Descriptions of learners: learners are at the age of 12 - 14 years old, their English level is Pre- intermediate A OBJECTIVES: By the end lesson, students will be able to: - write a complete essay about causes and solutions to reduce pollution - arrange ideas in each paragraph logically - express opinions to persuade readers B TEACHING AIDS: Textbook, board, markers, laptop, TV C PROCEDURE 10 Teacher’s activities Students’ activities Time -T asks students to work in groups - Students work in mins -Teacher shows on slide pictures of groups different kinds of pollution - Write on a piece of -The winners is the group that has more paper kinds of correct answers II PRE - WRITING pollution on the slide I WARM UP Activity 1: - Teacher asks the following questions: What kind of pollution is serious in - Students work in Vietnam? What cause pollution? pairs to answer the questions 1 10mins How to reduce pollution? Activity 2: 20mins -Teacher divides the class into groups -T gives instruction: “2 groups will arrange the paragraphs I give you on the floor to have a complete essay Which one who finishes first and has a correct answer will be the winner.” -Students work in -Teacher gives feedback groups to arrange the -Teacher helps students to work out the paragraphs to make a form of an essay by answering the following questions complete essay -Answer the 8mins questions How many paragraphs are there? What you write in each paragraph? -Teacher writes on the board Paragraph 1: Introduction: mention to the 40mins topic (pollution) -Students work in Paragraph 2: causes pairs to make their outline for the essay Paragraph : solutions Paragraph 4: Conclusion: Give your own idea -Students work Activity 3: individually to write -Teacher asks students to make an outline an esay using what about causes and solutions for pollution they have just learnt III WHILE- WRITING -Students underline Activity: mistakes in their friend’s essay -Teacher asks students to write an essay individually using the outline mins IV POST- WRITING -Teacher ask students to exchange their -Students read and essays and underline mistakes notes on the portfolio -Teacher corrects some common mistakes what they learn from the text Homework -Teacher gives students reading texts; ask them to read at home and note on the portfolio what is new with them ... unpleasant task, but as a natural part of language learning Moreover, it was found that students’ writing performance substantially improved Shahan and Lomax (1986) proposed three models that explain... extensive reading program supported the idea that students learn to write through reading Grabe and Kaplan (1996) suggested that reading activities will be of a great assistance to improve too many writing. .. foreign language learners, both intensive and extensive readings are of great importance as they act as a means to gain knowledge 2.1.3 The roles of reading in learning Reading plays an inevitably