A STUDY ON SECOND YEAR STUDENTS’ DIFFICULTIES IN READING ESP MATERIALS AT AUTOMOBILE TECHNOLOGY DEPARTMENT INVIETNAM KOREA TECHNICAL COLLEGE

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VINH UNIVERSITY -  - HA THI THANH A STUDY ON SECOND -YEAR STUDENTS’ DIFFICULTIES IN READING ESP MATERIALS AT AUTOMOBILE TECHNOLOGY DEPARTMENT IN VIETNAM-KOREA TECHNICAL COLLEGE (Tìm hiểu khó khăn sinh viên năm thứ hai việc đọc hiểu tài liệu tiếng Anh chuyên ngành khoa Công nghệ Ôtô, trờng Cao đẳng Kỹ thuật Việt Nam- Hàn Quốc) Field: Theory and Methodology of English Language Teaching Code: 60.14.10 Master thesis in Education Vinh, 2011 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP 1 I hereby certify that the thesis entitled A STUDY ON SECOND-YEAR STUDENTS’ DIFFICULTIES IN READING ESP MATERIALS AT AUTOMOBILE TECHNOLOGY DEPARTMENT IN VIETNAM - KOREA TECHNICAL COLLEGE is the result of my own research for the Degree of Master of Education at Vinh University I confirm that this thesis has not been submitted for any other degrees Student’s signature Hà Thị Thanh 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my deepest thanks to my beloved supervisor Dr Le Van Canh for his invaluable support, patient guidance, and encouragement he gave me throughout my research I am truly grateful to him for his advice and suggestions right from the beginning when this study was only in its formative stage I also wish to send my sincere thanks to the students of the classes I visited in order to gather information for my survey questionnaire Without their help, this study could not have been successful I am indebted to my friends, my classmates, as well as my colleagues for their invaluable comments and criticism and also for their continued interest and encouragement Finally, I would like to express my gratitude to family members whose support and encouragement greatly contributed to the completion of my study 3 ABSTRACT Reading is one of the four important skills in learning English, especially English for specific purposes (ESP) For non-English major students at VietnamKorea Technical College, reading has been given the first priority and has been paid more attention as the students have to read English materials related to their own specialist subject However, they have encountered a lot of difficulties in reading ESP materials and, therefore, failed to become efficient readers What, then, are the difficulties that the students at Vietnam-Korea Technical College encounter when reading ESP materials? And what hinders their reading comprehension? Many studies have already been conducted in the area of reading problems This study aims to examine the difficulties in ESP reading for the second-year students at Vietnam-Korea Technical College and the causes of their unsuccessful reading comprehension The results of this study has shown that the second-year students often have difficulties in many areas of the language such as difficulties with ESP vocabulary, discourse, reading skills and subject background knowledge when dealing with ESP texts and their unsuccessful reading comprehension comes from different sources: inadequate ESP vocabulary, limited background knowledge about the subject, unsuitable materials, the teachers’ teaching methods as well as the negative attitude of some students This study has also suggested some solutions to help to reduce their difficulties in reading ESP and obtain desirable achievements in ESP reading 4 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS EFL: English as Foreign Language EGP: English for General Purposes ELT: English Language Teaching ESP: English for Specific Purposes FL: foreign language GE: General English L1: first language L2: second language TALO: text and as a linguistic object TAVI: text as a vehicle of information VKTC: Vietnam-Korea Technical College 5 LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES Table 3.1 Students’ attitudes towards ESP reading 44 Table 3.2 The difficulties in terms of ESP vocabulary 46 Table 3.3 The difficulties in terms of grammar 47 Table 3.4 The difficulties in terms of text discourse 49 Table 3.5 The difficulties related to lack of background knowledge 51 Table 3.6 The difficulties due to lack of reading skills 52 Table 3.7 Rank order of difficulties in ESP reading 54 Table 3.8 Students’ views of sources of difficulties 55 Table 3.9 The students’ needs for ESP materials 59 Table 3.10 The students’ needs for teachers’ methodology 61 Figure 2.1: The vicious circle of the weak readers 15 Figure 3.1 Students’ attitudes towards ESP reading 44 Figure 3.2 Causes of difficulties from materials 56 Figure 3.3 Causes of difficulties from teachers 58 Figure 3.4 Causes of difficulties from students 59 Figure 4.1: Automobile parts 65 Figure 4.2: Automobile systems 66 Figure 4.3: Automobile inside parts 66 Figure 4.4: Parts of an automobile fuel system 67 Figure 4.5: Diagram of the fuel flow 68 6 APPENDIX A Questionnaire for students This questionnaire is designed for my research into difficulties in ESP reading of the second year students in Vietnam – Korea Technical College Your assistance in completing the survey is appreciated All the information provided by you is solely for the study purpose, and you can be confident that you will not be identified in any discussion of the data Thank you very much for your cooperation! *Where you come from? □ Rural □ Urban *Did you learn English before entering Vietnam-Korea Technical College? □ Yes □ No - If Yes, when did you start learning English? …………………………… - If No, did you learn any other foreign languages? ……………………… * What is your average mark of General English in the first year? ……………… Section A: Do you agree with these? Question 1: I need to read technical texts well for my future job □ Strongly agree □ Agree □ Disagree □ Strongly disagree Question 2: I find it difficult to understand technical texts because my technical words are limited □ Strongly agree □ Agree □ Disagree □ Strongly disagree Question 3: I like reading texts about my specialized topics □ Strongly agree □ Agree □ Disagree □ Strongly disagree Section B: Here are some of difficulties you may encounter when reading ESP Please tick the appropriate box according to the level of difficulties you have 7 Very difficult (VD) Difficult (D) Easy (E) Very easy (VE) Question 4: Difficulties with ESP vocabulary VD D E VE 4a I find it difficult to pronounce technical words □ □ □ □ 4b I find it difficult to understand the meaning of technical □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ terms in reading texts 4c I find it difficult to memorize technical terms ( such as: ignition, lubrication, spark plugs .) 4d I have troubles in using idomatic expressions and phrasal verbs (such as: convert into, by means of ) 4e When a word has many meanings, I don’t know which meaning is used in the reading text 4f Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………….……………… Question 5: Difficulties with Grammar 5a I don’t remember all grammatical structures that I have learnt and this makes it difficult to understand the content of the reading text 5b If the sentence is a new grammatical structure in the text I not understand its meaning 5c Long sentences are difficult to me to understand their meanings 5d Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………….……………… Question 6: Difficulties with the Text Discourse 8 6a I don’t understand how a reading text is organized and VD D E VE □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ this makes it difficult to understand the content of the text 6b I don’t understand how a paragraph is organized and this makes it difficult to understand its content 6c I cannot find which is the most important sentence in each paragraph of the reading text 6d I have problems understanding how meanings of different sentences are linked together 6e Understanding graphs and diagrams is difficult to me 6f Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………….……………… Question 7: Difficulties related to Lack of Background Knowledge 7a I find it difficult to understand the content of unfamiliar VD D E VE □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ VD D E VE professional topics 7b I find I don’t have enough professional knowledge related to the topics 7c I find it difficult to understand authentic materials 7d Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………… ……………… Question 8: Difficulties due to Lack of Reading Skills 9 8a I find it difficult to find out the main idea of a reading text □ □ □ □ 8b I find it difficult to find out the specific ideas of a reading text □ □ □ □ 8c I don’t know how to guess meanings of new words in a reading □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ 8e I find it difficult to summarize the mains ideas of a reading text □ □ □ □ 8f I don’t know how to answer comprehension questions of a □ □ □ □ text 8d I find it difficult to recognize what the writer wants to imply in a reading text reading text 8g Others (Please indicate here) ………………………………… Section C Question 9: Please indicate what possible sources of your problems in ESP reading YES NO 9a The texts are very too long and full of technical terms □ □ 9b The texts are full of new and complex grammar structures □ □ 9c Some texts are taken from authentic materials, which □ □ 9d The teacher doesn’t teach us sufficient reading strategies □ □ 9e The teacher doesn’t give us sufficient practice of grammar □ □ 9f The teacher is too strict and demanding □ □ 9g I lack confidence and motivation □ □ 9h I lack vocabulary especially ESP vocabulary □ □ 9i I lack knowledge about the topics I am studying □ □ makes us difficult to understand and vocabulary 10 10 concentrated and be aware of the details they are looking for, search for some specific information in a certain time allowance For example, if you want to search dates, you should use the key word “When” If you want to know the time, please look for “What time”, in order to look for definitions, see the words “define, definition, mean, refer to ”, ignore other information and finally write down the specific required information * Predicting: Students can learn to make prediction on the basis of the title, subtitle, linguistic context, or non-luinguistic context such as graphs, tables, diagrams, maps and their knowledge of the topic This skill not only activates their mind but also gives them a strong motivation to proceed to the next step of the lesson *Word-building: If students master this skill, they can work out the meaning of many unknown words or phrases without dictionary There are two ways to work out the meaning of new words or phrases without dictionary: using structural formation and using context clues + Using structural formation: The meaning of new words can be worked out by referring to their information such as suffixes or prefixes + Using context clues: Meanings of new words or phrases also can be deduced by using the meanings of other words such as synonyms and antonyms in the same sentence of paragraph In ESP reading there are an ever-increasing number of compound nouns, which acts as single nouns It is important to teach students to recognize how compound nouns are formed in order to understand what they mean *Recognizing organizational patterns: Recognizing larger textual patterns was at the top of difficulty list (Table 3.4) To reduce this difficulty, it is necessary to teach students how to identify different textual patterns The best way to this is to ask students to read different passages with different organizational patterns and identify their textual connectors *Inferring: Making implications and inferences was perceived by the 88 88 students as the most difficult skill (Table 3.6) Thus, it is the teachers’ responsibility to teach this skill as comprehension involves understanding both explicitly stated things and implied ones Readers have to make inferences based on what is stated and deduce what is implied 4.2.4 Encouraging students to develop extensive reading habit As shown in the study, most of the students reported that the most difficult part in reading English for Automobile Technology is vocabulary This means that they lacked necessary vocabulary related to the subject matter and limited knowledge of the subject So, teacher should encourage the students to form the positive and extensive reading habit Reading extensively outside the classroom can help them enrich their vocabulary and knowledge of the subject matter According to Nuttall ( 1982:168), “the best way to improve your knowledge of a foreign language is to go and live among its speakers The next best way is to read extensively in it” Teacher should provide students with the materials related to the topics they are learning, the source of these materials (from some books, websites ) and the way to read effectively Besides, teacher also should provide a variety of reading exercises such as summarizing, finding new words, answering the questions about the passage, translating, making outline, etc with different levels of difficulty These exercises may be given to students after each lesson The students should be encouraged to these exercises individually, in pairs or in groups Then, teacher should give assessment to them and ask students to point out the difficulties they may encounter when doing the tasks It is very important for the teachers to know the students’ difficulties to help them overcome 4.3 Improving teachers’ classroom techniques and subject background knowledge 4.3.1 Employing three stages in ESP reading lessons It is apparent from the findings of the survey that there are a number of things that should be done to aid students in the three stages of a reading lesson 89 89 *Pre-reading activities: This stage aims at raising students’ expectations and activating their background knowledge so that they will become less dependent on the words in the text The most important things for the teachers to in this stage include: giving/ elicting basic information about the text topic, text structures, text genre; providing necessary background knowledge related to the topic; pre-teaching vocabulary and explaining unfamiliar difficult grammatical structures The preteaching activities may include: - Using visual aids such as illustrations, drawings, pictures, photographs, diagrams, maps, tables, charts related to the text to draw the students’ attention, arouse their motivation, encourage them to predict about the text and elicit key vocabulary - Giving the title and asking students to write down the important things related to the topic - Asking students to complete a chart or a diagram - Brainstorming: this is a very popular and advantageous activity that activate students’ prior knowledge and opinions, and at the same time involves the whole class The teacher gives the students a key word or a key concept, a title or a headline and asks them to call out associated words or concepts *While-reading activities: During this stage, the teacher should help students develop effective reading strategies, improve their control of the language and decode problematic texts In other words, reading strategies practice and linguistic development should form the core of the while-reading stage Whilereading activities can be: reading for general understanding, reading to extract specific information, reading for detailed comprehension, predicting continuous events and then reading to verify these predictions, reading for communicative tasks such as separating or resembling jumled texts, finding the sequenced events, cloze reading, jigsaw reading or presenting the text as a diagrammatic display Example: In Unit 3: Faults in cars, in while-reading stage, the teacher can use various activities to help the students develop scanning skill by asking them to 90 90 read tha passage and complete the table FAULTS IN CARS SOLUTIONS *Post-reading activities: The purpose of these activities is to consolidate what students have read and provide a sense of completion to the whole process They may include: application and evaluation questions; follow up writing or listening; role play, discussion; problem-solving tasks with the aid of the information in the text The teachers must help their students to see if they have completed tasks successfully, find out how well they have worked and explain any misunderstandings The teacher’s positive feedback is considered essential to maintain students’ motivation and to prevent fossilization For example: When teaching Unit 2: Types of automobile , in post-readind stage, the teacher should divide class into groups and ask them to make a report on different types of automobile with their structures, characteristics and suitale users Types of automobile Structures Characteristics Suitable users 4.3.2 Giving homework and checking previous lessons frequently In order to form a habit of frequent study for students, teacher should give them a variety of exercises such as summarizing, finding new words, answering the questions about the passage, making outline, translating, with different levels of difficulty Then, these exercises must be checked in the next class by requiring students to go to the board to homework, presenting the topics, translating, answering the questions about the passages or texts they have read, etc If the 91 91 teacher doesn’t check homework frequently, the students will become lazy and then their reading will go worse 4.3.3 Improving teachers’ professional knowledge It is undeniable that teachers play a very important role in the students’ success So, they should be trained in terms of automobile background knowledge and teaching methodology The poor knowledge of subject mater is a matter of all ESP teachers As mentioned above, these teachers are teachers of GE who have unexpectedly required to teach students with special needs So they have to face so many difficulties, of which the gap of knowledge in the subject matter seems to be their biggest concern If the teacher does not have basic knowledge of the fundamental principles of the target discipline, it is very difficult for them to teach effectively That is why teachers of automobile should master the specialized content as much as possible Moreover, teachers of English for automobile should be provided with some further in-service training in automobile technology field by automobile specialists Besides, attending workshops or lectures given by the specialists and contacting with subject teachers and specialists are essential for teachers to improve their professional knowledge about automobile technology 4.4 Developing ESP reading materials As mentioned in chapter the reading materials at VKTC includes units from the “Automobile English” by the group of authors at Vinh Teaching Technical University Some adaptions could be made to these units as follows 4.4.1 Adjusting and improving reading exercises The exercises in this material were of various types They included guiding questions before reading, vocabulary exercises for checking students’ reading strategies, comprehension questions, exercises on word usage and follow up writing and speaking exercises They were systematic and facilitated reading and language learning However, some exercises were too difficult for our students’ proficiency level Therefore, the teachers should leave out some difficult tasks and give 92 92 alternative exercises Also, as expressed by the students, teachers should give them extra reading which may not be confined to the content required in the course but related to current international and domestic issues to encourage extensive reading This will provide more up-to-date information about the rapid achievements in the development of automobile technology 4.4.2 Reducing highly specialized texts Hutchinson & Waters (1987:161) advised teachers not to use highly specialized texts, which might not be able to operate effectively The findings of this study have shown that a great number of technical terms make the readers fail to comprehend the texts properly Thus, the teachers should choose appropriate texts for their students’ level and leave out difficult texts 4.5 Summary This chapter has made some possible suggestions to reduce difficulties that the learners at the VKTC encountered when reading ESP materials In order to reduce these difficulties, it is neccesary to improve the teaching and learning of ESP reading Firstly, teachers should arouse their students’ motivation by making ESP reading lessons interesting and useful In addition, teachers should train their students to become efficient readers by making them be aware of the reading process, teaching them with a variety of reading stategies and encouraging them to read extensively What is more, teachers should improve their teacing techniques by utilizing various types of activities during the three stages of teaching in order to provide their students with the clearest explanation of the techinal terms and gradually improve their students’ reading skills Finally, the ESP reading materials need adjusting and updating Teachers should choose and adapt materials carefully so that they suit the students’ needs and proficiency level CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION 5.1 Summary of the findings 93 93 This study provides an analysis of some difficulties in ESP reading and the sources of these difficulties as perceived by the second-year students at VKTC This graduation paper is conducted with the purpose of helping the teachers to foresee the problems and find out ways to solve them The findings of the study show that when reading ESP, the students encountered difficulties in all the five areas of language The most common difficulties are in the area of vocabulary and subject background knowledge The grammar area appears to be the least difficult of all The discourse and reading skills are perceived to have the same difficult level The findings of the study also show that despite the awareness of the importance of reading in ESP learning, some students had negative attitude towards ESP reading, which made their reading more difficult Also, the students were not equipped with necessary skills to become successful readers and lacked linguistic knowledge as well as subject background understanding Another cause of difficulties came from the ESP reading materials which were highly specialized and contained many difficult terminologies that the students and even the English teachers could not cope with Also, many exercises were not appropriate for the students’ proficiency levels and there was a lack of reinforcement of language structures presented in the texts Finally, inefficient teaching methods and classroom techniques might be another cause of the students’ difficulties Based on the results of the study, the researcher has presented some suggestions including the ways to make ESP reading lessons interesting and useful, the ways to improve teachers’ classroom techniques, to develop ESP reading materials and to train students to become efficient readers It is hoped that what has been discussed in the study might be beneficial to both automobile teachers and students as they helps them learn about their strengths and weaknesses, and thus, lay the foundation for future improvement and development in ESP reading syllabus Also it is hoped that the study will prove significant to those who want to conduct research in this area and who are concerned with this problem 94 94 5.2 Limitations of the study and suggestions for further study Despite the useful information the present study provides, it has some limitations Firstly, methodologically, the study used only one instrument, i.e the students’ questionnaire Information gained from the questionnaire is just on the surface Also, the respondents are very likely to be affected by the researcher’s research agenda In other words, the responses to the questionnaire may not reflect accurately what the respondents really think Therefore, future studies should use other methods such as observation and interviews A case study using multiple methods could be an appropriate methodlogical choice Secondly, within the scope of this study, there was no chance for the researcher to deal with other important factors affecting the reading process such as readers’ general intelligence, language aptitude, attitudes, language exposure and personality factors… This calls for further research Despite all the aforementioned limitations, the author hopes that the study will make a contribution to the better situation of teaching and learning ESP reading skill at VKTC 95 95 REFERENCES Aebersold, J A & Field, M L (1997), From Reading to Reading Teacher: Issues and Strategies for Second Language Classrooms., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Alderson, J.C.(2000) Assessing Reading, New York: Cambridge University Press Anderson, R.& Pearson, P (1984), “A Schema-Theoretic View of Basic Processes in Reading Comprehension”, Technical Report, (306), pp Anderson, N (1991), Individual differences in second language reading strategies, Paper presented at the 25th Annual TESOL Convention, New York Bacha, N.N & Bahous, R (2008), “Contrasting views of business students’ writing needs in an EFL environment”, English for Specific Purposes, (27), 74-93 Barnett, M.A (1989), “More than meets the eye: Foreign Language Reading Theory and Practice”, Language in Education series (No.73), Eaglewood Cliffs, NJ: CAL7 Prentice Hall Regents/Center for Applied Linguistics-ERIC Clearinghouse on Languages and Linguistics Bernhard, E.B & Kamil, M.L (1995), “Interpreting relationship between L1 and L2 reading Consolidating the linguistic threshold and linguistic interdependence hypotheses”, Applied linguistics, Vol 16 , No1, 15-34 Berman, Ruth A & Esther Dromi (1984), On Making Time Without Aspect in Child Language, Papers and Reports on Child Language Development No23, 23-32 Brantmeir, C (2002), The effects of passage content on second language reading comprehension by gender across instruction levels In J Hammadou Sullivan (Eds), Reasearch in Second Language Learning Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing 10 Brown, J.D (2001) Using Surveys in Language Programs Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press 11 Carrell, P.L (1981), ‘Culture-specific Schemata in L2 Reading comprehension’ In R.Orem &J.Haskell (Ed), Selected Papers from the Ninth Illinois TESOL/BE 96 96 annual convention and the first Midwest TESOL conference, Chicago, 123-132 II: TESOL/BE 12 Carter, R and McCarthy, M (1991), Applied linguistics and language study., New York: Longman 13 Chang, H.F (2000), A study of business English course in technology and vocational school, Selected papers from the Ninth International Symposium on English Teaching (pp.167-177), Taipei: Crane Publising Co 14 Coady, J.A (1979), Psycholinguistic Models of the ESL Reader, in Reading in a Second Language: Hypotheses, organization and Practice, Rowley, Mass, Newbury House 15 Dudley-Evans, T., & St John, M (1998), Developments in ESP: A multi- disciplinary approach, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 16 Duffy, G.G & Rochler L.R (1986), Improving Classroom Reading Instruction: A Decision Making Approach, New York: Random House 17 Duquette, G., S Dunnett, &A Papalia.(1987), “The Effect of Authentic Materials in Acquiring A Second Language”, The Canadian Modern Language Review, Vol 43, No 3, 479-492 18 El-Bashbishy, E.M (1993), An ESP Unit for the Pre-service Students in the Department of Ready-made clothes Pharos: An ESP Newsletter, (6:1) ESP Center: Alexandria University 19 Ferris, D & Tagg, T (1996), “Academic oral communication needs of EAP learners: What subject-matter instructors actually require”, TESOL Quarterly, Vol 30, 31-58 20 Gatehouse, K (2001), “Key issues in English for specific purposes (ESP) Cirrriculum development”, The Internet TESL Journal, Vol 7, Retrieved May 02, 2009, from http:/iteslj.org/Articles?gatehouse-ESP.html 21 Girard, D (1997), “Motivation The responsibility of the Teacher”, ELT Journal, Vol 23, pp 43-45 97 97 22 Goodman, K.(1971), ‘Psychololinguistic universals in the reading process’, in P.Pimsleur and T.Quinn(Ed.), Psychology of Second Language Learning, Cambridge: CUP 23 Grellet, F (1981), Developing Reading Skills: A Practical Guide to Reading Comprehension Exercises, Cambridge: CUP 24 Harmer, J (1989), The Practice of English Language Teaching, Harlow: Longman 25 Hudson, T.(1982), “The effects of induced schemata on the ‘short circuit’ in L2 reading: Non-decoding factors in L2 reading performance”, Language Learning, Vol 32, pp1-31 26 Hutchinson, T., & Waters, A (1987), English for specific purposes: a learning- centred approach, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 27 Jacson, J (2004), “Case-based teaching in a bilingual content: Perceptions of business faculty in Hong Kong”, English for Specific Purposes, Vol 23, pp 213232 28 John T., Davies F (1983), “Text as a vehicle for information: the classroom use of written texts in teaching reading in a foreign language”, Reading in a Foreign Language, Vol 1, No 01, pp 1-19 29 Johnson, P (1981), “Effects on Reading Comprehension of Building Background Knowledge”, TESOL Quarterly, Vol 16, pp 503-516 30 Jolly, D (1978), The Establishment of a Self-access Scheme for Intensive Reading, Paper presented at the Goethe Institute., British Council Colloquium on Reading, Paris Oct 1978 31 Kaprova, L.V.(1999), “Considering the Following when Selecting and Using Authentic Materials”, TESOL Matters, Vol 9, No2, April/May 1999 32 Krashen, S.D & Terrel, T.D (1983), The Natural Approach: Language Acquisition in the Classroom., Oxford and San Francisco: Pergammon, Almany 33 Lee, J.F ( 1986), “Background Knowledge and L2 reading”, The Modern Language Journal, Vol 70, pp 350–354 98 98 34 Lee, J& Schallert, D.L (1997), “The Relative Contribution of L2 Proficiency and L1 Reading Ability to L2 Reading Performance: A test of the Threshold Hypothesis in an EFL Context”, TESOL Quarterly, Vol 31, Issue 35 LeLoup, J.W., &R.Ponterio.(2000), Creating Standards-based Activities Integrating Authentic Materials from the WWW, in Wm Heller, Ed., ABC to PhD: Foreign Language Proficiency for ALL, Annual Meeting Series No 17, 13- 20; Schenectady, NY: New York State Association of Foreign Language Teachers 36 MacNamara, J.(1967), Comparative Studies of Reading and Problem Solving in Two Languages, Language Research Group: McGill University 37 Nuttall, C (1982), Teaching reading skills in a foreign language, London: Heineman Educational Books 38 Martinez, A.G (2002), “Authentic Materials: An Overview”, Karen’s Linguistics Issues, Feb, 2002 39 McDonough J & S Mc Donough (1997) Research Methods for English Language Teachers London: Arnold 40 Morrow, K (1980), Skills for Reading, Oxford: Oxford University Press 41 Nonaka, T.(2001), The importance of Authentic Language of SLA http://members.aol.com/mrNonaka/index.htm 42 O’Dennell, R.C (1961), “A study of the Core Relation between Awareness of StructuralRrelationships in English and Ability in Reading Comprehension’ Journal of experimental Education, XXX 1961, pp 313-316 43 Oxford, R (1990), Language learning strategies What every teacher should know, New York: Newbury House Publishers 44 Pardón, Y.N, Knight, S.L & Waxman, H.C (1988), “The Effect of ESL Students’ Perceptions of their Cognitive Reading Strategies on their Reading Achievement”, TESOL Quarterly, Vol 22, pp 146-150 45 Richard, J.C& Rodgers, T.S (1986), Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching, Cambridge University Press 99 99 46 Sarig, G (1987), ‘High level reading in the first and in the foreign language: some comparative process data” In J Deine, P.L Carrell & D.E Eskey (Ed) Research in reading in English as Second Language, Washington, D.C: TESOL 47 Silvia Tropea, (2010), “A Window to ESP: Teaching Medical English to Italian nurses and healthcare professionals”, ESP World, Issue 2(28), Volume 9, 2010 http://www.esp-world.infor 48 Smith, F (1985), Reading Cambridge: CUP 49 Steffensen, M.F Joag-Dew, C & Anderson, R.C (1979), “A Cross-Cultural Perspective on Reading Comprehension”, Reading Research Quarterly, Vol 15, pp 10-29 50 Strang, R (1972), “The Nature of Reading”, in Melnik, A & Merrit, J (Ed), Reading Today and Tomorrow Open Milton Keynes, 67-117 51 Strevens, P (1988), “ESP after twenty years: A re-appraisal”, in M Tickoo (Ed.), ESP: State of the art (1-13), SEAMEO Regional Language Centre 52 Swan, M (1975), Inside meaning, Cambridge: CUP 53 Ulijin, J M & Salager-Meyer, F (1998), “The professional reader and the text: Insights from L2 research”, Journal of Research in Reading, Vol 21, No 2, pp 79-95 54 Wallace, M.J (1993), Reading, Oxford: Oxford University Press 55 Widdowson H.G (1983), Learning Purpose and Language Use, Oxford: Oxford University Press 56 William, M & Burden, R.L (1997, Psychology for Language Teachers A Social Constructive Approach, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 57 Van Dijk, Teun A (1977), Text and Context: Explorations in the Semantics and Pragmatics of Discourse, London: Longman 58 Yang, H (1986), “New Technique for identifying scientific/technical terms and describing texts”, Literary and Linguistic Computing, Vol 1, pp 93-103 59 Yorio, C.A (1971), “Some Sources of Reading Problems for Foreign Language Learners”, Language Learning, Vol 21, pp 107-115 100 100 60 Yuet Hung Chan, C (2003), “Cultural Content and Reading Proficiency: a Comparison of Mainland Chinese and Hong Kong Learners of English Language”, Culture and Curriculum, Vol 16(1), pp 60-69 61 Zwiers, J (2005), Building reading comprehension habits in grades 6–12, Newark, DE: International Reading Association 101 101 ... ideas, supporting ideas and examples - processing and evaluating the information during reading - transferring or using the information while or after reading 2.4.4 ESP reading materials Materials... skills as well as ESP materials Finally, factors causing difficulties for ESP readers will be reviewed 2.1 Reading and reading comprehension 2.1.1 Definition of reading It is stated that reading. .. the nature of reading, and reading act, in which the readers, reading process and reading messages are emphasized 2.1.2 Reading comprehension Reading comprehension takes a very important part in