An investigation into classroom interaction in teaching the english reading skill to 10th grade students at some upper secondary schools in quang tri province

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HUE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES PHAM THI TUYET VAN AN INVESTIGATION INTO CLASSROOM INTERACTION IN TEACHING THE ENGLISH READING SKILL TO 10th GRADE STUDENTS AT SOME UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN QUANG TRI PROVINCE SYNOPSIS MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING HUE, 2013 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HUE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES PHAM THI TUYET VAN AN INVESTIGATION INTO CLASSROOM INTERACTION IN TEACHING THE ENGLISH READING SKILL TO 10th GRADE STUDENTS AT SOME UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN QUANG TRI PROVINCE SYNOPSIS MA THESIS IN THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING CODE: 60140111 SUPERVISOR: NGUYEN THI QUYNH HOA, D.Ed HUE, 2013 BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO ĐẠI HỌC HUẾ TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ -PHẠM THỊ TUYẾT VÂN KHẢO SÁT SỰ TƯƠNG TÁC TRONG LỚP HỌC ĐỐI VỚI VIỆC DẠY KỸ NĂNG ĐỌC TIẾNG ANH CHO HỌC SINH LỚP 10 TẠI MỘT SỐ TRƯỜNG PHỔ THƠNG Ở TỈNH QUẢNG TRỊ TĨM TẮT LUẬN VĂN THẠC SĨ LÝ LUẬN VÀ PHƯƠNG PHÁP DẠY HỌC BỘ MÔN TIẾNG ANH MÃ SỐ: 60140111 NGƯỜI HƯỚNG DẪN KHOA HỌC: TS NGUYỄN THỊ QUỲNH HOA Huế, 2013 ABSTRACT This thesis aims to investigate effective ways to improve students’ learning of reading skill in English classes through classroom interactions at Quang Tri upper secondary schools Firstly, it defines the importance of classroom interactions Secondly, it seeks to answer which interaction patterns can be observed in language classroom Thirdly, it studies how these interactions affect the learners’ participations and learning outcomes The participants of this study include 20 teachers and 100 students from the 10th classes at Trung Vuong and Quang Tri upper secondary schools The data are collected by means of questionnaires, class observations and interviews and then statistically analyzed by means of charts and tables These findings of the research show that both teachers and students are aware of the importance of classroom interactions The teachers used many types of activities to encourage students to learn and interact with them so that they have more chance to develop the reading skill However, there is a mismatch between the teachers’ belief and their students’ perceptions of effect of the interaction modes the teachers think popular they create inside their classrooms From the findings, there are three types of classroom interaction including teacher- student, student- student and student- content The survey shows that the teacher- student and student- student interaction modes are frequently used in teaching and learning English reading skill at Quang Tri upper secondary schools Finally, some implications and suggestions are made with the hope that teachers will improve the students’ English through promoting classroom interactions CHAPTER 1- INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale For non- native English speakers, English reading has been considered as one of the necessary skills that they need to achieve I have discovered that students at some upper secondary schools in Quang Tri province have encountered some difficulties in English reading due to some factors In reality although many students spend a lot of time and energy learning English, they still fail to use English to communicate effectively Classroom interaction can be seen as an effective way for students to learn the reading skill It is where students and teacher exchange their knowledge and lessons related problems Through interaction students have more chance to practice the reading skill Today with the popularity of CLT in Viet Nam, English learners had access to a more interactive learning environment On the other hand, not many students realize the importance of interaction in their learning and of implementing those strategies efficiently Therefore, I am motivated to choose the topic “An investigation into classroom interaction in teaching the English reading skill to 10th grade students at some upper secondary schools in Quang Tri province” for my thesis and I hope to increase the students’ awareness of the importance of English classroom interaction and improve the students reading abilities reading comprehension 1.2 Aims and objectives This thesis has been carried out to investigate classroom in interaction in teaching the English reading skill to the 10th grade students at some upper secondary schools in Quang Tri province so as to give some suggestions for improving their reading skill 1.3 Research questions Which types of classroom interaction are used in teaching the English reading skill to 10th grade students at some upper secondary schools in Quang Tri province? How these interactions affect the learners' participation and their learning outcomes? What suggestions can be made to improve the teaching and learning of the reading skill via classroom interaction? 1.4 Scope of the research This research focuses on investigating classroom interaction in teaching the English reading skill more communicatively to grade 10th grade students at some upper secondary schools in Quang Tri province namely: Trung Vuong and Gio Linh 1.5 Significance of the research The result of this research will bring about some possible solutions, meaningful suggestions and pedagogical implications which are very beneficial for teachers to overcome difficulties mentioned previously and improve English language communication for grade 10 students through the reading skill 1.6 Structure of the thesis Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: Literature review and theoretical background Chapter 3: Research methodology Chapter 4: Findings and discussion Chapter 5: Conclusions and implications CHAPTER - LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 2.1 Previous studies related to the topic There are many researchers have considerably contributed to the improvement of teaching and learning English reading skill to some extent However, the issue of applying the classroom interaction with four skills especially the reading skill has not paid much attention to Therefore, I find it necessary to conduct this research 2.2 Interaction 2.2.1 Interaction as a general term 2.2.2 Interaction as a key term in EFL 2.3 Teaching and learning activities promoting interaction 2.4 Types of classroom interaction 2.4.1 Teacher – Student interaction 2.4.1.1 Teacher- Student interaction 2.4.1.2 Teacher- Students interaction 2.4.2 Student- student interaction 2.4.2.1 Student- Students interaction 2.4.2.1 Student- Student interaction 2.4.3 Student- content interaction 2.5 Definition of the reading skill Though these opinions are not exactly the same, what comes up as a common point is that reading skill is the process in which the readers, as they read, can recognize the graphic forms of the reading text and understand what is implied behind these forms The second definition helps to make the definition by Nunan clear and complete The researcher finds it good to combine Nunans (2003, p.68) and Grabes (1991, p.378) ideas in defining reading to include in the research That is, the thesis will be based on the two abovementioned definitions whenever the concept is dealt with I will base on the definition reading of William which states that reading was a process where by ones look at and understands what has been written and the reader is not simply a passive object fed with letters, words and sentences, but it is actively working on the text, and is able to arrive at understanding without looking at every letter and word 2.5.1 Stages of teaching reading 2.5.1.1 Pre-reading stage 2.5.12 While-reading stage 2.5.1.3 Post-reading stage 2.5.2 Reading in second language learning and teaching 2.5.2.1 The importance of teaching reading in the L2 classroom 2.5.2.2 Reading purposes of second language learners (Rivers and Temperley 1978, cited in Nunan, 1989:34) 2.5.3 Students and teachers’ roles in studying and teaching the reading skill 2.5.3.1 Students’ roles in studying the reading skill 2.5.3.2 Teachers’ roles in teaching the reading skill 2.6 Summary This chapter so far has presented the relevant literature, which has helped to form the theoretical and conceptual framework for the study It has talked about different aspects related to the reading skills and reading activities What is more, the importance of teaching reading in the second language classroom and factors in teaching and learning reading have been reviewed 10 Option Number of teachers Percentage Teacher- student 35 Student- student 11 55 Student- content 10 Total 20 100 4.3.5.2 Students’ perception of interaction patterns in reading classroom Table 4: Students’ perception of interaction patterns in reading classroom Option Number of students Percentage Teacher- student 40 40 Student- student 55 55 Student- content 5 Total 100 100 To gain learning efficiency and to make students more active, teachers motivate interaction patterns in class as much as possible in order to help students achieve communicative competence Due to, the importance of interaction, the research 15 decided to consider the reality of how upper secondary school teacher of English organize activities to promote interaction 4.4 Kinds of activities are used to promote interaction in the reading stage 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 Pre- readin Figure 4.2: Kinds of activities are use to promote interaction in reading individually pairwork groupwork stages 4.5 Difference kinds of activities used by teachers to interact with students in teaching and studying the reading skill Table 6: Teachers’ choices of types of activities from questionnaire Activities Percentage a True- false statement 16 100 b Multiple choice 100 c Wh-questions 88.2 d Find someone who 19.8 e Guessing game 45.6 g Noughts and crosses 10.7 h Mapped and dialogues 33.3 i Chain game 40.4 j Matching 98.2 k Gap filling 44.3 l Bingo 35.6 m Picture drill 99.7 n Word cue drill 40.2 o others 45.7 In general, all types of activities get the environment of interaction to encourage students’ learning 17 4.6 Interaction’s effect on learning and types of interaction in classroom Students can improve their learning through using interaction in classes “Interaction is a process designed to assist learners is acquiring and restricting knowledge by mediating an investment of effort and the allocation of cognitive resources” (Gavora & Hannafin,1993,p.18) The data from the questionnaire show that to most the teachers who employ meaningful interaction, the target of teaching is more easily fulfilled, and students are able to develop their reading skills, especially communicative competence Table 7: Interaction types in reading skill Types of interactions Perception Teacher- student 78% Teacher- students 90.1% Student- student 77.2% Student- students 40.5% Student- content 80% In terms of reading skill, Figure 4.6 shows that 77.7% of the teachers applied interaction types of teacher- student, student- student and student- content are 77.2% and 80%, 90.1% chose of chose 18 teacher- students motivate students’ learning Students can work in the activity including wh- questions, true- false statement, multiple choices or matching Students were asked to work in pairs or in groups Members of different groups can compare and discuss group 4.7 Summary This chapter describes classroom interaction which plays an important role to bring about in effectiveness of learning and teaching This chapter, it is shown clearly that there are two different perceptions of interaction including students’ perception and teacher’s perception That is how many types of interaction are frequently used to promote students’ learning in class These kinds of activities aim at focusing on interaction to help students enhance their communicative competence CHAPTER - CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS 5.1 Conclusions This piece of research was conducted with an attempt to investigate potential types of classroom interaction in teaching the English reading skill, factors that affect the learners’ participation and learning outcomes and look for suggestions on how to improve the learning and teaching of reading skill These two groups of subjects were asked to give suggestions for better interaction between students and teachers, from students to students and from student and content 19 in reading classes The study, therefore, sought the answers to the following the research questions Classroom interaction plays a very important role in helping students to learn English language It helps students develop not only the English fluency but then accuracy as well Both teachers and students are aware of the important classroom interaction The teachers also used many types of activities to encourage students to learn and to interact with teacher and with classmate together so that they have more chance to develop reading skill, especially communicate competence However, there is a mismatch between the teachers’ belief and their students’ perception of the effect of the interaction modes the teachers think they create inside their classroom This is an important finding The learners’ and teachers’ awareness of the impact of interaction is not enough It is equally important that the teachers should be fully informed of the real effect of the meaningful interaction they create and encourage The findings in chapter 4, clearly show that there are three interaction patterns including teacher- student, student- student and student- content which used to promote students’ learning as well as communicative skills However, the survey shows that teacherstudent and student- student interactions modes are frequently used in teaching and learning in classes at Trung Vuong and Gio Linh upper secondary schools in Quang Tri province Most of the teachers realize the importance of interaction and the role of learners in CLT 20 methods, 100% of teachers reported that they prefer to promote student- student interaction to improve students’ learning Truly, student- student and teacher- student interactions are used from beginning of the lesson to involved students because it provide them with relaxed feelings and community environment where students can play and talk, they are motivated to interact with students during the time of learning It is important that the learning environment is set at the beginning in order to create and build up a collaborative learning In general, activities play a crucial role in promoting interaction, especially student- student interaction There are many activities which are often used to create these interaction modes However, there are some main activities Firstly, wh- questions are considered as an essential activity for interaction; it helps from students in groups and pair to work Students are able to discuss, share ideas and they also have chance to interact with other students from other pairs or groups Another activity is true- false statement, this activity also promotes interaction In this activity, teachers often asked students to work in pairs or in groups Student- student and student- content interaction modes are promoted to use Moreover matching and multiple choice activities, the activities promote interaction For example, students work in pairs or in groups to match the heading to the paragraphs In these cases, student can share ideas, discuss and explain their choices This leads to an active and collaborative learning environment 21 Therefore, pair work and group work promote interaction actively through organization 5.2 Implications and suggestions From the findings and discussion, I would like to offer some suggestions to promote interaction in classroom at some upper secondary schools Interaction should be encouraged through activities because it is a promoted student’s learning Moreover, it is created a collaborative learning environment teachers not understand clearly what patterns of interaction are Interactions as much promote when pair work or group work It enhances students’ communicative encourage Pair work and group work motivate classroom interaction Thus, the more group and pair work are aware, the more interactions are increased  For teachers: Accordingly, the teachers play important to set the learning environment which brings about effectiveness of students’ learning They should use different activities to promote the interaction in learning The increased interaction not only helps build up an effective learning environment but also helps students reach the outcome of the learning successfully Interaction modes can include not only teacher- student, student- student and student- content but other interaction as well The other interactions can suggest based on 22 teachers’ perception and their teaching methods in which interactions is created The teacher who are directly in charge of teaching students, they may know how to use interaction modes in different way to help them learn better, student- interface interaction, for example  For students: For the needed improvements will be achieved in implication of classroom interaction in teaching and learning English It is important that the teachers in classroom interaction frequently to involve students’ learning Activities should be included to enhance interaction Interaction used in language classroom has positive impacts on learning community, which implies that they should feel as comfortable as possible in their classes before and while teachers asked to involve in learning activities For example, establishing learning classroom communicative is in fact available for classroom activities to which students learn as they and play at home Teacher need to use interaction modes as much as possible so that they are able to 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