Exploring difficulties faced by students of accounting in learning reading in english at nguyen tri phuong vocational college phong dien district thua thien hue province

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale The global spread of English over the last forty years is remarkable by the increasing number of users of the language, by its depth of penetration into societies and by its range of functions Nowadays there is a requirement to study English usually because of the known role of English as an international language of communication, trade and research In addition, with the globalization of trade and economy and the continuing increase of international communication in various fields, the demand for English for Specific Purposes (ESP) is expanding, especially in countries where English is learned as a foreign language The success of English language has turned it into a vehicle for international communication and the orientation of linguistic studies towards language as communication in social contexts has largely contributed to enhance the dignity of ESP studies Currently, there is a greater interest in the content with which ESP must be involved – the subject matter which ESP students have to study and work with through English Furthermore, there have been a growing number of individuals who require language for occupational or vocational purposes This has necessarily led to a corresponding increase in attention on teaching and learning ESP so as to provide appropriate knowledge toward the ESP students ESP has become one of the most important areas of EFL teaching (Brunton, 2009) In Vietnam, ESP plays an essential role in teaching and learning English because it prepares learners to “use English within academic, professional, or workplace environment” (Basturkmen, 2006, p.17) Many ESP courses such as English for Science and Technology, English for Business and Economics, English for social Science (Hutchinson & Water, 1987) have been organized in order to meet students‟ demand As for students of economics, especially for accounting, the demand for learning ESP is more increasing because of the requirements of an accountant in the future As a teacher of a vocational school, I have found that the reading capability of students of accounting at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College is still much limited First, the level of General English of most students is low, they could not read effectively, so they cannot gain understanding of major materials Even some students don‟t know how to speak, listen or write in English, they know nothing in English Second, many ESP students have a background knowledge in their specific area However, one of the challenges that most of them face is their English language inadequacies, especially the specific English language competence necessary to read their content subjects Third, ESP teachers who devote a lot of time and energy to students‟ skills lessons find that constraints in the process of teaching are unavoidable Many teachers at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College have difficulties designing lesson plan with interesting learning materials or motivating their students to learn ESP because of the limit of time for preparatory work, the limit of students‟ knowledge of English, the lack of necessary skills on the part of the teacher and the limited resources And the last is that although there are some accounting books available on the market, the bookshop, no books meet the needs of students interested in becoming Certificated Public Accountant Some books are out of date, some books not have various and interesting activities to motivate the learning process of students Correspondingly, this research was carried out for the following reasons: Firstly, ESP has become more and more important, so the needs of studying ESP of accounting students have been stronger and stronger nowadays, especially reading skill needs to be paid much more attention Secondly, English for accounting is a compulsory subject of learning process at university in general and at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College in particular The ESP reading skill can help students widen their background knowledge, as well as knowledge of accounting Thirdly, reading ability of accounting students is too weak Many students cannot succeed in this subject because of facing many different difficulties And their failure makes them unconcerned with learning reading in English As a result, they cannot make progress and gain high score in examinations This problem reduces the output quality of accounting students Last, I am now a language teacher of ESP class for the accounting students of Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College As a matter of fact, how students actually learn reading is one of my major concerns Exploring the students‟ difficulties in their learning reading ESP can help me better my teaching practices as well as providing my students‟ implications for a more efficient ESP reading learning With these assumptions in mind, I decided to conduct a study with the following topic: Exploring difficulties faced by students of accounting in learning reading in English at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College, Phong Dien District, Thua Thien Hue Province 1.2 Research purposes Based on the reasons mentioned above, the specific aims of this research are to study and investigate the following points: - The reality of teaching and learning reading comprehension ESP for accounting students at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College - The difficulty in learning reading ESP that students of accounting at this college have been facing - The main factors that lead to such difficulties in learning ESP reading comprehension - Making some suggestions to overcome the difficulties and improve ESP ability of learning reading comprehension for students of accounting 1.3 Research questions  How is ESP reading skill learned at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College?  What difficulties students of accounting at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College often encounter in learning reading ESP?  Which factors lead to such difficulties in learning reading ESP of Accounting students at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College? 1.4 Scope of the study This study is mainly carried out on a small scale including language teachers, content teachers, 100 third – year students of accounting at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College 1.5 Organization of the thesis This thesis is divided into five chapters as follows: Chapter 1: Introduction includes the rationale for the research, the purpose of the study, the objectives, research questions, scope and organization of the study Chapter 2: Literature Review will be an introduction about the previous study related to the problem under investigation The theory background such as theory of reading, reading comprehension, English for specific purposes, accounting is included in this chapter Chapter 3: Method and Procedure will present research method, procedure of data collection, description of samples, data analysis and research procedures Chapter 4: Findings and discussion will analyze the results from the questionnaires, the classroom observation as well as interviews The results is the base to suggest some solutions to help students of accounting study better at ESP reading skill in the next chapter Chapter 5: Conclusion and Implication summarizes the major findings of the research and gives implications for teaching and learning reading ESP at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College, and point out the limitations of the study There are also some suggestions for further research works related to the study CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Previous studies related to difficulties in reading In Japan, Matsumura (1984, cited in Kitao (1982) said that Japanese learners believe that they can read English well but cannot speak it well But this is only a fiction Most of the Japanese, according to this person, can neither speak nor read English well The author has taught reading English to more than 2,000 Japanese college students since 1978, he has strong doubts about Japanese students‟ actual English reading proficiency According to Kitao (1982), Japanese learners meet a lot of difficulties when reading because of the following reasons: Firstly, vocabulary plays an important role in reading in English Students often use an English-Japanese dictionary whenever they read English materials As soon as they find a new word, they look it up in the dictionary and write down the first meaning in Japanese language They not care whether the meaning of the word fits in that context or not They continue reading until they find another word After knowing all the meaning of all new words one by one, they replace all English words into Japanese words one by one They not pay attention to the meaning of the context Secondly, most students know a little about the culture or social implication of words, sentences or discourse Thirdly, some students considered reading aloud as reading strategies If being asked to read a text aloud, most of the students can read it so that it is understandable to native speaker of English However, these students cannot remember anything about the content of the text after finishing reading if they not read it again silently In order to overcome the above problem, Kitao (1982) gave some solutions such as: Textbooks should not use exercises that involve replacing Japanese words with English words Students need to read English without using Japanese Students should be encouraged to read faster, for example, by keeping track of their speed In this way, students can improve not only their reading speed but also their reading comprehension Students should know a purpose for reading each time they read In Vietnam, Nguyen (2012) in her research paper, she did an investigation on difficulties encountered by students majoring in general practitioner in reading at Hue University, College of Medicine and Pharmacy She indicated many problems in reading texts such as limited vocabulary knowledge, difficult terminology Among them, vocabulary is considered as the biggest problems To overcome the above problems, Nguyen (2012) stated that teachers should improve their methodology They should apply different approaches to teach vocabulary, giving homework and checking previous lesson frequently Similarly, Nie (2011) carried out a case study on the difficulties in learning English reading comprehension by 11th grade students at a high school in Daklak province This study showed that these 11th grade students did not face any difficulties relating to the issue of perception of reading comprehension However, it pointed out a number of difficulties resulted from teaching method of the teachers as well as learning materials The findings of this research were significant and helpful in drawing solutions to deal with these difficulties and help students improve their reading comprehension skill In brief, there are many researches of problems in reading skill and many solutions for the above problems However, these pieces of research focused on students who learn general English For ESP students, realizing difficulties in their learning reading ESP is also important and necessary Thus, difficulties in reading ESP faced by subjects are worth investigating 2.2 Theoretical background of teaching and learning reading 2.2.1 What is reading? Reading belongs to receptive skills and is considered as one of the cognitive activities of languages that are written or printed in a text However, there are a number of definitions of reading but the following can be regarded as the most typical ones William (1984) and Grellet (1981) argues that “Reading is a process whereby one looks at and understands what has been written or printed in a given text” (p.2) According to Lefevre (1964), reading is one of the great practical significances to everyone It helps us to open our minds to understand and watch everything in every field in the world It brings us new overview about society and human beings Moreover, Witty (1963) claims that “Reading is one of means of communication” (p.16), and explains that reading is considered as a two-way action that involves both the writers and readers, and reading is successful when the writer‟s meaning is clear in the reader‟s mind In addition, Nuttall (1982) also asserts that reading is a process of communication between writers and readers through a text This process shows us that the writer has a message, which he wants the readers to share through the form of encoding and decoding Kenneth Goodman (1967, cited in Carrell and Eisterhold, 1998) refers to reading as a psycholinguistic guessing game (p.41) The “guessing”, however, is far from random It is principled guessing, which draws upon two sources to guide it However, Godman (1973, cited in Carrell and Eisterhold, 1998) admits that reading is not always an exact process of perceiving, but by using available information enough in the text, the reader can predict the decodable language structure In conclusion, reading is the process of recognition, interpretation, and perception of written or printed material In other words, reading is a process of communication from the writer to the reader It involves the recognition of letters, words and clauses Thus an efficient reader makes use of this to take what s/he needs, and no more to obtain meaning Moreover, reading is also a complex activity and no one can claim to the most correct and general view of what reading is 2.2.2 What is reading comprehension? There are many different definitions on reading comprehension but the following definitions have been used as the theoretical support for the study Reading comprehension is the ability that the learner can apprehend and receive the meaning and content of a written text According to the definition of Grellet (1981), reading comprehension is considered as “Understanding a written text means exacting the required information from it as efficiently as possible” (p.3) It means that we apply different reading strategies when looking at a notice board to see if there is an advertisement for a particular type of flat and when carefully reading an article of special interest in a scientific journal With this view Sheng (2001) suggests that comprehension is the understanding of the meaning of the written material and covers the conscious strategies that lead to understanding In other words, reading comprehension is a process of negotiating understanding between the reader and writer It is a more complex psychological process and includes linguistic factors, such as phonological, morphological, syntactic and semantic elements It means that the reader can receive information from the author via the words, sentences, paragraphs and so forth, and try to understand the inner feelings of the writer However, it is not necessary for readers to understand the content of an article or the whole text If being a competent reader, she/he will be able to reject the irrelevant information and find the facts she/he needs quickly In contrast, the reader cannot understand the gist of the text It is essential to take some elements such as what she/he reads, why she/he reads or how she/he reads and so on into his/her consideration 2.2.3 Stages of teaching reading According to William (1984), in order to achieve high effectiveness in teaching reading, the language teachers need to follow the steps below: 2.2.3.1 Pre-reading stage This is the opening step for reading a text Harmer (1991, p.188) states “We will not get students to interact properly with spoken and written materials unless we ensure that their desire to read or listen has been awakened.” Especially, when the subject matter of the text may not be immediately appealing to students, teachers have a responsibility to encourage students to tackle the text with positive anticipation Therefore, to enable students to understand the reading text, without their looking up every single word, teachers should employ pre-reading stage, as it is important in building confidence and creating security in learners To this, teachers should activate students‟ background knowledge and schema in regards to the target text Ghani (1993), Stott (2001) and Chan (2003) suggest that in the pre-reading phase, provision of background knowledge to students through the pre-reading activities are useful for facilitating their reading comprehension and motivating their reading interest Ringler and Weber (1984) also agree that pre-reading activities provide a reader with necessary background to organize information and to comprehend the materials (cited in Ajdeh, 2003) However, some traditional prereading activities simply comprise questions to which the student is required to find answer from the text In other words, this type of activity is designed to test comprehension Thus, the students read the text quickly in order to find specific information related to questions Other pre-reading activities are word definitions to clarify the meaning of difficult words; and some syntactic explanation to help the students understand complex structures in the text However, if teachers follow such an approach to teach reading, students may rely much on bottom-up processing of individual words and analyzing sentence 10 annual Convention, the first MID-West TESOL Conference (pp 123-132) Chicago: Illinois Carrel, P and Floyd, P (1987) Effects on ESL reading of teaching cultural content schema Language learning, 37, p.p 88 - 108 Carrell, P.L (1988a) Some causes of text- boundedness and Schema Interference in ESL reading In P.L.Carrell, J Devine, and D.E Eskey (eds) Interactive Approaches to Second Language Reading Cambridge: CUP Chan, H Y (2003) Cultural Content and Reading Proficiency: A comparison of Mainland Chinese and Hongkong learners of English Language Culture and Curriculum, 16 (1), p p 60-69 Chia, H L (2001) Reading activities for effective top-down processing FORUM, 39(1), p.22 Crandall, J (1995) The why, what and how of ESL Reading Instruction: some guidelines for writers of ESL Reading Textbooks In Intensive program for Vietnamese language Educators Reading Packet Los Angeles Donald, M (1991) The origins of the modern mind: Three stages in the evolution of culture and cognition Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press Dudley – Evans, T and Johns, A.M (1991) “English for Specific Purposes; 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(pp 216–232) Boston: Heinle & Heinle Publishers Mori, S (2002) Redefining Motivation to Read in a Foreign Language Vol 14 No 12 Available from http://www.nflrc/hawaii.edu/rf/October2002/mori/mori_html [ Accessed :9:16 P.M, June, 2013] Nguyen, T.T.L (2011) An investigation into difficulties encountered by students majoring in general practitioner in reading texts at Hue University, College of Medicine and Pharmacy MA Thesis Hue College of Foreign Languages Nie, K.H (2011) An investigation into difficulties in learning EFL English reading comprehension faced by students at Grade 11th at No Trang Long Ethnic Minority Boarding High School, Daklak Province MA Thesis Hue College of Foreign Languages Nunan, D (1988), “Syllabus design”, Oxford University Press Heinemann Publisher„s Ltd Nuttall, C (1982) Teaching Reading Skills in Foreign Language Heinemann Publisher‟s Ltd Rao, Z (2004) Fitting a top-down strategy into a traditional reading class Teacher ‘s Edition 15, p.p.12-15 62 Reany, P (1998) What is knowledge Arizona Journal of Natural Philosophy Vol2 (Mard.1998) p.p 7-14 Available from http://www.world-mysteries.com/sci-knowledge.htm [Accessed: 8:37 AM , June, 2013] Richard, C.J (1990) The language teaching matrix USA: Cambridge University Press Sheng, H.J (2001), “A cognitive Model for Teaching Reading Comprehension” Forum, Vol 38 No4 P.12.31 Smoak, R (2003), “What is English for Specific Purposes”, English Teaching Forum Stott, N (2001) Helping ESL students become better readers: Schema theory applications and limitations The Internet TESOL Journal, (11) Available at: http://iteslj.org/Articles/Stott-schema.html (last accessed on 5.7 2008) Witty, P (1963) “How to improve your reading” Science Research Associates, Inc William, E (1984), “Reading in the language classroom”, Modern English Publications William, E (1987) Classroom reading through activating content based – schemata Reading in a foreign language 4(1), p.p 1-7 63 APPENDICES APPENDICE 01 QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENTS The purpose of this questionnaire is to survey the project: Exploring difficulties faced by students of accounting in learning reading in English at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College, Phong Dien District, Thua Thien Hue Your contribution is one of the great successes for my research paper: the data collected will be only used for research paper, not for publication or any other purposes Please put a tick (√) on the answer you choose Do you enjoy ESP reading lesson?  Very much  Yes  Not much  No If yes, which factor(s) activate(s) your interest in ESP learning reading lessons?( for this question you can tick more than one answer)  Texts are easy to understand  No much new vocabulary  No new structures  Teachers‟ methods of teaching attract you  You can accumulate knowledge of English related to your specialism  Information in reading materials is interesting and necessary for you Other factor(s)…………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… If no, please provide the reason(s) by ticking the answer(s) below:  Reading content is boring 64  Teachers‟ methods of teaching are dull  Your English is not sufficient (such as pronunciation, vocabulary, etc…)  You are not interested in English  Information in the texts is not familiar to you  There is too much ESP vocabulary and economic terms are difficult to understand or to remember  Your personal characteristics such as too shy, -…  Teachers‟ instructions are not clear Other reason(s)…………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… How you often read an ESP text? (you can tick more than one answer)  Looking up all new words  Guessing meaning from the context, ignoring some new words  Reading and translating into Vietnamese  Always taking notes  Never taking notes Others ……………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… When reading ESP, which of the following factors you often focus on? (you can tick more than one answer)  What you learn from the text  The speed of reading 65  Skills of taking notes  Levels of understanding  Reading techniques Others………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… According to you, what are the determinants of your ESP reading comprehension ability? (you can tick more than one answer)  Vocabulary or lexical knowledge  Translating ability  Background of knowledge  Background of language Others…………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… Have you got enough time to improve ESP reading skill at home?  Enough  not enough Which of the following factors affect the time for your improving reading skill? (you can tick more than one answer)  You have too many subjects at school  You have to some housework  You help family with earning living  You join in students‟ activities at school Others…………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………… 66 Have you got many different kinds of books, newspapers, magazines or any other ESP materials as references to improve your reading skill?  Many 10  few  enough  not enough Have you got many different kinds of dictionaries (ESP dictionaries, ordinary dictionaries, etc…) to study?  Many 11  enough  few  no Where you usually get materials to improve your ESP reading skill?  In school library  teachers‟ supplies  On the internet  buying in bookshops Other…………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… 12 Please give some of your comments on the texts in the textbook (English for accounting)?  Lacked update information  lacked pictures  Uninteresting topic  unsuitable length Other(s)………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………… 13 According to you, which difficulties of knowledge affect your reading comprehension?  Knowledge of English  Economic terms are difficult to understand and remember  Finding the main ideas Others…………………………………………………………………………… 67 ………………………………………………………………………………… 14 According to you, how you feel about the total number of learning ESP reading periods at school?  Too many  enough  few  not enough Please supply some personal information (this is optional) Student s’full name:………………………………………………………………………… Sex:  male  female Class: ………………………………………………………………………………… THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR COOPERATION 68 APPENDICE 02 QUESTIONNAIRES FOR TEACHERS The purpose of this questionnaire is to survey the project: exploring difficulties faced by students of accounting in learning reading in English at Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College, Phong Dien, Thua Thien Hue Your contribution is one of the great successes of my research paper The data collected will be only used for research paper, not for publication or any other purposes Please put a tick (√) on the answer you choose Some answers you can choose one or more According to you, your students like to learn reading ESP? Why? Or why not?  Like very much  like  dislike Because……………………………………………………… In order to improve reading skill, 60 periods of English for specific purposes (ESP) for students of accounting are:  Enough  not enough Which of following difficulties you have coped with in your teaching process?  The text is too long and the time is limited  Your students lack knowledge of English (vocabulary, structure, terms…)  Your students‟ mother language has not achieved the standard  Your students‟ communicative competence is limited  Your students‟ character is too shy, timid or nervous, etc  Your students lack different kinds of major dictionary  Your students lack motivation 69 Other(s)………………………………………………………………………… According to you, which of the following difficulties of yourself affect teaching reading ESP?  You haven‟t got appropriate methods to teach ESP  You haven‟t got enough time to prepare your lesson plans because you have too many classes to teach  You haven‟t mastered students‟ psychology  Other(s)………………………………………………………………………… In teaching reading process, which of the following points of students you often focus on?  The speed of reading  The level of understanding  What they learn from the text  Skill of taking notes  The styles of techniques of reading: skimming and scanning  Other(s)………………………………………………………………………… Which of the following visual aids you often use in teaching reading process?  Pictures or paintings  real objects  Diagram, charts  video tapes, tape recordings  Real situation  projector  Internet  Other(s)…………………………………………………………………………… To teach an ESP reading text, which stages you often follow?  Pre-reading  while – reading  post-reading 70  Pre-reading  while-reading, not Post-reading What advantages and disadvantages you usually face when following the teaching stages above?  Advantages:  Be easy to adapt CLT to teaching ESP reading  Make students more comfortable and confident in learning ESP  It‟s easy for students to start the reading text at Pre-reading stage  Students understand the content of the reading text quickly at While-reading stage  Students have opportunities to evaluate them at post-reading stage Other(s)……………………………………………………………………………… …  Disadvantages:  The limitation of time for preparation  Lacking teaching facilities and teaching aids  The class size is not suitable for some activities  Students are multi-leveled Others……………………………………………………………………………… Which problems you often encounter when carrying out activities in post-reading stage?  Limitation of time  Class size is too big to organize some activities  Students‟ communicative competence is limited 71  Some reading texts are difficult to design interesting activities  Sometimes the teacher cannot think or find out appropriate activities Others……………………………………………………………………………… 10 Where you collect materials for teaching reading ESP?  In library  on the internet  in bookstores  in other course books Please supply some personal information Teacher’s full name:……………………………………………………………………… Sex:  Male  Female Years of teaching: ………………………………………………………………………… THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR COOPERATION! 72 APPENDICE 03 OBSERVATION SHEET Place: Nguyen Tri Phuong Vocational College Class: ……………………Date:……………………Period:………………………… Teacher‘s full name:…………………………………Unit:………………………… Excellent Very good Good Fair Average Weak Students’ motivation Students’ participation Pre- reading While – reading Post-reading Teachers’ management Diversity of activities Group work activities Pair work activities Teacher’s feedback Teacher’s signature Observation’s signature 73 APPENDICE 04 QUESTIONS FOR INTERVIEW These questions are design to know how teachers’ opinions about teaching and learning reading ESP are and find the ways to help students of accounting study better In your opinion, what is the purpose of teaching reading ESP? What difficulties you often meet in your ESP teaching? What will you to overcome such difficulties? What you expect your students to gain from this course? How can the teaching and learning ESP be improved? According to you, how does the condition of facilities affect your teaching ESP reading? 74