A study on the teachers’ teaching techniques for improving the reading skills of freshmen at Hanoi College of Industrial Economics.

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES ĐẶNG THÚY HẰNG A STUDY ON THE TEACHERS’ TEACHING TECHNIQUES FOR IMPROVING THE READING SKILLS OF FRESHMEN AT HANOI COLLEGE OF INDUSTRIAL ECONOMICS (Nghiên cứu thủ thuật dạy học giáo viên nhằm nâng cao kỹ đọc cho sinh viên năm thứ trường Cao đẳng Kinh tế Công nghiệp Hà Nội) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60 14 01 11 HANOI, 2014 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ĐẶNG THÚY HẰNG A STUDY ON THE TEACHERS’ TEACHING TECHNIQUES FOR IMPROVING THE READING SKILLS OF FRESHMEN AT HANOI COLLEGE OF INDUSTRIAL ECONOMICS (Nghiên cứu thủ thuật dạy học giáo viên nhằm nâng cao kỹ đọc cho sinh viên năm thứ trường Cao đẳng Kinh tế Công nghiệp Hà Nội) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60 14 01 11 Supervisor: Dr Trần Thị Thu Hiền HANOI, 2014 DECLARATION I, Dang Thuy Hang, hereby certify that this minor thesis entitled “A study on the teachers’ teaching techniques for improving the reading skills of freshmen at Hanoi College of Industrial Economics” is the result of my own research in the fulfillment of the requirement for the Degree of Master of Arts at Faculty of Post Graduate Studies - University of Languages and International Studies – Vietnam National University, Hanoi Hanoi, April 2014 Signature Đặng Thúy Hằng i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS On the completion of this thesis, I would like to give my sincere thanks to many people for their encouragement and assistance during the preparation of my thesis First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Dr Tran Thi Thu Hien, who has been most willing and ready to give me valuable and helpful guidance, advice and support during the most difficult time of thesis construction Without her help, this thesis would not have been made possible I would also like to express my thanks to the lecturers and the staff of the Departure of Postgraduate Study at College of Foreign language for their useful lectures and careful guidance My special thanks also go to English teachers in Foundation faculty, at Hanoi College of Industrial Economics for their enthusiastic participation and constructive suggestions for the development of the study And I also wish to express my thanks for the great cooperation from the freshmen in the classes: CKX12.3, CKX12.8, CKT12.6, and CKT12.10 in the data collection of my study Last but not least, my sincere thanks go to my family who give me much motivation, energy and support in accomplishing this challenging work ii ABSTRACT This study investigates the real situation of teaching and learning reading skills at HCIE for freshmen and providing some suggested reading teaching techniques for the teachers to help teachers and students teach and learn reading skills more effectively To attain these objectives, three kinds of instruments are applied such as survey questionnaire, observation and semi- interview Ten English teachers and one hundred students are selected to be participants of the survey Necessary data are gathered using questionnaires for both students and teachers Contributing to these data, observation is used to get useful information at CKX12.8 where is experimented some effective teacher’s teaching techniques In addition, five teachers are randomly chosen to give their opinions about their real teaching experience, difficulty and solutions From the findings, the study depicts that while students are passive and demotivated in learning, the teachers’ techniques are dominated by traditional approach which are not effective enough to improve students’ reading skills Basing on the research’s results, some recommendations for the students, the teachers and the authorities are stated In conclusion, this study’s findings contributes a better understanding of teaching and learning reading techniques in general and teachers’ reading techniques in particular; however, some debatable points are unavoidable in this thesis iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Declaration………………………………………………………………………… i Acknowledgements………………………………………………………………….ii Abstract…………………………………………………………………………… iii List of abbreviations………………………………………………… …viii List of tables and figures …………………………….………….………………….ix PART A: INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………… 1 Rationale of the study……………………………………………………………1 Aims of the study…………………………………………………………….… Research questions………………………………………………………….… Scope of the study………………………………………………………….…….2 Methodology…………………………….………….……………………….… Significance of the study…………………………………………………….… Structure of the study……………………………………………………….… PART B: DEVELOPMENT………………………………………………….… Chapter 1: LITERATURE REVIEW……………………………………….……5 1 An overview of the nature of reading skills…………………………….… 1.1.1 Definition of reading……………………………………………….……… 1.1.2 Reading comprehension…………………………………………………… 1.1.3 The importance of reading in foreign language teaching and learning… 1.2 Teaching reading skills……………………………………………………… 1.2 The objectives and goals of teaching reading………………………… ….7 1.2.2 The reading teaching/ learning approaches…………………… …… … 10 1.2.3 Techniques for teaching reading……………………………… …………12 1.3 Factors affecting teaching and learning reading………………… ……… 14 1.3.1 The reading text……………………………………………….……………14 1.3.2 The student………………………………………………………….………15 1.3.3 The teacher……………………………… ………………… ……………16 1.5 Summary……………………………………………………… …………….17 Chapter 2: THE STUDY…………………………………………………………18 The context……………………………………….………………………….18 2.1.1 An overview of Hanoi College of Industrial Economics…………… ……18 iv 2.1.2 Teachers and teaching methods………………………….…………… ….19 2.1.3 Students and their background English knowledge………………… ….20 2.1.4 Teaching materials ……………………………….…… …… ……… ….20 2.2 The study…………………………………….………… .………… 21 2.2.1 Participants……………………………………………… …………….….21 2.2.2 The instrument……………………………………………….………….….22 2.2.3 Data collection procedure………………………… ………………………23 2.3 Data analysis…………………………………………….………….… …….23 2.3.1 The survey questionnaires…………………………….…………………….23 2.3.2 The class observation ……………………….……………………… ….…29 2.3.3 The semi-interview……………………………………….………… ….….32 2.4 Summary……………………………………………………….……… ……32 Chapter 3: RECOMMENDATIONS……………………… ………………… 34 3.1 To the students ………………………………………………… …… … 34 3.2 To the teachers………………………………………………… … … 35 3.3 To the authorities…………………….……………………………… ……36 3.4 Summary………………………………………………………… … ……37 PART C: CONCLUSION……………………… …………………… ………38 Conclusions………….…………………………………………… … ……38 Limitations and Suggestions for further studies………………… ………39 References:………………………………………………………… ………40 Appendices…………………………………………………………… …… I v LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CLT: Communicative language teaching EFL: English as foreign language ESL: English as second language ESP: English for specific purposes HCIE: Hanoi College of Industrial Economics NCLRC: National Capital Language Resource Center NHWP: New headway pre-intermediate OU: Open University Ss: Students Ts: Teachers ULIS, VNUH: University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi vi LIST OF TABLES AND FINGURES Table 1: Students’ and teachers’ attitude toward the course book (p 23) Table 2: Students’ attitude toward the reading activities (p 24) Table3: Students’ attitude toward the teacher’s techniques and preferring techniques (p 25) Table 4: Teachers’ technique of combination and its efficiency (p 26) Table 5: Teachers’ responses concerning Pre-reading activities (p 26) Table 6: Teachers’ responses concerning While-reading activities (p 27) Table 7: Teachers’ responses concerning Post-reading activities (p 28) Table 8: Students’ and teachers’ attitude toward supplementary texts (p 29) vii PART A: INTRODUCTION Rationale On the road of integrating and developing in Vietnam, English is quite important to learners The teaching and learning of English is paying much more attention by both teachers and learners Nowadays, a lot of universities require their students to learn English as one of their general subjects In order to master English, students have to try their best to develop the English skills such as listening, speaking, writing and reading There have been debates on the topic: which skill in English teaching and learning is the most important? There are some who state what they need is only speaking English fluently Some disagree with that idea They consider writing is vital because documenting reports, letters, etc are what they daily deal with in their work and life In contrast, there are still some who propose listening is more important for the realization of their goal However, among these skills, according to the writer, reading is the most important one because it helps not only develop other skills but also provides learners knowledge of the target language Reading is also benefit for the students in a lot of aspects in acquaintance of a new language This topic interests a lot of researchers to put their passion on One of the famous scholars whose reputation is not able to forget Grellet (1981) with his famous book on reading such as “Developing reading skills” In addition, many Vietnamese authors and researchers pay much attention to this issue For example “A study on how to improve the teaching of reading English in Economics to the 2nd year students at Hanoi national Economics University” by Trang (2005) refers to reading skill in Economics only, and “ A study on how to improve ESP reading skills for the students of Information Technology” mainly focuses on reading skills for Information Technology students by Huong (2003) Hop (2008) also concerns this topic in her MA thesis “Improving reading skills of Post Graduate Students at College of Natural Sciences, VNU by developing the reading materials” Although this subject gains a lot of interest from researchers and linguistics, there have not been any researchers who does research on the teacher’s reading techniques This is one of the main reasons which raises the interest for the author to this research -1- then answering comprehension questions, translating, etc it is advisable for the teachers to use alternative techniques First of all, using visual aids is an useful technique which attracts the students’ interest This technique is not timeconsuming to prepare but effective to raise the students’ motivation in reading the text It also gets the same effectiveness with using games in teaching As the finding from the class observation, most of students show their interest when they answer comprehension questions combining with game “The faster is the winner” Playing games to learn not only changes the class atmosphere but also motivates the students to learn better The following technique the researcher would like to recommend is guessing It is not only guessing new words but also new structures The teachers are able to use various kinds of guessing as guessing the meaning from the context, guessing using synonyms/ antonyms or guessing using affixes/ suffixes As mentioned above, this technique is beneficial because it does not disturb the students in the reading process but it makes the students more confident in learning In addition, it is an advisable way to enrich students’ vocabulary because the students will find it is easier to learn new words and remember the new words longer Finally, combining reading with speaking and writing is useful for students to improve their reading skills as well That is why teachers should use it more frequent in their lesson 3.3 To the authorities In charge of the researcher, the write would like to give some for the authorities who play an essential part in improving the English teaching quality in general, and the reading teaching quality in particular at HCIE As said in the context of the study, freshmen at HCIE are classified randomly in English class after their desires They not take part in an entrance English test in order to adjust their English abilities This causes some difficulties for both the teachers and the students in teaching and learning process It leads to the first recommendation for the authorities there should be a placement test to classify the students into classes of the same levels The second suggestion is about the class size It is better if each class has approximately 30 students when they learn English - 36 - instead of over 70 students as at the present The next consideration is to change the course book Instead of using the current obsolete one, it is advisable to use a more updated version of the book which may be New Headway pre-inter, the fourth edition that adds more interesting parts not only in reading but also in other skills In addition, they should update English books, magazines or newspapers in the library so that both teachers and students can have more reference to diversify their teaching and learning activities in English Sending teachers to short course specializing in teaching reading skills is also suggested By doing this, teachers will have more chance to improve their teaching methods and update their teaching knowledge Last but not least, the authorities at HCIE should improve the class condition to meet the teaching and learning’s needs For example, they should install projectors in all classes so that teachers can use visual aids in their teaching to motivate students in learning or they should build lab-rooms which equipped with computers, projectors, etc for students to access the lesson more quickly 3.4 Summary There are many considerations in teaching reading to improve reading skills for freshmen at HCIE What have been presented in the preceding sections is a set of what the writer believes the most important principles However, each of these principles must be adapted for a specific context, for a specific language, and for students of differing abilities Teaching reading is surely difficult To get profit for the teaching techniques the author of this paper would like to propose recommendations to the students, the teachers and the authorities at HCIE With these recommendations, the researcher hopes to contribute an idea for teachers to improve reading skills for freshmen at HCIE - 37 - PART C: CONCLUSION Summary of the study With the aims at investigating the real situation of teaching and learning reading skills at HCIE for freshmen and providing some suggested reading teaching techniques for the teachers to help teachers and students teach and learn reading skills more effectively, this paper states two research questions: (1) How reading skills are teaching and learning at HCIE? and (2) What reading techniques should be applied to improve the reading skills of freshmen at HCIE? By doing the research, the answers to these questions are pointed out With the first question, the findings from the research reveals that teaching and learning reading skills at HCIE is still passive when preferable method is translation and inactive doing comprehension questions Teachers rarely apply CLT techniques such as prediction, guessing the meaning, combining reading with other skills, etc Whereas, students not usually prepare for the reading lessons and they depend much on teachers’ help in their learning As can be seen from the survey, the teachers try their best to apply effective techniques to help their students; however, it does not work as they have expected The paper also gives some recommendations for the students, the teachers and the authorities at HCIE to improve teaching and learning reading skills of freshmen at the college The students should try their best by preparing the lessons carefully before going to the class; trying to use techniques which encourage them to be more active and confident in learning process such as predicting the content or guessing the meaning of the words/ structures; reviewing the lesson by composing an essay relating to the topics using new words/ structures after each reading lesson, etc The teachers are advised to avoid using loud reading, inference, and supplementary texts In contrast, they are encouraged to use CLT techniques such as applying visual aids, using games, guessing the meaning, etc The last recommendation is to the authorities at HCIE They should arrange the students into classes with students of the same level of English, dividing classes into smaller ones, changing the course - 38 - book, providing the teachers more chance for professional development to master their teaching reading method and improve the teaching condition It is hopeful that what have been discussed in this study may be beneficial for both teachers and students With my own effort to this research, it is sure that there still have a lot of debatable points that the writer would really like to receive attributions to make the thesis better The limitations of the study and suggestions for further study In any research papers, limitations are unavoidable The study presented in this minor thesis is of no exception Firstly, the number of 100 freshmen is not sufficient enough for the researcher to have precise judgments Secondly, not all the suggested techniques for teaching and learning reading are experimented properly, so the researcher cannot draw a conclusion of the effectiveness Finally, this survey purpose is mainly to find out the teachers’ techniques that help improve reading skill more effectively This point causes the lack of view to compare and contrast which techniques is better, which is worse, when and how to use these techniques to get the highest efficiency That is the biggest problems in this study Despite such limitations, the writer strongly believes that this research is successful to some extents Though this is just a small-scale study on the issue, it really provides some helpful suggestions for the teaching reading to the freshmen However, any further researches that employ supplementary instruments such as field-notes, log, journals, diaries or carry out in a longer period of time or be on a larger scale can help to prove the above results more strongly and persuasively; consequently, the limitations of this study can also be avoidable - 39 - REFERENCES Abbott et al (1981) The teaching of English as an international language Collins, London Aebersold, J and Field, M (1997), From Reader to Reading Teacher: Issues and strategies for second language classrooms Cambridge University Press Billow (1982) The techniques of language teaching New York: Longman Carrell, P L (1988) “Interactive text processing: Implications for ESL/ Second Language reading classrooms.” In Carrell, PL., Devine, J And Eskey, D.E (eds.) Interactive Approaches to Second Language Reading Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Chall, J S (1996) Stages of reading development (2nd ed.) Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt Brace College Publishers Christina Bratt Paulston and Mary Newton Bruder (1976).Teaching English as a second language: Techniques and procedures Winthrop Publishers, Inc., Cambridge, Massachusetts Elba Villanueva de Debat, Applying current approaches to the teaching of reading, 2006 Number 1, English teaching forum Goodman, K (1971) “The reading process” in Carrel, P.L., Devine, J and Eskey D.E (eds.) Interactive approaches to second language reading Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Greaney, V & Neuman, S B (1990) The functions of reading: A cross-cultural perspective Reading Research Quarterly, 25, 173–195 10 Grellet, F (1981) Developing reading skills: A Practical guide of reading comprehension exercises Cambridge: Cambridge University press 11 Hop, N.T (2008), Improving reading skills of Post Graduate Students at College of Natural Sciences, VNU by Developing the reading materials.VNU, Hanoi University of Languages and International Studies, Hanoi MA thesis 12 Huong, L.T T.(2003),A study on how to improve ESP reading skills for the students of Information Technology VNU, Hanoi University of Languages and International Studies, Hanoi.MA thesis 13 Heidi Byrnes, “Reading in the beginning and intermediate college foreign language class” in Modules for the professional preparation of teaching assistants in foreign languages (Grace Stovall Burkart, ed.; Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics, 1998) 14 Jonh and Liz Soars (2000) New Headway, pre-intermediate Oxford: Oxford university press 15 Lenz K (2000).Reading in the language classroom Oxford: Mac Millian Publisher - 40 - 16 National Capital Language Resource Center (NCLRC) (n d.).The essentials of language teaching Retrieved October 23, 2013 from http://nclrc.org/essentials 17 Nuttall, C (1992) Teaching reading skills in a foreign language Heinmann Oxford: 18 Nuttall, C (1996) Teaching reading skills in a foreign language Heinmann Oxford: 19 Richard Yorkey (1970).Study skills for students of English as a second, language New York: McGraw-Hill, citing Francis P Robinson, p.130 20 Richard, J C and Thomas, R (1987) Being an effective reader Harper and Row publish 21 Sadoski, Mark (2004) Conceptual foundations of teaching reading New York: The Guilford press 22 Silberstein, S (1994) Techniques and resources in teaching reading Oxford: Oxford University 23 Tomlinson, B (1998), Materials development in language teaching, Cambridge University Press 24 Trang, N T (2005) A study on how to improve the teaching of reading English in Economics to the 2nd year students at Hanoi national Economics University VNU, Hanoi University of Languages and International Studies, Hanoi MA thesis - 41 - Appendices Appendix Questionnaire for Teachers This survey questionnaire is designed to support my thesis “A study on the teachers’ teaching techniques for improving the reading skills of freshmen at Hanoi College of Industrial Economics” Your cooperation would be essential in my paper The answers will be used for research purposes only Please circle the appropriate options to respond to each statement or question and answer the questions as accurately and frankly as you can Thank you for your cooperation What you think about the reading topics in the course book “New headwayPre intermediate”? a very interesting b interesting c neutral d boring e very boring d easy e very easy What you think about the contents of the texts? a very difficult b difficult c neutral What you think about the length of the text in each lesson? a very long b long c neutral d short e very short What you think your students read the English texts for? a pleasure b doing exercises c gaining the language knowledge d enriching grammar and vocabulary e improving other skills f other: Do you often combine teaching reading skills with other skills? a always b often c sometimes d never How effective you think of combining reading with other skills? a very effective b effective c not very effective d not effective at all Which of the following Pre-reading activities you use in reading lesson? Pre-reading activities always using games to introduce the text using pre-reading questions pre-teaching new vocabulary I sometimes rarely never explaining the instructions of the text asking students to predict the content by using background knowledge setting up a clear goal for students to read using visual aids to introduce the text giving a brief introduction to the text Which of the following While-reading activities you use in reading lesson? While-reading activities always sometimes rarely never skimming to get main ideas 10 scanning to get specific information 11 guessing new words in the contexts 12.answeringcomprehension questions 13 reading orally and answering comprehension questions 14 assigning students to pre-read at home and work on comprehension questions in the class 15 engaging students in reading silently then asking them questions 16 integrating the prior knowledge by recalling the pre-reading Which of the following Post-reading activities you use in reading lesson? Post-reading activities always 17 summarizing the text 18 writing on topics relevant to the reading text II sometimes rarely never 19 discussing on the topics for supplementary reading 20 checking students’ understanding 21 translating into Vietnamese 22 giving similar reading task(s) to students 23 doing nothing 10 How often you use supplementary texts? a always b usually c sometimes d rarely e never 11 How effective you think of using supplementary texts ? a very effective b effective c not very effective d not effective at all Thank you! III Appendix Questionnaire for Students This survey questionnaire is designed to support my thesis “A study on the teachers’ teaching techniques for improving the reading skills of freshmen at Hanoi College of Industrial Economics” Your cooperation would be essential in my paper The answers will be used for research purposes only Please circle the appropriate options to respond to each statement or question and answer the questions as accurately and frankly as you can What you think about the reading topics in the course book “New headwayPre intermediate”? a very interesting b interesting c neutral d boring e very boring d easy e very easy What you think about the contents of the texts? a very difficult b difficult c neutral What you think about the length of the text in each lesson? a very long b long c neutral d short e very short What you read the English texts for? a pleasure b doing exercises c gaining the language knowledge d enriching grammar and vocabulary e improving other skills f other: How you prepare your lesson before going to class? a very careful b careful c not very careful d no preparation Which techniques you often use in Pre-reading phase? a predict the content of the reading text b glance at the title, heading, subheading, the first and the last sentence c set up a clear goal for students to read d brain storming e pre-learn new words f other: How you often read the texts? a reading aloud b reading silently IV Which techniques are you often asked to read the texts? a skimming b scanning c predicting d inferring e answering the questions f other: When you have some new words or structures, what you do? a look them up in the dictionary b guess the meaning from the context or by synonyms, antonym or affixations, etc c ignore them d ask your teacher e stop reading f other: 10 What you after you read? a summarizing the text orally b translating into Vietnamese c discussing the topic d writing a short paragraph related to the text e other: 11 What is your opinion about your teacher’s methods of teaching reading skills? a very effective b effective c not very effective d not effective at all 12 Which of the following techniques you want your teacher to focus on? a predicting of the reading text b using games/ visual aids to introduce the text c combining reading with other skills d guessing the meaning of the words effectively e explaining carefully how to skim, scan, infer or guess the content, etc effectively f creating more interesting activities in reading process g other: 13 How often you use supplementary text? a always b often c sometimes d rarely V e never 14 How effective you think of using supplementary texts? a very effective b effective c not very effective d not effective at all Thank you, VI Appendix Observation procedure of the real reading lesson The researcher adapted a reading text in NHWP (Unit 11- Three plants that changed the world) to apply the suggested solutions The reasons why the teacher chooses this unit are followed: First of all, the reading text is about three common plans that all students already know and have background knowledge about them including Tobacco, Sugar and Cotton In addition, the text is thought to have a reasonable length and it contains a lot of illustrations which are able to get students’ attraction Secondly, this reading text is about three kinds of plant that will be easier for the teacher to create interesting activities, control and manage the class, and make students to be center of the lesson The class CKX12.8 which the researcher has been teaching from the beginning of semester is chosen to apply the suggested techniques This class has 83 students with the typical characteristics of students at HCIE Using the data from the survey and the own experience, the teacher experimented these following techniques to teach unit 11 at CKX12.8 class: Phases Prereading Teacher’s activities Students’ activities - using pre-reading questions - making students predict the content work individually pair- work then - using visual aids to introduce the text - giving a brief introduction to the text Whilereading - skimming to get the main ideas group work - scanning to get the specific information - guessing the new words in the contexts - answering the comprehension - engaging the students in reading silently Postreading - summarizing the text -discussing on the related topics - writing on topics relevant to the reading text VII work in pair, then in group and individually Observation check list of the real reading lesson Techniques Very effective using pre-reading questions making students predict the content using visual aids to introduce the text giving a brief introduction to the text skimming to get the main ideas scanning to get the specific information guessing contexts the new words in the answering the comprehension engaging the students in reading silently summarizing the text discussing on the related topics writing on topics relevant to the reading text VIII effective Not very effective Not effective at all Appendix Interview Questions for Teachers This survey questionnaire is designed to support my thesis “A study on the teachers’ teaching techniques for improving the reading skills of freshmen at Hanoi College of Industrial Economics” Your cooperation would be essential in my paper The answers will be used for research purposes only Please answer the questions as accurately and frankly as you can What problems are your students coping with in learning reading skills? What have you been doing to overcome these difficulties? Which techniques are easy to use in teaching reading skills? Which techniques are difficult to apply? Why? Which techniques are your students eager to use most? What should be done to improve techniques’ effectiveness in teaching reading skills? IX