Application of cohesion theory in discourse analysis to the teaching of reading comprehension to foreign language learners

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES BỒ THỊ LÝ APPLICATION OF COHESION THEORY IN DISCOURSE ANALYSIS TO THE TEACHING OF READING COMPREHENSION TO FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNERS (Áp dụng lý thuyết liên kết văn việc dạy đọc hiểu tiếng Anh cho học viên học Tiếng Anh ngoại ngữ) MINOR M.A THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60.14.10 Hanoi, December, 2012 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDY BỒ THỊ LÝ APPLICATION OF COHESION THEORY IN DISCOURSE ANALYSIS TO THE TEACHING OF READING COMPREHENSION TO FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNERS (Áp dụng lý thuyết liên kết văn việc dạy đọc hiểu tiếng Anh cho học viên học Tiếng Anh ngoại ngữ MINOR M.A THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60.14.10 Supervisor: Huỳnh Anh Tuấn, PhD Hanoi, December, 2012 TABLE OF CONTENT Table of contents Page Declaration i Acknowledgements ii Abstract iii Table of content iv Lists of tables, figures and abbreviations vi Part A: INTRODUCTION I Rationale II Aims III Scope of the study IV Research methodology V Significance of the study PART B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND and LITERATURE REVIEW I Theoretical background 1.1 RAND Model of reading comprehension 1.2 Previous approaches to teaching reading comprehension 1.3 Discourse and discourse analysis 12 1.4 Cohesion and coherence 13 1.5 The role of cohesion competence in reading comprehension 17 II Literature Review 19 Chapter II: Methodology 2.1 Research questions 21 iv 2.2 Research approach 21 2.3 Data collection methods 21 2.4 Data analysis methods 28 Chapter III: Data Analysis: Results, Discussions and Recommendations 3.1 Results and discussions 31 3.1.1 Student‘s pre-existing knowledge about cohesion and coherence 31 3.1.2 Students‘ level of improvement in reading comprehension 33 3.2 Recommendations 35 PART C: CONCLUSION I Major findings of the study 38 II Limitations of the study 39 III Suggestions for further studies 39 IV Contributions of the studies 40 REFERENCES APPENDICES LISTS OF TABLES, FIGURES AND ABBREVIATIONS List of tables: Table 3.1 Descriptive Statistics for the group‘s performance in the pre-test and post-test Table 3.2 Results of the Paired-Sample T-tests v List of figures Figure 1.1 The RAND model of reading comprehension From Reading for Understanding: Toward an R&D Program in Reading Comprehension, by RAND Reading Study Group (p 12), 2002, Santa Monica, CA: RAND Copyright 2002 by RAND Figure 3.1 Number of students who have learnt and have not leant about cohesion Figure 3.2: Importance of cohesion in a written text Figure 3.3: Necessity of understanding cohesion in comprehending a text? Figure 3.4: Effectiveness level of the experimental teaching course List of abbreviations: L1: ISP: First language the International Standard Program vi PART A: INTRODUCTION I Rationale It is widely known that reading is very important for almost everyone, especially for second language learners According to Tomlinson (1990), a good reading competence is a necessity for those using English for academic and occupational purposes and many curricula therefore devote large amounts of time to intensive and extensive reading lessons in order for their learners to achieve such competence As a result, teaching English reading has been always the focus of much concern However, after a great deal of research has been done in this aspect, we are aware that many students, though having learnt English for years, often end in failure about their comprehension when asked to read a passage After years of practice in reading, many learners still find it difficult to make sense of the texts they want to read One of the reasons is, as pointed out by many scholars such as Cook (1989) and Nuttal (1982), the failure to interpret the writer‘s cohesive signals as intended and so to understand correctly the functional value of individual sentences as thus their relationship to each other and the whole In the view of Halliday and Hasan (1976) the continuity that cohesive relations bring about is a semantic continuity This makes it possible for cohesive patterns to play an indispensable role in the processing of text by a listener or reader It is, therefore, necessary to help our students identify different kinds of cohesive relations which form the backbones of different types of text, because those chains signal organizational patterns of different types of text All these conditions stimulated the researcher to conduct a study on “Application of cohesion theory in discourse analysis to the teaching of reading comprehension to foreign language learners” This is an action research in which the researcher taught reading comprehension by applying cohesion theory in the lessons and guide students to use the knowledge conveyed to enhance their reading ability II Aims As mentioned above, the knowledge about cohesion may assist students‘ comprehension of a reading text Therefore, the study aims to investigate the effect of cohesion competence on students‘ reading comprehension In order to fulfill such an aim, two main objectives were set for the study Firstly, the study was expected to provide an insight into students‘ prior knowledge about cohesion and cohesion in reading Secondly, the researcher expected to find out whether the teaching of cohesion to students could improve their reading ability III Scope of the study Although the title of the research is generally ―cohesion theory‖, this paper mainly focuses on analyzing types of cohesion that appeared in reading texts Furthermore, the teaching of cohesion in reading does not only mean the researcher would teach cohesion theoretically but also by analyzing and guide student to analyze cohesive items in reading passages In addition, the researcher adapted the reading passages in the reading course book for B1 level namely Issue For Today combined with several further practices as homework instead of providing new out-book reading materials for in-class practice The informants of the study were 24 non-English majored first year students They were all of B1 level of English according to the Common European Framework of Reference The participating students were in the same class to whom the researcher was in charge of teaching reading IV Research methodology Research questions The study was conducted to address the following two research questions: What kind of prior knowledge did the students in the study have in terms of cohesion and cohesion in reading comprehension before the experimental teaching phase? How does the teaching of cohesion improve the reading comprehension of second language learners? Research approach To address the two research questions, action research was adopted as the research approach as it meets the aim and objectives of the study This approach is also justified to offer significant benefits for the researcher, who is also a teacher Johnson (1995) pointed out three mains advantages of action research namely to promote personal and professional growth, to improve practice to enhance student learning, and to advance the teacher profession Data collection instruments The four main instruments for data collection used in the study were observation and field notes, reading comprehension tests, and survey questionnaires An observation checklist was particularly designed to assess the students‘ participation and motivation in the reading lesson The researcher based on the observation checklist and takes notes about the students‘ performance in the class There are two reading comprehension tests, namely a pre-test taken before the intervention and a post-test taken after the intervention Both tests were of the same level of difficulty regarding timing, number of questions, number of text, length, passage structure and vocabulary level Two survey questionnaires were designed to gain data for the research One questionnaire was sent out before the intervention to find information about students‘ prior knowledge, experience and belief in learning cohesion The other was distributed after the intervention to collect data about students‘ attitude towards the experimental teaching Data collection procedure The data collection was conducted through phases including preintervention, while-intervention and post-intervention The data collection instruments were adopted flexibly for each phase as illustrated in the timeline below: Pre- intervention While – intervention Post- intervention (6 weeks) Survey questionnaire Observation Survey questionnaire Pre-test Field notes Post-test The survey questionnaires and reading comprehensions tests went through three stages regarding piloting, delivering and collecting Observation and field notes were taken during the six-week experimental teaching phase to assess students‘ motivation and participation in the reading lessons Data analysis methods Both quantitative and qualitative methods were utilized to analyze the data collected Specifically, quantitative method was used to analyze objective data from tests and survey questionnaires Meanwhile, qualitative method was for data from field notes and open-ended questions in the survey questionnaires Furthermore, statistical analysis was employed to analyze the data collected Simple descriptive statistics is the most suitable method to present the finding of this study in terms of the study scope as well as the researcher‘s own capabilities V Significance of the study In general, teachers, educational administrators and researchers working on related issues could gain certain benefits from the study First, the researcher was provided a precious chance to reflect her own teaching, to investigate a new teaching strategy and raise other teachers‘ awareness of such a strategy Besides, this research could offer references about updated and reliable information about a context of applying cohesion in teaching reading skills for second language learners to interested individual to conduct further studies Student handout 2: I Reading the following text, underline all the reference and draw a table to explain the referents of all the reference words Most people can remember a phone number for up to thirty seconds When this short amount of time elapses, however, the numbers are erased from the memory How did the information get there in the first place? Information that makes its way to the short term memory (STM) does so via the sensory storage area The brain has a filter which only allows stimuli that is of immediate interest to pass on to the STM, also known as the working memory There is much debate about the capacity and duration of the short term memory The most accepted theory comes from George A Miller, a cognitive psychologist who suggested that humans can remember approximately seven chunks of information A chunk is defined as a meaningful unit of information, such as a word or name rather than just a letter or number Modern theorists suggest that one can increase the capacity of the short term memory by chunking, or classifying similar information together By organizing information, one can optimize the STM, and improve the chances of a memory being passed on to long term storage When making a conscious effort to memorize something, such as information for an exam, many people engage in "rote rehearsal" By repeating something over and over again, one is able to keep a memory alive Unfortunately, this type of memory maintenance only succeeds if there are no interruptions As soon as a person stops rehearsing the information, it has the tendency to disappear When a pen and paper are not handy, people often attempt to remember a phone number by repeating it aloud If the doorbell rings or the dog barks to come in before a person has the opportunity to make a phone call, he will likely forget the number instantly.* Therefore, rote rehearsal is not an efficient way to pass information from the short term to long term memory.* A better way is to practice "elaborate rehearsal" *This involves assigning semantic meaning to a piece of information so that it can be filed along with other pre-existing long term memories.* XII Reading Comprehension questions: According to the passage, how memories get transferred to the STM? A) They revert from the long term memory B) They are filtered from the sensory storage area C) They get chunked when they enter the brain D) They enter via the nervous system The word elapses in paragraph is closest in meaning to: A) passes C) appears B) adds up D) continues All of the following are mentioned as places in which memories are stored EXCEPT the: A) STM C) sensory storage area B) long term memory D) maintenance area Why does the author mention a dog's bark? A) To give an example of a type of memory B) To provide a type of interruption C) To prove that dogs have better memories than humans D) To compare another sound that is loud like a doorbell How theorists believe a person can remember more information in a short time? A) By organizing it C) By giving it a name B) By repeating it D) By drawing it The author believes that rote rotation is: A) the best way to remember something B) more efficient than chunking C) ineffective in the long run D) an unnecessary interruption The word “it” in the last paragraph refers to: A) encoding C) semantics B) STM D) information The word elaborate in paragraph is closest in meaning to: A) complex C) pretty B) efficient D) regular The word cues in the passage is closest in meaning to A) questions B) clues C) images D) tests XIII APPENDIX F READING COMPREHENSION TEST 1(PRE-TEST) XIV XV XVI XVII XVIII XIX APPENDIX G READINGCOMPREHENSION TEST (POST-TEST) XX T2 XXI XXII XXIII XXIV XXV XXVI