Analysis of verbal presentation of the series of the picture books twiggle story

BINH DUONG PROVINCIAL PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY PHAN HOANG DIEM TRUC ANALYSIS OF VERBAL PRESENTATION OF THE SERIES OF PICTURE BOOKS: “TWIGGLE STORY” MAJOR: ENGLISH LANGUAGE MAJOR CODE: 8220201 MASTER THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE Supervised by Nguyen Vu Phuong, PhD BINH DUONG PROVINCE - 2021 BINH DUONG PROVINCIAL PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY PHAN HOANG DIEM TRUC ANALYSIS OF VERBAL PRESENTATION OF THE SERIES OF PICTURE BOOKS: “TWIGGLE STORY” MAJOR: ENGLISH LANGUAGE MAJOR CODE: 8220201 MASTER THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE Supervised by Nguyen Vu Phuong, PhD BINH DUONG PROVINCE - 2021 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I would like to send thanks to all the lectures in Foreign Languages Department at Thu Dau Mot university for helping me to enrich my knowledge, offering me precious lessons, positive encouragement, and enthusiastic supports Especially, from the bottom of my heart, I would like to express my appreciation to my supervisor -Dr Nguyen Vu Phuong, who always teaches, supports, and assists me to complete this study Furthermore, I am also sincerely grateful to my classmates for the happiness and difficulties we shared throughout the course These would become unforgettable memories in my life Last but not least, I would like to extremely express my gratitude to all of the members of my family for supporting me to overcome all challenges in my life, including this postgraduate journey I STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY I hereby certify that I write this thesis entitled “Analysis of verbal presentation of the series of the picture books: “Twiggle story.” Apart from the act of consulting references which is considered as the information of reliable studies, this thesis is not plagiarism or made by other researchers Anything related to other’s work is written in the quotation, the source of which is listed in the references This thesis has not been submitted for the award of the degree or diploma in any other tertiary institution, organization, or publisher If this pronouncement proves incorrect, I am willing to accept any academic punishment, including the withdrawal or cancelation of my academic degree Signature Phan Hoang Diem Truc II ABSTRACT The thesis investigated the verbal presentation of the picture books: “Twiggle Story” by the four authors, Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, and Cortes (2004) Even though most picture books combine both verbal and visual modes of expression, the main aim of this study is to analyze the verbal mode of the series of the picture book “Twiggle Story” by describing different functions of the three language metafunctions Through the Systemic Functional Linguistic (SFL) theory, the study researched how the authors of the selected picture books implement the ideational functions of language as regards subordination, coordination, and modification The study also explored the use of interpersonal functions of language in line with mood, modality, and person In addition, it examined the theme and the rheme of the textual functions and how coherence is built by making use of the textual function of language in the selected picture books The study used a qualitative content analysis research design to achieve the research purpose The study found that ideational metafunction aims to give extra information and create interconnection in the two picture books With the interpersonal metafunction, the four authors reveal the characters’ points of view in the stories The textual metafunctions are used to create logic and build coherence in the picture books Based on the findings of the study, it is obvious that text analysis relied upon the three language metafunctions, and a text without the components of language metafunctions can be limited in meanings, so it is suggested that using different elements of these metafunctions in exploring verbal presentation should be extensively examined Key words: Systemic Functional Linguistic, Metafunctions of language, ideational functions, interpersonal functions, textual functions, picture books III TABLES OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY II ABSTRACT III LIST OF FIGURES VII LIST OF TABLES VIII LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS IX CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY 1.2 THE RATIONALE FOR THE STUDY 1.3 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM 1.4 PURPOSES OF THE STUDY 1.5 RESEARCH QUESTIONS 1.6 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY 1.7 SCOPE OF THE STUDY 1.8 ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 DEFINITION OF PICTURE BOOKS 2.2 PICTURE BOOKS AND CHILDREN 2.3 LANGUAGE FUNCTION 11 2.4 DISCOURSE-SEMANTIC MODEL OF SYSTEMIC FUNCTIONAL LINGUISTICS 12 2.5 IDEATIONAL METAFUNCTION 13 2.5.1 Logical function 14 2.5.1.1 Modification 14 2.5.1.2 Coordination 17 2.5.1.3 Subordination 20 IV 2.5.2 Experiential function 22 2.6 INTERPERSONAL METAFUNCTION 24 2.6.1 Mood 25 2.6.2 Modality 27 2.6.3 Person 29 2.7 TEXTUAL METAFUNCTION 30 2.7.1 Theme and Rheme 31 2.7.2 Coherence 34 2.7.3 Cohesion 35 2.8 HALLIDAY’S SYSTEMIC FUNCTIONAL LINGUISTICS 36 2.9 CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK OF THE STUDY 37 2.9.1 Systemic Functional Linguistic (SFL) theory 37 2.9.2 Principal elements of SFL 38 2.10 REVIEW OF PREVIOUS STUDIES 44 2.11 SUMMARY 47 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 48 3.1 RESEARCH DESIGN – QUALITATIVE 48 3.2 RESEARCH INSTRUMENT 51 3.2.1 Data selection and the author 52 3.2.2 Summary of the selected stories 53 3.3 DATA ANALYSIS 55 3.4 SUMMARY 57 CHAPTER 4: ANALYSIS 58 4.1 INTRODUCTION 58 4.2 DATA ANALYSIS 58 4.2.1 Implementation of logical functions in line with modification, coordination and subordination 59 4.2.1.1 Modification 59 V Adjective modifiers 59 4.2.1.2 Coordination 67 4.2.1.3 Subordination 76 4.2.2 Implementation of interpersonal functions in line with mood, modality and person 81 4.2.2.1 Mood 81 4.2.2.2 Modality 86 4.2.2.3 Person 88 4.2.3 The use of theme and rheme to build coherence 92 4.2.4 The use of cohesion to be coherence 99 4.2.5 The use of other features to build coherence and perform the textual function 104 4.3 CHAPTER FINDINGS 109 4.3.1 Author’s implementation of the ideational functions of language in with modification, coordination, and subordination 109 4.3.2 The use of the interpersonal function of language in line with mood, modality and person 112 4.3.3 How the textual metafunction is used to build coherence in the selected picture books 113 4.4 CHAPTER SUMMARY 115 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS 117 5.1 CONCLUSION 117 5.2 PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS 119 5.3 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY 122 5.4 RECOMMENDATION FOR FURTHER STUDY 123 REFERENCES 124 APPENDICES 133 VI LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.1 The levels of discourse-semantics 13 Figure 2.2 The functional model of language 40 Figure 2.3 The (sub)systems of Context of situation, Discourse Semantics and Lexicogrammar 41 Figure 2.4 The semiotic framework 42 Figure 4.1 The parallel progression pattern of the seven extracts 95 Figure 4.2 Extract 8, the zig-zag progression pattern 96 Figure 4.3 Extract 9-12, the parallel and zig-zag progression pattern 98 VII LIST OF TABLES Table 2.1 Subordinate conjunction 22 Table 2.2 Theme and Rheme 32 Table 5.1 The similarity and difference of word orders in English and Vietnamese SVC structures in the series of picture books “Twiggle Story” 121 VIII (MF, p.40) "Do you know what the best part is?" asked Twiggle "The best part is that, even though I not have any brothers or sisters, I have friends "I am not a sad and lonely turtle anymore!" he said (MF, p.42) The content of Twiggle Learns To Do Turtle Twiggle the turtle liked going to school At school, he saw his friends Henrietta the hedgehog, Daphne the duck and Duke the dog (LT, p.4) Twiggle liked his teacher, Miss Cathy He liked Circle Time and having cheese crackers for snack (LT, p.6) Twiggle’s favorite place to play was the block area Most days, Twiggle and his friends had fun playing together (LT, p.8) But sometimes, if Twiggle felt sad or mad, he would say or mean things (LT, p.10) One day, Twiggle and his friends built a super tower in the block area Henrietta decided the super tower needed one more block She stood on tiptoe to reach the top of the tower (LT, p.12) All of a sudden, there was a loud crash The super tower came tumbling down The blocks fell all over the floor (LT, p.14) Twiggle felt very, very angry inside His heart was beating very fast He felt like he was going to blow up (LT, p.16) "You ruined our super tower," he yelled at Henrietta "I don't want to be your friend!" Twiggle was so mad that he pushed Henrietta on top of the blocks Henrietta felt scared The blocks hurt her when she fell on them Her feelings were hurt, too (LT, p.18) Miss Cathy said, "Twiggle, I know you are angry, but yelling at Henrietta and pushing her down are not OK choices in our classroom." “Tomorrow” she said, "I want you to talk to my friend His name is Wise Old Turtle He will help you learn how to calm down when you are upset." (LT, p20) For the rest of the day, Twiggle's friends stayed away from him On the way home 147 from school, no one wanted to sit next to Twiggle on the bus Twiggle felt lonely without his friends (LT, p.22) The next day at school, Twiggle played by himsef He felt very sad about what he had done to Henrietta "Twiggle, Wise Old Turtle is here to talk with you," Miss Cathy said (LT, p.24) Wise Old Turtle and Twiggle sat in the quiet corner Twiggle told Wise Old Turtle what had happened with Henrietta He told Wise Old Turtle that he sometimes has problems with his friends when he gets mad or upset "Twiggle, you already have the answer to your problem wherever you go,” said Wise Old Turtle (LT, p.26) "It is your Shell!" Wise Old Turtle said "If you feel mad, sad or upset in any way, you can go inside your Shell to calm down I call this 'doing Turtle Watch me." "Go inside your Shell like this," said Wise Old Turtle "When you are inside your Shell, three things." "First, tell yourself to stop." (LT, p.28) "Next, take one long, deep breath." (LT, p.30) "Then, say what the problem is and how you feel." "This will help you calm down and stay in control," Wise Old Turtle explained (LT, p.32) The next day at school, Henrietta still felt mad at Twiggle for pushing her down in the block area She grabbed a picture that Twiggle was drawing and ripped it in half (LT, p.34) Twiggle started feeling very mad inside his body He wanted to hit Henrietta Then he remembered what Wise Old Turtle taught him He could Turtle! Twiggle pulled his arms, legs and head into his Shell and said "Stop!" (LT, p.36) Next he took a long, deep breath Twiggle could feel that he was starting to calm down Then he came out of his Shell He told Henrietta, ''The problem is that you tore my picture—and I feel mad." (LT, p.38) Miss Cathy gave Twiggle a compliment She said, "I like the way you did Turtle to calm down and used your words to talk to Henrietta." Henrietta said she was sorry to Twiggle for tearing his picture Twiggle said he was sorry for pushing Henrietta down in 148 the blocks Twiggle and Henrietta were friends again (LT, p.40) Henrietta asked Twiggle to teach her how to Turtle Twiggle taught all of his friends how to calm down when they felt upset Soon the whole class was doing Turtle! (LT, p.42) 149 Figure The cover of the picture book ‘Twiggle Makes Friends’ Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) 150 Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Figure The cover of the picture book ‘Twiggle Learns To Do Turtle’ Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) 151 Source: Adapted Domitrovich, Greenberg, Kusché, & Cortes (2004) UBND TỈNH BÌNH DƯƠNG TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC THỦ DẦU MỘT CỘNG HÒA XÃ HỘI CHỦ NGHĨA VIỆT NAM Độc lập – Tự – Hạnh phúc Bình Dương, ngày 29 tháng 08 năm 2021 BIÊN BẢN CUỘC HỌP HỘI ĐỒNG CHẤM LUẬN VĂN THẠC SĨ Của học viên: Phan Hoàng Diễm Trúc Về đề tài: Analysis of Verbal Presentation of The Series of Picture books: “Twiggle Story” Tại Hội đồng trực tuyến - Trường Đại học Thủ Dầu Một, ngày 29 tháng 08 năm 2021 Hội đồng chấm luận văn thành lập theo Quyết định số, ngày cấp: 1238/QĐ-ĐHTDM, ngày 16/08/2021 Hiệu trưởng Trường Đại học Thủ Dầu Một nghe học viên: Phan Hồng Diễm Trúc trình bày tóm tắt nội dung luận văn thạc sĩ Nhận xét, đặt câu hỏi thành viên Hội đồng chấm luận văn: 1/-Lê Thị Thanh - Nhận xét: Đính kèm Phiếu nhận xét - Câu hỏi: (1) Diem Truc wrote on pages 50 and 51 about the use of a qualitative research design as “it is for subjective interpretation of the content of the text data Therefore, the researcher must be absorbed closely in the reading of textual materials and cohere with the standards of intersubjectivity Intersubjectivity is various subjective perspectives that are put together in a story” (pp 50-51) Please dedine the concept of “Intersubjectivity” and how it affects the reliability of verbal presentation analysis (2) In section 2.10, about Previous Studies, Diem Truc reviewed research projects that used SFL to explore the experiential meaning which is one of the components of ideational metafunction to analyze texts Could you state how your findings reveal any similarities or differences compared with those studies 2/-Huỳnh Thị Bích Phượng - Nhận xét: Đính kèm Phiếu nhận xét - Câu hỏi: Can you please give an explanation of choice of the two stories? 3/-Trần Thanh Dũ - Nhận xét: Đính kèm Phiếu nhận xét - Câu hỏi: What is the reasons for selection of these picture series/stories? Are these series/stories used in Vietnamese schools? If yes, how can the research results be applied in Vietnamese context? 4/-Nguyễn Thị Thanh Tâm - Nhận xét: Đính kèm Phiếu nhận xét - Câu hỏi: None 5/-Nguyễn Thị Châu Anh 152 - Nhận xét: Đính kèm Phiếu nhận xét - Câu hỏi: None Sau nghe tác giả trả lời người hướng dẫn khoa học nhận xét luận văn Hội đồng họp riêng thông qua kết luận Khi thông qua kết luận, Hội đồng bầu Ban kiểm phiếu gồm: 1) Huỳnh Thị Bích Phượng, Trưởng ban 2) Nguyễn Thị Châu Anh, Ủy viên 3) Trần Thanh Dũ, Ủy viên Căn vào kết bỏ phiếu Hội đồng chấm luận văn là: + Số thành viên Hội đồng tham gia bỏ phiếu: 05/05 + Tổng số điểm chấm luận văn Hội đồng: 27.5đ + Điểm bình quân: 5.5đ Hội đồng kết luận: 1) Bản luận văn học viên Phan Hoàng Diễm Trúc đáp ứng yêu cầu luận văn Thạc sĩ 2) Các nội dung đề nghị chỉnh sửa (nếu có) - Lê Thị Thanh: + About the title of the book series selected in the study, Diem Truc should follow the consistency: Twiggle Story is used in the title of the thesis and Twiggle and His Friends is used in the abstract and the Introduction + The Abstract needs improvements to be more concise and represent the thesis in terms of research objectives, method, result and implications (i.e., two sentences “The study applied a qualitative approach and the content analysis method to achieve the research purpose The qualitative approach was applied to analyze how words and sentences in the stories convey meaning-making to children ” Diem Truc should restructure them to avoid repetitions of words and ideas) + For Chapter 3, the author needs to clarify the criteria of choosing the series of Twiggle and His Friends that make it typical for the purpose of using SFL And the reason why the two books Twiggle Makes Friends and Twiggle Learns To Do Turtle (I know Diem Truc first aimed to analyze books instead of 2) were chosen should be explained to avoid the subjectivity bias in selecting the research data + Chapter needs careful editing to be more convincing and coherent to focus on the analysis content First, the data should be introduced in the forms of tables for presenting the data and interpretating the meanings Diem Truc did tables (2.1.for Subordinate conjunctions and 2.2 for Theme and Rheme) but it is easy to recognize that she tended to list more than to analyze in other sections Section 4.2.1, 23 pages long, mainly lists data for citing examples, is lengthy and causes confusion and distraction Second, section 4.3, (pp.108-113) about the findings, a very important concluding part of the study, should be presented in the form of dot points according to each finding to reveal the concrete achievements of the study Diem Truc described them in long sentences and paragraphs instead to make them look pervasive and lack of focus that should be emphasized for the finding conclusion 153 + Section 5.2 should be improved to fit with the subtitle “Pedagogical implications” rather than activities listed on pages 118, 119, and 120 Diem Truc should provide more ESL related impacts (i.e., from the reader point of view, I hope the thesis would add some contrastive analysis about the word orders in Vietnamese language compared with those in English in terms of English language acquisition if that does not seem too ambitious) + The appendices should include the content of Twiggle Makes Friends and Twiggle Learns To Do Turtle (even in the minimized form) for illustrating the language data described and analyzed in Chapter - Huỳnh Thị Bích Phượng + Title: the title does not include the author’s name of the series of books, which are used for research; even it does not indicate the research subject as well as the research purpose + Significance of the study: needs clarifying in term of practical application + Literature review: should be focused on the theories that are related to the study + Conceptual framework: the writer is requested to consider the design of the conceptual framework, which is currently complicated so that it can show exactly the frame and its process of the research development + Research question: there are three research questions, of which responses are not logical to conclusions and implications The writer is requested to revise these points to make sure that they are logically related + Data collection: two storybooks are selected for research and analysis without any explanation; therefore, that cannot convince the readers + Conclusion: the conclusion does not actually present the research subject or the benefit they can gain from the study + Mistakes of spelling, grammatical points, structures, language use, academic writing: there are a lot of mistakes of spelling, grammatical points, structures, language use, expression that need to be checked thorough the writing - Trần Thanh Dũ + Restructure the thesis; + Make clear why the author choses these stories as the source of data; + Relate the research question to the rest parts of the thesis; + Specify the methodology and the theoretical framework; + Rewrite the conclusion to make it relevant to the research results; + Revise and correct lexical and grammatical errors - Nguyễn Thị Thanh Tâm + Restructure the format of the thesis + Revise and correct lexical and grammatical errors - Nguyễn Thị Châu Anh 154 + When reviewing literature, the thesis focused on listing the writers’ names and works; there are few arguments and remarks from the thesis’s author in the second Chapter - Literature Review + It is necessary for the writer to determine and confirm the purposes of the study and the ways to solve the problems leading to the findings should be clear + The Appendix (about data base) should be presented in more detail in the thesis This will make the research increase its reliability + Suggestions: The thesis needs to be revised and added with some more information in the findings 1) Đề nghị công nhận học vị Thạc sĩ cho học viên Phan Hoàng Diễm Trúc sau chỉnh sửa, góp ý theo khuyến nghị/đề nghị thành viên Hội đồng (Học viên phải trình Luận văn chỉnh sửa Bản giải trình cho Chủ tịch Thư ký Hội đồng xem xác nhận trước nộp Viện Đào tạo Sau đại học để hoàn tất thủ tục Bảo vệ LVThS, chậm 01 tháng kể từ ngày nhận Hồ sơ nhận xét Hội đồng)./ THƯ KÝ HỘI ĐỒNG CHỦ TỊCH HỘI ĐỒNG Trần Thanh Dũ Nguyễn Thị Châu Anh 155 156 157 158 159 THE SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF VIET NAM Independence - Freedom - Happiness M.A THESIS COMMENTS AND EVALUATION Research title: Analysis of verbal presentation of the series of picture books: “Twiggle story.” Candidate: Phan Hoàng Diễm Trúc Supervisor(s): Dr Nguyễn Vũ Phương Examiner: Huỳnh Thị Bích Phượng, PhD Role: Reader Examiner’s institution: Banking University of Ho Chi Minh City COMMENTS Study significance, scientific and practical implications The researcher presents the values of scientific significance at a point; however, the writer has not stated obviously the significance in term practical implications Appropriateness of the research topic The research topic is relevant to the major named the English language However, it is not a very close focus as it is required Research methodology The research methodology presented in chapter include both quantitative and qualitative methods, that meets the requirements of research methodology Structure and format of the paper The thesis concludes 122 pages with chapters and other parts including Abstract, Table of content, Reference, Appendix, etc… which fullfills the requirement of the organization of an MA thesis Research findings and contributions The research findings are relevant and supportive to the research questions However, contributions of the study seem unclear or unpractical The writer attempted to cite some theories used to interpret meanings and messages in a picture storybook Actually, an MA thesis in English Language expects the writer, basing on the existing theory, to make a suggestion as a contribution in term of linguistics or related ones Suggestions for research improvement - Title: the title does not include the author’s name of the series of books, which are used for research; even it does not indicate the research subject as well as the research purpose - Significance of the study: needs clarifying in term of practical application - Literature review: should be focused on the theories that are related to the study 160 - Conceptual framework: the writer is requested to consider the design of the conceptual framework, which is currently complicated sothat it can show exactly the frame and its process of the research development - Research question: there are three research questions, of which responses are not logical to conclusions and implications The writer is requested to revise these points to make sure that they are logically related - Data collection: two storybooks are selected for research and analysis without any explanation; therefore, that can not convince the readers - Conclusion: the conclusion does not actually present the research subject or the benefit they can gain from the study - Mistakes of spelling, grammatical points, structures, language use, academic writing: there are a lot of mistakes of spelling, grammatical points, structures, language use, expression that need to be checked thorough the writing General evaluation and scoring: The thesis generally meets the requirements of an MA thesis Question: Can you please give an explanation of choice of the two stories? Thu Dau Mot City, May 2021 Huỳnh Thị Bích Phượng 161 ... thesis entitled ? ?Analysis of verbal presentation of the series of the picture books: ? ?Twiggle story. ” Apart from the act of consulting references which is considered as the information of reliable... discusses the background of the study, the rationale of the study, the statement of the problem, the purpose of the study, research questions, significance of the study, the scope of the study,... with the verbal presentation to make the meaning of the story vibrant There are many studies on the multimodality of picture books, the relationship between verbal and visual models of picture books,