A Study on some possible effective pre-Reading activities to improve reading skills for the 2nd -year English Majors at the Military Science Academy

PART A: INTRODUCTION I. Rationale In many second or foreign language teaching situations, reading receives a special focus. There are a number of reasons for this. First, many foreign language students often have reading as one of their most important goals. They want to be able to read for information and pleasure, for their career, and for study purposes. In fact, in most EFL situations, the ability to read in a foreign language is all that students ever want to acquire. Second, written texts serve various pedagogical purposes. Extensive exposure to linguistically comprehensible written texts can enhance the process of language acquisition. Good reading texts also provide good models for writing and provide opportunities to introduce new topics, to stimulate discussion and to study language. Reading, then, is a skill which is highly valued by students and teachers alike. In process of teaching and learning English as a foreign language in Vietnam in general, and at the Military Science Academy (MSA) in particular, reading has always been offered a great deal of attention both from the teachers and the students. Like many others universities in Vietnam, English at the MSA is learnt and taught in non-native environment, therefore, reading is not only considered as a means to gain knowledge but also a means by which further study takes place. In other words, learners “read to learn” (Burns, 1988:11). According to Carrel (1981:1), “for many students, reading is by far the most important of the four skills in a second language, particularly in English as a second or foreign language”. This is especially true to the students at the MSA, where learners are mostly future interpreters, translators, or teachers of English in others Military Colleges whose desires are to be able to handle subjects related to written materials in English and to work with their English-speaking colleagues and partners. It is essential for them to acquire the ability to read English effectively and efficiently. However, despite the teachers’ and students’ effort, students still often claim to have a lot of difficulties in reading English textbooks or English materials, and therefore, they sometimes read them inefficiently. For the second-year students of English, although they have been learning English for at least several years, it is still often difficult for them to understand a text or a passage in English, since they still lack vocabulary, grammar, reading skills and poor background knowledge. Besides, the teachers sometimes have to face with difficulties in dealing with the students’ learning demand and newly introduced sources of materials. In addition, teaching methods and teaching techniques in general, are still below the international standard of education. To find out the areas of students’ difficulty at the MSA and the causes of their unsuccessful reading comprehension is necessary. Therefore, these reasons have inspired the writing of A Study on some possible effective pre-reading activities to improve reading skills for the 2nd -year English Majors at the Military Science Academy. It is hoped that the study will make some contributions to improve the learning of English in general, and the learning of reading in particular among the 2nd-year English majors at the MSA. The author also hopes that it will be possible to make suggestions for the teachers to improve the situation of teaching and learning reading at the MSA. II. Aims of the study The main purposes of the study are to investigate pre-reading techniques employed by the teachers of English at the MSA, and to give a suggestion of some possible pre- reading activities that can be applied to teach the text book More Reading Power to the second-year students of English at the MSA. To achieve these purposes, the study will focus on the following aims: * To understand better and more fully the notions of reading and reading comprehension, etc. * To investigate the teachers’ and students’ attitude towards the pre- reading techniques. * To examine the students’ preference for pre-reading techniques. * To suggest some possible pre-reading activities which are thought to be effective for teaching reading to the 2nd-year students at the MSA. III. Scope of the study To improve reading skill for students of English at the MSA, the teachers can make use of various techniques and number of things should be done. However, in this study, the author only intends to overview a brief of current situation of teaching and learning reading of the 2nd-year students of English at the MSA, and to suggest some possible activities that can be applied in the Pre-reading stage in order to motivate students in reading lesson as well as help them to become good and effective readers. IV. Methods of the study The study was carried out on the basis of qualitative research method including questionnaires and class observation. Questionnaires are designed as a mean to make the researcher’s evaluation more objective. The questionnaires are given to the second-year students and the teachers of English at the MSA with the hope to find out their attitudes towards pre-reading techniques and their comments and suggestions for these activities. Data were collected through the survey questionnaires and class observation. Analyzing statistics from the survey questionnaire on reading activities conducted with the cooperation of the both teachers and students at the MSA. All comments, remarks, recommendation assumptions, and conclusion provided in the study based on the data analysis. Besides, more information needed for the study is gathered through other methods such as class observations, informal interviews, and discussions with the teachers and students at the MSA. V. Significance of the study The study highlights the importance of motivation to the reading skills in general and to the pre-reading stage in particular. Moreover, the findings of the study are thought to be useful for teachers of English to be aware of the essential role of the pre-reading activities to the students’ motivation in reading lessons. VI. Design of the study The study is composed of three parts: Part A-Introduction provides rationale, the aims, scope, methods, and design of the study. Part B-Development consists of three chapters: Chapter 1-Literature review, conceptualizes the study’s theoretical background, presents the concepts relevant to the topic of the thesis: reading and reading comprehension, classification of reading, role of reading in foreign language learning, motivation and factors in teaching and learning reading. Chapter one will be closed with the importance of the Pre-reading activities in a reading lesson. Chapter 2-The study, presents the methodology used in the study. It also shows the detailed results of the survey and covers a comprehensive analysis on the data collected form questionnaires and class observations. Chapter 3-offers some major findings and suggestions of some possible Pre-reading activities which are thought to be helpful for teaching reading to the 2nd-year students of English at the MSA. Part C- Conclusion is a review of the study, future directions for further research and limitations of the study as well. PART B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter 1 LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1. Introduction In this chapter, the author mainly concerns with reviewing the notions of reading and reading comprehension. The review includes the definitions of each notion and followed by the classification of reading, the importance of reading in foreign language learning, theory of motivation and factors in teaching and learning reading. Last but not least, the importance of the Pre-reading activities are also presented in this chapter as the main purpose of the research 1.2. Theoretical background of reading 1.2.1. Definitions of reading and reading comprehension 1.2.1.1. Definition of reading Reading is often referred to as the most important of the four language skills for EFL learners, as it enables students to gain exposure to the target language and receive valuable linguistic input to build up language proficiency (Erten & Razı, 2003). We can not be sure when reading activity begins, but we have to admit that reading is essential activity that provides a great contribution in obtaining knowledge. It is obvious that in real life we usually spend much time reading all sorts of things like books, magazines, newspapers, novels, stories. However, sometimes we read but we do not understand what they mean, or can not understand the text we read. In this case, it can not be called reading. So what is reading? There have been numerous definitions of reading each of them is the reflection of its author’s view of the reading process. Anderson (1999: 1) explains this very neatly as follows: “Reading is an active, fluent process which involves the reader and the reading material in building meaning. Meaning does not reside on the printed page or occurs in reading, which combines the words on the printed page with the reader’s background knowledge and experiences.” According to Harmer (1989: 153), reading is a mechanical process that “eyes receive the message and the brain then has to work out the significance of the message”. In his definition, Harmer focuses on both two actions dominated by the eyes and the brain as well as on the speed of the process “a reading text moves at a speed of the reader”, which means that the readers themselves decides how fast he wants to read the text. Sharing the same opinion, Smith (1985:102) defines “reading understands the author’s thought”. He also added that “understanding print or even receiving communication can hardly be said to explain reading”. The problem still remains how the reader understands the print or the message. “It means that we-the reader-read the author’s mind not the author’s words”. Roe, Stood and Burns (1987:2) describes reading in a more extensive way. In their opinion, “reading is understanding written language”, “reading is a complex mental process”, “reading is thinking”, or “reading comprehension is reconstruction, interpretation and evaluation of what author of written content means by using knowledge gained from life experience.” Another definition of reading was offered by Allen and Valletta (1977: 249). In their opinion, “reading is a developmental process”. We learn reading not only to know how to read, to master the symbols, the sound, the language, the grammar etc, that used in the text but also to understand the ideas, the information expressed in that text or to develop the ability of reconstructing its content using our own words. One more researcher called Goodman (1971: 153) considers reading is “a psycholinguistic process by which the reader- a language user, reconstructs, as best as he can, a message which has been encoded by a writer as a graphic display.” Reading involves a reader, a text, and a writer. Reading skills are developed in an active process. This process involves the surface representation encoded by a writer and ends with interpretation of the written text and interchanges between the writer and the reader (Goodman 1969 in Carrell 1988). If the writer is careless, the reader may not get the message. If the writer makes demands that the reader cannot fulfill, the message will not be received, even though to another reader it might be clear. If the reader is careless, reading will result in incomplete interpretation. The reader tries to interpret the text through his/her own experiences, but they may differ from the writer’s experiences. This explanation proves that reading is not just an active process, but also an interactive one. Reading is closely linked with meaning. For this reason, lack of shared assumptions presents the most difficult problem in reading. To sum up, from all these opinions above, it is obvious that no definition can possibly capture all the ideas and features of what reading is. Each linguist’s definition reflects what reading means as seen from his own point of view. However, they all have some features in common, they share the same ideas that reading means we-the readers read the author’s mind not author’s word, and that reading means comprehending written language and it employs a variety of skills. In addition, they all concentrate on the nature of reading. 1.2.1.2. Definition of reading comprehension In teaching and learning a foreign language in general and teaching reading in particular, reading comprehension plays an important part, it can be understood as the ability to draw attention to the required information from the text as efficiently as possible. So what is reading comprehension? According to Richard and Thomas (1987: 9), “Reading comprehension is best described as an understanding between the author and the reader”. This point of view concentrates on the reader’s understanding of the message based on the individual’s background knowledge. They stated that “reading is much more than just pronouncing words correctly or simply knowing what the author intends: it is the process whereby the printed pages stimulate ideas, experiences and responses that are unique to an individual.” In his book, Swan (1975: 1) pointed out that “A student is good at comprehension we mean that he can read accurately and efficiently, so as to get the maximum information of a text with the minimum of understanding”. For Roe, Stood and Burns (1987: 9): Reading comprehension is reconstruction, interpretation, and evaluation of what author of written content means by using knowledge gained from life experience. Study the nature of reading comprehension, Grilled (1981: 3) indicated that “Reading comprehension or understanding written text means extracting the required information from it as effectively as possible”. This means that the student can show his understanding by re-expressing the content of the text in many ways such as summarizing the text, answering questions etc. From these theories above, it can be understood that reading for comprehension is the primary purpose for reading; raising students' awareness of main ideas in a text and exploring the organization of a text are essential for good comprehension. It is the process in which the readers - as they read, can recognize the graphic form and understand the relation between the writing and the meaning. It means that after reading, students can master grammar structures, words, pronunciation etc and can understand the content of the text and use it in their real life as effective as possible. Furthermore, “reading without comprehension is the meaningless” (Karolin and Karin, 1988: 2). Reading means comprehending written language so when understanding break down, reading actually does not occur. 1.2.2. Classification of reading 1.2.2.1. According to manner According to Doff (1988), reading is divided into two main types: reading aloud and silent reading. * Reading aloud involves “looking at the text, understanding it and also saying it” (Doff: 70) and he considers reading aloud as a way to convey necessary information to someone else. Very few people are required to read aloud as a matter of daily routine. The readers are asked to read the text so loudly that other people can hear it. Reading aloud does not happen outside the classroom as Doff (1988: 67) said, “reading aloud is not an activity we engage in very often outside the classroom”. Reading aloud has both advantages and disadvantages. Natal (1966) sees reading aloud as an important aid for beginners to improve their pronunciation. It helps students to make the connection between sounds and spelling of letters and words and also assists the teacher to check students’ pronunciation. Moreover, it is a technique for him to keep the class under control, since when one student reads aloud, the others are asked to listen in case they may be required to continue the reading. However, Greenwood (1985) criticizes this idea; he claims that students may unable to focus adequately on the text’s meaning when they highly concentrate on pronouncing the words. His point of view implied that there are also some negative effects that should be taken into account in the process of teaching and learning that involves reading aloud. First of all, when reading aloud, students only focus on the pronunciation not on the meaning of the text. The second thing is that when students take turn to read a text aloud, only one student is active; the others will do something else, since they do not have to read. In addition, this way of reading usually waste much time because students read in turn so they have to wait one after one. It can be inferred that there is little value in reading aloud if we want to improve the readers’ reading skills. Therefore, the teachers as educators should identify the level of their students and decide whether to apply reading aloud or not in teaching reading to their students. * Silent reading is “the method we normally use with our native language and on the whole quickest and most efficient” Lewis (1985: 110). Sharing the same idea, Doff (1988: 67) defined silent reading as followed: “silent reading involves looking at sentence and understanding the message it conveys, in other words making sense of a written text. It does not normally involve saying the words we read nor even silently in our heads”. Therefore, we can see that silent reading is an effective skill for reading comprehension since students do not need to read all the words of a text, they can read at their own speed and in case they do not understand a sentence they can go back to read again. When reading silently, students not only obtain its main ideas in the shortest length of time but also deeply understand its details and can answer the questions as well. To summarize, silent reading is one effective skill for reading process in general and reading comprehension in particular, since the teacher can check his or her students’ understanding easily and can adjust the reading materials and exercises to suit the students’ ability. Therefore, it should be applied in teaching and learning a foreign language. 1.2.2.2. According to purposes People do not usually read unless they have a reason or a purpose for reading. They always have a need of some kind that can be satisfied through reading. In the case of an effective reader, his reason for reading will also determine his style of reading and the relevant reading skills to be used because the purpose could be very general when he reads for pleasure or escape. On the other hand, it could be specific like looking up a telephone directory for someone’ phone number he can not use the same way of reading. According to Nutgall (2000: 38), there are two main types of reading, namely, intensive and extensive readings, these are not just two contrasting ways of reading but an infinitive variety of interrelated strategies; both of them are complementary and necessary. * Intensive reading (IR) The aim of intensive reading is to arrive at a profound and detailed understanding of the text not only of what it means but also of how the meaning is produced. IR means reading short texts to extract specific information. Its main concern is for detailed comprehension. In IR, students normally work with short texts with close guidance from the teacher. The aim of IR is to help students obtain detailed meaning from the context, to develop reading skills- such as identifying main ideas and recognizing text connectors- and to enhance vocabulary and grammar knowledge. Nutgall’s opinion about this kind of reading is: “Intensive reading involves approaching the text under the close guidance of the teacher or under the guidance of task which forces the students to pay great attention to the text” Nuttal (1982: 23). “Intensive reading”, from Francoise’s point of view, “means r