The impact of extensive reading on students' reading proficiency at university of labour and social affairs

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION I.1. Background to the study. The University of Labour and Social Affairs (ULSA) is a university which was upgraded from the College of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs in 2005. Like other universities in Vietnam, this university is responsible for the training of skilled students to meet the demand of the society in the process of industrialization and modernization. There are faculties in the university namely Accounting, Insurance, Labour Management, and Social Affairs with about 1.200 students being trained at the moment. However, this number is increasing because of the expansion of the university. Every year, graduates from ULSA are sent to work in various economic fields such as national and local resorts, the state and joint-venture companies, enterprises located in Hanoi as well as throughout the country. With the direction of globalization in our society nowadays, foreign languages- especially English seems to be a very important condition for them to get a job. ULSA graduates are supposed to be able to use English to communicate as well as to read materials. However, a lot of ULSA graduates miss their job opportunities because of their poor English proficiency. Being aware of the problem posed to their students, ULSA authorities have implimented some specific innovations in order to raise the quality of training in their own context, among which is the change of teaching and learning English at the institution. These attempts can be seen in the curriculum of the school which allocates outnumber of periods for English among other school subjects and their encouragement to the English teaching staff to renovate their teaching methods. During their course at the university, students are given 330 class-hours of English ( each class-hour equals forty five minutes) of which 150 are spent on the course book Lifeline Elementary and divided equally in the first and the second semester of the first year ( each semester covers 75 class hours). In the rest 180 class hours, students must take English for Special Purposes (ESP) courses with the book " English for Labour and Social Affairs" compiled by the English Division of the university. In this course English learning focuses mainly on reading. However, after finishing the course book Lifeline-Elementary the students still have a lot of difficulties with new words and new grammar structures which affect their learning. Our observations and our experience of teaching English at ULSA suggested us to think that English teaching at the institution tend to focus exclusively on intensive reading, concentrating on the teaching of grammar and vocabulary in relatively short texts via post-reading exercises, often ending up demanding a translation of the passage into Vietnamese word by word with extensive use of a dictionary. The pedagogical result of this approach is that students read slowly, without a communicative purpose and they have had a passive way of learning that is students only perform what their teachers ask them to do. This results in students finding English very difficult especially when they have to deal with ESP. Facing the problem of finding an appropriate way to help our students improve their English not only to do well in their exams but also to use it effectively when they go to work after graduating, and encouraged by researches on the benefits of extensive reading for students' English language learning and skills development, I decided to conduct an experimental research on the topic to gain a better understanding about extensive reading and its effects on the students' reading comprehension in the context of ULSA. I. 2.Aims of the study In an effort to provide more empirical evidence with regard to the actual impact of ER in ULSA setting, the present study takes a control and an experimental groups and measures their reading test scores before and after ER treatment in order to investigate the efficacy of exposing ULSA students to ER techniques. The purpose of the investigation was also to find out how fruitful students find the extensive program through the questionnaires distributed to the learners. I.3. Research hypotheses and question. In order to gain the above purpose the study was designed to test the following hypotheses: Null hypothesis: The students who take part in the program get the same result measured in a post-test and have the same improvement in their reading skills as those who do not. Alternative hypothesis: Students who receive extra reading practice will perform better overall in a post test and have some improvement in their reading skill in comparison to those who not have extra reading practice. So as to draw the conclusion on the hypothesis, the study is to get the answer to the following question: Does an extensive reading program have a positive effect on students' reading comprehension in the context of ULSA? I.4. Research method. Research design can be thought of as the structure of research -- it is the "glue" that holds all the elements in a research project together. Therefore, it requires the researcher's prudence and caution to single out among a variety of research methods the one that best suits the aims and objectives of the study. As stated previously, this study is aimed to examine the effectiveness of extensive reading on students' reading comprehension at ULSA, therefore, the best method to be used in this study is experimental research. Experimental designs are proved to be especially useful in addressing evaluation questions about the effectiveness and impact of programs, as Salkind has pointed out that in an experimental research" One factor is related to another in such a way that changes in that factor are usually causally related to changes in the other. So, it is not just a relationship where two variables share something in common (as in the case with a correlation relationship); it is much more. They share something, but one directly affects the other." (Salkind, 2006; 127). The three designs within the scope of experimental method are true-experimental, quasi-experimental and pre-experimental designs. They are different from one another in terms of the degree to which they impose control over the variables being studied and the degree of randomness that enters into the design. (Salkind, 2006; 218). Considering the conditions in which the study would be carried out, the quasi-experimental design is chosen for the study for the following reasons. Firstly, the subjects of the study have already been assigned prior to the study. In this study, two classes of first-year students were assigned to the researcher as well as a teacher by the person who was in charge of arranging the teaching schedule for the teaching staff. In addition to this, the two classes in the study were not removed from the normal teaching and learning context. This characteristic made up the external validity of the study which helps to increase the validity of the later generalization of the result to the population. Involving the generalization of the results, extraneous variables need controlling prior to the experimental like the gender, the group size, etc. To control the group size, some students were removed from the researcher's observation and study during the experiment. That is, though these students received the same treatment either in the control group or experimental group, their records were not counted in the study. With regard to the disproportion in gender, three male students in the control group were removed to make the number of male students in this group equal to that of the experimental group. Since all the participants were Vietnamese of the same age and had lived in Vietnam since they were born, they were considered to be of the same level of social and cultural background. In addition to this, their English readiness was the same according to their scores in the placement test they had done. Apart from the quasi-experimental design that acts as the main method of the study, a post-program questionnaire was also designed and administered to the subjects to collect their feedback to the extensive reading program. According to Seliger and Shohamy (1995), questionnaire is an attractive means of collecting data on phenomena, which are not easily observed, such as motivation, attitude, LLS use, etc…. They also point out that the questionnaire is self-administered and can be given to large groups of subjects at exactly the same time; hence the data are more uniform, standard and accurate. In the questionnaire of this study students were asked about their general impression of the program, their preference of the post- reading activities and other ingredients such as reading materials, time spent on post-reading activities, etc. CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW. II.1. Introduction This chapter reviews different issues in the theories of reading in a foreign language. The three main features will be presented in this chapter are: theoretical background of reading activities, definition of extensive reading and the benefits of extensive reading in language learning. Before we go any further, however, it is important to decide whether this study is concerned with second or foreign language learning since there a traditional distinction between the two. Those who learn a language as a second language live in countries where the language is used at least for some day-to -day activities and/or as the medium of instruction in the secondary schools. If people learn a language in a country where it is not commonly spoken, they are taking part in foreign language learning. In the case of a language learnt for academic purposes, learners may not use it in everyday life but use it as the medium of learning at least at tertiary level. However, as my research related to English as a subject at school, I shall refer to all non-native speakers as speakers of foreign language. II.2. Theoretical background of reading and reading activities. II.2.1 Definitions of reading Reading is a completely individual activity which takes place in all different ways from reading newspapers, magazines, written tests, telephone directory, labels on medicine bottles, notices, ect. The ability to read is such a natural part of human beings that they seldom try to define reading. However there are still different points of view on the definition of reading. If Ur defines "reading means reading and understanding" (Ur, 1996;138), Goodman (1971; 135) considers reading as "a psychological process by which the reader, the language user, reconstructs, as best as he can, a message which has been encoded by a writer as a graphic display", and the act of reconstruction is viewed as " a cyclical process of sampling, predicting, testing and confirming." Another researcher named Tickoo emphasizes "reading involves a triangular interaction- between the reader, the writer and the texts."(Tickoo; 2006). In addition to this, Rubin and Thompson (1994; 91) offer another definition:" Reading is active information -seeking process in which readers relate information in the text to what they already know". In this view, reading is about understanding written texts. It is a complex activity that involves both perception and thought. Reading consists of two related processes: word recognition and comprehension. Word recognition refers to the process of perceiving how written symbols correspond to one’s spoken language. Comprehension is the process of making sense of words, sentences and connected text. Readers typically make use of background knowledge, vocabulary, grammatical knowledge, experience with text and other strategies to help them understand the written text. All in all, what all the linguists have in common is that reading involves a variety of skills and reading usually means comprehending written language so when understanding breaks down, reading actually does not occur. Learning to read is an important educational goal. For both children and adults, the ability to read opens up new worlds and opportunities. It enables us to gain new knowledge, enjoy literature, and do everyday things that are part and parcel of modern life, such as, reading the newspapers, job listings, instruction manuals, maps and so on. Reading is one of the best ways for an EFL learner to improve his or her skills in English. Readers gain more than just new vocabulary. They learn how words are used by native speakers. Reading a novel, for instance, can help students review previously learned grammatical structures and teach them to recognize rules being applied in a new way. Reading provides a way for students to practice and reinforce new material learned in the classroom, with the benefit of being portable for independent study. With regard to the role of reading in foreign language learning, we now move to the process of reading. II.2.2. Reading Process Models The reading models discussed in this part are bottom-up models, top-down models and interactive models of the reading process. II.2.2.1.The bottom-up view of reading With regard to bottom-up models, Nuttal generalizes that" In bottom-up processing, the reader builds up a meaning from the black mark on the page: recognizing letters and words, working out sentence structure." (Nuttal, 1996: 16). She also points out that bottom-up processing can be used as a corrective means to "tunnel vision"(seeing things only from our own limited point of view). She compares this approach to the image of a scientist with a magnifying glass examining the ecology of a transect. This view is supported by Omaggio who claims that language learning was characterized as a "response system that humans acquire through automatic conditioning processes," where "some patterns of language are reinforced (rewarded) and others are not," and "only those patterns reinforced by the community of language users will persist" (Omaggio, 1993: 46 as cited in Elba,2006). According to Elba (2006), the main method associated with the bottom-up approach to reading is known as phonics, which requires the learner to match letters with sounds in a defined sequence. From this point of view, reading is a linear process by which readers decode a text word by word, linking the words into phrases and then sentences. Sharing the same view, Anderson considers textual comprehension as a process which involves adding the meanings of words to get the meanings of clauses (Anderson, 1994 as cited in Elba, 2006). In this view point, language is a code and the reader is a passive decoder whose main task is to identify graphemes and convert them into phonemes. Information is received and processed beginning with the smallest sound units, and then proceeding to letter blends, words, phrases, and sentences. The bottom-up model describes information flow as a series of stages that transforms the input and passes it to the next stage without any feedback or possibility of later stages of the process influencing earlier stages. Elba (2006) also added that the ESL and EFL textbooks influenced by this perspective include exercises that focus on literal comprehension and give little or no importance to the reader's knowledge or experience with the subject matter, and the only interaction is with the basic building blocks of sounds and words. Most activities are based on recognition and recall of lexical and grammatical forms with an emphasis on the perceptual and decoding dimension. II.2.2.2. The top-down view of reading The top-down approach to L2 learning strongly emphasizes the experience and knowledge of the learner. In Nuttal's words, in top-down processing," we draw our intelligence and experience - the prediction we can make, based on the schemata we have acquired- to understand the text........this kind of processing is used when we interpret assumptions and draw inferences." (Nuttal, 1996: 16) This approach is compared to an eagle's eye view of the landscape in the meaning that from a great height, the eagle can see a wide area spread out below; it understand the nature of the whole terrain, its general pattern and the relationships between various parts of it, far better than an observer on the ground. Elba (2006) supports this approach by introducing the notions of meaningful learning and rote learning. An example of rote learning in her study is simply memorizing lists of isolated words or rules in a new language, where the information becomes temporary and subject to loss. Meaningful learning, on the other hand, occurs when new information is presented in a relevant context and is related to what the learner already knows, thereby being "easily integrated into one's existing cognitive structure". She also emphasises that learning that is not meaningful will not become permanent. In this view, reading is not just extracting meaning from a text but a process of connecting information in the text with the knowledge the reader brings to the act of reading. Reading, in this sense, is "a dialogue between the reader and the text" (Grabe 1988, 56 as cited in Elba, 2006). It is seen as an active cognitive process in which the reader's background knowledge plays a key role in the creation of meaning. Reading is not a passive mechanical activity but "purposeful and rational, dependent on the prior knowledge and expectations of the reader (or learner). Reading is a matter of making sense of written language rather than decoding print to sound. Apparently, top-down models have many superior strong points to bottom-up models. To some researchers, these models still own some short comings. Failure to distinguish adequately between beginning readers and fluent readers is said to be its main weakness. Moreover, Stanovich (1980) argues that the generation of hypotheses would be more time consuming than decoding. II.2.2.3. The interactive view of reading The interactive model takes into account the continuous interaction between bottom-up and top-down processing in the construction of the meaning of a text. Although good readers decode automatically with little cognitive effort, second language learners need help in decoding, since for them language is a key problem that cannot be solved by guessing. The interactive model acknowledges that lower level processing skills are essential for fluent and accurate reading; it also emphasizes that as bottom-up processing becomes more automatic, higher-level skills will become more engaged. In interactive model, different processes are thought to be responsible for providing information that is shared with other processes. The information obtained from each type of processing is combined to determine the most appropriate interpretation of the printed page. (Hayes, 1991) To summarize, the appearance and popularity of interactive model show that interactive model is able to maximize the strengths and minimize the weaknesses of the separate use of either bottom-up or top-down model. The interaction of the two models is of much use as Nuttall concludes 'both approaches can be mobilized by conscious choice, and both are important strategies for readers' (Nuttall, 1996:17). In this view he suggests using the top-down approach, that is first activating all the prior knowledge you can about the topic and the type of text and second, skimming to get the rough idea of the content and structure when we start reading. This enables you to have "an idea of the context and the general direction of the argument or narrative". If the top-down approach does not provide you with adequate understanding of the text, you use the bottom-up insights 'to weigh up competing interpretations.' And when you have already got the possible interpretation of the text, you assess its plausibility using top-down means. (Nuttall, 1996:78) II.2.3 Reading strategies /skills Reading strategies(