Tgp chi khoa hgc TrUdng Dgi hgc Quy Nhan Sd3, T4p VI ndm 2012 ERRORS IN ENGLISH READING TECHNIQUES OF THE FIRST YEAR ENGLISH MAJORS AT QUI NHON UNIVERSITY NGUYEN THI THANH TAM", HUYNH THI CAM NHUNO'''' 1[.]
Trang 1ERRORS IN ENGLISH READING TECHNIQUES OF THE FIRST-YEAR
ENGLISH MAJORS AT QUI NHON UNIVERSITY
NGUYEN THI THANH TAM", HUYNH THI CAM NHUNO'
1 INTRODUCTION Today, in order to meet the requirements of intemational communication with native English-speakers or English speaking people worldwide, the training of highly-trained Enghsh majors at higher education is enhanced and strengthened in our country; especially those of high-level skills of English practice, namely speaking, listening, writing and reading English Reading comprehension for English majors al Qui Nhon University (QNU) is enhanced with high-level reading techniques-speed reading, which requires EngUsh-students' thorough knowledge and long regular practice
of them to acquire This inevitably expects the students to have regular feedback and timely adjustments to their errors in their realization and practice from the teachers Hence, grasping the first-year English majors' awareness of the reading techniques is
of great importance to the students' building good knowledge and practice of EngUsh-reading by giving proper feedback on their errors in reading practice Therefore, the study is intended to identify QNU first-year Enghsh-majors' errors
in reading techniques to figure out the reasons for their ineffective reading with waste
of time or without correct answers Thereby, their teachers have suitable adjustments
to their teaching programs and methods to correct them opportunely for their successfully forming effective and efficient reading habit
2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
It is clear from the English reading syllabus for first-year Enghsh majors at QNU that the students have to acquire four main reading techniques, namely skimming, scanning, reading for detail and guessing meaning in context in the reading course
books Interaction 1 reading and Interaction 2 reading by Kim and Harlmann [2, p 92-95], [3, p 93-96] Skimming is a type of rapid reading technique which is used when a reader wants lo get the main idea or ideas from the passage while scanning is a technique employed when the reader wants to locale a particular piece of information without necessarily understanding the rest of a text or passage [9, p 322] Guessing meaning in
context, according to O'Connell [7, p 10], is a technique used to identify the meaning
of unknown words in the context by their parts of speech and the clues in the context
He also confkms that recognizing whether an unknown word is important to one's
Trang 2Finally, reading for detail partly results from these techniques' coordination Reading
for detail is a technique oi studying part of a text very carefully to make sure you understand exactly what the writer means [8 p 10] In order to identify which sentences or
information needs to be studied carefully for the detail, skimming is n e e d e d to determine which part of the text lo read for the detail required and scanning is used lo locate the sentences or information in the relevant pari of the text by the key words or expressions of the questions 11 p, 561- The new words in these sentences may influence the choice of the answers; hence, guessing the mcaning.s of the new words in context is used when necessary
Mastering these techniques requires students lo have insightful knowledge of them and clear distinctions between ihem on the ways of reading, their purposes and their coordination in effective practice This is inevitable for students lo have certain confusions in their awareness, which results in errors in their practice It is obvious that people have to learn not only from inslruclions on what to do but also from theu-errors or warning of what not to do, which h e l p s t h e m lo a v o i d u n d e s i r a b l e consequences
3 METHOD AND PROCEDURE The study is based on quantitative and qualitative methods The quahtative method helps us determine which errors in English reading techniques students commit during reading practice and the quantitative method is carried out lo decide the percentage of the poll sample to have the same mistakes so as to figure out the popular ones that students usually have to determine their influence on ihe students' English reading
The study involves 160 first-year English majors of course 33 al QNU responding
lo the questionnaire of 9 questions related to the four main reading techniques, namely skimming, scanning, reading for detail and guessing meaning in context mentioned in
the course books for Reading 1: Interaction I reading and Interaction 2 reading by Kim
and Harlmann [5 & 6] The survey was carried out as the end-of-term check on their acquisition of reading techniques after the course Reading 1 T h e findings are analysed
in percentage terms (with two figures in decimal fraction) and sorted out into two main ways - correct and incorrect ones The incorrect ones are further analysed to determine the kind of errors and the possible causes or reasons for them; thereby, the consequences can be inferred or confirmed
4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION For convenient observation, the findings presented in the tables in the following sections have the following abbreviations:
a, b, c d etc represent the choices of answers to each question in the questioimaire;
Trang 34.L Errors in skimming
In regard to the way of skimming, the first question is on the ways dial the students
skim a paragraph for its main idea The answer is one of Ihq choices: (a) read the paragraph quickly and focus on its main point, (b) read the paragraph carefully with every detail (c) read the paragraph slowly and try lo cover every detail, and (d) read and stop to look up the new words in the dictionary for thorough understanding of the paragraph Their choices are presented in table 1
Table I Students' ways of skimming
Ways of skimming
Ntmiber of students
Percentage
Correctness
a
117
73.12
C
b
8
5
c
1 0.62
d
13 8.12
Bc/bd/cd
5 3.12
16,87
ab/ac/ad/abd
16
10
26.87
IC
Table 1 has shown that more than a quarter (26.87%) of the students have incorrect knowledge of ways of skunming Specifically, 16.87% of the students have mistaken skimming for careful reading or reading for detail On the other hand, 10%
of the students are confused in their way of skimming by their conflicting choice of different ways of reading This provides evidence that more than a quarter of the students still commit errors in skimming because of their tough habit of careful reading and incomplete knowledge of skimming
This mformation is confmned by the students' knowledge of skimming purpose
by the data in question 2 The answers are: (a) to read for the main points, (b) to read for details, (c) to read for specific information, and (d) to read for supporting ideas
Table 2 Students' knowledge of the purpose of skimming
Purposes of
skimming
Number of students
Percentage
Correctness
a
114
71.25
C
b
1
c
4
d
12 bc/cd
2
19
11.87
ac/ad/abcd/acd
27
16.87 28.75
IC
Trang 4According to Kirn and Harlmann [5, p 65), the common reason to skim is to find out the topic or to get the main idea of some reading material By comparison with the data in lahlc 1, a nearly similar number of students (28.75% in comparison with 26.87%) have misunderstood the purpose of skimming technique; particularly, 11.87% of the students have confused skimming purpose with that of scanning or reading for detail while 16.87% are completely confused about it This is further proved in their choice
of first reading texts of different task types, which is manifested in questions 3 in the questionnaire
Table 3 Students' ways ofjiisl reading a le.xt ol different task types
Ways of reading
Number of students
P e r c e n t a g e
Correctness
a
86
53.75
C
b
6
c
13
19 U.87
D
23 ac/ab/ad/abc/acd
32
55
3 4 J 7
46.25
IC
The data in table 3 show the students' choice of ways of first reading texts of
different task types: (a) skim the passage loform a general picture of the text (its topic and its structure), (b) read the whole passage in detail lo understand it carefully, (c) scan the passage for specific information, and (d) It depends
As is clearly shown in table 3 nearly a half of the students questioned (46.25%)
do not understand that the purpose of their first reading text is to cover the text in general or to realize the text's organization for specific tasks Nearly a third of students (34.37%) are unclear about their first reading text for different task types According
to O'Connell [7, p 9], skimming is considered as the first basic step of dealing with many kinds of tasks and it is always required in every text in part 1 of reading course
Interaction I and 2 Thus, their misunderstanding of skimming technique in first reading
texts unavoidably leads to their ineffecti\ c reading texts for different tasks
In general, over a quarter of the students are confused on the wav of skimming (26.87%) and its purpose (28.75%) but nearly half of them (46 25*:^) are unaware of its application m reading tasks
4.2 E r r o r s in scanning
The data obtained by questions 4 and 5 in the questionnaire have given a clear view of QNU first-year English majors' knowledge of scanning In regard to the way
of scanning, question 4 shows accurate information on the students' perception of the
Trang 5(b) read through the text quickly for general idea and its organization, (c) read the relevant
section in detail for the information required, and (d) read through the text to locate the
key words In the question or their synonyms, read for Ihe answer
Table 4 Students' ways of scanning
W ^ s of scanning
Number of students
Percentage
Correctness
d
63
39.37
C
c cd
45 22
a
4
ad
5
76 47.5
b
11
bd
7
18 11,25
bc/bcd
3
1.87 60.62
IC
As is seen clearly in table 4 above, the majority of students (60.62%) have
inaccurate knowledge of ways of scanning 47.5% of the informants have mistaken
scanning for reading for detail or careful reading while 13.12% of the students make a
serious mistake when confusing scanning with skimming or completely confused about
scanning To clarify the extent of their misunderstanding of scanning, question 5
indicates further information about their awareness of scanning purpose
Table 5 Students' knowledge of the purpose of scanning
Purpose of
scanning
Number of
students
Percentage
Correctness
d
39
24.37
C
a
34
ad
12
c
27
cd
9
82 51.25
b
21
bd
5
26 16.25
bc/abcd/
abd/bcd
11
6.87
No ciioice
2
1.25
75.62
IC
The choices are: (a) to read for details, (b) to read for the main points, (c) to read
for supporting ideas and (d) lo read for specific Information
It is obvious from table 5 that a great percentage of the students (75.62%) have
inaccurate knowledge of scanning purpose Most of them (51.25%) mistake the purpose
of reading for detail for that of scanning because of their confusion between details
and specific information which is considered easily recognizable without reasoning or
inference [4, p 13] On the other hand, 16.25% of the informants make a serious mistake
Trang 6between them Similarly, 6.87% of the students make no distinction between scanning and other techniques namely skimming and reading for detail by their mixed choices between them Specially, this question actually confuses two students without answer Thus, the vast majority of respondents have not grasped the way of scanning (60.62%) and scanning purpose (75.62%), in which most of them confuse it with reading for detail (47.5% and 51.25% respectively in the way and purpose)
4 V Errors in guessing nicanln); hi context
Being asked about the usual way of dealing with unknown words, the students
have the following answers: (a) look them up In the dlcllonary, (b) rough guess the meaning of the unknown words by the clues In their contexts, and (c) ask their friends or teachers for help
Table 6 Students' ways of dealing with new words
\\ a> s of dealing with
new words
Number of students
Percentage
Correctness
b
90 56.25
C
abc/ab/lK
44 27.5
A
19
c
0
ac
7 16.25 43.75
IC
It is obvious from the data in table 6 that nearly half of the students (43.75%) have incorrect ways of dealing with new words in a texl Among them 16.25% of the students just depend on dictionaries or other people while more than a quarter of them (27.5%) are not quite sure about the usual \va\ to deal with new words in the text or they lack self-confidence in using one of the ways mentioned Students are trained to process the text without using dictionaries or exchanging with other people when taking a test and they are equipped for completing their tasks \^hcnever or wherever they carried out reading for a certain reason-they can not use a dictionary
or ask for help anywhere or anytime to do a job or make a living It is not involved in
a natural way of doing reading in the real life Furthermore, a great number of words are polysemous and their meanings are realized in the context Consequently, looking up new words in the dictionary lakes their lime to realize them in the context Therefore, they have to practice guessing meaning in context when necessary On the other hand, students do not need to find the meanings of all the new words in the text lo complete a task Question 7 gives us a good view of their ways of determining
Trang 7Table 7 Determination of words for guessing meaning
Words requiring
guessing
Number of students
Percentage
Correctness
be
21
b
19
c
50 56.25
C
a
11
d
28
ad
4
26.87
ab/ac/bd/cd bcd/acd
27
16.87 43.75
IC
The choice in table 7 are: (a) any new words in the text, (b) the unknown words outside the relevant sections of the texl for the answers can be ignored, (c) the unknown words important to your understanding of the answers, and (d) the words that prevent you from underslanding some sentences
It can be seen clearly in table 7 that nearly half of the informants (43.75%) do not realize which words are important to the task, in which more than a quarter (26.87%)
do not focus on the task and are unaware of the selection of words for the answer; on the other hand, 16.87% of the students are completely confused about the way of choosing words for task completion
When students figure out the words important to the answer, they have to decide the way to make a guess at them Question 8 reveals their ways of guessing a word in
context There are 4 ways mentioned in the answers: (a) by its part of speech, (b) by the words around it (after or before it) in collocations, (c) by ihe sentence meaning, and (d)
by the paragraph meaning The mformants may have more than one correct choice
Table 8 Students' ways of guessing new words
Way of guessing new words
Number of students
Percentage Correctness
Incorrectness
a
19 11.87
88.13
b
126 78.75
21.25
c
79 49.37
50.63
d
18 11.25
88.75
The data in table 8 show that more than three quarters of the stodents (88.13%)
do not realize that the part of speech of a word can help figure out the meaning of the word more exactly The meaning of a word changes according to its parts of speech; however, different parts of speech of a word may be in the same form; for example, the word "back" may be a noun, a verb, an adjective or an adverb Hence, the meaning
Trang 8Table 8 also indicates that many students do not understand the context of a word fully Specifically, 21.25% of the students do not know that the words around it really affect their meaning in the word combination or phra.se meaning Worse, more than half of Ihem (5().fi37r) ignore the meaning of the word decided in the sentence (sentence structure) and more than three quarters (88.75%) are unaware that the meaning of a word can be determined in the other sentences in Ihc paragraph by its synonyms for diverse expressions in writing or by paragraph's topic or idea
To sum up, the same percentage of the students (43.75%) have incorrect way of dealing with new words and determining words necessary for guesses However, different percentages of them miss important information in guessing meaning in context; including the words' parts of speech (88.13%), their paragraph meaning (88.75'«) the sentence meaning (50.63%) and the phrase mcanmg or word combination (21.25%)
4.4 E'>rors in reading for detail
Reading for detail is commonly involved in quite difficult tasks uhlch require high comprehension of the text (809(.9()'/f comprehension of the text) Therefore, this technique involves a range of steps of reading to process a texl in an efficient way for the task Question 9 in the questionnaire exploits students' knowledge of this technique
Table 9 Students' win \ of reading for detail
S t e p of r e a d i n g
N u m b e r of s t u d e n t s
C o r r e c t n e s s
Incorrectness
70 43.75 56.25
c
120
25
d
79 49.37 511.63
e
79 49.37
50.63
g
49 30.62
69.38
a
19 88.13
11.87
f
9 94.38
5.62
The answers to question 9 are: (a) read the whole te.xi carefully, (b) skimming for the text structure, (c) identify the relevant sections for the detail, (d) scanning for the key words of the questions or their synonyms, read around iheni for the answer, (e) rough guess the meaning of ihe unknown words important to ihe answers, (f) try to understarul every word in the texl (g) ignore the words thai are not important lo your understanding
of the answers
In this question, students have to identify all the steps that are necessary for the task, hence, they have more than one option for the answer As is shown in table 9, more than half of the students have ignored most of the steps that are involved in reading for detail, specifically skimming for the general picture of the text (56.25%), scanning for the key words of the questions in the text (50.63%) or making a guess at the meanings of important words in context (by the choice of e and g by 50.63% and
Trang 969.38% respectively) Without these steps, they can not figure out the answers to the
questions more quickly and exactly Seriously, a quarter of the students have overlooked
the important part of reading for detail, which speeds them in finding the answer and
focusing on the correct one by identifying the relevant section to study in detail for the
answer (choice c) On the other hand, a small number of the students have a severely
mistaken idea about reading for detail by carefully reading the whole text (11.87%)
or figuring out every word in the text (5.62%) This means that these students read
without strategy or exactly speaking, they read without a reason
5 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
5.1 Conclusion
Through the survey of QNU first-year English majors on iheir English reading
techniques, the study has come to the following conclusions:
- A number of the students confuse between the three main ways of reading,
namely skimming, scanning and reading for detail Specifically, over a quarter of the
students confuse skimming way with careful reading or skimming purpose with that of
scanning and reading for detail The majority of the students mistake reading for detail
or skimming for scanning in the way of reading and its purpose Consequently, over
half of the students forget skimming and scanning steps m reading for detail
- Their confusion between these techniques in the way of reading and on their
purposes has led lo their improper application of these techniques m processing a text,
for example, their wrong way of first reading texts or their missing steps of skimming
and scanning in the process of reading for detail, which will result in ineffective reading,
waste of time or incorrect answers
- The technique of guessing meaning in context plays an important role in the
process of decoding information in a text for tasks However, nearly half of Ihe students
(43.75%) do not lake it seriously and still depend on dictionaries or other people, which
is usually not available for natural reading Especially, the same percentage of students
are still confused about the words important to the tasks and the majority of them have
incomplete knowledge of the way of guessing meaning in context, which inevitably
results in their waste of lime for unnecessary words and in incorrect guesses
- Their misleading knowledge of the four main reading techniques undoubtedly
leads to their confusion about their effects in reading strategies for specific tasks, or
their uncertainty of using these techniques in reading practice Therefore, they may
use another way of reading-careful reading of the whole text for different kinds of
Trang 105.2 Recomnumdations
Based on ihe findings and conclusion of the study, the following solutions are
recommended:
To clear up their confusion between ihese reading techniques, the students require thorough instructions on them with the focus on the main differences in the ways of reading and the purposes for clear distinction between them
To help students understand ihe usages of these techniques and their effects more deeply, teachers should instnid the students to realize them in practice in specific tasks with each task for each technique In specific situations, they will realize the real application of each technique and their coordination in a test of different kinds of
lasks or in the processing of a text for diverse task types
- To help students lo avoid undesirable effects of ineffective reading, common errors in reading techniques are mentioned with their consequences Examples of errors are given in specific situations to clarify their impacts on ineffective reading in time consuming or in finding correct answers
To sum up, the study has provided a general view of the present situation of QNU first-year English majors' reading techniques; thereby, their teachers have suitable directions to their reading study in their next course, simultaneously, other teachers of Reading 1 at QNU will probably plan appropriate leaching methods and programs for first-year English majors in the future
TAI LIEU THAM KHAO
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