(Skkn 2023) adapting reading comprehension questions in english 10 global success textbook in the direction of competence development to improve reading comprehension results for grade 10 students

NGHE AN DEPARTMENT OF TRAINING AND EDUCATION NAM DAN 1 UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL TEACHING EXPRIENCES TOPIC: “Adapting reading comprehension questions in English 10 global success textboo

NGHE AN DEPARTMENT OF TRAINING AND EDUCATION

NAM DAN 1 UPPER SECONDARY SCHOOL

TEACHING EXPRIENCES TOPIC:

“Adapting reading comprehension questions in English 10 global success textbook in the direction of competence development to improve reading comprehension results for

grade 10 students”

Teacher: Hồ Thị Mỹ Hạnh Group: Xã Hội 1 Tel: 0986987872

Nam Dan 2022-2023

III Scope of the study

IV The new point of the study

III Measures taken to solve the problem

IV The necessity and the feasibility of the suggested

solutions

V Effectiveness of the study

VI Meaning of the study

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale

English plays an essential part in many fields, including science, culture and social interaction Thanks to English, people have more opportunities to understand advanced scientific and technological theories It also helps people to integrate into international society quickly so that they can improve their abilities Therefore, English is considered as the second important foreign language in the education system in many countries around the world

In four skills: Listening - Speaking - Reading - Writing, reading is a basic skill that helps students form vocabularies and ideas related to the topic of the lesson Besides, if students have good reading comprehension ability, they can read and understand documents written in English, this helps them to improve their English in general and other knowledge and social skills in particular In the current English 10 (10-year system) program, many reading passages have designed tasks that are not suitable for learners' abilities as well as the format of questions in the high school graduation exam In addition, Reading Comprehension also accounts for 35% of the total score in the current high school exam Therefore, how to develop reading comprehension skills for students is an important task that teachers need to do in order to help them not only have the ability to read and understand the lessons in the program but also

be able to read at home to expand your knowledge In addition, this is also an opportunity for students to have early access to the types of questions that will appear in the Reading Comprehension Test, and help to improve students' scores

in this exam

However, basing on preliminary observations at Nam Đàn 1 high school, I find that our students consider reading a difficult skill They often cannot understand the content of English texts well For example, after reading a text, it

is often difficult for them to grasp the main idea of the text Furthermore, they were not able to correctly answer questions related to the text Therefore, improving reading level is a must for students and it is beneficial for their reading as well as their daily test Researchers have consistently emphasized the importance of teaching in the class and teacher’s guidance on reading practice

In fact, students themselves are responsible for their own learning In addition, teachers also need to innovate methods of teaching in the direction of competence development for students and need to start from the 10th grade program

From the reasons mentioned above, I have studied the solution: “Adapting reading comprehension questions in English textbooks 10 global success in the direction of competence development to improve reading comprehension

2 Aim of the study:

The purpose of the study is to redesign the reading questions in the 10th grade English textbook towards the development of students' ability The study aims to accomplish the following objectives:

- To explore the effectiveness of adapted reading skills towards competence development

- To analyze the student's progress through the measures

3 Scope of the study:

- Scope of content: Reading Comprehension lessons in the 10th English

textbook program

- Scope of research: 42 students in class 10D2

4 New point in research results

- Promote the activeness and initiative of students in Reading Comprehension lessons

- Systematize the questions in English 10 textbooks (10-year system) in the direction of the final examination

- Contribute to innovate methods of competence development teaching for students in high school

oriented Help learners have more interest, enthusiasm as well as motivation with the subject

- Contribute to improve the score in the graduation exam through reading comprehension exercises designed to follow the final exam’s structure

PART B: CONTENT

Chapter 1: Literature review

1 Definition of reading skills

Reading is a familiar term in teaching and learning Reading is one of the English skills that are part of the four essential skills that include listening, speaking and writing However, different scholars define reading skills in different ways

Richards and Schmidt (2002) define reading skill as abilities required for skillful reading, such as discerning main ideas, understanding sequence, noticing specific details, making inferences, making comparisons, and making predictions in second and foreign language instruction, particularly with adults These skills are sometimes taught separately

Patel and Jain (2008) state that reading is understanding the meaning of printed words i.e written symbols Reading is an active process which consists

of recognition and comprehension skill Reading is an important activity in life with which one can update his/her knowledge Reading skill is an important tool for academic success

Gray in Patel &Jain (2008) classifies that reading is form of experience Reading brings us in contact with the minds of great authors, with the written account of their experiences Strickland, Galda, & Cullinan (2007) say that reading is a dynamic process in which an active reader engages with a text in order to create meaning This creation of meaning requires a greet deal of work

by the reader Reading is a visual process - vision is a symbolic process of seeing an item or symbol and translating it into an idea or image

According to Richard (2003), reading means using knowledge to understand, not just how to read written symbols Millrood (2001) defines reading as a visual and cognitive process of extracting meaning from a passage

by understanding written text, processing the information, and connecting it to existing experience He also pointed out that reading is a way of intellectual communication between people and society that they can use to sustain ideas, knowledge is converted into behavior

According to Josef Essberger, "Reading" is the process of looking at a series of written symbols and getting meaning from them When we read, we use our eyes to receive written symbols (letters, punctuation marks and spaces) and we use our brain to convert them into words, sentences and paragraphs that communicate something to us

Mareilon (2007) states that reading is making meaning from print and from visual information But reading is not simple Reading is an active process

reader combining information from a text and their own background knowledge

to build meaning (Nunan, 2003)

Based on the definition above, the researcher can make sum up that reading is receptive skill to understand printed words likes discerning main ideas, understanding sequence, noticing specific details, making inferences, making comparisons, and making predictions in second and foreign language instruction And also the researcher can say that reading is an ability to understand written English as it is presented in textbooks, newspaper, magazine,

menu, massages and in academic materials

2 Definition of reading comprehension

Reading comprehension is the ability to process what is being read, understand the meaning the author is trying to convey - both textually and

subtextually - and make inferences based on prior knowledge

Reading comprehension involves two levels of processing, shallow level) processing and deep (high-level) processing Deep processing involves semantic processing, which happens when we encode the meaning of a word and relate it to similar words Shallow processing involves structural and phonemic recognition, the processing of sentence and word structure, i.e first-order logic, and their associated sounds This theory was first identified

(low-by Fergus I M Craik and Robert S Lockhart

Al-Sa’oud (2002) states that reading comprehension is the final goal of any reading task As a result, he believes that the readers have to employ different reading strategies, knowledge of the content, and experience to comprehend the reading text and obtain the meaning Reading comprehension is considered the ultimate goal of reading According to Snow (2002), reading comprehension is an ongoing reading process in which the reader constructs the meaning from the printed text through an interactive process To Snow, reading comprehension requires three main components which vary in the phases of reading (pre-reading, reading, post-reading) These components are: the reader interacts with the text using his/ her abilities, various sources of knowledge such

as linguistic and discourse knowledge, and experiences, the text which might be

a printed or electrics text, and the activity which includes the reader’s purposes and process Along this line of thought, Woolley (2011), for example, defines reading comprehension as the process of extracting meaning from the text while Pakhare (2011, p.1) considers it as “the level of understanding of a passage or text" Gagen (2007) defines reading comprehension as an active, complex, and important process in which the reader interacts with the text using his/her vocabulary knowledge and reading strategies

As we know, the reading skill is one of the most basic skills in a foreign language learning and teaching, some foreign language teachers have continued

to teach reading just as silent reading or reading aloud This reason, may contribute to students’ weakness in English in general and in reading in specific are still weak in English especially in reading Using the most appropriate reading method that can develop students’ reading ability could be a solution to this problem

3 Reading comprehension skills

To ensure students that acquire students reading comprehension skills before they read the text, readers need to have other skills such as:

- Reading skills to find the necessary information (scanning)

- General skimming skills to get the main content (skimming)

- Ability to judge before reading

- Ability to Make Inferences and/or Predictions

- Ability to guess unknown words in context

4 Common types of question in English reading comprehension passages in high school

- Main idea questions

- Detail questions in the passage (detail questions)

- Details are mentioned in the article (stated detail questions)

- Unstated detail questions

- Vocabulary questions

- Inference question

5 Steps of teaching reading comprehension skills in the direction of students’competence development

The Reading Comprehension lesson is conducted in three stages:

a Pre - reading (Before reading)

b While - reading (While reading)

c Post – reading (After reading)

The general purpose of each stage:

- Before you read: create opportunities for students to identify the topic of the reading, introduce some necessary vocabulary to help students familiarize themselves with the reading

- While you read: develop students' reading comprehension skills Completing tasks during this stage helps students expand their vocabulary, develop reading skills, and understand content

- After you read: helps reinforce students' reading comprehension ability, and at the same time expands the topic they are learning with real life

II The situation analysis

1 The reality of teaching reading comprehension skills in Nam Dan 1 high school

From the fact, I found that the teaching of reading comprehension by the teachers in Nam Dan 1 high school still has some limitations Many teachers still apply traditional teaching methods such as presentations and lectures, but do not use active teaching methods such as applying information technology or designing games to increase students' interest Besides, in some Units (lessons)

in 10-year English textbooks, the tasks (Task) in the textbooks weren’t designed

as the format of questions in graduation exam However, in the teaching process, not all teachers redesign those activities This makes students passive in learning and creates boredom and loss of learning motivation Therefore, the practice of reading comprehension skills will not achieve the expected results Moreover, in the 10th English textbook program (10-year system), most of the question levels

of some reading comprehension activities is quite simple, not create a challenge and motivation for quite good students as well as improve and expand vocabularies for children

2 Student's interest in Reading Comprehension lesson at Nam Đan 1 high school

By surveying the students in grade 10D2 with questionnaire, we can see that, before participating in Reading Comprehension classes towards competence development, only 5 students out of 42 students ( accounting for 11,9 %) rated that they were very interested in Reading Comprehension, 10 students (23,8 %) commented that they were interested Most students have little interest in this skill 13 students (30,9%), and even no interest at all (33,3%) 14 students

The common reasons given by students are that this skill often has many long texts and many new words, so they are afraid and do not want to learn In addition, most students do not have the method to do the Reading Comprehension test, and do not have the skills to recognize the types of question In particular, the progress of Reading comprehension lessons is often too familiar and quite boring, the content of the tasks in the textbook (tasks) is quite easy They don’t create challenges for learners At that time, teachers did not really make a breakthrough in terms of lesson design Therefore, many students have not found much joy and interest in this lesson and the effectiveness of the Reading Comprehension lesson has not been good as expected

3 Data of survey

The results of the survey on students' reading comprehension skills before this experiential initiative has not been applied to the teaching, I obtained the following:

Medium (5 - 6)

Weak (< 5)

3 7,1 10 23,8 11 26,2 18 42,8

It can be seen that the number of students with quite good and good reading comprehension skills in class 10D2 only accounts for 30,9 %, many students in class have poor reading comprehension skill, 29 out of 42 get the scores under 6 the rest of the students mainly study English because this is a obligatory subject These data also shows me that they are still quite weak in reading comprehension skills, do not really love and have appropriate methods to do the exercises The students need to learn about how to do reading comprehension task effectively and need do more types of reading tasks which are suitable with the topics in their textbook

4.2 To the teacher

Most teachers have focused on innovating English teaching methods, but have not created interest and motivation for students In addition, in the teaching process, some teachers only pay attention to imparting knowledge but have not designed lessons which are suitable for the students' abilities

- Students in the same class are not equal in ability and level, so the available exercises in the textbook do not meet the need of training and improving reading comprehension skills for all students at different levels

- There are many Tasks (tasks) in the textbook that are not designed as the format of reading tasks with the reality of the new program, leading to low results in reading comprehension skills

III Measures taken to solve the problem:

To solve the problems most effectively, I combined 2 following solutions together

1 Specific instructions on how to identify and handle each type of reading comprehension questions for students

- Basic types of question in reading comprehension exercises

Question 1: Find the main idea of the passage

Question 2: Infer to find implications (Inference)

Question 3: Identify the information stated in the article (Stated detail)

Question 4: Identify information not stated in the article (Unstated details) Question 5: Find antonyms (Vocabulary)

Question 6: Find the word or phrase mentioned or referred to (Reference) Question 7: Identify where this information is mentioned in the article (Where questions)

These questions are divided into the following types

Type 1: Find the main ideas in the text

Main ideas questions

Kinds of

questions

What is the topic of the passage?

What is the subject of the passage?

What is the main idea of the passage?

What is the author’s main point in the passage?

With what is the author primary concerned?

Which of the following would be the best title?

What is the author’s main purpose in the passage?

Answer

Usually located at the beginning or end of paragraph If the main idea doesn’t appear at the beginning or at the end of the paragraph, we will leave it at the last after taking time to answer the detailed questions

Method

- Read the first lines of each paragraph

- Find the most common idea in the first line and find the connection between them

- While reading, pay attention to the key words that are repeated

- Usually do this question at the last time after answering the detailed questions firstly to save time

- Quickly skim the entire article to check if you have found the main content

- Type of options is definitely wrong, usually main idea (too general), (too specific) or (not mentioned)

- Choose the best option from the remaining options

Type 2: Infer and find implication

Implied detail questions

Kinds of

questions

It is implied in the passage that …

It can be inferred from the passage that

It is most likely that…

What probably happened….?

Answer

The answer to this question is usually based on their understanding of the text, but students can search in the order of the passage

Method

- Find the key words, the key of each question

- Skimming (skimming) skimming to see the key words, where the key ideas are in the passage (usually in the order in the text)

Read carefully the sentences containing key words and ideas

- Find the correct answer according to the passage

- Use the method of eliminating the most incorrect type of alternative, then choose the most correct answer from the remaining options

Type 3: Identify the information given in the text (STATED DETAIL QUESTIONS)

Stated detail questions

Kinds of

question:

According to the passage,…

It is stated in the passage…

The passage indicates that…

Which of the following is true…

Answer The answer lies in the reading

Which of the following is not stated ?

Which of the following is not mentioned ?

Which of the following is not discussed…?

All of the following are true except

Which of the following are false…?

Answer The answer will be information that does not appear in the

article or the answer is wrong compared to the article

- Eliminate the options mentioned or correct from the text

- Choose the option that is not mentioned or does not match the reading passage

Type 5: Find synonym and antonym (Vocabulary)

Vocabulary in context question Kinds of question What is the meaning of “X” in line “Y”?

The word “ X” in line “Y” could be replaced by … Which of the following word has the closest meaning

with the word “ X” in line “Y”?

Which of the following has the opposite meaning with

the word “X” in line “Y”?

Answer Based on the information surrounding the given word to

guess the meaning of the word Method - Find the word in the passage

- Read the sentence containing the word carefully

- Find clues in context to help understand the meaning of words

- Choose the answer that the context shows

Type 6: Find the word or phrase that is mentioned or referred to (Reference)

Reference questions

Kinds of question The word “ X” in the passage refers to…

answer Usually the words or the phrases are in the sentences

before or in the sentence containing the referenced word Method - Read the question and the options given

- Skim through the text to find the word referenced in the question

- Carefully read the sentence containing the referenced word and the sentence before it and look for the phrases listed in the answer choice

- Eliminate the options that are definitely wrong, choose the most correct option among the remaining options

Type 7: Identify where the information is mentioned in the text (Where questions)

Question about where in the passage

Types of question Where in the passage….?

Answer The answer will be a few consecutive lines in the text

containing the information in the question

Method - Identify the key word or main idea in the question

- Read quickly the options given

- Skim through the entire article to locate the keyword information in the question

- The answer choice is the place where the information in the question is stored

2 Adjusting teaching and learning activities of Reading Comprehension program English 10 (Global Success) in the direction of competence development and improve learning interest for students

Teachers redesign the types of questions and exercises in English 10 textbooks to best suit the abilities of their students, ensure to help them practice

in the most effective way Some questions in reading part are adapted to be suitable with actual situation in graduation exam Specifically, from UNIT 1 to UNIT 9 as follows:

UNIT 1 FAMILY LIFE – Reading (textbook English 10 - page11)

The questions in the textbook

The adapted questions:

1 What is the best title of the text?

A Doing housework helps children develop life skills

B Some necessary household chores for children

C Studies about doing chores toward children

D Benefits of doing housework to children

2 The word “responsibility” in line 2, paragraph 1 is closest in meaning to

A Chore B housework C duty D hobby

B

3 What do most people think about housework?

A It is the responsibility of parents

B It is the responsibility of wives and mother only

C It is the responsibility of husband only

D It is the responsibility of the whole family

4 The word “These” in line 6, paragraph 2 refers to _

A Their own families

B The important skills

C Taking care of others

D Cleaning the house

5 What are some important life skills children can learn when doing housework?

A Doing the laundry and cleaning the house

B Cleaning the house and taking care of others

C Doing the laundry and taking care of others

D Doing the laundry, cleaning the house and taking care of others

6 Which of the following statements about the benefits of doing housework to children is NOT true?

A It helps them develop important life skills

B It helps them learn to take responsibility

C It helps them develop their gratitude to their parents

D It helps them have more time to play and study

7 What do children learn as they finish household tasks that they don’t enjoy?

A To appreciate their parents’ hard work

B To take responsibility

C To show their gratitude to their parents

D To build their character

8 Why does sharing housework strengthen family bonds?

A Because children learn to appreciate all the hard work their parents do around the house for them

B Because children start treating doing household chores as special moments shared with their parents

C Because children can improve life skills and build character

D A & B are correct

UNIT 2 HUMANS AND THE ENVIRONMENT - Reading

(textbook English 10 - page22)

The questions in the textbook

The adapted questions:

1 What is the best title of the text?

A Green living

B Green issues

C Green environment

D Green products

2 Which of the following ways to adopt a green lifestyle is NOT true?

A Turning off electrical appliances when not in use

B Buying products grown by using harmful chemicals

C Reducing plastic use

D Recycling used items as much as possible

3 According to the text, what is the simplest/ easiest way to save energy?

A Turning off electrical appliances when not in use

B Buying organic food

C Cutting down on plastic use

D Recycling as much as possible

4 The word “It” in paragraph 2 refers to _

A Carbon footprint

B Energy

C The easiest way

D Turning off electrical appliances

3 Why is organic food better for us?

A Because it is safer and healthier

B Because it is healthier and more delicious

C Because it is safer and more delicious

D Because it is safer, healthier and more delicious

6 The phrase “cut down on” in paragraph 4 is closest in meaning to

A Reduce B Reuse C Redo D Recycle

7 In what way can we reduce plastic use?

A Bring a reusable bag when shopping

B Use refillable water bottles

C Use refillable water bottles and buy bottled water

D Bring a reusable bag when shopping and use refillable water bottles

8 Why does recycling prevent pollution?

A Because recycling reduces the need to collect new raw materials

B Because recycling reduces natural resources such as water and trees

C Because recycling reduces explosion

D Because recycling reduces energy

UNIT 3: MUSIC – Reading (textbook English 10 – page 31) The questions in the textbook

The adapted questions:

1 What is the best title of the text?

A American Idol – An exciting game show on TV

B American Idol – A TV singing competition

C American Idol – A live dancing competition

D American Idol – A popular programme on TV

2 When was American Idol shown for the first time on television?

A In January 2002 B In January 2012

C In February 2002 D In February 2012

3 The phrase “in search of ” in line 1, paragraph 2 is closest in meaning to

4 Which of the following statements is correct?

A From the semi-final onwards, people over 23 and living in the US can vote for their favourite singers

B From the semi-final, singers who can go to the next stage are decided by the audience vote

C The judges choose as many singers as they can

D People around the world can vote for the songs they like

5 Who wins American Idol?

A The singer with the highest number of votes on the final night

B The singer with the highest number of text messages

C The singer with the highest number of votes and highest score from the judges

D The singer with the highest score from the judges

6 Why do people watch American Idol?

A They want to see the singers’ performances and give different opinions

B They want to hear the judges’ comments and make interesting arguments

C They want to see the singers’ performances and hear the judges’ comments

D They want to give different opinions and make interesting arguments

7 Which of the following statements about the judges is NOT mentioned?

A They travel all round America to seek the best singers and bring them to Hollywood

B They give comments after each live performance

C They have different views about the singers’ performances

D They disagree with choosing ordinary people

8 The word “It” in the last paragraph refers to _

A The year 2007

B The world

C The first season of Vietnam Idol

D The music show

9 How many stages did the first season of Vietnam Idol include?

A two B three C four D five

10 What can be inferred about the competition in Vietnam?

A It was held a short time ago

B The audience decides who makes it to the final stage

C All the singers will be famous

D It can help develop participants’ singing careers

UNIT 4: FOR A BETTER COMMUNITY - Reading

(textbook English 10 – page 45)

The questions in the textbook:

The adapted questions:

1 Which of the following statements is correct?

A The club has organised various volunteer activities since it was formed

B One of the most popular activities of the club is selling machine-made

items

C The club welcomes similar kinds of donations

D Volunteering has helped the author lose life experiences

2 Who gets help from the money of selling handmade items?

A The local orphanage

B The homeless old people

C The local orphanage and homeless old people

D The children and the old people

3 The word “it” in line 2, paragraph 1 refers to _

A the volunteer club B the school

C local orphanage D community centre

4 The word “organize” in line 3, paragraph 3 is closest in meaning to

A help B hold C take D find

5 What does the club organise for the children at the orphanage?

A outdoor activities B Singing club

C After-school games D Concerts

6 Which volunteer activity is NOT mentioned in the text?

A Selling handmade items

B Donating clothes, picture books, unused notebooks

C Organising concerts for the old people at the centre

D Teaching children to read and write

7 How often does the club take the donations to the community centre?

A at the end of each month

B at the end of each year

C at the end of six months

D at the end of three months

A life experiences

B the opportunities to make new friends

C essential life skills

D the sense of purpose in life

9 What is the best title of the text?

A The formation of the volunteer club

B Some popular volunteer activities

C The meaning of volunteer work

D Benefits of volunteer activities to the community and students

UNIT 5 INVENTIONS - Reading (textbook english 10 – page 55) The questions in the textbook:

The adapted questions:

1 What is the best title of the text?

A Robots: The best Al inventions

B Al development over time

C Al in use today

D Al in education

2 The word “communicate” in line 3, paragraph 1 is closest in meaning to

3 According to the text, how many areas of life has Al been applied?

A one B.two C three D four

4 Which area of life can Al be used to measure the room size and recognise any furniture?

A At home B In transport C At work D In education

5 What is the purpose of using Al on many smartphones in transport?

A To collect/ gather information about traffic

B To measure the length of airline

C To find the shortest route

D To book flights and hotels

6 The word “It” in the last paragraph refers to _

A The 21st century

B The most important invention

C Al

D Computer program

7 Which of the following statements is NOT true?

A Asimo can walk down the stairs

B Sophia can show emotions when talking to humans

C Al helps to make machines that think and act like humans

D Al is one of the most important inventions of the 20th century

8 What can customers do with computer programs using Al?

A Plan their holidays and answer questions

B Book/ reserve/ order flights and hotels

C Plan their holidays and book flights

D Plan their holidays, book flights and hotels, and answer questions

UNIT 6 GENDER EQUALITY – Reading (Page 69) The questions in the textbook: