Luận văn effectiveness of guessing meaning from context in improving students' word attack skills at university of labor and social affairs

2.1.1 Definition of reading 212 Types of reading 2.2 Leaning strategies 2.3 Reading strategies 23.1 Definitton of reading strategies 232 Classification of reading strategies 2.4.3 Ef

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

Faculty of Post-Graduate Studies

DAM LAN HU

EFFECTIVENESS OF GUESSING MEANING FROM CONTEXT IN IMPROVING STUDENTS’ WORD-ATTACK SKILLS AT UNIVERSTITY OF LABOR AND SOCIAL

AFFAIRS

(Hiệu quả của việc đoán tử theo ngữ cảnh nhằm nâng cao kỹ năng xứ

lý từ mới của sinh viên trường Dại học Lao động Xã hội)

M.A Minor Programme Thesis

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology

Code: 601410

TIANOI - 2009

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

Faculty of Post-Graduate Studies

DAM LAN HUONG

EFFECTIVENESS OF GUESSING MEANING FROM

CONTEXT IN IMPROVING STUDENTS’ WORD-ATTACK SKILLS AT UNIVERSTITY OF LABOR AND SOCIAL

AFFAIRS

(Iligu qua của việc đoán tử (heo ngữ cảnh nhằm nâng cao kỹ năng xử

lý từ mới của sinh viên trường Dại học Lao động Xã hội)

M.A Minor Programme Thesis

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology

Code: 601410

Supervisor: Nguyén Huyén Minh, M.A

TIANOI - 2009

1.1 Background to the study

1.2 Statement of the problem

1.3 Purposes of the study

1.4 Scope of the study

1.5 Method of the study

1.6 Design of the study

CITAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 What is reading?

2.1.1 Definition of reading

212 Types of reading 2.2 Leaning strategies

2.3 Reading strategies

23.1 Definitton of reading strategies

232 Classification of reading strategies 2.4.3 Effect of reading strategies on reading comprehension 2.4 The strategy of guessing meaning from context

244.1 What is context?

242 What ix guessing from context?

243 Factors affecting students’ success in guessing meaning from context

244 Approaches to teaching of guessing strategy

245 Review of related studies CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS

3.1 The setting of the study

3.2 Subjects

3.3 Instruments

3.3.2 Questionnaires 3.4.2 Pre-test and post-test

3.3.3 Interviews

3.4.4 Observations 3.4 Materials and the Instruction programme 3.5 Procedure of the study

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

CITAPTER 5: CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

APPENDICES

k

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

EFL; English as a Foreign Language

ESL: English as a Second Language

FSP: English for Specific Purpose

Ll: First Language

ULSA: University of Labor and Social Affairs

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Results of pre-test and post-tast

‘Table 2: Students’ attitudes towards reading comprehension and the strategy of guessing

Tearing from context

Table 3: Students’ opinions on the effectiveness of the programme

Table 4: Overall students’ guessing strategies for two passages

Table 5: Tow level group's guessing strategies

Table 6; Intermediate level group’s guessing strategies

‘Table 7: High level group’s guessing strategies

CHIAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

This chaptor provides an overview on the background of the study, the stalemuon! of problam, 4 brief of the purpose of study, methodology of the study, followed by an ovarmew of forthcoming chapters

1.1 Background to the study

Since 1986 when the Vietnamese government implemented open door policy, English has gained more significance and heen considered as an important tool for Vietnam’s integration into global world Thus, the government has paid more and more attention to the teaching and learning of English at schools, colleges and universities English has rapidly become the most

popular s

information ftom different sources including scientific and literary books and journals as well

as the internet websites in an English as a Foreign Language (ETL) context, which helps to

cond language among Vielnamese people TL is a tool for getting access to

bring them opportunities lo enrich their knowledge in particular and to improve their falure

prospect in general

Reading is a process which contributes to success in learning a foreign language and good language Iearners are considered to be good readers In order to become good or successful readers, students need to be equipped with the skills to comprehend the reading texts Reading slralggics are siid in ficitilate succossfal sceand language leaning and be effcotive tools for students to develop thei reading skills, To help students master these reading strategies, instruction on reading strategies is said to be essential However, empirical research indicates

that in most reading classrooms students have received inadequate instruction on reading skills and strategics There is a lack of connection between instruction and reading activity The teacher's emphasis is often put on the production of comprehension rather than the processing skills This reality called for the inlegration of reattimg strategies into reading instruction io help students become more strategic readers

Of all the reading strategies commonly recognized today in second language reading, guessing fiom context seems to be one of the most valuable but difficult strategies for second language students to master It was found out that they were offen reluctant to engage in the guessing

proce:

sas thy proferred first language (1.1) translations Furthermore, stndents do not have sufficiont skills Io derive the meaning of unknown words or phrases [hai they meet during reading comprehension process, Their guessing skills are often poor, especially where context clues are not in the immediate textual environment Therefore, guessing strategies for

unknown words has becn stongly emphasized

1.2 Statement of the problem

Reading comprehension is essential to academic learning areas, to professional success and to lifelong learning University students can not achieve success in reading comprehension without masteting reading strategies in general and the strategy of guessing from context in dcaling with reading texts in particular

At University of Labor and Social Affairs (ULSA), Linglish for Specific Purpose (SP) syllabus mminly focuses on reading skill Yet many studenls have nol succeeded in their reading texts, which contain lots of professional words This is partly due to the fact that they lack the skills to cope with unknown words, or in other words, they are not equipped with the

siralegy of guessing from context

This fact raises the question on the necessity as well as the effectiveness of instruction on the strategy of guessing meaning from context for improving reading skills for students at UI.SA

1.3 Purpos

of the study Therefore, the main purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of instruction

programme on thy stralogy of gusssing from context for improving sludants’ word-allack skill and reading comprehension in teaching reading for second-year ESP students at University of Social and Labor Affairs In addition, since this study was conducted in a university general

English reading class where students’ reading proficiency was mixed, the second objective of this study was to find out how students with different reading proficiency are influenced by

the instruction programme

The following specific research questions were addr

1) Does instruction on the strategy of guessing fiom context enhance second language students’ word-attack skill in particular and reading ability in general?

2) How to empower students to become more self-directed and cffoctive in their learning

of guessing strategy?

1.4 Scope of the study

The study is focused only on the second-year students at ULSA who begin to have ESP lessons ‘The subjects of the study were chosen at random and various among 68 second-year

students of ULSA Yel, the sturly results carmol be true to all Vietnamese students Thus, my

recommendations for teaching and learning the strategy of guessing from context might work

well only for ULSA teachers and students, and for the ones who are teaching and learning at such universities with similar English syllabus or education training, or for the ones who

concern

1.5 Methodology of the study

This study employs both qualitative and quantitative methods An explicit instruction programme on the strategy of guassing from context was conducted in addition to regular English curriculum Data fiom questionnaires were eollceted to study the students’ changes in attitudes towards the strategy of guessing from context A pre-test and post-test were done to study the actual performance of students in the use of the strategy before and after the

1.6 Design of the study

‘The research consists of four main chapters: Introduction, Literature Review, the Study and

Conclusion

Chaplor 1, Introduction, presents the background and statement, of the problem, the purpose, and the design as well as the scope of the study

Chapler 2, Tileralure Review, discusses issues of reading, reading processes, major

approaches to teaching reading, reading strategies in general and the strategy of guessing

meaning from context in particular

Chapter 3, Ri

including the population information, instrumentation, and data collection and data analysis,

arch Design and Methods, explains the methodotogy usod im the study

Chapler 4, Findings and Discussion, reporls the fndin

Chapter 5, Conclusion, offers a summary of the findings and fiuther implication for using the strategy of guessing from context in teaching reading skills

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter provides an overview of the topic, review of related studies, The three main features will be presented are: theoretical background of reading, reading strategies, and the

strategy of guessing meaning Gor context

2.4 What is reading?

2.1.1 Definition af reading

Trachtionally, reading is seen as a mere process of decoding of reconstructing the author's intended meaning via recognizing the printed letters and words, and building up a meaning for

atexl from the srualicst textual units at the boltern (letters and words) to larger unils al the lop

(phrases, clauses, links) Problems of second language reading and reading comprehension were viewed as being essentially decoding problems, deriving meaning fiom print Ilowever, this view has been changed during the past few decades (Cartel, 1988, p.2)

Nowadays, even though there have been a variety of definitions of reading, they all share a common view that reading is an interactive process hetween a reader and a text which leads to automaticity or reading fluency Reading is also seen as a creative process in which “the reader interprets a message in the light of his previous knowledge, predicts and anticipates subscquonl rhetorical strategy and information, sclecls information relevant to his reading purpose, matches information with his previous knowledge and experience, evaluates it in the light of that knowledge and then applies this information to new experience” (Goodman, 1967, p.259),

In this process, the reader interacts dynamically with the text as he/she tries to elicit the meaning and whers various kinds of knowledge are being used: linguistic or systematic knowledge (rough bottom-up) process as well as schematic knowledge (Umough lop-down processing) (Alyoussef, 2005) And Carrel and Eisterhold add that in this interactive process, both bottom-up and top-down processing occur simnitzncously al all levels Hoilom-up

process ensures that the listeners/readers will be sensitive to information that is novel or that does not fit their ongoing hypotheses about the content or structure of the text; top-down process helps the listenersreaders to resolve ambiguities or to select between alternative possible intarprctations af ths incoming dala (Carrel and Fisterhold, 1983, 7.557)

necessary to generate productive expressions in second language (Paran, 2003, p.40)

The advantage of intensive reading is that it focuses the student on certain aspects of the language However, intensive reading is usually done with difficult texts with many unknown words thal roquire the stndenl lo use a dictionary This means the reading is slow and thal there are few opportunities tor the student to learn to read smoothly, because she has to stop every few seconds to work on something she can't understand ‘his slows or prevents the development of flisnt eye movements that are so necessary to improve one's reading skill Intensive reading is the most typically taught method of teaching reading Unfortunately some teachers only know this method and believe that by teaching the vocabulary and grammar that

is all the student needs This is not so, she also needs practice in reading and to he trained in developing reading skills

Lxtensive reading

Another lype of reading is “ơ = roading” There have boon conflicts about the definition

of the term “extensive reading”, Some refér it to “skimming, and scanning activities”, while

others associate it to quantity material Susser and Robb (1990) define “extensive reading” as

a language tcaching/Icarning procedure that it is rcading (a) of a large quantity of material or ong texts; (b) for global or general understanding; (c) with the intention of obtaining pleasure from the texl, Dormes also strares the same idea about definition of “extensive reading” as Susser and Robb, stating that it is an approach in which readers self-select matenals fom a collection of graded readers (books which have reduced vocabulary range and simplified

grammatical structures)

Extensive reading has several aims, which include encowagmg second language readers to read for pleasure and information both inside and outside the classroom, to read for meaning, and to cricourage in sustained silent reading He also points out benefits of extensive reading Extensive reading improves second language readers’ comprehension, promotes their vocabulary knowledge development, and enhances their writing skills and oral proficiency Extensive reading is also effective in facililaling growth of readers’ positive altitndes loward reading and increasing their motivation to read With specific reference to reading fluency development, extensive reading has shown to be effective in increasing reading speed and comprehension (Bell, 2001)

Hedge also pointed out lots of advantages of extensive reading It not only helps to develop roading ability and but also cnablss students lo achicve their indspendeney by reading cither im class or at home, through sustained silent readmg in the way that “Students can build thei: language competence, progress in their reading ability Become more independent in their

studies, acquire cultural knowledge, and develop confidence and motivation to carry on their learning (Hedge, 2003, p.204-205)

It can be seen that both approaches have important roles to play in helping students gain Musney, first in the critical area of vocabulary and word recognition, and then in developing better reading comprehension skills Thus, it is suggested that a well-balanced second language reading program should include three main foci: vocabulary development activities,

As Wenden (1987) statzs the term “learnor/lcarning strategies” refers lo language learning

behaviors learners actually engage in to learn and regulate the learning of a sccond language For Oxford (1996), learning strategies are important for language learning and they are specific actions Laken by the leaner lo make learning easier, faster, inore enjoyable, wore self directed, more effective, and more tuansferable to new situations According to Ahmed (1989; cited in Lawson and Llogben, 1996, p.106), good learners not only use more strategies, but they also rely more heavily on different strategics than the poor learners

Learning strategies are classified as metacognitive, cognitive or socio-afivetive strategies

Metacognitive strategies involve thinking about the learning process, planning for learning, monitoring of learning and selfevaluation of learning, cognitive strategies involve manipulation or transformation of the material to be learned, i.e, the learner interacts direetly with what is to be learned; and socio-affective strategies deal with social-mediating activity and transacting with others (Brown, 1994} Oxford (1990) has divided leaming strategies into two general classes: direct (memory, cognitive and compensation, etc.) and indirect Gnelecognilive, affective and social) She claims that these lwo slratogics are closely comected and support each other

©’ Malley (1987) points out that good language leamers use a variety of strategies in their

learning ofa sccond language and thal less competant learners tight improve their skills in a

second langnage through traning on strategies Thus, they can apply strategies to The acquisition of different lanpuage skills, and explicit strategy training, should be applied to them 2.3 Reading strategies

Over the past three decades the importance of the stratggics FST stndonts uss while roading has been recognized Nowadays, most researches on reading focus on the effective reading, strategies that increase students’ comprehension ‘Ihe common results showed that there is a positive relationship between stratcgics and reading comprehension Success in reading mainly depends on appropriate strategy used and unsuccessfiul students can improve their reading by being trained lo use eflective strategies (Danseean, 1985) Carrell (1983) alsa

stated that reading strategies can be taught to students, and when taught strategies help

improve student performance

2.3.1 Definition of reading strategies

So, the question is “What are reading strategies?” There is a lack of consensus about the definition of the term “reading strategigs” According to Black, reading strategies indicate how readers conceive a task, what textual cues they attend to, how they make sense of what they read, and what they do when they do not understand (Block, 1986), Also, they suggest how

readers view interaction with written text and how strategies are related to text comprehension

Garner (1987) defined reading strategies ax an action or scrics of actions omployed io construct meaning Barnett (1989) used the term “treading strategy” to refer to the mental operations involved whsn readers purposefully approach a text to make sense of what they read Inthe light of these concepts, the working definition of “reading strategies” in my study

is that specific actions consciously employed by the student for the purpose of reading

2.3.2 Classification of reading strategies

‘The classification of reading strategies may range from very broad one such as skimming and scanning to very sophisticated one including guessing and recognizing text structure, from

simple fix-up strategies such as re-reading difficult segments to more comprehensive strategies such as summarizing and relating what is being read to the reader’s background knowledge (Janzen, 1996) Oxford (1990) classified reading strategies into six types including cognilive, memory, compensation, metacognitive, affective and social stralegics Another author also chssificd tcailing stralogics inlo six types, including recogniving text type;

recognizing text structure; predicting or summarizing the context of the text; making guesses;

using the context to determine the meaning of unknown words and analyzing the word form of unknown words (Patterson and Van Patterson, 1981) Pritchard (1990) compiled taxonomy of

22 reading strategies in five categories: developing awareness, accepting ambiguity,

cslablishing inlrascntonlial ties, establishing intersentontial tics, and using background knowledge For many researchers, defining the strategies is not an end in itself, They recommended the integration of reading strategies into regular classroom reading instruction They advocated a shifl of emphasis tom the prodnets of comprehension lo the process of

comprehension In other words, teachers should teach reading strategics and techniques rather

than test comprehension

2.3.3 Impact of reading strategies on reading comprehension

An impressive number of empirical investigations have established a positive relationship belwcon slralegics and reading comprehension, For instance, Brooktank, Grover Kultherg, and Strawser (1999) have found that the usc of various rcading strategics improved the students’ reading comprehension Certain studies in second language contexts have shown that reading comprehension may be altributed to the level of the effective use of reading strategies (Braum, 1985, Dermody, 1988), Other studies that have investigated the relationship between reading strategies and success in comprehension by speakers of other languages have

studi

produced interesting resulls, The have domonstratzd that different text types may call for the use of different reading strategies Studies examining the reading strategies of both good and poor readers have shown a différential use of strategies pertaining to text type Golinkoif (1975) has slated thal poor readers peruse all types of lexis in the same tanner Sunilarly, Jimenez, Garcia and Pearson (1996) show that less suecesstid bilingual readers read

both narrative and expository texts in similar ways Furthermore, researchers argue that the strategies preferred in the beginning stage of learning are not the same as those preferred in the advanced stage (Iakeuchi, 2002)

2.4 The strategy of guessing fram context

One problem encountered by many readers is unfamiliar vocabulary, Guessing using context clues has been suggested by researchers as a solution to that problem, It is an essential and good strategy for students to deal with reading texts while they can not, through vocabulary programme, acquire sufficient amount of vocabulary which is one of the most troublesome aspects of reading for second or foreign language tears

2.4.1 What is context?

‘Traditionally, context was seen as a given, existing filly and completely in any properly writien lot, and the key to using iL was linguistic knowledge However, this definition is claimed to place too much emphasis on linear, bottom-up processing Thus, various definitions

of context have been proposed that include language knowledge but emphasize the role played

by high-level knowledge sources and personal experiences

According to Dycus (1997), context, at a basic level, can be defined as information that

reduces uncertainty about Ihe elements of a texl, their meanings, and the meaning of the text as

a whole

Dycus (1997) classified context into local context and global context According to Dycus, local context is provided by intrascntential and scntential information while global context is provided by intersentential to discourse Jevel information and world knowledge He also added that if is useful to distinguish between these two types of context, especially regarding

Sinatra and Dowd (1992) have another way of classification that divides context into two types: syntactic clues and semantic clues The syntactic clues were related to grammatical structure whereas semantic clues invelved intra- and inter-sentence meaning relationship Thoy argued that by underslanding how the writer used grammar, the reader would have a direct key lo unlocking a word’s meaning The reader should also use somatic eles such as restatement, use of examples and summary clues when guessmg the meaning ofa new word,

Haustrup (1991) suggesis thal language learners possibly use three sources of guessing: contextual, intralinyuad, and wuertingual cues Contextual clues refér to one or two words

from the immediate co-text of new lexicon, the entire sentence context containing new lexical

items, or a specific aspect of eo-text beyond the sentence in which the new word may help in global understanding of the whole text Intralingual clues have to do with the morpho- syntactical and phonological features of the new word in which the learner utilizes his general information aboul phonalagy, orthography, morphology, word class and collocation to guess the meaning Interlingual prompts relate to a language other than the second language, ¢.g., the learners’ first language Interlingual prompts are used by Jeamers when they rely on their knowledge of their molher tongues or another language (hey have acquired to extrapolate or guess the meaning of a word in their second language

Brown and Yule sce thal “context” inctndes the reader's “internalization” of the surrounding text, i.c., the reader’s “mental mode!” of the word’s “textual context” (or co-text”) integrated with the reader’s prior knowledge (including the reader’s knowledge of language and meaning hypotheses developed by the reader from prior encounters with the word), but it excludes extemal sources of help such as dictionaries or people (Brown and Yule, 1983, p.46-50)

In investigating the role of prior knowledge, Beck pointed out that “the context that swrounds

a word in text ean give clues to the word’s meaning”, but a passage is not a clue without sonic other information to interpret it as a clue, ‘This implies that the clues in the text need to be supplemented with other information in order for a meaning to be figured out ‘This supplemented information must be supplied by the toader’s prior knowledge which right

ineluđe general “worlẩ” or cutural knowledge, and it might or mmight not incluđe the

“background” knowledge that the author assumes that the reader will have

‘The “context” that the reader uses ta figure out a word’s meaning is not just the textual context,

bul a wider context consisting of the reader’s available prior knowledge “inlegrated’ with the reader's “internalization” of the co-text (Beck et al., 1983), While wider context is used to figure out a meaning for an unfamiliar word, for the purpose of understanding the passage

conlaiming it, lextual cơntssd is used to help teach “the meaning” af the word Thess two

do not always coincide, especially of the latter includes as one of its goals the student’s ability

to use the word

Beck et al.’s classification divides all co-texts into two types, that is, “natural contexts” and

“pedagogical contexts” The former one refers to the contexts provided in fiction and information writings, such as newspaper articles and reports, which alone are not sufficient to help students gucss correetly the mcaning of the unknown words, while the later onc refers to those specifically designed for the training of the strategy of guessing from context (Beck et

al, 1983) Natural co-texls are divided info four calegories, wamely misdireotive co-texis,

nondirective co-texts, general co-texts and directive co-texts

To conclnde, these various factors operate simultaneously for proficient readers; they usually

operale quile unconsciously, and they can affeel the identification of single words as well as

the reader's understanding of an entire text The automatic use of context - of multiple contexts

- is a orncial part of the reading process, though most people don't realize it

2.4.2 What is guessing from context?

‘The notion of guessing from context arose fiom the analogy between LI and L2 reading According to Oxfard (1990) guessing is a compensation strategy which enables learners to use the new language for either comprehension or production despite Limitations in knowledge Haastrup (1991) claim that guessing is a cognitive strategy since cognitive strategies are the slops or operations uscd in Iemning or problom solving that toquirs dirccl analysis,

transformation or synthesis of learning materials and it does not automatically lead to learning,

although it has the potential for doing so

As Oxford (1990) states guessing strategies involve using a wide variety of clues - linguistic

or nonlinguistie- to guess the meaning when the learner does not know all the words She adds that good language leamers, when confionted with unknown expressions, make educated guesses On the other hand, less adept language learners often panic, tune out, or grab the dog- cared dictionary and try to laok up cvery unfamiliar word — harmful respons

s which imped progress toward proficiency

defines guessing from context strategies as any cognilive or melacognilive activity that

the learner turned to for help while trying to derive the meaning of the unknown word from context According Pressley and Afferbach (1995), three main categoties of strategy types are identifying, evaluating, and monitoring strategies Identifying strategies were defined as those

that the learners used to identify the meaning of the new word in the text Zvaluating strategies

were those that learners used to evaluate and check the accuracy of their initial guesses A slralegy was coded as neorizoring when Ihe learner showed an awareness of the walure of the

problem by making an explicit judgment about the ease or difficulty of the word based on the

available cues in the text While both identifying and evaluating are cognitive strategies,

inoniiloring is 4 melacogmilive strategy

A number of studies have indicated that this strategy is effectrve and offers many advantages over laborious, time-consuming, methodical instruction in vocabulary and collocation Furthermore, it involves gencrativable skills of interpreting surrounding text, predicting, and testing predictions while reading, which enhance reading skills as a whole (Nation and Coady, 1988) However, the effect of this strategy varies among different groups of students According to Carter (1987), the more advanced leamers are “the more likely they arc to

benefit from learning words in context” (Lawson and Hogben, 1987:106) And the guessing

method works well with learners who have good problem-solving skills (Hulstjn, 1992,

„1Ð

It has heen claimed by some researchers that guessing ftom context is the most frequently used strategy in discovering the meaning of words, and new words can best be learned when presented in texts and when their meaning is guessred fiom context by leamers (Lawson and Hogb:n, 1996, p.10S) Bul some researchers claim that conlext docs nol always provide cnough information, and Isarners can make wrong guesses

‘The problem for most students when guessing the meaning of words in a second language is

that 11

are less confident ahoul their und: standing of the context than they would be in Ueir

native language Therefore, they tend to rely on the context less For this reason, vocabulary

“guesswork” should be integrated as often as possible into text-based activities, such as reading for comprehension, and will be most cfivelive aller a general understanding of the text has been established,

2.4.3 Factors affecting students’ success in guessing meaning from context

It is most convenient to develop the strategy through reading and there are several

prerequisites if guessing is going to be successful According to Nassaji (2004) factors

affecting suc

that contains the word, the degree of textual information available in the surrounding context, the learner’s ability to make use of extra-textual cues, the importance of the word to

im guessing meaning fram context inchade the nature of the word and the Lex

comprehension of the Leal, the degree of cognitive and imental effort involved in the task, and the lzarner”s attention to the details in the text as well as his or her preconceptions about the possible meaning of the word (Nassaji, 2004) Nagy (1997) also pointed the important rols of learners’ pre-existing knowledys which is classified inlo (hee main calogarics: linguistic knowledge, world knowledge, and strategic knowledge

Hirikel addled thal the stidaris must have dovelaped some skill in reading and should read a loi Ninety eight percent of the running words in the texts that are used for guessing should be already familiar to the students This means that there will be a substantial amount of comprehensible supportive context for each familiar word If these prerequisites are satisfied,

then training in gusssing can have useful effects Training can focus on the linguistic clues available for guessing the part of speech of the word, its immediate context, and its wider context of conjunction relationships — and on the background knowledge clues Because the

linguistic clucs are more oralizablo, these should gel more allention, bul succzssful

guessing depends on a combination of a kanguage item and a message focus (Hinkel, 2005)

Huckin and Bloch (1968) propose a model of guessing meaning from context that incorporates

several components including a knowledge module component and a metalinguistic strategic component, The former component includes a vocabulary knowledge module, a text schema module, a syntax and morphology module, and a text representation module, etc, while the laler component includes a sequence of cognitive and decision-making strategies thal the learner uses when trying to generate and test word meanings and hypotheses According to Huckin and Bloch, these strategies play an important role in guessing from context in that they

holp the Izamner dsvide when and how to proceed and scck help from cantoxt and various sources of knowledge available However, it should be noted in addition to above components, guessing meaning from context also involved a range of knowledge sources and strategies, thal is Ihe various cognitive the various cognilive and metacognilive activilics learncrs use when identifying and constructing word meaning from context The strategy many range ftom the internal structure of the word (such as analysis of the phanolagical and orthographic structure of the word) to those involving the use of top-down contextual and sentence-leval clues (Haastrup, 1991),

2.4.4 Approaches to teaching of guessing strategiex

Guessing trom context is a complex and often difficult strategy to carry out successfully, Although this strategy often may not result in gaining fiill understanding of a word meaning and form, guessing from eontext may still contribute to vocabulary learning Given the continuing debate about the effectiveness of guessing from context, teachers and students should experiment with this strategy

‘There are differenr approaches 1o teaching the strategy of guessing fom context, two of which are inductive approach and deductive approach According to Nation and Coady (1988, pp 104-150) teachers can train students the guessing strategy with a five-step inductive

procedure

1 Determine the part of speech of uiknown word

k Look at the immediate context and simplify it if necessary

3 Look al the wider contexl This cnlails axamining the clause wilh the unknown word and tts relationships to the swrounding clauses and sentences

4, Guess the meaning of unknown word

“ Check that the guess if correel

Liu and Nation (1986) suggest practicing this strategy as a class rather than an individual work And William (1986) advises that it be demonstrated on an overhead transparency or a chalk board by circling the unknown word and drawing arrows fiom other words that give clues tơ its meaning However, it seems that this inductive approach is only suitable with more advanced students because il requires bsUer linguistic knowledge from the studerts

Another approach adopted by Bruton and Sanmda (1981), deductive approach, is more suitable for younger students who possess less linguistic knowledge This approach may inchaeke 3 steps:

1 Guess the meaning of the word

2 Justify the guess using a variety of clues

3 Readjust the guess if necessary

Pearson and Gallagher (1983) proposed using the cycle of explanation-guided, practice- comective, feedback-independent, and practice-application Winograd and [lara (1988) hava proposed a five-step approach, including:

1 Lxplanation of the strategy

Tlow

Why

When and where to use the strategy and

km SelfLcvalualz the uso of thơ sIralegy

Bruion and §amuda (1981) proposed a 6-stage guessing procedure, which provided a

framework for teachers to follow:

1 Focus on the unknown word

k ‘Teachers asks for guesses and students hazard guesses

om

If nol any students clos L clues leading to approximate meaning

If any students close, justify choices

24.5, Review of related studies

A number of studies have investigated the effectiveness of the strategy of guessing meaning from context on the inprovernent of word-allack skill in particular and reading strategy in

general Three related studies (Mei, 2005) will be described in detail and discussed below

Mei (2005) examined the impact of direct instruction on the learning of the strategy of guessing from context and the use of the strategy in coping with unknown words in reading

materials among young local ESL learners ‘The instruction programme was conducted in two

English classrooms in a local average-ability school Data were collected from the students of these two chisses om their perception of their mastery of the strategy before and aller the instruction programme through questionnaires Besides, two achievement tests (the pre-test and post-test) were dons to compare the actual performance of students in the use of the

strategy before and after the instruction programme Qualitative đaia fom lesson abservstion and interviews with both students and teachers were collected to triangulate with the quantitative data The findings of the study show that students do benefit ftom direct instruction in the Jearning of the stralogy of guassing fron context, Thsir melacognitive awarcness of the stralogy was found groally enhanced The actual performance also supporls this conclusion, Data tom lesson observation and the interview with teachers suggest that the different beliefs of teachers had impacted greatly on the teaching approaches they adopted, which in tum determined the results of the student performance, The author suggested that

fixther studies on the content of direct instruction programme on reading strategies are worth

conducting, Ricsides, the inierplay of various teadlimg cues deserves through studies Finally, a longitudinal study will facilitate a deeper understanding of the effects of direct instruction on the learning of reading strategies

Another study done by Chan investigatad te effectiveness of the inferring stralogy in helpings Jeamers get the meaning of unknown words fiom the context through reading, It is found that inferring skills are usefull and there are some implications Virst and foremost, the inferring strategy lends to change the learners’ allilude towards vocabulary learning They have tried lo perceive vocabulary learning differently Having acquired the skill to inter meaning from the conlexl, the learners may find iL easier to tackle unknown words They also may Iry Lo work out the meaning on their own instead of consulting the dictionary, The inferring strategy is a usefitl skill which not only helps students in tests or examinations but also saves their time

Besides, the inferring strategy is one of the most important factors to facilitate vocabulary

leaming Leaming a language, lewmners always el frustrated when they come across some difficult items If they find a way to handle them, they would be more motivated, The inferring strategy help students “ease their pain’ when tackling unknown wards, and therefore, students would be mote willing to work out the meaning on their own One of the limitations of the

study is time-constraint ‘Therefore 4 lessons are surely insufficient to teach and practice the

students da not Inve inferring stralogy sin cnough opporlunities to develap the inferring

skill Therefore, for further studies, more tume should be allocated to study the effectiveness of

the inferring strategy

Nassaji (2004) examines the relationship between TSI

Isarners’ depth of vocabulary knowledge, their lexical inferencing strategy use, and their success in deriving word meaning,

from context Participants read a passage containing 10 unknown words and attempted to

derive the meanings of the unknown words from context, Tntrospaclive think-aloud protocols were uscd lo discover the degree and types of infercncing stralegios learners used The Werd- Associate Test (WAT) was used to measure the leamer’s depth of vocabulary knowledge Results indicate a significant relationship between depth of vocabulary knowledge and the dcgrce and type of strategy usc and success, They reveal that (a) those who had stronger depth

of vocabulary knowledge used certain strategies more frequently than those who had weaker depth of vocabulary knowledge; (b) the stronger students made more effective use af certain types of lexical inferencing strategies than their weaker counterparts; and (c) depth of vocabulary knowledge made a significant contribution to inferential success over and above the contribution made by the learner’s degree of stralugy use, These findings provide cmpirical support for the contrality of depth of vocabulay knowledge in lexical infsreneing and the hypothesis that lexical inferencing is a meaning construction process that is significantly

influenced by the richness of the learner's pro-cxisting semantic systorn

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS

This chapter describes the characteristics of the subjects, the research instruments and justifications, followed by a detailed description of the procedures of the study

3.1 The setting of the study

‘The study was conducted at University of Labor and Social Affairs (ULSA) which has four

facullics namely Accounting, Insurance, Labor Management and Social Work Since 2005

when the university was upataded ftom College of Labor and Social Affairs, it has been developed considerably both in terms of number of students and training quality ‘he aim of the umiversily is to provide skilled labor force for sociely ta mest the demand of industrialization and modernization process, especially labor force for sectors of labor management, social work and insurance

All ULSA authorities agrce that English is the key forcign language to help them reach their goal Therefore, teaching and learning English in this university is given nich consideration Several spooific inmovalions have been implemented in order to Taise Irairing qualily in their own comtexl, among which is the change of teaching and leming English at tho institution These attempts can be seen in the cumnculum of the university which allocates outmumber 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 sponl on the course book Lifctins Elementary and divided equally in the first and the second semester of the first year (each semester covers 75 class hows), In the rest 150 class hours, students must take linglish for Special Purposes (LSP) courses with the hook

"English for Labor and Social Affairs" compiled by the English Division of the university

For second-year students at ULSA, reading skill is important since their ESP curriculum focus mainly on reading LSP materials ‘hey have 6 periods of L'SP lessons every week With the aim of motivating studenls in their reading, Fnglish teachers a USA spend much tine

discussing to find ont the most effective strategies for teaching reading skill Many instruction programmes on reading strategies have been conducted and have positive impact on students’ reading skill performance However, this is the first time instruction programme on strategy of guessing fom meaning is carried out Thercfors, T mysclf conduct a study to investigate how cffective instruction programme on stralggy of guessing from context is in helping sindenls at different levels to improve their reading skill

As no placement lesls were administered to the subjects, Ihey differed in thsir English reading proficiency, In this study, subjects were piven pre-test and post-test Not all of the 68 subjects completed the tests; eighteen subjects did not take either of the tests ‘hose who did not complete cither of tle tests wore excluded frorn the statistical analysis, Based on the resulls of the pre-test, students were classified into three reading proficiency groups: low, intermediate, and high 15 students who received scores below 5.0 (out of a possible 10.0) were classified into the low level group; 25 students whose vocabulary scores fell in the middle of the distribution (grade equivalent scores from 5.0 to 8,0) were classified into the intermediate level group; and 10 students who obtained scores above 8.0) were classified info the high level group

3.3 Instruments

Four instruments - questionnaire, test, interview and observation - were chosen and employed

for the present study

3.3.1 Questionnaires

‘The questionnaires were issued before and after the programme to find out the extent of changes in the students’ altitudes towards the stralegy of guessing from context and what

words are unknown to most students

The first questionnaire had two parts Part 1 was devoted to collect opinions of students on

their attitudes towards the strategy of guessing from context befare the instruction progranme

In the second pat students were given a list of 50 words and the subjects were asked to circle all the unknown words that do not look similar to them Some words in the lists were carefully selected for the subjects inay nol know their meanings, according ta the Leachers” judgment; while other words were randomly chosen irom the students The students were not told that they would learn those words at a later stage or even would have tests on them, The result of the unknown words was collected and collated The first ten words that most subjects circle were chosen as target words for pre-test and post-test The second questionnaire was to collect opinions of students on perception of their mastery, awareness and attitude towards fisture use

of the strategy of guessing fren context afler the instruction programm,

‘The questionnaires were written in English ‘The Vietnamese version in Appendix 1 was the translated version for the use in this study Since wrilton in English, the questionmaires were conducted with teachers’ explanation in Vietnamese

3.3.3 Pre-test and post-test

In this study, two scparate tests, a pro-test and a post-test were carticd out before and after the instruction programme to learn about students’ actual performance on the use of strategy of

guessing meaning from context In both pre-test and post-test students were required to answer

a total of sixteen multiple choice questions It is recognized that a multiple choice format does not admit partial knowledge and furthermore, readers are constrained by the choices suggested

It did, however, allow an cslitnution of whether the readers knew words that they claimed to

know and there fa

indicated if subjects hd mistakenly assunned thal they know the meaning, ofa word but in fact did not know it completely, since this mistaken assumption 1s a major cause of guessing failure, according to Iluckin and Bloch (1993) The tests were conducted by the students’ respective ESL teachers in their classrooms so as to minimize the cnvironmental

alienation to the students

One day prior to the Waning, all subjects were given a pre-test which was based on their first- year achievement tests, Six weeks later, when the subjects finished the 36-how-long training, all subjects were given the same reading comprehension test as a post-test ‘The rationale for using exaclty the same test for bath pre- and post-Losting was lo assure an oxctly comparable test, thus avoiding the problem of equating, different forms of pre-test and post-test The six- week interval between administration was deemed long enough to control for any short-term memory offeet; since subjccls were not provided will the correc! answers aller the pre-test, even were they to remember how they had answered a question the first time, they had no way

of knowing whether thal answer was correct

3.3.3 Interviews

It is agreed that questionnaires are not sufficient for studying the use of guessing strategy

Therefore, 1 lave conducted interviews to probe mors deeply into the students’ and perceptions regarding the use of guessing strategy Interviews with students were devoted to collect students” opinions on how well they perceived themselves on learning the strategy of guessing from context and their attitude towards future usc of the strategy, Vietnamess was employed as the medium of communication in the interview so that ftee flow of ideas without language barrier was facilitated During interviews, the interviewees can be asked to clarify and claborate their thaught which enhances botler communication, Srmall-group interviews are

preferred to individual interviews ta reduce to possible anxiety Moreover, small-group interviews also seem to be more feasible under the time constraint of the study Twelve out of

50 subjects participating in the interviews were randomly put into groups of three or four, All

Tesponses from the inlarvicwoos were noted down immediately in the recard sheets as the

presence of a tapo-recorder may result in corlain degree of cmotional uneasiness among the subject Each anterview lasted for less than 15 minutes, Three questions were asked in the interviews No comments from the interviewer were given during the interviews The interview data was recorded, translated and then later summarized for qualitative analysis, The interview questions were as follows

1 Do you think you have used the strategy of guessing meaning from coniext to find the answers to the questions in the post-test? If so, can you tell me the way you did it?

2 Do vou think you have learned how to use of the swategy of guessing meaning from the

context after the instruction programine?

3 Do you think thiy instruction programme iy useful for you ta enhance word-atiack skill

and reading comprehension ability?

3.3.4 Observations

Observations ars used to find out the strategies students use fo guess meaning from context

Aflsr finishing training sessions on five guessing strategies, in the last week sludenls were given two passages of about 350-400 words in length Ten words in passage 1 and twelve words in passage 2 which students would be less likely to know were underlined, I'he text was

selevted with the

ssumption that the theme will be very farniliar to the participanls, eliciting

strong interest in the text They were asked to scan the passages and to guess the meaning of

the underlined words Then they were required to write what they thought the word meant, and told that they must also describe why and how they came to such an understanding, They were reminded that they could use their native language In cases where the readers knew the word already, they were instructed to note so ‘The strategies used by students of three proficiency levels were counted and their poreoniages were [hen Laken and cormpared

3.4 Materials and instruction programme

‘The subjects had the reading textbook, English tor Social Affairs, which had been provided by the university; however, linglish teachers were allowed to use any textbooks and materials and

to develop their own tests Thersfore, the teacher selected twelve

eading passages which would be covered duing the semester fiom a variety of sources, Five reading passages were drawn from the subjects’ textbook, and seven reading passages ftom popular writings or ESL

roading matorials, The roading passages were chosen on the basis of subjce! sarniod

hạ interest and for their readability because they did not contain any structure which was completely new to the subjects

The programme was conducted in 6 weeks There were altogether 12 training sessions in the programme, Each session was made an extension of either the shared reading lessons or the teaching of reading comprehension ‘The training sessions were conducted mainly in English

and supplemented with Vietnamese (the subjects’ L1) when necessary Each training session

was limited to 15 minutes as Sze (1998, p.41) suggested after conducting a series of pilot studies for tertiary students on (he appropriale time for instruction During the programme the

students were led through five strategies of guessing, meaning from context

* Guess using visual form (similarity or morphological understanding)

* Guess using association or collocation knowledge (1.e a clue word)

© Guess using sentence level gramumalieat context

© Guess using discourse context i outside the sentence in which the werd occurred

fusing forward or backward context)

© Guess using extra lextual (Ihomatie or world) knowledge

In every two sessions, the teacher demonstrated how to use each of five strategies to guess meaning ftom contexl, In other words, the students worked ltrough five cycles of the same approach as spocificd below, ensuring thal they had clear input and cnough consolidation to

help them master the strategies

Since the subjects in this study were mixed the dednetive approach ta teaching the strategy of guessing meaning fiom context was chosen The approach used in this study was modified from the approach of Bruton and Samuda’s (1981) guessing procedure which consisted of six

thinking-aloud the steps in guessing right the mearring of the unknown words making use of the immediate

context of the unknown words