NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS BOTTOM-UP AND TOP-DOWN READING TASKS: A SURVEY RESEARCH AT PHUC YEN COLLEGE OF INDUSTRY (PYCI)

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGE AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ***************** NGUYỄN THỊ THU THỦY NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS’

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGE AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

*****************

NGUYỄN THỊ THU THỦY

NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS BOTTOM-UP AND TOP-DOWN READING TASKS: A SURVEY RESEARCH AT PHUC YEN COLLEGE OF INDUSTRY (PYCI)

THÁI ĐỘ CỦA SINH VIÊN KHÔNG CHUYÊN ĐỐI VỚI CÁC BÀI TẬP ĐỌC HIỂU TIẾNG ANH CÓ SỬ DỤNG HAI MÔ HÌNH “TỪ DƯỚI LÊN” VÀ “TỪ TRÊN XUỐNG”: MỘT KHẢO SÁT TẠI TRƯỜNG CAO ĐẲNG CÔNG NGHIỆP PHÚC YÊN

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology

Code: 60140111

HANOI – 2014

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGE AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

*****************

NGUYỄN THỊ THU THỦY

NON-ENGLISH MAJOR STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS BOTTOM-UP AND TOP-DOWN READING TASKS: A SURVEY RESEARCH AT PHUC YEN COLLEGE OF INDUSTRY (PYCI)

THÁI ĐỘ CỦA SINH VIÊN KHÔNG CHUYÊN ĐỐI VỚI CÁC BÀI TẬP ĐỌC HIỂU TIẾNG ANH CÓ SỬ DỤNG HAI MÔ HÌNH “TỪ DƯỚI LÊN” VÀ “TỪ TRÊN XUỐNG”: MỘT KHẢO SÁT TẠI TRƯỜNG CAO ĐẲNG CÔNG NGHIỆP PHÚC YÊN

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

i

DECLARATION

I hereby certify that the thesis entitled “Non-English Major Students’ Attitudes

Towards Bottom-up and Top-down Reading Tasks: A Survey Research at Phuc Yen College of Industry (PYCI)” is the result of my own research for the Degree of Master of

Arts at University of Foreign Languages and International Studies, Hanoi National University, and that this thesis has not been submitted for any degree at any other universities or institutions

ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Prof Nguyen Quang, Ph.D for his experienced guidance, valuable suggestions, invaluable critical feedback and encouragement in the writing of this study Without his support, this thesis would not have been completed

My great gratitude goes to all the lecturers and the staff of the Post-Graduate Department for giving me valuable knowledge and helpful assistance

My thanks are extended to my students, especially the students in two classes TA2.LT1 and TA2.LT3, who provided me with enthusiastic cooperation and valuable feedback during my research conducting

Finally, this thesis is also dedicated to my family for their care and encouragement during the time I carried out this study

iii

ABSTRACT

This is a study of students’ attitudes towards Bottom-up and Top-down reading tasks in Phuc Yen college of Industry, Vinh Phuc The study is aimed at finding out the students’ attitudes towards reading tasks using bottom-up and top-down models Therefore,

the findings of this study can serve as the answer to a main research question: What are

PYCI students’ attitudes towards bottom-up and top-down reading tasks? The data of this

study are collected through questionnaires and interviews The data from the questionnaire are calculated in percentage for interpretation and analysis based on the theory of attitude The participants are 78 second-year students who come from different majors in Phuc Yen College of Industry taking English2 course as a general subject The findings of the study revealed that most of the participants showed their positive attitude towards both Bottom-

up and Top-down reading tasks; however, they put their positive attitude to the Bottom-up tasks and preferred to do these tasks more Through the findings, the research is expected

to give benefit to the students by providing them necessary information about their own attitudes towards reading, especially bottom-up and top-down reading Besides, the results

of the study also provide teachers with better awareness of their students’ attitudes From that, they will adjust their teaching to encourage and motivate their students in reading activities as well as prepare more interesting reading materials and activities that meet their students’ needs and interests

iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Declaration i

Acknowledgements ii

Abstract iii

Table of contents iv

List of tables and figures vii

List of abbreviations vii

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Research questions 2

4 Scope of the study 2

5 Methods of the study 3

6 Organization of the study 3

PART B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter One: Literature Review 1.1 Attitudes 4

1.1.1 Definitions of attitudes 4

1.1.2 Attitudes in language learning 5

1.1.3 Reading Attitudes 5

1.2 Reading and schema theory 6

1.2.1 Reading 6

1.2.2 Schema theory 7

1.3 Types of reading 8

1.3.1 Reading aloud 8

1.3.2 Silent reading 8

1.3.2.1 Intensive reading .8

1.3.2.2 Extensive reading 10

1.4 Models of reading process 11

1.4.1 Bottom-up model 11

1.4.2 Top-down model 12

v

1.5 Reading tasks 13

1.5.1 Pre-reading tasks 14

1.5.2 While-reading tasks 15

1.5.3 Post-reading tasks 16

1.6 Review of previous studies 16

1.7 Summary 17

Chapter Two: The Study 2.1 Context of the study 18

2.1.1 The teachers and the students 18

2.1.2 The course book used 19

2.2 Participants 20

2.3 Methodology 21

2.3.1 Instruments 21

2.3.2 Data collection procedures ……… 22

2.4 Summary 23

Chapter Three: Data Analysis and Discussion 3.1 Questionnaire 1 24

3.1.1 Bottom-up strategies 24

3.1.2 Top-down strategies 25

3.2 Questionnaire 2 25

3.2.1 Students’ general assessments of the reading tasks 26

3.2.2 Students’ perceptions of difficulties of the reading tasks 27

3.2.3 Students’ perceptions of the most useful stage in reading 27

3.2.4 Students’ attitudes towards bottom-up and top-down reading tasks in three stages 28

3.2.4.1 In Pre-reading stage 29

3.2.4.2 In While-reading stage 30

3.2.4.1 In Post-reading stage 31

3.2.5 Students’ preference of the teachers’ ways of teaching reading 32

3.3 Interviews 33

3.4 Summary 35

vi

PART C: CONCLUSION

1 Conclusions 36

2 Implications 37

3 Limitations and suggestions for further study 39

REFERENCES 40 APPENDICES I

Appendix 1 I Appendix 2 III

vii

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 1: Types of reading tasks (unit 9 to unit 14) in the Lifelines Pre-intermediate book Table 2: Characteristics of the subjects

Figure 1.1: Frequency of the bottom-up strategies used by PYCI students (N=78)

Figure 1.2: Frequency of the top-down strategies used by PYCI students (N=78)

Figure 2.1: Students’ general assessments of the reading tasks (N=50)

Figure 2.2: Students’ general assessments of the types of reading tasks (N=50)

Figure 2.3: Students’ perceptions of difficulties of the reading tasks (N=50)

Figure 2.4: Students’ perceptions of the most useful stage in reading (N=50)

Figure 2.5: Students’ attitudes towards bottom-up and top-down reading tasks in the reading stage (N=50)

Pre-Figure 2.6: Students’ attitudes towards bottom-up and top-down reading tasks in the While-reading stage (N=50)

Figure 2.7: Students’ attitudes towards bottom-up and top-down reading tasks in the reading stage (N=50)

Post-Figure 2.8: Students’ preference of the teachers’ way of teaching reading (N=50)

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

PYCI: Phuc Yen College of Industry

EFL: English as a Foreign Language

N: Number

Q: Question

BU: Bottom-up

TD: Top-down

to “access the wealth of information” (p.563) The more we strengthen reading skills, the greater progress we make in English learning as well as in other areas

Reading is not only a good source of information and enjoyable activity, but a valuable means of extending and consolidating one's knowledge of the language (Rivers, 1981) In my teaching experience, although I provided my students different reading strategies to improve their reading comprehension, they have still had a lot of difficulties in reading and doing reading tasks As Amiryousefi (2012) states that the problems that students encounter may be due to a number of factors such as “lack of appropriate reading strategies, lack of background knowledge related to the topic of the target text, lack of attitudes toward reading or lack of vocabulary knowledge to name a few” (p 1172) While

a lot of researchers have carried their studies on students’ reading strategies or ways of improving reading abilities, not many studies on EFL students’ attitudes towards reading in higher education, especially reading with particular models like bottom-up and top-down have been conducted In fact, students’ attitudes are very important in learning process as it

is one important factor affecting motivation in language learning (Oxford and Shearin, 1994) Having positive attitude towards learning, students will carry out their learning to the best of their ability and vice verse

Therefore, with a view to gaining some insights into students’ attitudes towards reading to ascertain what reading task (top-down or bottom-up) EFL students prefer to use and find out the students’ attitudes towards the two model reading tasks, the writer decides

to do research on “Non-English Major Students’ Attitudes Towards Bottom-up and

down Reading Tasks” It is hoped that the findings from this study will be of some benefit

to teachers and students at PYCI in teaching and learning reading

2 Aims of the study:

The primary aim of the study is finding out attitudes of the non-English major students towards bottom-up and top-down reading tasks at Phuc Yen College of Industry The author believes that positive attitude is very important in learning because if the students do not have positive attitudes towards a subject, technique and innovation used by teachers in teaching that subject seem to be likely worthless It is hoped that the results of the study will provide PYCI teachers with better understanding of their students’ attitudes, and then they can adjust their teaching to teach more effectively Moreover, the findings of the study will also be some help to PYCI students by providing them with necessary information about their own attitudes towards reading Then, they can know more about their ways of learning reading and adjust their learning to get better results

To achieve this aim, the study has the following objectives:

 To examine what strategies (Bottom-up or Top-down) are used by students

at PYCI

 To investigate PYCI students’ attitudes towards Bottom-up and Top-down reading tasks

3 Research Questions:

The research questions addressed in this study are:

1 What strategies (Bottom-up or Top-down) are frequently used by PYCI students in their reading?

2 What are PYCI students’ attitudes towards bottom-up and top-down reading tasks?

4 Scope of the study

This study is limited to the area of investigating attitudes of non-English major students in doing English reading tasks using bottom-up and top-down models at PYCI It

is not intended to find out the effect of the two models on students’ achievements in reading The study takes place within one vocational school; therefore, there will be no generalization of the findings for other places

5 Methods of the study

This study adopts a descriptive method, especially, the survey method with two questionnaires taken as the main instrument in collecting data Besides, follow-up interviews are also carried out to get better understanding of the students’ attitudes towards reading and give more accurate data to the study

6 Organization of the study

The thesis consists of three main parts: INTRODUCTION which provides an overview of the study, DEVELOPMENT which is the main part and consists of 3 chapters, and CONCLUSION which includes the summary, pedagogical implications,

limitations of the study and suggestions for further study

Three chapters in the main part are as follows:

research topic, which serves as a theoretical foundation of the study

participants, research approaches, data collection instruments, data collection procedures, and data analysis procedures

Chapter III: Data Analysis and Discussion is the main part of the study,

which reports and discusses the main findings according to the research questions

PART B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter One: LITERATURE REVIEW:

This chapter aims at providing a theoretical background to the study The review of the issues most relevant to be the focus of the study will be included: theory of attitudes, reading, reading tasks, top-down and bottom-up strategies in reading

1.1 Attitudes

1.1.1 Definitions of Attitudes

Generally, attitudes can be understood as people’s response to a certain thing such

as an object, an idea, a person or a situation Hogg & Vaughan (2005) define that an attitude is “a relatively enduring organization of beliefs, feelings, and behavioral tendencies towards socially significant objects, groups, events or symbols” (p 150) Fishbein & Ajzen (1975, p 6) state that attitude is “a learned predisposition to respond in a consistently favorable or unfavorable manner with respect to a given object” They also indicate that a person’s attitude towards an object affects the person’s intentions to perform behaviors relating to that object (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975)

Kerlinger (1984) has a similar view to the above researchers He states that attitudes affect people to have a certain tendency toward things around them such as environment, issues, and different kinds of ideas Attitude affects people’s emotion, motivation, and cognitive response toward certain problems and matters In other words, attitude is a special thought or opinion that people have when they face some problems or view certain matters Since we are different from each other, we certainly have different responses or attitudes towards something

The structure of attitude is constructed by three components mentioned by Mathewson (1994) They are affective, cognitive, and behavior components The first component is affective which refers to a person’s feeling/emotion about an attitude object

A person can express his opinion of “good-bad” about a particular thing It can be like or dislike The second component is cognitive which involves a person’s belief/knowledge about a thing such as particular person, idea, argument, and situation In other words, it is a set of thoughts or beliefs towards an object The last component is behavioral response, which refers to the way the attitude we have influences how we act or behave When someone has a certain thought or belief about something, he/she will behave or shows

his/her response in a certain way towards that thing In other words, people’s behaviour will normally be decided by what they thought and believe and this behavior can be acted positively or negatively depending on what is in people’s mind Therefore, it can be said that an attitude is a tendency to respond emotionally, cognitively, or behaviorally to a particular entity in a particular way towards anything

In this study, the writer would like to focus “attitude” as “learning attitude”, particularly, student’s attitude in learning reading To measure attitude in reading, Mathewson’s definition of attitude is considered an effective and reliable way This study, therefore, adopts the definition by Mathewson (1994) as its framework, which mentions three components: affective, cognitive, and behavior The reason is that it can cover the meaning of how the students think, feel and react to bottom-up and top-down reading tasks

1.1.2 Attitudes in language learning

Attitudes and learning have a close relationship A lot of researches have been proved that students with positive attitudes towards learning can go further in their study, while those with negative attitudes often fail in achieving their goals As Gardner and Lamper (1972, p 132) conclude “success in mastering a foreign language would depend not only on intellectual capability and language aptitude”, but also on “one’s attitudes towards representatives on that language” as well

According to Gardner (1979), there is obviously a mutual relationship between attitudes and motivation in language learning He also adds in his later research (1985) that positive attitude and motivation are related to success in second language learning If learners have positive attitudes, they will have motivation in their study and then can get better results Also, Champer (1999) asserts that when the learner has a positive attitude towards the language learning, their learning will occur more easily Positive attitude can enhance an integrative motivation, so enhance the proficiency as well

In conclusion, all researchers have claimed that students’ attitude is an integral part

of learning, and therefore, should be an essential component of second language pedagogy

1.1.3 Reading Attitudes

For a particular skill like reading, some researchers give their conclusions about the relationship between attitudes and learning reading Reading attitude is defined as “a system of feelings related to reading which causes the learner to approach or avoid a reading situation” (Alexander and Filler, 1976, p 1) Smith (1990, p 215) describes it as

As mentioned above, Mathewson’s three-component view of attitudes including affective, cognitive, and behavior show one’s attitude towards reading The study, however, focuses on the first two of the three components: affective and cognitive The behavioral component is not included because it will need much more time and effort to measure separately the behavioral response with the two models: bottom-up and top-down In this case, the behavior is understood as “the action readiness for reading” (Yamashita, 2004, p 84) For example, a person will regularly spend time to read books or newspapers when he/she believes that reading is important or necessary thing to do That is a kind of positive response In contrast, if one has negative thought or feeling about reading, he/she may show negative response to reading Therefore, it can be understood that students will act positively and negatively basing on what they believe or think about reading

1.2 Reading and Schema Theory

1.2.1 Reading:

There have been many definitions of reading defined by many linguists, psychologists, educators and second language researchers, but an exact definition of reading still causes some confusion

Goodman (1971, p 135) defines that reading is “psycholinguistics process by which the reader, a language user, reconstructs, as best as he can, a message which has been encoded by a writer as a graphic display” When reconstructing the message, the reader needs to use his/her background knowledge to communicate with the written text, so that the text could be comprehended Koda (2005, p 14) and Sweet and Snow (2003, p 1) have the same opinion They think that reading is a process of deriving meaning from the

He says, “written texts, then, often contain more than we need to understand them The efficient reader makes use of this to take what he needs, and no more, to obtain meaning”

In different view, Harmer (1989, p 153) only focuses on two actions dominated by the eyes and the brain when one reads He considers reading a mechanical process that “eyes receive the message and the brain has to work out the significance of the message” Later

in their study, Stephenson and Harold (2009) define reading as “a complex cognitive process dependent on integration between information processing/decoding skills and background knowledge combined with social experiences” (p 14)

In short, all the definitions above reveal one common feature, that is, reading involves the reader, the text, and the interaction between the reader and the text

1.2.2 Schema Theory

According to DiMaggio (1997), a schema “describes an organized pattern of thought or behavior that organizes categories of information and the relationships among them” (cited in Wikipedia) Anderson (1977) points out that schema provide a form of representation for complex knowledge and provide a principled account of how old knowledge might influence the acquisition of new knowledge Schema theory is applied to understanding the reading process According to the schema theory, the reader brings previously acquired background knowledge organized into interrelated patterns, or schemata, to the reading process Then the reader creates meaning by relating the text to this background knowledge, including knowledge of customs and beliefs from his or her own experiences

Schema theory states that readers will base on their knowledge of the world in order to help them understand what they read (Anderson, 2004) Alptekin (2003) identifies three types of schemata, which have an impact on reading comprehension The first one is background knowledge of the subject of the text called “content schemata” If the reader

has it, it is likely that the comprehension of the text will be easier, or vice versa The second one is prior knowledge of rhetorical structures and conventions called “formal schemata” such as cause and effect, comparison and contrast, problem and solution, and chronological order, etc.) The last one is “abstract schemata”, which refers to the social relationships and activities that happens in specific situations or cultures Students who are equipped with abstract schema can make use of the memory about the events and thus contribute to their comprehension

1.3 Types of reading

According to manner, reading can be classified into two types: reading aloud (loud

reading) and silent reading Each type of reading has its own characteristic

1.3.1 Reading aloud

According to Doff (1988, p 70), “Reading aloud involves looking a text, understanding it and also saying it Its purpose is not just to understand the text but to convey the information to someone else” Reading aloud, in one way, can be an advantage

as it enhances students’ ability to ''hear'' what they are reading It is a good way for beginners learning a foreign language to establish the connection between sound and spelling However, because of totally focusing on the pronunciation when reading, students tend to misunderstand the meaning of the text Moreover, it takes more time for readers to read out loud As Abott and Wingard (1981, p 82) mention “the reader is often merely mouthing meaningless language because of lack of rehearsal and time to comprehend what

he has to read aloud” Therefore, the usefulness of reading aloud is limited and reading aloud might be a good way for students to practice and enhance pronunciation

1.3.2 Silent reading

As suggested by Brown (1989), one will encounter intensive and extensive reading when he/she reads a text silently Intensive reading is used to teach or practice specific reading strategies or skills Extensive reading on the other hand, involves reading of large quantities of material, directly and fluently It may include reading simply for pleasure or reading technical, scientific or professional material This later type of text, more academic, may involve two specific types of reading, scanning for key details or skimming for the essential meaning

1.3.2.1 Intensive reading

According to Brown (1990, p 297), intensive reading "is usually a oriented activity in which students focus on the linguistic or semantic details of a passage" Long and Richards (1987) say intensive reading is a "detailed in-class" analysis, led by the teacher, of vocabulary and grammar points, in a short passage" Agreeing with this view, Brown (1989) explains that intensive reading "calls attention to grammatical forms, discourse markers, and other surface structure details for the purpose of understanding literal meaning, implications, rhetorical relationships, and the like." According to Nutall (2000, p 38), intensive reading involves approaching the text under the guidance of a teacher or a task, which forces the student to focus on the text For example, students have

classroom-to learn the new vocabulary and phrases, study the grammar rules and the structures of the context Then, after the teacher gives instructions, a test of the vocabulary, grammar knowledge and the text’s content is followed The objective of intensive reading is to understand not only what the text means but also how the meaning is produced Intensive reading has some characteristics They are:

a) Usually classroom based

b) Reader is intensely involved in looking inside the text

c) Students focus on linguistic or semantic details of reading

d) Students focus on surface structure details such as grammar and discourse markers e) Students identify key vocabulary

f) Students may draw pictures to aid them (such as in problem solving)

g) Texts are read carefully and thoroughly, repeatedly

h) Aim is to build more language knowledge rather than simply practice the skill of reading

Advantages and disadvantages of Intensive reading

Some advantages and disadvantages can be pointed out For advantageous points, intensive reading provides a base to study structure, vocabulary and idioms Besides, it provides a base for students to develop a greater control of language Moreover, it also provides for a check on the degree of comprehension for individual For the opposite point, there have been some disadvantages Firstly, there is little actual practice of reading because of the small amount of text In a class with multi-reading abilities, students may not be able to read at their own level because everyone in the class is reading the same material Secondly, the text may not be interesting to the students because it is chosen by

the teacher or already fixed Thirdly, there is little chance to learn language patterns due to the small amount of text Finally, because exercises and assessment usually follow intensive reading, students may come to associate reading with testing and not pleasure

Extensive reading involves skimming and scanning as strategies to gain general

sense of a text, skimming for the gist and scanning for some key details

Scanning

Scanning is a quick reading, focusing on locating specific information According

to Francois (1981), “when scanning, we only try to locate specific information and often

we do not even follow the linearity of the passage to do so We simply let our eyes wander over the text until we find what we are looking for, whether it is a name, a date, or a less specific piece of information” (p 19) Therefore, scanning involves quick eye movements until the reader finds the piece of information needed Before finding the information, the reader knows what the item looks like and so, knows when he has located what he was searching for There is a great range of text suitable for scanning - indexes, dictionaries, maps, advertisements, labels, reference material, etc

Skimming

Skimming is also a quick reading to get to know the general meaning of a passage, the structure of the text, and to get an idea of the intention of the writer Nuttall (1982, p.36) states, “by skimming, we mean glancing rapidly through a text to determine whether a research paper is relevant to our own work or in order to keep ourselves superficially

informed about matters that are not of great importance to us” Skimming is considered a more complex task than scanning because it requires the reader to organize and remember some of the information given by the author, not just to locate it

Advantages and disadvantages of Extensive reading

There are also some advantages and disadvantages of extensive reading The advantages can be developing students’ reading habit, gaining more confidence in reading and improving their attitude towards reading From that, they become motivated to read However, an extensive reading program may be costly and time-consuming to set up if materials are not already available Besides, students need to have easy access to texts within their language proficiency level An extensive reading program is easiest to establish when the students have a high level of second language proficiency For intermediate levels, students require a specialized library within their language proficiency range They need texts they can read without great use of a dictionary Finally, it may be difficult to keep students challenged to read more difficult texts as the program continues

To sum up, for second or foreign language learners, both intensive and extensive reading are of great importance as they act as a means not only to gain knowledge but also

to develop learners' language skills

1.4 Models of reading process

The reading process involves the text, the reader and the interaction between the two Theorists have proposed three basic models of how reading occurs (bottom-up, top-down and interactive) In the bottom up process, learners use their linguistics ability to work with a text, whereas in top-down process, learners activate their background knowledge and reflect it on the text they read The third models claims that a learner needs

to combine the two processes mentioned above In this study, the author only analyses two models of reading process: bottom-up model and top-down model to focus only on the reading tasks using the two models

1.4.1 Bottom-up model

The first and oldest approach to the reading process is the bottom-up processing, which can be said to be a traditional view of the reading process In bottom-up model, comprehension begins by processing the smallest linguistic unit (phoneme) and working towards larger units (syllables, words, phrases, sentences ), and proceeds from part to whole In other words, bottom-up process refers to deriving the meaning of the text based

on the incoming language data, from sounds, words, grammatical relationships, to meaning

In this way, reading is viewed as a passive process dependent on the written or printed text Nuttall (2005, p 17) also points out that reading is a process of identifying letters and words, figuring out sentence structures and then constructing a meaning from the printed words That means they use linguistic knowledge to understand the meaning of a text According to Nunan (1991), reading in bottom-up view is basically a matter of decoding a series of written symbols into their aural equivalents in the quest for making sense of the text The reader reaches at understanding, in bottom-up reading, first, by putting different text elements together; that is, letters and words until a chunk of data is created (decoding stage) Paran (1996) and Alderson (2000) have the same view when they agree that the bottom-up process of reading can be as a serial model where the reader begins with the printed word, recognizes graphics stimuli, decodes them to sounds, recognizes words, and decodes meaning

Students may use some bottom-up strategies in their reading performance like identifying the meaning of unknown words (by dividing them into their component morphemes and analyzing each morpheme separately), analyzing sentences grammatically for their syntax, tense, reference, punctuation… (to determine what is happening and how sentences are related to each other), paying attention to the body of text (looking for visual aids or examining general context to determine the meaning of unknown words and phrases), identifying a paraphrase that sums up a difficult word or phrase…

As Anderson (2008) concludes in his study “beginning-level readers should be exposed to a strong bottom-up component” and “with a strong foundation in bottom-up skills, beginning-level readers will become more-proficient readers more quickly.” (p 28), bottom-up reading model is considered an effective way for beginning English proficiency learners It is, however, criticized for its failure to account for the contribution of the reader, whose expectations about the text, which are informed by his/her knowledge of language and his/her prior background knowledge, are employed as part of the reading process Eskey (1973) also agrees that the decoding model is inadequate because it underestimates the contribution of the reader who makes predictions and processes information It fails to recognize that students utilize their expectations about the text based on their knowledge of language and how it works (p 3)

1.4.2 Top-down model

A top-down reading model, which is called a cognitive view, can be described as a complete contradiction of a bottom-up model Goodman (1970) calls it "a psycholinguistic guessing game", which is quite exact that the reader does not immediately concentrate on the elements of text, but makes predictions about the meaning based on his/her knowledge

of syntax and semantics Therefore, this model mainly focuses on the learners/readers

In top-down process, “The knowledge, experience, and concepts that readers bring

to the text, in other words, their schemata, are part of the process” (Dechant, 1991, p 25) Learners use their prior knowledge to make predictions about the text they are reading It is possible to say that it is easier for students to comprehend the passage if they have background knowledge about it When students are familiar with the topic, they are able to process it much better Whereas, if students have difficulties with it, they may not truly understand the text and finish the reading task well

The top-down model could involve skimming over an entire text (to locate important points and gain a general understanding of the text), identifying the discourse structure of the text (to locate important information), predicting desired information, relating pieces of information, making inference, analyzing of the author’s motives, combining the information presented in the text with their background knowledge…

Although considered a good way of comprehending a text, the top-down model of reading also has shortcomings Samuels and Kamil (1988, p 32) reveals that a reader will

be unable to generate hypotheses about a text if he/she has insufficient prior knowledge of the topic, so according to the top-down theory, reading process will not occur Eskey (1988) also emphasizes the limitations of the top down model by pointing out that this model is dependent on the prediction of meaning (by using context clues) and combining contextual clues with background knowledge, so this model is only useful with skillful and fluent readers and does not work well with less proficient readers Moreover, if a skilled reader can generate predictions, this would take much longer than it would to recognize the words

1.5 Reading tasks

In teaching receptive skills like reading comprehension, there are usually three main stages which consist of several tasks The tasks are based on the purpose we want to achieve in each stage Before analyzing each in details, we first see what good reading tasks are Nunan (1999, p 262) points out some characteristics of good reading tasks as follows:

- Typically make use of authentic and challenging text

- Provide students with a rhetorical or topical framework for processing and analyzing the text

- Frequently involve an oral reading of the text by the teacher or a student followed by silent reading and rereading of the text

- Involve students in direct analysis of the text instead of indirect question answering

- Frequently involve the transfer of information from the text to a visual or diagrammatic representation

1.5.1 Pre-reading tasks

The pre-reading tasks in a reading are often aimed at providing anticipation and activating the reader’s schema (Ur, 1996) They generally help students to

- Activate or develop prior knowledge

- Activate or provide knowledge of the text structure

- Introduce key vocabulary

- Establish a reason for reading

The pre-reading activities are considered as vital because they provide students with required background knowledge that will be needed to have a better comprehension when the students interact with a passage They are also useful for students to set up a purpose for reading With the pre-reading activities, students get familiar with the topic, vocabulary, or complex structures in the passage Moreover, pre-reading activities are important factors in motivating the readers to read the text, and when they are motivated, then they are prepared for the reading activity Thus, they can finish the activity better without spending too much effort and are more willing to take a part in the activity as they have gained confidence

Ur (1996) believes that pre-tasks make the activities more interesting because they let the students have a purpose in reading, and give the teacher a chance to see how well the text can be understood with the help of the tasks given before/after reading In pre-reading activities, the teacher should prepare different tasks by getting students think, write, and discuss everything they possibly know about the topic, applying techniques like semantic mapping, prediction, previewing, brain showering, etc Here is a summary of some tasks used to predict the content in pre-reading stage:

- Overviewing: read the first and the last paragraphs of the text to predict what it is about

In short, the pre-reading tasks prepare the learners for a reading selection, or give them the first steps in order to develop skills in anticipation and prediction for the reading, activating background knowledge so they could later interact better with the text With these tasks, teachers give students meaningful pieces of information that they would encounter in the reading

1.5.2 While-reading tasks

The aims of this stage are to help students to understand the specific content and to perceive the rhetorical structure of the text (Celce-Murcia, 1991) This stage is quite important because the tasks aid students developing reading strategies, as well as improving their control of the second language by decoding problematic text passages Given tasks may consist of guessing word meaning by using contextual clues, word formation clues, or cognate practice like considering syntax and sentence structure (by noting the grammatical functions of unknown words, analyzing reference words, predicting text content, reading for specific pieces of information, and even learning to use the dictionary effectively) With these tasks, teachers take the learners through the reading and they interact in the text

A few examples of while-reading tasks could be any one of the following:

- Identify topic sentences and the main idea of paragraphs

- Distinguish between general and specific ideas

- Identify the connectors (however, moreover, thus, etc) to see how they link ideas within the text

- Check whether or not predictions and guesses are confirmed

- Skim/scan a text for specific information

- Answer literal and inferential questions

1.5.3 Post-reading tasks

Post-reading stage consists of tasks in which learners, after interacting with the reading, reflect, argue and give their points of view Post-reading tasks help students understand texts further through critically analyzing what they have read

In this stage, the students have chances to check their understanding of what they have already read, as well as applying and using the information they have gained Moreover, the tasks in this stage also give the teacher a chance to judge and check the students' comprehension, clarify their understanding, which results in having comprehension beyond the literal level to the interpretive and critical levels

Thinking aloud, discussion, and summarizing are considered useful post-reading tasks As Karakas (2002) declares that using activities like summarizing, question and answer type of activities, and drawing conclusions, readers can comprehend the text better Thus, the teacher can create activities like asking the students to retell story with new endings, re-enact text; dramatize interviews based upon the text, and create role-play situations, etc

1.6 Review of previous studies

There have been studies highlighting students’ attitudes towards some aspects of learning reading Black (2006) investigates students’ reading attitudes across the primary years and finds out that “with a positive attitude towards reading engagement, students are more likely to engage fully in reading activities in a recreational or an academic context” (p 150) Measuring third through fifth grade students’ attitudes towards digital and print-based reading, Allen’s (2013) research indicates that the female students have more positive attitudes toward reading than males; “younger students do not have more positive attitudes toward reading than older students” (p 160); and students’ attitudes towards reading are not depended on their access to modern technologies (p 161) In comparison with the research related to early readers, research related to adolescent readers seems to fall short Sarawit (2009) do research on freshman students’ attitude towards reading in an international bachelor degree program in Thailand, the results show that, in general, there are slightly negative attitudes towards reading among all of the students but they have positive attitudes toward the SAP program (a reading program with short stories and articles selected for cultural diversity) It can be seen that most of the research mainly focus on students’ attitudes towards reading in general, little attention has been given to students’ attitudes towards particular reading tasks It can be found only two of recent

studies concerning with reading tasks They are Al-Ghonaim’s (2005) study about students’ attitudes towards reading-to-write tasks and Zhou and Siriyothin’s (2009) study about writing-to-read tasks No study has been found about the students’ attitudes towards bottom-up or/and top-down reading tasks That is also the reason why the writer decides to

conduct this research

1.7 Summary

In this chapter, the author has been presented and discussed the theoretical background for the study relating to attitudes, reading and reading tasks as well As mentioned the important role of attitudes in language learning, investigating students’ attitudes will bring advantages to the teaching and learning process This is the motive of the study In the next chapter, the main study will be reported to answer the proposed research questions

Chapter Two: THE STUDY

This chapter introduces the context of PhucYen College of Industry where the study is conducted The participants, methodology, instruments and procedures of the study will be presented in details

2.1 Context of the study

The natural setting for the study is PhucYen College of Industry (PYCI), which is a small college in Vinh Phuc province Its principle objective is to train students with varieties of faculties such as Economics, Information and Technology, Electrical Engineering, Mechanic Engineering, Construction Engineering…

At PYCI, English is not regarded as the main subject However, it is considered as

a means to communicate and complete the students’ certain activities at work in their future career Through three years studying, students have to take part in two courses of General English called English 1 and English 2 The students can enrol English1 only when they pass an Entrance Exam for English English1 usually starts in the second term

of their first academic year and English 2 is in the next term After finishing the two courses, students will enter the English for Specific Purpose course It is applied in all

fields except for English in Geology and English in Construction Engineering

2.1.1 The teachers and the students

At PYCI, there are ten teachers of English currently working at the age from thirdty

to forty Their experience in teaching English varies from five years to over ten years Three of them had M.A degree, and five of them are taking M.A courses All the teachers here are enthusiastic with their career and willing to devote their time to language teaching Most of the teachers try to find out an appropriate way to teach English effectively They adapt materials and use some authentic materials to make the lessons more interesting However, some other teachers usually employ the traditional methods of teaching especially Grammar-translation method They spend most of the classroom time explaining new words, analyzing grammar structures and translating texts into Vietnamese They only focus on analyzing the grammar rules, not on the acquisition of language skills This creates very few chances for students to practice and improve their communicative competence

PYCI’s students come from different provinces and different parts of Vinh Phuc province where the school is situated All of them are from the countryside, where there

are not many good opportunities for studying English Although the students, theoretically, have all finished three years to seven years of learning English at secondary and high schools before, most of them commonly did not spend much time learning English at school Some students have rather good English, but generally, the students’ English proficiency is not high

2.1.2 The course book used

At PYCI, the book officially chosen in teaching and learning English is Lifeline Pre-intermediate by Tom Hutchinson including fourteen units in total In each unit, there are parts for grammar, vocabulary, reading, listening and speaking, and pronunciation After every unit, there is one Extension session, which provides students with some more reading, listening and speaking tasks In English 1, the students have to finish the first eight units in sixty periods (fifty minutes per period) The rest will be covered in English 2 in forty-five periods The time used for each unit is very short, so the teachers usually have to decide which part should be given more focus on than others Reading is a separated part

in each unit This part is often given more attention with the purpose of helping students get familiar with reading texts and learn how to read effectively That will be helpful for students in studying English for Specific Purpose course in the next year Here is the information about the reading session in English 2 (from unit nine to unit fourteen), which

is the part of this study

Pre-reading tasks While-reading tasks Post-reading tasks

9 Would you get

involved?

- Guess what the text

is about from the title

- Read the first paragraph and guess the following events

- Find specific information to answer the given questions

- Discuss the questions

in groups, then compare

- Give solutions in specific situations

- Describe what happened using the given information

- Write the ending of the story

10 The £349

housewife

- Guess what the text

is about from the picture and the headline of the article

- Decide if each statement is True/False/Don’t know

- Discuss the given question

11 Fiona’s new

look

- Look at the photograph and

- Skim for gist

- Do the matching

-Write a short summary of the articles

discuss the questions

- Read the first paragraph and answer the questions

- Scan the text for explicit information to answer the questions

- Discuss the questions

- Read the text more carefully and answer the questions

using the given format

12 Comet - Guess the main idea

of the text by reading the first and the last paragraph

- Scan the text and answer the questions

- Role-play the task, ask and answer about

an imaginary disaster

- Write a newspaper report about another imaginary disaster using given format

13 Body clock - Answer the

- Check the detailed information

- Answer the questions

- Discuss the given questions in groups

14 Heroic, brave

or just crazy?

- Discuss the questions basing on the title and the photograph

- Do the matching

- Find the words in the text associated with the word given

- Answer the questions

- Discuss the situation in groups

- Work in groups and write an article about another job using given format

Table 1: Types of reading tasks (unit 9 to unit 14) in the Lifelines Pre-intermediate book

It can be seen in Table 1 that the reading tasks in all three stages tend to be assigned with more top-down than bottom-up strategies For example, these tasks require the students to use top-down skills like predicting the content based on the students’ own knowledge, skimming the text, connecting parts of the text to comprehend the whole text

2.2 Participants

The target population of the study is all second-year students at PYCI eight of them taking the course English 2 in two classes TA2.LT1 (thirty-six students) and TA2.LT3 (forty-two students) were the accessible population All of the students were non-English major students and their age ranged from nineteen to twenty-three with twenty