Some recommedations to develop reading skills for the first year students at faculty of english, hanoi open university

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF ENGLISH GRADUATION PAPER B.A Degree in English SOME RECOMMENDATIONS TO DEVELOP READING SKILLS FOR THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT FACULTY OF ENGLISH, HANOI

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF ENGLISH

GRADUATION PAPER

B.A Degree in English

SOME RECOMMENDATIONS TO DEVELOP READING SKILLS FOR THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT FACULTY

OF ENGLISH, HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

Supervisor : Nguyen Thanh Binh, M.A Student : Pham Hoang Dung

Date of birth : 02/09/1994 Course : K19A3 (2012 – 2016)

Hanoi - 2016

CODE: 28

DECLARATION

Title: SOME RECOMMENDATIONS TO DEVELOP READING SKILLS FOR THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT THE FACULTY OF ENGLISH, HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY (Graduation Paper submitted in Partial Fulfillment for B.A Degree in

English)

I certify that no part of the above report has been copied and reproduced by me from any other person’s work without acknowledgement and that the report is originally written by me under strict guidance of my supervisor

Date submitted: April 15th, 2016

Phạm Hoàng Dũng Nguyễn Thanh Bình

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am so glad to have a good opportunity of doing this graduation paper

It helps me much in collecting and classifying my knowledge which I have studied To finish the paper, I have worked under extremely high responsibility I received many supports from teachers and friends I cannot accomplish this task without their help

First of all, I would like to express my profound gratitude to all the teachers of Faculty of English, Hanoi Open University for teaching me to be a well-educated student I have leant so many things from what they taught me They have made the best condition for me to study at school during my last four years here

Secondly, I am very grateful to my supervisor Mrs Nguyen Thanh Binh M.A for both her enormous positive response to my ideas for this paper, her honest advice and strict guidance that helped me complete this paper I would not complete my graduation paper without her enthusiastic instructions and correction

In particular, I would like to give my special thanks to my friends and all other students who helped me a lot during my studies and my research as well Finally yet important, I am very thankful to my family who have encouraged and supported me so much in all respects

Hanoi, April 15th,2016

Phạm Hoàng Dũng

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1.1 Understanding of reading 4

1.1.1 Definitions of reading 4

1.1.2 Types and skills of reading comprehension 6

1.1.2.3 Skimming and scanning together 7

1.1.2.6 Intensive and extensive reading together 10

1.1.3 The role of reading 11

1.2 Factors affecting reading 13

1.2.1 Language factors 13

1.2.2 Non - language factors 16

1.3 Summary of the chapter 18

CHAPTER II: SOME DIFFICULTIES AND LIMITATIONS OF THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS OF ENGLISH DURING THE PROCESS OF LEARNING READING SKILLS 19

2.1 Subject of the study 19

2.2 Data collection 19

2.2.1 Survey questionnaire 19

2.2.2 Class observation and discussion 20

2.3 Data analysis 20

2.3.1 Students' interest in reading 21

2.3.2 Real problems in reading 22

2.3.3 Methods used by students to develop their reading skills 25

2.4 Findings 31

2.5 Summary of the chapter 32

CHAPTER III: SOME RECOMMENDATIONS TO DEVELOP READING SKILLS FOR THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT FACULTY OF ENGLISH, H.O.U 33

3.1 Strategies for learning reading 33

3.1.1 Pre-reading activities 33

3.1.2 While-reading activities 35

3.1.3 Post-reading activities 37

3.2 Some other recommendations to develop reading skills 39

3.2.1 Enhancing background knowledge 39

3.2.2 Improving reading speed 41

3.2.3 Changing reading habits 42

3.3 Creating motivation for reading 45

3.4 Summary of the chapter 47

PART C: CONCLUSION 48 REFERENCES

APPENDIX

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale

Reading is one of four basic language skills - listening, speaking, reading and writing which is learned and practiced regularly during the process of learning a foreign language and is a receptive skill that base on reading, people can get information, knowledge, then analyzing and doing things what they need to do According to getting information or knowledge, reading also

is a tool that help people entertain after hard-working hours by reading books, comics, magazines or so on Beside collecting information and knowledge, reading also plays a very important role in improving English user’s pronunciation along with speaking, especially reading out loud

Meanwhile, students of English in general and first-year students at Faculty of English in particular are still bad at this skill The problem that they often get is about lack of vocabulary, grammar and limited social background, so they face with some difficulties in understanding the article if they do not know the meaning of the words Therefore, improving reading skill is very important for students at English faculty of Hanoi Open University Moreover, students learning English as a major at university are usually not interested in reading, they regard it as a boring skill, not interesting as speaking or listening skills As a result, their reading skills are not paid much attention One more factor of the necessity of improving reading skill is nowadays reading well is also a request for a good job along with other English skills Hence useful advice for boosting students’ reading level really is a necessary demand

During 4 years at the Faculty of English, the author of this paper and other students have met many difficulties in advancing reading abilities Moreover, enhancing reading skills for undergraduate students of English major at

Hanoi Open University is one of the top targets of English training program following Standard of English Ability of Ministry of Education and Training Therefore, with the purpose of helping the first-year students to develop reading skills, the author of this paper would like to suggest some strategies to help them deal with regular problems they face in the process of learning reading skills

2 Aims of the study

The purpose of this study is to help develop the reading skills for the first-year students at English faculty – Hanoi Open University Therefore, the main targets of this thesis are:

- Exploring the learning of reading skills of the first-year students at

Faculty of English, Hanoi Open University

- Finding the problems and difficulties that the students usually get in

reading process

- Proposing some suggestions to improve reading skill for the

first-year students

3 Scope of the study

Due to the time limit and the length of this paper so I only focus on

reading skills, some common problems and some strategies to develop

recommendations to develop reading skills for the first-year students

graduation paper

4 Research questions

- Are the first-year students interested in reading skills?

- What are the problems and limitations which first-year students are facing with?

- What have the first-year students done to deal with all the difficulties and improve their reading skill?

5 Methods of the study

- Consulting supervisor and other teachers

- Collecting data from :

+ Studying books related

+ Doing survey questionnaire

+ Getting from internet

+ Experienced teachers' points of view and comments

+ Class observation

- Analyzing data collected

- Drawing conclusion

6 Design of the study

The graduation paper is divided to three parts and three chapters

• PART A : Introduction

This part includes rationale, aims, scope, research questions, methods and design of the study

• PART B: Development

This part contains three main parts:

Chapter I : Literature Review

Chapter II : Some difficulties and limitations of the year students of English during the process of learning reading skills

first-
Chapter III : Some recommendations to develop reading skills for the first-year students at Faculty of English, H.O.U

• PART C: Conclusionn

This final part is to summarize or restate main points of the graduation paper

PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW

Reading plays a very important role in daily life in general and in searching and receiving information and knowledge in particular, especially with English learners In learning English, reading is one of the four main skills that almost people who study English have to use competently Reading

is used not only inside the class but also does outside in order to find out, collect and receive information and lore However, how many people understand exactly what is reading? The part below will provide different definitions of reading

1.1 Understanding of reading

1.1.1 Definitions of reading

Establishing a clear definition of reading provides an important perspective for evaluating approaches to teaching word-identification skills Most educators would agree that the major purpose of reading should be the construction of meaning - comprehending and actively responding to what is read Two of the most widely cited and agreed-upon definitions of reading are the following:

According to Anderson (1985), "Reading is the process of constructing

meaning from written texts It is a complex skill requiring the coordination of

Similarly, Wixson, Peters, Weber, & Roeber (1987, citing the new

definition of reading for Michigan) also assumed that: "Reading is the process

of constructing meaning through the dynamic interaction among: the reader's existing knowledge; the information suggested by the text being read and the

Previously, mechanistic definitions of reading as the translation of printed symbols into oral language equivalents are incomplete, given the progress made in understanding the nature of the reading process There is widespread agreement that without the activation of relevant prior knowledge

by a cognitively active reader and the melding of that prior knowledge with

the text information, there can be no reading of text

Even definitions of reading that emphasize meaning indicate that reading is activated by print The reader must be able to translate the written words into meaningful language Virtually, all four- and five-year-old children can communicate with and learn from oral language, but very few can read, because they lack the ability to identify printed words While simply

being able to recognize or "say" the printed words of text without constructing

the meaning of that text is not reading, constructing meaning from written text

is impossible without being able to identify the words

The terms word identification, word recognition, and decoding are frequently used interchangeably The new Literacy Dictionary (Harris & Hodges, 1995) defines both word recognition and word identification as "the

process of determining the pronunciation and some degree of meaning of an

vocabulary, unlocking the pronunciation leads to the word's meaning If a printed word is not in a reader's meaning vocabulary, word-identification skills may allow access to the word's pronunciation, but not its meaning Being able to arrive at the pronunciation of a printed word constitutes word identification in the most minimal sense; however, if the reader is unable to attach meaning to the word, then he or she has not read the word, since reading must end in meaning construction

Obviously, reading, like another terms, defined by many different ways depending on each person’s view However, in a general view, reading is a very important skills by which the learners could be access the knowledge and the information for what he or she wants In addition, it is also a complex process for readers to understand writer’s messages in the written or printed materials

1.1.2 Types and skills of reading comprehension

Reading – a receptive skill, together with listening, is the contrastive skill with two productive skills – speaking and writing These language skills apply and support one another to develop and master the language we are learning Nevertheless, this skill like other skills, has its own typical types, and of course, they are really more complicated than just pronouncing words

1.1.2.1 Scanning

Scanning ia a quick reading, focusing on locating specific information.Scanning involves quick eye movements, not necessarily linear in fashion, in which the eyes wander until the reader finds the piece of information needed Moreover, it is used when a specific piece of information

is required, such as a name, date, symbol, formula, or phrase, is required The reader knows what the item looks like and so, knows when he has located what he was searching for It is assumed then, that very little information is processed into long-term memory or even for immediate understanding because the objective is simply matching Scanning is used often with technical, scientific or professional materials to locate specific information Scanning is a valuable skill for second language learners to develop because often they do not require a detailed read of a text There are many everyday uses for scanning, relevant to a purpose, such as reading a schedule

1.1.2.2 Skimming

Skimming is reading through quickly from begenning to the end of the article to get - to know the general meaning of a passage - to know how the passage is organized, that is, the structure of the text or to get an idea of the intention of the writer This kinds of reading is 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 Skimming is a tool in which the author's sequence can be observed, unlike scanning in which some predetermined information is sought after

Skimming is used when reading some general questions in mind Skimming is used in making decisions on how to approach a text such as when determining if a careful reading is deserving Skimming is used to build student confidence and an understanding that it is possible to gain meaning without reading every word in a text Skimming is used as part of the SQ3R (survey, question, read, recite and review) method of reading, often for speed reading

This method involves the student in surveying, questioning, reading, reviewing

and reciting Skimming is used for the initial survey and for review.Skimming is

a skill that a student may want to develop if they are planning to continue with academic studies It is often used in reviewing for a test

1.1.2.3 Skimming and scanning together

Skimming and scanning are sometimes referred to as types of

of a text and implies a reading competence Scanning is more a limited activity, only retrieving information relevant to a purpose Brown (1994)

suggest ed that "perhaps the two most valuable reading strategies for learners

suggested that since scanning is a less complex style of reading it can be

introduced first Skimming requires greater fluency and more practice is required, so it should be introduced later

Often skimming and scanning are used together when reading a text For example, the reader may skim through first to see if it is worth reading, then read it more carefully and scan for a specific piece of information to note Students need to learn that they need to adapt their reading and techniques to the purpose of the reading By practicing skimming and scanning, the individual learns to read and select specific information without focussing on information that is not important for meaning

1.1.2.4 Extensive type of reading

Brown (1989) explains that extensive reading is carried out "to achieve

extensive reading as "occurring when students read large amounts of high

interest material, usually out of class, concentrating on meaning, "reading for

build reader confidence and enjoyment Extensive reading is always done for the comprehension of main ideas, not for specific details

Krashen's Input Hypothesis (1982) made a distinction between acquisition and learning For Krashen, the dominant mode of language

learning is inacquisition, the largely subconscious "picking up of the

similar, if not identical, to the way children develop ability in their first language (p.10) Language acquisition represents unconscious learning which takes place when attention is focused on meaning rather than form In order to acquire language, Krashen suggested the learner must be exposed to large amounts of second language input that was "meaningful" , interesting, relevant, not grammatically sequenced, and in a low anxiety

setting It is felt that Extensive Reading programs provide such an environment The L1=L2 Hypothesis suggests that second language learning, like the first, follows a highly predictable pattern If the conditions of first language acquisition are approximated by extensive second language reading, the second language learner can achieve native like competence in a classroom An extension of this suggests that reading for pleasure from

appropriate second language texts provides subconscious and progressively

language acquisition Rumelhart (1980) proposed an "interactive model" of

the reading process in which reading is a complex task of simultaneously

combining "bottom-up" processes (in which the reader analyzes text in small

pieces and builds meaning from these) and "top-down" processes (in which

the reader makes "guesses" about the content of a passage) It is thought

that Extensive Reading programs provide the quantities of reading practice

necessary for the automaticity of the "bottom-up" (word recognition) process

1.1.2.5 Intensive type of reading

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

"zoom lens" strategy" Meanwhile, Long and Richards (1987) say it is a

"detailed in-class" analysis, led by the teacher, of vocabulary and grammar points, in a short passage Intensive Reading, sometimes called "narrow

several texts about the same topic When this occurs, content and grammatical structures repeat themselves and students get many opportunities to

understand the meanings of the text The success of "narrow reading" on

improving reading comprehension is based on the premise that the more familiar the reader is with the text, either due to the subject matter or having read other works by the same author, the more comprehension is promoted

Practicing intensive reading will make some skills rapid reading speed

or interpreting text by using words attack skills, text attack skills and non-text information

Assessment of intensive reading will take the form of reading tests and quizzes The most common systems of questioning are multiple-choice

and free-response Mackay (1968) , in his book Reading in a Second

class should NOT be the testing of the student to see if they have

understood Teachers should, instead, be spending most of the

time training the student to understand what they read

1.1.2.6 Intensive and extensive reading together

It is common for both approaches to reading to be used in the same class For example, where extensive reading is encouraged, the teacher may

have all the students read the same text so they can discuss the topic together

or learn a specific skill such as as writing an outline In a class where intensive reading is mostly used, students may be asked to read texts of their own choosing to report back on, in either an oral or written format

In both approaches, it is not the nature of the skills that are of most interest but rather, the results

In general, depending on reading purposes of people, there are many kinds of reading for different aims and the technique chosen by each readers will be used to certain purposes For example, when people are in an exam like ielts test or toeic test or so on, they need to read quickly or skim to get the main idea to answer the question or read carefully scan for details and

particular words to complete the filling gap task Readers, moreover, if their purpose is for enjoyment, the technique could be used for this aim is extensive because the target of extensive reading is for enjoyment, maybe people do not understand exactly meaning of each word but they still understand the content

of the text Or if people want to understand, find out or study more about academic issues of language, intensive reading is the good technique for them

1.1.3 The role of reading

Reading is fundamental to function in today's society There are many adults who cannot read well enough to understand the instructions on a medicine bottle That is a scary thought - especially for their children Filling out applications becomes impossible without help Reading road or warning signs is difficult Even following a map becomes a chore Day-to-day activities that many people take for granted become a source of frustration, anger and fear Reading is a vital skill in finding a good job Many well-paid jobs require reading as a part of job performance There are reports and memos which must be read and responded to Poor reading skills increase the amount of time it takes to absorb and react in the workplace A person is limited in what they can accomplish without good reading and comprehension skills

It is also found that reading is important because it develops the mind The mind is a muscle It needs exercise Understanding the written word is one way the mind grows in its ability Teaching young children to read helps them develop their language skills It also helps them learn to listen Everybody wants to talk, but few can really listen Lack of listening skills can result in major misunderstandings which can lead to job loss, marriage breakup, and other disasters - small and great Reading helps focus on what someone else is communicating

Why is reading important? It is how we discover new things Books, magazines and even the Internet are great learning tools which require the ability to read and understand what is read A person who knows how to read can educate themselves in any area of life they are interested in We live in an age where we overflow with information, but reading is the main way to take advantage of it

Another benefit of reading is that reading develops the imagination TV and computer games have their place, but they are more like amusement Amusement comes from two words "a" [non] and "muse" [think] Amusement

is non-thinking activities With reading, a person can go anywhere in the world or even out of it! They can be a king, or an adventurer, or a princess, or the possibilities are endless Non-readers never experience these joys to the same extent Reading is fundamental in developing a good self image Nonreaders or poor readers often have low opinions of themselves and their abilities Many times they feel as if the world is against them They feel isolated [everybody else can read - which isn't true] and behavior problems can surface They can perform poorly in other subjects because they cannot

read and understand the material and so tend to "give up."

Good reading skills, especially in a phonics reading program, improve spelling As students learn to sound out letters and words, spelling comes easier Also, reading helps to expand the vocabulary Reading new words puts them in their mind for later use Seeing how words are used in different contexts can give a better understanding of the word usage and definitions

than the cold facts of a dictionary There is an old saying, "The pen is mightier

nations for better or worse The flow of ideas cannot be stopped We need to read and research to build on the good ideas and expose the bad ideas before

they bring destruction Only by reading can we be armed in this never-ending, life-and-death struggle The fact of the power of written ideas communicated through reading is a foundational reason why some governments oppose free and honest communication Illiterate people are easier to control and manipulate They cannot do their own research and thinking They must rely

on what they are told and how their emotions are swayed There is a good possibility that this is one of the main reasons phonics was removed from the schools about 100 years ago

Finally, reading is important because words - spoken and written - are the building blocks of life We are, right now, the result of words that we have heard or read and believed about ourselves What we become in the future will depend on the words we believe about ourselves now People, families, relationships, and even nations are built from words

1.2 Factors affecting reading

1.2.1 Language factors

Vocabulary

Whether or not students have mastered vocabulary skills affects their reading comprehension Students must be able to comprehend a familiar word and its relationship with other words within a text Mastering vocabulary includes recognizing a word’s part of speech, definition, useful context clues, and how it functions in a sentence These vocabulary strategies can help improve comprehension

Many researchers consider vocabulary knowledge to be an important variable that affects reading comprehension in both first and second language learning (Alderson, 2000; Joshi, 2005; Qian, 2002; Ricketts et al., 2007) A limited vocabulary size, as well as a lack of sufficient knowledge of word meanings, often hinders learners from understanding the meaning of the text

Garcia (1991) finds that a lack of familiarity with vocabulary in the test passages and questions is a powerful factor affecting fifth and sixth grade Latino bilingual learners on a test of reading comprehension Qian (1999, 2002; Qian & Schedl, 2004) studies the roles of breadth and depth of vocabulary knowledge in reading comprehension in academic settings Breadth of vocabulary knowledge refers to the size of vocabulary that a person knows and depth of vocabulary knowledge relates to how well the person knows a word The two factors play an important role for second language learners because learners are more likely to come across words in

which they are not familiar According to Qian (2002), “having a larger

vocabulary gives the learner a larger database from which to guess the meaning of the unknown words or behavior of newly learned words, having deeper vocabulary knowledge will very likely improve the results of the

Grammar

Even though grammatical competence is presumed to be indispensable for identifying syntactic relations of sentence components, there has been little research on how readers’ knowledge of grammar contributes to reading comprehension (Alderson, 1984; Shiotsu & Weir, 2007; Urquhart & Weir, 1998) Most studies addressing the role of grammar in reading explored the issue by measuring the correlation between learners’ grammatical knowledge and their reading comprehension ability (Urquhart & Weir, 1998) For example, Alderson (1993) reviewed the data from the English Language Testing Services (ELTS) Revision Project and found a considerable overlap between scores on the grammar test and the reading test, which led him to propose a significant role of grammar in reading In a similar vein, in Kuhn and Stahl’s (2003) review of theories and research on reading instruction,

training readers to parse sentences into meaningful phrases and providing them with already syntactically segmented texts were revealed to promote reading comprehension to a significant level That is to say, the abilities to identify syntactic roles of words, dissect sentences into meaningful chunks, and recognize the syntactic structure of a sentence seem to contribute to the construction of meaning from the text

Active reading

Beginning readers often rely on skilled readers to guide them through a text However, as readers develop, they will be able to monitor their own reading comprehension Students can actively guide their own reading by targeting comprehension problems as they occur Students can troubleshoot comprehension problems by recalling what they read, asking themselves questions or evaluating the text

Academic language challenges

Academic words is the words only used in certain major, so not all of people know exactly and totally the academic words of all branch This academic language can be a challenge to students' ability to understand concepts in science or social studies class Mrs King sometimes helps students work on their classwork and sees them struggle with academic language on three levels:

Phrase: at the phrase level of academic language, challenges are typically vocabulary words that students only encounter in that particular class For example, students only see the words 'numerator' or 'denominator' in math

Sentence: at the sentence level, challenges deal more with grammar and understanding how sentences are formed and work Students see different kinds of sentence structure in content area classes as they learn about things such as comparing and contrasting two animals, for example

Discourse: at the discourse level, students are called on to make sense

of content and meaning of overall structures and genres They have to figure out how different text is organized, such as a fairy tale and an autobiography

Or understanding a science lab report may be difficult for some students if they haven't been exposed to this form of academic language

1.2.2 Non - language factors

Background knowledge

Background knowledge plays an essential role in reading comprehension In an effort to comprehend a text, students rely on their background knowledge to link what they already know to the text they are reading Background knowledge includes both a reader’s real-world experiences and literary knowledge Drawing parallels between background knowledge and texts helps students become active readers, improving their reading comprehension

Background knowledge (or background information) directly

influences comprehension A skilled, fluent reader who knows a lot about American history, for instance, will have an easier time understanding a passage about the Civil War than a reader who does not own such background knowledge to the reading We usually gain much of our background knowledge when we are children and adolescents in school

As accomplished readers, we are often not aware of how much understanding of what we read comes from the knowledge we bring to the text Reading comprehension is the process of 'constructing meaning' from a text Comprehension is a 'construction process' because it involves all of the elements of the reading process working together as a text is read to create a representation of the text in the reader's mind The more prior knowledge we have of the subject presented in a passage, the richer will be our

understanding Prior knowledge of a subject forms a framework (schema) into which additional ideas can be assimilated and remembered

Context materials

One factor that impacts reading comprehension is the context in which reading occurs, or where and how it takes place There are two ways to look

at the context in terms of reading comprehension

Where reading occurs Think about our favorite place to read Are we more successful in a crowded, noisy coffee house or in a cozy spot in our room? Factors show that often students are asked to read at school in noisy places, which may negatively impact their ability to understand

Social context Sometimes readers are asked to read independently, at their seats or in a quiet spot Other times they read as part of a social grouping, such as circle time or choral reading It is noticed that sometimes when students read out loud with another people they understand more than when they read by themselves

Comprehension basics

What is the point of reading unless we understand what we read? Students need to comprehend what they read in order to learn about the subjects they study, and comprehension depends on several factors Readers bring their skills and background knowledge about the topic with them They need to remember and make sense of what they are reading, connecting the new understanding to the old This can be a tricky process

Some surveys show that although some students are great at oral reading, they struggle with comprehension Why do some readers comprehend easily and others struggle? Let's take a look at factors that impact comprehension, including ways in which reading takes place, the reader's specific characteristics, and properties of the text itself Then we'll consider

some of the challenges presented by academic language Finally, we'll explore some strategies teachers can use to help student readers' comprehension

Motivation

The last but not least important factor affecting reading is motivation How does motivation affect reading? If someone is bored by the reading material, they won't want to do it Also, being able to decode what you are reading is important Being able to understand vocabulary and the main idea

is also important In my classes, I find that sometimes words that seem easy to the teacher are not easy to the students, and may throw off the main idea of the text if those words are not correctly interpreted

1.3 Summary of the chapter

In this chapter, a brief overview about reading has been showed that include the definition and the types of reading It is affirmed that reading is a very important and effective skill with many aspects in life Moreover, the author of this paper also provides knowledge on the factors affecting reading skill development

At the same time, the author of this paper has also expressed his own opinion about reading as a consideration and the readers might get a general view about reading In the next chapter, this paper will be designed

to help learners realize some barriers in improving their reading skills and the writer hope that the useful information will be transfer to the people who need it most

CHAPTER II: SOME DIFFICULTIES AND LIMITATIONS OF THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS OF ENGLISH DURING PROCESS OF

LEARNING READING SKILLS 2.1 Subject of the study

This survey was carried out among 100 students, group K22 of the Faculty of English, H.O.U They are the first-year students at pre-intermediate English level They have gotten familiar with English reading lessons and are all in need of upgrading their skills

2.2 Data collection

2.2.1 Survey questionnaire

In order to get information about the problems of the first-year students

in learning reading skills, a survey questionnaire was worked out and given

to the first-years students and they were asked to answer them honestly to guarantee the accuracy and the reliability of the results

The survey questionnaire (see Appendix), consists of 14 questions attributed to help find essential information of the overview of studying reading as well as challenges facing students Question 1 aims to explore the time the students started learning English Question 2, 3, 4, and 5 aim to find out students’ attitudes toward reading The sixth question attempts to find out the difficulties that students often encounter in reading English The aim of question 7 is to find out the teachers’ role in teaching English reading skills in class Question 8 is to find out what kind of reading exercise students are interested in Question 9 looks for the reading techniques that students often use to read in class Question 10 explores student’s reading results in previous tests Question 8 is to find out thinking of students about improving reading skills Question 11 is to find out what way that students tend to use to develop reading skills in class Question 12 and 13 aims to find out the intensity of

practicing and what methods students prefer to do to enhance reading at home And the question 14 is to find out the materials students usually use to practice reading

2.2.2 Class observation and discussion

Class observation brings many worthy and important educational intentions The goals of observing classroom is to gather additional information which is believed to be an essential contribution to make the analysis from data collected by survey questionnaire become more convincing and authentic

2.3 Data analysis

In survey questionnaires, some questions are designed to find out the situation of learning reading skills of the first-year students at Faculty of English, Hanoi Open University The results are described as follow

Nowadays, English has become a very popular international language

in all around the world and Vietnam as well Therefore, because of Vietnam integration process, the government has applied English as a compulsory subject in school from primary school to university In question 1 of the survey, it is found that many schools in Vietnam have taught English from grade 3, just there are a few schools that students have learned English after grade 3 According to the statistic got from students answering the question 1, the number of students learnt English under 8 years old is 60 percent (60%), and the percentage of students learning English from 11 years old is 30%, mostly in rural areas where the education conditions are still low Besides, there is a little number of students starting learning English after 15 years old And the number of this group is approximately 10% However, they have been taught only the basic program such as vocabulary, grammar and language structures Within 45 minutes of one lesson, they just only could learn these

program above The students hardly have learnt any reading long text skills until being students of university And after years of the process of learning reading skills, how do the students feel about it?

2.3.1 Students' interest in reading

TABLE 1: STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARD READING SKILLS

Q2 How do you find reading skills? Answer %

“taught” Because it requires a lot of time to practice if students wish to master it Therefore, students should recognize the importance of reading skills and pay much more attention to these skills Along with students' feeling of reading skills, the table below will show some aspects which students think it influence their reading skills

2.3.2 Real problems in reading

TABLE 2: STUDENTS’S READING PROBLEMS

Q6 Which factors affect you most in

Problem 1: Unfamiliar words

One of the biggest problems met by the first-year students is the lack of vocabulary The vocabulary or another way – new words is very important in learning a foreign language Any language, of course including English, has thousands and thousands of words In many cases, even those native speakers

of the language cannot know all the words of that language It is simple that there are too many to learn New words are usually considered as the barrier

in effective reading process to the students The above research shows that 61% of students who have low vocabulary resources to deal with reading exercises Therefore, they usually feel confused and nervous when facing with reading test, especially the test with the over 500 words texts It means that this difficulty really makes them hard to predict the meaning of the words and

the context Besides, many of them complained an issue with not knowing enough slangs to understand clearly the meaning of paragraphs or conversations in the reading materials In addition, there is another issue with their vocabulary that leads the misunderstanding the writer’s ideas as the first-year students have not learned much specialized words and academic words yet, so facing with academic contexts really is a hard task with the first-year students Moreover, a small problems with the vocabulary of the students is that they mentioned the variation of meaning of one word In many contexts, the writer uses the word but in this case, the meaning of that word is not the original meaning and it make the students very difficult to find out the exact meaning of the context As a matter of fact, poor vocabulary causes a lot of difficulties to the first-year students So it is a need for the students increase their vocabulary and build the lexicon in order to help them reading actively and make them understand the writer more easily

Problem 2: Motivation

Why is the motivation mentioned in the research of reading process? The purpose of reading is to get information, however, as a fact, students suppose that reading is very boring Therefore, it is one of the issue faced by the students in general and the first-year students at Faculty of English, Hanoi Open University in particular This issue like other normal things in life that if anyone is not interested in something, they could not do it comfortably In reading process and any other learning process, if the students do not have inspiration with reading context, reading really becomes a torture with them Looking to a text which over 2 pages without interest, it is really difficult to understand what the writer want to inspire to the readers, even that text is read many times Fortunately, the percentage of the students who get trouble with the motivation is just 23% It means that most of the first-year students have

their own way to deal with the bored of reading text As a fact, many students have their own learning habits Some of them think that learning is an important part of their life, so they always find out the way to learn effectively and they usually create the motivation for their study to achieve the knowledge In contrast, some of the students have not focused much on what they want to get after college, so their learning is still a deadlock and do not know how to motivate their learning spirit The challenge of learning reading motivation poses particular demands that they have to look immediately for the solution to involve this issue

Problem 3: Grammar structure

The above table just shows that 35% of the first-year students finds it difficult to understand grammar structures in reading The number percent through survey is not high Perhaps they know grammatical errors play an very important role in reading skills so they spent time to practicing so much with it or maybe they do not understand the difficult grammar structures in reading skills As a fact, a lot of students have their own reading habits Some of them often try to understand every word and every sentence For the first-year students, the challenge of reading poses particular demands because there are many sentences types that are complex and very different from their fist language Lack of grammatical knowledge can reduce English reading levels

Problem 4: Background knowledge

17% is the percentage of the students reported that their reading comprehension is affected by background knowledge Background knowledge

is absorbed through daily life like watching, reading, talking or so on And much information which is got day by day is effective with reading process For example, if students read any context relating to literature, the social

knowledge maybe help them understand the text and explain the meaning of the text more clearly Hence, enhancing background knowledge from the daily activities is also one of the important matter to improve students’ reading ability

2.3.3 Methods used by students to develop their reading skills

TABLE 3: TEACHERS’ ROLE IN TEACHING READING

TECHNIQUES

Q7 Do your teachers often give or advice

you some techniques to read

at a particular skill and assigned to teach that skill During reading time, all teachers recommended some techniques for students for effective reading In table 3 , we can easily to see that just 23% teachers often give some techniques/advice for students, 66% are sometimes , 8% are rarely and 3% are never However, students practice by themselves at home