A study on using short stories in teaching reading skill at nguyen khuyen secondary school

In addition, the result from questionnaire and interview indicated both teachers and students had difficulties when teaching and learning reading through short stories.. However, many su

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

PHẠM LAN ANH

A STUDY ON USING SHORT STORIES IN TEACHING READING

SKILL AT NGUYEN KHUYEN SECONDARY SCHOOL

(Nghiên cứu về việc sử dụng truyện ngắn trong giảng dạy kĩ năng đọc

tại trường trung học cơ sở Nguyễn Khuyến)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

HANOI – 2016

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

PHẠM LAN ANH

A STUDY ON USING SHORT STORIES IN TEACHING READING

SKILL AT NGUYEN KHUYEN SECONDARY SCHOOL

(Nghiên cứu về việc sử dụng truyện ngắn trong giảng dạy kĩ năng đọc

tại trường trung học cơ sở Nguyễn Khuyến)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Supervisor: Mai Thị Loan, PhD

HANOI - 2016

CANDIDAT’ES STATEMENT

I certify my authorship of the thesis submitted today entitled:A STUDY OF USING SHORT STORIES IN TEACHING READING SKILL AT NGUYEN KHUYEN SECONDARY SCHOOL is the result of my own work for the Degree of Master of Arts at University of Languages and International Studies, Hanoi National University The material in this thesis has not been submitted for assessment in any other courses of study

Hanoi,2016 Signature

Phạm Lan Anh

ACKNOLEDGEMENT

First of all, I would like to express my deep and faithful gratitude to my supervisor, Ms Mai Thi Loan, PhD for her whole hearted and valuable guidance, significant suggestions and useful materials in the process of writing this thesis Thanks to her noble devotion, the research report has been successfully completed

My sincere thanks were also presented to my classmates for their support and recommendations in choosing necessary materials so that I can fulfill this study Their sincere friendship has encouraged me a lot

I would like to thank to teachers and students at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school for their constructive suggestions and important help Without their support, there would not be a completion of this thesis

I also thank our university library for their sources of books and documents about methodology studies In addition, I was grateful to researchers, authors and teachers whose materials suggest necessary information for my reference

My true family deserves my gratefulness for their long lasting help and encouragement so that I have been able to complete this study

ABSTRACT

Reading comprehension has been highlighted as a problem among secondary school students This study examined the effects of short stories on 80 seven grade students to show if the method had an impact on students‟ reading comprehension Besides, this research also figured out the suitable methods teachers used to exploit short stories in teaching reading skill To serve this purpose, some instruments were used: pre-test, post-test; questionnaire for teachers and questionnaire for students Although the findings revealed some limitations, the use of short stories helped students to improve their reading comprehension The result in reading test showed

a slight improvement on the students‟ average score In addition, the result from questionnaire and interview indicated both teachers and students had difficulties when teaching and learning reading through short stories However, many suitable methods had been applied to help students and teachers overcome these obstacles and ensure the better use of short stories in teaching reading skill It is thus recommended for further studies to minimize the challenge found in this study and vary kinds of short stories used in teaching English skills

TABLE CONTENT

CANDIDATE’S STATEMENT i

ACKNOLEDGEMENT ii

ABSTRACT iii

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES iv

PART I: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale of the study 1

2 Aims and objectives of the study 2

3 Research questions 2

4 Scope of the study 2

5 Significance of the study 2

6 Method of the study 3

7 Design of the study 3

PART II: DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1.1 Reading in foreign language teaching 4

1.1.1 Definitions of reading 4

1.1.2Techniques of reading 5

1.1.3 Reading comprehension 6

1.1.3.1 Definitions of reading comprehension 6

1.1.3.2 Reading comprehension skills 6

1.1.3.3 Causes of poor reading comprehension among students 8

1.2 Short stories in language teaching 9

1.2.1 Definition of short stories 9

1.2.2 Benefits of short stories in language teaching 10

1.2.3 How to choose short stories in teaching language skills 12

1.3 Review of the previous related studies 14

1.4 Summary 15

CHAPTER II: METHODOLOGY 16

2.1 Setting of the study 16

2.1.1 Teachers‟ background information 16

2.1.2 Students‟ background information 16

2.1.3 Teaching and learning condition at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school 16

2.2 Research design 17

2.2.1 Participants 17

2.2.2 Data collection instruments 17

2.2.2.1 Tests 17

2.2.2.2 Questionnaire 18

2.2.3 Data collection procedure 19

2.2.3.1 Pre intervention 19

2.2.3.2 While intervention 19

2.2.3.3 Post intervention 21

2.2.4 Data analysis method 21

2.3 Summary 21

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS 22

3.1 Tests 22

3.1.1 Aims 22

3.1.2 Participants 22

3.1.3 Test description 22

3.1.4Data analysis of pre-test 23

3.1.4.1Frequency distribution 23

3.1.4.2 Correlation 23

3.1.5Data analysis of post- test 24

3.1.5.1Frequency distribution 24

3.1.5.2 Correlation 24

3.2 Questionnaire for students 25

3.2.1 Aims 25

3.2.2 Participants 25

3.2.3 Data analysis 25

3.2.3.1 Students‟ attitude towards short stories 25

3.2.3.2 Types of short stories students expect to learn 26

3.2.3.3 The activities students like most before reading a short story 26

3.2.3.4 Students‟ favorite activities while reading a short story 27

3.2.3.5 Students‟ favorite activities in the post-reading stage 28

3.3 Questionnaire for teachers 29

3.3.1 Aims 29

3.3.2 Participants 29

3.3.3 Data analysis 29

3.3.3.1 Teachers‟ frequency of using short stories to teach reading skill for students 29

3.3.3.2 Class organization 30

3.3.3.3 Pre- reading activities 30

3.3.3.4 While-reading activities 31

3.3.3.5 Post-reading activities 32

3.3.3.6 Assessment 32

3.4 Summary 33

PART III: CONCLUSION 34

1 Recapitulation 34

2 Pedagogical suggestions in using short stories in teaching reading skill 34

2.1 Strategies to improve comprehension skill 34

2.1.1 Encouraging the use of oral language 34

2.1.2 Motivating students 35

2.1.3 Providing practice in reading easy material 36

2.1.4 Encouraging purposeful reading 36

2.1.5 Stressing vocabulary development 36

2.2 Suggested activities in teaching reading using short stories 37

2.2.1 Pre-reading activities 37

2.2.1.1Strong lines 37

2.2.1.2Picture walk 38

2.2.1.3Storylines 38

2.2.2While-reading activities 38

2.2.2.1Modeling reading strategies 38

2.2.2.2In-class oral reading 39

2.2.2.3Textual analysis and group work 39

2.2.3Post- reading activities 40

2.2.3.1 Sequencing activity 40

2.2.3.2Writing assignments 40

3 Limitations of the study 41

4 Suggestions for further study 41

REFERENCES 42 APPENDICES I APPENDIX 1: Some stories used in the study I APPENDIX 2: Tests III APPENDIX 3: Raw results of test marks IX APPENDIX 4: The fomular of mean, median and standard deviation XI APPENDIX 5: Survey questionnaire for students XVII APPENDIX 6: Câu hỏi khảo sát cho học sinh XIX APPENDIX 7: Survey questionnaire for teachers XXI APPENDIX 8: Sample lesson plan XXIII

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES

Chart 1: Frequency distribution (pre-test) 23

Chart 2: Frequency distribution (post-test) 24

Chart 3: Students‟ attitude towards short stories 25

Chart 4: Types of short stories students expect to learn 26

Chart 5: The activities students like most before reading a short story 26

Chart 6: Teachers‟ frequency of using short stories to teach reading skill 29

Chart 7: Class organization 30

Table 1: Data collection procedure 19

Table 2: Mean and Std Deviation (pre-test) 23

Table 3: Mean and Std Deviation (post-test) 24

Table 4: Students‟ favorite activities while reading a short story 27

Table 5: Students‟ favorite activities in the post-reading stage 28

Table 7: Pre – reading activities 30

Table 8: While-reading activities 31

Table 9: Post- reading activities 32

Table 10: Reading assessment 32

PART I: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

Reading comprehension, as a fundamental language skill, requires a complex acquisition process which can account for the way that learners comprehend what they read Many of the Vietnamese students are suffering from the weakness in reading comprehension Especially, based on individual teaching experience, the researcher finds out that the capability of understanding English text of students at

in this school lack the ability of reading comprehension, so because of misunderstanding the meaning of the text, they find it difficult to answer questions related to the specific text and get bad scores in reading tests It is the reason why many students dislike, even fear of English classes One of the main causes of this problem is because of the boring and unattractive traditional method most of teachers use in teaching reading comprehension This fact raises a question of how

to make the students interested in reading English text and how the teachers choose the suitable materials that motivate students to read

In fact, many researchers and educators have made untiring attempts to find more efficient ways of enabling the learners to become more proficient readers Teaching English through literature has become the fashionable phenomenon Some researchers believe that teachers provide students with heavy, boring and somewhat redundant literature which has no use to solve students‟ problems and provides no room for creativity The students are taught literary terms, the meaning of words and the process of analysis; therefore, they take the form of repeating the material understanding mostly by memorization The idea of using short stories in teaching comprehension may come as an effective way to deal with this problem It helps students to cope with original texts, use the language creatively, improve their language level, loose themselves from the barriers of instructional texts and even learn some literature

Based on the explanation above, the researcher decides to conduct a study on using short stories in teaching reading skill for the 7th grade students at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school

2.Aims and objectives of the study

The study aims at investigating the use of short stories in teaching reading skill for the seventh graders at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school

To be more specific, the objectives of this study are to:

- find out the degree of effectiveness of using short stories to teach reading skill

- propose some suggestions to teach reading skill for students with the use of

short stories

3 Research questions

In order to reach the above aims and objectives, the study is going to seek answers for the following research questions:

a To what extent can reading short stories affect students‟ reading skill?

b What are methods of using short stories in teaching reading skill?

4 Scope of the study

In this study, the writer intends to deal with the questions that how effectively short stories are used in teaching reading comprehension for students, and what suitable ways of using short stories to teach reading skill are The short stories used

in this research are one page long with simple contents and various topics such as friendship, love and moral lessons

5 Significance of the study

By looking into the perception of the use of short stories in teaching reading comprehension and the satisfaction of students about their achievement and improvement in reading skill, the study is hoped to raise teachers‟ awareness, especially teachers at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school about the application of short stories as a useful material source in their teaching process The research is

hoped to inform teachers of the benefits of short stories and suggest some effective ways of applying them in teaching English to make the lessons more interesting

6 Method of the study

In order to achieve the aims of the study, the following data collection

instruments will be used:

(1) Tests for students

(2) questionnaire for students

(3) questionnaire for teachers

The data collection time lasts 10 weeks from April to June 2015

7 Design of the study

The study will be divided into three parts:

Part 1: Introduction shows rationale, aims, objectives, research questions, scope,

significance, methods and design of the study

Part 2: Development includes three chapters:

Chapter 1, Literature review deals with some theoretical background relevant

to the study: reading in foreign language learning, review of some methods and approaches for teaching reading and some benefits of short stories in language teaching

Chapter 2, Research methodology focuses on the current situation of teaching and learning at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school, participants of the study, data collection instruments and data collection and analysis procedure

Chapter 3, Data analysis and findings

This chapter provides an analysis of collected data and the findings

Part 3: Conclusion summaries the major findings discussed in part 2, shows

pedagogical suggestions in using short stories to teach reading, and points out some limitations of the study and gives suggestions for further study

PART II: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1 Reading in foreign language teaching

1.1.1 Definitions of reading

Reading is one of the most important skills for mastery of a foreign language Reading is more than simply referring the activity of pronouncing the printed material or following each line of written page It is also more than recognizing words within a sentence; it includes whole activity of thinking process to evaluate the information

According to Grellet (1981:7), reading is defined as medium of communication, the power to get information from the written language It is also an active taught-arousing problem solving process In this process, the reader must take an active contribution by drawing upon and using concurrently various abilities that he has acquired

Wallace (1992: 4) says that reading as interpreting means reacting to a written text as a piece of communication; in other words, readers assume some communicative intent on the writer‟s part which the reader has some purposes in attempting to understand

Aebersold and Field (1997:15) claim that reading is what happening when people look at the text and assign meaning to the written symbols in that text, further, the text and the reader are the two necessary physical entities for the reading process to begin Therefore, there is an interaction between the text and the reader that constitute actual reading Meanwhile, Heilman, Blair and Rupley (1981:4) state that there are some basic aspects of reading with which most authorities are in agreement as follow:

- Reading is interacting with language that has been coded into print

- The product of interacting with the printed language should be comprehension

- Reading ability is closely related to oral language ability

- Reading is an active and ongoing process that is affected directly by an individual‟s interaction with his environment

It can be concluded that reading is a process of reacting and understanding a written text as a piece of communication Reading does not need to look everything

in a given text It is significant to comprehend genre to catch the information and message in the text In short, reading is a mean of communication which is an active, communicative and interactive process that goes on between the reader and the text, resulting in comprehension

1.1.2 Techniques of reading

Some linguists have proposed many ways of reading, Grellet (1998:40) summarized the way of reading including as follow:

a, Skimming: quickly running one‟s eyes across a whole text (an essay, article or

chapter) to get the gist of it The reader goes through the text quickly The purpose

of skimming is simply to see what a text is about The reader skims in order to satisfy a very general curiosity about the text Skimming is useful in three different situations:

more accurate picture of text to be read later

more detailed attention

b,Scanning: quickly going to a text to find a particular piece of information

Williams (1996:100) states that scanning occurs when reader goes through a text very quickly in order to find a particular point of information In addition, scanning

is very useful for finding a specific name, date, static or fact without reading the entire article

c, Extensive reading: reading longer text usually for someone‟s pleasure This is a

fluency activity, mainly involving global understanding

d, Intensive reading: reading short text to extract specific information This is more

an accuracy activity involving reading for details

In my opinion, these techniques are very important and useful for students who want to enhance their reading comprehension skill Consequently, teachers should consider teaching these techniques systematically to help students get thorough knowledge to improve their language skills

1.1.3 Reading comprehension

1.1.3.1 Definitions of reading comprehension

Reading comprehension is a development in which the reader devises sense, using as the building materials, the message on the printed page, and the information stockpiled in the reader‟s head It involves deliberate thinking, in which significance is built by exchanges between manuscript and person who reads Efficient comprehenders not only make logic of the text they are reading, they can also utilize the message it holds

Miller (2002:8) states that reading comprehension is the ability to understand

or to get meaning from any types of written material It is the reason for reading and the critical component of all content reading

Grellet (1981:3) assures that reading comprehension is understanding written text that means extracting the required information from it as efficiently as possible Reading comprehension is not enough to understand the gist of the text but more detailed information is necessary as well

In short, comprehension is powerful because of the ability to construct meaning comes from the mind of the reader Therefore, specific comprehension instruction-modeling during targeted mini-lessons and varied opportunities for practice during small group and independent reading is crucial to the development

of strategic and effective readers

1.1.3.2Reading comprehension skills

Dallman (1982:133) states that there are various skills that make the ability to comprehend what is read These specific skills may be classified as the purpose of the reader and the length and nature of the selection or reading units

a, According to the reader’s purpose

The skills dependent upon the reader‟s purpose are classified into nine levels of comprehension skills:

 Reading to select significant details: to note important details

graphs and maps

b, According to the structure of length of reading unit

details, answering questions, arriving at generalizations, and following in a paragraph

special attention needs to be paid to the mains of reading short stories, articles, chapters and books

From the above theories, the author thinks that students must understand that good readers use a variety of these strategies every time they read Therefore, simply knowing the individual strategies is not enough, nor is it enough to know them in

isolation Students must know when and how to collectively use these strategies

1.1.3.3 Causes of poor reading comprehension among students

Literature suggests that a lack of systematic direct instruction is one of the main causes for inadequately developed reading comprehension (Carrier, 2006:25) There are print specific skills that need to be taught instead of leaving children on their own to discover them (Moats, 2002:96) Not all children will discover comprehension strategies on their own; therefore instruction must be tailored to facilitate students in doing so

Fuchs, Hosp, & Jenkins (2001: 245) thinks that poor readers do not construct their own meaning and need direct explicit instruction on how to be strategic while reading According to Chittenden & Salinger (2003) many teachers assumed that students would just “figure out” comprehension strategies all on their own

Children with low aptitude or impoverished literacy backgrounds are not likely to figure out reading strategies for themselves Research has shown that effective reading programs and explicit directed instruction with clearly defined goals and objectives can improve students‟ comprehension (Foorman, Francis, Fletcher, Schatschneider, & Mehta, 1998)

Poor reading comprehension can also be attributed to students lacking reading strategies Chittenden & Salinger (2001:54) state that our lack of knowledge, until recently, to identify comprehension skills has made it difficult for teachers to help students with strategies

Comprehension is the ultimate goal of reading and as a result, must not be taken lightly Struggling readers in upper elementary grades must be provided with systematic explicit instruction to improve their understanding of text, and indeed, their knowledge of the world in which they live Salinger (2003:108) points out that instructional approaches which did not work for yesterday‟s children will not improve tomorrow‟s students‟ comprehension skills in grade 4 and higher Therefore, teachers must retool themselves and possess a repertoire of effective reading strategies that they can employ to help struggling readers overcome their

comprehension difficulties In addition, students‟ reading difficulties must be identified, and carefully addressed to prevent them from falling further behind academically

Vocabulary knowledge is a requisite for reading comprehension Individuals who

do not know the meanings of words can be described as poor readers Therefore, lack of vocabulary development is a likely cause of poor reading comprehension (Moats, 2002: 102) Research also suggests that large class size directly affects inadequately developed reading skills by limiting teacher interaction with individual students during reading instruction (Gillet & Temple, 1994)

Poor comprehenders are often unaware of their inability to comprehend what they read They may not be able to monitor their own comprehension, but often times these students will realize that they are not successful academically, and often experience low self esteem, and lack of motivation (Duke & Pearson, 2002)

To sum up, teachers should find out students‟ problems so that they can use suitable approaches to help poor comprehenders to develop the necessary skills and strategies to improve their comprehension, thus becoming active and purposeful users of text

1.2 Short stories in language teaching

1.2.1 Definition of short stories

Stories are as ancient as humankind itself In real life people read short stories extensively for variety of purposes Fairy tales, folk tales, fables and short stories have always been used as a vehicle for developing understanding of centuries old wisdom of mankind, for entertaining and instructing the people because of their distinctive pattem and narrative elements.Poe (in Abrams, 1970:158) defines short story as “a narrative that can be read at one sitting of from one-half hour to two hour and that is limited to a certain unique or single effect to which every detail is subordinate”

Webster‟s dictionary (1983:137) describes story as the full sequence of events in

a work of fiction as we imagine them to have taken a place, in the order in which they have occurred in life

Wright (1995:6) states that the stories are motivating, rich in language experience, and inexpensive He adds that stories should be central part of the work

of all primary teachers whether they are teaching the mother tongue or a foreign language

In general, short story is one of the most useful types of literary texts to teach culture and language skills especially reading skill The reason is that most learners

in EFL contexts have little or no opportunity to contact with native speakers, so reading short stories will give them the chances to have better interaction with foreign culture, language and people

1.2.2 Benefits of short stories in language teaching

Almost all short stories have the following unique characteristics which make them especially suitable to be used in reading comprehension classes: universality, non-triviality, personal relevance, variety, interest, economy and suggestive power, and ambiguity (Maley, 1989:12) Moreover, each learner's interpretation has validity and an almost infinite fund of interactive discussion is guaranteed

Various advantages have been proposed for the use of short stories in the language classes Short stories are selected among many kinds of literary genre because of the length of the story and readability for foreign language learners especially for low-intermediate level of students Collin and Slater (1991:196) explained that short stories can be used for EFL learners because 1) the length of the story is appropriate for one or two class session, 2) it is not complicated for students, 3) it has variety choices, and 4) it can be used for all leveland all ages Besides, short stories provide real examples of grammatical structure and vocabulary items (Pardede, 2011) which provide the students an exposure of native language that could not be encountered in EFL setting Moreover, reading short stories gives the students enough exposure to L2 reading According to Davis (1995, cited in

Harmer, 2001:204), giving enough exposure to L2 reading can lead studentsto enhance their comprehension skills and add their active and passive vocabulary

In addition, Arigol (2001 as cited in Hismanoglu, 2005:15) lists the following benefits of stories over other literary texts:

 offer a fictional and interesting world

 help students to be more creative and raise the critical thinking skills

 raise cultural awareness

contexts because of its universal language

Moreover, short stories let educators drill four skills at every stage of verbal communication expertise Murdoch (2002: 9) indicates that “short stories can, if selected and exploited appropriately, provide quality text content which will greatly enhance ELT courses for learners at intermediate levels of proficiency”

Young (1996:90) also argues that exploiting of stories to bring in critical things

to seminary learners He trusts that stories have two crucial advantages over traditional content: (1) because they are entertaining, students‟ pervasive apprehension is reduced, and they learn from the beginning that critical thinking is natural, familiar, and sometime even fun (2) the stories put issues of critical thinking in an easily remembered contexts Howie (1993:24) concurs on the application of short story to tutor critical thinking He wisecracks that teachers have been undertaking to assist learners to swell cognitive skills since eachone desires to

“make judgments, be decisive, come to conclusions, synthesize information, organize, evaluate, predict, and apply knowledge.”

On the other hand, the language in a short story is somehow different from other forms of discourse that it breaks the language norms; therefore, through

reading students will have chances to approach the language outside the classroom, which are not only increasing the students‟ reading skill but also solving problem that a student learning grammar rules very well still gets confused when talking to the native speakers (Widdowson, 1983:37)

Moreover, short story is handy in teaching culture to foreign language learners Short story conveys the culture of the populace regarding whom the story is portrayed Through learning the culture, students learn about the old times as well

as modern, along with concerning people‟s civilization and customs Culture educates students to understand and respect people‟sdifferences Misinterpretation may occur due to differences between the two cultures as Gajdusek (1998:232) explains To avoid misinterpretation, instructors should introduce the culture to the students or ask them to find relevant information about it

Finally, for the teachers, short stories offer some advantages as Colin and Slater (1991:113) lists below:

or plays can be sectioned in the same way but still take a few classes

of finding something to appeal to each individual‟s taste and interests

 Short stories are valuable for sectional courses or for teachers with shifting classes or continuous-intake adult classes

In conclusion, short stories bring various advantages for teachers to teach language skills However, teachers should consider how to use them correctly and effectively to get the best results

1.2.3 How to choose short stories in teaching language skills

In using short stories in EFL/ESL classes, story selection plays an important role Each story has a different aim to accomplish within the parallel syllabus depending

on its contents, language features and writing tasks to be performed Since the literature is intended to reinforce the language items, both grammar and vocabulary, each literary text is chosen with specific learning points in mind, matched the

instructional objectives in the ongoing syllabus to enable students to reinforce the

language Therefore, teachers should choose a short story well enough to handle

within the teaching hours and help the students to complete a given task and give

the students a feeling of achievement and self-confidence Therefore, it can be

encouraging when students are psychologically satisfied that they have read the

very words of a great writer Generally, the more confident choice concerning a

suitable text for EFL/ESL learners may be the short stories which are more

contemporary and short enough to be discussed in one or two teaching sessions Besides the length, the linguistic aspects of the text should concern the language,

style and diction, appropriate to the level of the students Lazar (1990:206) proposes

that “the text should be sufficiently challenging without being so difficult as to be

demotivating …[It] should be within the student‟s grasp, in terms of their linguistic,

intellectual, and emotional capacities” Moreover, Hill (1994:15) recommends

considering three other criteria in story selection: (1) the needs and abilities of the

students; (2) the linguistic and stylistic level of the text, and (3)the amount of

background information required for a true appreciation of the material

Furthermore, to use short stories in the learning process, it is required for the

teacher to think creatively how to plan the activity that makes the students to have

direct experience so that reading comprehension can be attained

When choosing a short story, teacher should also consider about the students‟

cultural background and social experience which help them understand the text It

would be difficult for most readers to make sense of the story without having any

knowledge of the value and culture of the society they describe

Last but not least, factors connected with the text like availability and

exploitability are also necessary to be considered Teachers should think of some

questions such as: How easily can teachers make the short stories available to the

students?; What kinds of tasks and activities can teachers exploit the stories?, etc

In the author‟s point of view, whether the use of short stories in teaching can be

successful or not depends to a large extent on how the teachers apply them and

whether this sits the teaching situation It can help teachers avoid serious unexpected problems and help students actively take part in the learning process Therefore, the issue of text selection is a very significant consideration teachers should pay much attention in language classes

1.3 Review of the previous related studies

It is clear that using literature, especially short stories in teaching language is one

of the most suitable methods that enhance learning in all fields Moreover, it also is

an influential and powerful way to improve students‟ skills, especially reading comprehension These are the reasons why teaching reading skill through story has drawn much attention of researchers in Vietnam as well as other countries recently First of all, Fitriya (2010) conducted an action research on using picture-stories to improve students‟ reading comprehension at the eighth grade of SMP N I Tasikmadu Karanganyar The author concluded that the use of picture-stories of narrative texts could improve the students‟ reading comprehension From the observation, she also found that the situation of the teaching and learning process became more enjoyable and interesting, and the students became happy and enthusiastic in the classes

graders‟ attitudes and comprehension of short story in Gaza governmental schools

In this study, animation films proved the large effects in enhancing the students‟ ability in the reading comprehension In addition, this strategy enhanced students‟ predictions and expectations, and attracted their attention in classes

Next, Merli (2013) carried out a case study on using children short stories to enhance students‟ reading comprehension The author drew conclusion from the findings that the use of children short stories improved the students‟ reading comprehension It could be seen from students‟ average scores which were slightly improved from diagnostic test Moreover, in this study, the use of children short stories displayed some advantages: it facilitates students to enrich their vocabulary;

it encourages the students to have critical thinking, it increases students‟ motivation; and it accommodates the students to practice their language skill

Also in 2013, Omid and Nasibeh investigated teaching reading comprehension through short stories in advance classes They found out that all respondents in a group that the researchers taught reading comprehension through short story showed improvement after the reading course The result pointed out that the control group and experimental group had a significant difference in their post-test Besides, the results of this research found sufficient reasons for teaching short story

in Iranian reading comprehension classroom

In the context of Vietnam, Nguyễn Hồng Quyên (2006) did a research on integrating short stories and poems in developing the reading skills for 2nd year students

in Hai Phong University In the study, she presented the potential values of using literary text in language development in general and how to integrate short story and poem in aiding reading comprehension in particular From the results, it can be claimed that language teachers should include more literary texts into their language lessons Phạm Thu Hà (2009) conducted a study on using short stories in teaching English in the context of Vietnam Australia school-Hanoi The research found out that it is necessary and beneficial for teachers to use short stories in teaching English to enhance students‟ language proficiency and creative expressions in the target language In addition, students also felt motivated and interested in their teachers‟ use of short stories in English class

In 2010, Đào Thị Minh Hương was concerned about the relationship between first-year Nghe An college students‟ motivation to read and their use of reading strategies She drew conclusion that motivation had important influence on students‟ use of reading strategies She also claimed that the reading texts played a significant role to students‟ motivation in reading in terms of its level of challenge, topics and content Therefore, she suggested teachers should use authentic materials such as magazines, articles, songs and stories

1.4 Summary

In short, this chapter has established the theoretical background concerned with the topic of the research It has mentioned an overview of reading, short stories and their benefits in teaching language and previous related studies

CHAPTER II: METHODOLOGY 2.1 Setting of the study

2.1.1 Teachers’ background information

The teachers under investigation are between 35 and 50 years old All of them graduated from universities or colleges at major English and have over fifteen year experience in teaching English The teachers also have certificate of B2 level in Common European Framework of Reference for language

2.1.2 Students’ background information

The students taking part in this study are eighty the seventh graders, and among them are forty three female and thirty sevenmale who come from various family backgrounds and have different learning styles However, most of them have problems with reading comprehension because of some causes such as limited vocabularies, difficulties in making sentences within paragraph, difficulties in finding main idea or making conclusion of the text Besides, some students do not have sufficient motivation to learn English They feel that reading is burdensome and boring Some of them delay the reading activity so long Some of them carry out the reading task, but they are not able to comprehend the contents of text due to their limited vocabulary It can be seen from the fact that the way they answer the questions is only by repeating the sentences they find in the questions They think that English is very difficult to understand, so they are reluctant to read English text and they are lazy to do practice or homework

The students have three English periods and one elective period per week Within each forty five minute reading class, they learn and practice reading skills such as skimming, scanning, reading for main ideas or specific information, etc The reading materials are mostly taken from course book: English 7

2.1.3 Teaching and learning condition at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school

Nguyen Khuyen secondary school is located in the center of Binh My town, but the situation of school environment is safe and quiet This school has good teaching and learning condition; therefore, it is acknowledged as national standard

school Nguyen Khuyen is also one of the best secondary schools in Ha Nam province Beside sixteen classrooms, the other rooms are headmaster office, teacher office, administration office, laboratory, computer room, etc.The school has special language laboratories which are equipped with many modern facilities such as boards, computers, speakers, projectors, etc The classroom is spacious enough to accommodate forty or more students Even though the seats and tables are fixed, there is enough space for the improvisations of seating arrangement for group work The school also has a big library with a lot of books, stories as well as other supplementary material for learners

2.2 Research design

2.2.1 Participants

The population of the study is eighty of the 7th graders at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school Besides, the other participants of this study are fifteen English teachers at this secondary school

2.2.2 Data collectioninstruments

To fulfill the requirements of the study, the researcher employed three kinds of instrument: pre-test, post-test, questionnaire for students and questionnaire for teachers These instruments helped the researcher get more in-depth and accurate data for analysis

2.2.2.1 Tests

In order to achieve the purpose of the study, the researcher carried out two reading comprehension tests: a pre –test and a post-test as instruments to collect data in relevance Then the results were compared to find out the effectiveness of using short stories in teaching reading skill

A test is an instrument used to collect data on subject‟s ability or knowledge of certain disciplines In a second language acquisition study, tests are used to collect data about the subjects‟ ability and knowledge of the second language such as vocabulary, grammar, and reading (Seliger & Shohamy, 1989: 176)

In this research, two reading comprehension tests were given for both class 7A1 and 7A2 and they had the same level and format The tests were twenty minutes in length and were delivered to students at week 1 as pre-test and week 10

as post-test Each reading comprehension test consisted of a short story and ten questions The questions were related to the objectives represented in testing the target students‟ reading comprehension skills: main ideas (question 1,2,3), details (question 4,5,6), vocabulary (question 7,8,9) and inference (question 10)

2.2.2.2Questionnaire

The questionnaire is exploited in this research since it is one of the most popular instruments in gathering data Questionnaires gather information directly by asking people questions and using the responses as data for analysis They are often used to gather information about attitudes, behaviors, activities, and responses to events (Wisker, 2007:187)

However, there are some weaknesses of questionnaires such as the “simplicity and superficiality generated in questionnaire” (Dornyei, 2003:210) and boredom and tiredness that affect the participants‟ responses Therefore, the researcher has attempted to make the questionnaire items clear and brief to avoid the drawback The questionnaire for students consisting of six questions aims at investigating the students‟ attitude towards the use of short stories, their favorite types of short stories and their responses to certain activities carried out in reading classes The questionnaire consisted two main parts The first part required subject to give information about their name, gender and their mastery of English The second one included six questions: question 1 found out students‟ attitude towards short stories; questions 2 worked out the types of short stories students expect to learn; question 3 clarified the activities they think the most useful before reading a short story; question 4 aimed at finding the activities students are interested in doing while reading short stories; question 5 worked out what type of tasks students like to do in the post-reading stage; question 6 clarified improvements of students after learning

reading skill through short stories The questionnaire is translated into Vietnamese

so that students can understand the questions clearly to give correct answer

The questionnaire for teachers aims at finding out the suitable methods that teachers use to teach reading with short stories The questionnaire was designed similarly but the second part included 5 questions: question 1 made clear about the frequency of using short story; question 2 pointed out the types of class organization teachers use in reading classes; question 3, 4, 5 found out the activities teachers designed to teach pre- reading, while-reading and post- reading stage and question 6 clarified what types of assessment applied to exploit short stories when teaching reading skill

2.2.3 Data collection procedure

The data was collected throughout three main stages: pre intervention, while intervention and post intervention The use of the instruments in the data collection process was illustrated in the following timeline

Table 1: Data collection procedure

Pre intervention

(Week 1)

While intervention ( Week 2-9)

Post intervention ( Week 10)

Questionnaire for students Questionnaire for teachers

2.2.3.1 Pre intervention

The purpose of the pre intervention stage is finding out the students‟ reading abilities Therefore, a pre-test of reading comprehension was used for both classes 7A1 and 7A2

2.2.3.2 While intervention

In this phase, the experimental class (7A1) was taught reading skill using short stories as supplemental material in elective English periods in 8 weeks The control class (7A2) used the normal textbook prescribed by the school

Each lesson lasted 45 minutes The researcher chose short stories from the websites http://shortstoriesshort.com and http://teacher.scholastic.com The stories were suitable for students‟ level and linked into the syllabus through topics or language items to teach reading skill Besides, after reading the short stories, students were required to complete the tasks and do some activities to enhance their reading comprehension skills such as short answer questions, gap filling, storytelling and role play, etc

The detailed lesson description is illustrated as below:

- Pre-reading activities: (10 minutes)

Step 1: The teacher could use some activities to lead in For example, teacher showed some pictures relevant to the story and asked students to guess the topic, or predict the plot of the story Besides, teacher could ask students to call out the name

of the character, or designed some activities such as storyline, strong line for student

to discuss what would happen in the story

Step 2: The teacher presented and guided student how to guess the meaning of unfamiliar vocabulary from the context Moreover, teacher could model some reading strategies such as skimming and scanning

- While-reading activities: (20 minutes)

Step 1: The students read the story and do some tasks as the following:

+ Ask and answer questions about the story

+ Describe the structure of the story

+ Make generalizations and draw inference based on what they have read + Gap-filling

Step 2: Teacher organized some games or activities such as roles play and storytelling

- Post- reading activities: (15 minutes)

Step 1: The teacher designed some activities to check students‟ comprehension about the story and enhance their use of oral language such as summarizing the story or discussing to share their ideas about what they had read

Step 2: Students could be asked to work in groups to complete projects such as making up new story with new ending or drawing pictures about what they have read Step 3: Teacher asked students to retell what they have learnt and gave homework

The detailed lesson could be seen more clearly in the sample lesson plan (Appendix 8)

2.2.3.3 Post intervention

A post-test was used to find out the results of the learning reading skill using short stories after the intervention Also, the survey questionnaire for students was also delivered to the experimental class to find out how much they enjoyed the effectiveness of using short stories in reading class In addition, a survey questionnaire was also delivered to fifteen teachers of English at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school to find out how they used short stories in reading classes

Consequently, for each research question, participants‟ scores or responses were calculated and transferred into numerical form The data was then tabulated and charted for clearer presentation and easier comparison

2.2.4 Data analysis method

The study aims at measuring the hypothesis that the application if short story in reading class is really effective and finding out suitable methods to teach reading The data was collected from the instruments: pre-test, post-test, questionnaire for students and questionnaire for teachers The researcher took advantage of the software Microsoft Excel to calculate the mean, median and standard deviation of students‟ scores in both classes (7A1 and 7A2) in the two reading comprehension tests

2.3 Summary

This chapter presents the procedures followed throughout the study It introduces a complete description of the methodology of the study in terms of the setting of the study, the teaching and learning conditions at Nguyen Khuyen secondary school; and the research design including population, instruments (tests,

a questionnaire for students and a questionnaire for teachers) and data collection and analysis procedure

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS 3.1 Tests

3.1.3 Test description

The pre-test and post-test consisting of ten questions were fifteen minutes in length The tests were delivered for students in week 1 and week 10 as pre- test and post-test

In analyzing the data in the form of numbers as the result of the test, the researcher found the mean scores of the pre-test and post-test Then the researcher compared those scores basing on the following criteria:

- The measures of central tendency: to clarify the progress tendency in each class

- The standard deviation: to help the author explore the degree to which the group of test mark deviated from the mean

Basing on the result, the improvement could be seen from the score in the test and post-test

pre-3.1.4 Data analysis of pre-test

3.1.4.1 Percentage of raw mark

Chart 1: Percentage of raw mark (pre-test)

As can be seen clearly from the chart that the students in two classes (7A1 and 7A2) are at the quite low level of proficiency The scores of both classes in pre-test are ranged from two to nine and students in class 7A2 seem to get higher marks In class 7A1, 47.5% of students got below average score while 40% of students in class 7A2 got mark three and four Besides, 22.5% of students in class 7A1 got mark six, seven, eight; whereas the number of 7A2 students getting above average score takes up to 25% However, there was no mark nine in class 7A1 and none of the students in both classes got the highest score

3.1.4.2Correlation

Table 2: Mean and Std Deviation (pre-test)

The table shows that the mean of class 7A1 (4.775) is lower than that of class 7A2 (5.075) which points out that the reading ability of students in class 7A1 is weaker than those in class 7A2 Besides, the standard deviation of 1.35(7A1) and 1.49(7A2) implies a very small spread of marks indicating narrow range of ability in reading skill of students in both classes

3.1.5 Data analysis of post- test

3.1.5.1 Percentage of raw mark

Chart 2: Percentage of raw mark (post-test)

As clearly shown from the chart that the students in two classes (7A1 & 7A2) have some progress in post-test The scores of both classes in post-test are ranged from three to nine and students in class 7A1 seem to get higher marks In class 7A1, 30%

of students got below average score while 35% of students in class 7A2 got mark three and four Surprisingly, half of students in class 7A1 got mark six, seven, eight and even nine; whereas the numbers of 7A2 students getting above average score accounts for 40% However, none of the students in both classes got mark 10

3.1.5.2 Correlation

Table 3: Mean and Std Deviation (post-test)

The table reveals the number of cases, means, standard deviations and median of the scores of the post-test in both classes The mean of the post-test of 7A1 is 5.625 which is higher than that of class 7A2 (5.3) It can be clearly seen that students in class 7A1 had dramatical improvement in post-test, because in pre-test, the mean of students‟ score in class 7A1 is lower than 7A2 Besides, the students‟ mean scores

of the post-test of 7A1 students is pretty higher than the mean score of the pre-test (in comparison with 4.775) The median of the two classes are 5.5 and 5 which is fairly corresponding to the mean The finding implied that students‟ reading skill in class 7A1 has an improvement after receiving the treatment

3.2 Questionnaire for students

3.2.1 Aims

The questionnaire aimed at investigating the students‟ attitude towards the use of short stories in improving reading skills and their responses to certain activities carried out in classes

3.2.2 Participants

The participants of this survey questionnaire are forty students in class 7A1 who were taught reading skill with the application of short stories

3.2.3 Data analysis

3.2.3.1 Students’ attitude towards short stories

Chart 3: Students’ attitude towards short stories

This pie chart illustrates the students‟ attitude towards reading periods with short stories From the chart, it can be seen that 70% of the students expressed their love with the way of using short stories in reading classes Besides, a quarter of the students were only sometimes interested in learning with the use of short stories However, there was a small number of them (7.5%) stated that they did not care much about this

Not interested at all Not very intersted Interested sometimes Very interested

2.5% 5 %

22.5%

70%

3.2.3.2 Types of short stories students expect to learn

Chart 4: Types of short stories students expect to learn

The chart 3 shows that students like short stories with familiar topics like family and friendship most which takes up to 87.5% while 70 % of students fancy horror or detective short stories On the other hand, the number of students who like easier and shorter stories within one page was nearly the same as the number of students who like longer and more difficult stories It is quite a predictable result revealing the right situation in the context of class 7A1 It can be inferred that the weaker students in this class like shorter and easier stories whereas better ones like longer and more challenging stories In general, the study about students‟ preference above helps teachers have the right selection of short stories to attract students‟ attention and interest for further learning

3.2.3.3 The activities students like most before reading a short story

Chart5: The activities students like most before reading a short story

Easier and shorter

stories within one page

Longer and more difficult stories

Short stories with familiar topics like family, friendship…

Horror or detective short stories

The chart shows that 90% of the students like predicting the plot of the story before reading a short story This may be because prediction can help them get fascinated in the story and understand the story more easily Guessing vocabularies in the context

is also considered a very good activity which accounts for 75% of the students Besides, 65% of the students like translating the story into Vietnamese The least popular activity is reading aloud to the whole class which is used by 57.5% of the students Perhaps, students feel this activity is quite boring and some of them are easy

to lose their concentration when listening the other„s reading out loud

3.2.3.4 Students’ favorite activities while reading a short story

Table 4:Students’ favorite activities while reading a short story

f Others

- Think of new ideas

- Imagine to be one of the character

- Just read to find the detailed ideas of the story

- Look up the new words in the dictionary

25

It can be seen from the table that students like to do various activities when reading short stories The students seem to prefer activities that help them improve their reading skills It is the reason why the numbers of students who likes answering comprehension question accounts for 72.5% while 70% choose to do the skill-drilling task Besides, more than half of students like to identify the main ideas

of the story; whereas just 47.5 % want to take note what they listen to teacher‟s explanation and describe the structure of the story In addition, a quarter of the students are also keen on some different creative activities such as thinking of new ideas or imagining to be one of the characters and making up a play In short, most

of students choose their own ways of doing when reading a story, so teachers should not limit the activities and let students develop their own creativity

3.2.3.5 Students’ favorite activities in the post-reading stage

Table 5: Students’ favorite activities in the post-reading stage

d Discuss and express opinions and attitude towards the short story

and its characters

57.5

It can be entailed from the table that students have positive feeling about activities at post-reading phase The two activities students like most are creating a new story with new ending based on the old one (90%) and role play (87.5%) On the other hand, just 57.5% like to discuss and express opinions and attitude towards the short story and its character while the percentage of students choosing to summarize or retell the story rises up to 62.5%

3.2.3.6 Students’ improvements after they have been taught with the use of short stories

Table 6: Students’ improvements after they have been taught

with the use of short stories

e Others

- I can enrich my background knowledge about people, animal, etc

- I feel more confident to talk in front of class

- My cooperation skill is improved

17.5

As can be seen from the table, 87.5% of the students express that they can answer comprehension questions quickly and 80% can guess new words from the context Besides, students‟ vocabulary and reading speed are also improved a lot Particularly, 17.5% of students claim that after learning reading skill with short stories, they can get more than just the skills such as enriching their background knowledge, raising their self-confidence or improving their cooperation skill with their friends These improvements of the students seem to be the most surprising and interesting achievement to the author

3.3 Questionnaire for teachers

For the first question, 40% of the teachers stated that they never used short stories

in reading classes Two teachers often taught reading through short stories and three teacherssometimes used short stories to teach reading for students 60% of the teachers usually use textbook as the main source for teaching reading comprehension

Never Rarely Sometimes Often Always

20%

13.3 %

40%

26.7%

3.3.3.2 Class organization

Chart 7: Class organization

It can be clearly seen from the table that most teachers (86.7%) decide to teach reading as whole class activity maybe because it saves time and it is easy to control the students Small group is also a good choice to exploit activity in reading lessons; however, the suitable way to divide class into small groups is very important The chart shows that almost half of the teachers (46.7%) use same-ability groupswhile66.7% of the teachers choose mix-ability group to teach students reading skill Furthermore, individual work is one of the best and easiest ways for teachers to exploit activities in class, so that over two thirds of teachers always let students work individually

3.3.3.3Pre- reading activities

Table 7: Pre – reading activities

d Teach or model for students different reading strategies (skimming,