Some measures to improve reading comprehension skills for students in teaching english 11 in the direction of the national high school exam

THE TABLE OF CONTENTS The research methods CONTENTS The reality Objections of knowledge and skills Basic knowledge - Definition of reading comprehension - Basic reading skills - Basic

THE TABLE OF CONTENTS

The research methods CONTENTS

The reality Objections of knowledge and skills Basic knowledge

- Definition of reading comprehension

- Basic reading skills

- Basic types of questions in reading comprehension exercises

- Specific steps in reading comprehension Experimental communication

Experiments and lessons learned CONLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS Conclusions

Recommendations and proposals

A INTRODUCTION

I Reasons to teaching experience

In the trend of international integration of the country today, language is an important issue, hotly being every profession and every industry all areas of interest Being an international language is widespread in most countries in the world, English plays indispensable roles in communication or research in all fields Therefore, the teaching and learning of foreign languages, especially English, today becomes imperative and is a compulsory subject in the curriculum at all educational levels as well as in the national high school exams of our country

The Ministry of Education and Training has developed a plan to improve the quality of foreign language teaching and learning across the country Innovating and improving the quality of foreign language learning need many synchronous solutions First of all, We need to innovate teaching and learning methods This spirit of innovation has been reflected in the Central Resolution 2 of Session VIII, which is institutionalized in the Education Law (December 1998) Article 24.2 of the Education Law states says that “The method of general education must promote students' activeness, self-awareness, initiative and creativity Consistent with the characteristics of each class and subject Fostering self-study methods, training the skills to apply knowledge into practice, affecting emotions, bringing joy and excitement to students' learning ”

English is very necessary for the daily life and work, but many people don’t know how to learn and approach it effectively Each person is also learning English for different purposes For example, English learners with the purpose of communicating for work, we need to focus on developing practical skills such as listening and speaking, and English learners for the purpose of testing, Teaching again must focus more on teaching skills with combining more academic skills such as reading, writing and grammar supplementation As a teacher in an educational environment with high school students and more specifically, college preparatory students in order to prepare for the tough and fierce competition in Vietnam, it can be said that responsibility and the teacher's role is even more important Teachers must find an effective method to guide their students to do the best results

In the process of teaching and learning foreign languages, reading is one of the basic skills that are very focused Reading is an effective and necessary tool for students to master, consolidate language knowledge, expand vocabulary as well as deepen the style and language they are learning Reading plays a very important role in developing students' reading comprehension skills

In fact, in reading skills and doing exercises after reading, students often make some common mistakes such as: incorrect pronunciation, often wind indiscriminately, their vocabulary is too little or no knowledge, not knowing how to read a reading comprehension, not remembering the information in the text, not

understanding the basic grammatical structure, most students do not know how to ask a paragraph and answer a question To overcome this situation, teachers must first make sure that students have a proper awareness of the importance of learning

a foreign language in general and specifically learning English in particular, especially making learning Favorite students, interested in learning a reading more effectively The lectures of teachers in the classroom must be suitable for all students, must have appropriate methods, which stimulate learning for students

From that fact, I chose the topic " Some measures to improve reading comprehension skills for students in teaching English 11 in the direction of the national high school exam " as a research issue in my experience initiative

II The purpose of the teaching experience

Help the students of two grades 11A2, 11A7 at Hau Loc 4th High School overcome the psychological barriers when reading a document, paragraph or text in English effectively

III The research subjects

The students of two grades 11A2, 11A7 at Hau Loc 4th High School

IV The research methods

1 Read analysis teaching materials

I have read the analysis and understanding of teaching materials

of the teacher cannot help but mention the improved teaching quality, innovative teaching methods suitable to each lesson and each student

In the old textbook curriculum, reading skills are practiced simultaneously with Listening- Speaking and Writing skills New words in each reading are often few or familiar topics that students know, teachers just need to ask questions and ask

students to answer coercively, awkwardly and thus the quality of their learning will never be tall

After the English program is re-compiled, the reading skills are trained individually, the higher the teaching method innovation, the more must follow Many new topics are mentioned, the number of vocabulary is also increasing Students feel overwhelmed, the old method is no longer suitable Therefore, teachers play a leading role in this Teach how to both meet practical requirements, while improving the quality of their learning

The cause of the reality

- Teachers:

Subjective reasons:

+ Aversion innovation, especially with some of the older teachers

+ Misconceptions about the new approach, including the application of language games

+ Talents limited

+ Apply new methods stereotyping and machinery

+ Bumper creativity, lack of flexibility

II Objections of knowledge and skills

- Practice reading skills such as "scanning" and "skimming"

- Practice the techniques of finding answers to the types of reading comprehension questions from easy to difficult and suitable for each student (students graduating and university students)

III Basic knowledge

1 Definition of reading comprehension

According to wikipedia, reading comprehension is defined as the level of understanding of a text or an information Understanding comes from a combination of the language written in the text and how they activate knowledge outside the text

According to the authors Mc Donough and Shaw (8: 102) extract Williams' concept that reading comprehension is the process of searching general information from a text, searching for specific information from a text, or reading to Seek fun

Nunan (10:68) argues that reading comprehension is the process by which readers combine information from a text with their background knowledge to understand a problem

There are many different definitions of "reading comprehension" but it can be generalized that reading comprehension is the process of finding information given

in the text and applying its background knowledge to understand a problem threads

2 Basic reading skills

One of the factors that make the success of the University English Exam is a reasonable division of time Within 60 minutes of 50 multiple choice questions, especially more difficult for 2 reading comprehension papers with each length of 200- 350 words, if the students do not have any effective method of doing it, they must confirm that the I will be short of time It is possible that time out of work for which many students have not finished reading To solve this problem students first need to grasp some basic skills when doing comprehension exercises Here are two skills that are essential for students to do this exercise

Skimming: use your eyes to skim through the entire lesson to get the main idea and the overall content of the lesson We use this skill when we want to identify important information, the main keyword After skimming you will determine if you need to read this paragraph later

Skimming steps:

- Read the topic of the lesson - this is the most concise summary

- Read the introduction or overview

- Read the first paragraph of the lesson

- Read the subtitles if available and find the relationship between them

- Read the first sentence of the remaining paragraphs because the main idea of each paragraph is usually in the first sentence

Scanning: using a quick scan to find an exact word or idea in a lesson This skill is used when they know for sure what information they are looking for For students, this skill should be used when reading the question requirements

Scanning steps:

- Read the title of the post

- Look from the top of the page to the bottom of the page to find out the specific words or phrases you need

- Pay special attention to definitions, formulas, diagrams, charts, etc

3 Basic types of questions in reading comprehension exercises

Question 1: Find the main idea of the reading (main idea)

Question 2: Determining the purpose of the lesson (Purpose)

Question 3: Identify how to organize an idea or overall layout or attitude (general

organization or attitude)

Question 4: Inference, find implications (Inference)

Question 5: Determining the information mentioned in the lesson (Stated detail) Question 6: Determining information not mentioned in the lesson (Unstated

details)

Question 7: Finding synonyms (Vocabulary)

Question 8: Search for words or phrases that are mentioned or referenced

(Reference)

4 Specific steps in reading comprehension

Of these 8 questions, questions 1, 2 and 3 are general questions that should be done later, the remaining questions are specific information questions, so they can

be considered in advance depending on the difficulty level of every sentence These questions are broken down into the following types

FORM 1: MAIN IDEA QUESTIONS (questions 1, 2 and 3)

Questions 1 and 2: Find the main idea of the reading (main idea) and determine the

purpose of the lesson (purpose)

Most readings contain at least one question of this type, which can be asked in various forms but will generally require students to identify "topic" "tiltle"

"subject" "primary idea" "Or" main idea " With basic exercises, the main content

of a paragraph is usually in the topic sentence or the first sentence in each paragraph (sometimes the last sentence), so students just need to skim the first sentence or the last sentence to find out the main content For advanced exercises, the main content of the lesson will not be in any specific sentence but the general idea of the whole lesson, so students need to leave these types of questions to do last, after spend time reading to find out the details of other questions students will understand the main content of the whole lesson

Main ideas questions

QUESTIONS What is the topic of the passage?

What is the subject of the passage?

What is the main idea of the passage?

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

With what is the author primary concerned?

Which of the following would be the best title?

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

KEYS Usually at the beginning or the end of each paragraph If

the main idea is not specific at the beginning or the end

of the paragraph, we will leave it as the final time after the time to answer detailed questions

- Read the first line of each paragraph

- Choose the best option from the remaining options

Question 3: Identify how to organize an idea or overall layout or attitude (general

organization or attitude)

This type of question often forces students to determine the layout of the passage or the author's attitude in the passage As for the question layout, students should pay attention to the words that connect between paragraphs For questions about the author's attitude, students should pay attention to the adjectives or judgments based

on the main content after skimming through the whole article Students need to use the exclusion method for completely false alternatives

Organization question signals

Time order Firstly, secondly, finally, next, then…

Cause and effect Because, since, as, lead to, due to, as a result,

consequently Definition – example Define, mean, indicate, show

Comparison and contrast On the one hand, on the other hand

More, less, least, most Problem – solution Cause, result in, deal with, solution,

Example:

Since the world became

industrialized, the number of animal

species that have either become extinct or

have neared extinction has increased

Bengal tigers, for instance, which once

roamed the jungles in vast numbers, now

number only about 2,300 By the year

2025, it is estimated that they will become

extinct

What is alarming about the case of

the Bengal tiger is that this extinction will

have been caused almost entirely by

poachers who, according to some sources,

are not always interested in material gain

but in personal gratification This is an

example of the callousness that is

contributing to the problem of extinction

Animals such as the Bengal tiger, as well

as other endangered species, are valuable

parts of the world’s ecosystem

International laws protecting these animals

must be enacted to ensure their survival –

and the survival of our planet

Countries around the world have

begun to deal with the problem in various

ways Some countries, in an effort to

circumvent the problem, have allocated

large amounts of land to animals

reserves.They then charge admission

prices to help defray the costs of

maintaining the parks, and they often must

also depend on world organizations for

support This money enables them to

invest in equipment and patrols to protect

the animals Another response to the increase in animal extinction is an

international boycott of products made from endangered species This has had

some effect, but by itself it will not prevent animals from being hunted and killed

The teacher explain students how to answer

Question 1:

What is the main topic of the passage?

A The Bengal tiger B International boycotts

C Endangered species D Problems with industrialization

For this question, the answer is usually in the first or last paragraph In this reading the answer is at the beginning and Key words “ the number of animal species” and

“extinct or have neared extinction” So the answer would be C

Question 2:

The previous passage is divided into two paragraphs in order to contrast:

A a comparison and a contrast

B a problem and a solution

C Specific and general information

D A statement and an illustration

As we can see, two paragraphs develop in two different directions

Para 1: “alarming about the case of the Bengal tiger is that this extinction will have

been caused almost entirely by poachers” warns of Belgan tiger being extinct due

to hunting

Para 2: “Countries around the world have begun to deal with the problem in

various ways” Countries are fixing the problem in different ways The hallmark here is "deal with the problem"

So the answer would be B because these two paragraphs talk about the extinction problem of rare species that are caused by hunting and countries that are giving solutions to it

Question 3:

Which of the following best describes the author’s attitude?

A indifferent B surprised C concerned D forgive

- With this type of question we should do after skimming the whole article to understand the main content of the article how we will find out the attitude of the author shown in the lesson

- In this exercise, the author raised the problem and solution of the countries for the rare animals so we will certainly eliminate the plan A (indifferent: indifferent) It seems that options B and D are not mentioned So the correct answer will be C: concerned because the author has raised a warning about the extinction of rare animals and what is the way to fix this problem

- Usually for this type of exercise they often have difficulty because they encounter many new words in this question And words that show attitudes are often adjectives, so after each reading comprehension, the teacher should pick up some common words in this form to help them notice and add new words

FORM 2: IMPLIED DETAIL QUESTIONS (question 4)

Question 4: Inference, find implications (Inference)

This type of question often requires students to draw conclusions or make inferences about the details outlined in the paragraph This type of question usually includes the words “implied, implied, inferred, or probably (maybe) are the signs for you to recognize these types of questions With this question, the answer is not directly given in the lesson but students need to rely on the information available in

Implied detail questions

QUESTIONS It is implied in the passage that …

It can be inferred from the passage that

It is most likely that…

What probably happened….?

KEYS The answer to this question is usually based on your

understanding of the text, but students can search in the order of the text

HOW TO ANSWER - Find key words, key words of each question

- Skimming (skimming) skimming to see key words, where the key points are in the paragraph (usually in the order in the lesson)

- Read carefully the sentences containing key words and ideas

- Find the appropriate answer according to the paragraph

- Use the method of eliminating the wrong type of plan, then select the best option from the other options

Example

The passage

The number of rings in a tree can be used to determine how old a tree really is Each year a tree produces a ring that is composed of one lightcolored wide band and one dark-colored narrow band The wider band is produced during the spring and early summer when tree stem cells grow rapidly and become larger The narrower band is produced in fall and early winter when cell growth is much slower and cells do not get very large No cells are

produced during the harsh winter and summer

months

Students work in groups and answer the

questions

The question

It is implied in the passage that if a tree has 100

wide bands and 100 narrow bands, then it is

A a century old

B two centuries old

C fifty years old

D two hundred years old

The correct answer to the above question is A