teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards using of authentic reading materials in eit at binh thuan vocational college

LIST OF TABLES Page Table 2.1 The Criteria for Using Authentic Materials in Language Teaching 14 Table 3.1 Demographic Information of Student Participants 30 Table 3.2 Demographic Inform

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STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

I, Tran Van Ty, certify that this thesis entitled, “Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards using of authentic reading materials in EIT at Binh Thuan Vocational College”, is my own work

Except where reference is made in the text of the study, this thesis comprises material published everywhere or extracted either in whole or in part from a thesis by which I have qualified for or been awarded another diploma or degree

No other person’s work has been utilized without due acknowledgments in the main text

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I cannot express enough gratitude to my supervisor, Dr Le Hoang Dung, Dean of the Faculty of English Linguistics and Literature, for his mindful supervision

My completion of the study would not have been occurred without my support of my family and colleagues, who gave me great help in sharing my own household chores as well as at work during the study

Also, I am grateful to all my TESOL9 classmates, who were always beside

me and helped me out of difficulties

Last but not least, my special thanks for my wife, Khue Khuc Khanh Van I would not have been able to go beyond in accomplishing the thesis without her high sympathy and understanding

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ABSTRACT

The utilization of authentic materials has been regarded as an effective teaching method through its great contribution to the enhancement of English reading for Information Technology Accordingly, the study on authentic materials would like to examine the teachers and IT students’ attitudes toward using authentic materials in IT reading class

To achieve these objectives, relevant literature on background of authentic materials, reading comprehension and previous studies were reviewed in the theory chapter to shape the theoretical framework of the study

The study was carried out at Binh Thuan Vocational College with the participation

of 35 IT students and 5 EFL teachers Mixed-methods research was employed in this study, i.e., both quantitative and qualitative data were collected from the questionnaire and semi-structured interview As for data analysis, descriptive statistics (e.g., mean, standard deviation, and frequencies/percentages) were used to analyze quantitative data, whereas qualitative data were analyzed through content analysis

The findings showed that both teachers and students had positive attitudes on the effect of authentic materials in IT reading classroom apropos of suitability, naturalness, usefulness or exploitability However, while teachers believed the chosen materials embraced their readability, their students opposed to that

From the research findings, it is recommended that the teachers should select the authentic supplementary materials readable and relevant to their students’ cognitive and

proficiency levels

2.1.3 The needs to authentic materials in language teaching 10 2.1.4 Challenges in the use of authentic materials 11

2.2.2 Reading comprehension and English for Specific Purposes 17

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2.3.2.1 Affective attitude dealing with authentic reading materials 18

2.3.2.2 Behavioral attitude dealing with authentic reading materials 20

2.3.2.3 Cognitive attitude towards dealing with authentic materials 20

2.4 Previous studies regarding the use of authentic materials 21

3.4.1.2 Description of the student questionnaire 34

3.4.2.2 Description of the student and teacher interviews 36

3.7 Reliability and validity 39

4.1.1.2 The IT students’ attitudes on the suitability of authentic materials 43 4.1.1.3 The IT students’ attitudes on the readability of authentic materials 44 4.1.1.4 The IT students’ attitudes on the usefulness of authentic materials 47 4.1.1.5 The IT students’ attitudes on the form-related naturalness of authentic materials

48

4.1.1.6 The IT students’ expectations on the future use of authentic materials

49

4.1.2.1 Data analysis of the student interview 51 4.1.2.2 Data analysis of the teacher interview 58

APPENDIX C: AUTHENTIC MATERIALS DOWNLOADED FROM INTERNET 91

LIST OF TABLES

Page Table 2.1 The Criteria for Using Authentic Materials in Language Teaching 14 Table 3.1 Demographic Information of Student Participants 30 Table 3.2 Demographic Information of Teacher Participants 31 Table 3.3 An Overview of Reading Materials Used in Class 32 Table 3.4 The Linkage between Research Questions and Research Instruments 33 Table 4.1 Reliability Analysis of Student Questionnaire (Cronbach’s Alpha) 42 Table 4.2 The IT Students’ Attitudes on the Suitability of Authentic Materials 43 Table 4.3 The IT Students’ Attitudes on the Readability of Authentic Materials 44 Table 4.4 The IT Students’ Attitudes on the Usefulness of Authentic Materials 47 Table 4.5 The IT Students’ Attitudes on the Form-related Naturalness of Authentic

Materials

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Table 4.6 The IT Students’ Expectations on the Future Use of Authentic Materials 49

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ABBREVIATIONS

TESOL: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages SPSS: Statistical Packages for the Social Sciences

IT: Information Technology

EIT: English for Information Technology

M: Mean

ESP: English for Specific Purposes

MOLISA: Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs EFL: English as Foreign Language

B.A: Bachelor of Arts

M.A: Master of Arts

BTVC: Binh Thuan Vocational College

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

This study is intended to investigate the use of authentic reading materials to enhance students‘ EIT learning as well as investigate their attitudes towards this kind of materials This chapter starts with the general background for the study, research questions, purpose of the study, significance of the study, scope of the study, and organization of the study

1.1 Background of the study

In today‘s demand of integration and globalization, the role of English language has become more and more essential when functioning as a bridge to gap the nations throughout the world In the Vietnamese context, English has been considered to be an automatically compulsory subject in professional at colleges and universities in order to

―provide a new tool of communication to gain scientific knowledge, advanced technology and so on for students in the period of the current globalization‖ (Le, 2005, p 67) In this respect, it is definitely necessary that learners should develop four skills, namely Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing However, in the existing tertiary context of Vietnamese education, the reality of English teaching and learning reaches to

an alarm to be wakened up According to Tran (2005) in her article of ―Factors affecting

teaching and learning English in Vietnamese universities‖ published by Vietnam

National University-Hanoi, she defined several problems affecting English language teaching and learning in Vietnam regarding the size of each class, traditional form– focused instruction rather than interactive teaching approach, and low English proficient levels of the majority students when entering university, and especially severe lack of authentic context for language study

According to Hart (2003), English language learners need to be exposed to and have access to the same language by which native speakers typically use and communicate in a natural way In other words, materials in general play a crucial part in language learning and teaching, this accounts for the fact that discussions about the roles

of materials appear in almost all books on course design Therefore, introducing authentic materials in teaching English can be beneficial for students as these materials prepare them for real life communication Authentic materials ‗expose‘ students to real language as it is used in real life situations by native speakers (Peacock, 1997)

Additionally, the role of motivation in foreign language learning is a very important ingredient linked to students‘ success of language performances (Gardner, 1985), and the way of teaching is considered in the heart of learning process so; that is to say, the more we encourage and motivate our students to research and to communicate their information and share it with each other, the more independent they become In this respect, Nuttall (1996) argues that ―authentic texts can be motivating because they are proof that the language is used for real-life purposes by real people‖ (p 172)

Along with the issues set above, in teaching English reading for Information Technology (IT), students almost depend upon the currently used materials which are double repeated with out of date information whereas it is students who are in need of the new knowledge related to their future work Besides, most of the students spend 120 periods learning with general English, which is not enough for them to master the language employed in the materials Hence, the English teachers are obliged to employ not only the suitable teaching techniques but also provide the supplementary materials so

as to enhance students‘ motivation in learning to read English As proved by Berry (2000), the majority of the currently used materials put emphasis on teaching English proficiency skills rather than teaching real language that students really need to interact with and communicate in the real world In addition, the contrived materials of traditional textbooks have often presented learners with a meager, and frequently distorted, sample of the target language to work with and have failed to meet many of their communicative needs (Schinffrin, 1996) In short, employing suitable materials is one of big issues in making considerable contribution to language teaching and learning successfully To put simply, when used appropriately, materials might help to expose learners to closer with the target language and become to gain better skills

According to Alderson and Bachman (2000), there is a close relationship between

the readers and the texts Therefore, if the materials that are collected and introduced fit students‘ interests and levels in reading class, they can be a great support for students to learn a foreign language as well as enhance this group‘s learning motivation Hence, it is high time language teachers needed to stimulate this world into the classroom by introducing students numerous types of materials the fact that since the outcome of language learners is for communication and knowledge of the world

In order to provoke students‘ learning involvement and make the learning environment more active, it is advisable that language teachers should bring supplementary materials in the reading class to provide students with the innovative knowledge and real language for student practice Due to being insufficient here and there to present the language, authentic materials, a new concept has been introduced with a view to helping students whose majors are in IT to better gain for reading

1.2 Rationale for the study

Indeed, the debate over the role of authenticity, as well as what it means to be authentic, has become increasingly sophisticated and complex over the years and now embraces research from a wide variety of fields such as second language acquisition, social psychology, etc With its expansion across the globe, English has naturally diversified into arrays of forms, varying in pronunciation, intonation, grammar, vocabulary, spelling and conventions of language use, as it has been adapted to suit new surroundings It is this unavoidable variation of the English language in the world that urges language teachers to introduce authentic materials in teaching English, which can

be beneficial for students as these materials prepare them for real life communication

In the same line with this trend, Binh Thuan Vocational College (BTVC) has incorporated some authentic materials such as newspaper articles, magazines, etc into its

teaching beside the main instructional material, namely English for IT & Computer

Users, written Thac Binh Cuong and Ho Xuan Ngoc, published in 2005 by Ha Noi

Technology and Science Publishing Housing, to the students who are of IT specialization In reality, the issue of authentic materials is not only about which one is better, but also about how it is best applied to the teaching and learning process In many

school contexts, learners commonly are not involved in choosing what materials to be used, instead it is the teachers themselves who give and determine the kind of material for them For some cases, students‘ attitude to the material is usually ignored, although the ones who need the material are the students To put simply, in the field of material use, the attitudes of the learners and teachers towards the effects and possible challenges

of the employment of any materials is important because they explicitly imply whether these materials can benefit students and teachers in the teaching-learning process

Based upon the condition above, this study would like to investigate students‘ and teachers‘ attitudes on the use of the authentic materials in the reading class In other words, the study is purported to check whether the authentic texts can match the IT students‘ needs and expectations as well as language proficient levels; moreover, whether these materials are actually feasible for the teachers to exploit for their act of teaching EIT

1.4 Significance of the study

Realizing that mastery of English is of great importance in the span of world‘s integration, especially for students whose major is for IT, this study in investigation of using authentic materials explores teachers‘ as well as students in comparison with the previous teaching without them Therefore, should the study to be successful in application, it will put emphasis on the roles of authentic materials in the language teaching and learning With its importance as set, teachers of English at BTVC are able to employ authentic materials to teach their students in their EIT class

1.5 Scope of the study

Binh Thuan Vocational College is located in Phan Thiet City, one of the biggest vocational training places in Binh Thuan province The college is in charge of training vocations for students All students are required to learn English as a compulsory subject during the course The researcher is responsible for teaching English for IT Therefore, the class with 35 students chosen to take part in the study is the first year students at college

1.6 Organization of the study

The current chapter, Introduction, presents the general interest of the study, the

research purpose, research questions and significance of the study

As the name suggests, in chapter two, Literature Review, the theoretical

background to this research is provided by reviewing the areas of interest to the study Foremost, it looks at the general background related to authentic materials and its uses Most importantly, the chapter moves on to summarize some related empirical studies which examined attitudes shown from teachers and students when dealing with authentic materials in ESP classrooms Based on what have already been done with regard to the study‘s field, some research gaps are provided to situate the study itself

The design and method of this study are presented in chapter three, Methodology

In specific, this chapter will present the context and population, data collection methods and how they were designed and developed, in addition to other methodological concerns such as the reliability and validity as well as ethical issues of the research area Also, it describes how the data were collected and which tools were used in the analysis process, and how the data were presented

Chapter 4, Findings and Discussion, provides a comprehensive presentation and

discussion of the results of the study obtained from the analyses of questionnaires and interviews

As the name suggests, in Chapter 5, Conclusion, the main findings of the study

will be precisely summarized Some contributions of this work are then presented in this chapter Besides, the last chapter of this work reveals the limitations and offers suggestions for further research

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

In order to well understand how the IT students and teachers show attitudes towards using of authentic reading materials when learning English, the chapter aims to establish a conceptual framework on which is related to this kind of materials, as well as an additional part of EIT and attitudes Therefore, the present chapter mainly focuses on definition of authentic materials, the types of authentic materials, the selections for authentic materials in language teaching, the reasons for adapting authentic materials, its role in teaching and learning Moreover, a substantial part is used to talk about definition, importance of reading Lastly, definition, components of language attitude are provided as a pillar to categorize students‘ and teachers‘ attitudes Especially, the previous studies are summarized to situate the study itself in this field

2.1 Background on authentic materials

Klinghammer, 2006), which is ―exposure to real language and use in its own community‖ (Kilickaya, 2004, p 67) In this regard, Tomlinson (2012) stated that several researchers argue that ―[…] authentic materials can provide meaningful exposure to language as it is actually used and enhance positive attitudes towards the learning of a language‖ (p 161) Back to Tomlinson (1998), he concedes that authentic materials are inclusive of anything which can be used to facilitate the teaching and learning of a language They can be linguistic, visual, auditory or kinesthetic, and they can be presented in print, through live performance or display, or on cassette, DVD or the Internet They can be instructional, experiential or exploratory while informing learners about the language, providing experience of the language in use, stimulating language use or helping learners to make discovery about the language for themselves

To sum up, these scholars have many opinions in common when inferring the definitions of authentic materials is that authentic materials are texts prepared for communicative purposes in the language the native speakers use To further elaborate, although being slightly different in literature when defining authentic materials, these definitions have one thing in common is that the real language is created by native speakers and used in the real world, which is easily found in authentic materials To recap, from the different definitions above, the researcher of this study draws out the definition of authentic materials as below: authentic materials are the ones created by native speakers for the purposes of using in real life such as newspapers, magazines or printed papers in a specific field Whereas, several sample writings, essays, etc applied in educational environment are not considered to be authentic To go beyond and in detail about authentic materials, principal characteristics of any authentic materials are included Firstly, their language is natural, which is written for real communication rather than for education purposes Secondly, authentic material offers students the chance to deal with a small amount of print which, at the same time, contains complete, meaningful messages Thirdly, authentic printed material provides students with the opportunity to make use of non- linguistic clues (layout, pictures, colors, symbols, the physical setting in which it occurs)

to help them discover the meaning more easily Finally, learners need to see the

immediate relevance of what they do in the classroom, and to what they need to do outside it

To sum up, the language written in authentic materials need to be met the naturalness Besides, meaningful messages as well as non-linguistic clues and the relevance are also mentioned to support students to obtain the satisfaction in use

2.1.2 Authenticity of materials

In the process of teaching and learning, material plays an integral part However, using inappropriate teaching materials might more or less make learners face tackles in learning of a foreign language Most learners need to be encouraged to manage to achieve

in language learning As a result, the materials used in teaching must meet learners‘ needs

To assist learners to learn better, a wide range of researchers recommend that teachers should use authentic materials To elaborate, the issue of authenticity of materials appeared in the 1970s as the debate between Chomsky (1965) and Hymes (1972) led to a realization that communicative competence involved much more than knowledge of language structures, and contextualized communication began to take precedence over form

However, whether those materials meet the ―authenticity‖, they depend on the way language teachers employ There is a fundamental array of meanings associated with the term ―authenticity‖, and therefore there is no surprise that the term remains ambiguous in most teachers‘ perspectives Indeed, the term ―authenticity‖ has been put under deep discussion by many researchers (e.g Morrow, 1977; Porter & Roberts, 1981; Van Lier, 1996; Kramsch, 1998; Rost, 2002); in specific,

1 Authenticity relates to the language produced by native speakers for native speakers in a particular language community (Porter & Roberts, 1981), conveying a real message (Morrow, 1977);

2 Authenticity relates to the interaction between students and teachers (Van Lier, 1996);

3 Authenticity relates to the social situation of the classroom (Rost, 2002);

4 Authenticity embeds culture, and the ability to behave or think like a target language group in order to be recognized and validated by them (Kramsch, 1998)

According to Breen (1985) there are four types of authenticity These are: text authenticity, learner authenticity, task authenticity and authenticity of the classroom These types are discussed below:

1 Authenticity of text: refers to the authentic qualities of a text in the context of language learning, means any source of information used to help learners to develop an authentic understanding

2 Authenticity of learners: refers to the ability of learners to interpret the meaning presented in the text like the native speakers do in the real world

3 Authenticity of the tasks: refers to the chosen tasks provided for the learners to be engaged in an authentic communication and authentic aims for learning

4 Authenticity of the classroom: the most important role of the classroom is to enable the learners to experience

Generally speaking, from these brief outlines we can see that the concept of authenticity can be situated in either the text itself, in the participants, in the social or cultural situation and purposes of the communicative act, or some combination of these Along with this, authenticity refers to a correspondence occurs between the texts used by teachers in the classrooms and kinds of texts used in the real world, in this case, these texts can be regarded authentic

In fact, employing ―authenticity‖ is a vital element for those who are concerned in language teaching in EFL classrooms generally and ESP in particular because it makes good preparation for the learners to engage into the real world situations with regard to the use of the target language Conversely, using less authentic materials on our learners may lead to the state of being far away the real world In this respect, Pinner (2013) has illustrated the continuum of authenticity showing that the elements of classroom, individual, community and reality are interrelated to each other These four elements are connected with each other based on mutual relationships that make the learning turn out

contextualized; therefore, as a consequence, the things students have produced can be independent in using the language outside the classroom

2.1.3 The needs to authentic materials in language teaching

Even though there has been still a debatable issue in the use of authentic materials in language teaching over the past 30 years since the 1970s, many language teachers paid a close attention to them However, scholars‘ outlook has changed regarding the presence of authentic materials in ESP classroom Below is a description of benefits that authentic material application brings to ESP programs:

Firstly, authentic materials bring a lot of linguistic advantages when incorporated in teaching a foreign language In specific, Berardo (2006) indicates that several studies have found that authentic materials can increase reading development by introducing to new vocabulary and expressions According to Grellet (1981), authentic materials embrace many linguistic cues as they usually use synonyms or related words, equivalents, hyponyms, antonyms and so on to convey meaning Moreover, McCarthy, Louwerse, and McNamara (2007) investigated differences in linguistic structures between sampled simplified and authentic reading texts using computational tools They found that authentic texts demonstrate less syntactic complexity than simplified texts do To sum up, it is generally accepted that getting chances to learn from authentic texts, students read the real language used by native speakers and prefer being like them in speaking in terms of pronunciation, accent and idioms in use

Secondly, many professionals in the field of language pedagogy have emphasized the importance of using authentic materials in order to improve the communicative competence of learners (Guariento and Morley, 2001) since its exposure to real language (Berardo, 2006) In other words, authentic materials can bridge the discrepancy between the classroom and the outside the real-world events Students have the opportunity to study the language and skills of using it is applied in actual settings (Tani & Yusuf, 2010)

Next, to be successful in learning a foreign language, students need to have their motivation for learning By doing so, applying suitable materials is of great importance In

this respect, Peacock (1997) and Kilickaya (2004) indicate that the use of authentic texts is now considered to be one way for increasing students‘ motivation as they give the learner the feeling that he or she is learning the real language – the target language as it is used by the community that speaks it

Kim (2000) argues that authentic materials make a considerable contribution to improving certain cultural awareness to language learning Sherman (2003) further argues

―one reason why authentic material is so important for language learning is that it is a window into culture‖ (p 12) There has been much progress in providing in aesthetic look

at the culture of cultural target language speakers as well as about one‘s own culture requires tools that assist language learners in negotiating meaning and understanding the communicative and cultural texts in which linguistic codes are used

In the same vein, Harmer (1994) states that authentic material has numerous positive effects on learners, in that it: (1) helps learners to produce better language, (2) helps learners to acquire the language faster, (3) makes learners more confident to deal with real life situations Furthermore, Peacock (1997) regard authentic materials useful in language teaching, for the following reasons: (1) they expose learners to real language; (2) they are more related to learners‘ needs; (3) they have a positive effect on learners‘ motivation; (4) they bring cultural information to the students‘ attention

All things considered, learners might get many benefits from learning with authentic materials such as [1] linguistic advantages, [2] communicative competence improvement, [3] learning motivation increase, as well as [4] cultural awareness enhancement, which are listed by Berardo (2006, p 64) Nevertheless, while using them, it is likely for both teachers and students to face several problems, which are presented as follows

2.1.4 Challenges in the use of authentic materials

Albeit various scholars doing researches on authentic materials strongly argue that they have made a greatly considerable contribution in foreign language teaching and learning, there are several researchers who say ‗no‘ with authentic materials and claim that they have no value For instance, Kilickaya (2004) claims that authentic materials

burden teachers as they may contain difficult vocabulary and structures which need more effort to be simplified and explained; in order to make them appropriate for learners Additionally, Miller (2005) also states that it is too difficult and time consuming to select, edit, and prepare for authentic materials in teaching

Pertaining to Kilickaya (2004) believes that the use of authentic materials at lower levels causes students to feel frustrated and demotivated since students at these levels lack many lexical items and structures used in the target language In the same vein, Richards (2001, p 253) points out that alongside with advantages authentic materials bring, they often contain difficult language, unneeded vocabulary items and complex language structures, which cause a burden for the teacher in lower level classes Ur (1996) further argues that the use of authentic texts with less proficient learners is often frustrating and counter–productive

In addition, Martinez (2002) thinks that authentic materials are regarded too culturally biased and difficult to comprehend by learners in the classroom Kilickaya (2004) believes that using authentic materials with weak learners frustrate and de– motivate them, because they lack the required skills and vocabulary to deal with presented text, successfully

In conclusion, learners might get a variety of benefits from using authentic materials; the researcher chose advantages related to positive effect on learner motivation, exposure to real language and more closely to learners‘ needs for the aims of the study Once again, authentic materials are more disadvantageous than textbook–based or simplified materials, it requires the language teachers to need in the selection (2.1.5) and adaptation (2.1.6) carefully

2.1.5 Criteria for choosing authentic materials

Chosen from the various sources of materials, it is worth taking into consideration that the aim should focus on understanding meanings rather than forms For instance, when using literary texts, the emphasis is on what is being said and not necessarily on the literary form or stylistics Oguz and Bahar (2008) hardly ever encourage random selection of

authentic materials but we must have ―an aim in using them and chosen materials should meet the objectives of the lesson‖ (p 331) In the same vein, several researchers, including Berardo (2006), provide three criteria that need to be considered for choosing authentic texts, these are suitability, exploitability and readability:

In regard to suitability of content, it can be considered to be the most important one just because of its function in arousing the learners‘ interest, need and motivate them as well as meet their needs According to Neikova (2005) added that the text should be interesting and informative

In term of the exploitability, it refers to how the text can be utilized in order to enhance students‘ competence as readers As stated by Berardo (2006, p.62), a text that

―cannot be exploited for teaching purposes is not used in the classroom‖ According to Neikova (2005), exploitability ―means that the text should facilitate the development of reading skills so as to help the students become competent and independent readers‖

And readability infers to the texts and level should be suitably matched; the reading text is advisable not to be too difficult Furthermore, it must also live up to learners‘ level

of English Rogers and Medley (1998) explain that readability has close relationship with naturalness of language forms and well-contextualized in the speakers‘ context In this respect, naturalness of forms relates to language produced by native speakers for native speakers in a particular language community

In comparison with Berardo (2006) when revealing three criteria that are necessary

in language teaching and learning, the researcher known McGrath, he further introduced eight criteria to be considered when choosing appropriate authentic texts These are: [1] Relevance to course book and learners‘ needs, [2] Topic interest, [3] Cultural fitness, [4] Logistical considerations, [5] Cognitive demands, [6] Linguistic demands, [7] Quality and [8] Exploitability

From criteria mentioned above presented by Berardo, Neikova and McGrath, three main criteria are used to choose materials in teaching owing to their appropriateness, including [1] suitability, [2] exploitability, and [3] readability and [4] naturalness To sum

up, smart choice of materials needs to be met those requirements and it can be summarized

as follows:

Table 2.1: The Criteria for Using Authentic Materials in Language Teaching

(Source: Berardo, 2006, p 63)

Suitability of content: Does the text interest the student?

Is it relevant to the students’ needs?

Does it represent the type of materials that the student will use outside of the classroom?

Exploitability: Can the text be exploited for teaching purposes?

For what purpose should the text be exploited?

What skills/strategies can be developed by exploiting the text?

Readability: Is the text too easy/ difficult for the student?

Is it structurally too demanding/ complex?

How much new vocabulary does it contain? Is it relevant?

Naturalness of form: Is the language involved in the texts written by the native authors?

Is the language naturally related to the communicative needs?

2.1.6 Adaptation of authentic materials

Most teachers are not creators of teaching materials but providers of good materials However, in fact, it does not make sense that authentic materials are always suitable to the teachers and students in terms of three aforementioned criteria (i.e suitability, exploitability, and readability) Therefore, the teachers need to take some certain actions

to make the authentic materials meet the three criteria For example, Evans and John (1998, p 173) suggest that a good provider of materials will be able to:

Select appropriately from what is available;

Be creative with what is available;

Modify activities to suit learners‘ needs;

Supplement by providing extra activities (and extra input)

It can be time-consuming for most of English teachers to make their preparation authentic materials for use However, adapting authentic materials to match the teaching context is a more challenging job That adaptation of given material responds to the need

of individualizing it to focus on one or various aspects of the language Can authentic materials be adapted or simplified without losing its authenticity? The answer depends on the purpose of what we are going to use them for McDonough and Shaw (1993) have listed several reasons for materials adaptation For examples, (1) grammar points included in the material are not clear enough or do not correspond to the level of our class; (2) too much emphasis on the communicative aspect of the material, not allowing the students to understand the message; (3) the vocabulary included is too complex or there are too many unknown words; (4) the text might be appealing, but it could be too easy or too difficult However, the most important reason is that there is mismatch between what is needed and what is provided by materials What makes the matter worse

is that sometimes the teachers are compelled to use certain materials, that is, materials imposed by authorities In sum, in most ESP cases, teachers have to adapt the materials they are using if they want to be successful in their teaching

Authentic materials are believed to be better than non-authentic materials for supplementation Therefore, teachers who make a point of collecting authentic materials find it much easier to adapt textbooks This is especially true in ESP contexts where authentic English materials are not always available to use Osborne (2005) suggests that it is essential to have a clear purpose in mind as well as a personal approach that permits the adaptation of most authentic materials Successfully utilizing a continuing series of authentic materials in your English language learning classroom is simply a matter of adapting those materials to suit the needs of your language learners

Larry (2007) suggested some keys to successful adaptation of authentic materials First, it is advisable that the teachers convert them into workshop activities Second, the teachers also take into consideration the length of the materials in order to adjust it to fit the students‘ level Third, it is inevitable to contain difficult words and structures Therefore, adapting the texts means simplifying or explaining key language elements

to reduce the level of difficulties Finally, adaptation of authentic materials requires the teachers to design different task types to facilitate and guide students to achieve the language In short, in the same line as Larry (2007), it can be inferred that selection and adaption of authentic materials is an extremely important process and needs following by the three criteria such as suitability, exploitability and readability so that these teaching materials can fit students‘ need, level and teachers‘ usage ability

2.2 Understanding of reading

Reading is one of the two receptive skills that are very important to the academic success of language learning and teaching, especially ESP, like IT specialization In this section, the study provides a precise picture of reading skill or comprehension synthetically drawn by its various definitions, and importance

2.2.1 Definition of reading

Urquhart and Weir (1998) define reading as ―the process of receiving and interpreting encoded in language form via the medium of print‖ (p 22) In more specific explanation, Tomlinson (2001) reports that when we read a text, we are ―[…] decoding visual squiggles on paper, making connection between meanings of the words, then interpreting the writer‘s intensions, situating the text in a linguistic and social context…‖ (p 165) Whereas, Alderson (2000) defines that reading is ―[…] an enjoyable, intense, private activity, from which much pleasure can be derived, and in which can become totally absorbed (p 28) To recap, reading is a complex, strategic, and active process of constructing meaning, not simply a matter of skill application (Palinscar & Brown, 1984)

In brief, reading is a complicated process in which readers must interact directly with materials In other words, the overall quality of reading texts such as the difficulty levels of language forms, the attractiveness, or the suitability of content can motivate or demotivate students‘ reading act, and infer students‘ reading comprehension

2.2.2 Reading comprehension and English for Specific Purposes

English for Specific Purposes (ESP) can be inferred as the teaching of specific English (specialized discourse) to learners (adults), who will use it, in a particular setting (business, engineering, medical field, science, etc.) for a specific purpose (Hutchinson & Waters, 1987) In this study, English for Information Technology (EIT) is purposely concerned To further elaborate, IT learners must acquire EIT effectively so that they can understand all IT terminologies and absorb IT knowledge sufficiently which is globally everyday updated Until they master EIT, they can work efficiently in this field Specific

to the current study, English, especially reading skill, is important to IT students since it helps students become more knowledgeable IT specializers

In another line, to learn EIT better, it requires students to handle their reading comprehension ability Reading comprehension is an interactive process between the text and the reader (Rumelhart, 1980) If a student is ―good at comprehension‖, we mean that

he can read accurately and efficiently, so as to get the maximum information from a text with the minimum of misunderstanding

Most accounts of the reading comprehension process focus on three elements: the text being read, the background knowledge possessed by the reader, and the contextual aspects relevant to interpreting the text (Alderson & Urquhart, 1984) It is clear that the reading texts also play an important role in accelerating readers‘ comprehension level Thus, it is necessary for the teachers to select and choose reading texts suitably

2.3 Teachers’ and students’ attitudes

Research indicates that attitude has an essential part to play in language learning Hence, this section attempts to provide a review of attitudes toward the presence of authentic materials in the ESP classroom In this respect, it is essential that the author should give definitions and components of attitudes

2.3.1 Definition of attitudes

Attitudes, in general, are defined as a positive and negative evaluation of people According to Hayakawa (1994), attitude is a more general term than the other terms, which indicate a personal or institutional feeling Brown (2008) has defined attitudes, like all aspects of the development of cognition and effect in human beings, develop early in the childhood and are the result of parents‘ and peer‘s attitude of contact with people who are ―different‖ in any number of ways, and of interacting factors in the human experience These attitudes form a part of one‘s perception itself, of others, and of culture

in which one living In the same vein, Eagly and Chaiken (1993, p 1) further stated

―Attitude is a psychological tendency expressed by evaluating a particular entity with some degree of favor or disfavor‖, ordinarily expressed cognitive, affective and behavioral responses The definition reveals three components of attitudes, including cognitive, affective and behavioral types In this paper, the researcher tried to seek the teachers and students‘ attitudes towards using authentic materials based on three components above which are used as framework for categorizing students‘ attitudes

2.3.2 Components of attitudes

2.3.2.1 Affective attitude dealing with authentic reading materials

There have been a lot of changes in teachers‘ and students‘ affective attitudes through dealing with authentic language They give their motivation in language activities Besides, they will also have interests, feel enjoyable in the materials, and thereby show enthusiasm, confidence and responsibility for their language teaching and learning

Teachers and students show their interest in the materials they are dealing with and want to have an interaction with them owing to their realness in terms of the content They feel these texts more interesting and visually stimulating (Peacock, 1997), more updated (Berardo, 2006), and more informative (Neikova, 2005) and are likely to contain topics of interests to learners (Martinez, 2002) Moreover, the presentation of authentic

materials is also positively received from both teachers and learners In other words, they contain authentic look and attractive illustration, grabbing their interests for teaching and learning In short, to what extent the teachers and students feel interested in dealing with these materials will be sought in this research study; for example, whether the used authentic materials are more interesting than textbook–based materials or not, or whether these materials are more updated than simplified textbooks or not, etc

Besides, authentic materials can stimulate students and teachers to feel enjoyable Indeed, once perceiving the usefulness of these materials to their teaching and learning process, they can build up their own enjoyment In the current study, this attribute of affective attitude of the teachers and students will be assessed by the question whether the two subjects can perceive the realness and usefulness of the used authentic materials

Next, authentic materials can directly affect the language teachers‘ and students‘ enthusiasm for the process of teaching and learning To students, they are keen on for not only language learning but also exploring these materials outside (Thanajaro, 2000, as cited in Nguyen Thi Viet Nga, 2012) Of course, the students can become more engaged into their learning if their teachers provide adequate assistance

Fourthly, authentic materials can heighten students‘ confidence level if teachers exploit them appropriately In reality, thanks to the good utilization of authentic materials and a feasible approach from the teachers, the students will become much more confident

to their reading comprehension By exposing the target language in real–life situations, authentic materials are useful to ―lessening the nervousness and heightening self– confidence‖ (Thanajaro, 2000, p 73, as cited in Nguyen, 2012)

Finally, according to Neikova (2005), authentic materials can accelerate the students to take their own responsibility for their learning when they have been interested, enjoyable, enthusiastic and confident to their language learning under the use

of authentic materials For this, the teachers need to choose materials that help their

students become more autonomous readers, employing suitable reading strategies to conquer the reading texts

2.3.2.2 Behavioral attitude dealing with authentic reading materials

There has also been a change in teachers‘ and students‘ behavioral attitude resulted from using authentic materials With the impact on students‘ affection, the authentic language will make their learning change in terms of involvement, concentration, effort, and persistence on completion the task Whereas, these authentic materials also have ample influence on the teachers‘ teaching behaviors, in which they have to change their teaching modes to match with what is covered in these authentic materials

Talking about the impacts on language students, the study conducted by Kienbaum

et al (1986) reveals that as students gained confidence and ability when learning with authentic materials, they turned out quite ―unwavering‖ in their choosing active involvement rather than receiving a passive learning role Peacock (1997, p 152) suggested that using appropriate authentic materials ―may increase their learners‘ levels

of on–task behavior, concentration, and involvement in the target activity more than artificial materials‖ It can be inferred that through kind of attitude, we can see if the authentic materials enhance learning participations from the IT students or not; at the same time, whether the currently used authentic materials can impact the teachers‘ teaching modifications

2.3.2.3 Cognitive attitude towards dealing with authentic reading materials

Dealing with authentic language brings an impact on cognition of both teachers and students They show the relevance of the materials Authentic texts provide both the teachers and students with much new information (Neikova, 2005) Accordingly, students have come to realize the relevance of authentic texts to the real world when learning with them; and, teachers are consciously aware of the necessity of using authentic materials due to this positive effect There is a close relationship between the readers and the texts

(Alderson & Bachman, 2000) This makes clearer in learning ESP because students will have a chance to go beyond their future profession, leading to the changes of teachers in generating alternative approach

Discovering the relevance of the language they are studying in the real world will encourage students and teachers to bridge the gap between what happen inside with outside the classroom Due to the relevance to their real life, the use of authentic materials helps to bridge the gap between classroom knowledge and their capacity to participate in real world events (Wilkins, 1976, as cited in Guariento & Morley, 2001) Back to the present study, the researcher would like to investigate how the teachers and students are cognitively aware of the effectiveness and challenges of the use of IT authentic reading materials for their ESP teaching and learning

2.4 Previous studies regarding the use of authentic materials

Numerous studies have extensively been conducted to investigate the effects of using authentic reading materials on students‘ motivation and language performances Besides, the teachers‘ and students‘ attitudes on the employment of authentic reading materials have been focused

Numerous researchers have carried out several studies in the realm of authentic materials outside the Vietnamese context, such as Peacock (1997), Alfarisi (2010), and Guo (2012) Initially, Peacock (1997) conducted an action research to check whether authentic materials increase the learners‘ motivation A sample of 31 beginner–level students at South Korean University EFL institute was recruited, consisting of 18 males and 13 female Data was collected over a seven-week term Based on the results from the observation sheets, he reported that students‘ motivation has significantly improved from the use of authentic materials The study recommended that teachers should try appropriate authentic materials because they may increase students‘ concentration, interest, and participation in the target activities However, according to the statistics

from self–report questionnaire, students found simplified materials more interesting than authentic ones

Alfarisi (2010) conducted a classroom research in Indonesia to investigate the effects of authentic materials to students‘ reading comprehension He conducted the research in two cycles divided into four steps: planning, implementation, observation, and reflection In the first cycle, the researcher applied the authentic materials so as to arouse students‘ interest in reading and enjoyed themselves during the reading lessons; however, the students‘ reading ability increased but not optimally yet In the second cycle, he focused on the teaching materials and adding the medium to the teaching learning process

by facilitating group discussion The result showed from t-tests indicated that the students‘ level of interest in reading class increased optimally and their reading comprehension improved well after implementing with authentic materials

The research carried out by Guo (2012) probed the effects of extensive reading using authentic materials on students‘ English recruited from two intact classes to participate in this experiment and were randomly appointed to be experimental group and control group The instruments included: (1) Pre-test and post-test under English proficiency test, made up of 25 items; (2) Attitudinal survey containing 19 questions conducted by the end of the semester to investigate students‘ attitudes towards authentic reading materials The results revealed that experimental group that received authentic reading materials had a higher score than control group in terms of vocabulary but not grammar Also, students experienced and gained knowledge, sources for communication, and other language skills

In the Vietnamese context, the use of authentic materials does also show an interesting arouse for the educators and researchers The common point in these studies is that participants come from ESP courses at the site of college or university In master‘s thesis of Tran (2010), the effectiveness of authentic materials on tertiary students‘ reading comprehension was put on emphasis This action research was carried out at

Thanh Do College of Technology (Hanoi, Vietnam) with the participation of 30 second year students, which consisted of 24 females and 6 males To collect data, multiple sources including pre-test and post-test and questionnaire were employed The findings from the tests showed that there was a significant difference in the scores of pre-test and post-test for the experimental group That is to say the students who use authentic materials made certain improvement in their reading achievement In addition, the results

of questionnaire indicated that the students were in favor of using authentic materials

Nguyen (2010) made an endeavor to seek EFL teachers‘ perceptions towards the readability of authentic texts and the ways of modifying authentic materials used in teaching reading Twenty-six EFL teachers from a community college and a TESOL class in the context of Vietnam were involved in the investigation The data was collected

by means of a questionnaire and test The findings showed that awareness of readability and modification of authentic texts in teaching reading benefited both the teachers in facilitating their teaching process and the learners in their language acquisition For recommendations, teachers are suggested to choose appropriate texts for teaching reading

or they need to be aware of readability and modification towards reading materials is important In other words, teachers should pay more attention to text readability when using authentic texts because of students‘ comprehension

In order to check the reality of using these materials to motivate students to learn English, an experiment was carried out at Tay Bac University (Son La province, Vietnam) by Do (2008) This experiment focused on 2 types of materials, namely textbook-based materials and supplementary authentic materials In this study, the former are commercially available textbooks and the later can be anything that is available to the language teacher but which was not produced for language-teaching purposes These materials were both used during this 12-week experiment with the attendance of 40 second year students to assess its roles towards students‘ motivation The results from the questionnaire and classroom observation revealed that student's motivation increased significantly in ―authentic materials‖ weeks in comparison to ―textbook-based materials‖

weeks However, the interview results unraveled that students‘ self-reported motivation did not increase considerably and this might be because the time for authentic materials was insufficient

In the 2012 master‘s thesis, Nguyen tried to probe the impact of authentic materials on students‘ motivation in terms of their thought, feeling, and behavior The participants were comprised of 100 Economics students at An Giang Vocational College For data collection, the researcher literally employed 54-item questionnaire to explore how the respondents felt, thought, and behaved in relation to the use of authentic materials; concurrently, pre-test and post-test were used to check the impact of these materials on the students‘ language performance The results from the questionnaire showed that the used authentic materials positively motivated the participants by changing their cognitive, behavioral and affective attitudes, while t-test results affirmed that authentic materials benefited the students‘ language performance

Regardless of certain success from the previous studies, also they disclosed several significant gaps when reviewing with care Firstly, only few previous experimental studies have been carried out in the field, and the population of the study is mainly selected from a number of college or university The second thing, methods revealed from these studies some cons that need to be perfected Several of the researches concentrated only on measuring the students‘ achievement of reading comprehension and showed not enough about the relationship between students‘ achievements and attitudes after being treated with authentic materials Additionally, quantitative research was utilized in most researches with the assistance of pre/post-test and questionnaire Last but not least, there have not been any studies in teaching reading in Binh Thuan province, in particular, at BTVC

2.5 Research gaps

The body of literature representing the related works in the field of authentic materials, in spite of making an attempt to identify the impact of these authentic materials

on the students‘ motivation and language performance, has disclosed some inadequacies

Foremost, almost all the previous studies were conducted empirically to test the actual impact of authentic materials on the students‘ motivational attitudes and language outcomes, especially reading comprehension However, these impacts were open to debate In other words, while many studies (e.g Alfarisi, 2010; Guo, 2012; Tran, 2010;

Do, 2011; Nguyen, 2012) concluded the used authentic materials motivated the students

in language learning, Peacock‘s (1997) study indicated an inconclusive effect of these authentic materials that students found simplified materials more interesting than authentic ones In other words, the impact of authentic materials on students‘ learning motivation is a quite complicated issue related to multiple factors Hence, it should be further studied in other educational contexts

Secondly, almost no studies have investigated the teachers‘ and students‘ attitudes toward using authentic materials in language classrooms concurrently Instead of that, either teachers‘ perceptions (e.g Nguyen, 2010) or students‘ attitudes (Do, 2011; Nguyen, 2012) were focused on Theoretically, it is recommended that both teachers and learners should be taken into consideration since the fact that teachers are the practitioners of authentic materials and their students automatically are the utilizers of these materials Also, an investigation of attitudes from both of them will bring many benefits in selecting, exploiting and using authentic materials in actual classes because the reality that there may exist an incongruence of attitudes among the teachers and students, which needs bridging the gap urgently

2.6 Conceptual framework of the study

Based on the definition of authenticity, criteria of choosing authentic materials, the researcher designed a conceptual framework of the study This framework aimed at investigating the students‘ and teachers‘ attitudes about some aspects of authenticity of the used supplementary materials These aspects included suitability of content, naturalness of forms, readability, and exploitability, which were developed from the previous studies by earlier authors such as Morrow (1977), Breen (1985), Rost (2002), Berardo (2006)

Authenticity of materials

- The attraction of authentic materials

Suitability of

content

- The relevance of authentic materials to the students‘ needs

- The correspondence between the used material types and the outside classroom application

- The difficulty level of the text

Readability - The structural complexity of the text

- The amount of new words of the text

aspects of the used authentic materials; that is, suitability, readability, exploitability, naturalness, etc In terms of suitability, this conceptual framework focuses on the attractiveness, the relevance of the authentic materials to the students‘ need and language use In respect of readability emerged from the conceptual framework, the questionnaire and interview tools are purported to examine the difficulty level of language and text organization of the used authentic materials Regarding exploitability or usefulness, the conceptual framework assists the researcher to discover the connection between use of authentic materials and the teaching and learning purposes under the participants‘ perceptions Concerning the naturalness of language in the authentic materials, the conceptual framework drives the research to inquiry how natural the language quality of the texts is From what are investigated in respect of the actually deployed authentic materials for EIT teaching and learning process, some improvements can be made so that EIT authentic materials are genuinely advantageous to BTVC students‘ EIT acquisition

2.7 Chapter summary

The literature review supports the researcher considerably in overarching theoretical background in terms of nature of authentic materials (e.g definition, authenticity, benefits and shortcomings, adaption ways, criteria for selecting), reading background, and attitude components in connection to authentic materials In addition, it provides the researcher with some previous related studies, which play a pivotal role in seeking research gaps to situate the study The next chapter presents the research design, subjects and contexts, methods of data collection and analysis for the current study

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY

In Chapter 1, the problem of English teaching and learning in reading was identified The second chapter gave a conceptual framework shape to the study And, chapter 3 purposely depicts research methodology To specify, it first describes the research site and participants, next the research tools and methods are explained Then, the data analysis was employed after data collection The study has made an effort to find out the answers to two research questions mentioned in Chapter 1

3.1 Research method

According to McMillan and Schumacher (2001), research method is ―the way one collects and analyzes data‖ (p 9) The current study aimed at checking whether the authentic texts can match the IT students‘ needs and expectations as well as language proficient levels; moreover, whether these materials are actually feasible for the teachers

to exploit for their act of teaching reading skills In order to reach the purposes of the study, the researcher carried out a survey on an English reading class for IT with 35 students among learners of Binh Thuan Vocational College Actually, several theories have proved the effectiveness of using authentic materials in the classroom and in the study, the researcher wanted to know teachers‘ and students‘ attitudes towards to using authentic materials in their classes of English for IT

To collect the data adequately for answering the research questions posed in Chapter 1, the study conductor utilized the mixed methods design, which has been extensively defined in an array of ways, but in general involving both quantitative and qualitative research techniques, methods, and approaches in a single study (Creswell, 2012) According to this theorist, utilizers of the mixed methods approach select a sequence of data collection instruments in a combined way Bazeley (2002) emphasizes that the research might get benefits from using quantitative and qualitative methods in order to get the validity of the research In short, in the current study, the quantitative data was in application to show the results numerically from the students‘ questionnaire Also, the qualitative data were utilized to gain more information which came from the interview

The mixed-method purported to interpret the data in order to find out the answers to the research questions as much as possible

3.2 Research site

In this section, three aspects will be in turn gone into details: pedagogical setting, participants of the study, and the prescribed reading syllabus used for EIT teaching and learning, published in 2005 by Ha Noi Technology and Science Publishing Housing besides authentic reading supplementary materials

3.2.1 Pedagogical setting

The study was conducted at Binh Thuan Vocational College, situated at Truong Chinh Street, Phu Tai ward, Phan Thiet City, Binh Thuan province There are 10 classes with the total number of 450 students categorizing into different majors The teacher staff includes 72 teachers, six of whom are EFL teachers The EFL teachers ranged from the age

of 30-41; all of them are local residents of Binh Thuan province Regarding the qualifications of EFL teachers, five of them got Bachelor of Arts (B.A), and only the other one obtained Master of Arts (M.A) Most teachers are extremely keen on their noble teaching career

In the school year 2017-2018, Binh Thuan Vocational College drew a special attention from the People‘s Committee of Binh Thuan Province The school is sponsored lots of advanced equipment, which helps teachers and students to have many chances to work or study

3.2.2 Participants for the research

3.2.2.1 Students

Thirty-five students of the IT-majored class, including 34 males and 1 female, took part in the study Although they are neither the same age nor the same backgrounds, they are obliged to take the same course The participants are required to pass the general English exam in the first semester

Even though the school is well-equipped with advanced technology, the currently used material is not punctually updated Hence, it is an obstacle of the English in

professional to have a successful lesson because it might bore students when learning

Table 3.1: Demographic Information of Student Participants

3.2.2.2 Teachers

For the teacher participants, the current study recruited 5 EFL teachers in which there is one male (M1) and the four other teachers are females (F2, F3, F4, F5), aging at the age of from 22 to over 35, who took part in the study All of them are in charge of teaching ESP Most of them have short span of time in teaching experience (1-5 experienced years) Hence, they are enthusiastic enough to respond the interview sessions by the researcher In specific, they in turn give the response to the equivalent questions relating to the criteria of authentic materials chosen by the researcher and so on Since all of EFL teachers were in charge of teaching ESP like IT specialization, they have no difficulty answering the

interview The table below is the summary of what were mentioned above

Table 3.2: Demographic Information of Teacher Participants

3.3 Description for reading syllabus in the currently used material

The material for learning and teaching, namely “InfoTech–English for computer

users”, written by Thac Binh Cuong and Ho Xuan Ngoc, Hanoi Polytechnic University,

was first published in 2005 by Technology and Science Publishing Housing The framework of this book includes four all skills and grammar area Students are engaged to different topics from seven lessons related to their future job To be successful in transferring knowledge, teachers make good preparations for lesson plans to carry out the activities and choose the appropriate methods Additionally, teachers frequently bring their supplementary teaching materials to substitute as well as complement for the difficult lessons to meet learners‘ level requirements (See more in Table 3.3) There are seven lessons covering a wide range of current IT fields are (1) Computer today, (2) Input/ Output devices, (3) Storage devices, (4) Basic software, (5) Creative software, (6)