1 CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale As an effective medium of international communication, English language has been making a considerable contribution to the increasing development of various fields of people’s life such as economy, politics, culture, science, education and international relations Indeed, to meet the increasing demands for the development and integration of the country into the greater English-speaking world, over the last two decades, English language teaching and learning have been carried out throughout the country, not only at tertiary level but also at secondary and primary education Many Vietnamese linguists, educators and researchers have been doing their best in order that the quality of English language learning and teaching at all educational levels will be greatly improved for the time being However, at upper secondary schools, the teaching and learning of English language in general, English vocabulary in particular are still far from satisfaction as students’ final results in most English examinations remain unchanged at low level In fact, most secondary school students have not paid enough attention to vocabulary learning as they mainly receive basic lessons of grammar together with four skills from their teachers and textbooks It is common knowledge that vocabulary has a very important role to play in the language learning process and in language use as Wilkins (1972: 11) has claimed that “without grammar, very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed” Also, vocabulary can function as the cohesive device that links the four skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing all together Thus, vocabulary deficiency will lead to deficiency in other language skills Though vocabulary is vitally important to mastering any foreign languages, in reality, many grade 10 students' English vocabulary is still limited even though they have learned English for four years at the lower secondary schools It is their limited vocabulary that explains their poor performance in using English and in their test performance All these have motivated me to conduct this quasi-experimental research on the topic given, namely developing grade 10 students' English vocabulary through extensive reading 1.2 Aims and Objectives of the Study The main aim of this study was to experiment a guided extensive reading program (GERP) in helping grade 10 students develop their English vocabulary To be more specific, the primary objectives of the study were set as follows: • To experiment the GERP and examine its effects on grade 10 students’ English vocabulary acquisition; • To investigate the experimental students’ attitudes towards the GERP, and then to make some recommendations for further study 1.3 Research Hypotheses and Questions To achieve the aims and objectives, the study was designed to test the hypothesis: H1: Grade 10 students who participate in the GERP will make more significant improvement in their English vocabulary acquisition as measured by both pre-test and post-test scores than those who not take part in such a program If the above hypothesis was fully accepted, the following null hypothesis would be obviously rejected or vice versa: H0: There is no difference in English vocabulary acquisition as measured by both pre-test and post test scores between grade 10 students who participate in the GERP and those who not take part in such a program In order to identify which hypothesis would be accepted, the following research questions were formulated and needed to be answered satisfactorily: (1) Does an extensive reading program bring about differences in terms of students’ vocabulary acquisition as measured by their scores in the pre-test and post-test? (2) What are the students’ attitudes towards the GERP after the experimental period? 1.4 Method of the Study To test the hypothesis (Grade 10 students who participate in the GERP will make more significant improvement in their English vocabulary acquisition as measured by both pretest and post-test scores than those who not take part in such a project), a quasiexperiment was adopted in this study A design of pretest and posttest was employed as the main research method to measure the validity of the hypothesis Two non-random groups of 60 students (one control group and one experimental group, N= 30 each) participated in this experiment The pre-test and post-test scores were analyzed by means of t-test to find out the correlation of the two means to accept or to reject the null hypothesis, namely extensive reading (ER) does not have any effect on grade 10 students' English vocabulary learning Besides, a post-experiment questionnaire was also used as the supplementary instrument to elicit the students’ evaluative attitudes towards the GERP after the experimental period 1.5 Scope of the Study This quasi-experimental study was designed to measure the effects of the GERP on grade 10 students' English vocabulary acquisition at HTSS Due to the time constraint, the researcher could just carry out an experiment upon a small sample of grade 10 students who were non - randomly assigned to a control class and an experimental class, (30 students per each) The pre-test and post-test scores were used to measure both groups' English vocabulary before and after the trial period of 16 weeks in the first semester of the 20072008 academic year The post-program questionnaire was administered to get more feedback from the experimental students The results of the questionnaire would give the researcher supplementary support for the conclusion drawing Thus, the findings of the research could just reflect the effects of the GERP on the subjects in the context under consideration 1.6 Significance of the Study The present research was carried out with the hope that it would bring practical benefits to teaching and learning English vocabulary at upper-secondary schools If the GERP actually helps to develop grade 10 students' vocabulary knowledge, it should be applied to the teaching and learning of English at other grades 1.7 Design of the Study The study is divided into five chapters, which are presented as follows: Chapter one provides an overview of the study, consisting of the rationale for the study, aims and objectives, research hypothesis and questions, research method, scope, significance and design of the study Chapter two presents essential literature review relevant to the study including the place of vocabulary in foreign language learning, L2 vocabulary acquisition processes, extensive reading and vocabulary learning Chapter three deals with the methodology underlying the research, which presents the context of the study, the rationale for using quasi-experiment, the background information about the subjects of the study, the procedures as well as the instruments for data collection Chapter four is devoted to a detailed description of the significant findings from data collection, i.e., the presentation of the two groups' pretest and posttest scores and the experimental students' attitudes towards the GERP Chapter five presents the discussion and conclusion which focus on the findings and summary of the major points of the study This chapter also point out several limitations of the research as well as some recommendations ad suggestions for further study CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Introduction In Chapter One, the rationale, aims and the hypothesis to be tested in the present study were presented This Chapter reviews the relevant literature on the relationship between extensive reading and L2 vocabulary acquisition The Chapter begins with a definition of vocabulary, which is followed by the discussion of the role of extensive reading in L2 vocabulary from both Second Language Acquisition theory and pedagogical perspectives 2.2 Vocabulary in Foreign Language Teaching and Learning 2.2.1 What is Vocabulary? So far, the term vocabulary has been defined quite differently according to its various aspects such as criteria, features and functions According to Ur, P (1996: 60), vocabulary can be defined “as the words we teach in the foreign language However, a new item of vocabulary may be more than a single word: a compound of two or three words or multi word idioms” Lewis, M (1993: 89) states that vocabulary “… may be individual word or full sentences – institutionalized utterances – that convey fixed social or pragmatic meaning within a given community” Pyles & Algeo (1970: 96) also emphasizes that “It is words that sounds and meanings interlock to allow us to communicate with one another, and it is word that we arrange together to make sentences, conversation and discourse of all kinds” The above quotations have helped us have general look at the notions of vocabulary However, as going into further features, vocabulary can be interpreted as knowledge of words and word meanings Firstly, words are virtually manifested in the two forms: spoken form and written form Oral vocabulary including the words, phrases or sentences are used for listening and speaking, and the words which we recognize and use for reading and writing can be identified as written vocabulary Secondly, our word knowledge is also represented in two forms, receptive and productive The words that we use to write and speak are considered as productive vocabulary and the words that we hear from the people around us and see or read from stories, books, newspapers, etc… are recognized as receptive vocabulary In language learning and teaching, the term vocabulary is used with changing meanings by the teachers at different levels of education For example, the teachers at nursery or primary schools might regard the word as synonymous with “sight vocabulary" by which they mean a certain number of the most common words in language that young pupils need to recognize quickly when they see them in print or written materials Meanwhile, for the upper secondary school teachers, vocabulary usually means the “hard” words that students encounter in a subject matter and literature selections Therefore, it is possible to state that the word vocabulary means both the knowledge of words and word meanings in both oral and print language and in productive and receptive forms Of course, lexical meanings vary from context to context In language communication, there are many cases in which the lexical meaning can not be deducted from analysis of the individual components of that word For this reason, in foreign language teaching and learning, helping students to gain vocabulary from the different contexts is a must for all the instructors If this is regularly done, the learners will not only know how to use appropriate vocabulary in communication, but also develop their vocabulary repertoire themselves 2.1.2 The Place of Vocabulary in Foreign Language Teaching and Learning Nowadays, more and more people become aware that besides their mother tongue or first language, they need to acquire several foreign languages in order to take full advantages of the advancements in information technology For many people, the first thing to in learning a foreign language is to acquire its vocabulary, which is perceived as the building blocks upon which knowledge of language can be built In fact, vocabulary always holds a significant place in foreign language teaching and learning According to Troike (1976: 87), “vocabulary is most important for understanding and knowing names for things, actions and concepts” Also, vocabulary knowledge can help language users perform and develop language skills since “substantial vocabulary knowledge is always a prerequisite to the performance of language skills Vocabulary enables language use, language use enables the increase of vocabulary knowledge and language use and so on” (Nation and Waring, 2004: 6-19) Therefore, it is undeniable that vocabulary plays an extremely important role in making a success of language learning and that the acquisition of adequate vocabulary is essential for successful second language use The main objective of language learners is to be able to use their learning language to communicate well with people around them To achieve this objective, they have to master enough vocabulary of that language; if not, they will find it impossible to express themselves in most circumstances Wallace (1982: 73) has said that “failure to find the words one needs to express himself is the most frustrating experience in speaking another language” Indeed, as students succeed in obtaining wide knowledge of vocabulary, they often get more confidence in using language and they can perform other language skills for various communicative purposes Thus, vocabulary knowledge always holds an important role in performing language skills For example, vocabulary has a close relationship with reading skills which in turn have an interconnection with reading comprehension This relationship seems logical because of the fact that when students get meaning from what they read, they also need both many words in their vocabulary repertoire and ability to use various strategies to establish the meanings of new words when they encounter them It is the case that most of the weak students who don’t have enough vocabulary or effective word-learning strategies often struggle to achieve comprehension in reading Also, as they don’t have sufficient word knowledge to understand what they are reading, they often avoid reading As a result, the students who don’t read very much don’t have the opportunity to see and learn very many new words in various contexts but the students who read more can become better readers and gain more words The very particular relationship between vocabulary knowledge and language skills once again highlights the significant position of vocabulary in language learning and teaching as Wilkin (1972: 110) has summed up “Without grammar, very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed” 2.3 Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition Processes As examining “vocabulary acquisition: word structure, collocation, word-class, and meaning”, N C Ellis (1997: 122-139) states that language consists of strings of units hierarchically organized into increasingly large chunks He argues that the acquisition of phonological form, collocation and grammatical class results from unconscious analysis of sequence information but the acquisition of semantics and the mapping of form to meaning are accomplished by conscious learning processes Much of language learning is the memorization of strings which results in the formation and retention of patterns in long-term memory These in turn help language learners in the memorization of new strings of language units Knowing a word involves knowing its form, morphological structure, syntactic pattern, meaning, connotation, pragmatics, lexical relations, and collocations According to Nagy, Anderson, & Herman (1985: 233-253), developing understandings of word meanings is a long-term process that involves many encounters with both spoken and written words in varying contexts On the first encounter with a new word, a student stores in memory some information about how the word fits into what he is reading This information is reinforced each time he sees or hears the word With each new encounter, the student picks up more information about the word from its use in various contexts As a result, the student gradually acquires “ownership” of the word Thus, L2 vocabulary acquisition is a very complex phenomenon involving several different learning processes The most common distinction between implicit and explicit learning is that implicit or incidental learning is often defined as “accidental learning of information without the intention of remembering that information” (Hulstijn, J., Hollander, M & Greidanus, T., 1996: 327), and explicit learning, on the other hand, refers to the application of vocabulary learning strategies on the part of the learner L2 vocabulary acquisition processes are also presented quiet enough by Krashen (1989: 440-464) in the Implicit Vocabulary Learning Hypothesis and Explicit Vocabulary Learning Hypothesis According to Krashen’s Input Hypothesis, the former holds that meanings of new words are acquired subconsciously as a result of repeated exposures in a range of contexts, where the conscious focus is not on form, but on the message The latter holds that the employment of a range of vocabulary learning strategies can greatly facilitate and enhance vocabulary acquisition; on this view, learners are seen as active processors of information Agreeing to some points in Krashen's Hypothesis, Ellis (1995: 12-16) also claims that both hypotheses are true, but apply to different aspects of vocabulary acquisition According to him, the implicit vocabulary learning hypothesis holds true for simple pattern recognition of surface forms of input and output Explicit learning, on the other hand, is necessary for the mapping of those surface input and output forms to their corresponding semantic or conceptual representation Then, learners can recognize the word meanings via spelling, associations, grammatical information and meaning He, therefore, suggests the following possible explanations for the process of vocabulary acquisition: • According to the strong implicit vocabulary learning hypothesis, new words are acquired totally unconsciously • A weak implicit vocabulary learning hypothesis holds that it is at least necessary for learners to notice that a word is new to them • A weak explicit vocabulary learning hypothesis suggests even when words are learned implicitly, some active processing is also taking place • A strong implicit vocabulary learning hypothesis holds that learners consciously apply meta-cognitive strategies in acquiring new vocabulary In sum, each hypothesis explains different aspects of vocabulary acquisition The strong implicit hypothesis can explain a learner's ability to recognize and produce words This ability is a skill developed through repetition Hence, extensive reading can offer students good opportunities to fortify their vocabulary acquisition 2.4 Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition & Intentional Vocabulary Learning The fact that incidental vocabulary acquisition takes place in second language learning is generally acknowledged among researchers Most scholars agree that except for the first few thousand most common words, L2 vocabulary is predominantly acquired incidentally (Huckin & Coady, 1999: 181-193) The terminological clarification visualized in the following figure (adapted from Schmidt, 1990: 138-149; Ellis, 1994: 38) enables us to relate the terms implicit and explicit by viewing incidental vocabulary acquisition as being composed of implicit learning processes which happen without the learner’s awareness and/or of explicit learning processes which take place without learning intention but involve online awareness and hypothesis formation Figure 1: Incidental vocabulary acquisition as a process involving implicit and/or explicit learning Incidental vocabulary acquisition – intention is achieved by Implicit learning processes – intention – awareness and/or Explicit learning processes – intention + awareness With regard to the role of consciousness, however, two complementary viewpoints can be distinguished An implicit viewpoint would hold that incidental vocabulary acquisition takes place without awareness, involving implicit learning processes only However, the implicit viewpoint fails to take account of the fact that learners are active and strategic information processors An explicit viewpoint would thus argue that incidental vocabulary acquisition also involves explicit (i.e conscious) learning processes, and would consequently characterize it as primarily explicit learning Ellis (1997) claims that both implicit and explicit learning mechanisms are involved in incidental vocabulary acquisition: while the acquisition of a word’s form, collocations and grammatical class information are said to involve implicit processes, acquiring a word’s semantic properties and mapping word form to meaning are claimed to result from explicit learning processes Furthermore, He also argues for a complete dissociation of implicit aspects and explicit aspects of vocabulary acquisition (see Figure 2) Figure 2: Ellis’ view of implicit and explicit learning processes in incidental vocabulary acquisition Incidental vocabulary acquisition learning word form = implicit learning (without awareness) dissociated processes learning word meaning = explicit learning (with awareness) 2.5 Extensive Reading and Vocabulary Learning 2.5.1 Definition of Extensive Reading The term “Extensive Reading” was originally coined by Palmer (1968), to distinguish it from “Intensive Reading” Intensive reading focuses mainly on the careful reading of short, complex texts for detailed understanding and skills practice Extensive reading, however, involves the reading of large amounts of longer, easy-to-understand materials, usually done outside the classroom and at each student’s own pace and level According to Lewis and Hill (1992: 109), extensive reading means "students have a general understanding of the text without necessary understanding every word" This definition appears to have some shortcomings as it fails to help the readers see the whole picture of extensive reading The concept extensive reading seems to be clarified through the definition given by Susser and Robb (1990: 161-185) as they see extensive reading as a language teaching or learning procedure is… reading (a) of large quantities of material or long texts; (b) for global or general understanding; (c) with the intention of obtaining pleasure from the text Moreover, because (d) reading is individualized, with students choosing the books they want to read, (e) the books are not discussed in class What makes this definition better than Lewis & Hill's definition is that it can summarize the general characteristics of ER However, as considering the overall context of the present study, this definition is still irrelevant In this study, extensive reading is defined as a language learning activity that is aimed to getting additional linguistic input for vocabulary acquisition This type of reading is characterized as (a) being graded, (b) student-selected, (c) suitable to the students’ level of proficiency, (d) done beyond the classroom, and having pleasure as primary purpose 10 2.5.2 Role of Extensive Reading in L2 Vocabulary Acquisition from Second Language Acquisition Perspectives: Krashen's Comprehensible Input Hypothesis It is possible for us to claim that extensive reading has a very important role to play in language learning as it can bring the benefits to learners in acquiring language in general, vocabulary in particular This is because extensive reading may provide 'comprehensive input' (Krashen, 1982), which is claimed to result in language acquisition when certain preconditions are met These include adequate exposure to the language, interesting material, and a relaxed, tension-free learning environment Moreover, he also claims that the unconscious process of language acquisition which occurs when reading for pleasure is more successful and longer lasting than conscious learning There are five main hypotheses in his theory of second language acquisition Among the five main hypotheses initiated by Krashen (1982), (the Acquisition-Learning hypothesis, the Monitor hypothesis, the Natural Order hypothesis, the Input hypothesis, and the Affective Filter hypothesis), the Input Hypothesis is seen as the corner-stone for the setting up of the guided extensive reading program in the present study According to Krashen's (1982) book, one acquires language is only one wayby exposure to Comprehensive Input He claims that exposure to comprehensive input in the target language will lead to the simultaneous occurrence of comprehension and acquisition The theory can be illustrated as the following figure (adapted from Krashen, 1982: 16- 32) Figure 3: The input hypothesis model of L2 learning and production Learnt knowledge Affective filter (Monitoring) Comprehensive input Language Acquisition Device (LAD) Acquired knowledge Output The Comprehensible Input Hypothesis is obviously an attempt to explain how the learner acquires a second language In other words, this hypothesis is an explanation of how second language acquisition takes place So, the input hypothesis is only concerned with 'acquisition', not 'learning' According to this hypothesis, the learners improve and progress along the 'natural order' when they receive second language 'input' that is one step beyond 31 4.3 Comparison of Both Groups' Vocabulary Gains after the GERP The following table presents the means, the standard deviation, the t value, the degree of freedom and the critical value, which were calculated to establish the differences in the gains between the pretests and posttests performed by the experimental and control groups Here, the t-test was used again to compare the mean gains made by both groups to see if the treatment might have been associated with any difference in vocabulary acquisition Table 4: Mean gains of the experimental and control groups after the experiment Number Mean SD t df tcrit Experimental group 30 4.23 1.50 2.12 58 1.672* Control group 30 1.80 0.85 * p< 0.05 As can be seen in Table 4, the mean gain of the experimental group was greater than that of the control group (4.23 compared to 1.80) However, the gains made by the control group were more homogeneous than those of the experimental group since its standard deviation value is shown to be lower (1.50 compared to 0.85) The alpha level of 0.05 (p< 0.05) was set for the t-test With the degree of freedom is 58, the critical value is 1.672, which lower than the obtained t value of 2.12 The difference between the mean gains made by the two groups proved to be significant Therefore, the null hypothesis was rejected Now we can safely come to the conclusion that the mean difference of 2.30 between the experimental group's gain and the control group's gain was not due to the chance alone In other words, the higher mean gain made by the experimental class must be the result of the experimental treatment To be more convenient, the whole comparison between the two groups' gains after an experimental period was illustrated in Figure below The gain of each group was calculated by subtracting the pretest score from the post test score Figure 5: Difference in gain values obtained by both groups after the experiment Number of students Control Group Experimental Group Students' gains As can be seen in the above figure, the gain values achieved by the control group were ranged to while the gain values obtained by the experimental group ranged from to 32 In terms of individual students' gain values, 22 of 30 students in the control group reached the two gain values and 2, i.e., 11 of 30 students gained the value and 11 students gained the value Only of them reached the value 3, the maximum value Especially, one student kept unchanged in his test performance since he made no gain in the posttest compared with the pretest after the experiment In comparison with the gain values made by the control group, the experimental group achieved the higher gain values ranged from to Specifically, four of 30 participants got ahead of all the other students in the class to obtain the value 6, the maximum gain Especially, half the students in the experimental group (15 of 30) reached the value Only two students got at the value 1, the minimum gain Nine of 30 students obtained the values 2, and 4, i.e., four of them got at the value 2, two of them got at the value and three of them got the value With the values compared in pairs, the greater gain values achieved by the experimental group indicated the significant improvement in their vocabulary acquisition In summary, after the five-month experiment, there were significant differences existed between the two groups in terms of English vocabulary acquisition Though both the experimental and control groups have made certain progress in their vocabulary development at the end of the first semester, the improvement made by the experimental group who took part in the GERP was considerably greater than that made by the control group who followed the conventional teaching and learning of vocabulary 4.4 Participants' Perceptions of the Effectiveness of the GERP In this section, we focus on the data collected from the questionnaire, i.e., the experimental students' opinions of the GERP Eight of ten multiple choice items (1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, and 10) involved investigating their evaluative attitudes towards the positive impact of the experimental treatment on English vocabulary acquisition The two items (3 and 8) dealt with their negative criticism of the GERP, i.e., the program did not bring about any improvement for their English vocabulary learning All these data were presented in Table As can be observed in the table, 93.3% of the subjects who took part in the program stated that reading extra English materials at home could help them quickly extend their English vocabulary repertoire although two of them disagreed with this idea Similarly, 93.3% of them affirmed that the program not only helped to increase their English vocabulary but also helped to consolidate grammar and improve reading comprehension 33 Table 5: Experimental participants' attitudes towards the GERP Items 10 Agree Disagree No idea Reading extra English readers at home helped me quickly enlarge my vocabulary My English vocabulary repertoire increased thanks to the GERP I found the GERP very restricted since I had just learned very little from it Guided extensive English reading not only helped me widen my vocabulary, but also helped me know how to put it into practice Guided extensive English reading helped me extend vocabulary and reinforce grammar knowledge The GERP helped to improve my reading comprehension 28 93.3% 28 93.3% 3.3% 27 90% 6.7% 0% 28 93.3% 0% 0% 6.7% 3.3% 10% 28 93.3% 28 93.3% 29 96.7% 3.3% 0% 3.3% 3.3% 6.7% % 3.3% 26 86.6% 28 93.3% 6.7% 3.3% 6.7% 28 93.3% 3.3% 3.3% The GERP helped me get the better retention of English vocabulary in comparison with learning English vocabulary only in classroom before The GERP really made me waste my time since the reading texts contained a lot of new words I advise that all learners of English should positively read as much extra English as possible because it helps to expand and memorize vocabulary very well If the GERP were frequently maintained, my competence in using English would be much improved Obviously, the responses of 28 experimental participants suggested that GERP played a powerful role in improving their reading ability and reading skills, the so-called metacognitive skills Moreover, 90% of them recognized that they not only expanded English vocabulary, but also knew how to used acquired words in practice However, there was still one student who thought that the program was restricted as he just learned little from it and another one who did not give his idea In fact, the figure (6.6%) reflected the truth that two of them had made little improvement in their vocabulary acquisition after the experimental treatment since the score they gained in the posttest compared with the pretest was just one value Also, one student said that the program was helpless and time-consuming as he met so many new words in his graded readers Another student did not have any idea about this issue These negative ideas also reflected through their posttest scores compared to pretest scores In comparison with the conventional teaching and learning of English vocabulary, it was surprising that up to 96.7% of them acknowledged that the GERP really helped them fortify their vocabulary Just one only one student denied this view With reference to the continuance of the program in the future, 93.3% of them thought that their competence in using English would be enhanced progressively if this program kept frequent Only one student disagreed with this opinion and another one did not express any idea On behalf of 34 the experimental students who had participated in the program, the majority of them (86.6%) would like the others to take their advice that they should follow the program since it could help them to widen and reinforce acquired vocabulary in English However, there were still two negative ideas about this matter, i.e., 6.7% of them disagreed with this statement Also, two of them sat on the fence by choosing a neutral non-opinion option In order to hold an overall view of the experimental group's attitudes towards the GERP, Figure was designed to summarize the results of the questionnaire in terms of three aspects, namely positive ideas, negative ideas and no information or neutral ideas It was assumed that the ideas supporting the program were considered as positive ideas, and the ideas objecting to the program were seen as negative ideas, i.e., the experimental subjects did not support the program If the students did not express any idea about the items mentioned, their ideas were viewed as no information or neutral ideas As can be seen in Figure 6, while negative ideas ranged from to and neutral ideas ranged from to 3, the positive ideas which supported the program ranged from 26 to 29 In other words, the number of the experimental participants who did not give their opinions or approve of the program was just one or two, i.e., they might not receive any benefits from the program after four months of treatment The numbers ranged from 26 to 29 indicate that almost experimental students really realized the important role of extensive reading in learning English vocabulary, i.e., they recognized the positive effect of the program on their English vocabulary acquisition In summary, the results of the questionnaire have indicated that almost all the participants in the experimental group presented their positive attitudes towards the GERP which was carried out for a period of four months They acknowledged the positive impact of the program on their English vocabulary acquisition 35 CHAPTER FIVE: DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION 5.1 Introduction In this chapter, the major findings of the study will be discussed in detail Through specific discussions, both the research questions and hypotheses of the study will be answered and proved satisfactorily After the results of discussion, some conclusions of the study will be drawn out to summarize all the main points presented in the five chapters of the whole research paper Since no study is perfect without any weaknesses, the limitations of the study will also be discussed in this chapter in order to propose some recommendations and suggestions for further study 5.2 Discussion of Research Questions As stated at the beginning of the research paper, this study focuses on the two major research questions, namely (1)Does an extensive reading program bring about difference in terms of students’ vocabulary acquisition as measured by their scores in the pre-test and post-test?, and (2) What are the experimental students’ attitudes towards the GERP and their suggestions for the future program? This section will be dedicated to the major discussions on these questions 5.2.1 Discussion of Both Groups' Vocabulary Gains after the GERP The comparison of both group's vocabulary gains in the pretest and posttest has helped us find out the answer to the first research question of the study The pretest was designed for testing the subjects' English vocabulary knowledge to get some pre-examination of the two groups before the experiment As mentioned in Section 4.2., the control group outperformed in the pretest as compared with the experimental group (28.43 compared to 27.87) As for the posttest, the version of the pretest, was designed with the content of the same vocabulary items and comprehension questions as the pretest However, to take it for granted, these tests were built to be valid and reliable measurement, and some changes were made by disordering the language items and questions in the each task of the post-test for both groups As stated above, the comparison of the posttest scores gained by the two groups revealed a significant difference since the experimental group obtained a higher mean score than the control group (32.10 compared to 30.23) Although these figures may not assure that the identification of the whole situation of a matter would be always true in other 36 contexts, they almost indicated that the presupposition set up before the experiment became realistic and reasonable That is, the experimental group obtained a greater mean gain than the control group (4.23 compared to 1.80) This difference, as the researcher had expected, was proved to be significant (t= 2.12, df = 5848, p < 0.05) On the whole, the present study has brought out enough evidence to come to the conclusion that the GERP has positive effect on the students' English vocabulary learning In other words, students who took part in the program were able to make more progress in their vocabulary acquisition than those who did not participate in the program The findings of the significant difference between the two groups' test scores, as illustrated above, suggested that the program could offer opportunities for most experimental students to develop their English vocabulary The main assumption behind this program is that as students become aware of the importance of extensive reading and interested in reading more and more English language, they can gradually build up their reading habits which in turn help to extend and reinforce their acquired vocabulary Let us return to the previous studies mentioned in the literature review section to confirm more value of extensive reading for vocabulary learning In their investigation into L2 vocabulary acquisition, Woodinsky & Nation (1988) and Krashen (1989) claim that incidental vocabulary acquisition through extensive reading does indeed occur Also, there are those who believe that vocabulary acquisition through extensive reading is sufficient for L2 learners For example, Nagy and Herjman (1987) argue that "teachers should promote extensive reading because it can lead to greater vocabulary growth than any explicit instruction alone ever could" (cited in Coady, 1997: 225) Generally speaking, most practitioners of second language instruction seem to be resigned to the default argument that incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition through reading is sufficient Based on Schmidt's (1990: 138-149) and Ellis' (1994: 38) theories that incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition should cover the right combination of implicit learning processes and explicit learning processes, the GERP was proved to be pedagogically successful in this study In fact, during the experimental period, the students in the experimental group were assisted with reading learning strategies such as cognitive strategies, meta-cognitive strategies and extensive reading Also, they were helped to deal with unknown words in graded readers by applying guessing strategies, note-taking strategies Explicit instruction was also offered to those who really met difficulties in comprehending the contents of language Under the light of Krashen's (1982) comprehensive input theory and Nation's (1991) theories of L2 vocabulary acquisition, the GERP was designed to be in the contents of comprehensible reading materials which were aimed to encourage students to read a lot to 37 acquire vocabulary and develop reading comprehension According to Nation (2001), the variety of meaning-focused input (extensive reading) helps vocabulary growth Krashen (1989: 440-464) also states that extensive reading in an L2 is one of the main ways that language learners acquire new vocabulary knowledge However, to achieve this, students must be exposed to a larger amount of comprehensive texts since numerous appearances of a word in the rich contexts help them retain and reinforce both form and meanings of that word In this study, the results of the experimental group's posttest scores reflected the proper application of the GERP which could bring about effectiveness to teaching and learning English vocabulary This affirmation was true at least in the context of this research Basing on the above discussions, it was possible to conclude that the answer to the first research question has been confirmed, i.e., there existed a significant difference in the test scores between both groups, the experimental group made more improvement in their English vocabulary acquisition than the control group This answer leads to the rejection of the null hypothesis (H0) and accepts the expected hypothesis of the study (H1): Grade 10 students who participate in the GERP will make more significant improvement in their English vocabulary acquisition as measured by both pre-test and post-test scores than those who not take part in such a program 5.2.2 Discussion of the Experimental Students' Opinions of the GERP This section will discuss the results of the questionnaire given by the experimental participants to obtain further examination of the correlation coefficient between their test scores and their evaluative opinions of the GERP Ten multiple-choice items related to the effects of the program on English language acquisition were written in Vietnamese so that the respondents would have no difficulty in understanding the contents of language in the questionnaire After gathering all the responses from the experimental group, we realized that most participants' reactions to the program were positive They appeared to approve of the program as an effective means for vocabulary acquisition In fact, the GERP in the study was considered as the home reading program in which most students voluntarily read their chosen graded readers at home and this kind of treatment appeared to have benefits in both reading comprehension and vocabulary acquisition Specifically, the majority (93%) of students who found the program both effective and enjoyable made a marked improvement in their vocabulary learning This result matched with their vocabulary gains after the experiment As presented above, 28 of 30 experimental students reached the gain values ranged from to This finding also accords with Krashen's (1989) research result that 38 learners gain vocabulary knowledge after participating in an ER program However, there were still 3.3% students who found the program ineffective since they met much new vocabulary in their reading materials This opinion seemed reasonable as this student made no gain value in his posttest score, but it was contradictory in terms of the characteristics and level of graded readers As stated before, basing on the characteristics of the GERP, the researcher of the study had attempted to get a thorough knowledge of the subjects before implementing such a program at a level that the researcher believed to be proper In addition, all the experimental subjects were informed to change their readers if the level or the content-area of the book was inappropriate Put another way, the GERP in this study strictly followed Krashen's (1989) view that "a variety of materials on a wide range of topics is available so as to encourage reading for different reasons and in different ways Students select what they want to read and have the freedom to stop reading material that fails to interest them” Thus, students were supposed to be most comfortable with readers at the 300400 headword level whose content was easy and comprehensible Anyway, only one negative opinion like the above seems to make little sense on the whole The responses to the significant items (2, 4, 6) in the questionnaire indicated that no participants (0%) in the experimental group denied the significant role of the GERP in their English learning process It means that more than 93% of them affirmed that their vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension improved a lot thanks to the program; about 90% of them acknowledged the program as an effective one in which they had opportunities to develop and practice their acquired vocabulary This affirmation also reflects what Grabe (1991: 391) and Paran (1996: 30) emphasize that ER can enhance learners' general language competence as it provides learners with practice in automaticity of word recognition and decoding the symbols on the printed page Besides the above, more than 93% of responses to the other items of the questionnaire (1, 5, 7) indicate that ER not only helped to widen vocabulary knowledge, but also helped to reinforce acquired words Especially, 99.3% of them recognized the GERP as a better technique to retain vocabulary repertoire Just 3.3% of them disagreed with this view Once again, the students' positive responses accord with the belief that ER is a very effective way of reinforcing, confirming and deepening knowledge of vocabulary, expressions and structures, and of developing an implicit understanding of when and how words are used (see Nation & Coady, 1997) With regard to the neutral ideas, it seems that some experimental students (from 3.3% to 6.7%) did not express their attitudes towards the program as a whole These vague ideas would lead to some different ways of interpretation That is, they were not sure of what they 39 thought or they might stand on the half -way point of agreement and disagreement Thus, it was not possible to take much account of these neutral opinions since they did not tell us much about the items raised in the questionnaire Besides all the above, the tally of the responses to the questionnaire concerning the program revealed that the majority of students (93.3%) admitted having received a good deal of vocabulary from extensive reading and that they would like to keep on such a program in the future In a word, through the discussion on the results of the questionnaire, it was possible to conclude that feedback from the experimental students basically accorded with their test scores Most of them acknowledged that their reading skills, vocabulary and grammar were improved thanks to the GERP This conclusion also makes the second research question become clear-cut, i.e., students appeared to hold positive attitudes towards the program 5.3 Conclusion 5.3.1 Conclusions As a quasi-experimental study, this study in the form of an action research mainly aimed to investigate the effect of the GERP on grade 10 students' English vocabulary acquisition The experiment was carried out on a group of 30 grade 10 students who were learning English as a foreign language at Ha Tinh Specialized School (HTSS) The theoretical background for the study was totally presented in Chapter two, in which the positive impacts of ER on reading fluency and vocabulary acquisition were pointed out as the results of the previous studies Moreover, literature related to benefits of ER to vocabulary acquisition was also revealed quite fully in connection with the major respects of language improvement Chapter three presented the quasi-experimental methods of research to examine the effects of the GERP on grade 10 students' English vocabulary acquisition The design of the study took a pretest and posttest design as the main measure to explore the research questions set out before the experiment In this design, the control group took the conventional teaching and learning of English vocabulary as the other classes did with their text books at school while the experimental group received the GERP to develop their vocabulary instead T-test was used to compare the scores of pre tests and post tests gained by both groups and then their vocabulary gains were calculated and analyzed for later comparison In Chapter four and Chapter five, the significant findings of the study were presented and discussed in detail to determine the answers to the research questions in As for the first research question, the results of the experiment indicated that there was a significant improvement made by the experimental group in the posttest Also, the 40 experimental subjects' feedback to the questionnaire was an affirmative answer to the second research question, i.e., most experimental students had positive attitudes towards the program In fact, their faithful opinions reflected what they performed in their test results Put another way, they acknowledged that they were capable of acquiring a lot of English vocabulary through the GERP and that the program became an effective way to develop their lexical knowledge during and outside their school-time In the context of this study, it must be remembered that only words that were chosen by the researcher were tested It was possible that there were other words that students acquired were not accounted for In short, the greatest impression gained from this questionnaire was that respondents found the program very useful and admitted its positive impact on their vocabulary acquisition Furthermore, not only did the majority of students apparently come to enjoy and benefit from home reading but also, having developed the reading habit, many voluntarily went on to engage in reading tasks according to their interests Thus, there was evidence to suggest that the GERP would be a valuable complement to existing methodologies as Colin Davis (1995: 329-336) ever claims: “Any ESL, EFL or L1 classroom will be poorer for the lack of an extensive reading program of some kind and will be unable to promote its pupils’ language development in all aspects as effectively as if such a program were present.” 5.3.2 Limitations of the Study The first limitation is due to the sample size of the study Since the quasi-experiment was only conducted once and on a limited number of subjects (two groups of 60 grade 10 students, only 30 of them received the treatment), it would be unlikely to ensure that the findings of the study would be always true to other subjects in different contexts Although the statistic results of pretest and posttest scores by means of t-tests showed that the experimental students gained more vocabulary than those who didn't take part in the GERP, the subjects in this study could not be representative for all the population of the other contexts Thus, subjects in different contexts may have reacted differently to the treatment Another limitation of the study still exists in the methodology for this research, some of which have already been mentioned It must be said that no method was perfect For this study, a quasi-experimental study also remained some shortcomings For example, the t-test could not tell us all the things as expected by any other researchers as it neither indicates theoretical validity nor tests importance of the variable Moreover, it must be remembered that this experiment was carried out in and outside classrooms and not in a laboratory Thus, there was no random assignment of students Rather, they were artificially grouped 41 according to the researcher's pre-assignment before the experimental period If they had been carefully selected and assigned in to the proper groups according to the researcher's controlled criteria, the subject groupings may have differed and thus produced varied results Furthermore, the lack of consideration of other possible factors is also a critical limitation of this research paper In fact, there existed some other factors that affected the experimental group's improvement in vocabulary acquisition, they were indeed impossible to be examined during the experiment treatment It was true that the researcher couldn't measure exactly the time amount or frequency or of the subjects' involvement in extensive reading activities The test used in this study to measure the impact of the GERP on the students’ vocabulary acquisition was designed by the researcher himself This definitely raises the question of internal and external validity of the test This limitation makes it hard to generalize the findings The final limitation of the study is attributed to the limited time for the experimental treatment with the program Hence, it is advisable that continued extensive reading would be part of the necessary elements of a program for overcoming this deficit From a research perspective, the two groups would, ideally, have continued the control and experimental treatments for a longer period to see if the effect remained and if the experimental group continued their progress Also, the research design would have been improved if follow-up activities had been done to investigate whether the ER program was associated with more out-of-class reading activities by students after the program had ended Unfortunately, the researcher's limited time didn't permit of anything else 5.3.3 Recommendations for the Application of the GERP To emphasize the key role of reading, Krashen also claims that Reading is good for you, … Reading is the only way, the only way we become good readers, develop a good writing style, an adequate vocabulary, advanced grammar, and the only way we become good spellers (Krashen, 1993: 23) There is no doubt that reading a lot can contribute to our reading ability, our writing style and can help build our vocabulary and aid our spelling and that reading is a very effective way of building up a lot of one’s language competence One thing we can make sure is that Krashen's claim goes further than that It suggests that all other methods of vocabulary learning are less effective, or less useful than simply just reading However, to make full use of the benefits of ER, students should be guided to choose appropriate reading materials, and to spend proper time on reading and to exploit effective reading strategies, guidance is always necessary According to Nation (1990: 356), 42 "for second language learners, direct teaching and learning of vocabulary is a feasible proposition" In order to get students to a vocabulary knowledge level where they can read texts with ease and acquire words by themselves, some form of explicit instruction should be offered Concerning the role of reading texts, Hirsh and Nation (1992) also emphasizes that most series of simplified graded readers would play a vital part in developing L2 learners' vocabulary acquisition Therefore, there is a need for more graded readers which 'bridge' the gap between the monotonous reading and learning of vocabulary Moreover, an effective extensive reading program should engage the learners to get their sustained attention, should encourage large quantities of reading to get adequate vocabulary repetition, and should provide texts at the right coverage levels to allow unknown vocabulary to be adequately dealt with In sum, whatever design may come out, the teacher is advised to be considerate and flexible in designing an ER program by making reference to the following principles: • Investigating students' interest and abilities to meet theirs needs of language learning; • Preparing an appropriate reading room or a good library which should contain as many graded readers as possible; • Designing the extensive reading program which can meet the demands of the students at the right level and at the right time; • Assessing the ER program to make any changes necessary for the coming term As can be seen, to set up and carry out an ER program successfully, it requires more time, work and resources than teaching regular lessons with a textbook Therefore, there should be much approval and support from the other co-operators and administrative staff 5.3.4 Suggestions for Further Study Since this study was just conducted on a small sample size with the experimental period of four months, it was impossible for the researcher to establish all the effects of extensive reading on English language acquisition Thus, it would have been better if further researches with the GERP had been done on a larger sample size for a longer time Also, more studies should be carried out to consider more impacts of extensive reading on other aspects of vocabulary such as spelling, word-meanings, part of speech and grammatical 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Vocabulary: Description, Acquisition and Pedagogy Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Susser, B & Robb, T (1990) EFL Extensive Reading Instruction: Research and Procedure, 12 (2): 161-185 The Language Teacher Online Retrieved September 23, 2007, from http://www.kyoto-su.ac.jp/~trobb/sussrobb.html Ur, Penny (1996) A course in Language Teaching (p.16) Cambridge University Press Wallace, M (1982) Teaching Vocabulary (p.32) London: Heinamann Educational Books, Wilkins, D.A (1972) Linguistics in Language Teaching London: Edward Arnold ... textbook Ti ng Anh 10 ) In this study, the experimental treatment was done together with the new textbook Ti ng Anh 10 The 26 treatment period lasted for months, started on September 10th, 2007 and... the control group took frequently were of fixed selections from the textbook Tieng Anh 10, which was designed for 10th form students as a whole Meanwhile, the experimental group who took part in... and vocabulary acquisition by Grade 10 students In order to achieve the aim of the study, a quasi-experiment was designed and implemented in two intact Grade 10 groups in one high school This Chapter