Website: http://www.docs.vn Email : lienhe@docs.vn Tel (: 0918.775.368 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN STUDIES nguyen thi huyen AN INVESTIGATION INTO the reality of teaching reading to the second -year students at national Economics university Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements of the Degree of Master of Arts in Tesol. SUPERVISOR : Nguyen thai ha, MA Hanoi October, 2006 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I certify that the thesis entitled “An investigation into reading strategies of learners in reading classes at The Military Political Academy” and submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts (TESOL) is the result of my own work, except where otherwise acknowledged, and that this minor thesis or any part of the same has not been submitted for a higher degree to any other university or institution. The Hanoi University of Foreign Studies approved the research procedures reported in this thesis. Signed : Dated : i TABLE OF CONTENTS STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I TABLE OF CONTENTS II ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS IV ABSTRACT V LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS VI LIST OF TABLES VII CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1 1.1. BACKGROUND TO THE THESIS 1 1.2. THE AIMS OF THE STUDY 3 1.3. RESEARCH QUESTIONS 3 1.4. OUTLINE OF THE THESIS 3 CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW 5 2.1. DEFINITION OF READING 5 2.2. LANGUAGE LEARNING STRATEGIES 7 2.2.1. Reading strategies 7 2.2.2. Definition of language learning strategies 8 2.2.3. Characteristics of language learning strategies 9 2.2.4. Classification of language learning strategies 10 2.3. FACTORS INFLUENCING READING STRATEGIES CHOICE OF LANGUAGE LEARNERS 11 2.3.1. Proficiency 12 2.3.2. Motivation 13 2.4. READING IN SECOND AND FOREIGN LANGUAGE 15 2.5. PREVIOUS STUDIES ON READING STRATEGIES 16 2.6. CONCLUSION 19 CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY 20 3.1. RESEARCH QUESTIONS 20 3.2. DESCRIPTION OF VARIABLES 20 3.3. THE SETTING OF THE STUDY 20 3.4. DATA COLLECTION INSTRUMENTS 21 3.4.1. Test 22 3.4.2. Questionnaire 24 3.4.3. Interview 25 3.5. ANALYZING DATA 26 3.5.1. Coding scheme for the use of reading strategies in students’ reading comprehension 26 3.5.2. Coding scheme for the use of reading strategies while doing reading tasks 27 3.5.3. Coding Scheme for factors influencing MPA learners’ reading strategy choice 27 3.6. CONCLUSION 28 CHAPTER IV: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 29 4.1. WHAT READING STRATEGIES ARE USED BY DIFFERENT LEARNER GROUPS AT THE MPA IN THEIR READING COMPREHENSION? 29 4.2.WHAT READING STRATEGIES DO THE EFFECTIVE AND INEFFECTIVE LEARNERS USE WHILE THEY ARE DOING READING TASKS? 31 4.3. WHAT FACTORS INFLUENCE LEARNERS’ LEARNING STRATEGY CHOICE? 44 C 45 EINTEL 45 S 45 EINTEC 45 ii S 45 S 45 S 45 S 45 S 45 4.4. DISCUSSION 47 4.5. SUMMARY 48 CHAPTER V: IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSION 49 5.1. FINDINGS 50 5.2. IMPLICATION OF THE STUDY TO STRATEGY TRAINING. 51 5.2.1. Enhancing learners’ awareness of the use of reading strategies 51 5.2.2. Teacher and students’ role in activities of strategy training 52 5.3. LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY 54 5.4. SUGGESTION FOR FURTHER STUDIES 55 5.5. CONCLUSION 55 REFERENCES 58 APPENDIX 1 65 APPENDIX 2.1 67 APPENDIX 2.2 74 APPENDIX 3 81 APPENDIX 4 82 iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my thanks to many people who have assisted my research work. To my supervisor Mr Le Quoc Hanh, M.A. (TESOLT), a senior lecture at Hanoi University of Foreign Studies. I am grateful to him for his valuable guidance and great insight into my thesis writing. His guidance was indispensable to the design and completion of the study. I am also grateful to him for his comments, correction and for his kindly encouragement and enthusiasm during the development of this study. My special words of thanks also go to the Management Board of the Post- Graduate Department of the Hanoi University of Foreign studies for their consideration and enthusiasm in helping me to pursue the course. My particular thanks go to Ms. Nguyen Thai Ha, M.A. (TESOLT), a senior lecture at Hanoi University of Foreign Studies, the Deputy Dean of post graduate Department for her useful advice, criticism and support while the research was being done. I would also like to thank my collueges at Military Political Academy and my students in the two classes of BT4A, BT4B for their participation and support. Finally, I would like to express my deep gratitude to my husband and my children for their love, great encouragement and support to me to fulfill this thesis. iv ABSTRACT This study is an investigation into reading strategies of different groups of learners in reading classes at the Military Political Academy. It purposes to find out the reading strategies used by different groups of MPA learners in their reading comprehension, especially while they do reading tasks, and look at the factors influencing their reading strategy choice. The participants of this study were forty-eight students at varied levels of English proficiency. An experimental method was chosen as the methodological approach underpinning this study Test, questionnaire and interview were used to gather data, which then analysed. The findings indicate first, learners at the Military Political Academy used six groups of reading strategies that offered by Oxfords (1990) at different degrees in their reading comprehension. Among them, metacognitive strategies rank first, next come social strategies. Second, the effective and ineffective learners’ uses of reading strategies vary across the six reading strategy groups. The former tended to use metacognitive, social and cognitive strategies at higher degree than did ineffective ones while they do reading tasks. Final, MPA learners are most strongly motivated by instrumental motivation although they were also influenced by integrative and intrinsic motivation and they are not fully aware of the use of reading strategies despite the fact that they used some kinds of reading strategies in their reading. As for the implications of the study, some suggestions are recommended for strategy training to MPA learners such enhance the learners’ conception of the use of reading strategies in their learning reading comprehension and implication for classroom learning and teaching. v LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS EFL : English as a foreign language ESL : English as a second language SIIL : Strategy inventory for language learning LSs : Learning strategies LS : Learning strategy RSs : Reading strategies RS : Reading strategy MPA : Military Political Academy vi LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1 : Summary of the analysis of the SILL. Table 4.1 : A Comparison of the use of RSs between effective and ineffective learners across six groups of RSs. Table 4.2.1 : The reading strategies used by two groups of sample at the pre- reading stage. Table 4.2.2 :The reading strategies used by two groups of sample at the while- reading Table 4.2.3 : The reading strategies used by two groups of sample at the post- reading stage. Table 4.3 : Summary of the analysis of informants’ reasons for learning English vii CHAPTER i: INTRODUCTION 1.1. Background to the thesis English is one of the most important of Vietnam’s foreign languages. It is used not only by Vietnamese to communicate with native speakers of English but also as an important international language in communicating with people from non- native English countries. Although English functions as a foreign language, Vietnamese who are likely to be in contact with foreigners in various areas, for example, education, politics, tourism, industry, business and in general social contexts, need considerable proficiency in English. In fact, many people nowadays realize that a command of English has become essential for their future occupations, since it is a pre-requisite for success in both the public and private sectors. Of the four macro skills in language (listening, speaking, reading and writing), there has been growing and justified concern about reading in Vietnam. This concern is due to the increasing amount of printed English material in the society. Various sources of modern knowledge and technology needed in developing the country at large are usually reported in English. Proficient readers in English are high demand. In connection with the matters, in recent years, together with the increasing needs for English learning at colleges or universities in the Army in general and at the MPA in particular, great efforts have been made to improve the quality of the teaching reading. To meet the demand of the state military, every year, the MPA trains about one thousand political officers at different levels, who are not only expected to be competent at their specialties but also have good knowledge of foreign language. Every year, about a thousand officers at different levels, hundreds of potential teachers and many post-graduate students of different social sciences and humanities are trained here. Foreign language is a compulsory subject at the MPA, because it is very important and necessary for the learners’ future work. After the course, they will have to read different materials written in 1 English such as academic texts from their specialist subjects, newspapers, reports, the world’s military information, politics and economics, etc, from a number of different sources. In teaching and learning English as a foreign language at the MPA, reading has always received a great deal of attention. Teaching English at the MPA provides the students with the abilities to understand the written materials and to communicate in English. Furthermore, English is taught and learnt in a non - native environment. That is why reading is not only an important means to gain knowledge but also a means by which further study takes place. According to Carrell (1988:1), “if we consider the study of English as a foreign language around the world - the situation in which most English learners finds themselves - reading is the main reason why students learn the language”. This is particularly true to the students of the English Department at the MPA. It is crucial for them to acquire the ability to read English efficiently and effectively. However, students at the MPA do not seem to be good at reading. In the past, at the MPA, English teachers focused only on the teaching of grammatical rules, ignoring how sentences were used in the performance of communicative acts. In teaching reading, teachers paid too much attention to the explanation of language points, but failed to help students analyze the connection between sentences, or to find out the main ideas of a text. Consequently, what the students gained was just a little knowledge about language. As the result, the students had no ability to understand the text as a whole. Most learners complain that there are too many new words and complicated sentences throughout the whole English reading texts. However, reading does not only involve the understanding of what words or sentences mean on the surface, but it also involve the logic and value relations between sentences. Some other learners think that it is difficult to understand the English text because of lacking background knowledge. And some students say their reading 2 [...]... collection instruments and the data gathering procedures used for analyzing reading strategies used by the learners in their reading comprehension, and the factors affecting their reading strategy choice were described The interpretation of the results of analyses these data will be discussed in next chapter The suggestions of the study about the use of reading strategies in learning and teaching English... spontaneously The standardized open-ended interview (the structured interview): in this interview, the exact wording and order of questions to be asked is determined in advance The interview guide (semi-structured): in this type of interview the interviewer can specify a range of questions to be coved in advance, but they can also formulate the wording of the questions as well as the order of the questions as the. .. summarizing in writing, underlining important parts of the story, selfgenerated questions, checking through the story to see if you remember all of it, asking questions about the parts of the story you don’t understand, taking notes and imagining or picturing the story in your mind These finding are limited in how much they reveal of actual ESL students’ reading strategies because the research methodology... difficulties and influence of other factors on the implementation of reading strategies to improve the students’ reading skill 3.6 Conclusion In this chapter, I have attempted to describe and explain the methodology used in this study First, the decision on the research questions and the choice of an experiment as the method of the study Then the research procedures including the setting of the study, the data... to facilitate the learning and recall of both linguistic and content area information These authors have also extended the sphere of description of learning strategies, which may include: focusing on selected aspects of new information, analyzing and monitoring information during acquisition, organizing or elaborating on new information during the encoding process, evaluating the learning when it is... because they have an idea of something that they have wish to achieve However, a question that has aroused considerable interest is whether they have the same kind of motivation To answer this, Harmer (1991) divided language learning motivation into two types: the extrinsic concerning with factors outside the classroom, and the intrinsic, relating to activities in the classroom In their study of extrinsic... other one of intrinsic motivation were coded as Instrh = having friends speaking English, and Instrio = other In addition, informal talks with students to gain more information about their own experiences, motivation toward reading strategies used in reading that were not expressed in the formal interviews The analysis results of these documents helped me with in- depth understanding about the potential... and it was judged to be the best way to determine the reading strategy use in our own context According to Dudley- Evans (1998), interviews are useful in investigation as they can provide in- depth and valuable information There are three types of interviews: The informal conversational interview (the unstructured interview): in this interview there is no set of questions but the questions arise more... while they doing reading tasks in particular, were obtained from the questionnaire The items that deal with the subjects, learning motivation were coded in term of classification system of learning motivations In this study four items of extrinsic motivation were coded as Einterl = interested in language, Einterc = interested in English culture, Eintert = travel, Einstrua = advancement, while two other... (1.4-0.0) These reading strategies were analysed at each stage of reading The analysis result of these strategies will be presented in the next chapter 3.5.3 Coding Scheme for factors influencing MPA learners’ reading strategy choice The factors affecting students’ reading strategy choice such as proficiency and motivation toward the use of learning strategies in their reading comprehension in 27 general . university Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements of the Degree of Master of Arts in Tesol. SUPERVISOR : Nguyen thai ha, MA Hanoi October, 2006 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I certify that the. the thesis entitled “An investigation into reading strategies of learners in reading classes at The Military Political Academy” and submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the. the degree of Master of Arts (TESOL) is the result of my own work, except where otherwise acknowledged, and that this minor thesis or any part of the same has not been submitted for a higher degree