pNATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES DEPARTMENT OF BUSINESS ENGLISH NGUYEN HONG NHAT READING COMPREHENSION DIFFICULTIES AMONG SECOND- YEAR BUSINESS ENGLISH STUDENTS AT NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY AND SOME SOLUTIONS NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES DEPARTMENT OF BUSINESS ENGLISH NGUYEN HONG NHAT READING COMPREHENSION DIFFICULTIES AMONG SECOND- YEAR BUSINESS ENGLISH STUDENTS AT NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY AND SOME SOLUTIONS Hanoi, April 2023 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT On top of the list, I am most in debt to the professors in the Faculty of Foreign Languages at National Economics University. My genuine gratitude is reserved for all teachers who have led and passed down knowledge to me during the past four years. I also want to show my thankfulness to the dean of the department, Mrs. Kelly Pham and the faculty assistant, Mrs.
Nguyen Thi Bich Thuy for assisting me in changing the field of internship despite the sudden request. It would be incomplete to miss out on my thesis instructor, Mrs. Nguyen Do Huong Giang, who has accompanied me throughout the whole period of research with meticulous care and enthusiasm. Besides the beloved teachers are my fellows, both inside and outside of the department, who actively fought alongside me and sent continuous blessings to each other during the previous three months.
Had it not for their encouragement, I would have been defeated by pessimism and struggles. To all the participants who helped to fill out my survey, you guys play the most crucial role to my research and in return, this should also help you to detect your problems and work on it strategically. The last tribute is paid to my family. Their love and empathy meant so much during the process of graduation.
EXCUTIVE SUMMARY English is now the compulsory standard to enter and graduate from most universities. Among the four skills that are determined to judge one's English skill, this study focuses on reading only, with a specific objective to investigate second- year BE students’ reading comprehension difficulties at National Economics University. 50 answers collected from the survey and 5 interviews contributed to the analysis of the difficulties. In particular, reading comprehension problems are scrutinized from two aspects: linguistic and non-linguistic.
While the former comprises vocabulary and grammar (or syntax), the latter examined text features, prior knowledge and reading strategies. The results indicated that vocabulary and text features were the most taxing problems regarding linguistic and non-linguistic respectively. Within vocabulary territory, technical terms seemed to perplex students the most when reading. In the case of text features, most students displayed their concern about unfamiliar topics and contents.
Finally, some solutions to both teachers and students were proposed to improve the situation. The recommendations were matched with the order of the analyzed data about reading comprehension problems to create a connection between the problems and the corresponding solutions. LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS BE : Business English EFL : English as a Foreign Language NEU : National Economics University : Second Language : Vocabulary Nn : Syntax TF : Text features RS : Reading strategies 1 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. The number of Foreign Languages learners worldwide.
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Solutions to linguistic pFOÏGHS. Solutions to non-linguistic pFObÏGIHS. Recommendations fOr CÍÍVIÍÄ@S. Qui 31 REFERENCES APPENDIX Nguyễn Hong Nhật- 11193946- Business English 61B CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION This chapter clarifies the background, objectives, scope, research questions, methodology and structure of the study.
Background to the study During the International Integration Period, students from all backgrounds are expected to sharpen their language skills to a working proficiency extent. The better their language ability is, the more chances they have to get a decent job, secure their position, and gain success in the global, yet competitive job market. Among the six international languages, English has become the most popular learning option for educational institutions and individuals because of its prevalent nature and abundant learning resources. In fact, from Newsdle’s statistics in 2022, the number of English learners globally reached 1.5 billion, the highest figure in the report.
@ Highest Studied Foreign Languages wsdle in the World in Numbers English SIE 1.5bn Mandarin Chinese French Spanish German Japanese Italian www. The number of Foreign Languages learners worldwide Today, universities across Vietnam, including National Economics University, have set English outcome standards for a vast number of majors as the mandatory graduation requirement. Therefore, it is the student’s responsibility to learn and master the language as required for their future. To appraise the English level of a person, an evaluation format of four skills, namely listening, reading, writing, and speaking, is accepted and used widely.
Reading as a receptive skill, meaning receiving and processing information, plays a crucial role in the mastery of the language. In the educational setting, reading is an indispensable activity during the learning process. As a matter of fact, EFL 1 Nguyễn Hong Nhật- 11193946- Business English 61B students seem to have trouble making progress when there is little exposure to reading materials in learning environments (Nation, 1979). In reality, EFL students across many countries admitted that without reading, they would not have been able to finish their program and obtain their degree (Kim & Anderson, 2011; Salehi, Lari & Rezanejad, 2014).
Hung and Ngan (2015) also ascertained the role of reading when concluding that reading helps enhance students’ vocabulary and fluency and supports the acquisition of two productive skills, which are writing and speaking. During reading training, reading comprehension is one of the pressing topics for both teachers and students. By reading, we in general, and students in particular seek to comprehend the content of the texts (Stauffer, 1969). Therefore, reading comprehension belongs among the essential contributors to reading success.
Even so, a number of EFL learners still struggle to resolve their reading problems. This matter seems to worsen with the lack of linguistic elements and foreign knowledge backgrounds such as culture, socio-economic, etc., and proper solutions to guide the students to the learning path suitable for them. Based on the above reasons, this study is conducted to discover and analyze “READING COMPREHENSION DIFFICULTIES AMONG SECOND- YEAR BUSINESS ENGLISH STUDENTS AT NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY AND SOME SOLUTIONS”. Aims of the study The aims of this research include: - Investigating the difficulties that second-year BE students at NEU face in reading comprehension.
- Proposing several solutions to tackle the reading comprehension problems among second-year BE students at NEU. Research questions This study focuses on finding the answers to the following questions: - What are the reading comprehension difficulties that BE sophomores at NEU encounter? - What can be done to improve the reading comprehension of BE sophomores at NEU? Nguyễn Hong Nhật- 11193946- Business English 61B 1. Scope of the study This study focuses mainly on the reading comprehension difficulties among BE sophomores at NEU and some solutions to improve the reality. This research limits its coverage to 50 second-year BE students of the academic year 2022-2023.
Methodology Primary data is collected via survey questionnaires. The designed queries are delivered to 50 BE students at NEU during the second semester of the 2022- 2023 academic year. The answers gained from the survey form are a key tool for further analysis of problems that BE sophomores face in reading comprehension activities and recommendations for improvement. Secondary data is gathered through desk research based on available sources such as published reports, foreign scientific research, journals, books, etc.
Structure The study consists of five chapters. Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: Literature review Chapter 3: Methodology Chapter 4: Analysis and findings Chapter 5: Recommendations Nguyễn Hong Nhật- 11193946- Business English 61B CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2. Types of reading Researchers have expressed a barrage of distinct opinions on the types of reading. Grellet (2010) believed that reading comprises four categories: scanning, skimming, intensive and extensive reading.
While the two former terms may belong to the reading skills, the latter two remain the principal types (Harmer, 2002 and Nuttall, 2005). The two authors also stressed that in order to profit from their reading, students need exposure to both intensive and extensive reading. Intensive reading As claimed by Nuttall (2005), intensive reading guides the readers to an understanding of not only the text surface but also of the context. Conquering this goal requires efficient readers.
From Grelle (2010)’s standpoint, this type of reading is “an accuracy activity” that drives learners to read thoroughly to find answers to questions. Intensive reading involves learners reading in detail with specific learning aims and tasks. Patel (2008) placed the term in connection with teacher guidance in a classroom dynamic. During an intensive reading session, the teacher is the center who gives instructions and explanations to students.
This demands them to carry out a strict procedure for classroom preparation. In the pre-class phase, teachers may send out reading materials as homework for students to prepare beforehand. When the class comes, they will clarify the reading purposes and steps to accomplish them. There will be plenty of exercises to solve as this is the nature of intensive reading.
From the performances of students, teachers should be able to identify the students’ reading progress and give them feedback to improve their skills. Through intensive reading, students gain a lot of benefits in terms of linguistics. Most notably, it is their lexical resource as well as control of the language in speech and writing that will be upgraded efficaciously. Additionally, intensive reading activities consist of short passages comprehension that focuses mainly on vocabulary and grammar (Mart, 2015).
Brown (2000) worded it as “narrow reading” since students are to dissect different Nguyễn Hong Nhật- 11193946- Business English 61B paragraphs with the same or different topics. The more attentive students are to the texts, the more comprehension is elevated. Extensive reading This means reading texts for the enjoyment and development of general reading skills. It covers a wide range of materials within learners’ linguistic proficiencies (Grabe and Stoller, 2002).