VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES *************** VŨ THỊ THANH HUYỀN ADAPTING READING TASKS IN THE TEXTBOOK ENGLISH 12 TO IMPROVE THE 12TH FORM STUDENTS’ READING ACHIEVEMENT ĐIỀU CHỈNH CÁC NHIỆM VỤ ĐỌC HIỂU TRONG SÁCH GIÁO KHOA TIẾNG ANH 12 NHẰM NÂNG CAO KẾT QUẢ ĐỌC HIỂU CỦA HỌC SINH LỚP 12 M. Minor Thesis Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60.10 Hanoi, 2013 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ***************** VŨ THỊ THANH HUYỀN ADAPTING READING TASKS IN THE TEXTBOOK ENGLISH 12 TO IMPROVE THE 12TH FORM STUDENTS’ READING ACHIEVEMENT ĐIỀU CHỈNH CÁC NHIỆM VỤ ĐỌC HIỂU TRONG SÁCH GIÁO KHOA TIẾNG ANH 12 NHẰM NÂNG CAO KẾT QUẢ ĐỌC HIỂU CỦA HỌC SINH LỚP 12 M. Minor Thesis Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60. Hoàng Thị Xuân Hoa Hanoi, 2013 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com DECLARATION I declare that Adapting reading tasks in the textbook English 12 to improve 12th form student reading achievement is my own work, that it has not been submitted before for any degree or examination in any other university, and that all the sources I have used or quoted have been indicated and acknowledged by means of complete references.
Hanoi, September, 2013 Signature Vu Thi Thanh Huyen i LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS There have been many helping hands along the way and I wish to thank all of them, who have always supported and encouraged me in different but equally important ways in accomplishing this research. First of all, I would like to express my sincere and deep gratitude to my supervisor, Dr. Hoang Thi Xuan Hoa, for her precious lectures and invaluable guidance which helps me to write this research with less difficulty. Without her helpful suggestions, I could never have finished my writing.
My sincere thanks also go to all lectures and staff of Postgraduate studies for their valuable lessons and precious helps. Thanks to their lessons as well as needed helps, I could overcome enormous obstacles when doing this research. Besides, I am also grateful to Mrs. Le Thu Ha- the librarian, and all the library staff at the post graduate studies library of ULIS, VNU.
I would like to gratefully acknowledge the support that I received from my colleagues and students, especially students of group 12A1 at Kim Bang A high school, who have inspired and guided me in the accomplishment of the study. Finally, special thanks are also due to my family and my friends for their support in bringing this research to a success. ii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT In learning a language, students show their different needs as well as different language proficiency. Therefore, materials adaptation can be considered as a very important step in language teaching and learning in general and teaching English reading skill in particular so students will understand the content of reading materials with less frustration.
The study aims at investigating students’ opinions about reading tasks in the textbook English 12. Based on students’ opinions about reading tasks, the teacher attempts to find how to adapt them. Then the teacher applied those adapted tasks in teaching English in the classroom to help students of group 12A1 of Kim Bang A high school have more chances to practice reading and improve their reading achievement. The results indicated that most of the adapted tasks were suitable to students and helped them improve reading achievement slightly.
Briefly, the study suggests some adapted reading activities and tasks for teachers to utilize to increase the effectiveness of English reading lessons when applied to the textbook English 12 to teach the 12th form students at Kim Bang A high school. iii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Students’ opinions about reading skill and reading lessons Table 2: The students’ factors affecting their reading comprehension Table 3: The students’ evaluation on reading tasks in the textbook Table 4: The students’ most frequent habit of doing reading tasks Table 5: Students’ preference on types of reading tasks Table 6: Students’ improvement in their reading achievement ABBREVIATIONS T: The teacher Ss: Students iv LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements. iii List of tables and abbreviations. iv PART I: INTRODUCTION.
Statement of the problem and rationale of the study. Aims of the study. Significance of the study. Scope of the study.
Design of the study. 4 PART II: DEVELOPMENT. 5 CHAPTER 1 : LITERATURE REVIEW. Reading and teaching reading skill.
Definitions of reading. The importance of teaching and learning reading skill. Defining task and task-based language teaching and learning. Defining reading tasks and types of reading tasks.
Characteristics of reading tasks. Definitions of adaptation. 11 v LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Reasons for adapting tasks.
Techniques for task adaptation. Reading tasks in the textbook English 12. Data Collection Instruments. Pre-test and post-test.
Data collection procedure. Data analysis procedure. 26 CHAPTER 3 : RESEARCH FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION. Students’ opinions about reading skill.
Students’ opinions about reading tasks. Students’ awareness of task adaptation. Students’ improvement in their reading achievement. 35 vi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.
36 PART III : CONCLUSION. Summary of the main findings. Suggestions for adapting reading tasks. Limitations and recommendations for further research.
I Appendix 1a: Questionnaire for students. V Appendix 2: Pre-test. IX Appendix 3: Post-test. XI Appendix 4: Samples of students’ diaries.
XIII Appendix 5: Samples of adapted while reading tasks. XVI vii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com PART I: INTRODUCTION 1. Statement of the problem and rationale of the study In recent years, there has been a dramatic increase in the use of commercially produced foreign language textbooks or coursebooks as core teaching materials in young learner classrooms. In many cases, the approaches taken, the methods advocated and the tasks given in these materials are unsuitable to certain language learning and teaching context.
Therefore, there is a huge risk of not doing what is best to promote learning. In my own teaching context, the similar problem also occurs. Thus, to promote language learning and teaching, adapting textbooks in general, adapting tasks given those ones is very important. Reading comprehension can be considered the first step in acquiring English in Vietnam.
Among the four skills, reading is often taught with less focus, less innovation. That means teachers base on the text, ask students do some tasks provided and correct them. This method of teaching derives from many reading problems including “insufficient sight vocabulary”, “inadequate visual analysis skills”, “inability to use context clues” and “inadequate comprehension skills” (Edwards, 1976). For all those obstacles, they pay less attention to reading skill and also get less motivation in learning this skill.
Therefore, the importance of having appropriate reading tasks to students’ level is becoming increasingly recognized. According to Harmer (1998:68), it is very important to teach reading to students because “some of the language sticks in their mind as part of the process of language acquisition, and if the reading is especially interesting and 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com engaging, acquisition is likely to be even more successful”. To students in the author’s context whose English proficiency is so low, the textbook English 12 is quite challenging to them. In reading lessons, they always find it difficult to cope with tasks which help them comprehend the given texts.
It is both the roles of teaching reading and my students’ difficulties that inspire the researcher to do this study “adapting reading tasks in the textbook English 12 to improve 12th form student reading achievement”. Aims of the study This minor action research was designed to help 12th form students work harder on reading texts, get more reading comprehension and improve their reading skill through the adaptation of reading tasks in the textbook English 12. From the study, recommendations on how to encourage students to read effectively can be drawn out. Research Questions In order to get the aim of helping 12th form students improve their reading achievement, the study tried to answer the following questions.
What are students’ opinions about reading tasks in the textbook English 12 based on the reading lessons they have learnt in class? 2. To what extent do the adapted while reading tasks help the students improve their reading achievement? 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail. Significance of the study This study was believed to be useful for the researcher because she could find out an effective way to make her teaching process more easily. Moreover, students of class 12A1 also got benefits from the research.
They were motivated in learning reading skill so that their reading achievement could be improved. Research methodology This minor thesis employed Action Research in order to gain its aims because according to Tsui (1993:33) “action research is a very effective way of helping teachers to reflect on their teaching and to come up with their own alternatives to improve their practice”. The author’s desire is to measure the difference in the students’ reading achievement before and after the adaptation of the tasks in while-reading parts in the new textbook English 12 so after identifying the difficulties raised in the process of teaching reading lessons, the researcher took intervention by delivering reading lessons with adapted tasks. The data was collected via a number of instruments including a questionnaire, a pre-test, a post-test, teacher’s diaries and students’ journals.
The data was analysed and discussed so that reliable findings could be clarified. Scope of the study This thesis was carried not to cover all kinds of materials adaptation because this is a board aspect investigated by many authors. The author’s attempt was only to adapt some difficult while reading tasks in the textbook English 12 to 3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com reduce student’s difficulties and make them more interested in English lessons, thus, improving their reading achievement. The study focused on one class of grade 12 students so the results of the study could not be applied for all students at Kim Bang A high school.
The research was carried out during the second semester of the school year at class 12A1. Design of the study The thesis consists of three parts: Part I: Introduction: introduces the rationale, aims, research questions, significance, scope and methodology of the study. Part II: Development: includes three chapters: Chapter1: Literature review: provides a theoretical basis for issues relating to reading tasks and the adaptation of reading tasks in the textbook English 12. Chapter 2: Methodology: Includes an overview of the approach used on conducting the study.
It also provides a thorough description of the data collection procedure as well as the analytical procedure. Chapter 3: Results and Discussion: reports the findings of the real situation of learning English of students at Kim Bang A high school. Part III: Conclusion: summarizes the study, recommends for improvements and acknowledges the limitations of the study. 4 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com PART II: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.
Reading and teaching reading skill 1. Definitions of reading Reading has been investigated by linguists, psychologists, educators and second language researchers, but an exact definition of reading really causes much confusion because different authors define the terms in different ways. In this thesis the author would like to mention some definitions of reading extracted from different sources on the theme. To give the definition, William (1984: 4), Nuttall (1996: 3), and Frank (1985:104) share the same view that reading accounts for understanding what has been written.
Also, Goodman (1971 cited in Ha, 2003:6), states that “reading is psycholinguistic process by which the reader, language user, reconstructs, as best as he can, a message which has been encoded by writer as a graphic display.