Tài liệu Using mind maps to improve the students’ reading skills at dong nai technology university .

VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES NGUYỄN HOÀNG PHI USING MIND-MAPS TO IMPROVE THE STUDENTS’ READING SKILLS AT DONG NAI TECHNOLOGY UNIVERSITY MA THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE HANOI, 2019 VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES NGUYỄN HOÀNG PHI USING MIND-MAPS TO IMPROVE THE STUDENTS’ READING SKILLS AT DONG NAI TECHNOLOGY UNIVERSITY Field: English Language Code: 8220201 Supervisor: Bùi Thị Thục Quyên, Ph.D. HANOI, 2019 DECLARATION BY AUTHOR I certify this thesis entitled “USING MIND MAPS TO IMPROVE THE STUDENT’S READING SKILLS AT DONG NAI TECHNOLOGY UNIVERSITY” is my own study. All statements in this thesis which are not my own will be shown in the list of references. Author’s signature Nguyễn Hoàng Phi APPROVED BY Suppervisor Bùi Thị Thục Quyên, Ph.D Date: ……………………………. i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to express my deepest thanks to my supervisor, Bùi Thị Thục Quyên, Ph.D. who gave me precious guidance, assistance and encouragement during the time of conducting this study. I also want to express my sincere thanks to all my students at Dong Nai Technology University for their contribution in completion this research. Finally, I would like to express my thanks to my beloved family for supporting me during the time of my study. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page DECLARATION BY AUTHOR ...................................................................... i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .............................................................................ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................... iii ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................... v LIST OF TABLES ..........................................................................................vi LIST OF FIGURES........................................................................................vii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ................................................................. 1 1.1 Rationale of the study................................................................................. 1 1.2 Aims of the study ....................................................................................... 3 1.3 Research questions ..................................................................................... 3 1.4 Scope of the study ...................................................................................... 3 1.5 Significance of the study ............................................................................ 4 1.6 Research Methods ...................................................................................... 4 1.7 Structure of the study ................................................................................. 5 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW..................................................... 6 2.1 Theoretical review. ..................................................................................... 6 2.1.1 Reading........................................................................................... 6 2.1.2 Reading skills ................................................................................. 9 2.1.3 The mind map technique .............................................................. 13 2.2 Previous studies ........................................................................................ 18 2.3 Chapter summary ..................................................................................... 20 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY.............................................................. 22 3.1 The research settings ................................................................................ 22 3.2 Research Design ....................................................................................... 22 iii 3.3. Population and Sample ............................................................................ 23 3.4 Data collection instruments ...................................................................... 24 3.4.1 Test ............................................................................................... 24 3.4.2 Questionnaire ............................................................................... 25 3.5 Data analysis procedures .......................................................................... 25 3.5.1 The analysis of test ....................................................................... 25 3.5.2 The analysis of questionnaire ....................................................... 26 3.6 Chapter summary ..................................................................................... 26 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS ...................................... 27 4.1 Data analysis of Test ................................................................................ 27 4.1.1 Data description ........................................................................... 27 4.1.2 Data Analysis ............................................................................... 34 4.2 Analysis of Questionnaire ........................................................................ 39 4.3 Discussion ................................................................................................ 59 4.4 Chapter summary ..................................................................................... 60 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION .................................................................... 62 5.1 Recapitulation........................................................................................... 62 5.1 Concluding Remarks ................................................................................ 62 5.3 Implications .............................................................................................. 63 5.4 Limitations and suggestions for further studies ....................................... 63 REFERENCES ............................................................................................. 65 Appendix 1: Questionnaire .............................................................................. I Appendix 2: PRE-TEST and POST-TEST ..................................................... V 1. Pre-test ................................................................................................ V 2. Post – test ....................................................................................... VIII Appendix 3: Lesson Plans ..............................................................................XI iv ABSTRACT This is an experimental research about reading skills at Dong Nai Technology University. Its objective are to find out students’ perception about reading and mind maps as well as find out whether mind maps can help students in improving their reading skills or not. The data were collected through test and questionnaire. The test included pre-test and post-test were delivered before and after the experimental teaching for both control class and experimental class. The questionnaire was delivered only to experimental class before and after the treatment. The results of this study showed that mind maps technique really helps in improving the students’ reading skills. v LIST OF TABLES Table 4.1.1.1: The results of pre-test score ....................................................... 29 Table 4.1.1.2: The results of post-test score ..................................................... 31 Table 4.1.1.3: The results of gained score ........................................................ 34 Table 4.1.2.1: The t-test of Pre-test ................................................................. 345 Table 4.1.2.2: The t-test of Post-test ............................................................... 347 Table 4.1.2.3: The t-test of Gained scores ...................................................... 348 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 4.2.1.1: Reading habit before the experimental teaching .................... 39 Figure 4.2.1.2: Reading habit after the experimental teaching ................ Error! Bookmark not defined. Figure 4.2.2.1: Student’s excitement before the treatment.. ........................... 41 Figure 4.2.2.2: Student’s excitement after the treatmentError! Bookmark not defined. Figure 4.2.3.1: Reading’s importance before the experimental teaching ....... 42 Figure 4.2.3.2: Reading’s importance after the experimental teaching ... Error! Bookmark not defined. Figure 4.2.4.1: Getting main idea before the treatment .................................. 44 Figure 4.2.4.2: Getting main idea after the treatment .... Error! Bookmark not defined.5 Figure 4.2.5.1: Comprehension ability before the treatment .......................... 45 Figure 4.2.5.2: Comprehension ability after the treatment .. Error! Bookmark not defined. Figure 4.2.6.1: Reviewing the material habit before the treatment. ............... 47 Figure 4.2.6.2: Reviewing the material habit after the treatment. .................. 48 Figure 4.2.7.1: Before applying Mind maps. .................................................. 48 Figure 4.2.7.1: After applying Mind maps ..................................................... 49 vii Figure 4.2.8.1: Color and images effectiveness before the treatment............. 50 Figure 4.2.8.2: Color and images effectiveness after the treatment ............... 51 Figure 4.2.9.1: Information organizing before the experimental teaching ..... 51 Figure 4.2.9.1: Information organizing after the experimental teaching . Error! Bookmark not defined. Figure 4.2.10.1: Vocabulary improvement before the experimental teaching 53 Figure 4.2.10.2: Vocabulary improvement after the experimental teaching ......................................................................... Error! Bookmark not defined. Figure 4.2.11.1: Saving time opinion before the treatment ............................ 54 Figure 4.2.11.2: Saving time opinion after the treatmentError! Bookmark not defined. Figure 4.2.12.1: Getting genaral idea ability before the treatment ................. 56 Figure 4.2.12.2: Getting genaral idea ability after the treatment ............. Error! Bookmark not defined. Figure 4.2.13.1: Confident feeling before the experimental teaching ............ 58 Figure 4.2.13.2: Confident feeling after the experimental teaching ........ Error! Bookmark not defined.9 viii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale of the study English is an international language and it plays an important role in our daily life nowadays. In Vietnam, English is used as a foreign language and it is taught as a compulsory subject at all levels of educational system from kindergarten to university. As we know, there are four skills taught in English teaching and learning process. They are reading, speaking, listening and writing. Reading is one of the essential skills that need to be mastered when learning English as Nunan (2003, p.69) states that “Reading is an essential skill for learners of English as a second language. For most of these learners it is the most important skill to master in order to ensure success not only in learning English, but also in learning in any content class where reading in English is required. With strengthened reading skills, learners will make greater progress and development in all other areas of learning”. In addition, reading is not an easy skill to master because it cannot be separated from comprehension. If the learners do not understand the text, they cannot achieve the information from the text they read. The reading activity requires the learners’ knowledge in identifying the structure and the main topic of the text. Moreover, most of the best books are written in English, to reach the useful information, students need to be good at English to comprehend. Especially, they need to develop their reading skills to get the knowledge easily. 1 After three years of teaching at Dong Nai Technology University, the researcher realized that the reading skills of the students here are still low. Most of them supposed that the reading lessons are the most boring part in English. They are not very patient with the texts, especially the long texts. The first things they do when are asked to do a reading task is looking up all the new words to make sure that they understand the meaning of all words and doing the tasks then. It often takes them a lot of time to do such a task. So they usually feel bored with the texts or even they fear for reading texts. Based on the facts above, the researcher would like to find a better way to make students more interested and motivated in reading activity. Thus, they can comprehend the text easily and gradually improve their skills in reading. In this case, the researcher chooses mind maps technique because when using mind maps, the learners can speed up their think rapidly and develop their think quickly. Moreover, mind maps gives easy way for the students to plan, communicate, be creative, arrange, and explain the ideas quickly. It also facilitates the students to understand a complicated system or structure because mind map delivers the students to be focused on the ideas (Indrayani, 2014). Therefore, the researcher conducts this study to mainly find out whether mind maps technique have an effect on improving the reading skills of the students at Dong Nai technology or not because their skills of reading are quite low. 2 1.2 Aims of the study In line with the purposes of this study is to find out whether mind-maps have any effectiveness on improving the reading skills on the students. The main aim of this study is to find out the attitude of the students toward reading and mind maps technique as well as to explore whether the mind map technique can improve the students’ results in reading tests at Dong Nai Technology University. 1.3 Research questions Based on the main objectives, this research is mainly answer for the following questions: 1. To some extend does the mind maps technique improve the reading skills of students at Dong Nai Technology University? 2. What are the attitudes of the students toward reading and mind maps technique? 1.4 Scope of the study The focus of this study is on using mind maps to improve the students’ reading skills at Dong Nai Technology University. After teaching at this university for more than 3 years the researcher recognized that the students usually have difficulties in learning English, especially their reading skills. They are not very interested in reading lessons, they often get bored with long reading text since they do not really understand what the text about. They may not have sufficient vocabularies to understand the text or reading strategy to comprehend it easily. So the researcher would like to find a good way to help them overcome those problems. 3 The subjects of this study are 61 second year students come from two classes that the researcher is teaching. They are going to participate in doing the test and respond to the survey questionnaire. 1.5 Significance of the study At Dong Nai Technology University, the students have to self-study a lot to do the assignment that the lectures gave. They have to read books from the library or on the internet. As mentioned before, the reading skills of the students at this university are quite low so this study was expected to provide some advantages for both students and teachers in teaching and learning process. For the students, this study is hoped that it would figure out the benefit of mind maps to help the students feel more interested and active in reading classroom activity. Therefrom, they can take the most advantages of mind maps technique to motivate themselves in joining the teaching and learning process so that they can improve their reading skills to comprehend the text easier. To the teachers, this research is expected to be helpful in improving the teachers’ teaching skills in order to create an exciting atmosphere during the class time to gain the best results of reading teaching and learning activity. 1.6 Research Methods This study was an experimental research. The data were collected by means of test (pre-test and post-test) and questionnaire. The details would be presented in the Chapter 3. 4 1.7 Structure of the study The study will be divided into five chapters: o Chapter 1: Consisted of rationales, aims, research questions, scope, the significance, the methods and the structure of the study. o Chapter 2: Provides the definition of reading, reading skills, the mind mapping technique and the previous studies. o Chapter 3: This chapter describes the research setting, research design, population and sample, data collection instruments and data analysis procedures. o Chapter 4: “Findings and Discussions”, offers the data analysis from test, questionnaire and discussions. o Chapter 5: “Conclusion”, wraps up the study, followed by the summary, limitation and recommendations for further study. 5 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Theoretical review. 2.1.1 Reading 2.1.1.1. Definition As Nunan (2003) stated that reading is a fluent process of readers combining information from a text and their own background knowledge to build meaning. The goal of reading is comprehension. He also defined two vital elements of reading activity: Strategy and fluency. According to him, strategic reading is defined as the ability of the reader to use a wide variety of reading strategies to accomplish a purpose for reading. Good readers would know what to do when they faced difficulties in reading. Fluent reading is the ability to read at an appropriate rate with adequate comprehension. Meaning does not rest in the reader nor does it rest in the text. The reader’s background knowledge integrates with the text to create the meaning. He emphasized “the text, the reader, fluency, and strategies combined together define the act of reading.” Nunan (2003, p.68). According to Grabe and Stoller (2011, p.3), “Reading is the ability to draw meaning from the printed page and interpret this information appropriately.” It means that reading activity is the interaction between the readers and the printed papers. The readers try to understand what the printed papers mean. 6 In another book of Grabe (2009, p.14) “Reading in a second languagemoving from theory to practice” he cited some definitions of reading as the following: “Reading is the process of receiving and interpreting information encoded in language form via the medium of print” or “Comprehension occurs when the reader extracts and integrates various information from the text and combines it with what is already known”. Rubin (1982) supposed that reading is the bringing of meaning to and getting of meaning from the printed page. It means that reading is an active activity, the readers have to do something to get the meaning of the text. Nuttall (2005) also agreed with the role of the reader in reading activity when he stated about the meaning of the text. According to him, it is not lying in the text waiting to be passively absorbed. On the contrary, the reader is actively involved and often has to work to get the meaning out. Harmer (2007) as cited by Indrayani (2014, p.16) stated that reading is useful for language acquisition; the more the students read, the better they get at it. In addition, reading also has positive effect on students’ vocabulary knowledge, on their spelling, and on their writing. Reading is the skill or activity of getting information from books. It is an important skill for learners. Hence, who is not engaged in reading activity, they will miss new information. Although there are various definitions of reading, the researcher follows the definition of Grabe & Stoller “Reading is the ability to draw meaning from the printed page and interpret this information appropriately.” After reading, the learners must comprehend what the paper mean. 7 2.1.1.2 Types of classroom reading performance It is stated by Brown (2001, p. 312): “Variety of reading performance in the language classroom is derived more from variety of the texts to which you can expose to students than from the variety from overt types of performance. There are two types of reading performance: oral reading and silent reading.” Figure 1: Types of classroom reading performance of Brown (2001) 1) Oral reading During the teaching and learning process, the teacher may ask the students to read orally. Oral reading brings many benefits for the basic to higher levels as Brown (2001, p. 312) stated in his book.  Serve as an evaluative check on bottom-up processing skills.  Double as a pronunciation check.  Serve to add some extra student participation if you want to highlight a certain short segment of a reading passage. However, this oral reading still has some disadvantages as stated by Brown (2001, p.132) 8  Oral reading is not a very authentic language activity  While one student is reading, others can easily lose attention (or be silently rehearsing the next paragraph!)  It may have outward appearance of student participation in reality it is mere recitation. 2) Silent reading According to Brown (2001, p.312), silent reading may be categorized into intensive and extensive reading. “Intensive reading the students mainly focus on the linguistic or the semantic details of a passage. Intensive reading calls students’ attention to grammatical forms, discourse markers, and other surface structure details for the purpose of understanding literal meaning, implications, rhetorical relationship, and the like.” While “extensive reading is carried out to achieve a general understanding of a usually somewhat longer text (book, long article, or essay, etc.). Most extensive reading is performed outside of the class time.” Brown (2001, p.313) 2.1.2 Reading skills As Brown (2004, p.187) wrote in his book, there are two major skills of reading. They are micro-skills and macro-skills. Here are the lists of micro skills: 9 a) Discriminate among the distinctive graphemes and orthographic patterns of English b) Retain chunks of language of different lengths in short-term memory c) Process writing at an efficient rate of speed to suit the purpose d) Recognize a core of words, and interpret word order patterns and their significance e) Recognize grammatical word classes (nouns, verbs, etc.) systems (e.g., tense, agreement, pluralization), patterns, rules, and elliptical forms. f) Recognize that a particular meaning may be expressed in different grammatical forms g. Recognize cohesive devices in written discourse and their role in signaling the relationship between and among clauses. The list of macro skills are presented below: a. Recognize the rhetorical forms of written discourse and their significance for interpretation. b. Recognize the communicative functions of written texts, according to form and purpose. c. Infer context that is not explicit by using background knowledge. d. Infer links and connections between events, ideas, etc., deduce causes and effects, and detect such relations as main idea, supporting 10