iv

Table of contents

pages
Certificate of originality i
i
Acknowledgements ii
ii
Abstract iii
iii
Table of contents iv
iv
List of abbreviations v
v
List of tables vi
vi
PART A : INTRODUCTION 1
1
1. Rationale for the study 1
1
2. Aims of the study 2
1
3. Research questions 2
2
4. Scope of the study 2
2
5. Methods of the study……………………………………………………
2
6. Design of the study…………………………………………………………

9
1.3.1 Grammar – Translation Approach………………………………………
9
1.3.2 Communicative Language Teaching Approach……………………
10
1.3.2.1 Content-Based Approach…………………………………
10
1.3.2.2 Task-Based Approach…………………………………………………
11
1.4.Techniques to Teach Finance and Banking Reading ……………………….
12
1.4.1 In Pre-Reading…………………………………………………………….
12
1.4.2 In While-Reading…………………………………………………………
12
1.4.3 In Post-Reading………………………………………………………….
13
1.5. Challenges in ESP Reading Comprehension ………………………………
13
1.5.1 Language problems…………………………………………………………
13
1.5.2 Reading skill problems
14
1.6. Summary
15
CHAPTER II: METHODOLOGY
16
2.1 The setting of study
16
2.1.1 The teachers ……………………………………………………………….

24
3.1 The students' questionnaires 20
24
3.2 The teachers' interview 25
30
3.3. Findings 28
32
3.4. Possible solutions 29
33
3.4.1 Raising the students’ awareness of the importance of reading in their
future job.
33
3.4.2. Improving teachers‘ specialized knowledge of Banking and Finance at
HUI Nghe An campus
34
3.4.3. Improving reading purpose of students
34
3.4.4. The teachers should be aware of the students’ needs
35
3.4.5. Im proving reading course books
35
PART C : CONCLUSION 40
36
1. Conclusions 40
36
2. Limitations and suggestions for further study
37
References
38
Appendixes
viii

LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES

Figure 1: Types of ESP by Hutchinson (1987: 16)
Table 1: Description of survey questionnaire
Table 2: Description of interview questions
Table 3: Students’ favorite in ESP reading
Table 4: Students’ perception about the purpose of learning reading English for Banking
Table 5: Students’ expectation about four language skills in their future work
Table 6: Levels of difficulties in terms of vocabulary
Table 7: The difficulties in the area of types of texts
Table 8: The difficulties in the area of reading skills
Table 9: The difficulties in the area of course books
Table 10: The learners’ expectation in terms of methodology


English for Finance and Banking.
-To recommend some suggestions for teachers and learners to overcome these
difficulties.

3. The research questions
2

The research is carried out with an attempt to find out the answers to the
following research questions:
1. What are the difficulties of students of Finance and Banking at HUI Nghe an
campus in learning to read ESP ?
2. What solutions can be offered to help students overcome the difficulties in learning
to read English of Finance and Banking ?

4. The scope of the study
This study is limited to the area of investigating in learning reading English for
Finance and Banking learning faced by the second-year students of Banking and Finance at
HUI Nghe An campus. More importantly, it tries to serve the purpose of finding out the
most common problems in the students‟ learning reading English for Finance and Banking
and seeking for possible solutions to deal with the found problems.

5. The method of the study
With the aims of finding out the area of difficulties in learning reading English for
Finance and Banking at HUI Nghe An campus, this study adopts a survey approach. To
achieve the aims of the study, the survey questionnaire is used as the main method to
collect the needed data from the learners as well as the researcher‟s observation and
interviews and informal discussion with the students and the colleagues.

6. Design of the study
The thesis was designed with three parts: Introduction, Development and

PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW
4

This chapter will briefly present a theoretical background of the study with the
examination of the concepts most relevant to the thesis‟s topic. Firstly, a general
introduction of nature of reading comprehension will be given. Secondly, the overall of
ESP will be discussed. Thirdly, approaches to teach reading and techniques to teach
English for Finance and Banking reading will be mentioned. Finally, challenges in ESP
reading comprehension will be referred to in reading classes.
1.1 The nature of reading comprehension
1.1.1. What is reading and reading comprehension?
1.1.1.1 What is reading?
Reading is an interactive process that goes on between the reader and the text,
resulting in comprehension. The text presents letters, words, sentences, and paragraphs that
encode meaning. The reader uses knowledge, skills, and strategies to determine what that
meaning is. So far reading has been defined differently by lots of scholars, however no
single definition is acceptable to everyone.
Goodman (1971, p.135) stated that reading is “a psycholinguistics process by
which the reader, language user, reconstructs, as best as he can, a message which has been
encoded by a writer as a graphic display”. In his opinion, readers not only learn how to

1.1.2 Reading comprehension process
The nature of reading comprehension process – how people learn to process textual
information – has been researched by cognitive and behavioral scientists for many decades.
So far reading has sometimes been characterized as “passive” or “receptive”. According to
Christine Nuttall (1982, p.192), “reading is like an infectious disease. It is caught not
taught (And you can‟t catch it from someone who hasn‟t got it…)”.
More recently, scholars (notably Goodman, 1967 and Smith, 1971) developed a
psycholinguistic perspective of reading, focusing on its active, cognitive processes.
1.1.2.1 The Schema Theory
According to Nunan (1999, p.201), “schema theory is based on the notion that
experiences lead to the creation of mental frameworks that help us make sense of new
experiences.”
The schemata are recognized as a useful concept in understanding how we are able
to interpret texts (Nuttall). When a reader reads a text, he must use his own background
knowledge, the situational context and the cues provided by the author to interpret the text.
How much he can understand a text depends on whether his schemata are sufficiently
similar to the writer‟s. That is why many arguments suggest that the concepts which a
reader brings to the text are actually more important than the text itself for comprehension.
Therefore, the more experiences of the world we have, the better we can interpret texts. A
reader who is rich in background knowledge will comprehend the text more than another
6

whose schemata are poorer. In addition, the schemata enable the reader to predict about
what he might get from a certain context.
To sum up, it is essential for teachers to recognize that the schemata are the basis
for comprehending. Therefore, in order to comprehend texts in standard English foreign
language students need to develop new schemata of language, text and interpretation, as
well as schemata of alternative cultural practices and values.
1.1.2.2 Bottom – up and Top-down processing
According to Silberstein (1994), “text comprehension requires the simultaneous

for providing information that is shared with other processes. The
information obtained from each type of processing is combined to
determine the most appropriate interpretation of the printed pages”.
In short, the popularity of interactive processing shows that interactive processing
can maximize the strengths and minimizes the weaknesses of the bottom-up and top-down
processing.
1.2. An Overview of ESP
1.2.1 What is ESP ?
ESP originates from a famous saying “Tell me what you need English for and I
will tell you the English that you need”. So far, ESP has been defined differently by
different authors. According to Hutchinson and Waters (1987, p.19), ESP is “an approach
to language teaching in which all decisions as to content and approach are based on the
learner‟s reason for learning”.
Sharing with Hutchinson and Waters, Strevens (1988, p.1) said “ESP is a particular
case of the general category of special – purpose language teaching”.
However, all the above authors have the same opinions about the ESP‟s features:
1) It is purposeful and aimed at the successful performance of occupational or educational
roles by an individual or a group.
2) It is based on an analysis of the students‟ needs and is tailor-made to meet these needs.
3) It may differ from another general language course in its selection of skills, themes,
topics, situations, functions, language and approachology.
Most of all, according to Munby (1978), one important feature which characterizes ESP as
being different from other general language courses, is that “the domains not only relate to
distinctive content, but also to discipline-specific lexis, genres and registers.”
1.2.2 English in Finance and Banking
8

According to the tree of ELT given, ESP can be classified into two major groups:
English for Academic Purposes (EAP) and English for Occupational Purposes (EOP).
English for Economics belongs to EAP and English in Finance and Banking is one of

9

described as “ objectives”. Needs can also mean “ that the user- institution or society at
large regards as necessary or to be learnt from a program of language instruction”.
At HUI Nghe An campus, students learn English not with the intention of taking it
professionally in the future career, but using it as a means to complete their certain banking
activities like: opening accounts, filling in slips, doing banking transaction between banks
and or with customers or even for their future training. And it is HUI „target to equip
students with necessary English which is frequently used in their business. That is, English
is taught generally to meet the students‟ future job requirement
1.3 Approaches to teach reading
In fact, there are quite a lot of approaches of teaching GE reading in general and
ESP reading in particular. However, in this study, I would like to mention about two
approaches which are most commonly used in teaching ESP reading: Grammar –
Translation approach and Communicative Language Teaching approach.
1.3.1 Grammar – Translation Approach
The Grammar Translation Approach is the oldest approach of teaching in the
world. A number of approaches and techniques have been evolved for the teaching of
English and also other foreign languages in the recent past years, yet this approach is still
in use in teaching. The main principles on which the Grammar Translation Approach are
based are the following:
1. Translation interprets the words and phrases of the foreign languages in the best
possible manner.
2. The phraseology and the idiom of the target language can best be assimilated in the
process of interpretation.
3. The structures of the foreign languages are best learned when compared and
contrast with those of mother tongue.
Advantages:
1. The phraseology of the target language is quickly explained. Translation is the
easiest way of explaining meanings or words and phrases from one language into

text.
Disadvantage:
11

The content-based approach is difficult to apply especially for learners who are low
in English competence. Furthermore, learners who use this approach to read ESP materials
have certain knowledge about that specific field.
1.3.2.2 Task-Based approach
According to Brown, H.D. (2001, p.50), Task-Based approach “puts task at the
center of one‟s methodological focus. It views the learning process as a set of
communicative tasks that are directly linked to the curricular goals they serve…”
In reading comprehension, tasks are especially important since they will guide reader
in a correct reading procedure and help them have thorough understanding about reading
texts.
Advantages
1. Task-based learning is more student-centered, allows for more meaningful
communication, and often provides for practical extra-linguistic skill building.
2. Tasks are likely to be familiar to students who are more likely to be engaged, which
may further motivate them in their language learning.
Disadvantages:
There have been criticisms that task-based learning is not appropriate as the
foundation of a class for beginning students. Others claim that students are only exposed to
certain forms of language, and are being neglected of others, such as discussion or debate.
1.4. Techniques to teach English for Finance and Banking reading
1.4.1 In Pre-reading
At this important stage, teachers should make sure that students have the relevant
schema for understanding the text. This is achieved by having students think, write, and
discuss everything they know about the topic employing the most common techniques such
as prediction, semantic mapping and reconciled reading.
12

while-reading stages into writing tasks, such as summarizing, evaluating, synthesizing,
commenting and reflecting.
13

By engaging students in pre-, while-, post-reading activities, teachers not only support
students‟ understanding of content, but also provide them with opportunities to hone their
comprehension, vocabulary, and study skills without interrupting content learning.
1.5. Challenges in ESP reading comprehension
1.5.1 Language problems
Language plays a vital role in reading in general and ESP in particular. One cannot
read a book in a language unless one knows that particular language. If learner‟s
knowledge of English is poor, then his reading will be also poor, and naturally also his
reading comprehension. The guessing or the predicting ability necessary to pick up the
correct cues is hindered by the imperfect knowledge of the language; the wrong choice of
cues or the uncertainty of choice makes association more difficult; the memory span in a
foreign language in the early stages of its acquisition is usually shorter than in our native
language; recollection of previous cues then is more difficult in a foreign language than in
a mother tongue; and at all levels, asnd at all time, there is interference of the native
language.”
From the above viewpoints, problems of foreign language learners in reading process
are mainly caused by the imperfect knowledge of the target language and the interference
of the native language.
It is agreed that a lack of appropriate linguistics constrains the transfer of reading skills and
strategies from L1 to L2.
When dealing with a reading text, readers not only face with unfamiliar topic but also
difficulties in vocabulary and grammatical structures. They deal with idioms, proverbs,
synonyms, antonyms, etc., which can be considered to have an impact on the readers‟
motivation. Knowing vocabulary and structures is necessary for getting meaning from a
text, especially for second or foreign language readers who frequently say that they need
more vocabulary and structures so that they can understand the meaning of the sentences.
15

materials written in English

2.1.1 The teachers
At HUI Nghe An campus, there are 5 teachers of English currently working at the
age from 27 to 30. Their experience in teaching English varies from 4 years to 8 years.
Three of them graduated from Ha Noi Foreign Languages University, one was from Hue
Foreign Languages University and one was from Vinh University. Two of them are M.A,
and the rest are taking M.A courses. It is proved that all of them are qualified and
experienced English teachers. All the teachers here are willing to devote their time and
enthusiasm to language teaching: researching and debating to find out an appropriate and
progressive way to teach English effectively. Beside the textbooks, teachers always use
supplementary materials or adapt materials to make the lessons more interesting and
authentic. They all understand the importance of communicative activities in the class and
always try to apply them in their lessons
2.1.2 The students
There is one class of vocational training college of Finance and Banking at HUI
in Nghe An campus. They come from different parts of the province. Some of them are
from the rural or remote areas, where there are no good opportunities for studying
English, these students commonly did not spend much time learning English at high
school before. The others come from cities, who, theoretically, have all finished three
17

years or seven years of learning English at secondary schools before entering the HUI
Nghe An campus. To some extent, there are some students whose English is very good,
but generally the target students' English proficiency is still low level. Most of them learn
English to read specialized documents rather than speak English to foreigners. Some have
strong pressure to pass exams with high mark; the others would prefer ESP enhance their
specialized knowledge, which is required in their future jobs. However, specialized
knowledge in Vietnamese makes it easy for them to learn English for Finance and
Banking, and, on the other hand, brings them high motivation in learning ESP. In

In the book there are parts for reading, listening, and speaking practice. Speaking
parts are titled discussion. Discussion are composed of questions before each reading and
listening parts. They can be in the forms of either “ questions-answers” or “ T-F
statements” to draw the students‟ attention to topics and main ideas of the reading texts.
With these students learn to express and exchange their opinions about banking services
and business operated among banks. Furthermore, this part may act as the lead-in to the
reading or listening parts, introducing the topics or main points which students have to
find out from the reading or listening parts. Each unit in the book contains three or five
reading passages of about 400 to 500 words. Grammar in this book is complicated. This,
therefore, requires better command of not only reading skills but also English language.
Reading passages themselves are divided into short paragraphs, dealing with different
banking business operations in detail. The key word and terminologies are boldly printed
in the text. They are also key words of the text. Almost texts require scanning and
intensive reading skills because they show the procedures of businesses to be carried out
among banks. After reading passage are exercises .This part is for vocabularies and
terminologies practice. They are gap-filling, matching the definitions to the words, finding
synonyms and antonyms, finding phrases equivalents, word forms. They are filling in
diagrams, putting available words into correct gaps, multiple-choice. In one word,
Banking Transaction is a book specifically designed for students who will work in the
Bank field after their graduation. The reading passages involve in specialized banking
business that a bank clerk must acquire to fulfill his job in a bank. However, it is not
meant to teach students basic banking knowledge through English but provide them with
indispensable vocabularies and terminologies used in Banking operation and get them
familiar with types of texts to help them a lot for further study.
The second book is English for Banking and Finance. The book‟s complilation is
meticulous, practical and updated so that the readers are able to obtain fundamentals of
English for Banking and Finance. As a result, they are able to improve their competence in
professional careers in the process of world economy integration. The aims of this book
are:
19

books, especially ESP books. It is obviously that teaching facilities at HUI Nghe An
campus are well supported. This certainly has considerable positive effects on English
teaching and learning.
2.2. The study
20

2.2.1 Research questions
With these aims of the study as stated in the Introduction part, three following
questions have been raised:
1. What are the main difficulties of students of Finance and Banking at HUI Nghe An
campus in learning reading English of ESP ?
2. What solutions should be offered to help students to find out the effective ways to
learn reading English of Finance and Banking ?
2.2.2 The participants
In order to achieve the aims of the thesis and answer the above research questions,
the main subjects of the study include a group of 5 teachers of English currently teaching
at HUI Nghe An campus. All of them are female. They have at least 3 –years experience
in teaching English. And 50 second- year students of Banking and Finance. The number of
participants is limited to only 5 teachers and 50 students because there are only 5 teachers
teaching in HUI Nghe An campus at the time the study was being carried out. The
teachers involved in the study are those who have experience on teaching English for
Finance and Banking. At present, there is one class with 50 students of Finance and
Banking in HUI Nghe An campus. The students are in their second year of studying in the
school and 30 of them are female.
2.2.3 Research instruments
According to Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 59), there are a number ways in
which information about the needs can be gathered such as questionnaires, interviews,
observation, etc. The researcher of this study decided to choose questionnaires as main
tool and semi- interview as an additional tool for collecting information.
2.2.3.1 Questionnaire