VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
TRẦN THỊ THANH HÒA IMPROVING GRADE 11 STUDENTS’ READING
COMPREHENSION SKILLS THROUGH FOCUSED TASKS
AT A HIGH SCHOOL IN NAM DINH
(Nâng cao kỹ năng đọc hiểu cho học sinh lớp 11 tại một trường
trung học phổ thông ở Nam Định thông qua các bài tập trọng điểm)

M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology
Code: 60.14.10
Course: 20 (2011-2013)

HANOI - 2013

VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES


Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi and that this
thesis has not been submitted for any degree at any other university or tertiary
institution.

Signature:
Date: ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This study has, in many senses, been accomplished with the help and
encouragement of many people. Therefore, I hereby would like to express my
appreciation to all of them.
Firstly, I wish to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor, Assoc.Prof. Dr.
Nguyen Van Do, for his invaluable inspiration, assistance and guidance during the time
I tried to complete this thesis.

Nam Dinh province. These benefits bring considerable effectiveness to teachers and
students in teaching and learning reading. This is also the main aim of the study and the
researcher’s wish.
In order to achieve this aim and wish, the researcher enters into consideration of
the relevant literature and then carries out observing classes, giving questionnaires to
them, etc. to have necessary findings and analysis. At the same time, the researcher
also suggests the suitable reading tasks to apply in teaching and learning reading
lessons in Tieng Anh 11.
iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Candidate’s statement i
Acknowledgements ii
Abstract iii
Table of contents iv
List of abbreviations vii
List of tables and charts viii
PART I INTRODUCTION 1
1. Rationale 1
2. Aims of the study 1

I.6.1. Focused tasks 14
I.6.2. Using tasks to develop reading comprehension skills 14
I.6.2.1. Skills involved in reading 14
I.6.2.2. Questions and tasks in a reading lesson 15
Chapter II: Methodology 16
II.1. Situation analysis 16
II.1.1. Setting of the study 16
II.1.2. Participants 16
II.1.3. Reading materials 17
II.2. Instrumentation 18
II.2.1. Instrument 1 18
II.2.1.1. The questionnaire for the students 18
II.2.1.2. The questionnaire for the teachers 19
II.2.2. Instrument 2-class observation 19
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Chapter III: Data analysis and findings 20
III.1. Data analysis and findings 20
III.2.1. Survey for students 20
III.2.2. Survey for teachers 26
III.2. Classroom observation 28
Chapter IV: Suggested some focused tasks in teaching reading skills and sample
work 30
IV.1. Suggested some focused tasks in teaching reading skills 30
IV.1.1. Bases for reading tasks 30
IV.1.2. Suggested some focused tasks 33
IV.1.2.1. Suitability for students’ level 33
IV.1.2.2. Suitability for reading purposes 33
IV.2.Sample work 38
PART III: CONCLUSION 40

viii

LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS

Tables:
1. Students’ Attitudes towards reading in English
2. Students’ Attitudes towards purpose of reading English
3. Kinds of tasks students are often asked to do
4. Students’ strategies of doing reading tasks
5. Students’ strategies when coming across a new word
6. Students’ interest in doing supplementary tasks
7. Teachers’ attitudes towards students’ problems in reading

Charts:
1. Students’ Attitudes towards reading materials
2. Students’ difficulties in doing reading tasks
3. Teachers’ attitudes towards reading texts and tasks in textbook


skills. When teaching reading, some issues may arise such as how to assess students’
reading ability, how to give tests to students, techniques to improve students’ reading
skills and so on. Among these issues, I choose to do my research on the project entitled
“Improving Grade 11 Students’ Reading Comprehension Skills through Focused Tasks
at A High School in Nam Dinh” because I myself believe that reading can help learners
to get information to the fullest, and that providing learners with useful techniques and
tasks will motivate them in reading.
II. Aims of the study
The study is aimed at:
2

1) better understanding the concepts of reading, content reading, reading
comprehension.
2) identifying some problems in teaching and learning reading English at Ngo
Quyen High School in Nam Dinh.
3) providing the 11
th
grade students at Ngo Quyen High School with useful
focused tasks to improve reading comprehension skills.
The study is the hope of the author to make some contributions to the improvement
of reading comprehension skills for the 11
th
form students .
III. Scope of the study
The study on reading in general is immense and covering every aspect of
language theory and practice in this study is impossible. Due to the time limitation,
only one small aspect of reading comprehension is mentioned to, that is reading
comprehension tasks. Some focused tasks to help teachers and students better in
teaching and learning reading comprehension would be recommended.
IV. Methodology

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PART II: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

In this chapter, the review of the issues most relevant considered as a theoretical
background to the study will be provided. It consists of definitions of reading and
reading comprehension, the purposes of reading, classification of reading, stages in a
reading lesson, factors affecting reading skills, and focused tasks and using tasks to
develop reading comprehension skills.
I.1. Definitions of reading, reading comprehension and purposes of reading
I.1.1. What is reading?
Reading is a natural and common activity that people always do in their daily
life. It is stated that reading is a kind of culture that people regardless of age, sex, or
class should learn and have. Although no one can deny the high frequency of reading
in every day life, to understand thoroughly what reading or reading comprehension is
may not be well aware by many. There have been so many definitions of reading that
they cause much confusion. Hence, many linguists take reading into account to do
research. They have studied and given various definitions of reading.
According to Frank Smith (1978:2) “reading is to understand the author’s
thought”. He also adds “Understanding print or even receiving communication can

that requires how to decode through the development of an extensive repertoire of sight
words, learning the meanings of vocabulary words encountered in the texts, and
learning how to abstract meaning from text. It represents how well readers understand
literal comprehension which concentrates on explicit meaning and inferential
comprehension which concentrates on implicit meaning in the reading text.
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Grellet gives an idea that “reading comprehension or understanding a written
text means extracting the required information from it as effectively as possible”
(Grellet, 1981:34). From this point of view, Grellet focuses on readers’ ability of
understanding the meaning of a written text based on the individual’s background
knowledge.
Richard and Thomas (1987: 143) state that “Reading comprehension is a mental
process that in the final analysis, only the readers fully understand. Comprehension is
what stimulates readers to remember the past experience. That knowledge is, then,
used in trying to get meaning out of print. Meaning does not reside on the printed page
but rather in the meaning of the reader.”
From the above mentioned definitions, it is possible to draw a conclusion that it
is meaningless if readers spend time reading but have no comprehension or attain
nothing or even little from a written text. In other words, it is no use of reading without
comprehension. Therefore, reading comprehension is an important part in teaching and
learning a foreign language in general and teaching reading in particular. However, the
reasons for reading differ from one person to another. As a result, the ways we read are
also different. In other words, the purposes of reading determine the ways or the styles
of reading. Now it is necessary to have a close look at the classification of reading
according to manner and the purposes of reading to identify different types of reading.
I.1.3. The purposes of reading
The purposes of reading will determine how we read, what skills we need and
what types of reading text we practise in order to fulfill the purposes. There are three
main purposes of reading: reading for pleasure, reading for information and reading for

whole the quickest and most efficient” (Lewis, 1985:110). It is an activity that we
focus on meaning of the text so silent reading is called “reading on meaning”. It
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involves looking at a text and saying the words to yourself so it is useful for
development of reading skills.
I.2.2. Classification of reading according to purposes
It is clear to assume that the reasons for reading are different from this person to
that person because of their uncommon purposes. According to purposes, reading is
categorized into skimming, scanning, intensive reading and extensive reading.
Skimming is commonly used in reading comprehension. Grellet assumed that
“when skimming, we go through the reading material quickly in order to get its main
points or the intention of the writer, but not to find the answer to specific questions”
(Grellet, 1981:19). In skimming, the reader goes through the text extremely quickly,
merely dipping into it or sampling it at various points. By skimming, students quickly
run their eyes over the text to get the gist of it. It is a kind of reading we do when we
want to read in details or to find out the subject of the text.
In terms of scanning, Nuttall indicated that “Scanning means glancing rapidly
through a text either to search for a specific piece of information or to get an initial
impression of whether the text is suitable for a given purpose” (Nuttall, 2000:49).
From this notion, scanning is a type of reading frequently used by all. When scanning,
students quickly go through a text to find a particular piece of information. This skill
involves the ability to reject or pass over irrelevant information. Scanning can be
practised with variety of texts such as maps, dictionaries, reference materials, etc.
In terms of intensive reading, Grellet defined that “Intensive reading means
reading short texts to extract specific information. This is an accuracy activity
involving reading for details” (Grellet,1981:41). The aim of intensive reading is to
arrive at a profound and detailed understanding of the text not only of what it means,
but also of how the meaning is produced. Under the guidance of the teacher or a task,
students have to read the text carefully and try to understand every single word and


Normally, pre-reading phase often last from two to ten minutes depending on
each lesson. Several techniques are suggested such as using pictures, predicting from
the titles, guessing and brainstorming to see what students have already known. These
activities are aimed at drawing the students’ interest towards reading as well as
preparing them for the reading text.
I.3.2. While-reading stage
Williams (1984:38) states that while-reading stage is the main part of a reading
lesson with the following specific aims:
- To help understanding of the writer’s purpose.
- To help understanding of the text structure.
- To clarify text content.
At this stage, there is a great deal of activities can be performed in order to help
students to understand the text. The teacher acts as an organisor, a helper only. He will
be available to help individuals with their particular difficulties. He will be likely to be
about the meaning of new vocabulary items, new grammar structures, etc. In this
situation, he should encourage students to guess the meaning from the context.
On the whole, the teacher must manage his class in such a way every student
participates in the lesson and understands the text.
I.3.3. Post-reading stage
After reading, the teacher needs to consolidate or reflect upon what has been
read. Williams stated that “the post-reading stage is aimed at consolidating or reflecting
upon what has been read and relating the text to the learners’ own knowledge, interests
or views” Williams (1984:39). This stage is where integration of four skills will be
appropriately conducted. Activities in this stage are aimed at helping students apply
what they have learnt from the text to their further study or communication through the
tasks provided by the teacher.
Obviously, the three-phase approach is not to be carried out mechanically on
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promote this skill is to talk about texts in class.
- Taking risks: Students have to take the risk of making mistakes because a
mistake is an opportunity to learn.
- Learning not to cheat oneself: Learning to read is learning to give students
enormous advantages in life. It may lead to better jobs, to personal development,
interest and enjoyment. Students who do not want to learn to read can easily cheat but
they are only cheating themselves.
In short, students are the key figures to decide the success of teaching reading.
I.4.3. The role of reading texts
Texts plays an important role in a reading lesson. That is because text is used
“as a way of learning new language by looking at the text and focusing on particular
words and expression” Doff (1988:62). This means that through reading text, students
can understand phonetic, lexical and grammatical items. Besides, students can enrich
their knowledge in different fields such as science, technology, culture, art etc in the
target language.
I.5. Factors determining successful reading comprehension
I.5.1. Considerations for students
Language learners can learn to use different kinds of reading strategies. Some
read and understand a text very quickly while others read slowly and fail to understand
what they read and it is essential to take the following elements into consideration on
the part of students.
I.5.1.1. Reading strategies
Reading is considered as an active skill. It involves guessing, predicting,
checking and asking questions. Therefore, students should apply reading strategies to
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each kind of reading effectively. Students do not read every word in a text. They
should focus on the important words so they can understand most of the text and can
read faster. They should try to predict what comes next in the text and read the text
again if they do not understand what they have read. They should read silently, not

reading lesson. One of the teachers’ roles is to provide the students with suitable
reading texts. To fulfill this role and have a successful lesson, the teacher should bear
in mind the following criteria for the selection of a text: readability, suitability of
content and exploitability.
I.6. Focused tasks and using tasks to develop reading comprehension skills
I.6.1. Focused tasks
According to Breen (1989), a task is “a structured plan for the provision of
opportunities for the refinement of knowledge and capabilities entailed in a new
language and its use during communication. He specifically states that a task can be a
brief practice exercise or a more complex work plan that requires spontaneous
communication of meaning.
Focused asks, according to Ellis (2003), aim to introduce learners to process,
receptively or productively, some particular linguistic feature, for example, a
grammatical structure. He says that focused tasks have two aims: one is to stimulate
communicative language use, the other is to target the use of a particular,
predetermined target feature.
I.6.2. Using tasks to develop reading comprehension skills
I.6.2.1. Skills involved in reading
Readers need variety of skills when reading. In fact, a change in purpose of
reading usually results in the change in the reading skills so the type of reading
performed. According to Tomlinson and Ellis (1980:150), reading skills include:
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mechanical skills, understanding the lexical items, understanding grammatical
meaning, reasoning skills, selection skills and evaluation skills.
Another possible way of classification of reading skills is suggested by Grellet
(1981:4). He considers that reading skills consist of: recognising the scrift of a
language, deducing the meaning and use of unfamiliar lexical items, understanding
explicitly stated information, understanding information what not explicitly stated,
understanding conceptual meaning, understanding the relations within the sentence,