Improving grade 12 students’ reading comprehension through scanning technique at Muong Lat high school

THANH HOA DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
MUONG LAT HIGH SCHOOL
EXPERIENCE INITIATIVE
IMPROVING GRADE 12 STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION THROUGH SCANNING TECHNIQUE AT MUONG LAT HIGH SCHOOL
The author: Nguyễn Thị Thoa
Job position: Teacher
Experience initiative about: English
THANH HOÁ – 2018
TABLE OF CONTENTS
	Pages
1. INTRODUCTION	1
1.1. The reason of selecting the topic	1
1.2. Objectives of the study	1
1.3. Scope of the study	1
1.4. Methodology	2
2. CONTENTS	2
2.1. Theoretical background 	2
2.2. Reality	2
2.3. Measure implementation	3
2.3.1. Training students the scanning technique	3
2.3.2. Identifying question types 	4
2.3.3. Skills for stated questions	5
2.3.4. Skill for unstated questions	9
2.4. The results of the study	10
3. CONCLUSION AND PROPOSAL	12
3.1. Conclusion	13
3.2. Proposal	 13
3.2.1. To teachers	13
3.2.2. To students	13
REFERENCES 	14
1. INTRODUCTION 
1.1. The reason of selecting the topic 
It can not be denied that English plays an important role in the process of the industrialization, modernization and globalization. Being good at English hepls the learners feel more confident in their study as well as in their job, so teaching and learning English have been paid more attention than ever before. In Vietnamese context, as it can be seen, English is now taught in all school at all levels, a lot of English laguage centres are set up continuously, teachers of English are carefully trained with strick requirement
Reading is the most important skill of all for most students of English throughout the world. Both English teachers and students need to improve and master four important language skills, i.e. listening, speaking, reading, and writing. By reading, the students are able to access much information, vocabularies as well as necessary structures to develop other skills. With strengthened reading skills, students will make greater progress and attain greater development in all academic areas. 
For most of the students at Muong Lat high school, they reported that they found learning English quite difficult especially learning reading skill. The reading passages are often too long and contain a lot of new words whereas their repertoire of vocabulary was very poor. They also stated that they had not been introduced any strategies that helped improve reading skill. When doing reading comprehension exercises, students often read the passage word by word, translated the passage word by word, understood the passage word by word first, then they asked the teacher the meaning of the questions in Vietnamese before they looked back the passage to find the answers. This took them a lot of time to read the whole texts, affected their reading quality and made the reading lessons less effective. Thus, there is a need find out the effective ways to improve the current situation. Personally, I have found that it is necessary to provide students with useful reading strategies to help improve their reading skills. The above reasons have inspired me to conduct my initiative with the title "Improving grade 12 students’ reading comprehension through scanning technique at Muong Lat high school” 
1.2. Objectives of the study.
1.2.1. For the students
This study set out to provide students with scanning technique to deal with the reading comprehension exercises; help students know how to identify some kinds of questions and how to deal with them and apply scanning to do the reading comprehension exercises well.
1.2.2. For the teachers
The study was designed to find out the effective technique to improve students’ reading skill and know how to stimulate students to improve their reading skill.
1.3. Scope of study
The study was designed to investigate the strategie to improve reading comprehension skill. The finding obtained from this study was to help improve teaching and learning reading in general and learning and teaching reading at Muong Lat High School in particular. 
1.4. Methodology 
I wrote this topic based on:
- The method of studying theory.
- The method of investigating and observing.
- Applying the topic to real teaching reading at Muong Lat high school. 
- Comparison, collection and summary of the result, effect of the topic.
2. CONTENTS
2.1. Theoretical background
Reading is a part of our daily lives. Reading skill also plays an integral part in learning process. It is a base from which other skills are developed. It helps students expand their repertoire of vocabulary; it provides students with grammatical structures as well. For grade 12 students, it is far more important because having good reading skill is one of the key factors to help them achieve high marks in the national GCSE examination. (The number of reading questions makes up of 20 out of 50 ones).For this reason, reading skills should be taught in school for students to be able to cope with comprehension problems
2.2. Reality
Most of the students at Muong Lat high school complained that they found reading skill difficult. When I asked them to do reading comprehension exercies, they seemed to be daunting. Observing them doing the tasks, I found that most of them often spent too much time reading the passages; they all tried to decode the meaning of all the words. Then, they read the questions and looked back the text again to find the answers. This was time consuming and less effective. Some of them chose the answer randomly without reading the passages at all. Most of them got bad results. I wanted to know what the reasons were. So, at the beginning of the first term - school year 2017 - 2018, I conducted a small survey with 70 students in 2 classes – 12E and 12D - to find out the ways they had done the tasks and why a lot of them got bad marks, and I got the result:
The reasons
Percentage
1. I understand the passages as I read
2%
2. I read the passage words by words and decoding the meaning of the passage.
80%
3. There are too many new words.
70%
4. The passage is too long.
60%
5. I don’t understand the meaning of questions.
75%
6. I try to identify each question first, then scan and skim the passage to find out the answer.
2%
7. I choose the answers randomly
70%
8. I can find the keys words of the passage
1 %
9. I find the reading passage boring
75%
10. I can control my reading speed
2%
From the above table, we see that the majority of the students do not have good reading skill. Most of them often spent too much time reading the passages; they tried to decode the meaning of all the words. They also lacked of using reading strategies, so they could not control their reading. They had no skill to scan, skim the phrases, sentences, clauses in the passage. This made them have no enough time to answer the questions correctly, resulting in getting bad marks when doing reading comprehension task. The results from this survey coincided with my observing above.
2.3. Measure implementation
2.3.1. Training students the reading techniques: Scanning
The first task of my study was to make students understand what the scanning means, what kinds of questions in the reading comprehension can be answered by using scanning. Then, I adapted the reading passage in the text book to make them familiar to students as well as gave them extra-exercise to practice.
2.3.1.1. Definition of scanning
According to Vaezi (2006: 5), scanning is reading rapidly to find a specific piece of information (name, place, and time, etc). The readers know what they want to look for, so they are concentrating on finding a particular answer. Scanning involves moving the reader’s eyes quickly down the page seeking specific information without reading the whole text. Meanwhile, Grellet (1981) argue that scanning is quickly searching for some particular piece of information in the text. In addition, in reading by using scanning technique, the teacher gives students time to search specific information (time, place, and name) in the text quickly, so the students do not need to read the whole text. Harmer (2005: 69) states that this technique means that the readers do not have to read every word and line: through scanning, the students are also trained to move their eyes rapidly in finding out the specific items of information that they want to discover.
Based on the above definitions, in my study, I used scanning as a term describing quick reading a passage to get detail information in the reading passage. Students use this skill when they look for information relating to proper names, dates, numbers, or other information without having to read every word of the whole text. 
2.3.1.2. Steps in scanning:
- keep in mind the information you are looking for, the questions and find out key words.
 - Try to anticipate how the answer will appear and what clues might used to help locate the answer such as the numbers, the date, the “wh”, places 
- Use headings and any other aids that will help identify which sections might contain the information such as charts, the italicized words
- Selectively read and skip through sections of the passage
- When you find the sentences containing the needed information, just stop to read the whole sentences. Look for the answers that are definitely true according to the passage. Eliminate the wrong ones.
- You can read the passage from top to bottom.
2.3.2. Identifying questions types.
There are 9 types of questions appearing in reading comprehension exercises. They are grouped into 3 categories namely questions for main idea, questions for detail information and inference, and vocabulary questions. The nine question types are shown in the table below:
Types of questions
Identifying questions
A. Main ideas
1. Main idea
2. Main purpose
+ What is the topic of the passage? 
+ What is the subject of the passage?
+ What is the main idea of the passage? 
+ What is the author's main point in the passage? 
+ With what is the author primarily concerned?
+ Which of the following would be the best title? 
+What is the author’s main purpose in the passage?
3. General organization or attitude
+ Time order
+ Cause and effect
+ Definition and example
+ Comparison and contrast
+ Problem and solution
B. Detail information
4. Stated detail
+ According to the passage
+ It is stated in the passage
+ The passage indicates that
+ Which of the following is true..?
5. Unstated detail
+ Which of the following is not stated?
+ Which of the following is not mentioned?
+ Which of the following is not discussed?
+ All of the following are true except
+ Which of the following is false
+ Which of the following is not true
6. Where question
+ Where in the passage.
7. Inference
+ It is implied in the passage that
+ It can be inferred from the passage that.
+ It is most likely that
+ What probably happened.?
8. Reference
+ The word X in the passage refers to ..
C. Vocabulary question
9. Synonym and antonym
+ What is the meaning of “X” in line “Y”?
+ The word “X” in line “Y” could be replaced by..
+ Which of the following has the closest meaning with the word “X” in line “Y”?
+ Which of the following has the opposite meaning with the word “X” in line “Y”?
Because of time limitation and students’ ability limitation, in this study I mainly focus on guiding students how to answer the stated questions and unstated questions using scanning.
2.3.3. Skills for stated questions
- How to identify stated questions:
Stated questions are those which ask for small details in the passage. The answers are often in the passage. Normally, the answer is restated in different ways. Stated detail questions include:
- According to the passage
- It is stated in the passage
- The passage indicates that
- Which of the following is true..?
- How to find the answer:
- Underline the key words in the questions
- Use scanning skill to appropriate paragraph for reading carefully.
- Read the sentences containing the key words.
- Eliminate the wrong answers, choose the correct one. 
In my teaching, I adapted the reading passage in the text book to help students understand and know how to use this strategy and make them familiar with this type of question which is included in the national GCSE examination. I also provided students with extra-exercises to practice with the hope that they would improve their reading ability.
Example 1: The reading passage in Unit 15– Women in society – Tieng Anh 12 – Basic:
Throughout much of the history of human civilization, deep-seated cultural beliefs allowed women only limited roles in society. Many people believed that women’s natural roles were as mothers and wives. These people considered women to be better suited for childbearing and homemaking rather than for involvement in the public life of business or politics. Widespread doubt about women’s intellectual ability led most societies to deny education, employment and many legal and political rights to women. It was men who controlled most positions of employment and power in society.
The struggle for women’s rights - the rights that establish the same social, economic, and political status for women as for men - began in the 18th century during a period known as the Age of Enlightenment. During this period, political philosophers in Europe began to argue that all individuals, male or female, were born with natural rights that made them free and equal. These pioneer thinkers advocated that women should not be discriminated against on the basis of their sex.
Today, although their status varies in different countries, women in most parts of the world have gained significant legal rights. The most important of these are: the right to have equal work opportunities and pay to men, the right to vote, and the right to formal education.
Question 1. According to the text, what was the main role traditionally accorded to women?
A. working in education
B. building houses
C. taking care of the house and family
D. working in factory
(Key words: main role, traditionally. Answer: C)
Question 2. According to the text, what is the purpose of the struggle for women’s rights?
A. to free women from housework
B. to establish a friendly relationship between men and women
C. to bring equality between men and women
D. to argue that women have better intellectual ability
(Key words: struggle, women’s rights. Answer: B) 
Example 2: The reading passage in Unit 16 “The Association of Southeast Asian Nations” – Tieng Anh 12 Basic, page173
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, was founded on 8th August, 1967, in Bangkok, Thailand by the five original member countries, namely, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Brunei joined ASEAN in 1984. Vietnam became its seventh member in 1995. Laos and Myanmar were admitted to this association in 1997 and Cambodia in 1999. The main goals of the Association are to accelerate economic growth, social progress and cultural development; and to promote peace and stability through respect for justice, and the rule of law, in the relationship between countries in the region.
ASEAN has a population of 575.5 million, accounting for about 8.7% of the world’s population. Its total area is 4,464,322 square kilometers. It is a region of diverse cultures, and people in some countries such as the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Singapore speak English besides their own languages. According to the statistics recorded in 2007, ASEAN had a combined gross domestic product of about US$ 1282 billion. This combined GDP grew at an average rate of around 6% per year from 2003 to 2007. The economies of the member countries are diverse, although its major products include electronic goods, oil and wood. The Governments of ASEAN countries have paid special attention to trade. In 2006, the ASEAN region had a total trade of US$ 1405 billion. It has been estimated that a free trade area would be established in the region by 2020. The ASEAN leaders have also adopted the ASEAN Vision 2020, which is aimed at forging closer economic integration within the region. The Hanoi Plan of Action, adopted in 1998, serves as the first in a series of planned actions leading up to the realization of the ASEAN Vision.
Today, ASEAN economic cooperation covers many areas: trade, investment, industry, services, finance, agriculture, rural development, forestry, energy, transportation and communication, science and technology, small and medium enterprises, and tourism. ASEAN has actively worked to improve the socio-economic situation and solve problems among its member countries
Task 3: Answer the following questions.
Question 1. According to the passage, which countries founded ASEAN? 
A. Indonesia, Malaysia	
B. Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore
C. Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand	
D. Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand
(Key words: founded, ASEAN. Answer: D)
Question 2. According to the passage, what are the main goals of the Association?
A. to accelarate the economic growth, social progress and cultural development 
B. to promote peace and stability through respect for justice and the rule of law in the relationship among countries in region.
C. to remain the economic growth, social progress and cultural development and to promote peace and stability through respect for justice and the rule of law in the relationship among countries in region.
D. to promote peace and stability through respect for justice and the rule of law in the relationship among countries in region and accelarate the economic growth, social progress and cultural development 
(Key words: main goals. Answer: D)
Question 3. According to the text, the total trade value of ASEAN in 2006 was ___? 
A. US$ 1405 million	B. US$ 1405 Billion
C. US$ 1282 Billion	D. US$ 1450 Billion
(Key words: total trade value, 2006. Answer: B)
Question 4. When was the Hanoi Plan of Action adopted? 
A. 1989	B. 1999	C. 1998	D. 1898
(Key words: Hanoi plan of action, adopted. Answer: C)
Question 5. What sectors does ASEAN economic cooperation include? 
A. trade, investment, industry, tourism
B. finance, agriculture, rural development, energy, transportation, trade
C. trade, forestry, communication, small and medium enterprises and tourism.
D. trade, investment, industry, services, finance, agriculture, rural development, forestry, energy, transportation and communication, science and technology, small and medium enterprises, and tourism.
(Key words: sector, economic cooperation. Answer: D)
Example 3: The 4th paragraph of the reading passage in “ĐỀ THI THAM KHẢO MÔN TIẾNG ANH- 2018- BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO” 
“Reading is one of greatest enjoyments of life. To book-lovers, nothing is more fascinating than a favorite book. And, the ordinary educated man, who is interested and absorbed in his daily occupation wants to occasionally escape from his drudgery into the wonderland of books for recreation and refreshment.”
Question 34. According to paragraph 4, which of the following is the most fascinating to book-lovers?
A. a daily occupation	B. an ordinary educated-man
C. the wonderland	D. a favorite book
(The key words in the question are “book-lovers” and “fascinating” so the answer is D)
Example 4: The reading passage in “Ôn tập các chủ điểm ngữ pháp Tiếng Anh 12- Thư viện Sen Vàng, page 119”
“Langston Hughes was one of the greatest American writers of the twentieth century. He was born in Joplin, Missouri, and moved to Cleveland at the age of fourteen. Four years later he went to Mexico and spent one year there before attending Columbia University in New York. For a few years after that he roamed the world as a seaman, visiting ports around the world and writing some poetry. He returned to the United States and attended Lincoln University, where he won the Writer Bynner Prize for undergraduate poetry. After graduating in 1928, he traveled to Spain and to