Skkn improve students’ reading comprehension skill through reading fill exercises

SỞ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO THANH HOÁ

TRƯỜNG THPT NGUYỄN THỊ LỢI

SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM

IMPROVE STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION
SKILL THROUGH READING FILL EXERCISES

Người thực hiện: Nguyễn Thị Xuân
Chức vụ: Giáo viên
SKKN thuộc lĩnh vực (mơn): Tiếng Anh

THANH HỐ NĂM 2022

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Contents
PART I: INTRODUCTION.......................................................................................1
1. Reasons for studying:.........................................................................................1
1.1. Reasons for the theoretical side....................................................................1
1.2. Practical reasons...........................................................................................1
1.3. Reasons for urgency.....................................................................................2
1.4. Reasons for the condition and capacity of the instructor.............................2
2. Aims of the study................................................................................................2
3. Methods of the study..........................................................................................2
4. Scope of the study...............................................................................................2
4.1.Subjects of study: grade 12 students.............................................................2
4.2. Scope of study: practice test and semester exam questions.........................2
5. New features in the study’s result.......................................................................2

PART II: CONTENT.................................................................................................2
1. General difficulties in the process of teaching and learning reading:................2
On the learner's side:...........................................................................................2
On the teacher's side............................................................................................3
2. Limitations in the process of teaching and learning reading skills.....................3
2.1. Subjective limitations:..................................................................................3
2.2. Objective limitations:...................................................................................3
*For teachers.......................................................................................................3
*On the student's side..........................................................................................4
3. Measure implementation....................................................................................4
3.1. Checking the word formation.......................................................................5
3.2. Checking the meaning of the word..............................................................7
4. The adaptation of the textbook.........................................................................10
PART III. PROCEDURE.........................................................................................12
1. Experimental time: 5 months (the first semester of school year 2021 - 2022).12
2. Arrange the experimental groups......................................................................12
3. Educational effects of the study........................................................................12
PART IV. CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS.................................................16
1. Conclusion........................................................................................................16
2.1. To teachers:................................................................................................16
2.2. To students:................................................................................................16
REFERENCES:.......................................................................................................17
DANH MỤC SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM..........................................................18

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IMPROVE STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION SKILL THROUGH
READING FILL EXERCISES
PART I: INTRODUCTION

1. Reasons for studying:
1.1. Reasons for the theoretical side
Today, when English has confirmed its role and importance in schools,
improving the quality of teaching and learning is a top important issue. How
students can fully grasp the knowledge and use it competently is a matter of
concern to our teachers. We all know that learning English is simply learning a
language. To use that language fluently, learners must practice four basic skills: Listening, -Speaking, -Reading, -Writing. In which, reading skills play a decisive
role in determining whether learners understand the content of the article or not.
In Vietnam, as in many Asian countries, English is now taught as a
compulsory school subject from an early age (it is officially taught from grade 3
onwards) (Ministry of Education and Training (MOET), 2008), and many changes
have been initiated in the teaching of the subject in the last few years. Implement
multiple-choice test for English subjects becomes popular and compulsory in high
school graduation exams, university exams, and colleges of the Ministry of
Education and Training. Practicing test-taking skills is considered as a basic goal in
the teaching process to meet national examinations. Reading comprehension is
considered as a basic element of the exam preparation process. Only when readers
can respond will the reading process be completed and will the communication
process achieve the desired results. Poor reading skills cannot gain high scores in
general exams and national examinations in the reading test part. Therefore,
learners who want to improve their grade in English exams have no other way but
to improve their reading comprehension skills, and also do better in English tests.
Based on the results of the tests, lesson plans, assessments on the receptive
ability of Nguyen Thi Loi School students and observation of the students’
activities in choosing the best answer in each test of grade 12 students, the
conductor can recognize the difficulties of students in the process of solving
differences in each reading fill exercise. Therefore, I decided to choose the topic:
“Improve students’ reading comprehension skill through reading fill exercises”
1.2. Practical reasons.
With the direction of the Ministry of Education on innovating the teaching

methods of English subject under the 2020 project and the changes in the forms of
tests, the grammatical knowledge plays an important role.
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1.3. Reasons for urgency.
According to the Department of Education's guidelines for the 2014-2015
school-year assessment innovation, the grade of reading skills account for 40% of
the 45-minute tests and semester exams as well as national examination. Therefore,
it is essential for learners to focus on improving the effectiveness of reading
classes.
1.4. Reasons for the condition and capacity of the instructor.
Based on the results of the tests, lesson plans, assessments on the receptive
ability of Nguyen Thi Loi School students and observation of the students’
activities in solving reading comprehension exercises of grade 12 students, the
conductor can recognize the difficulties in the process of teaching and learning
reading skills, especially through the reading fill exercises for high school students.
2. Aims of the study
The aims of this research are to investigate how English reading skills are
taught in here and to apply some new techniques and adjustment to help the
students tackle the challenges on the learning reading skills more effectively.
3. Methods of the study
- Observe reading classes
- Consult many documents, especially methods of study.
- Study colleagues’ experience
4. Scope of the study
4.1.Subjects of study: grade 12 students.
The research has been carried out in 2 classes of grade 11: 12A1 (in the

controlling group) and 12A6 (in the experimental group) at Nguyen Thi Loi High
School.
4.2. Scope of study: practice test and semester exam questions
5. New features in the study’s result
In the study with the researcher’s innovation, the new approaches help students to
identify the types of exercises and to solve situation better.
PART II: CONTENT
1. General difficulties in the process of teaching and learning reading:
On the learner's side:
Nguyen Thi Loi High School is located in a tourist area, Sam son beach, the
development of the tourism has had a significant impact on the learning of most
students. They don’t focus on studying seriously because of their part time jobs. It
is the thinking of earning money early and easily that makes them neglect study.
They spend the less time doing homework and preparing lessons before class.
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Another drawback in this context is the bad learning habits that many
beginning learners have. The habit of translating into Vietnamese to understand
each word, the desire to read and understand 100% of information also makes
many students unable to know what is the core content to capture and what
information to skip during reading. Misunderstanding of the requirements of
different types of exercises makes the learner tired and tends to become confused
during reading lessons in class.
The passive learning attitude during reading lessons in some classes
observed by the teachers also shows that learners do not seem to pay adequate
attention to self-improvement in the learning process.
On the teacher's side.

The application of translation methods or traditional methods in language
teaching including reading comprehension observed in some teachers makes the
skill training ineffective.
It is still believed that reading is practicing receptive skill. Learners are asked
to get to know information of the writing without any prior hints about the situation
they are about to read. This means that there is no pre-reading step in the class, or
they are not allowed to request feedback after reading clearly. It is observed that
some teachers often begin a reading lesson by listing all the new words that appear
in the text, which is a waste of time and destroys the ability of guessing the
meaning of new words in the context, a vital skill for a foreign language learner.
Some teachers, although are aware of the need to change teaching methods,
they cannot apply many effective measures to change the situation due to the
limited time in class
2. Limitations in the process of teaching and learning reading skills.
2.1. Subjective limitations:
One of the main obstacles that prevents students from doing well the form of
filling in is the lack of language knowledge. Limited vocabulary is the biggest
obstruction to the reading comprehension process of learners. This restriction
interferes with learners’ reading process when seeing to many new words, which
has affected the speed and time of reading.
2.2. Objective limitations:
*For teachers: Due to the limited time of 45 minute with so many tasks to
carry out in a class, there is not enough time to carefully guide students on tips to read
effectively. On the other hand, skill training requires time, perseverance, and repetition
of the requirements of the lesson many times, but due to subjective and hasty
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psychology, some teachers do not have detailed instructions to clearly orient students
about the topic of the reading or the steps to follow to solve the given reading
exercises. Especially, teacher’s attention cannot be paid equally to all the student
groups in a big size class (40- 50 students).
*On the student's side:
During learning process, students at Nguyen Thi Loi high school have
complained that reading comprehension skill through reading fill exercises is
extremely difficult because his skill not only requires students to understand the
content of the reading passage, but also master the relevant grammar knowledge. I
have found that when doing this kind of tasks, I found that the majority of the
students choose the answer indiscriminately. As the result, they usually get bad
marks. At the beginning of the first semester - school year 2021 - 2022, I conducted
a small survey with 83 students in 2 classes – 12A1 and 12A6 - to find out the
difficulties when they did the test and why a lot of them got bad result, and I got the
result:
The reasons
Percentage
1. There are too many new words in the passage.
65%
2. I spend time reading and translating the passage into 66%
Vietnamese.
3. I don’t remember the grammatical knowledge.
57%
4. I don’t know how to do this type of exercise.
70%
5. I choose the answer indiscriminately.
55%
In the process of teaching students to do reading comprehension tests and fill
in correct answers, I noticed that most of the students do not grasp relevant
grammatical knowledge such as word forms, conjunctions, quantity words...

By analyzing subjective and objective difficulties in the process of teaching
and learning reading, focusing on the type of exercise: filling in words the
researcher recognizes that most students are confused, encounter many mistakes
when doing homework, or do not even be able to do this type of exercise at the
average level. The aim of the research is to suggest some solutions to improve the
situation, to help students do the reading comprehension tasks more effectively and
eventually improve their results and grades in exams.
3. Measure implementation
The structure of the comprehension skill through reading fill exercises
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Answer
- Conjunction
- Relative
pronoun
- Quantities
- Vocabulary
- Vocabulary

Number
Recognize
questions
1
1
x

Understandin

g
x

1
1
1

Comprehension

Advanced
application

x
x
x

3.1. Checking the word formation
Students must first understand the functional position of adjectives, nouns,
verbs and adverbs. Only then can you choose the correct answer.
3.1.1 Nouns
Before or after verb

After adj

Place

After the articles

After possessive adj
NOUN

After indicative adj

Formation:
Noun usually
ends by______

After words of
quantity
“- ness, - er, - or, ty, - ment, - -ance, tion, -sion, -ee, - cy,
- dom, - hood, ism, - ship, - th, al…
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3.1.2 Adjective
Before noun
After “to be” or linking verbs
ADJ

Used in the structures: so...that/ such ...that/ too
or the comparisons
Adj usually ends by: “- ful, - able, - ic, - less, ous, - al, - ing/ed, - y, - ive, -ish, - ible, -ent, -ant,
-ly…. ”

3.1.3. Adverb
Before or after verb

Before adj

Adv

At the beginning of the sentence

Between aux and participle

Adj + ly = Adv
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3.2. Checking the meaning of the word
For this type of exercise, students often encounter conjunctions and quantity words
3.2.1. Conjunctions
For sentences with answers that are conjunctions, what form should students
get after the blank?
- if it is a clause, subordinators are used
- if it is phrasal noun or Ving, prepositions are used
- if it is a sentences, conjunction adverbs are used
Conjunctions
Meaning

Subordinator

Preposition

Because, since, as

Because of, thanks

to, on account of,
owning to

Reason

Despite, in spite
of, regardless of

Therefore,
consequently, as
result, thus
Nevertheless,
however

In addition to,
apart from, except
for
Such as

Also, furthermore,
moreover, in
addition, besides,
For example

Result
Contrast
Additional
meaning
Giving example

Although, even
though, though,
even if

Conjunction
adverbs

3.2.2. The quantities
When the answer is a word indicating quantity, it is necessary to determine
what kind of noun after the vacancy is, countable or uncountable, plural or singular.
- MANY = a large number of/a great MUCH = a great deal of/a large
many/ a majority of/ a wide variety of/ amount of...
a wide range of
- Used with countable nouns.
- Used with uncountable nouns.
A FEW/ FEW
A LITTLE/ LITTLE
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- Used with countable nouns.
SOME
- Used in affirmative sentences and in
interrogative sentences when
inviting/suggesting.
ALL
- Used to refer to three or more
people/things (all) or more.

NONE
- Used to refer to three or more
people/things.

MOST
- Most + N
MOSTLY (mostly): used as an adverb
ALMOST (almost): used as an adverb
to complement verbs, adjectives, and
nouns.
EACH
- used with singular countable nouns
OTHER
- Other + uncountable noun.
- Other + plural noun
- Other + ones
- Others are used as pronouns.
- The other: the other of two, or the
other of two,...
- The others: the remaining or
remaining people in a group of many
things or people.

- Used with uncountable nouns.
ANY
- Used in negative, interrogative

BOTH
- Used to refer to both people/things
(both).

NEITHER/EITHER
- Used to refer to both people/things
not.
+ Neither: used in affirmative
sentences.
+ Either: used in negative sentences.
MOST OF
Most of + the/possessive adjective + N

EVERY
- used with singular countable nouns
ANOTHER
- Another + singular noun
- Another + one
- Another + count + plural noun
- Another is used as a pronoun

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3.2.3. Relative pronouns
When the answer is the relative pronoun, students must understand the use and
place of each type of relative pronouns
Table 1: Functions of relative pronouns
Subject
Object
Possessive
Person

Who/ that
Who/ whom/ that
Whose
Thing
Which/ that
Which/ that
Whose/ of which
Table 2: Notes of “that”
it can replace the nouns: person/thing
(subjetc or onject)

it can't be put after comma and
preposition

That

it's required to put after indefinite
pronouns, the superlative

Table 3: Use of the relative adverbs

= in/at/on + which
Where

= in/at/on + which
When

= for which
Why

place

time

reason

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4. The adaptation of the textbook.
Father's Day was created to complement Mother’s Day. Like Mother's Day (1)
_______ honors mothers and motherhood, Father's Day celebrates fatherhood and
paternal bonds; it highlights the (2) _______ of fathers in society. Many countries
celebrate it on the third Sunday of June, but it is also celebrated widely on other
days. Historically, Sonora Smart Dodd was the woman behind the celebration of
male parenting. Her father, the Civil War veteran William Jackson Smart, was a
single parent who (3) _______ his six children there. After hearing a sermon about
Jarvis' Mother's Day in 1909, she told her pastor that fathers should have a similar
holiday honoring them. Although she initially suggested June 5, her father's
birthday, the pastors did not have enough time to prepare their sermons, and the
celebration was deferred to the third Sunday of June. The first celebration was in
Spokane, Washington at the YMCA (Young Men's Christian Association) on June
19, 1910. Since then it has become a traditional day (4) _______ year.
In recognition of what fathers do for their families, on this day people may have
a party celebrating male parenting or simply make a phone call or send a greeting
card. (5) _______, schools help children prepare handmade gifts for their fathers
many days before the celebration.
Question 1. A. which

B. when

C. who

D. where

Question 2. A. conquest

B. impact

C. influence

D. effect

Question 3. A. realized

B. raised

C. took

D. made

Question 4. A. another

B. other

C. any

D. every

Question 5. A. Besides

B. In contrast

C. However

D. Then

Key:
Question 1. A
Consider the answers:
A. Which: replaces the noun indicating the thing that functions as the subject and
object in the relative clause.
B. When: replaces a noun indicating time that functions as an adverb of time in a
relative clause.
C. Who: replaces the noun indicating the person that functions as the subject and
the object in the relative clause.
D. Where: replaces nouns indicating hiding places that function as adverbs of
hiding places in relative clauses.
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Information: “Like Mother's Day (1) __which__ honors mothers and motherhood,
Father's Day celebrates fatherhood and paternal bonds;.”
Question 2. C
Consider the answers:
A. Conquest /ˈkɒŋ.kwest/ (n): xâm chiếm, xâm lấn

B. Impact /ˈɪm.pækt/ (n): ảnh hưởng
C. Influence /ˈɪn.flu.əns/ (n): ảnh hưởng, gây tác động
D. Effect /ɪˈfekt/ (n): sự ảnh hưởng
Distinguish Impact, Influence and Effect:
- Impact means the influence, the impact of someone, something on someone else,
another thing
Influence means influence, great influence to change someone's thoughts and
actions
- Effect means that influence leads to specific results, with more emphasis on the
results of that influence
Information: “....it highlights the (2) __influence__ of fathers in society. Many
countries celebrate it on the third Sunday of June, but it is also celebrated widely on
other days.”
Question 3. B
Consider the answers:
A. Realize /ˈrɪə.laɪz/ (v): nhận ra
B. Raise /reɪz/ (v): nâng lên, nhấc lên, nuôi nấng
C. Take /teɪk/ (v): mang, lấy
D. Make /meɪk/ (v): làm, thực hiện
Information: “Historically, Sonora Smart Dodd was the woman behind the
celebration of male parenting. Her father, the Civil War veteran William Jackson
Smart, was a single parent who (3) __raise__ his six children there.”
Question 4. D
Consider the answers:
A. Another /əˈnʌð.ər/: khác (được sử dụng với danh từ số ít)
B. Other /ˈʌð.ər/: khác (được dùng với danh từ không đếm được và danh từ số
nhiều)
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C. Any /ˈen.i/: bất kỳ (được dùng với danh từ không đếm được và danh từ số nhiều
trong câu hỏi và câu phủ định)
D. Every /ˈev.ri/: mỗi, mọi (được dùng với danh từ số ít)
Information: “The first celebration was in Spokane, Washington at the YMCA
(Young Men's Christian Association) on June 19, 1910. Since then it has become a
traditional day (4) __every___ year.”
Question 5. A
Consider the answers:
A. Besides /bɪˈsaɪdz/ (adv): bên cạnh đó
B. In contrast: trái lại, ngược lại
C. However /ˌhaʊˈev.ər/ (adv): tuy nhiên
D. Then /ðen/: sau đó
Information: “In recognition of what fathers do for their families, on this day
people may have a party celebrating male parenting or simply make a phone call or
send a greeting card. (5) __Besides__, schools help children prepare handmade
gifts for their fathers many days before the celebration.”
PART III. PROCEDURE
1. Experimental time: 5 months (the first semester of school year 2021 - 2022)
2. Arrange the experimental groups
There are two groups in these experiments.
The first group consists of 42 students, class 12A1. For this group, the researcher
still uses the traditional methods while teaching, focusing on translating the text
into Vietnamese. After that students will be given the answers.
The second group with 42 students, class 12A6 is taught by the new techniques for
processing a reading text with tables and new methods. Students are asked to
follow every step when they do reading fill exercises when they do this type of
exercise both in class and at home.
3. Educational effects of the study.

The first test is taken at the beginning of the experiment in September 2021 and
the other is implemented in January 2022.
The achievement in the experiment is divided into 4 levels: very weak mark
is from 1,0 to 3,0 points; weak mark is from 3,5 to 4,5 points; average mark is from
5 to 6,5 points; good mark is from 7 to 9 points.

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Graph 1. Result of tests after 5 months of the first groups (12A1)
* Test in September 2021, the beginning of the experiment:
* Test January 2022, the final test after the experiment’s time:

25

23

19

20

15

13

10

8

5

6

6
4

5
0
0

Good

0
Above average

Average

Test in September 2021

Weakness

Poverty

Test January 2022

The graph shows and compares the results of the two tests taken at the
beginning of the experiment in September 2021 and in January 2022, after a term
of the first group.
As can be seen from the column graph, most of the students (23 students

=54,8 %) in this groups get very low mark after 5 months , from 1 to 4,5 points
when doing the tests in the experiment and a moderate percentage (13 students =
30,9%) could get the average mark because the teacher still uses the traditional
methods in teaching reading lessons. Only 6 students (14,3%) get above average
and no students gets good mark after 5 months with different tests about relative
pronouns and clauses. It is obvious that without innovating techniques to practice
during grammatical classes, little progress is seen in this group after a term.

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Graph 2. Result of tests after 5 months of the second groups (12A6)
*Test in September 2021, the beginning of the experiment:
* Test January 2022, the final test after the experiment’s time:
17

18
15

16

14

14
11

12

10

10
7

8

7

6
3

4
2
0

0
Good

0
Above average

Average

Test in September 2021

Weakness

Poverty

Test January 2022

The graph shows and compares the results of the two tests taken at the
beginning of the experiment in September 2021 and in January 2022, after a term
of the second group.
As can be seen in the graph, this group of students has made great
progress in completing the filling reading tests after 5 months thanks to the
applying the new methods during reading lessons both in class and at home.
From the compared numbers, it is clear that the number of students with very
weak and weak points has reduced from 21 (50%) to 7 students (16,7%).
While, the number of students getting average grade and above average has
significantly increased, from 21 students (50%) to 32 students (76,19%). 3
students (7,11%) have got good mark in the filling reading test at the end of
the first semester, compared with no student (0%) at the beginning .

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Graph 3. Compare the results of two groups through the test in January 2022
*Group 1: the controlling group
*Group 2: the experimental group
Through the assessment in class 12A1, 12A6 students of my charge, I
achieved the following result:

19

20
17

18
15

16

13

14
12
10
8

7

6

6
4
2
0

4

3
0
Good

0
Above average

Average
12A1

Weakness

Poverty

12A6

Comparing the results between the two classes, we see that the number of
students of my charge getting average marks has increased. This means that most
of the students know how to do the multiple-choice filling reading quickly and
effectively. They tried their best to identify the word type at each blank position in
the passage as well as rely on the context to effectively guess the answer. By this
way, they have enough time to finish their task in advance.
Through the process of applying these methods to improve filling reading
comprehension skills for the 12th graders at Nguyen Thi Loi high school, I have
found out that most students are interested in reading lessons. Especially for weak
students, they feel more confident of doing this type of exercise.

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PART IV. CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS
1. Conclusion
Mastering reading skill is very important for all English learners. On the
whole, from the result gained before and after the application of the new ideas in

the study, the quality of learning filling reading activities in grade 12 has been
significantly improved. They find out the answers quickly and accurately. The
number of very weak and weak students has dropped drastically from 23 (54,76%)
students to 7 (16,7%) students. The number of students gaining good grades
significantly from 0 (0%) to 3 (7,11%) students. All these are evidences to prove
that the introduced filling reading techniques to help student improve their quality
of the reading skills.
2. Proposal
2.1. To teachers:
- Try to use different methods to encourage students to enlarge their
vocabulary and become confident in doing the filling reading tests.
2.2. To students:
- Apply these above methods to do as many multiple-choice filling reading
as possible to improve reading skills.
- Spend time learning vocabulary and mastering the grammatical knowledge
so that it will be easier when doing filling reading tasks.

THE PRINCIPAL'S CONFIRMATION

Thanh Hoa, May 5th 2022
Undertaking not to copy

Nguyễn Thị Xuân

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REFERENCES:

1. English vocabulary in use (Michael McCarthy/ Felicity O’Dell, Cambridge
University Press)
2. Harmer, Jeremy: The Practise of English Language teaching, Longman, 1993.
3. Longman: Preparation course for the TOEFL TEST – Deborah Phillips
4. Fundamentals of English Grammar – Betty Schrampfer Azar.
5. Understanding and using English Grammar – Betty Schrampfer Azar.
6. Mann, M & Taylore-Knowles, S. (2003). Reading skills for First Certificate.
Macmillan Publishers Ltd.
7. Dr. Than Trong Lien Nhan, (2000). English language teaching methodology.
Hue University of Foreign Languages.

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DANH MỤC SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM
ĐÃ ĐƯỢC HỘI ĐỒNG SÁNG KIẾN KINH NGHIỆM
NGÀNH GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO HUYỆN, TỈNH VÀ CÁC CẤP CAO
HƠN XẾP LOẠI TỪ C TRỞ LÊN
Họ và tên tác giả: Nguyễn Thị Xuân
Chức vụ và đơn vị công tác: Giáo viên Tiếng Anh – Trường THPT Nguyễn Thị
Lợi, Tp Sầm Sơn, tỉnh Thanh Hóa.

TT
1.

Tên đề tài SKKN
MỘT SỐ GIẢI PHÁP
NÂNG CAO CHẤT

Cấp đánh giá
xếp loại
(Ngành GD cấp
huyện/tỉnh;
Tỉnh...)
Sở GD&ĐT
Thanh Hóa

Kết quả
đánh giá
xếp loại
(A, B,
hoặc C)
Loại B

Sở GD&ĐT
Thanh Hóa

Loại C

Năm học
đánh giá
xếp loại
2016 2017

LƯỢNG SINH HOẠT CHI
BỘ TẠI TRƯỜNG THPT
NGUYỄN THỊ LỢI
2.

RELATIVE CLAUSES
WITH TYPES OF
EXERCISES AND SOME
TIPS

2020 2021

3.
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5.
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