A study on communicative activities in english reading classes for the 10th from students=nghiên cứu về các hoạt động giao tiếp trong bài học tiếng anh cho học sinh lớp 10

VINH UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

==== ====

A STUDY ON COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES IN
ENGLISH READING CLASSES FOR THE 10TH
FORM STUDENTS
(NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ CÁC HOẠT ĐỘNG GIAO TIẾP TRONG
BÀI ĐỌC TIẾNG ANH CHO HỌC SINH LỚP 10)

GRADUATION THESIS
FIELD: ENGLISH TEACHING METHODOLOGY

Student:

VŨ HẢI YẾN, 47A1_ENGLISH

Supervisor: NGUYỄN THỊ VÂN LAM, M.A.

VINH, 2010

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This study has been finished with the support and encouragement of many
people to whom I am grateful.
First of all, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor,
Mrs. Nguyen Thi Van Lam, M.A. With her profound knowledge and experience in
teaching English as well as great enthusiasm, she has given me a lot of valuable

advice, suggestion and encouragement during my researching process.
I would also like to give my sincere thanks to all my teachers from the
Foreign Languages Department of Vinh University for their lectures and advice
which are very useful for me to finish this study.
I am fully grateful to the help of all the teachers and students at Thach Thanh
II High School so that I could finish the survey for my study.
Finally, I wish to thank my family and my friends who have encouraged and
supported me during the time of doing this study.
Though the study has been done with all my attempts, my limitations of
ability and knowledge may cause mistakes in the study. Therefore, I would like to
receive any regard and comment from you on my study.

Vinh, May 2010
Vu Hai Yen

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................ i
TABLE OF CONTENTS ........................................................................................ ii
ABBREVIATION ................................................................................................... v
PART I

INTRODUCTION .............................................................................. 1

1. Reasons for Choosing the Study ................................................................................... 1
2. Aims and Objectives of the Study................................................................................. 2
3. Scope of the Study ........................................................................................................ 2
4. Method of the Study ...................................................................................................... 3

5. Design of the Study ....................................................................................................... 3

PART II

DEVELOPMENT ............................................................................. 5

CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND .......................................................... 5
1.1. Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) .............................................................. 5
1.1.1. Aims of CLT ........................................................................................................... 5
1.1.2. Teacher Roles and Learner Roles in CLT ............................................................... 6
1.1.2.1. Teacher Roles ....................................................................................................... 6
1.1.2.2. Learner Roles ....................................................................................................... 6
1.2. The Communication Continuum ................................................................................ 7
1.2.1. Characteristics of Communicative Activities ......................................................... 7
1.2.2. Purposes of Communicative Activities ................................................................... 8
1.2.3. Types of Communicative Activities in Language Teaching ................................... 8
1.3. Reading Skill .............................................................................................................. 9
1.3.1. Definition of Reading .............................................................................................. 9
1.3.2. The Importance of Reading ................................................................................... 10
1.3.3. Principles for Teaching Reading in a CLT Classroom ......................................... 11
1.3.4. Types of Reading Activities in Language Classes ................................................ 13
1.4. Summary .................................................................................................................. 15

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CHAPTER 2: REAL SITUATION OF TEACHING AND LEARNING
ENGLISH READING SKILL AT THACH THANH II HIGH SCHOOL .................. 16
2.1. Characteristics of the 10th Form Students ................................................................ 16
2.2. Characteristics of the New Textbook “Tieng Anh 10” ............................................ 17

2.3. Design of a Reading Lesson for the 10th Form Students ........................................ 19
2.4. Situation of Teaching and Learning English Reading Skill at Thach Thanh II
High School ..................................................................................................................... 21
2.5. The Survey on the 10th Form Students and Teachers of English at Thach Thanh
II High School ................................................................................................................. 22
2.5.1. Aims of the Survey................................................................................................ 22
2.5.2. Description of the Survey...................................................................................... 22
2.5.3. Result of the Survey .............................................................................................. 23
2.6. Summary .................................................................................................................. 31
CHAPTER 3: SUGGESTED COMMUNICATIVE ACTIVITIES TO IMPROVE
ENGLISH READING SKILLS FOR THE 10TH FORM STUDENTS ........................ 32
3.1. Introduction .............................................................................................................. 32
3.2. Suggested Communicative Activities to Improve English Reading Skills
for the 10th Form Students .............................................................................................. 34
3.2.1. Out of Ten ............................................................................................................. 34
3.2.2. Finding Synonyms................................................................................................ 34
3.2.3. Get it wrong ......................................................................................................... 35
3.2.4. Role Play ............................................................................................................... 36
3.2.5. Students Interview ................................................................................................ 36
3.2.6. Completing Network ............................................................................................. 37
3.2.7. Crossword Puzzle.................................................................................................. 38
3.2.8. Lucky Number ...................................................................................................... 38
3.3. Sample Reading Communicative Activities ............................................................ 39
3.4 Summary ................................................................................................................... 48

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PART III

CONCLUSION .............................................................................. 49

3.1. Recapitulation .......................................................................................................... 49
3.2. Suggestions for Further Studies ............................................................................... 50

REFERENCES
Appendix 1
Appendix 2

ABBREVIATIONS

5


CLT:

Communicative Language Teaching

A:

Answer

Q:

Question

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PART I:

INTRODUCTION

1. Reasons for Choosing the Study
Language is the most important means for people to communicate to each
other. Nowadays, with the non-stop development of society and the tendency of
integration among the countries over the world, English becomes an official and
effective international communicative language. English is widely used in many
fields of life such as science, technology, education, etc. As a result, more and more
people are studying English with the hope that they can meet the requirements of
society in general and of their jobs in particular.
In education, especially, for High school grade, English now is a compulsory
subject not only in teaching and learning but also in many important examinations.
It is, therefore, comprehensible why nowadays students learning English with a
great concern. They not only study English because it is compulsory but also
because they are interested in English and they are aware well of the importance of
English for their job in the future.
As a matter of fact, it is not easy to master a foreign language at all. Learning
English is not an exception. It requires many sub-skills such as listening, speaking,
reading and writing. Being a receptive skill, reading also has some certain
requirements to the students, not just a process of understanding grammar structures
mechanically. In fact, many students are very good at grammar and vocabulary but
they cannot finish the reading tasks successfully.
Of course, there are many ways to teach reading skill, however, the given
question is that which way is the most effective for the students. Nowadays, we are
trying to teach English in a communicative way. Communicative activities,
therefore, are becoming an essential part in language learning. In real teaching in
high school, not many teachers use communicative activities in English classes,
especially in reading lessons. They only teach students reading skills through
mechanical drills in the textbook. Thus, the author carries out a study on the

communicative activities in English reading classes to somewhat help students to
improve their reading skill in particular and their language competence in general.

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For the reasons above, the author decides to choose the topic “A Study on
Communicative Activities in English Reading Classes for the 10th Form Students”
as the study of her graduation thesis.
2. Aims and Objectives of the Study
The aims and objectives of the study are as follows:
- To provide some basic knowledge ranging from CLT, Communicative
Continuum to Reading Skill.
- To make an investigation into the real situation of using communicative
activities in teaching and learning English reading skill at Thach Thanh II High
school.
- To provide some suggested communicative activities to partly improve
reading skills for the 10th form students.
To fully achieve these aims, the study has to answer the following questions:
* What are Communicative Activities? What is “reading”?
* What is the real situation of using communicative activities in English
reading lessons for the 10th form students at Thach Thanh II High school?
* What kinds of Communicative Activities can be applied in English reading
classes to improve reading skill for the 10th students?
3. Scope of the Study
The study concerns about communicative activities and reading skill.
However, “A Study on Communicative Activities in English Reading Classes for
the 10th Form Students” is a broad topic and it cannot be exploited in the study due
to the limitation of a graduation thesis. Therefore, within this study, the author just
mentions about some background knowledge about CLT and reading skill as well as

some communicative activities in language classes.
Furthermore, in this study, the author also attempts to carry out the research
on the situation of teaching and learning English reading skill at Thach Thanh II
High School. From these, the author‟s purpose is to give some suggested
communicative activities as a technique to partly improve reading skills for the 10 th
form students.

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4. Method of the Study
To finish this study, the author has used quantitative and qualitative methods.
First, the author collects and analyzes the materials which refer to CLT,
Reading Skill and Communicative Activities in English reading classes.
Then, she conducts a survey to get information about the real situation about
teaching and learning English reading at Thach Thanh II High School.
After that, the author analyzes and synthesizes the collected data.
Finally, the author discusses about some suggested communicative activities
in English reading classes for the 10th form students.
5. Design of the Study
The study has three main parts. Part I is “INTRODUCTION” which
consists of the author‟s reasons for choosing the study, aims, scope, methods, and
design of the study.
Part II entitled “DEVELOPMENT” includes three chapters. Chapter 1,
“Theoretical Background”, provides some background knowledge about CLT, the
aims of CLT, learner roles and teacher roles in CLT. This chapter also gives an
overview on the Communicative Continuum, characteristics, purposes and some
types of communicative activities in language teaching. In addition, the author
briefly introduces reading skill with definition of reading, the importance, the
principles for teaching reading and types of reading activities in CLT classroom.

Chapter 2 is titled “Real Situation of Teaching and Learning Reading
Skill at Thach Thanh II High School”. In this chapter, the author mentions about
some characteristics of the 10th form students and the new textbook “Tieng Anh
10”, the design of a reading lesson for the 10th form students as well. This chapter
mainly focuses on the situation of using communicative activities in English reading
classes for 10th form students at Thach Thanh II High School.
Chapter 3 entitled “Suggested Communicative Activities” presents some
criteria for selecting communicative activities in English reading classes for the 10th
form students. In addition, the author also provides some suggested communicative
activities to improve reading skills for the 10th students and some sample

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communicative activities that she has applied in her real teaching at Thach Thanh II
High School.
Part III is “CONCLUSION” in which the author summarizes the main
points in the study and suggests some topics for further studies.
The study ends with the “REFERENCES” which lists all the materials and
sources of information used in this study, and the “APPENDIX” in which the
samples of questionnaires for teachers and students are mentioned.

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PART II:

DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

1.1.

The Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)

1.1.1. The Aims of CLT
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) began in Britain in the 1960s as a
replacement to the ealier structural method called Situational Language Teaching.
The goal of CLT is to develop what Hymes (1972, cited in Richards and
Rodgers 2001: 159) referred to as “communicative competence”. This term was
referred in order to contrast to Chomsky‟s theory of grammatical competence. For
Chomsky, linguistic theory was mainly concentrated on the mastery of grammatical
structures, on the knowledge of sentence building, the ability to produce
grammatically correct sentences in a language.
In contrast, Hymes‟s theory of communicative competence focused on what
a speaker needs to know in order to be communicatively competent in a speech of
community. In other words, communicative competence can be understood as the
ability to use language correctly and appropriately to accomplish the
communication goals in authentic and meaningful situations. Communicative
competence is measured by determining if, and to what degree, the goals of
interaction are achieved.
In addition, CLT also developed procedures for the teaching of the four skills
that knowledge the interdependence of language and communication. Because
communicative principles can be applied to the teaching of any skill, at any level,
and because of the wide variety of classroom activities, description of typical
classroom procedures used in a lesson based on CLT principles is not feasible. In
CLT, traditional procedures are not rejected but they are reinterpreted and
expanded. Teaching points are introduced in dialogue form, grammatical items are
isolated for controlled practice, and then freer activities are provided. Pair and
group work is suggested to encourage students to use and practice functions and
forms. It can be said that CLT procedures are evolutionary rather than

revolutionary.

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1.1.2. Learner Roles and Teacher Roles in CLT
The aims of CLT, “communicative competence” also implies new roles in
the classroom for teacher and learners. So how do the roles of teacher and learners
change in CLT? In traditional second language classroom, teacher was the center,
teacher controlled every activities in the class. Teacher talks all the time and
students only listen and write down everything. However, in CLT, the role of
teacher and students has changed a lot.
1.1.2.1. Teacher Roles
According to Breen and Candlin (1980:99, cited in Richards and Rodgers,
2001:167), teacher in CLT has some main roles following:
The first role is to facilitate the communicate process between all participants
in the classroom and the various activities and texts.
The second role is to act as an independent participant within the learningteaching group.
The third role for the teacher is that of researcher and learner, with much to
contribute in terms of appropriate knowledge and abilities, actual and observed
experience of the nature of learning and organizational capacities.
Other roles assumed for teacher are needed analyst, counselor, and group process
manager.
CLT procedures often require teachers to acquire less teacher-centered
classroom management skills. It is the teacher‟s responsibility to organize the
classroom as a setting for communication and communicative activities.
1.1.2.2. Learner Roles
Since the teacher‟s role in CLT is less dominant than in a teacher-centered
method, students are seen as more responsible managers of their own learning.
According to Breen and Candlind (1980:110, cited in Richards and Rodgers,

2001:166), the learners can be negotiators - between the self, the learning process,
and the object of learning – emerges from and interacts with the role of joint
negotiator within the group and within the classroom procedures and activities
which the group undertakes. The implication for the learner is that he should
contribute as much as he gains, and thereby learn in an interdependent way.

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Additionally, in CLT, students are expected to interact primarily with each
other than with the teacher and to engage in negotiating meaning actively. The
correction of errors maybe absent or infrequent. Thus, CLT procedures should be
focused on learner-centered instructions to enhance the students‟ communicative
competence.
1.2. Communicative Continuum
1.2.1. Characteristics of Communicative Activities
Communication between humans is an extremely complex and everchanging phenomenon, but there are certain characteristics that the great majority of
communicative

events

share.

Communicative

Activities

also

share

the

characteristics of communication. They are various depending on each
communicative situation with a particular purpose.
As we know that students‟ motivation in real communication is very
important, thus, the students should have desire to communicate. In other words, the
activity must be genuinely communicative and really promoting language use. The
students should also have some kinds of communicative purposes rather than just
practicing the language. In addition, when the students engage in talking to each
other, they must be focused on what they are saying not how they say it. The
activity must involve the students in using a variety of language, not just one
specific language form. The students should free to improvise, using whatever
resources they choose.
In CLT, classroom activities must be designed for students to do by
themselves rather than with the teacher. When students are involved in
communication, the teacher should not intervene, telling students what they are
making mistakes, insisting on accuracy, etc. Besides, the activity should not be
designed to force students to use a certain language in communication. The choice
of what to say and how to say it should rest with the students.
To conclude, there are six main characteristics of communicative activities as
follows:
* A desire to communicate
* A communicative purpose

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* Content not form
* Variety of language

* No teacher intervention
* No material control
In real communication, it seems to be impossible for an activity to meet all
the criteria discussed above. The value of an activity should be considered based on
the aim of that activity and on what context the activity is used.
1.2.2. Purposes of Communicative Activities
1.2.2.1. Communicative Activities allow natural learning
Language learning requires the learners‟ knowledge about many aspects of
language such as vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, etc. In real language
teaching, the teacher can not control the students‟ acquisition of all aspects because
language learning takes place inside the learners. Some aspects of language learning
can take place only through natural acquisition process in which the learners are
involved in using the language for communication.
1.2.2.2. Communicative Activities promote learning motivation
Students always take part in real communication to each other with a specific
purpose. Their motivation to learn will be improved if the classroom learning
procedure is designed with many activities related to their communicative purpose
and can help them to achieve it successfully.
1.2.2.3. Communicative Activities create a context which support learning
In language learning, the learning atmosphere in the classroom is also very
important. It somewhat affects the students‟ learning. Communicative Activities can
create a positive learning atmosphere by providing opportunities for students
interacting with each other and with the teacher as well. The interaction can support
students in their efforts to learn.
1.2.3. Types of Communicative Activities
It can be said that activity is an important part in the procedure of any
language classroom. Through activities, students can improve their communicative
competence by interacting with other students and with the teacher. In real teaching,
depending on the content of each lesson, the level of students, the teacher can

14


design many activities that support students‟ learning. There are two main types of
Communicative Activities mentioned in Nguyen Thi Van Lam and Ngo Dinh
Phuong (2007) as Oral Communicative Activities and Written Communicative
Activities.
For the first type of Communicative Activities, there are various sub-types
which help to promote oral communication in the classroom such as Reaching a
Consensus, Relaying Construction, Communication games, Problem Solving,
Interpersonal Exchange, Story Construction and Simulation and Role Play.
For the second one, there are also various sub-types of activities which help
promote written communication in the classroom such as Relaying Instructions,
Exchanging Letters, Writing Games, Fluency Writing, Story Construction and
Writing Report and Advertisements.
1.3. Reading Skill
1.3.1. Definition of Reading
Reading is an important skill in order to master a language. However, it is
not easy to establish a clear definition of reading. The ways of understanding about
reading are different, depending on the reading purposes of the readers. Most
educators would agree that the major purpose of reading should be the construction
of meaning - comprehending and actively responding to what is read. From this
purpose, there have been two main ways to understand about the term “reading” as
follows:
First, “reading is a complex information processing skill in which the
readers interact with the text to (re)create meaningful discourse” (Silberstein, 1993,
p.12).
It can be inferred from this definition that reading is not just a process of
picking up the literal meaning by understanding the meaning of all words in the
given text. The readers, when reading a text, have to coordinate a lot of information

related to the text to interpret it in a meaningful way. By this way, the readers can
facilitate reading comprehension tasks and also understand the text better.
Second, “reading is the process of constructing meaning through the
dynamic interaction among the reader’s existing knowledge,

15

the information


suggested by the text being read and the context of the reading situation” (cited
from .)
In this point of view, in order to understand the text thoroughly, the readers
have to use their own knowledge to interpret the information in the given text. In
addition, it is possible that the meaning of a text varies depending on each reading
context; therefore, a good reader should be an active and flexible one who can apply
various reading strategies to infer the meaning of a text in different situations.
As mentioned above, there have been many ways of defining reading,
however, these are two of the most widely cited and agreed-upon definitions. From
these definitions, we can see that the readers play an important role in deducing the
text in order to realize communicative functions. Thus, it is necessary for the
students learning how to read in an effective way.
1.3.2. The Importance of Reading
Like listening, reading is a receptive skill with many sub skills just as
involved in listening. Reading is very important in real life in general and in
language learning in particular. “Reading may contribute significantly to
competence in a second language. This is a good reason, in fact, to hypothesize that
reading makes a contribution to overall competence, to all four skills” (Krashen &
Terrel, 1983:131).
From this point of view, reading can enhance the learners‟ general language

competence. The students‟ ultimate objective is to use language in real
communication. Thus, by reading a lot, students can improve their English
background knowledge and their English vocabulary as well. These things can help
students use language creatively in real life.
In addition, reading also makes a great contribution to other language skills.
We know that the four language skills are closely related to each other not only in
teaching but in learning as well. When reading, students have a chance to enrich
their vocabulary, grammatical structures, and their knowledge about the real world,
etc. For this reason, the improvement of reading can promote further improvement
in other skills such as speaking, listening and writing as well. In order to be good

16


language learners, it is necessary for students to master all four language skills
together.
1.3.3. Principles for Teaching Reading in a CLT Classroom
As mentioned above, reading skill plays an important role in English
language learning. Therefore, it is necessary to have a set of principles that teachers
of English must follow when teaching reading so that they can ensure their students‟
understanding of the lessons.
Forseth et. al. (1996:84-85) has pointed out principles for teaching reading as
follows:
1. State the purpose of a reading task to the students before they read.
It is obvious that people have their own purpose when reading a text. Thus, it
is beneficial to state a purpose for reading the given text. The teacher should tell the
students why they are reading a text. By means of this, the students can focus on the
text better for they know what information they need to get after reading.
2. Prepare students to read by introducing the topic of the text.
When teaching a reading text, the teacher should introduce the topic of the

text beforehand to prepare for students with general knowledge about what they are
going to do in the text. If the subject is difficult, provide students with background
information. When the students are prepared carefully before reading, they will
comprehend the text more thoroughly.
3. Before the students read the text, have them read questions about it beforehand to
help them focus on meaning.
Normally, each reading passage in the textbook has some questions relating
to its content for students to answer after reading. Therefore, have students read the
questions first will guide them to what information they need to understand the text.
If questions do not come with the text, the teacher can make up one or two which
will help the students concentrate. It is even helpful to have them try to answer the
questions before they read the text.
4. Do not pre-teach vocabulary unless necessary
We know that one of the skills readers should learn is to guess the meaning
of unknown words. If all words are presented beforehand, this will prevent them

17


from being able to guess from context. Besides, it is very ineffective for students to
remember the meaning of lists of isolating words. Instead of doing in this way, the
teacher should work on skills that help the students guess intelligently. If a word is
rarely used, it is better to ignore it then.
5. Have students read silently without whispering the words or moving the lips.
Reading silently will help students to read more quickly and focus on more
important words. Moreover, the students will be able to pay attention on meaning,
not to the form of words only.
6. Discuss difficult vocabulary after reading the text.
After reading, if the students are not able to understand certain words by
guessing from the context, the teacher will help them by explaining the meaning of

the words.
7. When discussing the answer to the comprehension questions, be sure to refer
back to the text often.
Generally, the comprehension questions are aimed at checking whether
students have understood the contents of the reading text or not. Thus, referring
back to the text will help the teacher check the students‟ understanding as well as
make them realize where in the text that information locates.
8. Focus on developing the skills of the readers.
The goal of teaching reading is not only to help the students to understand
the text for that day, but also to help them to effectively read for themselves after
class. It means that they can apply sub-skills that are taught in the classroom to read
any kind of text in their daily life.
In short, there are a number of principles that the teacher must follow when
teaching reading. Depending on the features of each class and each reading lesson
as well as the level of students that the teacher can choose an appropriate one for
their reading classes.
1.3.4. Types of Reading Activities in Language Classes
Like other language skills, Reading skill also involves a variety of reading
activities. In a study of teaching reading, Forseth et al (1996) have analyzed such
types of activities as follows:

18


* Word Attack Skills
There are three sub-skills of this type:
+ Affix Analysis: Guessing at the meaning of the words by examining their stems,
prefixes and suffixes
Example: Geology = geo + ology = earth + study
+ Context guessing: When reading a text, the readers can infer the meaning of

many unknown words by looking at surrounding words in the passage. This can
help students improve their skills for guessing new words and avoid an excessive
use of the dictionary.
+ Grammatical Clues: From the context in which the word is used and the form of
the word itself, the readers can deduce what part of speech a word is. It means that
the readers can realize whether a word is a noun, a verb, an adjective or an adverb
through grammar.
* Skimming
In this activity, the teacher provides students with a passage to read quickly
to look for the main ideas. The teacher has them write a title for the passage or a
single sentence covering the main point.
* Predicting
The teacher provides portions of a text in successive stages after students
guess at what might come next in the text. After they predict, the teacher hands out
the next portion of the text and then check if their guesses are correct.
* Scanning
In contrast with skimming, scanning requires students to find the certain
specific information of the text. This type of activity can be applied in many
different types of reading text such as poems, phone books, graphs and stories.
* Critical Reading
This activity is usually used for advanced-level students. The teacher
provides students with a new story or letter which has clearly false information. The
students have to give their opinions on the text or find the false information.

19


* Outlining
We know that outlining is quite familiar in writing skill but how about in
reading skill? For the beginning level students, the teacher can give them a list of

words and ask them to place those words in an outline form or in categories.
Students must decide how to organize them. For the higher-level students, they are
required to put a highly structured text in an outline form. Later, the teacher asks
them to make sketch outlines of their assigned reading.
* Paraphrasing
The teacher gives students a list of words or sentences and asks them to
paraphrase by writing them again using very similar meaning, different words and
different grammatical structure.
For examples:
Talent = intelligent, clever
Winner = the person who gets the first prize in a competition
It is difficult to learn English = Learning English is difficult
* Inference
In this kind of activity, the teacher asks students questions that force them to
“read between the lines”. In other words, the students have to infer the implicit or
hidden meaning of the text.
* Summarizing
Like skimming, summarizing also relates to the main ideas of the passage.
However, summarizing skill requires the students to find what in the text is the most
important, more significant and less significant. A summary should only include
important information. Thus, the teacher should tell the students how long the
summary should be.

20


* Comprehension questions
A wide variety of questions can be written to test the reader‟s
comprehension. Some types of questions are short answer, single word, multiple
choice, true or false, or open-ended.

* Timed reading
The teacher provides students the reading texts of different lengths and
difficulty. Students are asked to read within a given time frame and then turn their
papers over (or close their books) to answer questions about the text.
* Strip Stories (or Ordering Exercises)
For this type of activity, the teacher uses a story that students can understand,
then jumbles up the order of sentences and asks students to put them in the right
order by assigning them the correct numbers.
* Cloze
The students are given an appropriate text. After reading, they are provided
with the same or a similar passage with some words taken out. The students have to
fill in the blanks with acceptable words. For the lower levels, the teacher should
give the students a list of words to choose from in advance.
* Non-Prose Reading
In this type, the students are provided with charts, graphs, maps, etc., and
asked various comprehension questions
1.4. Summary
In this chapter, the author has attempted to make an overview about CLT, its
aims, the learner roles and teacher roles in CLT. The author has also mentioned
about characteristics, the purposes and some types of Communicative Activities in
language classes. In addition, the definition of reading, the importance of reading,
the principles

for teaching reading and types of reading activities have been

discussed in this part.

21

CHAPTER 2: REAL SITUATION OF TEACHING AND LEARNING
ENGLISH AT THACH THANH II HIGH SCHOOL
2.1. Characteristics of the 10th Form Students
High school students, especially the 10th form ones are in between childhood
and adulthood – a crucial period in the development of students both in bodies and
minds. Generally, at this age, students always try to express themselves in expect
that the others regard them as adults.
The 10th form students are also an age of transition from secondary school to
high school. Students now learn how to behave as an adult in a new learning
environment. As a matter of fact, their thoughts as well as their behaviors in this
period are unpredictable. It is obvious that the physical and spiritual development of
students somewhat affect their studying. Therefore, if the teachers do not
understand their students in the right way they will themselves enlarge the gap
between teachers and students that may lead to some negative effects in teaching
and learning.
After the two-month period of teaching practice at Thach Thanh II High
School, the author herself has experienced a lot of interesting things as having a
chance to teach the 10th form students. Of course, two-month period is not a long
time enough to understand thoroughly about students, however, the author attempts
to give some common characteristics of the 10th form students as follows:
- They are in the age of transition, confusion and self-consciousness and
changing both in bodies and minds.
- They want to prove themselves to be more mature. Nevertheless,
sometimes they behave in a very childlike way.
- Students focus more on their learning and their learning now is selective.
They pay much attention to some subjects that they consider more necessary for
them than others.
- Making friends is also quite selective. They only make friend with a small
number of students who have the same interests with them. As a result, they like
talking and playing within their groups than with the whole class.

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- Most of students want to be “the center of attention”. They take part in
activities in the class enthusiastically to show their abilities, to declare their position
in the class. That leads to a situation in which they compete with each other more at
school.
- Still having some students who are not confident in themselves. They are so
shy to express their abilities, their feelings. They are also afraid of loosing their face
in front of other students.
As mentioned above, there are several characteristics of the 10th form
students that somewhat affect their learning at school. Therefore, it is necessary to
have a set of consideration to teach the 10th form students in teaching in general and
teaching English reading in particular. If the teachers understand their students in
the right way, they can easily find an appropriate way to teach students effectively.
As a consequence, the studying results of the 10th form students will improve day
by day.
2.2. Characteristics of the New Textbook “Tieng Anh 10”.
The society is changing day by day with the non-stop development of
science, technology. To meet the higher requirement of modern life, the
requirement for education is also higher and higher. Along with the renewal of
teaching methodology is the necessity to renew the syllabus of the textbooks. After
years of discussion, since the beginning of the school year 2006-2007, the new
textbooks have been applied for the 10th form.
In this study, the author only points out some main differences between the
new English textbook for the 10th grade in comparison with the old one.
The old English textbook is designed mainly for three-year educational
curriculum. It concludes 36 lessons and 4 review lessons. The topics in the old
English books are various and familiar with the daily life, however, the lessons

mainly focus on providing grammatical issues for students. Each one contains a
dialogue which introduces some vocabulary related to the topic and presents models
for equivalent grammatical issues of that lesson. Following the dialogue are two or
three exercises helping students to practice grammar that they have learned. English
skills are not focused adequately.

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The new English textbook is divided into two types: one is for students at the
basic level of English and the other is for advanced ones. Within the scope of this
study, the author only conducts the research on the one for basic English.
The new English textbook is theme–based with 16 units and the other 6
lessons are for revision. Each unit has an equivalent topic and the similar syllabus
with 5 main parts as follows:
READING includes one or more passages from 180-200 words in length. It
is conducted with the aim at providing general information and materials for the
whole lesson. After each reading text, there are usually 3-4 reading tasks that aim to
improve reading comprehension skill of students.
SPEAKING is designed with various kinds of communicative activities that
enable students to develop their speaking skill. The teacher can ask students to work
in pairs, in groups or individual presentations depending on the requirement of each
speaking tasks. The topics for speaking are various and based on the topic of each
particular unit in the textbook.
LISTENING is also divided into three main parts: Before you listen, While
you listen and After you listen.

This part usually contains a dialogue or a

paragraph related to the topic of each lesson which aims at helping students practice

their listening skills through a number of listening activities such as Deciding on
True/False Statements, Completing a dialogue, Gap-Filling, Comprehension
Questions. In addition, Listening also partly improve students‟ pronunciation skills
and their English vocabulary as well.
WRITING is conducted with many types of exercises such as writing a letter,
describing a place, writing an announcement following different kinds of text. Most
of the writing lessons in the textbook for the 10th grade have two writing tasks. Task
1 is the one which get students to be familiar with the model of a writing
composition of each unit. This task is regarded as the preparation step for writing
the task 2. Task 2 requires students to write about a topic following the model in the
task 1.
LANGUAGE FOCUS has two smaller parts: Pronunciation and Grammar &
Vocabulary. Pronunciation helps students pronounce English sounds more

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correctly, helps them to distinguish between two similar sounds (both monothongs
and diphthongs). This part also gives students some practice of those sounds in
minimal pairs and in short sentences. Grammar & Vocabulary is aimed at helping
students revise the main grammatical points and vocabulary issues which are the
focus of the unit. It also provides exercises for students practice using such
grammatical points just introduced.
The six lessons for revision are written in the form of “TEST YOURSELF”.
All exercises in “Test Yourself” help students test their ability and knowledge in
four skills after 2-3 units when students have finished from 10-15 periods. Those
exercises are also for teachers to prepare 45 minutes‟ tests for students. The mark
given for each part in TEST YOURSELF is as follow:
Listening: 2.5 points
Reading: 2.5 points

Writing: 2.5 points
Language Focus: 2.5 points
At the end of the book is the list of vocabulary which is sectioned following each
unit with the transcript and Vietnamese meaning.
To conclude, the syllabus of the new textbook for the 10th form students has
much improvement compared with the old one. As for the old one, all four English
skills and the grammar issues are mixed with each other and there are not many
communicative activities for students to practice. In contrast, the new English
textbook is divided into individual skills (Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing,
Language Focus). This is the most obvious difference between the new English
textbook with the old one. By means of this, students have more chances to practice
and improve their language skills. In short, the new English Textbook for the 10th
form is really an innovation in all efforts to renew the learning syllabus with a view
to helping students study English better.
2.3. Design of a Reading Lesson for the 10th Form Students
A reading lesson in the new textbook for the 10th form is divided into three
main parts: BEFORE YOU READ, WHILE YOU READ and AFTER YOU
READ.

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