FINAL TEST OF TOPIC IN APPLIED LINGUISTICS: A Study on the Reading Skills of EFL University Students

Fitri Olifia

2201409092

Thursday, 403-404

A Study on the Reading Skills of EFL University Students

1. SUMMARY

This study is conducted based on some finding of some studies that reading a lot is very important for EFL students without getting much exposure to reading materials in class, EFL students cannot make much progress. Realizing the importance of reading for EFL students, it is very crucial for EFL students to have good reading proficiency, and reading proficiency is determined by reading skills.

Considering the importance of mastering reading skills, the writers then conducted a research to get further investigation about what types of reading skills that the EFL students have difficulty and from those types, which one is the most difficult.

1.      Method

This writer focused on the investigation of the reading skills of ten batch-2003-students studying at an English Department of a private university in Surabaya. In doing the data collection, the writers used some steps.

The first step was to analyze the kinds of reading skills which were taught in the department. There are seventeen reading skills which were taught there: (1) scanning, (2) skimming, (3) improving reading speed,(4) structural clues: morphology (word part), (5) structural clues: morphology (compound words), (6) inference from context, (7) using a dictionary, (8) interpreting pro-forms, (9) interpreting pro-forms, (10) interpreting lexical cohesion, (11) recognizing text organization, (12) recognizing presupposition underlying the text, (13) recognizing implications making inference, (14) prediction, (15) distinguishing between fact and opinion, (16) paraphrasing, and (17) summarizing.

The second step of the data collection was to develop two reading tests. Each test consists of two reading texts. The researchers then developed test items based on those reading texts. The test items covered seventeen kinds of reading skills mentioned above. Each reading test consisted of thirty four items as the representatives of seventeen kinds of reading skills.

The third step was piloting the two reading tests. He piloting was aimed to help the writers to see whether the two reading tests had clear and good instructions and items. After piloting the two reading tests, the writers did some minor revisions concerning typographical errors and unclear instructions.

The next step of the data collection was to distribute the reading tests to ten students of English Department Batch 2003 students who had already passed all reading classes.

The last step of the data collection was to check and count the result of both reading tests. In doing this, the writers used answer keys. If the respondents’ answers were correct or in accordance with the answer keys more than 75%, the respondents got full mark. On the other hand, if the respondents’ answers were just in accordance with the answer keys less than 75%, the respondents got zero.

The first step of data analysis was to analyze the results of each reading test. The results were put in two separated tables. Each table was divided into four columns.

The next step of the data analysis was to list seventeen kinds of reading skills which were listed in the reading tests. Then the percentage of incorrect answer for each reading skill was calculated. The higher of the percentage meant the more difficult that particular reading skill for the respondents. If the percentage was low, it was assumed that the skill was easier for the respondents.

2.      Findings

The findings of the two tests were presented in a hierarchy from the reading skill which had the highest difficulty level to the skill which had the lowest difficulty level. The findings were:

No.	Kinds of Reading Skills	The Difficulty Level (Percentage)
1.	Recognizing Text Organization	72.5 %
2.	Paraphrasing	65 %
3.	Inference from Context	57.5 %
4.	Summarizing	47.5 %
5.	Skimming	42.5 %
6.	Structural Clues: Morphology (Compound Words)	40 %
7.	Prediction	40 %
8.	Interpreting Pro-forms	37.5 %
9.	Interpreting Elliptical Expression	37.5 %
10.	Structural Clues: Morphology (word Parts)	35 %
11.	Using a Dictionary	30 %
12.	Interpreting Lexical Cohesion	27.5 %
13.	Recognizing Implications and Making Inferences	22.5 %
14.	Distinguishing between Fact and Opinion	17.5 %
15.	Improving Reading Speed	10 %
16.	Recognizing Presupposition Underlying the Text	10 %
17.	Scanning	7.5 %

3.      Discussion

The most difficult reading skill for these students was recognizing text organization (72.5 %). Perhaps it was because many Indonesian students were not trained to activate recognizing text organization after they read a passage. However, there were only three wrong answers (7.5 %) from the total respondents’ answers toward scanning skill’s items. Therefore, it could be assumed that students did not have much difficulty with this skill. It might because they had already been trained to use this skill in all reading classes. As a result, they could use this skill effectively.

4.      Conclusion and Suggestion

The findings discussed in this research showed that each reading skill had different level of difficulty for the respondent. Further research could be conducted on a larger scale to produce wider results which could be used to make generalization.

2. My Comment

After reading this journal, I understand about the various reading skills. I didn’t expect that there are seventeen reading skills. Before I read this article, I just know three of them. They are scanning, skimming and summarizing. I also understand that reading is not as simple as I know before, that it will be very powerful if we can master those various reading skills.

From this journal, we can get any information to improve our ability in reading skill. So, we can master the reading skill easily.

3. The Benefits of the Study for the Teacher

As a teacher, we can get any knowledge about various reading skills and various degree of difficulty they bring to EFL students. We can also understanding about the difficulty our students may face in reading activity. After we know it, we can implement our knowledge we get from this research to our beloved students. We can use it as our references when we want to make a research or case study in our class.

This journal is so beneficial for us since as teacher. We also conduct some studies to solve our confusion about our teaching, method, students, etc. We can use this research report as guidance in teaching and learning the reading skill in the classroom.