Techniques for developing content reading skills for the third year students at the university of odonto and stomatology

. Meanwhile the amount of 26 students (32%) considered reading documents in English their utmost purpose. The rest 11% and 12% of the students circled further study and improving reading ability as their choice when asked about their purpose of learning reading English. The results are likely to lead to the idea that the students are so eager to learn Medical English for a reason that they hope to learn much knowledge of this field. Obviously, the students bear in their mind that if they are good enough at reading, their knowledge of Medicine will be enriched which means they totally give their priority to learning reading English but not other literacy skills. III.4.3. The teachers’ and students’ focus when teaching and learning reading English in Medicine – Chart 3 When asked about their focus in teaching and learning reading English in Medicine, two out of the five teachers (40%) and 33 students (41%) put vocabulary and dental terminologies to their foremost priority whereas 20% of the teachers and 19% of the students pay attention to meanings of the texts. Grammar draws focuses from 20% of the teachers and 14% of the students. Types of text are chosen to be the focus of 20% of the teachers and 5% of the students. The same amount of the students (5%) concentrate on the relating knowledge of Dentistry meanwhile it is not caught attention by any teacher. Apparently, both of the teachers and the students at UOS think that teaching and learning reading English in Medicine is the teaching and learning Medical terminologies, hereby Dental words. III.4.4. The student’s and teachers’ attitudes towards the present course book taught in the class– Table 4. Options No. of Ts. Percentage No. of Sts. Percentage A. Difficult and boring 1 20% 20 25% B. Difficult but interesting 3 60% 39 49% C. Interesting but long 2 20% 16 20% D. Easy and boring 0 0 5 6% E. Interesting and Stimulating This table indicates the teachers’ and students’ evaluation on the present course book used in the class to find out if it motivates or demotivates the teaching and learning English in Medicine at UOS. As it is shown in table 4 that 60% of the teachers and 49% of the students found the course book difficult but interesting. One fifth of the teachers (20%) and one fourth of the students (25%) believed that the material is difficult and boring. From the results, the author of the study can come to a conclusion that the material somehow satisfies the teachers and students in spite of its difficulty. So to make the material become less difficult, it is a real need for the teachers to simplify the reading texts in terms of vocabulary, structures, and text organization. III.4.5. The students’ difficulties in dealing with content readings in the view of the teachers and students – Chart 5. This question is for identifying the difficulties the students encounter during reading process in the view of both the teachers and students, and from which the author of the research can make comparison between these two information resources then work out the possible solutions to overcome those difficulties. The above chart illustrated clearly that the teachers’ view about the posed difficulties is quite different from the students’. When the majority of the students (45 accounting for 56%) found reading difficult because they have limited vocabulary knowledge, only one out of the five teachers (20%) considered it as their students’ difficulty in reading process. 40% of the teachers think that the most difficulty their students encounter when reading is difficult terminology because Medical terminology is long and complicated to remember but so does only 10% of the students. The next two difficulties, i.e., new topics and limited grammar knowledge take an equal percentage of 20 in the view of the teachers and a nearly equal number of the students: 7 and 8 accounting for 9% and 10% (respectively). For the other option, there is no teacher paying attention to. But 15% of the students believed that reading texts make them feel difficult because of their limited vocabulary knowledge and grammar knowledge as well. Basing on the results of Chart 3 and 5, it is clear that the great priority the students give to is likely to be the most difficulty they encounter in learning reading process – that is vocabulary knowledge. Consequently, to help the students in teaching and learning content reading is mostly to provide the students with useful techniques so as to help them learn vocabulary in general and terminology in the content field in particular. III.4.6. The activities carried out by the teachers at pre-reading, while-reading and post-reading stages and the students’ response. III.4.6.1. The activities carried out by the teachers at pre-reading stage and the students’ response – Table 6. For the question about the activities the teachers often carry out before reading and the students expect their teacher to apply at this stage, more than one choice is acceptable. Therefore, the result in this table is presented in percentage that the options are chosen. Activities No. of Ts. Percentage No. of Sts. Percentage Using pre-reading questions 3 60% 15 18.75% Pre-teaching new vocabulary in the text 2 40% 12 15% Explaining the instructions of the text 2 1.25% Giving a brief introduction of the text 1 20% 1 3.75% Making students ask questions about the text 2 40% 7 8.75% Using games to introduce the topic of the text. 1 20% 48 60% Making students predict the content of the text basing on the topic. 2 40% 6 7.5% Using visual aids to introduce the topic of the text 1 20% 42 52.5% Making students brainstorm words, ideas….related to the topic of the text. 2 40% 10 12.5% The table figures out that the teachers and the students’ opinion about pre-reading stage are different. At this stage, 40% of the teachers wanted their students to ask questions about the text meanwhile only two students accounting for 8.75% of the respondents preferred this activity. There is a reason for this is that the teachers want their students to get involved in the reading text by activating them but some of the students are passive because they are familiar with the traditional teaching method – teacher-centered approach. For “Using games to introduce the topic of the text” activity, most of the students (60%) want their teachers to apply it. But it is strange that only one teacher chose this as a good technique for the pre-reading stage. The explanation for this fact is that students want to play to learn so as to lessen the tension of the difficult reading texts they are dealing with, and to learn and remember better with the help of the game. In contrast, the teachers do not want to spend time playing games because of the limited time in the class, the difficulty in getting the students involved back in the serious reading class if they are too interested in the game, and sometimes it becomes ridiculous if the applied game does not attract the students. The next activity - Making students brainstorm words, ideas…related to the topic of the text drew the attention of 40% of the teachers and 12.5% of the students. This shows that words and structures are of importance in avoiding the students’ misunderstanding unfamiliar texts. However, it is not necessary to apply this technique in all lessons as the students sometimes may read and prepare for the texts before class time. Using visual aids to introduce the topic of the text is an activity of 52.5% of the students’ attention but only 20% of the teachers’. This is easy to understand that the students are now well aware of the benefits of information technology in their learning but the teachers find it time and effort consuming. From this result, it is time for the teachers to take advantages of visual aids in teaching reading for the students in the content field. III.4.6.2. The activities carried out by the teachers at while-reading stage and the students’ response – Table 7. Activities Number of Ts. Percentage Number of Sts. Percentage 1. Reading and looking for new words and terms. 2 40% 21 26.25% 2. Discussing the topic with partners 2 40% 27 33.75% 3. Predicting the main information based on the context. 1 20% 20 25% 4. Having a quick look at the exercises 3 3.75% 5. Others (1+2+3) 9 11.25% The table presents that while reading, 33.75% of the students put their focus on discussing with partners about the topic, and 40% of the teachers had the same choice for this activity. This explains that the students did not tend to learn individually. They wanted to work with their friends to make sense of difficult things. As for the first activity “Reading and looking for new words and terms”, 26.25% of the students showed their preference for it meanwhile 40% of the teachers chose this activity as their usual requirement toward their students. This choice indicates that some of the students’ utmost purpose while reading is to understand as many new words and terms as possible with the teachers’ help. As for “Predicting the main information based on the context”, only 20% of the teachers chose it to ask his/her students to do, but this paid the attention of 25% of the students. This is clear to state that the teachers and students did not share the same idea of making sense of the text based on the context. The reason for this is that the teachers found it difficult for the students because of their limited vocabulary and background knowledge in the content field meanwhile the students themselves knew that it is a useful technique to understand the reading text and wanted to get benefit from it. So it is the teachers to take this activity into consideration when teaching at the while-reading stage. III.4.6.3. The teachers’ techniques to teach new words and the students’ response –Table 8 Options Ts Percentage Sts Percentage Translating them into Vietnamese 3 60% 12 15% Using synonym and antonyms 5 6.25% Giving examples 2 40% 30 37.5% Asking your students to guess the meanings from the context in the reading texts 1 20% 10 12.5% Using definitions or explanation in dictionaries 1 20% 3 3.75% Using pictures 20 25% From the students’ viewpoints, using synonyms and antonyms (6.25%) and using definitions or explanations in English (3.75%) are not effective enough for them to learn new words. And giving examples got the most preference by 37.5% of the students. The table shows that most of the teachers (60%) employed translating new words into Vietnamese as their method of teaching vocabulary. This only received positive response from 15% of the students. As a result, the teachers’ most frequently used technique in vocabulary explanation does not satisfy the students and negatively influences the students’ motivation in reading. In brief, the given information is of great help to the teachers in finding out the most appropriate ways to teach new vocabulary, in other words, to facilitate learning new vocabulary and to meet their students’ expectations. III.4.6.4. The teachers’ activities at post-reading stage and the students’ response- Table 9 Activities Teachers Percentage Students Percentage 1. Summarizing the text 2 40% 13 16.25% 2. Translating it into Vietnamese 1 20% 16 20% 3. Learning by heart new words, terms and structures in the text 1 20% 20 25% 4. Discussing about the text 1 20% 16 20% 5. Others (2+3+4) 15 18.75% The table indicates that 40% of the teachers asked their students to summarize the text after reading because it is a good way to help the students gain better understanding and memorizing of the text whereas only 16.25% of the students recognized the usefulness of summarizing work. Only 20% of the teachers controlled the reading class at this stage by translating texts into Vietnamese. And this activity is also of the students’ same preference. The students expose that they can develop their communicative abilities by discussing in pairs or small groups so that they can have thorough comprehension of the text. This is clearly illustrated in the following table. When asked about the form of practice the students are most interested in small-group work of 3 or 5 people (39%). Still 23% wants to be controlled by the teachers. Only 6% likes presenting before the class, 7% prefers pair work, 15% enjoys class discussion – Table 10 Form of practice Students Percentage Lockstep 18 23% Small-group work 31 39% Pair work 6 7% Individual learning 8 10% Students’ presentation 5 6% Class discussion 12 15% (Table 10: The students’ interest in form of practice.) The reason is that students can benefit much from working in small groups as it offers opportunities for them to integrate, to share experience and exchange ideas, to learn to cooperate in order to complete an actual learning task. This is a significant recommendation for the teachers in organizing class activities which make their students find learning English in general and reading in particular enjoyable and beneficial. III.4.6.5. The necessary reading skills to enhance reading ability in the view of the teachers and students – Table 11. Skills Ts Percentage Sts Percentage 1. Summarizing texts 4 80% 56 70% 2. Giving a title to a text or a paragraph. 2 40% 22 27.5% 3. Differentiating the main idea from supporting. 1 20% 5 6.25% 4. Understanding the meaning of vocabulary items. 3 60% 38 47.5% 5.Understanding the grammar of a sentence. 2 40% 19 23.75% 6.Understanding the relationship between sentences and clauses in a text. 1 20% 3 3.75% 7. Transferring information into diagrams, charts, graphs,… 1 20% 2 2.5% 8. Making inferences. 2 40% 31 38.75% 9. Reading for main idea. 3 60% 48 60% 10.Reading to find piece of information, specific details. 3 60% 13 16.25% As shown in the above table, the greatest portion of both teachers (80%) and students (70%) chose summarizing texts to be the most important reading skill because summarizing what the students have read helps understand the reading texts thoroughly. The other skills considered important by both respondents are understanding the meaning of vocabulary items, reading for main idea, making inferences, and understanding the grammar of a sentence. A choice as reading to find piece of detailed information has no harmony between the teachers and the students. 60% of the teachers believed that identifying specific details of a text can help students fully understand the text but only 16.25% of the students considered this skill important to them. This explains why spending time reading texts makes students bored and tired. To sum up, it is advisable for the teachers to ask their students to summarize what they have read for their practice of not only reading comprehension but also writing skill because when they do that task, they must recall the text and weave the information in logical order which are necessary skills of a good reader. III.4.7. Further training on Medicine in the view of the teachers. When asked about the way to improve the students’ reading comprehension skills, all of the teachers announced yes to using additional difficult materials like articles, magazines, newspapers, online documents, and others as a challenge in the content field. The reason for that choice is demonstrated in the following table – Table 12. Reasons Number of Ts Percentage A. Those reading styles are not like the ones in the reading course books. B. I want to give my students some more vocabularies and terminologies. 5 100% C. I want to give my students some more knowledge about Dentistry in English. 4 80% D. Their ideas are somehow related to Dentistry specialization. E. I want to make my students interested. 5 100% Table 12: The reason for further training on Medicine in the view of the teachers. The table indicates that all of the teachers are aware of the utmost importance of vocabulary and terminology in comprehending a reading text. And no teacher can deny that using additional materials will catch the students’ attract. Another reason of great importance in the majority of teachers’ viewpoint (80%) is to help the students widen their knowledge of the content field because the information in the course book is surely never enough for the knowledge of a content field. The more resources are used in teaching reading, the more the students can practise reading, the more they can be familiar with types of texts, and the more knowledge of the content field the students can enrich. III.5. Data analysis of the classroom observation As described in “the data collection methods”, the text in Unit 1 (Scanning a Case History) is about a patient’s health condition in brief called a case history. According to the author’s observation, at pre-reading stage, after spending some minutes warming up the class and introducing the topic of the reading text, the teacher asked the students if there were new words and structures to them. He/she facilitated the students’ reading by translating those new words into Vietnamese, giving examples and then asking the students to read him/her. The students listened to the teacher and took notes carefully and attentively. They passively got involved in the activity and had no interaction with each other. At while-reading stage, the teacher employed the Grammar-Translation method in teaching reading, asking some Students to read aloud the text and translating each paragraph into Vietnamese. Next, the teacher asked the students to do exercises, and then checked the answers around the class. From the author of the study’s observation, this method did not motivate the students in reading although most of them participated in this activity. At post-reading stage, the teacher asked the students to write a summary of the text. Most of them were not ready to do the task except a few who did know what to write because of their good English. However, the summaries were not in the students’ own words but had the same morphological shape with the origin of the text. In Unit 4, before reading, to create interest the teacher let the students to play a matching game for 3 minutes. There were definitions of all the certain words in the text such as introduction, title, author’s affiliators, methods, result,… The definitions were written on paper and sticked on the board into 3 similar column, and the words were also written down into 3 similar sets of cards by the teacher. The student were divided into 3 groups and handed one set of cards for each. They were asked to match the words with right definitions as quickly as possible. The group with right matches in shortest time would be the winner. Actually, all the students got involved in this game. At while-reading stage, the students were asked to read separate paragraphs of an article and give the headings for these parts in pairs. And the students had chance to play the game with their partner’s cooperation. They shared their opinion, exchanged the answers and corrected mistakes for themselves. Consequently, the task were done quickly with interest and little difficulty. At post-reading stage, the teacher required the students to recall what they had read by writing a summary for each part of the article. Although the students found difficult in weaving the ideas in the article, recalling the information from separate parts did not challenge them much. To conclude, it can be stated that the techniques the teachers employ in teaching reading are of great influence on the students’ motivation in reading and the success of the lesson. By observing, the author of the study can decide on the techniques which should be applied for effective reading comprehension. III.6. Findings and Discussions From the data analyzed based on the survey questionnaires and the data analysis of classroom observation, the author of the research can come to the conclusion that although both the teachers and students are aware of the importance of teaching and learning content reading at the university, how to make the reading text fully beneficial is still far from their satisfaction because of the problems encountered by not only the teachers but also the students as follows: Most of the teachers believe that teaching Medical English is just the teaching of vocabulary and terminology of that field. They do not know that there are other more important purposes of reading activity: to get information from the reading passage, to develop proper reading strategies and skills for different types of texts. Therefore, they fail to encourage their students to set purposes of reading and adopt proper reading strategies and skills for different types of texts. All the teachers have little fundamental knowledge of the content field because they were trained to be teachers of General English which leads to the gap of content knowledge between the teachers and students. As a result, it is a real challenge for the teachers to be confident enough to handle the specialized content in the Medical field. Commonly, it is the teachers to make their students passive in the classroom when they employ traditional teaching methods such as dominating all the classroom work, explaining unfamiliar vocabularies by translating them into Vietnamese, etc. Consequently, the teachers, not the students, work in the class which is not the command of the teaching-learning process. As for the students, reading processes are difficult because of their language competence, their limited reading skills and background knowledge as well. They are largely dependent on the course books, teachers, peers, and dictionaries. They do not know how to use appropriate ways in dealing with a reading text. They just look at every single word, sometimes get stuck when encountering new words or structures or the topic of the text is unfamiliar to them, which prevent them from developing their reading abilities. Another difficulty faced by both the teachers and the students is that the reading materials and classroom equipment do not meet the demand of their teaching – learning process. Meanwhile the students are eager and in hope to learn with the aid of Information Technology (IT.), the teachers do not satisfy them because of lacking teaching aids, poor IT knowledge, time constraint, and much effort to prepare, etc. Besides, the content of the course book is out of the students’ expectation because it is difficult and unrelated to their specialization. For the mentioned above problems, it is a real need to make the teachers feel confident in teaching the content field and to provide the students with useful techniques for improving their reading skills so as to get most benefits of reading. In order to achieve these two targets, some suggestions are to be made in the next chapter. Chapter IV: Suggested Techniques for Developing Content Reading Skills to Students at the University of Odonto and Stomatology. On the basis of the analysis exposed in the study from the beginning of the study, in this chapter the author of the research will suggest some techniques for improving the students’ reading skills. Hopefully, these suggested techniques can serve as a tool to enable both the teachers and students to successfully play their roles in a reading class. IV.1. Motivating the ESP students IV.1.1. Making ESP reading helpful. On the move to motivate the students in ESP reading, it is necessary for the teachers to assist their students to realize the usefulness of reading in their content study and to raise the students’ awareness of reading for a reason that reading is the most important of the four literacy skills i.e. listening, speaking, reading, and writing for perceiving knowledge but these four skills should not be separated in an ESP class. The teachers should help the students understand that learning to read in general well and efficiently is a difficult task, but learning to read a content field in particular is more challenging because of its specialized knowledge, words and terms. Also, the teachers should emphasize how beneficial reading is in their study and their future career as well. Specifically, if one reads well, he/she will surely acquire adequate knowledge, structures, or ideas to speak, to write. And if he can is an efficient reader, he/she will feel little worried about difficult reading materials which leads to his more reading, more knowledge and more self-confidence. IV.1.2. Employing more games in reading process. Although teaching – learning new words and terms in an ESP reading process is not the most important task for the teachers and students because of other more important ones such as understanding general meaning of a text; understanding textual organization; finding grammatical patterns and lexical items in sentences; summarizing texts, this task should be taken into consideration. When dealing with teaching new words and terms, it is advisable for the teachers to employ as many interesting games as possible to make the students get involved in the learning reading process actively. The games should be in various forms in accordance with the class size, time allowance, the students’ preference, etc. By applying games in teaching – learning ESP reading, the teachers will create more fun in the class, make it easier to learn new and difficult things of the subject matter. IV.1.3. Using visual aids in teaching reading. It is high time for the teachers to change their traditional teaching methods and use visual aids in their teaching for the following benefits: Firstly, it is easier to draw the students’ attention. Secondly, authentic settings surely help the students understand more easily and remember longer. The visual aids are mentioned here namely the teachers themselves, real objects, flash cards, projectors, pictures, etc. IV.1.4. Modifying too difficult reading texts and diversifying reading exercises. It is necessary for the teachers not to give the students the whole reading texts to read immediately if they are long and difficult because these texts may make the students get bored and tired. Furthermore, not every part in the course books, magazines, newspapers, etc. readers receive contains information they need. In fact, most of it is simply junk. So the students should notice that just spending time in reading every part from the beginning to the end will double the amount of time they have available to read and they are probably spending a lot of time reading stuff they do not need. It is a need for the teachers to be choosy in selecting the parts or chapters that are important and ignoring the rest to save time and make the students more interested in class. Besides, reading exercises and tasks should be diversified into various kinds such as Matching, True/False, Translating, Summarizing, Questions – Answers, Filling blanks, Presenting, etc. Otherwise, it is very boring if the teachers only employ a traditional teaching method of translating written texts into Vietnamese and then answering comprehension questions. IV.2. Training the students to become efficient readers. IV.2.1. Raising the students’ awareness of setting their reading purposes. If the teachers want their students to become efficient readers, they should make the students understand that good readers would spend time reading with certain purposes which are like a guidance to get information quickly and effectively. The purposes of reading are various such as reading for pleasure and enjoyment, reading to locate specific information, reading to get an overview, reading to learn some vocabulary, and reading to become familiar with the style of a new text, article, document, etc IV.2.2. Developing the students with different reading strategies. It is depressing to verbally explain an assignment to the students when finding that in the classroom most students are unable to accurately complete assignments because they failed to follow directions. If the teachers want the students to comprehend what they are reading with little help, it is advisable to assist them to use reading strategies that they can maximize their comprehension of text, and identify relevant and non-relevant information. The students should notice that depending on different types of texts, purposes of reading, and the context, reading strategies will be various such as: using finger to help eyes follow lines of text; reading each word very carefully in order to understand the entire text; keeping eyes moving past the unfamiliar words and thus trying to understand the main ideas; saying words quietly; writing the meaning of new words in the mother tongue in margin of page; looking up unfamiliar words in a bilingual dictionary; looking for linking words that help explain relationship between sentences; asking teacher for help whenever meeting an unfamiliar word; translating a difficult section of text into the mother tongue; etc. (Tanner and Green, 1998: 66) Instruction in reading strategies is not an add-on, but rather an integral part of the use of reading activities in the language classroom. The teachers can help their students become effective readers throughout the teaching procedure as follows: Before reading: Plan for the reading task Set a purpose or decide in advance what to read for as a whole class. Firstly, the teacher clarifies the purpose of reading to the students.  After that, the teacher introduces what kind of reading strategies are necessary for reading texts and achieving the above purpose; such as skimming, scanning, and close reading. This activity assists the students in selecting appropriate reading strategies for a particular text type.  These strategies also help the students to acquire skills to deal with unfamiliar vocabulary without depending on dictionaries. Decide if more linguistic or background knowledge is needed so that it is easier for the students to get information from the reading texts. To do this, the teachers should ask questions to motivate the students and activate their background knowledge. Make predictions based on the title. At this stage, the teacher should show only the title of the text (visual aids if available) and ask the students to predict the topic based on the previous questions, prior knowledge. From the students’ prediction, some questions will be asked by the teachers to focus on the main point when reading the text. Then, the teachers ask the students to predict the style of language and the schematic structure of the text. All of the teachers’ above activities will encourage the students to actively use their background knowledge to assist reading comprehension because oral interaction with the teacher and peers could assist reading as giving and sharing background knowledge. Determine whether to enter the text from the top down (attend to the overall meaning) or from the bottom up (focus on the words and phrases). For this activity, the teachers guide the students to skim, scan, and break up the text in groups. By skimming, the students can get an overall picture and to ascertain the genre and field of the text.  Discussion with peers and the teacher at this stage can provide general information about the topic and structure of the text, and the students will be able to predict further what the text is about. By scanning, the students are produced to locate specific information about the topic of the text. Answering the previously designed questions confirm or disconfirm the readers' prediction. By breaking up the text, the teacher provides handouts, which is the text broken up into sections, to each group and asks the students to compile the texts in groups.  After summarizing the texts, the students are encouraged to report their task to the other groups of students.  This activity allows the students to comprehend more detail in each section, obtain specific information more closely, combine information of the sections, and understand the main idea of the text.  Pre-teach important words to the whole class. Before moving into actual reading activities, teaching new and important words for reading comprehension is necessary.  The readers are able to prepare and acquire the new vocabulary or terminology which would be necessary to understand the text before tackling reading practice.  Vocabulary items are categorized as those which could be or could not be guessed from the context, and essential or less important to understand the text.With the help of the teachers’, the students are able to expand and relate their current knowledge and gain new knowledge of the text. During reading: Monitor comprehension Verify predictions and check for inaccurate guesses. At this stage, the whole class has a discussion to generate questions, make summaries, predict and clarify the text.  This is to clarify the purpose of reading, direct attention, activate background knowledge again, and also to evaluate content, check predictions, and draw conclusions.  The teacher is able to monitor the students’ performance, confirm whether the students are able to use new vocabulary, express ideas and concepts and link ideas, and help the students check if their previous guesses are accurate or not. Decide what is and is not important to understand. The teacher asks the students to find the main idea in a paragraph or whole text.  This activity is to identify and distinguish the important information from the less important information in the text, summarize the concepts, confirm the understanding of the content. So the students are able to avoid misunderstandings about the topic by sharing the idea with peers. Guessing words from the context. If the teachers want to produce their students who will be able to explore reading texts to the maximum, they should train them how to guess words from the context. Because the more they are not depending on the teachers, the peers, and dictionaries, the more they feel self-confident in getting knowledge of their concerning. In order to do this, the teachers need to expose them to the two ways of guessing words as follows: Recognizing structural formation: The meaning of new words can be worked out by referring to their formation such as prefixes and suffixes. For examples: + Prefixes mean negative and positive: un-(not), mis-(bad, wrong), re-(do again), etc. + Prefixes mean number: mono-(one), bi-(two), hex-(six), oct-(eight), multi-(many). + Prefixes mean time and order: pre-(before), prime-(first), post-(after), ante-(before). + Prefixes mean location: ex-(out), extra-(beyond), super-(over), inter-(between),etc. + Prefixes mean size: semi-(half), mini-(small), micro-(very small), macro-(very big). + Suffixes form nouns: -ance, -ence, -ian, -ness, -ation, -sion, -ity, -ist, -er, -or, -ment. + Suffixes form verbs: -en, -ify, -fy, -ize, -ate. + Suffixes form adjectives: -able, -ible, -full, -less, -ical, -ish. + Suffixes form adverbs: -ly Using context clues: Students can deduce the possible meanings of unfamiliar words or phrases by using the meanings of other words such as synonyms and antonyms in the same sentence or paragraph as a whole. For examples: + Synonyms: ultimately = eventually, worldwide = international, alter = change… + Antonyms: aggravate >< major… Re-read to check comprehension. This activity is to one more time confirm the students’ understanding of the content. Ask for help. Of course, at this stage it is indispensable for the teachers’ availability with the students’ asking for help in further understanding the text. After reading: Evaluate comprehension and strategy used. Evaluate comprehension in a particular task or area by asking the students comprehension questions in various kinds such as True or False questions, Alternative questions, and WH-questions. By doing this, the students are produced to develop their vocabulary knowledge, understand cohesion in the text, and investigate the text further. Evaluate overall progress in reading and in particular types of reading tasks. By checking the students’ answers for the comprehension questions above with the class, the teachers can confirm the students’ understanding of the context and evaluate their advancement in reading and in particular types of reading tasks before moving onto the next activity. Modify strategies if necessary. This activity is a step to make decision if the strategies used were appropriate for the purpose and for the task so as to employ other useful strategies for effective reading. It is also to help the students not to conform with one reading strategy. They need to know that varying reading strategies in different text types is a good way to understand texts thoroughly. IV.2.3. Assigning and checking students’ fulfillment of homework It is clear that the students will gradually form their habits of reading if they are consistently given a reason to read. The acceptable reason is the students’ fulfillment of homework. The reading exercises given to the students after each lesson may be designed in various forms and with different levels of difficulty such as a reading passage for gap-filling, gist, comprehension questions or paragraph re-ordering… It is the right time to check the given exercises in about 10 minutes before the new lesson as a warm-up activity. The students should be encouraged to exchange with their peers for self-checking the exercises, express their opinions about the question involved or talk about difficulties they encounter in doing the tasks. This is of great importance for the teacher to know the students’ problems to help. In brief, assigning homework will ask the students to make their own decision on what skills to employ to fulfill the task, and bring a chance of practising reading skills to the students. IV.3. Improving teachers’ classroom techniques for teaching reading IV.3.1. Focusing on the reading process When dealing with teaching reading for the students, the teachers should focus on the process of reading rather than on its product because the utmost target of their task is not the knowledge of the subject matter but the ways the students can get benefits from reading to the fullest so that they take up their own good reading habits outside the classroom. In order to accomplish the goal, the teachers need to: Develop students' awareness of the reading process and reading strategies by asking students to think and talk about how they read in their native language. Allow students to practice the full repertoire of reading strategies by using authentic reading tasks. They encourage students to read to learn (and have a authentic purpose for reading) by giving students some choice of reading material. Show students the strategies that will work best for the reading purpose and the type of text when working with reading tasks in class. Explain how and why students should use the strategies. Have students practise reading strategies in class and ask them to practise outside of class in their reading assignments. Encourage students to be conscious of what they are doing while they complete reading assignments. Encourage students to evaluate their comprehension and self-report their use of strategies, build comprehension checks into in-class and out-of-class reading assignments, and periodically review how and when to use particular strategies. Encourage the development of reading skills and the use of reading strategies by using the target language to convey instructions and course-related information in written form: office hours, homework assignments, test content. Help the students not to transfer strategy use from one task to another, and explicitly mention how a particular strategy can be used in a different type of reading task or with another skill. IV.3.2. Employing different teaching methods. If the teachers want their students to be efficient readers, they should employ different teaching methods, not only the traditional teaching method as mentioned in the last parts. The teaching methods should be varied as follows: they should work in groups and exchange their experience in teaching; they can share their lesson plans to find the best activities and choose appropriate supplementary materials that are suitable for their students’ level of English; besides, they can work together to design supplementary exercises and prepare necessary visual aids which have a certain place in a successful English lesson. Being successful in the sense that it motivates pupils' interest, stimulates their thinking and consolidates what they have learnt...; furthermore, it is a good idea for teachers to attend and observe their colleagues’ lectures. By this way, teachers can help and learn a lot from each other. IV.3.3. Using authentic material and approaches. For students to develop communicative competence in reading, classroom and home reading activities must resemble (or be) real-life reading tasks that involve meaningful communication. Therefore, when assigning classroom or homework reading exercises, the teachers need to consider if the materials in use are authentic. It must be the kind of material that students will need and want to read when traveling, studying abroad, or using the language in other contexts outside the classroom. When selecting texts for students’ assignments, remember that the language of a reading text is simple and easy to understand, but the conceptual difficulty and the task(s) that students are expected to complete are a little challenging. Simplifying a text by changing the language often removes natural redundancy and makes the organization somewhat difficult for students to predict. This actually makes a text more difficult to read than if the original were used. Rather than simplifying a text by changing its language, make it more approachable by eliciting students' existing knowledge in pre-reading discussion, reviewing new vocabulary before reading, and asking students to perform tasks that are within their competence, such as skimming to get the main idea or scanning for specific information, before they begin intensive reading. Besides, the reading approach must be authentic: Students should read the text in a way that matches the reading purpose, the type of text, and the way people normally read. This means that reading aloud will take place only in situations outside the classroom, such as reading for pleasure. The majority of students' reading should be done silently. IV.3.4. Improving teachers’ professional knowledge. This is a real need for the ESP. teachers at UOS. because of the fact that most of the teachers feel worried in teaching ESP. to the students when their background knowledge in the content field is poor and insufficient. Although it is wrong to assume that teacher needs to be an expert in the subject matter because teaching ESP means not to teach specialized knowledge in English, it is difficult for the teacher to make an effective class performance in asking right questions, making good use of the answers, explaining new terminologies and choosing supplementary materials to the students, etc. without a basic knowledge of the fundamental principles of the target discipline. The ways to improve the teachers’ professional knowledge are to conduct some further in-service training in Medicine for teachers of English at UOS. in the form of individual self-study or attendance at workshops or lectures given by Medical specialists, to hold short training courses on professional knowledge to equip teachers with basic fundamental knowledge of the specialized subject, and to involve them in material development. Because the writing of materials is a very important aspect of teacher training that makes teachers become more involved in the work of the course and will as a result teach the course materials with more understanding and confidence. IV.3.5. Integrating reading and writing It is good advice for the teachers to integrate reading and writing in a reading classroom because English acquisition for EFL students is mainly developed through reading and composing English texts (Tsai, J. (2006)). Assisting the students in writing-to-read and reading-to-write will help students improve language proficiency through reading and writing activities, and develop these two literacy skills in a meaningful way. As for the activity of writing-to-read, there are some more activities to help the students learn effectively. Firstly, the teachers may ask their students to keep a double-entry notebook which helps them become conscious of their reactions. In these notebooks, students copy passages that have particular significance for them in one column, and then respond to them in the other. The responses to the passages can take such forms as summaries, marginal notations, reflective comments in relation to the passages, or expressions of students’ ideas. Secondly, the teachers may require their students to summarize what they have read in their own words. By summarizing, not only will students' writing proficiency be enhanced through the writing exercises, but their reading strategies of selecting important information of the texts will be reinforced.   As for the activity of reading-to-write, during the reading process, the teachers draw the students’ attention on grammar, which supports student writing. This activity will encourage the students to pay attention to and learn consciously about grammatical and lexical features of the texts, organization of the articles, and expressions which are unfamiliar to them. Through the practice, students will improve their reading skills, and, at the same time, build the foundation of future writing. Part iii: conclusion 1. Summary of the study It is undeniable that English now is a language of internationalization. So acquiring the knowledge of English to the maximum is the foremost target of an EFL. learners. Among the four literacy skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing, reading truly is a fundamental survival one because in the modern age of information technology, anyone who wants to get information, to accumulate knowledge, to develop communicative competence, etc., they need read as much as they can. However, it is the fact that reading English in general is difficult, reading a particular subject in that language is more challenging because of their limited language competence, background knowledge, and reading strategies, … With the hope of providing the students with useful techniques for improving their reading skills in the content field of Medicine, the author of the research conducts the study titled “Techniques For Developing Content Reading Skills For The Third Year Students At The University of Odonto and Stomatology”. The study includes four chapters as follows: Chapter one deals with theoretical background about definitions of reading, content reading and reading comprehension; classification of reading according to manner and purpose; reading in ESP teaching and learning; factors affecting reading skills; and difficulties foreign language learners encounter when reading English materials. Chapter two is about the present situation of teaching and learning content English reading at the University of Odonto and Stomatology. In this chapter, the author deals with The Objectives of Teaching and Learning Reading English in Medicine at the University of Odonto and Stomatology; The Teachers and Content Teaching Methods; Learners and Content Learning Requirements; Materials and Assessments; An evaluation on learners’ learning ESP. Chapter three refers to the study in which the author analyzes the current situation of teaching and learning reading at UOS based on the data collected through survey questionnaires for both the teachers and students, and class observation. On the basis of the analysis, the author works out what is existing in teaching and learning reading ESP at UOS so as to give suggestions for solution. Chapter four suggests the techniques to help enhancing ESP reading skills for the students of UOS. They are techniques for motivating students, techniques for training the students to be efficient readers, techniques for improving teachers’ classroom techniques for teaching reading. 2. Limitations and Suggestions for further study. The study was carried out with the author of the study’s great attempts to provide the students at UOS with useful techniques for improving reading skills so that they can do reading task effectively not only in-class but also out-of-class without help, and suggesting some techniques for the teachers’ teaching reading successfully. However, the study still has a number of unavoidable limitations due to limited time, lack of resources and also the author of the study’s doing research ability. For the participants of the study, both of the respondents (teachers and students) involved in the survey are of small size, therefore the findings are not quite of popularity. Which leads to the recommended techniques are helpful and effective for the third year students of the University of Odonto and Stomatology only. The study merely focuses on working out the techniques for improving the students’ content reading skills based on the teachers’ and students’ attitudes and their problems in teaching and learning reading in the content field of Medicine. Further study on designing supplementary reading texts and exercises in various types for practising vocabulary and language skills is quite a lot of attention.