Comprehending English text

CHAPTER 1
1.0 Introduction
Reading ability is a very important element in a higher education level. Since English has become
the lingua franca or the language of all regions, students of a higher education as in the tertiary level
must be able to read and comprehend English text.
Reading is a vital for an individual especially students of a higher education for many reasons.
Reading is done by most people in order to obtain information, to make decision or for pleasure.
Professionals too read to expand their knowledge and skills. Hence, the ability to read well is a
valuable asset because any act either education professional or less need at least some reading
ability. Furthermore, tremendous quantity of reading material makes the reading possible.
However, if an individual can read but could not understand the meaning of what he has read, then
the reading served no purpose to him. In fact, he will face a lot of problem in order to acquire
information.

Since reading skill plays a major role in education, great emphasis is given towards this skill started
from the early school. Knowledge in most cases is imparted through printed material. Therefore, in
order to have an effective teaching learning atmosphere, the students should be able to read and
comprehend English text. Same goes when the students are in the higher education level, reading is
still one most important skill to be mastered as there are thousands of education source are written
in English.
Reading is an active mental process which deals with interaction between readers and the text. A
good reader is hypothesized as who are not only able to comprehend the text as a whole but are
also who are able to employ various skills such as scanning, skimming, locating information,
predicting, understanding, sequencing and interfering while comprehending the text. Weak readers
on the other hand may only read the text where they can only understand the text at the surface
level.
1.1 Background Of The Problem
Difficulties in comprehending English text within Malaysian students have occurred so many years
ago. In order for them to excel in the higher education level as in the tertiary level depends very
much on their ability to read and comprehend text because reading is a fundamental asset for every
individual. Brunan W.K (1980) for instant defines reading as a two way interaction in which
information is exchange between the reader and the author.
From many researches done, it shows that there are a lot of difficulties faced by Malaysian students
and also by the native speakers in comprehending English text. This happen caused by several
factors or problems that contribute to the difficulty of comprehending text such as low vocabularies,
different social background knowledge, sentence length and also the term used.
Based on my own experience, I am facing with students who are having this kind of problem,
difficulties in comprehending English text. This happen when they are given a text written in English
such as journals by their lecturer as the material was the source of the subject matter, they rather
ask me or some students who are good in English to translate the text into Malay language. This
shows that they are having problem in comprehending English text. I do believe that they can read
but what makes them refuse to read is because they can't understand or comprehend the text.
1.2 Problem Statement
This problem arises when the students read English text or materials but could not be able to
comprehend them. They simply could not get the essence or the main idea of the writing which
would be very problematic when it comes to the higher education level.
From my own observation which is concern with some UPSI students of different courses such as
Sport science, Science, Business Study and Counseling, it was initiated that they are having
problem in comprehending English text even though most of the references regarding the courses
are most found in English language. As a result of having problem in comprehending English text,
they face other difficulties when carrying out assignments or presentations. In order for them to
understand and comprehend the text, they need the text to be translated into Malay Language as
Malay language is their first language. People with a good language of English will be chosen as
their translator. Hence their English skill will never develop.
This is a very serious matter because they could not comprehend English text. It means that they
are having problem with their reading skills. This study is necessary to find the difficulties faced by
the students of various courses studying in a tertiary level at Sultan Idris Education University and it
is hoped that this study will help the teachers as well as the students of how to handle these
difficulties.
1.3 Purpose of The Study
The purpose of this study is to investigate the difficulties faced by the students of various courses
studying in a tertiary level at Sultan Idris Education University in comprehending English text. This is
because being able to understand English text is necessary since English language is concerned to
be the language used in most of the reference books.
This study will also help teachers to know what are the difficulties that actually faced by the students
and it is hoped that this difficulties can be eased to enhance students' reading ability. I will analyze
and look what are the problems faced by the students and what strategies that they do in order to
overcome that problem. From the data gained, some suggestions will be added in contributing to the
diminution of the problem.