7/27/2019 Tw 30003

1/4

Case-based Method TW30003

Context

I am teaching in a rural area which the students are not familiar with the English

language and English only learn formally in school as their second or third language after

Dusun and Malay language As an English teacher, I was assigned to teach English language

for Standard 1. This stage of age is the most important stage for teacher to build students

strong foundation in learning to read and write as the students are introduce to more new

vocabulary. According to journal written by Susan B. Neuman, Carol Copple, and Sue

Bredekamp (2004), although reading and writing abilities continue to develop throughout the

life span, the early childhood years from birth through age eight, are the most important

period for literacy development. Young children need writing to help them learn about

reading, they need reading to help them learn about writing (Kathleen A.R., James F.C.,

Donald J.R., 2003). This shows that reading and writing are interrelated to helps students

especially young children to be language literate. The numbers of students in my classroom

are only 15 which include 6 boys and 9 girls. It seems not really going to be a hardworking

task to handle only small group of students but it becomes a headache when it comes to teach

them on writing and especially in reading. The level of achievement of my students

especially in reading is also still below par and most of them still do not know how to read

although all of them have entered preschool for a year or two. This is based on the test that Igave to them when I first entered their class. The differences between the vowel sound in

English language and Malay language also make my students tends to read the English words

in Malay sounds. Thus, the general purpose of this case study is to explore different teaching

approach in developing reading and writing skills in the English classroom for primary

schools students. As we all know, reading and writing are two important parts in learning

and developing students language literacy especially in this case focusing on teaching the

sound of vowel and consonant in English language. In school, different English teachers have

different approach or technique they used in teaching reading and writing. These approaches

and techniques are differing according to the students ability, their first language background

and some other things.

Dilemma

This case study reviews a problem faced by me as an English teacher in developing

my students skill in reading and also in writing. It is important for the students to be able to

read and write fluently to function competently in school and being able contribute actively in

7/27/2019 Tw 30003

2/4

Case-based Method TW30003

our community especially in communication and as a tool to gain higher knowledge. Ernest

Boyer (1995) in , former president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of

Teaching, once asserted that the success of every elementary school is judgedby its students

achievement in reading and writing. At first, my teaching practice is more focusing onteacher-centered which I tend to use reading aloud and repeated reading when it comes to

introducing new vocabulary. By using this method, I will read first and followed by my

students and for each word I will repeatedly reading it aloud more than three times so the

students can sound it correctly. After that, I will ask the students to spell the words and sound

the word. The problem occurred when they have to sound it after they finished spell the

words which they cannot sound it correctly although teacher have repeatedly reading the

words in the beginning. Problem also occurred when it comes to writing. There are students

who write words according to the sound they heard especially the vowel sound. As I said

before, they tend to confused between the English vowel sound and Malay vowel sound. For

example, the word bookthey wrote as bukwhen it comes to writing simple sentence activity.

All these problems showed that my students do not have yet the recognition of the English

vowel sound and some of consonant sound such as c that sometimes has to be sound as k.

Therefore, this case study focuses on choosing the best teaching approach which involves

teaching phonic to develop the skills of reading and writing among my year 1 students. This

case study also seeks to use different instructional technique in teaching phonics. The word

phonics comes from the ancient Greek word for sound and it is fitting that in English we

use the word phonics to mean the teaching of the letter-sound relationships for reading and

the sound-letter relationships for spelling (Hamzah, 2013). Trying out the phonics teaching

approach in this case stud is suitable as the problem is my students keep confusing

themselves between English and Malay letter sounds.

Solution

I have been teaching English in primary school for almost 9 years and I never used

phonics to teach reading but I found out that it is an interesting method that can be enjoyed by

students to learn to read. The new content standard curriculum (KSSR) for English language

implemented in 2011 starting with Year 1 is already including phonics teaching. Through

some readings on phonics teaching, I could see the sense in the progression and arrangement

of the letter sounds. It is a completely different method from what I was used to. I went

through several approaches in teaching phonics such as Systematic Phonics, Analytical

7/27/2019 Tw 30003

3/4

Case-based Method TW30003

Phonics and Synthetic Phonics and it was then that I realised that using these approaches

have bring big changes to my students literacy levels. Starting was not easy, though. I was

already teaching letter sounds to the children, but I was teaching the letter names before the

sounds and teaching them in alphabetical order. Teaching Phonics way was completelydifferent. Other than the teaching method, I also was focusing on my instructional techniques

during the lesson implementation. According to Judith (2007), after examining all the

findings from the study that examine the effects of instruction on student learning, she

concluded that high calibre schools and quality instruction definitely can make a difference in

students achievements. One of the instructional techniques that I have been using is blending

and segmenting activities. For this activity, I would explicitly talk about the words in words

emphasizing each sound. I would also use Jazz chant or action songs to emphasize the rime

of each letter sound and make the lesson a lot more interesting. The students are really

enjoying it and would sometimes do the different actions for each letter sound. After some

times, I noticed that they could identify the letter sounds with ease. The majority of students

in my class can understand blending letter sounds to make words and some can actually start

reading short words. Teaching Phonics by mixing it with language art such as Jazz Chant and

action song has worked quite well for me and helps my students to learn reading and writing

in fun way.

Responses

I have discussed my case study to a fellow teacher who also teaches English. Our

discussion is involved the context, the dilemma I am facing and my proposed solution. The

teacher found out that my solution which is using phonics to teach reading is a good idea. By

learning to read using Phonics method, the difference between letter sound in English

language and Malay language can be easily distinguish. She also added that, Phonics teaching

can be a bit complex as there are rules that have to be followed and teacher have to be well

versed to teach Phonics. She also suggested that, other than Jazz chant and action song,

teacher can also provide other activities that increase students awareness of the sounds of

language such as playing games and listening to stories, and recite poems. As for my fellow

teacher, she use different teaching which is she engaging students with materials that promote

identification of the letters of the alphabet, including ABC books, magnetic letters, alphabet

blocks and puzzles, alphabet charts. Direct instruction is used to teach letter names that have

personal meaning to students.

7/27/2019 Tw 30003

4/4

Case-based Method TW30003

References

Hamzah Bin Md. Omar, (2013). TW30003: Developing Reading and Writing Skills For

Primary Schools, Program Pensiswazahan Guru (PPG). Sekolah Pendidikan dan

Pembangunan Sosial, Universiti Malaysia Sabah: Kota Kinabalu

Judith Rollins Burch, (2007).A Study Examining the Impact ofScaffolding Young Childrens

Acquisition of Literacy in Primary Grades. The Department of Educational Theory,

Policy, and Practice: Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical

College

Kathleen A.R., James F.C., Donald J.R., (2003). The Essentials of Early Literacy Instruction.

National Association for the Education of Young Children. Retrieved from

http://www.naeyc.org/files/yc/file/200303/Essentials.pdf

Susan B. Neuman, Carol Copple, and Sue Bredekamp, (2004).Learning to Read and Write:

Developmentally Appropriate Practices for Young Children. National Association for

the Education of Young Children: Washington D.C.

Wendy Lee, (2008). Speech, Language and Communication Needs and Primary School-aged

Children:I CAN TalkSeriesIssue 6. Royal Mail

http://www.naeyc.org/files/yc/file/200303/Essentials.pdfhttp://www.naeyc.org/files/yc/file/200303/Essentials.pdf