Promoting the interest of learning English Language through the teaching of literature is considered to improve the proficiency of the students in the target language too. Therefore, this study aims to investigate whether the teaching of literature promotes students' proficiency in the target language. Thus this study has taken into account the students' feedback on the subject, teaching methodologies employed by teachers and the literary texts used in the school. The survey was conducted at SMK Bukit Besi to elicit information on the students' perception and interest towards literature as part of their English Syllabus. A total of 50 respondents were selected and given a set of questionnaire to provide the data. Based on the findings, it was found out that learning literature has indeed assisted them to improve their grasp of the target language. It was also found that students perceive learning literature as important and integral in the holistic development of language of the students. The study also determined that the approach and styles of the teacher, choice of literary texts and students' interest determine a successful programme. Future researchers should widen their scope of research by a more varied and wider sampling.

Reading has always been an important skill for university students in order for them to gain access to knowledge in the academic books. Despite this, many students who view reading in English as important do not actually engage themselves in English reading activities outside class hours. Reading for pleasure allows learners to acquire certain language skills. Therefore, an experimental study using reading for pleasure was conducted. The experimental group was exposed to reading for pleasure for 5 weeks, while the other group was not. However, the control group showed better improvement of comprehension skills in the post test. Whereas, the pre-test scores results were nearly the same. The reasons for this are explained in the discussion that follows. From questionnaires distributed, a substantial number of subjects (79%) said that reading for pleasure would help them to understand the text better and they would pursue reading for pleasure. It is hoped that this small-scale study would highlight the effect of reading for pleasure in improving the students’ reading comprehension skills. Future researchers should cover an experimental study which is of longer duration. A period of six months is suggested

In the tourism industry the prominent role of English is inevitable as the communicative tasks involve tourism employees and tourists to cooperate with one another in order to attain successful communication goals. While research on English language use has been conducted upon other fields of tourism, there is a paucity in English language related studies associated specifically with island tourism industry. The present study is established based on the two objectives: (1) to identify the importance of English in performing communicative tasks among island tourism employees and (2) to identify the sources of difficulties encountered by the employees. Data were collected from 59 employees working in island tourism in Perhentian and Redang islands using questionnaire as the instrument. SPSS Version 22 was used to calculate the mean value and standard deviation of each item. Based on the analysis, English language is most important for the employees when enquiring about international tourists’ information and needs and least important to refuse tourists’ offers. In relation to language difficulties, the employees rated the skills to understand international tourists’ foreign accents when they speak English and to use correct English grammar as most difficult as compared to other sources of difficulties in speaking English.

Perceived as one fundamental element in language learning, grammar is reckoned important in ESL writing. ESL learners need to master the knowledge of how to transfer grammatical concepts into their ESL composition. However, Malaysian learners of English often repeat errors in writing which they cannot even recognize. The current study draws attention to the occurrences of language errors and examines their sources in Malaysian ESL learners’ writing. 40 students in their Semester 2 of diploma level were selected to participate in the study. Each student was to produce two essays of 100-word length. Each essay was first examined before language errors were identified and coded based on the parts of speech: Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives, Adverbs, Articles, Pronouns, Prepositions, Adverbs, Conjunctions and Determiners. For each type of errors, the sources were categorized based on interlingual and intralingual sources. 258 errors were identified with the most frequent language errors produced were verb errors while the least were determiner errors. The result revealed that the most dominant errors were caused by intralingual sources. This study would greatly help teachers to establish better curriculum and select materials to facilitate students in learning English and develop them as proficient learners who can self-correct language errors.

Tagline slogans are aggressively used in the marketing field to promote specific products or services to consumers. However, they are least used as authentic materials in the teaching and learning of English as a Second Language (ESL) class. The too-brief structure embodying tagline slogans makes them difficult to be exploited to be used as materials for teaching and learning processes. Studies on the use of tagline slogans in ESL speaking lessons are still scarce, making it inconclusive to fully comprehend why they are underutilized as opposed to the other authentic materials. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the reasons for such ill preference towards the employment of tagline slogans as authentic materials in speaking lessons from the view of English for occupational purposes (EOP) students. The qualitative data of this study was obtained from seven participants who had utilized tagline slogans in their class presentations. The findings show that tagline slogans are less preferable due to inappropriate words or sentence structures used, presenters’ inefficient explanation resulting in the audience’ misunderstanding and suitability issues with context. Even though there lie limitations in using tagline slogans as authentic materials, with the right selection, they could act as a platform to improve learners’ shared world knowledge in particular and their productive skills of the target language in the long run. This study has unearthed the case against the use of tagline slogans in speaking lessons from the lenses of EOP learners and at the same time has provided lessons learned on how tagline slogans could positively nurture learners’ speaking skills.