Undergraduate Study Thesis Bachelor of Secondary Education Major in English University of Rizal System 2010

This study aimed to determine the English Vocabulary Proficiency of the freshman students of University of Rizal System, Rodriguez during school year 2009-2010.

This research was undertaken to seek answer to the following: The profile of the students in terms of sex, school graduated from, parents' educational attainment, course, high school grade in English; the English Vocabulary proficiency of the respondents and the significant difference between their English vocabulary proficiency and profile.

This study utilized the descriptive method of research using the prepared questionnaire of the researchers with 50-item questionnaire adopted from MSAT college entrance examination, which was administered to one hundred thirty two respondents, who were selected through random sampling from two hundred four BSE / BEED students in the School of Education of the University of Rizal System Rodriguez Campus.

The data obtained were tallied, computed and interpreted with the appropriate statistical treatment such as Percentage Distribution and One-way ANOVA to come up with the diagnosis of the grammatical problems of the respondents and to determine the significant difference between the proficiency in English vocabulary and profile of the respondents in freshman students.

This study revealed that the majority of the respondents were having difficulty in vocabulary. The English Vocabulary Test has the verbal interpretation of poor with a percentage of 56.8 of scores ranging from 1-24. Only 41 students got a verbal interpretation of satisfactory with 31 percent with their scores ranging from 27-38. Out of 132 students, only 16 students got a verbal interpretation of fair with 12.2 percent with their scores ranging from 25-26. There was no significant difference between the performance in English Vocabulary test and the sex, school graduated from, parent's educational attainment and grade in English of the respondents but there is significant difference between the English Vocabulary Proficiency of the respondents in terms of their course.

On the basis of findings stated above, the following were the conclusions drawn:

most of the respondents were females, most of the respondents graduated in public, most of the respondents' parents graduated in High School, most of the respondents were enrolled in Bachelor of Secondary Education and most of the respondents got 85 as their final grade in English.

The respondents were poor in performance in English vocabulary proficiency with the highest frequency of seventy-five with a highest percentage of fifty-six point eight, having scores ranging from 8-24 out of 50 items. There was a significant difference between the performance in vocabulary and the profile of the respondents in terms of course with the computed f- value of 10.275 and the p- value of 002, which is less than 05 level of significance.

Based on the findings and conclusions of the study, the researchers recommend that a program must be launched to aid this problem. More strategies should be initiated to boost their interest in reading which would lead to the enhancement of their English Vocabulary Proficiency. The students should also engage themselves in activities that can widen their English Vocabulary Proficiency such as reading written materials, media exposure, dictionary inclination, playing word games and answering word puzzles.