Malaysia's Vision is for the country to become a fully developed nation by 2020. In order to compete at international level, the country needs to produce future workers who are well-versed in English. The National Philosophy of Education aims to produce holistic graduates who excel academically and have better intercultural understanding, which resulted in the re-introduction of literature into the curriculum. In addition, English is also used as the medium of instruction for teaching science and mathematics. In 2000, literature became a part of the English syllabus when the Literature in English Component was implemented in secondary schools. This paper aims to discuss students' attitudes towards the texts used in the program, the challenges faced in reading these texts and the type of texts students prefer to read. It also discusses the teaching strategies used in class, their effectiveness as well as the methods favoured by students. The study was carried out in two schools in Kemaman, Terengganu involving 110 Form Five students. Questionnaire and interview were used as the research instrument. Findings suggested that students generally had positive attitudes towards the text selection although they were less enthusiastic about the teaching methods used by teachers.

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.

The major aim of this research is to determine the effectiveness of using songs in teaching English language to primary school students. This research will specifically investigate to what extent songs can contribute to the development of students' language proficiency. The research is designed to find out whether using songs can be an effective way in creating positive attitude and motivation in language learners. The research will be carried out through the use of questionnaire. The data will be analyzed using the SPSS software to determine the best statistical technique to be used to test the hypotheses and to interpret the result. This is a preliminary survey research and it is hoped that this research will give an opportunity to teachers to realize songs help improve students' language proficiency. From the survey, it has been discovered that the use of song not only helps the understanding, it also stimulates and increases the students' interest to learn, enjoy and engage in the learning process. Furthermore, it accelerates students' confidence, learning ability and skill when activities are highly motivated and memorable. Future researchers should extend this research to other samples in other localities and cultures.

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

Historically, the use of the English Language in Malaysia, then Malaya, dates back to the Colonial times. This shows there has been a legacy of English usage in the nation. Recently, in view of globalization and increasing competition among nations in the world, there has been a renewed emphasis on the importance of English. This study hopes to provide some feedback from four industries in Kemaman about the adequacy of our new graduates. This study focused on two GLCs and two private sector companies in Kemaman, Terengganu. However, the findings can be applicable to companies throughout the country, be they GLC’s, government or private sector. Although only 115 respondents from the supervisory level upwards have been selected as the sample, these 115 respondents can be representative of the work sector not only in Kemaman, Terengganu but in the entire nation. Based on the findings, the speaking, writing, social skills and overall English proficiency of new graduates were found to be not adequate. Future researchers should focus on the need for a new syllabus design which gives scope for the development of soft skills such as interpersonal skills, speaking skills and socializing skills

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In tandem with educational best practices the world over, School-based assessments (SBAs) were introduced in Malaysia in 2012 for secondary one students. This study investigated quantitatively and qualitatively matters such as the teachers' knowledge of SBAs and the issues faced when implementing SBAs. Whereas the factors contributing to the problems of SBA implementation was investigated only qualitatively. A sample of 60 English teachers in the district of Dungun, Terengganu, who were involved in SBAs from the beginning was used, out of this, 20 teachers were interviewed to obtain qualitative findings. It was found that teachers had satisfactory knowledge of planning an SBA tailored lesson. They also showed satisfactory knowledge of developing SBAs but appeared to have difficulty in the psychometrics of test analysis. As for issues faced by teachers, they were not indifferent to SBA implementation but team work and collaboration among SBA teachers needs to be improved. Teachers faced problems in SBA implementation but overall had a positive attitude towards SBA. Teachers voiced concerns over the lack of adequate staff numbers, lack of uniformity and a possible element of biasness in grading. Teachers also faced time constraints, lack of effective materials and methodologies and poor ICT facilities in schools. They also feared cheating by students in SBAs. Future researchers should investigate the success of SBA implementation after a few years.

Interactive and interactional metadiscourse are linguistic features used to maintain the coherence in essays. It involved a one-way interaction between the writer and reader, thus a challenge for Second Language (L2) learners to write effectively and comprehensively. A study is done on how the L2 learners produced the metadiscourse features and the usage is compared. A corpus of 200 evaluative essays by UiTM undergraduate students from computer science and business administration courses is analysed based on Hyland’s (2005) framework. The purpose is to find out the amount and types of metadiscourse used and whether students from different course groups make any differences in their choices. The analysis revealed that students in both courses produced more interactive than interactional metadiscourse. The most prominent feature is Self-mention and the least is Attitude Markers. The same prominent feature for both courses is Transition Markers. The business administration course shows the least feature in Evidentials, whereas Frame Markers in computer science. These are evidence as to the importance of metadiscourse in students’ academic writings and awareness is shown in its usage. This could lead to a proposition for a metadiscourse writing comparison between secondary schools and universities to gain fascinating outcomes.    Keywords: Evaluative writings, Interactional metadiscourse, Interactive metadiscourse, L2 learners, undergraduates