The Effectiveness Of Reading Strategies On Reading .
International Journal of Social Science and Humanity, Vol. 10, No. 2, May 2020The Effectiveness of Reading Strategies on ReadingComprehensionChoosri Banditvilaiquickly and skips the details. They read the first sentence ofeach paragraph. Each paragraph usually contains a topicsentence which states the main idea. McWhorter [5] suggestsa topic sentence can appear differently within a paragraph.The most common location of a topic sentence appears in thefirst sentence of the first paragraph. The second most likelyplace for a topic sentence is the first sentence of the lastparagraph.Abstract—This research aimed to investigate the effectivenessof reading strategies on reading comprehension of the secondyear English major students who enrolled to study EnglishReading at the faculty of Liberal Arts and Science, KasetsartUniversity, to find out whether, after being trained in readingstrategies, they were able to apply any of these strategies to theirreading processes. The data were collected from a questionnaireand reading tasks and semi-structured interviews. Thestatistical techniques used were the mean value and standarddeviation. The analysis of qualitative data and summary of keypoints were made from the interview. The findings were thatreading strategies had a positive effect on the students’ readingcomprehension. The students had favourable attitudes towardsskimming, scanning, making predictions and questioning andthey could apply these strategies to their reading processes andthey helped them to comprehend the text n, English reading, reading processes.B. ScanningScanning is a reading skill that allows the reader to locatespecific information quickly. With scanning you alreadyknow before you begin what sort of information you aresearching for. The purpose of scanning is to get specificinformation. Scanning is especially important for improvingyour reading. Many students try to read every word whenthey read, so they read very slowly. Scanning can help thestudents learn to read and understand faster.readingC. Making PredictionsHutchinson [6] defines prediction as “A matter of using anexisting knowledge of a pattern or system in order toanticipate what is likely in a novel situation”. Manyresearches have shown that good readers use theirexperiences and background knowledge to make predictionsand formulate ideas as they read [7]. This strategy also allowsstudents interaction, which increases students’ interests andimproves their understanding of the text [8]. Makingpredictions is a strategy in which readers use informationfrom picture, title, to make predictions about the story. Thetitle of a text can operate memories of texts, permitting themto guess the content of a new text. During reading, successfulreaders can make predictions about what will occur next, orwhat opinions the writer will offer to support a discussion.Readers try to assess these predictions ceaselessly andchange any prediction that is not approved by the reading [9].I. INTRODUCTIONReading is a lifelong skill for academic learning andsuccess in school. According to Anderson [1], reading is abasic life skill. Thai university students have to spend a greattime on reading materials. However, the students face theproblem of not understanding the passages of what they hadread. This is reflected in their poor reading scores. In reading,students need to use various strategies to help them in theacquisition, storage, and retrieval of information [2].Therefore, reading strategies are assumed to be important forstudents reading comprehension and the reading strategiesequip the students with the skills of how to handle theirreading effectively. Research reveals that good readers areactively involved with the text and they are aware ofprocesses they use to understand while they read. Teacherscan help students improve their reading comprehensionthrough reading strategies. Reading strategies are purposefulmeans of comprehending the author’s message [3].They arebelieved to influence readers in adjusting their readingbehaviours to work on text difficulty, task demands and othercontextual variables. Adams [4] identified the types ofreading strategies as follows:D. QuestioningQuestioning helps students monitor their comprehensionand stay engaged and interested in their reading. Readers canuse the questioning before, during, and after reading. Thequestioning process requires readers to ask questions ofthemselves to construct meaning, enhance understanding,find answers, solve problems, find information, and discovernew information [10]. In this strategy, the students return tothe text throughout the reading process to find the answers tothe questions. Questioning helps students to clarify andcomprehend what they are reading. In this strategy, askingappropriate questions permits successful readers toconcentrate on the most important information of a text [11].Asking questions while involving in the reading processprovides students with an opportunity to think about what arethey reading, be active and independent readers, and be ableA. SkimmingSkimming is a reading technique for speed reading. Thepurpose of skimming is to get an overview of theorganization of the text and its main idea from a passage in abook. To skim a passage, the readers read through the passageManuscript received November 20, 2019; revised March 12, 2020.Choosri Banditvilai is with the Department of English, Faculty of LiberalArts and Science, Kasetsart University, Kamphaeng Saen Campus,Thailand(e-mail: cbanditvtlai@yahoo.com).doi: 10.18178/ijssh.2020.10.2.101246
International Journal of Social Science and Humanity, Vol. 10, No. 2, May 2020to appropriately reflect on their reading [12].students on the effectiveness of reading strategies on Englishreading comprehension of third-year marketing students inThailand. The findings were that students had positiveattitudes towards reading strategies and felt that readingstrategies affected the students reading comprehensionmoderately. Saowakhon [19] studied the reading strategies offirst-year Engineering students at a university in Thailand.The findings were that the students employed readingstrategies moderately when reading English languagematerials. In 2005, Supanan [20] investigated the readingstrategies of first-year Business English students at auniversity in Thailand, it was found that the studentsemployed various reading strategies to assist incomprehension of English material. The most frequentstrategy used was looking up the meanings of unknownwords or usage from an English-Thai dictionary. Readersrequire reading strategies to help achieve readingcomprehension.II. LITERATURE REVIEWGoodman [13] defines reading as an active process inwhich readers use effective strategies to extract meaningfrom a text. In the process of reading, readers need to usereading strategies to understand the meaning from the text.Reading strategies are key elements in developing students’reading comprehension. According to [14], reading strategiesinfluence readers in adjusting their reading behaviors to workon text difficulty, task demands and other contextualvariables. Reading is a highly strategic process during whichreaders are constantly constructing meaning using a varietyof strategies. Several research studies have shown that thereis a positive relationship between learners’ reading strategiesand their reading comprehension skills [15]. Brookbank [15]indicated that the application of various reading strategiesincreased learners’ reading comprehension proficiency.Learners who learn reading strategies try to recognize themain point of a paragraph, to elaborate on unclear words,phrases, or sentences, and to summarize their reading. Thesestrategies aid readers in solving their problems when readingtexts and assessing their planning and its results. Readingstrategies improve the reading skills of proficient and lessproficient readers. Readers who have learned differentreading strategies know what, when, how, and why to usethem in their reading comprehension processes. Su [16]investigated the impact of reading strategies on the learners’reading proficiency. The findings indicated that readingstrategies are among the most powerful factors in improvingreading comprehension skills and they have a great impact onthe students’ reading comprehension ability. Studentsbecome not just passive receivers of information but activemakers of meaning. Successful readers try to apply numerousskills to grasp meaning from the texts. Readers should beinvolved in the reading process by using different strategiesto monitor their meaning. Paris et al. [17] classified readingstrategies into three categories based on when they are used:before, during and after reading. Pre-reading strategies is theprocess of examining a text or illustrations prior to actuallyreading the text. Pre-reading is aimed at activating thestudents’ background knowledge or schemata from personalexperience. Background knowledge is defined as thestudents’ prior knowledge, or knowledge of the world andcultural knowledge. Readers used background knowledge tointegrate new information from a text into their previousinformation. Pre-reading assists in the assimilation of newinformation that they are about to encounter. Generating partof the reading vocabulary and developing a goal for furtherreading, readers require reading strategies to help achievereading comprehension. While-reading phase is designed tohelp in understanding the writer’ s purpose, style and skills,improve understanding of the text structure, clarify textcontent and locate the main idea. While reading questionsmay enable students to understand the details of what theyread thoroughly. Post-reading strategies are aimed atpromoting: consolidation or reflection on what has been readand relating the text to the learners’ knowledge, interests orviews. Harnseithanon [18] conducted a study with ThaiIII. PROCESSThis section includes purpose of the study, the participants,the material, the significant of the study, the instruments, aquestionnaire and follow up interviews.A. Purpose of the StudyThis study, aims at answering the following questions:1) What are the effects of reading strategies namely:Skimming, scanning, making predictions andquestioning on students’ reading processes?2) After being taught reading strategies, are the studentsable to apply any of these strategies in their readingprocesses?B. ParticipantsThe participants in this study were 59, 13 males and 46females, second-year English major students at KasetsartUniversity, Kamphaeng Saen Campus enrolled in the courseof 01355201 English Reading from July to September 2019.It is a compulsory course for English major students. All ofthe students were approximately 18-20 years old and hadsimilar backgrounds since they were second year Englishmajors. They all had at least 10 years experience in learningEnglish at primary and secondary school.C. MaterialThe material used in this study was adapted from ReadingPower by [21]. The content in each unit contained threephases of reading to develop reading skills. Four readingpassages of the four units were selected for the experimentalteaching sessions and for checking the students’ applicationstrategies.The steps in teaching were divided into three steps basedon Williams, [22] as follows:1). Pre-readingThe purpose of pre-reading was to assist the students to getthe most out of what they were going to read. This was doneby providing the students with pre-reading questions toactivate students to think and to relate their relevantbackground to the text, to preview important points, and to47
International Journal of Social Science and Humanity, Vol. 10, No. 2, May 2020set a purpose for reading.Item 3. and 4 aimed to investigate students’ attitudestowards using the above strategies.Item 5. was to get the students’ general comments andsuggestions.2). While-readingThe while-reading phase was to help the students developthe skills of eliciting from what they read. Students needed touse bottom up processes to analyze words, phrases andsentences in texts to verify their anticipation from the readingphase and to understand the details of the text [23].G. FindingsData from the questionnaireThe results of the questionnaire found that students had afavourable attitudes towards the strategies that the teacherused. The students’ feedback supports the idea that learningtakes place by relating previous knowledge to understandnew information. In L2 learning where the students havelimited experience of the language, their previous knowledge,especially the knowledge of the content is very important.The students mentioned that prediction stimulated them topay more attention to the listening text in order to see whethertheir predictions were right or not. This gave them a purposefor reading. The reading strategies concerning skimming,scanning, making predictions and questioning could affecttheir reading comprehension. Therefore, they needed to betaught some pre-reading activities to be able to activate theirown prior knowledge about a given topic.3). Post-readingThe purpose of follow up was to help the students developthe information gained from what they learned. It enabledstudents not only to review or conclude what they have readfrom the text but also to integrate the textual information intotheir own experiences.In the pre-reading phase, the teacher asked the students tolook at the picture, read the title and try to predict what thestory was about. In while-reading phase, the students wereasked to read the text to check their predictions. In thepost-reading step students were asked to discuss the keyconcepts, review and summarize what they had read andintegrate the textual information with their knowledge of theworld.1). English reading tasksThis task was designed by the researcher to study thereading abilities of the students. It consisted of 4 passages.There were 4 multiple-choice answers. The objectives were tocheck whether the students could apply reading strategies toaid reading comprehension. The four reading tasks which thestudents did while reading the passages together with thefinal test of students abilities in skimming, scanning, makingpredictions and questioning strategies were used as onesource of data.To analyze the reading tasks, the steps were as follows:1) The full score of each task was specified as 10 points.The tasks were scored and results recorded in a tablewith frequency distribution. The arithmetic means ofthe scores from each task was calculated.The data from reading tasks that the students did in thewhile-reading phase were administered. Then the mean-valuewas calculated for each task. The results are presented inTable II.D. Significant of the StudyThe present study is significant in that it can providenotable insights into the effectiveness of reading strategies onreading comprehension.E. Research InstrumentsIn order to evaluate the effectiveness of reading strategieson reading comprehension i.e. skimming, scanning, makingpredictions and questioning, a questionnaire, reading tasksand semi-structured interviews were used to collect the data(see Table I).TABLE II: THE EXPERIMENTAL PERIODS IN THIS STUDYText UnitsClassroom PerformanceConduct the experimentalSeptember 4, 2019Unit 6teachingConduct the experimentalSeptember, 11, 2019Unit 7teachingConduct the experimentalSeptemberv18, 2019Unit 8teachingSeptember 23, 2019Unit 9Conduct the reading testDateUnitF. QuestionnaireThe first part of the questionnaire focused on theparticipants’ gender and length of English learningexperience. The second part was used to obtain students’reading strategies awareness focused on the above-mentionedreading strategies. The questionnaire was used to obtainstudents’ reactions towards using skimming, scanning,making predictions and questioning in the pre-reading andwhile- reading phase. This study was conducted during thefirst semester in the academic year 2019. It consisted of fiveitems.Item 1. measured students’ opinions on the effects ofskimming, scanning, making predictions and questioning ontheir reading comprehension.Item 2. elicited how different strategies helped them inreading.TABLE II: THE READING TASK RESULTSUnit 6Unit 7Unit 8Unit 9Mean8.899.279.089.00S.D.1. 070.861.110.97Table I, shows that the students have a reasonable readingcomprehension level since the mean value of reading taskscore were 8.89, 9.27, 9.08 and 9.00. The results of S.D.illustrate that the mean scores are reliable since the S.D. ofeach test is low.To support the results from the reading tasks, the data fromthe questionnaire, item 1 which asked the students to rate thedegree to which skimming, scanning, making predictions andquestioning assisted their understanding of each reading taskwas calculated into a mean-value. The results are presented asfollows:48
International Journal of Social Science and Humanity, Vol. 10, No. 2, May 2020IV. CONCLUSIONThe findings of this study showed that reading strategieshave a great impact on the students’ reading comprehensionability. Students have revealed that skimming, scanning,making predictions and questioning strategies have helpedthe students’ reading comprehension. The students hadpositive attitudes towards these strategies. Students needed tobe trained or guide on the use of different reading strategiesso that they would know how to apply these strategies forsuccessful comprehension of academic materials. Teacherswill require the skills in order to teach reading strategies thatwill assist students in understanding and applying theappropriate strategies to become skilled readers.Fig. 1. Students’ self-rating of the degree to which reading strategies assistedtheir reading comprehension.V. DISCUSSION AND IMPLICATIONIt can be seen from the graph in Fig. 1 that the students feltreading strategies assisted their comprehension a lot.The mean-values were calculated using the followingscale:1.00-1.75 None1.76-2.50 A little2.51-3.25 To some extent3. 26-4 A lotThe results of the semi-structured interviews show thatmost students had positive attitudes towards the readingstrategies on reading comprehension. Students taught thereading strategies were enabled to improve their readingcomprehension. The following are some quotes fromstudents’ attitudes towards using reading strategies onreading comprehension.“I like the way the teacher asks me to read the title, look atthe picture and make predictions. This strategy motivates meto read the article with a purpose”.“The teacher teaches us to find key words from the passagebecause it can help us to get specific information easily andquickly”.“I skim through the article about the content of thepassage and try to guess the meaning of the unknown wordsfrom the context”.“Prediction helps me get more understanding whenreading”.“Prediction gave me a chance to activate relevant existingknowledge in making predictions”.“It encourages students to pay more attention to thereading to see whether their prediction is right or wrong”.“The teacher’s questions activate relevant ideas and henceprovides a basis for understanding the reading text”.“Pre-reading questions helps me make predictions aboutcontent and can solve meaning problems when I am laterfaced with language difficulties”.“I have some background knowledge about Unit 6. Pleaselet smokers know: It is never too late to quit. This knowledgefacilitates my predictions”.“I like the way the teacher teaches me to find key wordsbecause they help me find specific information quickly and Ican apply this technique to use in my daily life”.“The questions that the teacher asks before readingactivates my background knowledge and stimulates myinterest to read the passage purposefully”.Reading strategies based on skimming, scanning,making predictions and questioning helped the students havea reasonable reading comprehension level. However, thelevel of the students’ comprehension might vary from tasks totasks, depending on students’ background knowledge and thecomplexity of the tasks. The majority of the students couldapply reading strategies to their reading processes. It could beinterpreted that students gained the ability to predict and askquestions because the teacher had provided the opportunityfor them to build up the skill.ACKNOWLEDGEMENTThe author would like to thank the department of Englishat the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Science, KasetsartUniversity, Kamphaeng Saen campus for funding andsupporting this research project.CONFLICT OF INTERESTThe author declares no conflict of interest.AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONSMs. Choosri Banditvilai is fully responsible for thisresearch paper.REFERENCES[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9]49R. Anderson, E. Hiebert, J. Scott, and I. Wilkinson, Becoming a Nationof Readers: The Report of the Commission on Reading, WashingtonD.C: National Institute of Education and the Center for the Study ofReading, 1985.M. Singhal. (2011). Reading proficiency, reading strategies,metacognitive awareness and L2 readers. [Online]. Available:http://www.reading matrix/articles/singhal/J. Olshavsky, “Reading as problem solving: An investigation ofstrategies,” Reading Research Quarterly, pp.1976–1977.W. Adams, Becky Patterson, Developing Reading Versatility,Thomson. USA, 2008.M. K. T. Whorter, Efficient and Flexible Reading, Boston. LittleBrown and Company, 1987.T. Hutchinson and A. Waters, English for Specific Purposes,Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.C. Block and S. Isael, Reading First and Beyond: The Complete Guidefor Teachers and Literacy Coaches, Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press,2005.L. D. S. Oczkus, Reciprocal Teaching at Work Strategies forImproving Reading Comprehension, Newark, DE: InternationalReading Association, 2003.J. W. Gillet and C. A. Temple, Understanding Reading ProblemAssessment and Instrction, (4th ed.) New York: Harpercollins College,1994.
International Journal of Social Science and Humanity, Vol. 10, No. 2, May 2020[10] S. Harvey and A. Goudvis, Strategies That Work TeachingComprehension to Enhance Understanding, York, ME: StenhousePublishers, 2000.[11] E. Wood, V. Woloshyn, and T. Willoughby, Cognitive StrategyIntruction for Middle and High Schools, Cambridge, MA: BrooklinePress, 1995.[12] J. N. Mahdavi and L. Tensfeldt, “Untangling reading comprehensionstrategy instruction: Assisting struggling readers in the primary grades,preventing school failure,” Alternative Education for Children andYouth, 2013.[13] K. S. Goodman, “Ken goodman on reading,” Portmouth, NH:Heinemann Online Journal, 1996, vol. 15, no. 2, pp. 156-166.[14] K. Koda, Insights into Second Language Reading: A Cross-LinguisticApproach, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.[15] D. Brookbank, S. Grover, K. Kullberg, and C. Strawser, StudentsAchievement of Student Chicago, IL: Saint Xavier University, 1999.(ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED 435 094).[16] C. Su, Evaluation of Reading Skills Applied in the First-year CollegeEnglish Reading Course, presented at the Tenth InternationalSymposium on English Teaching. Taipei: Crane, 2001.[17] S. G. Paris, B. A. Wasik, and J. C. Turner, “The development ofstrategic reading” in R.Barr, M.L. Kamil, P.B. Mosenthal &P.D.Pearson(eds), Handbook of Reading Research, New York: Longman,1991.[18] P. Harnseithanon, A Survey Study of Effectiveness of ReadingStrategies on English Reading Comprehension, Third Year MarketingStudents, Rajabhat Institute Pranakhon, Thammasart University,Bangkok, 2002.[19] K. Saowakhon, A Study of Reading Strategies in EnglishComprehension of First Year Engineering Students at King Mongkut’sUniversity of Technology North Bangkok, ULanguage Institute,Thammasart University, Bangkok, 2003.[20] P. Supanan, A Study of Reading Strategies in English Comprehensionof First Year English Students at Hatyai University, 2005.[21] S. B. Mikulecky and L. Jeffries, Reader Power, Second Edition.Addison Wesley Longman, New York, 1988.[22] E. Williams, Reading in the Language Classroom, London: Macmillan,1994.Copyright 2020 by the authors. This is an open access article distributedunder the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricteduse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the originalwork is properly cited (CC BY 4.0).Choosri Banditvilai was born in Bangkok,Thailand. She got a bachelor degree in English fromSilpakorn University in 1985. In 2003, she got amaster degree in applied linguistics from KingMongkut University of Technology, Thonburi inThailand. Presently, she is an associate professor atthe Department of English, Faculty of Liberal Artsand Science, Kasetsart University, KamphaengSaen Campus, Nakhon Pathom in Thailand. She iscurrently teaching business English and reading courses. She is the authorof English for Athletes and Referees (2017), Pathways to Opportunitythrough English (2014), Read All About It: English in Newspapers (2010)and Authentic English Texts for Advanced Learners (2003). All of thesebooks are published by Kasetsart University Press in Thailand.50
success in school. According to Anderson [1], reading is a basic life skill. Thai university students have to spend a great . reading, readers require reading strategies to help achieve reading comprehension. While-reading
May 02, 2018 · D. Program Evaluation ͟The organization has provided a description of the framework for how each program will be evaluated. The framework should include all the elements below: ͟The evaluation methods are cost-effective for the organization ͟Quantitative and qualitative data is being collected (at Basics tier, data collection must have begun)
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Le genou de Lucy. Odile Jacob. 1999. Coppens Y. Pré-textes. L’homme préhistorique en morceaux. Eds Odile Jacob. 2011. Costentin J., Delaveau P. Café, thé, chocolat, les bons effets sur le cerveau et pour le corps. Editions Odile Jacob. 2010. Crawford M., Marsh D. The driving force : food in human evolution and the future.
Le genou de Lucy. Odile Jacob. 1999. Coppens Y. Pré-textes. L’homme préhistorique en morceaux. Eds Odile Jacob. 2011. Costentin J., Delaveau P. Café, thé, chocolat, les bons effets sur le cerveau et pour le corps. Editions Odile Jacob. 2010. 3 Crawford M., Marsh D. The driving force : food in human evolution and the future.
