scholarly journals Fostering Metacognitive Reading Strategies in Thai EFL Classrooms: A Focus on Proficiency

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (7) ◽  
pp. 75
Author(s):  
Charinwit Seedanont ◽  
Suphawat Pookcharoen

EFL readers tend to experience a number of challenges while learning, due to a number of factors that affect how these readers achieve their learning goals. Metacognitive strategies, referring to one’s deliberate, goal-directed control over cognitive enterprises, are considered crucial for assisting EFL learners to be able to accomplish comprehension while reading. Previous studies have enriched the knowledge of metacognitive reading strategies in EFL settings. However, only few investigations yielded statistically significant effects on learners’ reading performance. This present study hence foresees an opportunity to shed new light on this issue by focusing on EFL learners’ proficiency. The objectives of this research are twofold: exploring the effects of the metacognitive strategy instruction on the strategy awareness, and perceiving the effects of the instruction on the reading performance in taking a standardized test. Forty-three students enrolling in a private male school in Bangkok, Thailand participated in the study, lasting ten weeks. A wide range of research tools were administered: SORS, IELTS reading test, and lesson plans. The findings suggested that the students’ awareness of reading strategies used in terms of sub-categories and IELTS reading test score improved with statistical significance. Pedagogical implications and suggestions for future research studies are discussed based on the findings.

Author(s):  
Parviz Ajideh ◽  
Mohammad Zohrabi ◽  
Kazem Pouralvar

This study investigated the effect of explicit instruction of metacognitive reading strategies on ESP reading comprehension among university students in Iran. Strategy instruction has recently been integrated into language teaching methodologies, stressing that successful language learners take advantage of appropriate strategy selection and application in order to develop better language skills. Poor learners, on the other hand, fail to know how to use strategies and for what purposes. There has been ample research on the impact of explicit strategy instruction on the EFL learners’ language skills. These studies indicate the effectiveness of strategy instruction on the various aspects of language learning such as skill development among EFL learners but the notion of the effectiveness of strategy instruction on ESP reading comprehension in university level has not been much scrutinized in Iranian context. The participants in this study included undergraduate first and second year students studying Islamic Art and Architecture Engineering at Tabriz Islamic Art University. A randomized subjects and posttest-only control group design was employed in this study. The number of students in Art control and experimental groups was 28 and the one for Architecture control and experimental group was 26 students. The participants in the experimental groups received explicit instruction of metacognitive reading strategies through the Cognitive Academic Language Learning Approach (CALLA) for strategy instruction. The results of independent t-test revealed that the students in the experimental groups outperformed those in the control groups and showed greater achievement in their ESP reading comprehension ability.


2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (6) ◽  
pp. 94
Author(s):  
Aziza M. Ali ◽  
Abu Bakar Razali

Being able to read well is important for English language learners. Through the process of reading, the learner becomes an active participant in producing an interaction with the writer of the text through predicting, analyzing, summarizing and using other types of reading strategies. However, building such a connection between the reader and the written information of the text is complex and for English as a second language (ESL) and English as a foreign language (EFL) students, it can be quite difficult for them to apply different types of reading strategies. This article provides a review of literature on 27 studies on the teaching of reading strategies (particularly cognitive and metacognitive reading strategies) for ESL/EFL learners, which reveals that ESL/EFL teachers need to keep updating their teaching methods to meet the ESL/EFL students’ needs, particularly in the use of correct reading strategies. The authors also highlight some of the main issues that prevent ESL/EFL students from improving and developing their reading comprehension. Furthermore, the authors discuss and conclude the article by suggesting to ESL/EFL teachers some teaching strategies to be applied in the reading lesson to improve the ESL/EFL students’ use of reading strategies.


2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-73
Author(s):  
Azadeh Rajaei ◽  
Seyed Hassan Talebi ◽  
Shirin Abadikhah

In an EFL context reading is a very important skill in language learning. This study aims at finding if instruction of reading strategies in two different collaborative and non-collaborative approaches affects reading comprehension and attitude toward reading differently. Forty-five Iranian adult female EFL learners at pre-intermediate general English proficiency level in Iran Language Institute (ili) were selected and divided into three groups of 15 students. One group functioning as the control group did not receive any strategy instruction; the second group, as the first experimental group, received reading strategy instruction in collaborative groups (Collaborative Strategic Reading or csr), and the third group considered as the second experimental group received reading strategy instruction in a non-collaborative way. A reading comprehension test and a reading attitude questionnaire were given to all three groups at the beginning of the term as pretests and after the experiment as posttests. The results obtained through one-way anova indicated that though both experimental groups outperformed the control group, there was no significant difference between the two experimental groups in reading comprehension and attitude toward reading. Therefore, it is up to teachers to weigh the advantages of using the collaborative approach to teaching reading against its disadvantages.


2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 39-52
Author(s):  
Saraswati Dawadi

There has been a steady interest in investigating the relationship between strategy use and English as a foreign language (EFL) test performance. Despite numerous studies on strategy use, the relationship between the two is still not clear. This paper reports on a study that investigated the use of reading strategies in the Secondary Education Examination English reading test and the relationship between reading strategy use and the test performance. A sample of 312 EFL learners studying at Grade 10 in Nepal participated in this study. They were asked to take the test and then respond to a reading strategy questionnaire. The quantitative software SPSS (version 20) was used to analyze the data. The results indicated that participants were active strategy users, and they used cognitive strategies more frequently than metacognitive strategies. A significant relationship was identified between reading strategy use and EFL proficiency; high-proficiency learners reported significantly higher use of reading strategies than moderate-proficiency learners, who in turn reported higher use of those strategies than their low-proficiency peers. Implications of these findings for EFL teaching and recommendations for further research are discussed.Journal of NELTA ,  Vol. 22, No. 1-2, 2017 December, Page: 39-52


2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 1043-1050
Author(s):  
Asalefew Mekuria Wudneh

The study was an attempt to investigate the level of awareness on Metacognitive reading strategies among first year Ethiopian EFL students.  It  also  tried  to  figure  out  the  possible  relationship  between  Metacognitive reading strategies  use  and  reading comprehension achievement.  Ninety-four EFL learners participated  in  the  study.  Metacognitive reading strategy inventory and reading comprehension test were used to collect the data. The data were analyzed through descriptive statistics to determine the mean value of strategies employed by the learners. Moreover, Pearson correlation coefficient  was  used  to discover  the  association  between  reading  strategy  use  and  reading  comprehension  achievement. According  to  the  findings  Ethiopian  EFL  learners ,were almost near to the lower limit (M=2.55,Sd.=0.34)line of medium level reading strategy users. Furthermore, the use of metacognitive reading strategy had weak correlation (r=0.21,p=0.039) with reading  comprehension achievement. The possible cause of this could be lack of awareness on how to regulate and monitor reading comprehension.


Author(s):  
Khalid Al Seghayer

This study was designed to investigate the adequacy of EFL learners' abilities in three major dimensions of digital literacy skills and whether self-assessments of competence were consistent with their actual performance. It also identified factors that affected learners' use of the selected digital literacy skills. To this end, 60 Saudi EFL learners (41 male and 19 female) responded to a five-part, cross-sectional questionnaire of 36 items categorized according to the three dimensions of digital literacy skills. They also engaged in 11 predetermined real-time Internet search tasks. The participants' on-screen online search activities were recorded and subjected to a search log analysis. Short, semi-structured post-search interviews were conducted to capture the participants' reflections on the search process. The data was analyzed with descriptive statistics and paired t-tests. The participants' success in searches was measured by the total number of tasks completed accurately. The results indicated that the participants were ill-equipped to efficiently handle the three key L2 digital literacy skills. Participants' low self-perceived ability to use them adequately was consistent with their actual poor online search performance. Further, the participants scored low in search accuracy, with the exception of search results interpretation skills and, to some extent, skills to evaluate a website's usefulness, and exhibited a wide range of areas for improvement and challenges in Web information search. The implications of the study and potential areas of future research are discussed.


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