Reading Strategies of High & Low Proficiency Learners of English

Zhang, L. J., Gu, P. Y., & Hu, G. (2008). A cognitive perspective on Singaporean primary school pupils’ use of reading strategies in learning to read English. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 78, 245-271.

Background

Children in Singapore primary schools had to read texts in English meant for first language readers although for the majority of them, English was not their dominant language.

Aims

This study examined the reading strategies that successful learners of English in Singapore used, and the differences in strategy use between students of different grade and proficiency levels.

Sample

The sample included 18 Primary 4, 5, and 6 students from three neighbourhood primary schools.

Method

In each school, one student each was selected from the top and bottom groups in each level based on their latest English examination results. The materials comprised two narrative texts for each level which differed in terms of level of difficulty. Four teacher-researchers rated independently the difficulty level of each text, which was divided into semantic chunks so that the subjects knew where to stop reading and start thinking aloud. The authors coded the reading strategies found in the think-aloud data and held calibration meetings to discuss and resolve inconsistencies until they reached final agreement.

Findings

The sixth graders appeared to be better users of strategies such as ‘inferencing’, ‘relating to personal experiences’, and ‘asking for help’. Older learners used more reading strategies and more global strategies, contributing to meaning-making while those used by younger learners were more local, their focus being on isolated words, phrases or information.

High-proficiency learners used metacognitive strategies more frequently than low-proficiency learners. High-proficiency learners used metacognitive strategies such as ‘self-initiation’, ‘planning’, and ‘monitoring’, while low-proficiency learners used the cognitive strategy of ‘decoding’ more frequently.

A typical low-proficiency fourth grader would decode the text instead of predicting or summarizing the content, seldom making inferences of the text content based on linguistic or real-world knowledge. The high-proficiency group anticipated the text flow in reference to the text structure, predicting, inferencing, and monitoring comprehension more regularly.

Implications

Teachers could familiarize their low-proficiency students with knowledge and strategies of comprehension monitoring and teach them word-attack strategies by going beyond word decoding, showing and modelling them in the right way so that children would know the steps they could take to understand difficult texts.

Original article retrieved from EBSCOHost.