Abstract:
This qualitative study identified the common reading problems that negatively impact
students‟ reading comprehension. It also investigated the effective reading strategies
that teachers of English have utilized to improve reading comprehension levels of the
students. For the purpose of this study, “effective reading comprehension strategies”
are defined as any strategies that have been found by teachers as beneficial for
improving reading comprehension levels of students. Importantly, a particular reading
comprehension strategy could be beneficial based on these teachers‟ experiences
while working with students who have difficult in reading, but it might not have been
found to be an effective reading strategy in the literature. Thus, the focus of this
research was on determining the effectiveness of using a particular strategy based on
teachers‟ teaching experiences, rather than strategies only found in the literature. The
data collection procedure involved interviews and questionnaire. The teachers in this
research pointed out that the reading problems that negatively influence reading
comprehension of their students include (a) issues with background knowledge, (b)
trouble with fluency, (c) difficulty with informational text, (d) difficulty with making
inferences, (e) issues with vocabulary, and (f) low reading level. According to the
teachers, there are numerous reading comprehension strategies found to be effective
to improve comprehension. These include graphic organizers, questioning, story
mapping, peer-assisted strategy, think aloud, discussing the text with students, and
different grouping. The teachers informally assess their students‟ reading
comprehension through retelling, questioning, Cloze procedure, having students fill in
graphic organizers, and writing activity.
Description:
A dissertation in the Department of Applied Linguistics,
faculty of Foreign Languages, submitted to the School of
Graduate Studies in partial fulfilment
of the requirements for the award of the degree of
Master of Education
(Teaching English as a Second Language)
in the University of Education, Winneba
DECEMBER, 2021