METHODOLOGY
The aim of the study is to investigate EFL junior high school students’
perceptions of English online extensive reading (ER) and their experiences of the English online ER program, Scholastic Learning Zone. In the following sections, the researcher will describe the methodology of the research: the English online ER program (Scholastic Learning Zone), the pilot study, and the formal study.
Scholastic Learning Zone
Nowadays, many websites provide various online reading materials, for example, Raz-Kids, XREADING, ER-Central, and Scholastic Learning Zone. In addition, most online reading websites also provide features that help learners learn English, such as oral reading, highlighting, animations, and comprehension quizzes. Different from other online reading websites, Scholastic Learning Zone provides learners with not only various online reading materials with audio and video features, but also
personalized learning. Specifically, when learners first use Scholastic Learning Zone, they have to take an adaptive reading assessment and answer about 20 multiple choice questions. After the assessment, learners will receive their own Lexile measures and reading lists. Therefore, learners can find suitable reading materials within their Lexile ranges rather than spending time finding suitable reading materials among an abundance of books.
Besides, Scholastic Learning Zone is very convenient for both students and teachers. To students, it provides access to Scholastic digital resources, such as Literacy Pro Library, BookFlix, TrueFlix, Grolier Online, Scholastic Online Assessment of Reading, Scholastic Literacy Pro. To teachers, it provides reports of students’ learning progress, such as the students’ comprehension scores, the number of
quizzes passed, the number of words read, and the time spent on reading. Due to the aforementioned features, Scholastic Learning Zone is chosen as a main instrument in this study.
Scholastic Learning Zone provides six online resources: Literacy Pro Library, BookFlix, TrueFlix, Grolier Online, Scholastic Online Assessment of Reading, Scholastic Literacy Pro. The first four resources are online reading systems. Literacy Pro Library provides over 900 fiction and nonfiction e-books and BookFlix pairs classic fictional video storybooks with related nonfiction e-books. Besides, TrueFlix provides nonfiction books with videos, audio, images, and texts. Grolier Online is designed for students’ reports and projects and includes nonfiction contents, newspapers, maps, and videos. The other two resources are about the online assessment. Scholastic Online Assessment of Reading assesses student reading comprehension and provide data for teachers and parents to meet individual needs.
Scholastic Literacy Pro is an online assessment that assesses students’ reading ability and comprehension and records students’ learning progress (Scholastic Digital Classroom Resources, n.d.).
In the present study, Scholastic Literacy Pro, Literacy Pro Library, and BookFlix were employed to collect data for further analysis. In the following sections, Lexile measures and the three main resources on this program will be described.
Lexile Measures
When leaners first use Scholastic Learning Zone, they have to take an adaptive reading assessment to determine their reading levels by receiving a Lexile measure.
Then, they can create a booklist based on their interests as well as their Lexile measures.
The Lexile measure is used to measure students’ growth in English reading. It is
based on more than 30 years of research conducted by psychometricians, data
scientists, and researchers with considerable experience. Besides, it is widely used by publishers, online booksellers, and school programs around the world. The Lexile measure ranges from below 0L for early readers to above 2000L for advanced learners.
The Lexile measure is shown as a number with an “L” after it. For example, 880L indicates an 880 Lexile measure. The higher the Lexile measures are, the longer and more challenging the reading texts will be. Besides, learners who score below 0L receive a BR for Beginning Reader. They receive a BR with a Lexile measure after it.
For instance, BR100L indicates that the Lexile measure of the reader is 100 below 0L.
The higher the number after BR is, the less skilled the readers are.
The reading lists will range from 100L below to 50L above learners’ Lexile measures. For example, if a learner’s Lexile measure is 500L, his reading list will range from 400L to 550L (About Lexile Measures for Reading, n.d.; Find Books for Beginning Readers, n.d.).
Literacy Pro Library
Literacy Pro Library provides 996 fiction and nonfiction e-books ranging in Lexile measures from Beginning Reader to 1340L. The leveled books cover a wide range of genres and interests, and it also has some features that help develop students’
reading skills. For example, read aloud with the function of adjusting speed (Figure 1) supports independent reading and listening comprehension, clickable vocabulary (Figure 2) helps students learn and reinforce unfamiliar vocabulary, and the function of adjusting the speed of the stories tailors to students’ different needs. In addition, every time students finish a book on Literacy Pro Library, they can take a
comprehension test to check their understanding.
Figure 1 The Screenshot of the Feature, Read Aloud, on Literacy Pro Library
Figure 2 The Screenshot of the Feature, Clickable Vocabulary, on Literacy Pro Library
Scholastic Literacy Pro
Scholastic Literacy Pro is a platform for students and teachers to monitor students’ reading ability and comprehension with thousands of quizzes. In student software, it provides students with a recommended reading list, book comprehension quizzes and scores, the number of quizzes passed, and the number of words read. It
supports teachers with reports of students’ performance, such as the scores of
comprehension quizzes, the number of quizzes passed, the number of words read, and the amount of reading time. Thus, teachers can monitor students’ progress, view their quizzes, and see whether more support is needed.
BookFlix
On Scholastic Learning Zone, BookFlix is another online resource that pairs classic fictional video storybooks with related nonfiction e-books (Figure 3). It
incorporates such multimedia tools as colorful animations, rich audios, and interactive games (Figure 4) to strengthen students’ reading skills, develop students’ knowledge of the world, and most important of all, cultivate the love for reading.
Figure 3 The Pairs of Fictional Video Storybooks and Nonfiction E-Books
Figure 4 The Interface on BookFlix
What follows are the feature of Literacy Pro Library and BookFlix.
The features of Literacy Pro Library:
996 fiction and nonfiction e-books
Read aloud
Clickable vocabulary
Adjusting the speed of the stories
Comprehension quizzes The features of BookFlix:
Fictional video storybooks and nonfiction e-books
Animations
Audio
Games
The Pilot Study
Before conducting the action research, the researcher did a pilot study to test the feasibility of Scholastic Learning Zone for EFL junior high school students. 21 participants in a junior high school were recruited. Those participants came from two English gifted classes, with 11 seventh graders and 10 eighth graders. Though they were English gifted students, their English reading ability was not as good as the researcher expected. The Lexile measures of those 21 participants ranged from 210L to 998L. From Lexile measures, it was obvious that their reading ability ranged widely and it was similar to common heterogeneous classes which included students with varying levels.
The participants were required to do the pretest and introduced to Scholastic Learning Zone in the first period. Then, in the following month, the students read books in Scholastic Learning Zone in class once a week. In the last period, the participants were encouraged to fill in a questionnaire (see Appendix A) to give feedback. The timetable of the pilot study was presented in Table 2.
Table 2
The Timetable of the Pilot Study
Period Content
1st period The pretest
Introduction of Scholastic Learning Zone The following month Implementation of Scholastic Learning Zone The last period The questionnaire
From the feedback, some advanced students whose Lexile measures were higher than 900L said that they did not have enough time in class to finish a book. One of the reasons was the length of the story. The higher the Lexile measure was, the longer the reading passages were. The story was so long that the students could not finish it
within only three to four periods. Another student whose Lexile measure was about 400L mentioned that she tried two to three books before she found the interesting book. When she started to read the book she liked, the class was going to end.
According to Sheu (2004), with the implementation of collaborative activities, such as discussion, role play, and retelling, the participants showed positive attitude toward English reading. Besides, Renandya and Jacobs (2002) mentioned that if follow-up activities were designed carefully, it would be good for students to share and reinforce what they read and learned from the books. Therefore, the researcher decided to include a follow-up activity, discussion, in the formal study. During the discussion, the participants could share the story they read and the interesting part of the story. Thus, it would arouse the participants’ interest to read more books. This way, they would spend less time searching for books they wanted to read. Based on the feedback provided by the participants, the researcher modified the research design and conduct the formal study as below.
The Formal Study
Participants
The participants for the formal study were from an intact class in a junior high school in Hsinchu County. The researcher was their homeroom teacher. There were 30 seventh graders, 15 males and 15 females. Most of them were from middle-class families. They had at least 4-year experience of learning English in elementary schools. Based on their performance on the school exams, two of them were low achievers and needed remedial teaching. Both of them even had difficulty spelling words. Besides, those two students showed little interest in English class and said they did not like English, so they were excluded from the formal study. Thus, there were only 28 participants, 14 males and 14 females, in the formal study.
Research Design
This action research lasted for 21 weeks. The researcher devoted one 45-minute class period per week to conduct the study from October 2018 to March 2019.
In the first week, the participants took the pretest, the reading assessment on Scholastic Literacy Pro. After the pretest, the participants got Lexile measures and recommended reading lists according to their Lexile measures and reading interests.
In the second week, the researcher introduced ER to participants and told the participants what ER was and how it would be carried out. Moreover, the researcher also introduced how to use Scholastic Learning Zone and the three online resources, Scholastic Literacy Pro, Literacy Pro Library, and BookFlix so that the participants knew the features of each resource. After the introduction, the participants had time to use the program themselves.
From the third to the 20th week, 18 weeks in total, the participants joined the program in a computer classroom. Between the 13th and the 15th weeks, there was a 3-week winter vacation. Thus, the participants were encouraged to read at home. A 45-minute class period was divided into two sections. In the first 30 minutes, the participants used Literacy Pro Library and BookFlix to read online. In order to be in line with the 10 principles of ER (Day & Bamford, 2002), the participants chose the books according to their own interests and read silently. They could change the books when they felt the books were boring or difficult. If they encountered any technical problems, they could ask the teacher (the researcher) for help immediately.
After reading a book on Literacy Pro Library and BookFlix, the participants could choose whether to take a quiz of the book or not. Scholastic Literacy Pro randomly provided 10 questions in the quiz. Students had to answer more than seven questions correctly to pass the quiz. They had three times to check their
comprehension of the books they read.
Besides the quizzes, when the participants finished reading or changed a book, they needed to fill in a reading log designed by the researcher (Appendix B). In the reading log, the participants had to record the title of the books, the numbers of pages they read, the length of the video they watched, whether they liked the book or not, and the reasons why they liked or disliked the books. Even if the participants did not finish the book, they still had to fill in the reading log according to the content they read. Furthermore, in order to let the participants feel less stressful, they could choose to write the reading log in either English or Chinese.
In the second section of the lesson, the last 15 minutes, there was a follow-up activity, a group discussion. The participants were divided into 10 groups. There were three people in a group and one of them was the leader. The leader led the group members to share what they read in class. Also, in order to reduce the participants’
pressure, they could choose to share in either English or Chinese. During the
discussion, the participants could share the summary, the interesting plot, or one of the impressive characters from the book. The group discussion gave the participants chances to listen to different stories, and it might arouse their interest to find more books to read.
In the 21st week, the last period of the program, the participants did a posttest on Scholastic Literacy Pro. The result of the posttest showed whether the participants improved their English reading comprehension. After the posttest, the participants filled in the Questionnaire on Scholastic Learning Zone (see Appendix C). It was used to investigate the participants’ feedback about the online ER program. The timetable of the formal study was shown in Table 3.
Table 3
The Timetable of the Formal Study
Week Content
1 The pretest on Scholastic Literacy Pro
2 The introduction of ER and Scholastic Learning Zone 3 to 20 The first 30 minutes
Reading on Scholastic Learning Zone The reading log
The last 15 minutes A group discussion
21 The posttest on Scholastic Literacy Pro
The questionnaire on Scholastic Learning Zone Note. Week 13 to week 15 was winter vacation (students read at home).
Data Collection
In this study, both quantitative and qualitative data were collected. The
quantitative data were collected from the questionnaire (closed-ended questions), the pretest and posttest, and the results of three monthly exams to examine the
participants' opinions of using Scholastic Learning Zone and their English reading proficiency. In addition, Scholastic Learning Zone reports provided information about the participants’ performance, including the Lexile scores, the scores of
comprehension quizzes, the number of passed quizzes, the number of words read, and the amount of reading time.
The instruments used to collect the qualitative data included the reading logs the participants wrote after reading, the questionnaire (the open-ended questions), and the teachers’ reflective journals.
1. Reading Logs
The participants were asked to fill in the reading log (see Appendix B) every
time they read. On the reading log, besides the title and the date, the participants recorded the pages they read, the length of the video, and whether they read it in class or outside of class. In addition, the participants had to write down whether they liked the books, the reasons why they liked or disliked the books, and any other comments about the books they read. Due to the participants’ limited English proficiency, they could choose to write the reading log in either English or Chinese. The Chinese comments were then translated into English by the researcher.
2. Scholastic Learning Zone Reports
Scholastic Learning Zone provided reports of students’ learning progress, for example, the growth of Lexile measures, the scores of comprehension quizzes, the number of quizzes passed, the number of words read, and the amount of reading time.
3. Scholastic Literacy Pro (Pretest & Posttest)
In the first week, the participants took the pretest to get their Lexile measures.
Then, they took the posttest in the last week. The pretest and posttest were provided by Scholastic Literacy Pro. The participants read short and authentic reading passages and answered multiple choice questions. The difficulties of the questions increased or decreased according to the participants’ answers. From the result of the pretest and posttest, the researcher could know whether the participants showed improvement in English reading.
4. Three Monthly Exams
The present study was conducted from October 2018 to March 2019. During the study, the participants took three monthly exams in November, January, and March. In the researcher’s school, there were 18 classes in the 7th grade. Comparing the class rankings with other classes in school, the researcher could know whether the
5. The Questionnaire
Questionnaire on Scholastic Learning Zone (see Appendix C) was designed to see the participants’ perceptions of using Scholastic Learning Zone. It was
implemented at the end of the study. It contained 11 questions. The first seven closed-ended questions were about the participants’ opinion of Scholastic Learning Zone, such as how they chose books, why they changed books, and how much time they spent on the program. The last four questions were open-ended questions. These four questions were designed to understand whether the participants liked the program, the participants’ willingness to use the program, mechanical problems, and any other problems they encountered in detail.
6. The Teacher’s Reflective Journals
During and after the class, the researcher kept reflective journals to record what happened in class and how the participants read and discussed. In the journals, the researcher also documented the assistance she provided to the students.
Moreover, the researcher also wrote down the participants’ expression of their feeling of the books and their explanation of why they liked or disliked the books on the reading logs.
Data Analysis
In this study, the collected data were analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively.
The quantitative data were collected from the pretest and posttest, the questionnaire (the first seven questions), the Scholastic Learning Zone reports, and the results of three monthly exams. Paired t-test were used to compare the scores of the pretest and posttest to see whether there is a significant difference. Besides, in the questionnaire, the first seven questions were computed and analyzed with Excel to see the
percentage distribution.
As for the qualitative data collected from the reading logs, the questionnaire (the last four questions), and the teacher’s reflective journals, the researcher coded the participants’ responses and comments first and then generated categories inductively from the data. After that, the researcher presented the interpretations which account for the participants’ perceptions and experiences of using the English online ER program, Scholastic Learning Zone, and draw conclusions. In order to ensure appropriateness of the categories and interpretations, the researcher constantly checked the transcriptions and made modifications (Zhang & Wildemuth, 2009).