Research Setting and Participants
In order to apply and analyze the effectiveness of literature circles in a Taiwanese EFL context, the researcher was granted with the permission to observe and participate in a reading program centered on the integration of LCs into an elective reading and writing class taught by a professor experienced in the use of LC’s in Taiwan. Through LC activities, students read and discuss texts and related issues, work cooperatively, and negotiate meaning based on their discussion roles.
Developing learners’ reading abilities as well as their critical thinking skills are also important goals of LCs. Finally, the most important goal of the program will be to improve students’ reading motivation and sustain reading (See Table 4 for listing of course objectives; for additional information on the course itself, see Appendix A:
course syllabus).
Table 4
Course Descriptions of English Reading Writing Class Course name English reading and Writing
The course objectives (1) help students have better ability to correctly use grammar,
(2) familiarize students with linguistic and rhetorical skills of appropriate word and phrase uses for different writing styles such as description, giving instruction, reasoning with examples, and expressing opinions, and
(3) enrich students language awareness and resources through reading stories and fiction
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Participants
A total of 19 EFL English-major students, 4 male and 15 female, from a National university located in the south of Taiwan enrolled in a non-required/elective English reading and writing course offered in the Spring of 2015 participated in the Literature Circles activities and agreed to participate in the study, which included participating in the class and LC program, filling out likert-scale questionnaires and agreeing to complete semi-structured oral interviews. All of the participants were from
sophomore English-major students, and their English proficiency levels varied from low to high-intermediate level, based on their self-reported results of GEPT (a) intermediate b) high-intermediate level) and TOEIC (a) 610-650 b) 705 c) 855-925 ) tests scores, which correspond to CEFR B1 and B2 levels. (Wu, 2015).
Teaching Procedure
The research teaching procedure would lasted for eighteen week and was separated into six phases. In the first phase, the teacher began with brief introduction about literature circles and class regulations of the course, explaining the rational of literature circles and tasks students need to do for the following weeks. Later, English reading proficiency pre-test and questionnaire were administered to the students.
In the beginning of second phase (week 2), students were grouped into five groups of 2 to 6. Students were allowed to select their own group members. After that, students were assigned a short article and a discussion role sheet. Then, the teacher demonstrated how each discussion roles work in literature circles and started
mini-literature circles. Students randomly chose a role they like and tried to jot down some important points and wrote down on discussion role sheets after reading the assigned article. Last but not least, students were going to share their texts
individually in front of the class. After running mini-literature circles, a book fair was held and the teacher presents selected novels to novels to students. Each group was
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allowed to choose their own novels base on their interests; however, every member in the groups should read the same novels for the following weeks.
In the third phase (week 3 to 10), the teacher began with series of lessons about texts analysis, paragraph and essay composition that would be helpful for students in writing and reflection. Later, the procedure repeated that students finished reading assigned chapters and had fifteen minutes discussion and then completed the role sheets. Finally, they would present their results individually to whole class.
In the fourth phase (week 11 to 14), students were assigned series activities－
conversation preparation and mini play performance. Students would first choose a part that interests them the most and transfer the texts into conversation and a ten-minute mini play. Students would perform the play on week 14.
In the fifth phase (week 15 to 16) would be the final creative presentation week which include poster advertising the book, videotaped dramatization, a new ending or character for the book, reader theater performance, etc.
The final phase (week 17 to 18), at the end of the week, students conducted post questionnaires and reading comprehension post-tests. Afterward, students perception questionnaire to LCs program was administered. In the final week, semi-structured interview was conducted.
Table 5
Summary of Teaching Procedure in Six Phases
Phase Schedule
Phase I (Week 1)
Instruction
English Reading Proficiency Pre-test (GEPT High-intermediate)
Phase II (Week 2)
Literature circle- preparation:
(1) Grouping (2) Demonstration
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(3) Show the books and know the authors (4) Book selection
Phase II
(Week 3 to 10)
Literature circle- 1
(1) Circle of Gold –Chapters 1~3 (G1) (2) Number the Stars–Chapters 1~4 (G2) Literature circle- 2
(1) Kira-kira – Chapters 1-4 (G3) (2) Warhorse－Chapters1~5 (G4) Literature circle 3
(1) Circle of Gold－Chapters 4~8 (G1) (2) Number the Stars－Chapters 5~8 (G2) (3) Kira-kira – Chapters 5-8 (G3)
(4) Warhorse－Chapters 6-10 (G4) Literature circle 4
(1) Circle of Gold－Chapters 9-11 (G1) (2) Number the Stars－Chapter 9~12 (G2) (3) Kira-kira – Chapters 9-12 (G3)
(4) Warhorse－Chapters 11-15 (G4) Literature circle 5
(1) Circle of Gold－Chapters 12~14 (2) Number the Stars－Chapter 13~17 (3) Kira-kira – Chapters 13-16
(4) Warhorse－Chapters 16-20
LC activities:
1. Literature circle (role sheets)
→ 20 minutes (Group leader leads)
2. Group or personal sharing and discussing
→ 5-10 minutes
Phase IV
(Week 11 to 14)
Presentation instructions-1(T) Presentation instructions-2(T)
Group activities:
Drama time-1(G1+G2) Drama time-2(G3+G4)
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Phase V (Week 15-16)
Final Group presentation:
Group presentation-G1-2 Group presentation-G3-4 Phase VI
(Week 17-18)
English Reading Proficiency Pre-test (GEPT High-intermediate)
Post motivation questionnaires Students perception questionnaire Semi-structure interview
Text Selection and Reading Materials
Hsu (2004) argues that text selection is the most important step in running literature circles. Topics should be suitable for readers to access and understand, interesting and attractive, authentic, and related to readers’ life experiences (Hsu, 2004; Chen, 2013). Topics and/or themes of the selected texts can cover different domains, such as courage, facing family death, family love, war and peace (For a brief summary of the four selected texts used in the program, see table 4).
Table 6
Content Descriptions of Reading Texts
Reading texts Content Descriptions
Circle of Gold A Coretta Scott King Award Honor trade
book written by Candy Dawson Boyd and originally published in 1984. The story describes how a brave and optimistic teenager, Mattie, makes efforts to bring back the joy of her mother after the death of her father.
Number the Stars: A Newberry medal trade book written by Lois Lowry and originally published
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1989. It is a historical fiction that mainly describes the escape of a Danish Jewish girl, Ellen Rosen, from Nazis’ search during World War II.
War Horse A historical fiction written by Michael
Morpurgo and originally published in 1982. The story describes the journey of a horse named Joey during war time.
Through the viewpoint of Joey, readers witness the horror and curial the battle fields, as well as the love between human and animal.
Kira-Kira. A story written by Cynthia Kadohata
published in 2004 describing the life story of a young Japanese-American girl named Katie. Through the story, readers witness the life and work experience of Japanese Americans and their struggle to accomplish their American dream.
Missing May A Newberry medal trade book written by
Cynthia Rylant and originally published in 1992. The novel describes the life story of a twelve-year-old orphan, Summer, and details her struggle to overcome a difficult life.
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Discussion Role Sheets
In literature circles, discussion role sheets are crucial as they offer participants instructional scaffolding by clarifying tasks and direction concerning discussion.
Participants may follow the descriptions on the sheets to share their ideas, feelings, and reactions. In the study, the researcher selected five discussion roles based upon Daniels (1994; 2002) and revised based upon the local context: (a) discussion director;
(b) summarizer; (c) connector; (d) literacy luminary; and (e) vocabulary enricher. (See Table 5)
Table 7
Task Descriptions about Each Role
Roles Task Descriptions
Discussion director Your job is to generate questions that your group might want to discuss about the text. Usually, the best discussion questions come from your own thoughts and feelings. Don’t worry about the small details. After collecting all the questions and
answers, you shall present them in class.
Summarizer Your job is to prepare a brief summary of the assigned reading. Your group will be counting on you to give a quick statement that mentions key events, key points, and main highlights of the assigned reading. Please write down the summary and key points in the slots below.
Connector Your job is to find connections between the text your group is reading and the outside world. This means connecting the reading to your own life, or to similar events at different times and places. You might also compare and contrast the content or the theme in your reading to other books or even to movies.
Literacy luminary Your job is to locate a few special sections of the text that your group would like to hear read aloud. The idea is to help people remember some interesting, powerful, funny, puzzling, or important sections of the reading. Please read the paragraphs aloud by yourself in class. (2-4 paragraph at least)
Vocabulary enricher Your job is to list out a few especially important words in the assigned reading. Those words could be words that are
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puzzling or unfamiliar. You may also run across familiar words that are repeated a lot, used in unusual ways, or are key meanings in the text. Highlight those words you want to share while you are reading and jot down the definition below.