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CHAPTER 3
RESEARCH METHOD
This quasi-experimental study intended to investigate the effects of Concept-Oriented Reading Instruction on a primary EFL remedial learners’ English reading ability and intrinsic motivation of reading. In addition to focusing on the effects of CORI, students’ perceptions to the instruction were also investigated. To answer the three research questions, this study employed a mixed-method research design.
Participants
The participants were 7 six graders from an elementary school in northern Taipei city, including 4 boys and 3 girls. They had received formal English instructions in school for five years. The average English hours students received at school were 80 minutes per week for the first and second grades and 120 minutes for those in the grades above. These 7 participants’ general academic ability levels were relatively lower than normal classes’ students based on school’s examination in midterm and final sections of each semester. Because their grades were at the bottom 25%, these students were selected to participate in the English remedial program. The remedial program, initiated on the recommendation with the support of the Ministry of
Education (MOE), aims to provide lectures to help struggling learners to learn better.
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Also, the program was established to help low achievement learners with their basic academic learning.
The CORI Instruction
The researcher, also the instructor, used the principles based on CORI to conduct the remedial lessons for three months. The class met 80 minutes every week.
According to Guthrie et al. (2006), the instructional practices are as follows:
providing content goals for reading, supporting learner autonomy, selecting
interesting texts, facilitating social interactions related to reading, maintaining close relationship between students and teachers, and using hands-on activities to inspire interests.
Based on the core principles of CORI, a set of instructional practices was developed in this study. The teaching process for each book was divided into three sections: before the reading, during the reading, and after the reading. Before the reading, storybooks were selected based on student’s reading ability level, interests and willingness to explore. In the remedial class, teacher provided the background information about the content. The brainstorming technique was used for students to firstly think about the things they knew about the topic of the books. During the reading, the class had a thorough discussion about the topic. While teacher read aloud to the class, the students repeated after the teacher and practiced reading.
Collaborative learning as facilitating social interactions related to reading was used as the main technique in the classroom. The teacher guided students to read in groups
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and raised questions for students to discuss with their classmates. By facilitating students’ interactions through reading and discussion, the students were able to build up the key concepts in each text as well as negotiate meaningful conceptual themes with their peers (Lutz, Guthrie, & Davis, 2006). After the students were familiarized with the core concepts of the reading content, they practiced reading in pairs. After the reading, the teacher firstly checked their understanding of new vocabulary with the class. After that, the students were given a chance to reflect on their own experience related to the reading material. At this stage, a variety of tasks and activities were used to engage students individually or in groups with the reading material. One example is the use of the reading poster activity to help students associate the reading with the real world. For the reading of each book, the same set of instructional procedures was utilized. The teaching procedures are also depicted in the following three flow charts, see Figures 3.1.1 to 3.1.3.
Figure 3.1.1 A Flow Chart of Classroom Reading Activities: Before Reading The teacher selected books.
The teacher provided bakcground information about the content.
The teacher brainstormed the topic with students.
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Figure 3.1.2 A Flow Chart of Classroom Reading Activities: During Reading
Figure 3.1.3 A Flow Chart of Classroom Reading Activities: After Reading
Instruments
In order to answer the research questions proposed in this study, four instruments The teacher and students discussed about the topic.
The teacher read aloud to students.
The students practiced repeated reading with the class.
The teacher asked questions about the content page by page with students.
The students practiced reading in pairs.
The teacher checked the understanding of new vocabulary with students.
The students reflected on daily life experience related to the reading content.
The students shared the poster project in pairs.
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were used and described in the following sections. These included teaching materials, the GEPT kids reading test, the post-experiment questionnaire, and interviews.
Teaching Materials
The storybooks adopted in this study were selected from the website Reading A to Z (https://www.readinga-z.com), an online reading instruction resource with extensive collection of leveled reading resources. The original CORI program provided learners leveled books of science. However, the aims of the present study were not focused on science. The materials were selected in Reading Z. Reading A-Z's English leveled books were carefully written in accordance with standardized Learning A-Z Text Leveling System and quality checked with custom software.
Leveled books are available in a wide variety of fiction and nonfiction genres. In attempt to strengthen the connections in literacy and content-area instruction, the website provides reading materials with engaging, developmentally appropriate leveled books at 29 reading levels. With graduated levels of difficulty, the website helps build students' confidence while increasing their reading comprehension and fluency. Key to any leveled reading program, leveled books support instructions in comprehension, vocabulary, close reading of text, and so on.
The books selected in this study were all nonfiction books from the reading A-Z website, which contained information about the topic in pictures and words. In this resource, all books in the online reading program were categorized into different levels based on the word count, the book length, and the frequency headwords. Four books were chosen for the remedial class in this study: Food Trucks (98 words),
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Basketball (237 words), All Kinds of Home (161 words), and Firefighters (296 words).
The selections of each book were based on the following criteria: word count, learners’ preference, motivation-initiative, learners’ ability level. The books were selected in different levels due to the preference of students. One of the CORI principles was self-direction (Guthrie et al., 1999; Guthrie et al., 2007). The participants could express their preference of reading, based on their interests. The screenshots of the four books are also found in Figure 3.2.1 to 3.2.4.
Figure 3.2.1 The First Nonfiction Book Food Trucks
Figure 3.2.2 The Second Nonfiction Book Basketball
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Figure 3.2.3 The Third Nonfiction Book All Kinds of Homes
Figure 3.2.4 The Forth Nonfiction Book Firefighters
GEPT Kids reading test
The purpose of using the GEPT Kids reading test in the present study was to know the level of each individual’s reading ability before and after the CORI instruction. There are two main sections in the GEPT Kids test, the listening section and the reading section. In this study, only the reading section was employed. The
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GEPT Kids reading test includes three sections. The first section includes 20 statements to test the ability of word recognition. The participants were asked to match the descriptions with the pictures to decide whether the statements were true or false. The second section contains 5 fill-in-the-blank statements to test the basic grammar knowledge. The final section consists of two reading passages, each followed by five reading comprehension questions.
Post-experiment Questionnaire
The aims of having participants to complete the post-experiment questionnaire were, first, to examine the participants’ changes in the area of intrinsic reading motivation and, second, to investigate students’ perceptions of CORI. Motivation for Reading Questionnaire (MRQ) was adopted in this study (Wigfield & Guthrie, 1997).
Adjustments of the items were further made to manage in line with the present study.
The post-experiment questionnaire consisted of 20 items, using a 5-point Likert scale.
These items were aimed at collecting data about the participants’ responses to the three dimensions of intrinsic reading motivation: (a) reading efficacy, (b) reading involvement, and (c) reading willingness. There were six to seven questions within each dimension. The questions were all translated into Mandarin, the participants’
mother tongue, for easy comprehension and reducing the participants’ anxiety.
Additionally, there were also five open-ended questions regarding the participants’
reading motivation as well as their perceptions toward CORI. Specifically, items 1 and 2 were designed to seek information from the participants about the enjoyment they found in reading in CORI; item 3 was designed to ask the participants’
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willingness to read after the program. As for items 4 and 5, the participants were asked to express their feelings about the three-month remedial program. The post-experiment questionnaire can be found in Appendix 1 and Appendix 2.
Interviews
To further investigate the participants’ perceptions of the CORI courses, interviews were also conducted in this study. Due to the fact that talking in young learners’ native language was believed to promote the willingness to communicate and to reduce the anxiety. The interview questions were in their mother tongue, and were open-ended questions. The questions given to the students were based on the post-experiment questionnaire, and it was hoped that they could provide further details about their feelings and perceptions toward CORI.
Due to the time constraint, only two out of the seven participants were invited to participate in the interviews. One of the interviewees was a boy, while the other was a girl. They were randomly chosen without any particular differences compared to other participants in the program. Interviews were arranged after CORI experiment; each interview took about 10 minutes. The interview questions are shown in the following part.
(a) How much did you like the reading materials in CORI?
(b) Is there any difference in your reading motivation between reading with peers and reading on your own?
(c) Among all the activities we have done in CORI, what helps you the most in your English Reading?
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(d)After attending the remedial program, experiencing CORI, what progresses have you made?
Data Analysis
In this present study, both quantitative and qualitative analyses were adopted. To answer the first research question about the impact of CORI on intrinsic reading motivation of students, the mean scores and standard derivation of students’ responses to the 20 items in the post-experiment questionnaire were analyzed quantitatively. To answer the second research question about the effects of CORI on students’ reading ability, the scores of the GEPT-Kids pre- and post- Reading Tests were compared quantitatively. Because of the small number of the participants in this study,
descriptive statistics was used to compare the scores of the GEPT-Kids Reading Test and the responses of the reading motivation questionnaire. To answer the third research question about student’s perceptions of the CORI instruction, data collected from the open-ended questions of the post-experiment questionnaire and the
interviews were analyzed qualitatively.
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CHAPTER 4 RESULTS
This chapter presents the results of the study, which can be divided into three parts. The first section is concerned with the effect on how CORI enhances students’
intrinsic reading motivation after the experiment on the basis of their responses to the first 20 items in the questionnaire. The second section, focusing on the effect on how CORI improves students’ reading ability, presents the results of the pre- and post- test scores from the GEPT-Kids Reading Test. The third section is related to how these students perceive the use of CORI in their English remedial class based on their responses to open-ended questions in the post-experiment questionnaire and interviews.
Research Question One: To what extent does CORI enhance students’ intrinsic motivation in a primary EFL remedial program?
Students’ Responses to Post-experiment Questionnaire
In this section, the participants’ responses to question items concerning intrinsic reading motivation in the post-experiment questionnaire are presented. These items were aimed at inquiring about the participants’ responses to the three domains in intrinsic reading motivation: (a) reading efficacy, (b) reading involvement, and (c)
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reading willingness in CORI.
Items Regarding Students’ Reading Efficacy
The statistical results of students’ responses to items concerning reading efficacy are presented in Table 4.1 in terms of the mean scores and standard deviations.
Table 4.1 Students’ Responses to Items Regarding Reading Efficacy
Items N Mean SD
1. I can guess the difficult words through teacher’s
guidance. 7 4.43 0.53
2. I make progress on remembering vocabulary after
CORI. 7 3.71 0.49
3. I make progress on L2 reading after CORI.
7 3.57 0.53 10. I build up more confidence on L2 reading after CORI.
7 3.86 0.69 12. Comparing to others in the program, I can understand
more on the reading contexts teacher prepares. 7 3.71 0.95 14. I can understand more concepts of each vocabulary
after CORI. 7 4.00 0.58
15. I can use different reading strategies to understand
better in L2 reading. 7 4.00 0.82
Note: N=the number of participants
As presented in Table 4.1, the mean scores of participants’ responses to Items 1 (M=4.43), 14 (M=4.00), and 15 (M=4.00) were above 4, indicating that students agreed that the instruction helped them guess the meaning of difficult words, understand the vocabulary better, and use different reading strategies.
Concerning the participants’ responses to Item 2, 3, 10, and 12, they nearly
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agreed with the mean scores ranged from 3 to 4. The remedial students’ responses to Item 2 (M=3.71) and item 3 (M=3.57) show that they had a tendency to agree that they made progress on remembering vocabulary and L2 reading after the program.
Students’ responses to Item 10 (M=3.86) show that they nearly agreed that they became more confident in L2 reading after the program. As for students’ responses to item 12 (M=3.71), the result indicated that compared to their classmates, students almost agreed that they could comprehend the reading material better after the instruction.
Items Regarding Students’ Reading Involvement
As for participants’ responses to items concerning reading involvement, the mean scores and standard deviations are presented in Table 4.2.
Table 4.2 Students’ Responses to Items Regarding Reading Involvement
Items N Mean SD
5. I like the books teacher prepared for us.
7 4.14 0.69
7. I like to read with my classmates in this program.
7 4.29 0.76
9. I like the content and learning in this program.
7 4.29 0.49
13. I like to learn with the remedial class.
7 4.29 0.49
16. I like the way teacher guided us to discuss in the
CORI. 7 4.43 0.53
18. I like the activities teacher designed in this program.
7 4.58 0.53
19. I like the reading activities and discussions in the
program. 7 4.00 0.58
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Note: N=the number of participants
According to Table 4.2, the mean scores of all the items under the category of reading involvement are above 4, indicating students’ enhancement of reading motivation in this area. To be more specific, students particularly liked the activities in the reading program (item 18, M=4.58). They also liked the books (item 5, M=4.14) as well as the content they learned (item 9, M=4.29).
Meanwhile, students’ responses to item 7 (M=4.29) indicated their positivity on reading with their classmates. Item 13 (M=4.29) also showed students’ enjoyment in learning with the class during the instruction. In addition, students’ responses to item 16 (M=4.43) revealed that they liked the way the teacher led them to discuss during the class. Similarly, they were fond of the reading activities and discussion parts in the remedial class indicated by their agreement to item 19 (M=4.00).
Items Regarding Students’ Reading Willingness
The results of the participants’ responses to items related to the dimension of reading willingness are presented in Table 4.3.
Table 4.3 Students’ Responses to Items Regarding Reading Willingness
Items N Mean SD
4. After CORI, I won’t reject to read.
7 3.71 0.76
6. After CORI, I am willing to read books that interest me.
7 3.71 0.76
8. I want to know what happens next in the book we read.
7 4.43 0.79
11. After CORI, I am willing to try reading on my own.
7 3.14 0.38
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17. I am willing to read books I like with guidance by
others. 7 4.43 0.53
20. I am willing to challenge myself to read books I like.
7 3.14 0.38
Note: N=the number of participants
As the results shown in Table 4.3, the mean scores of items 8 (M= 4.43) and 17 (M=4.43) were above 4 indicating the participants were curious about the content of the reading material and were willing to read books of their interest under guidance.
As for students’ responses to items 4 (M=3.71) and 6 (M=3.71), they nearly agreed that they would not resist the idea of reading in English and became more willing to read English books after the CORI instruction.
Regarding items 11(M=3.14) and 20 (M=3.14), students’ responses indicated that they were more reserved in reading on their own or challenging themselves in terms of reading English books.
In short, the results of the post-experiment questionnaire revealed that among the three dimensions of intrinsic reading motivation, reading involvement was the area where CORI had a particular effect on. In other words, CORI instruction is more effective in promoting the participants’ reading involvement. As for the aspects in reading efficacy and reading willingness, the overall results indicated that although students agreed that CORI helped them deal with unknown vocabulary and made them more interested in reading English books, they were less confident in reading on their own and without guidance.
Research Question Two: To what extent does CORI increase students’ reading ability
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in a primary EFL remedial program?
Students’ Performance on the GEPT Kids Reading Tests
The second research question concerns how CORI increases students’ reading ability in a primary EFL remedial program. For the assessment of remedial students’
reading ability before and after CORI, GEPT-Kids Reading Test was conducted as a pretest and a post-test . The results are presented in four phases. The first phase showed the overall reading performance based on the outcomes of the two reading tests. The second phase presents the participants’ reading performance on questions related to word recognitions. The third phase presents the students’ performance on questions regarding basic grammar knowledge. The fourth phase shows the students’
performance on the reading comprehension questions from the two passages in the tests.
The Effects of CORI on the Students’ Overall Reading Ability
As presented in Table 4.4, the mean scores of the pre- and post-tests showed that there were not much difference before and after the instruction (M=13.14 vs.
M=13.00).
Table 4.4 Comparison of the Students’ Overall Reading Ability Before and After CORI
Overall Reading Ability
Test N Mean SD
Pretest 7 13.14 3.236
Post-test 7 13.00 3.958
Note: N=the number of participants
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The Effects of CORI on the Students’ Word Recognition
As shown in Table 4.5, the participants’ word recognition ability was in no difference before and after CORI. The numbers of the questions related to word recognition were 20. Thus, the range of correct-answered scores was from 1 to 20. As measured, the mean score was 11.00 in the pretest, and 10.00 in the post-test.
Table 4.5 Comparison of the Students’ English Word Recognition Before and After CORI
Word Recognition
Test N Mean SD
Pretest 7 11.00 2.449
Post-test 7 10.00 3.366
Note: N=the number of participants
The Effects of CORI on the Students’ Grammar Knowledge
As presented in Table 4.6, there was not much difference between the mean scores of the pre- and post-test items on grammar. The total numbers of questions were 5 in grammar knowledge section. As the correct-answered questions’ range was from 1 to 5, the mean score was only slightly higher (1.14 > 1.00) in the post-test than
As presented in Table 4.6, there was not much difference between the mean scores of the pre- and post-test items on grammar. The total numbers of questions were 5 in grammar knowledge section. As the correct-answered questions’ range was from 1 to 5, the mean score was only slightly higher (1.14 > 1.00) in the post-test than