My tutor knew that I could understand an English word if it is explained with graphic description, so she would try to take advantage of the stuff

around me and let me think over the word meaning. (tutee #8)

In the following, two excerpts of the interactions between the peers in the tutoring sessions were shown. The two interactions revealed how insufficient vocabulary hindered the tutees’ performance of reading comprehension.

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Excerpt 10 (interaction)

Tutor #3: Why do you choose option (B)?

Tutee #10: Because I see the word” family” in the second line of the third paragraph and then……to…...

Tutor #3: To? Till the period?

Tutee #10: Till the comma.

Tutor #3: Ok. From the previous content, do you know what the old man is capable of?

Tutee #10: …....

Tutor #3: Ok, what is the sentence about? you can check the former paragraph to get some ideas of the old man’s ability.

Tutee #10: …....

Tutor #3: What ability does the old man have? Check the sentence in the very beginning.

Tutee #10: Hmm… is it prediction?

Tutor #3: Yes! So he can predict?

Tutee #10: Typhoon.

Tutor #3: And typhoon is a phenomenon of ? Tutee #10: A phenomenon of ?

Tutor #3: In the first paragraph, the content mentioned some words such as rainy and windy. Do you know what “windy” is?

Tutee #10: ……rainy?

Tutor #3: See, now there is strong? outside the classroom. So can you guess what it is?

Tutee #10: Wind?

Tutor #3: Ok, in the next sentence, wind definitely appeared.

Tutee #10: Yes.

Tutor #3: Hence, which phenomenon are these words categorized into?

Tutee #10: Weather.

Excerpt 11 (interaction)

Tutor #5: Show me your understanding of option (C) in Q1.

Tutee #1: We love working in space….

Tutor #5: Space space space. Do you know “space?” What does “space” mean?

Tutee #1: Does it mean “special” or “place?”

Tutor #5: We all learned that from earth science Book 5. Where are those planets?

Tutee #1: Outer space! Oh! This sentence means that we like to work in space. But if you ask us what we miss the most, most of us will say taking a real bath.

The water does not fall, but…. does that mean the water is not saturated?

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Tutor #5: What? The previous part you translated is correct, but the “water” part is weird.

Tutee #1: The water does not fall but float around….The water can float?! Does

“fall” mean “full?”

Tutor #5: That’s “full.”

Tutee #1: Does it mean “autumn?”

Tutor #5: Ok, “autumn” is one of its meanings. Do you recall another meaning of

“fall?”

Tutee #1: I only remember “autumn.”………Does it mean “trip over?”

Tutor #5: We should say “fall.” Think about whether it’s appropriate to describe “the water tripped over.”

Since tutee #8 classified herself as a graphic learner, the researcher asked her during the interview to elaborate on how her tutor modified her instruction to meet her needs.

Excerpt 12 (interview):

Researcher: Could you explain how your tutor made you understand a word with graphic description?

Tutee #8: For instance, she described a picture like somebody living above the earth to explain the word “space.”

Researcher: And, did you figure out the word meaning immediately?

Tutee #8: Hmm…I thought it was “sky” at first.

Researcher: Let’s see. Please give me another example about how your tutor used graphic description to make you figure out word meaning.

Tutee #8: Hmm…I cannot come up with any at this moment.

Researcher: Now I’ll show you two sentences, and then tell me which one is more easier for you to figure out the word meaning. Sentence 1 is that it’s a kind of electric appliance that is often used in summer and is cheaper.

Sentence 2 is that it’s a kind of electric appliance that can cause the air convection and is often used in summer.

Tutee #8: I prefer the latter one. It’s easier for me to figure out the meaning “fan.”

Researcher: So you mean your tutor guided you to figure out word meaning in this way?

Tutee #8: Yes!

Tutees’ Perceptions of the Peer Tutoring Program

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In response to the scale-rating question in second part of the perceptions questionnaire, 76.91% of the tutees agreed that the peer tutoring program of English reading was effective, especially the improvement in their inference making ability.

Also, figuring out the word meaning was helpful for some of them to grasp the gist of an article. Some of the comments in the open-ended questions were presented below.

Excerpt 13: With the assistance of my tutor, my ability of inference making was getting better. (tutee #4)

Excerpt 14: Now I learned to adopt the strategy of figuring out the word meaning from the context. I always translated the passage word by word before. I think looking at the context is fairly useful for me. (tutee # 1) Excerpt 15: I used to search for the sentences or words in the question items which

were similar to those in the article when coping with reading comprehension question. However, after the program, I was more capable of predicting the content through some keywords in the article. (tutee #2)

On the other hand, three tutees held neutral attitude towards the efficacy of the program. Their opinions were as follows.

Excerpt 16: As for me, what I did in the program was pretty much the same as my usual method to cope with reading comprehension. It didn’t make any difference to me. The most obvious difference is that I held back from speaking out what was in my mind because I always made a rough guess instead of fully understanding the reading content. Apart from that, maybe I couldn’t express the process of how I worked out problems precisely because I was afraid of misunderstanding the words or sentences and then I’d be corrected by my tutor. (tutee #11)

Excerpt 17: It seemed that I often learned on my own because I always worked on the