Language across the curriculum – An Empirical Study on Pre-service Teachers’ Knowledge in Fostering Reading Comprehension
Submitted by:
Diana Maak
Abstract:
Pupils are required to read, understand and deal with texts thoroughly in all subjects. Reading comprehension is therefore a key competence which all teachers should be able to foster. This suggests the need to be able to choose (authentic) texts, adapt these for teaching and stimulate the reflexive use of reading strategies by their pupils (McKeown, Beck & Blake 2009) to access texts, especially for low achieving students with low language proficiency. Part of that is applying the 3-phase-model of text understanding, which includes giving appropriate tasks prior to whilst and after reading (Nuttall 1996). Furthermore teachers should be able to differentiate according to their students’ achievement levels and to account for students’ diversity. Especially important – due to the latest migration trends – is differentiation regarding the language competence (Byrd 2014) in German which is a not fully acquired second language for more and more pupils in German schools; especially immigrant pupils are underperforming (i.a. PISA see for instance Stanat 2003).
The aim of our study was to find out whether pre-service teachers are competent in that matter after they have been trained in that issue. We approach this question by an explorative study with a mixed method design in order to assess both, competence and beliefs: First of all our data is based on a qualitative content analysis of written exams from pre-service teachers (n≈70). The pre-service teachers were required to independently choose a text for a reading lesson and adapt the selected text for the classroom, for example by generating tasks. The underlying category system for the qualitative content analysis consists of both: a priori categories, deducted from the theoretical framework (e.g. implementation of the 3-phase-model of text understanding) and a posteriori categories (e.g. variation in task format). In addition an ongoing qualitative in-depth analysis will focus on group discussions with some pre-service teachers of the sample. In our presentation we will present our results as well as discuss the scope and limits for our data. According to our first results pre-service teachers favor content questions which rather test reading comprehension instead of further pupils’ ability to access texts independently. Furthermore the pre-service teachers have difficulties in integrating reading strategy use into their teaching scenarios. Instead of teaching or rather fostering reading comprehension the pre-service teachers test reading comprehension.
Byrd, D. (2014): Learning to Teach Culture in the L2 Methods Course. Electronic Journal of Foreign Language Teaching, 11(1), 76–89. Retrieved from http://e-flt.nus.edu.sg/v11n12014/byrd.pdf .
McKeown, M. G., Beck, I. L., & Blake, R. G. K. (2009): Rethinking reading comprehension instruction: A comparison of instruction for strategies and content approaches. Reading Research Quarterly, 44 (3), 218–253.
Nuttall, C. (1996): Teaching Reading Skills in a Foreign Language. Macmillan Education; Auflage: 2nd edition.
Stanat, Petra (2003): Schulleistungen von Jugendlichen mit Migrationshintergrund: Differenzierung deskriptiver Befunde aus PISA und PISA-E. In: Jürgen Baumert, Cordula Artelt, Eckhard Klieme, Michael Neubrand, Manfred Prenzel, Ulrich Schiefele et al. (Hrsg.): PISA 2000. Ein differenzierter Blick auf die Länder der Bundesrepublik Deutschland ; Zusammenfassung zentraler Befunde. Opladen: Leske und Budrich, 243–260.