Effectiveness of reading strategies and improving reading comprehension in young ESL readers

Abstract

Metacognitive awareness and the use of reading strategies in second language reading is beginning to receive attention. This paper adds to relevant literature by presenting a quality investigation designed to provide a concrete picture of some of the reading and metacognitive strategies used by young ESL students in their academic reading. One 5th grade student at a bilingual school participated in the study for over 11 weeks. In depth interviews, think aloud sessions and journals served as the principal source of data. Analysis of the data revealed that ESL academic reading was a very complex process in which students could benefit of the use of reading strategies and metacogitive awareness. The findings of this research suggest the importance of incorporating reading strategies into the Language Arts program in order to provide the students with greater learning opportunities, furthermore to make reading in a second language an autonomous process. The implications of the findings for ESL strategy teaching and research are discussed.