The effect of literature circles on university EFL learners’ reading comprehension performances Presented by Fanny Chang G

Contents Introduction 1 Review of the literature 2 Methodology 3

Introduction Peer interaction  Peer interaction has been investigated to promote students’ learning successfully.  The relations of interaction and learning are highly related (Palincsar, Brown, & Martin, 1987).  Furthermore, it has been proved that the progress made by peer interaction was actually comparable to those made by teacher-student interaction (Palincsar, Brown, & Martin, 1987).

Introduction Literature circles  Literature circles are reading activities involving peer interaction among readers in which learners can read with the help of their group members (Palincsar, Brown, & Martin, 1987).  The practice of literature circles has led to the hope that reading becomes more interesting for learners who originally encounter reading difficulties.  Such cases as gaining reading motivation, literacy skills, or reading comprehension can be seen in many studies (Stringer, Reynolds, & Simpson, 2003; Brown, 2002).

Statement of the problem The initial idea of literature circles were created to facilitate learners in reading story-based fictions. Blum et al. (2002) adopted fiction like The Forty-third War as their material to implement literature circles. However, there has been growing interest in applying literature circles to nonfiction recently, such as science textbook (Wilfong, 2009). However, there were few other studies conducted to examine the effect of literature circles on expository text.

Research questions 1. Is there a significant difference in university EFL freshmen’ English reading comprehension performance on expository text between those who engage in literature circles and those who do not? 2. Is there a significant difference in university EFL learners’ learning attitudes on the effectiveness of literature circles between pre-test and post-test?

Review of the literature Literature circles and reading comprehension  Literature circles were proved to facilitate students’ reading comprehension in the study of Wilfong.  Wilfong incorporated literature circles into a science class in which he utilized the science textbook to be the reading material.

Review of the literature (cont.) Literature circles and self-perceptions  Self-perception refers to learners’ own awareness toward their learning abilities.  If students have high self-perception, they are more likely to achieve successful learning (Blum, Lipsett, & Yocom, 2001).  Blum et al. (2002) found that students who engaged in literature circles had positive opinions toward this reading activity.

Method Participants  Two classes of non-English major freshmen in certain university in central Taiwan

Method Secondly, Finally, Firstly, 1.The instructor assign roles to the students. 2.The students read aloud the text. 1.The students are expected to perform the job of their roles. 2.The students are expected to do group discussions. 1. The students are asked to share their works with the class. Treatment

Descriptions of literature circle roles Role Vocabulary Finder Your job is to… find out the unfamiliar or unknown words. Summarizerwrite a brief summary of the assigned reading. Story mappergraph the plot of the reading text. Question raiserraise questions based on the reading. Connectorraiser questions beyond the reading.

Data collection procedures (experimental group) Treatment First sessionSecond session Third~…Final session 1. Pre-test 2.Questionnair e Introduction of the literature circles Practice of the literature circles (treatment) 1.post-test 2.Questionnai re

Data collection procedures (control group) No treatment First sessionSecond session Third~…Final session 1. Pre-test 1.Read aloud the text 2.Read the text silently 3.Answer open questions 1.Read aloud the text 2.Read the text silently 3.Answer open questions 1.post-test

Data analysis procedures The scores of the reading comprehension pre-test will be analyzed by independent sample t-test to investigate if the participants all start off at the equivalent level. The scores of the reading comprehension post-test will also be analyzed by independent sample t-test to investigate if there is a significant difference in the participants’ English reading comprehension performances between those who engage in literature circles and those who do not. The scores of the learning attitude questionnaire will then be analyzed by pair sample t-test to explore if the participants’ learning attitudes change after the treatment.

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