The Relationship between teaching reading strategies to hotel staff and its effects on their attitudes: Learners’ Autonomy, Reading Strategies, and Reading Comprehension
محورهای موضوعی : Geography and tourism planning, geography and urban planning, urban planning, architecture, geography and rural planning, political geography
Ashraf Vaziri
1
(Ph.D. student in TEFL, Dept. of English Language and Literature,Islamic Azad University, Ayatollah Amoli Branch, Amol, Iran)
Hamed Barjesteh
2
(Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics, Dept. of English Language and Literature,Islamic Azad University, Ayatollah Amoli Branch, Amol, Iran)
کلید واژه:
چکیده مقاله :
The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between teaching reading strategies to hotel staff and its effects on their attitudes: Learners’ Autonomy, Reading Strategies, and Reading Comprehension. To accomplish this object, 130 ESP learners were asked to take part in a piloted PET reading comprehension test and two questionnaires on learner autonomy (Spratt, Humphreys, & Chan, 2002), and reading strategies (Mokhtari & Sheorey, 2002). After removing incomplete answer sheets, 106 (82 female and 24 male) acceptable cases were used in statistical analysis. Pearson Product Correlation analysis pointed out a statistically significant relationship between ESP learners’ autonomy and reading strategies. It was also exposed that the participants’ reading comprehension is positively correlated with their reading strategies. Though, a statistically significant relationship was not established between autonomy and reading comprehension.
Afflerbach, P., Pearson, P. D., & Paris, S. (2008). Skills and strategies: Their differences, their relationships, and why it matters. In K. Mokhtari, & R. Sheorey, Reading strategies of first- and second-language learners: See how they read (pp. 11-24). Norwood, MA: Christopher-Gordon.
Al-Nujaidi, A. H. (2003). The relationship between vocabulary size, reading strategies, and reading comprehension of EFL learners in Saudi Arabia. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater.
Amiri, M., & Maftoon, P. (2010). Awareness of reading strategies among Iranian high school students. Proceedings of EDULEARN10 Conference (pp. 6782-6791). Barcelona: IATED.
Benson, P. (2001). Teaching and researching autonomy in language learning. Essex: Pearson Education.
Brantmeier, C. (2002). Second language reading strategies research at the secondary and university levels: Variations, disparities and generalizability. The Reading Matrix , 1-14. Retrieved November 5, 2011, from
http://www.readingmatrix.com/articles/brantmeier/article.pdf
Chan, V. (2001). Readiness for learner autonomy: What do our learners tell us? Teaching in Higher Education, 6 (4), 505-518.
Cooper, C. R. (1993). Reading critically, writing well: A reader and guide. New York: Longman.
Dafei, D. (2007). An exploration of the relationship between learner autonomy and English proficiency. Asian EFL Journal, 24, 1-23. Retrieved December 3, 2011, from http://www.asian-efl-journal.com/pta_Nov_07_dd.pdf
Dickinson, L. (1993). Talking shop: Aspects of autonomous learning, An interview with Leslie Dickinson. ELT Journal, 47 (1), 330-341.
Durkin, D. (1993). Teaching them to read (6th ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.
Farhadi, H., Jafarpoor, A., & Birjandi, P. (1994). Testing language skills: From theory to practice. Tehran: SAMT.
Grabe, W. (1991). Current developments in second language reading research. TESOL QUARTERLY, 25 (3), 375-406.
Heidari, M. (2010). Therelationship among EFL learners’ left/right brain dominance, autonomy, and reading comprehension of the academic and general reading modules of IELTS. Unpublished master’s thesis, Islamic Azad University, Central-Tehran Branch, Tehran, Iran.
Holec, H. (1981). Autonomy and foreign language learning. Oxford: Pergamon.
Hosseini Nezhad, N. (2006). On the meta-cognitive awareness of reading strategies and the reading comprehension of Iranian non-English major university students. Unpublished Master’s thesis, Al-Zahra University, Tehran, Iran.
Janzen, J. (1996). Teaching strategic reading. TESOL Journal, 6 (1), 6-9.
Kendeou, P., Lynch, J. S., Broek, P. V., Espin, C. A., White, M. J., & Kremer, K. E. (2005). Developing successful readers: Building early comprehension skills through television viewing and listening. Early Childhood Education Journal, 33 (2), 91-98. Retrieved November 26, 2011, from
http://people.mcgill.ca/files/panayiota.kendeou/Kendeou3.pdf
Koda, K. (2005). Insights into second language reading. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
La Ganza, W. (2001). Out of sight – not out of mind: Learner autonomy and interrelating. Information Technology, Education and Society, 2 (2), 27-46.
Lehr, F., Osborn, J., & Hiebert, E. H. (2005). A focus on comprehension. Honolulu, HI: Pacific Resources for Education and Learning.
McClure, J. (2001). Developing language skills and learner autonomy in international postgraduates. ELT Journal, 55 (2), 142-148. Retrieved November 3, 2011, from
HYPERLINK "http://biblioteca.uqroo.mx/hemeroteca/elt_journal/2001/abril../550142.pdf" http://biblioteca.uqroo.mx/hemeroteca/elt_journal/2001/abril../550142.pdf
McKeown, M., Beck, I., & Blake, R. (2009). Rethinking reading comprehension instruction: A comparison of instruction for strategies and content approaches. Reading Research Quarterly, 44 (3), 218-253.
Mokhtari, K., & Sheorey, R. (2002). Measuring ESL students’ awareness of reading strategies. Journal of Developmental Education, 25 (3), 2-10.
National Reading Panel (NRP). (2000). Teaching children to read: An evidence-based assessment of the scientific research literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction. Washington, DC: National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved October 18, 2011, from
HYPERLINK "http://www.nichd.nih.gov/publications/nrp/upload/report.pdf" http://www.nichd.nih.gov/publications/nrp/upload/report.pdf
Nunan, D. (2000). Autonomy in Language Learning. Paper presented at the Plenary Presentation, ASOCOPI, Cartagena, Colombia.
Nunan, D. (1999). Second language teaching and learning. Boston: Heinle & Heinle.
Park, Y. H. (2010). Korean EFL college students’ reading strategy use to comprehend authentic expository/technical texts in English. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Kansas, Lawrence. Phillips, J. K. (1984). Practical implications of recent research in reading. Foreign Language Annals, 17 (4), 285-296.
Quintana, J. (2003). PET practice tests. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
RAND Reading Study Group. (2002). Reading for understanding: Toward an R&D program in reading comprehension. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Education. Retrieved October 18, 2011, from
HYPERLINK "http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/2005/MR1465.pdf" http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/2005/MR1465.pdf
Sheikhy Behdani, R. (2011). Critical thinking ability and autonomy of Iranian EFL learners. American Journal of Scientific Research (29), 59-72. Retrieved November 1, 2011, fromhttp://www.eurojournals.com/AJSR_29_06.pdf
Soi Meng, P. (2006). Strategy use in advanced EFL readers: Identifying and characterizing the patterns of reading strategies employed by tertiary EFL students. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.
Spratt, M., Humphreys, G., & Chan, V. (2002). Autonomy and motivation: Which comes first? Language Teaching Research, 6 (3), 245-266. Retrieved November 9, 2011, from HYPERLINK "http://ltr.sagepub.com/content/6/3/245.full.pdf" http://ltr.sagepub.com/content/6/3/245.full.pdf
Vogt, W. P. (2007). Quantitative research methods for professionals. New York: Pearson Education.
Wu, C. P. (2005). An investigation of metacognitive reading strategies used by EFL Taiwanese college students to comprehend familiar versus unfamiliar Chinese and English text. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Idaho, Moscow.
Young, D. J., & Oxford, R. (1997). A gender-related analysis of strategies used to process input in the native language and a foreign language. Applied Language Learning, 8, 43-73.
Zhang, L. X., & Li, X. X. (2004). A comparative study on learner autonomy between Chinese students and west European students. Foreign Language World, 4, 15-23.
Zhe, W. (2009). A contrastive study of Chinese and Western learner autonomy. US-China Foreign Language, 7 (12), 9-11.
