Maestrías a Distancia - Campus Virtual - FuniberTesis: Reading Comprehension Learning Strategies. An attempt to guide 4th grade students to learn some strategies for interpreting written pieces of discourse in EFL lessons

Autor: Constanza Muñoz Fuenzalida (Chile)

Programa: Master in Teaching English as a Foreign Language  (Universidad de Jaén sponsored by  FUNIBER)

Constanza Muñoz, a Chilean national, received a Masters degree in Teaching English as a Foreign Language.

To the reading comprehension difficulties presented by the group of students *, the author rule her research objective, it was to teach them appropriate learning strategies to enable them to interpret and understand written texts.  For four weeks, using the learning strategies of prediction, selection of information, inferences, activating prior knowledge, guessing words in context and disambiguation, students prepared for the annual testing in reading comprehension section and obtained the best scores; and in the author’s words “The most important finding here was the fact that “awareness” of learning strategies is fundamental for students to learn to think.»

An important tool in this research was the diary, in this,  Constanza kept  memories of her classes, her students’ impressions, new ideas that roamed their work … «The Benefit of using a diary also ensures that these issues will be recorded over a length of time, offering insight into the relationship between motivation and learning strategies”.

Ultimately «It is crucial to consider learning strategies when planning courses, teaching students, and designing classroom research. Appropriate learning strategies should be among the first considerations of any ESL/EFL teacher or researcher who wants to enhance student learning. »

Thesis with Creative Commons Licences (by-nc-nd).
If you want to know more about the Thesis, you can contact the Author: Constanza Muñoz Fuenzalida. Email: conilays@hotmail.com
* (Children between 9 and 10) 4th grade

Muñoz Fuenzalida, Constanza. (2010). Reading Comprehension Learning Strategies. An attempt to guide 4th grade students to learn some strategies for interpreting written pieces of discourse in EFL lessons. Universidad de Jaén, Santiago de Chile – Chile.