Changing Student Teachers’ Views of Comprehension Instruction through the Use of a Comprehension Instruction Framework

Abstract

Literacy statistics show that South African learners’ comprehension ability is generally poor and in some cases seems to be getting poorer. At the same time research shows that little, if any, explicit and continuous strategy instruction takes place in classrooms. Reasons seem to include a lack of proper teacher training in comprehension instruction, teachers remaining unconvinced about the value of strategy instruction, and concerns that strategy instruction is time consuming and difficult to learn and teach. This article reports on the effect of a reading comprehension instruction course on university student teachers’ lesson planning, strategy use and views about comprehension instruction. The course formed part of a teacher training module and centered on a reading strategy instruction framework designed to enhance comprehension instruction across all subjects in an easy-to-use manner. The article shows that strategy instruction can be taken up successfully in a relatively short time period, and that most existing concerns about strategy instruction can be addressed through in-depth training.

Keywords: Reading Comprehension Instruction, Reading Strategies, Comprehension Instruction Framework, Teachers and Comprehension Instruction, Reading Strategy Instruction