IMPROVING THE READING SKILLS OF GRADE 8 STUDENTS THROUGH THE SCHOOL READING PROGRAM

JOEY D. CAPINPIN

In a nation that offers few career opportunities to the illiterate, teaching children to read is the most important single task in public education. It is through reading that children learn certain skills necessary for them to grow in understanding and habits.

Reading involves the understanding of a complex and difficult concept by interpreting written language and making sense of it. In other words, it is a process of constructing meaning from a written text as a result of thinking with the guidance of the existing text (Rosenblatt, 2004; Ruddell, 2002; Rumelhart, 2004). Skilled reading is the ability to extend meaning from text accurately and effectively. Becoming a good reader requires both the ability to recognize words and the ability to comprehend text. Although instruction for word recognition is a critical process for students, some students continue to struggle with deriving meaning or acquiring knowledge from text in spite of possessing sufficient word recognition skills. Additionally, these students experience greater difficulty in upper elementary grades seeing attention switch from learning to read to reading to learn. Particularly, the students encounter problems about finding main idea, making predictions, using background knowledge, making connections, creating mind images, asking questions, drawing inferences, and summarizing information.

The scenario of students struggling to understand what they read also holds true in Estipona National High School where teachers observe that majority of the students find it hard to generally comprehend what they read, even in Filipino. Being a Grade 8 English and remedial instruction teacher, the researcher adheres to the belief that if this level of reading comprehension remains, these students would hardly cope with more challenging learning tasks in almost all facets of learning considering that reading is a primary skill.

On the basis of the findings and conclusions, the following are strongly recommended: (1)The conduct of a continuous School Reading Program is strongly suggested with the collaboration of all English teachers of the school. Such program shall focus on the least-learned skills of the students particularly in reading. (2)The School Reading Program herein conducted is recommended to be mainstreamed in the Reading Programs of all Grade 8 teachers. (3)The results of this study are proposed to be included in one of the In-Service Trainings (INSETs) and School Learning Action Cell (SLAC) sessions. (4)A copy of this action research may be offered to the office of the school head and division office as a possible reference for policy formulation. (5)Further related studies are proposed to be conducted on areas of reading and effectiveness of reading programs.

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The author is Teacher III at Estipona National High School