The Effects of Story Grammar Instruction on Taiwanese EFL Elementary School Students' Reading Comprehension Performance

• Main Authors: Chia-fang Tsai, 蔡佳芳
• Other Authors: Yu-ling You
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2012
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/36361256270057150277

碩士 === 國立彰化師範大學 === 兒童英語研究所 === 100 === Story grammar instruction has long been found as one of the effective approaches for enhancing learners’ reading comprehension (Idol &; Croll, 1987; Kuldanek, 1998). The related studies have revealed that story grammar instruction has significantly positive effects on students’ reading comprehension; however, most related studies in the Taiwanese EFL context focus on investigating the effects of story grammar instruction on low-achieving students’ or special education students’ reading comprehension of Chinese narratives. Few of them emphasize the importance of story grammar instruction on the average primary school students’ English reading comprehension. Thus, the present study aims to investigate the effects of the story grammar instruction on enhancing the Taiwanese elementary school students’ English reading comprehension and to probe their responses toward the instruction. This study adopted convenience sampling; 53 fourth graders from two intact classes were recruited as the participants and randomly grouped into two groups. One received the story grammar instruction as the experimental group, while the other received the traditional reading instruction as the control group. Four narrative stories were employed during the fourteen-week experiment. The instruments used in the present study included the story reading comprehension tests, the story retellings, and a questionnaire. The subjects of both groups were requested to complete the story reading comprehension tests to measure the effectiveness of the story grammar instruction. Two-way ANOVA was used to analyze the results of the story reading comprehension tests of the two groups. Moreover, six subjects, for each story, were selected from each of the two groups to retell the story. The students’ story retellings were scored according to the scoring sheets to evaluate their story recall. Their story retellings were analyzed in accordance with the story structure. At the end of the experiment, the subjects of the experimental group were also requested to complete a questionnaire. Descriptive statistics were employed to present the results of the subjects’ responses toward the story grammar instruction. The major findings of the present study were as follows. First, the story grammar instruction significantly improved the students’ reading comprehension performance. The story grammar instruction was more beneficial in enhancing the Taiwanese EFL elementary school students’ reading comprehension performance than the traditional reading instruction. Second, story grammar instruction was effective in helping elementary school students better retell the stories. The experimental group students performed better than the control group students in retelling stories with more story elements and complete structure. Third, the majority of the subjects in the experimental group responded positively toward the story grammar instruction and the story map worksheets. Based on the findings, the present study suggests that it can be feasible to incorporate the story grammar instruction in the Taiwanese EFL elementary school classrooms.