Despite the general consensus on the role of reading strategy in L2 learning, not more than 10 studies that directly addressed reading strategies have been published in the major academic journals of English education in Korea for the last two decades ...
Despite the general consensus on the role of reading strategy in L2 learning, not more than 10 studies that directly addressed reading strategies have been published in the major academic journals of English education in Korea for the last two decades. Given this, more vigorous studies of reading strategy in the context of Korean EFL seem to be required mainly for two reasons: Most recent reading theories view the reader as an active being who constructs textual meaning exerting/employing every source and resources available, from various type of prior knowledge to strategies at various levels; These days the learner's ability to manage his/her own learning, i.e., learner autonomy, is considered as a major component that works for successful learning. Another motivation for the current study comes from the realization that there are still areas to be further explored for more comprehensive and precise understanding of L2 readers and of exactly how strategy use contributes to L2 reading. As Brantmeier(2002) appropriately pointed out, previous studies in L2 reading strategies diverged in participants, types of research task, and reading materials, making it difficult to draw generalizations about the role of strategy use in L2 reading. Therefore, the present study aims to investigate some of the topics not adequately addressed in the previous studies of L2 reading strategy, such as the possible variation in the collected data as a function of type of task or elicitation device. Based on the review of literature and motivated by the need for more finely tuned research in L2 reading strategy, the present study posed the following research questions: Is there difference in strategy use depending on the type of reading task If so, what is the nature of the difference ; Is there difference in strategy use depending on the type of device eliciting strategy If so, what is the nature of the difference
In order to answer the questions posed, 28 college students in a university in Seoul were invited to participate in the present research. They filled out a reading strategy inventory specially designed for this study, completed two reading tasks in two separate sessions, and were interviewed. For Task 1, they read a given text, doing think-aloud, and marked on a reading strategy check-list, followed by an interview; For Task 2, writing a summary of the text was added to the procedures in Task 1. Their verbal protocols were all recorded using a high-quality voice recorder, transcribed verbatim, and then coded as strategies. The focus of data analysis was on examining whether the participants showed different patterns in strategy use as a function of task type, or depending on the time of reporting their strategy use.
It is hoped that the findings from the current study will contribute to a better understanding of L2 reading processes and also to more effective L2 reading instruction.