Degree
Master of Arts
Program
Education
Supervisor
Friesen, Deanna C.
Abstract
Children with a home language other than English (English Language Learners, or, ELLs) need good English reading comprehension skills to be successful in Canada. This research examined the differences in reading comprehension between ELLs and monolinguals (EL1s), reading strategies used, and predictors of successful reading comprehension. 57 students in grade 4 and 5 participated: 27 EL1s and 32 ELLs. They were tested for vocabulary knowledge, reading fluency, decoding, and reading comprehension. EL1s performed significantly better on reading comprehension and most language measure tasks. For reading strategies, necessary inferencing and predicting were used significantly more by the EL1s than the ELLs, and the ELLs used vocabulary significantly more. For EL1s, predictors for successful reading comprehension were reading fluency, vocabulary knowledge, and elaborative inferencing. For ELLs, predictors were vocabulary knowledge, decoding, necessary and elaborative inferencing, sentence structure, and summarizing. Results will be discussed in relation to theories of reading comprehension.
Recommended Citation
Schmidt, Katherine, "Reading Comprehension and Strategy Use in English Language Learners and Monolingual Children" (2019). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 6070.
https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/6070