This exploratory study represents an attempt to investigate the factors that may affect the reading comprehension abilities of English as an additional language (EAL) learners. For this study, we examined a participant group of 31 (25 EAL and 6 first language English) learners studying at an international school in Japan. We assessed the participants according to four factors shown to influence reading comprehension: vocabulary knowledge, word decoding skills, reading fluency, and general linguistic ability. Our results show that differences in vocabulary knowledge show more variance in reading comprehension scores than the other factors examined in this study, highlighting the importance of vocabulary knowledge for reading comprehension. However, other factors such as reading fluency and general linguistic knowledge are also shown to be moderate to strong predictors of reading comprehension. Based on these results, we suggest that EAL learners need targeted language support to enhance academic text comprehension.
This article presents a content analysis of vocabulary activities in selected lower-secondary coursebooks used in the Czech Republic in Years 6 and 7. The analysis is based on I. S. P. Nation’s classification of aspects of word knowledge that learners should acquire to master vocabulary knowledge. Accordingly, the aim is to discover which aspects of vocabulary knowledge are covered in the selected coursebooks. Levels 1 and 2 of Project Explore and Your Space are analysed, and vocabulary activities are classified based on the primary goal of each activity. The aspect of grammatical functions and that of form and meaning are covered most, whereas the aspect of concept and referents is not covered in Years 6 and 7 at all, and the aspect of constraints on use is not covered in Year 6. The present research can benefit the authors of coursebooks and other teaching materials and the teachers who use selected coursebooks.
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