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This study investigated the effects of foreign language reading anxiety on Korean ESL learners’ reading strategy use and reading comprehension. Data were collected from forty-five Korean students who were enrolled in either ESL programs or graduate programs at UT. The students took the foreign language reading anxiety scale (FLRAS) followed by a background questionnaire. Based on their FLRAS scores, six participants who were classified as high, mid, and low anxiety were invited to an individual reading study. Various types of data were collected from a reading comprehension task, a strategy inventory for reading comprehension, the Cognitive Interference Questionnaire, and interviews. The results showed that there is a fair amount of FL reading anxiety among Korean ESL learners. Although it seems at first glance that reading in a FL is not anxietyprovoking, the result indicated that it can indeed arouse anxiety in some learners due to distinct features of FL texts including a different orthography, textual organizations, and cultural topics. In addition, the results of reading processing of six participants representing different anxiety levels indicated that anxiety can affect learners’ reading processing in terms of their strategy use and cognitive interference. The results showed that highly anxious students who were occupied with off-task thoughts tended to use more local strategies while less anxious students employed more global strategies and background knowledge strategies. Lastly, the highly anxious students showed lower reading comprehension scores than their less anxious peers, suggesting that anxiety can play a detrimental role not only in reading processing but also in comprehension. / text

This case study is conducted in order to observe and investigate the critical reading discourse of twenty seven freshman pre service teachers of English at the department of foreign language teaching at METU. In addition, it attempts to answer the question how the critical reading discourse of the students&rsquo / are shaped through feedback, instruction and time. The extensive data (both written and audio-visual data) is collected in the Advanced Reading and Writing I and II courses which are offered to the first year students at the FLE department. The results of the analysis of the data indicate that the critical reading discourse of the freshman pre-service teachers of English at METU involves interpretive, evaluative and responsive discourse. Evaluative discourse is found to be limited in students&rsquo / written work and discussions when compared to interpretive and responsive discourse. The students also usually tend to evaluate the content of the texts rather than form of them. It is also found that instruction on academic writing foster critical thinking but it is not sufficient to encourage critical reading.

Orientador: Sylvia Bueno Terzi / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Estudos da Linguagem / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-09T00:02:05Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Seabra_Denise_M.pdf: 2545356 bytes, checksum: e41fa1b7cda5485ede8ae2a157b10305 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007 / Resumo: Neste estudo, examina-se a sócio-construção da leitura em sala de aula de língua estrangeira a partir de pressupostos dos Novos Estudos do Letramento - NLS (Street 1984, Barton 1994) relacionando-a à situação de letramento dos sujeitos pesquisados. Nessa perspectiva, considera-se a leitura como uma prática de letramento (Barton, 1994), tomando-se como objeto de análise os modos socioculturais gerais de usar a leitura e escrita que os participantes produzem num evento de letramento (Heath, 1983). A pesquisa caracteriza-se como um estudo de caso que adota parâmetros de coleta e análise dentro de um quadro interpretativo. Trata-se de um instrumental que permite dar conta de responder às necessidades de construção, análise e interpretação dos dados e aos processos de interesse desta pesquisa. O estudo foi realizado em um Instituto de Idiomas localizado no interior de São Paulo, durante curso de inglês de nível intermediário, ministrado por esta professora-pesquisadora, tendo como sujeitos-focais quatro aprendizes-adultos com letramento escolar de nível superior em diferentes áreas do conhecimento. De acordo com os dados analisados foi possível identificar que, por estabelecerem uma relação profunda com a escrita e seus usos sociais, os alunos conseguem interpretar textos escritos construindo sentidos que não estão ligados estritamente ao nível lingüístico, mas constituídos em nível sociocultural, ou seja, inseridos em um contexto sócio histórico determinado / Abstract: This study examines the social construction of reading during a foreign language class from the perspective of the New Literacy Studies (Street 1984, Barton 1994) and relating this social construction to the literacy background of the participants. According to this perspective, reading is considered as a literacy practice (Barton, 1994) and the focus is on social and cultural ways in which reading and writing are used as tools during a literacy event (Heath, 1983). A case study was conducted using an interpretative framework for both, the data collection and the analysis, due to the fact that we considered it to be a tool which would meet the needs of construction, analysis and interpretation of the data and the interests of this research. The study was carried out in a Language Institute located in São Paulo state during an Intermediate Level English course. The researcher, who was also the teacher during this course, had four students as participants, each one of them with a bachelor degree in a different area of expertise. According to the analysis of the data, it was possible to identify that these participants had established a very deep relationship with the social uses of written language which made possible for them to interpret written texts going beyond the linguistic level, being able to build meaning and situating this meaning socially and historically / Mestrado / Lingua Estrangeira / Mestre em Linguística Aplicada

This diploma thesis deals with the speech skills of reading comprehension and comparison of its implementation in selected textbooks of Czech as a foreign language at the B1 level. The analysis focuses on comparing how reading comprehension is approached in individual textbook materials - whether separate sections are set aside for this skill or not, whether reading texts are appropriate in terms of content and language of the level B1, and whether they are included in the reading texts activities before, during and after reading the text, or what form they have and what type of reading they focus on. The aim of the diploma thesis is also to find out whether the preferences of practicing only one of the types of reading do not prevail in selected textbooks, or whether the focus on practicing different types of reading according to SERR is balanced.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-02T20:25:13Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 4320.pdf: 2797157 bytes, checksum: 9d3bc1c470c0b601341992176eb1755e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-02-28 / Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos / Inferences based on the results of language tests have been used to make decisions about people s lives because tests work as a gateway at important moments related to education, employment and moving from one country to another (MCNAMARA, 2000). In this study, we aimed at discussing the inclusion of an English test in the ENEM entrance examination in Brazil. This test evaluates the reading ability in English as a Foreign Language (EFL). Its use in the Brazilian educational system was introduced without the development and publication of specifications that are a central and crucial part of a test construction process. Test specifications should include information related to the theoretical framework underlying the test and the level of understanding expected from test-takers (ALDERSON; CLAPHAM; WALL, 1995). From this perspective, we conducted an interpretative research (MOITA LOPES, 1994) based on documents (LANKSHEAR; KNOBEL, 2008) in order to understand the construct that underlies the ENEM English test. The documents that contributed to the data analysis were the English Curricular Guidelines for Brazilian Secondary Schools and the Guidelines for ENEM 2009, which are the documents that direct the development of the current version of ENEM. The results obtained from the analysis of the 2010 and 2011 ENEM English tests show that the assessment of the EFL reading ability is operationalized primarily through the decoding of texts by test-takers, which originates from a narrow concept of language (SCARAMUCCI, 1995). Based on this, we believe that the ENEM English test does not allow test-takers to read between the lines, as suggested by the English Curricular Guidelines. The results also show that the competence and the skills presented by the Guidelines for ENEM 2009 are not implemented in the ENEM English test. Furthermore, the results suggest that the development of this test should be reconsidered by the test writers, starting with the design and publication of specifications that are coherent with the contemporary theories that guide the process of EFL teaching, learning and assessment. / Na área de avaliação em contextos de ensino-aprendizagem de línguas, inferências feitas com base nos resultados de exames têm sido utilizadas de forma crescente na tomada de decisões sobre a vida das pessoas avaliadas, com os exames funcionando, por exemplo, como porta de entrada em importantes momentos da educação, na busca por um emprego e ao transitar de um país para outro (MCNAMARA, 2000). Em âmbito nacional, a reformulação do Exame Nacional do Ensino Médio (ENEM), ocorrida em 2009, implicou na sua transformação em um exame de acesso ao ensino superior, sendo que muitas instituições públicas de ensino vêm, desde então, substituindo, total ou parcialmente, seus exames vestibulares pelo ENEM. Nesse contexto de reformulação do ENEM, dois aspectos despertaram nossa atenção: a inclusão de uma prova que avalia a habilidade de leitura em língua estrangeira (LE) dos candidatos e a ausência de especificações para essa prova, nas quais deveriam constar informações relacionadas ao arcabouço teórico que a fundamenta, ou seja, ao seu construto, e ao tipo de compreensão esperada dos examinandos (ALDERSON; CLAPHAM; WALL, 1995). Partindo dessa perspectiva, procedemos a esta pesquisa interpretativista (MOITA LOPES, 1994) baseada em documentos (LANKSHEAR; KNOBEL, 2008), com o objetivo de compreender o construto que fundamenta a prova de inglês do ENEM. Os documentos que contribuíram para a análise da prova mencionada foram as Orientações Curriculares para o Ensino Médio - Língua Estrangeira (OCEM-LE) e a Matriz de Referência para o ENEM 2009, que segundo o MEC/Inep, direcionam a elaboração da versão atual do exame. Os resultados, provenientes da análise das questões da prova de inglês das edições 2010 e 2011 do ENEM, revelam que a avaliação de leitura em LE operacionalizada nessa prova mobiliza predominantemente a decodificação de textos pelos examinandos, sendo perpassada por uma concepção estreita e fragmentada de língua(gem) e associada a uma visão de leitura como extração passiva dos sentidos do texto (SCARAMUCCI, 1995). Assim, entendemos que a maior parte das questões da prova de inglês do ENEM não converge com as sugestões das OCEM-LE de que a leitura em LE deve ser entendida como uma prática cultural e crítica de língua(gem). Os resultados mostram, ainda, que a competência e as habilidades apresentadas pela Matriz de Referência para o ENEM 2009 não são contempladas nessa prova, além de sinalizarem que todo o processo de desenvolvimento da prova de inglês do ENEM deveria ser revisto pelos agentes do MEC/Inep, a começar pela elaboração de especificações consistentes para essa prova, e acima de tudo, coerentes com as teorias contemporâneas que orientam o processo de ensino-aprendizagem de LE (inglês) e sua avaliação.