Abstract In a more developed society, reading comprehension has become increasingly important, especially for students who are linguistically vulnerable. Students with language difficulties have more difficulty tackling both concrete and complex texts. This study aims to investigate structured strategy teaching to improve students’ reading comprehension in the context of a collaboration between a teacher and a special educator at a Swedish primary school. The main methodology used was action research during a four-week period when Reciprocal Teaching was used in combination with visual tools and a communicative approach to increase students’ reading comprehension. The theoretical framework of the study was informed by the sociocultural perspective and Bakhtin’s theory of the importance of dialogue for a multi-vocal classroom. Four students in the fourth grade participated in the study at the beginning of spring of 2024 and underwent four weeks of special education in the use of reading comprehension strategies with the help of a variant of Reciprocal Teaching combined with visual tools. Additionally, an unstructured interview was conducted with a class teacher and a focus group interview with the four students. The empirical data was analyzed using a thematic analysis method that led to four categorizations: linguistic tools, multivocality accessible teaching, and interdisciplinary collaboration. The results showed that the students improved their reading comprehension by about 40-50% when comparing pre- and posttests in reading comprehension. In combination with a multivocal perspective and accessible teaching, teaching, the method had positive impacts on the students ́ participation in the classroom. The students described how they benefited from the visual tool in understanding what they read. The study identified important aspects regarding how students with language difficulties adopt reading comprehension strategies as a tool to use in the classroom. Furthermore, the study highlights the role of collaboration between special educators and teachers in developing more accessible teaching in the classroom.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:mau-68947 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Awkal, Hiam |
| Publisher | Malmö universitet, Fakulteten för lärande och samhälle (LS) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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