An Experimental Study On Facilitative Effect Of Assisted Repeated Reading Upon Oral Reading Fluency And Reading Comprehension Of Grade7English Learners

Oral reading fluency (ORF) has been a major concern in reading research and language education in both first language (L1) and second language or foreign language (L2/FL) setting. A great quantity of researches have explored that repeated reading (RR) can develop ORF of L1students and then improve reading comprehension consequentially. This is also proved to be true in L2/FL settings as shown in many researches. However, the conclusion is far from being consensus. Some hold that repeated reading enhanced not only ORF but also reading comprehension. Others insist that repeated reading did improve readers’ORF but it can’t transfer its benefit to reading comprehension. In order to clarify the confusion, we applied RR method to L2teaching for Grade7students in a middle school.RR can be divided into two categories according to its instructional methods-assisted and unassisted repeated reading (ARR and URR). The distinction of these two methods lies in the fact the former (ARR) provides reading model and feedback from teachers while the latter (URR) doesn’t. In fact, ARR has been widely used in teaching in middle school in China. Reading models like audio tapes are normal tools for reading in and out of English class. Teachers always offer guidance for students to correct their accent, intonation and reading rate. Students learn and imitate to improve their ORF. In the present paper, we intended to answer the question:Does assisted repeated reading have a facilitative effect upon oral reading fluency and reading comprehension of Grade7English beginners?Based on the theoretical hypothesis that assisted repeated reading will have a facilitative effect upon oral reading fluency and reading comprehension, an experimental study was conducted to answer this research question. In this study,69students of Grade7, who were learning English as L2, took part in.31students were instructed by ARR with models and feedbacks. They made corrections based on audio models and feedbacks from instructor and peer classmates. Pretest and posttest of both WCPM test and reading comprehension were used to investigate the effect of ARR on ORF and reading comprehension. WCPM was the indicator of ORF. It was to measure the number of words a subject can decoded correctly in one minute. Reading comprehension assessed subjects’ ability to read silently and answer the relevant questions correctly. Both statistics were analyzed by SPSS. The result suggested assisted repeated reading has a facilitative effect upon Grade7students’ oral reading fluency and reading comprehension.