An Exploration of Academic Reading Proficiency at the University Level: A Cross-Sectional Study of 848 Undergraduates

Gorzycki, Meg; Howard, Pamela; Allen, Diane D.; Desa, Geoffrey; Rosegard, Erik

doi:10.1080/19388071.2015.1133738

Cited by 28 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…In summary, students declared that reading is important: “Reading is a basic step in building ideology towards subjects.” Yet, students did not believe that academic reading is essential for their success in the classroom: “Reading isn't necessary if the professor has teaching/lecture skills and sufficient time to provide the necessary information.” This paradox was illustrated by mapping the undergraduate comments to their IARP scores, a proxy for reading proficiency (Gorzycki et al., ). A number of patterns emerged from mapping the undergraduate comments by theme to low, medium, and high scores on the IARP (0–4, 5–7, and 8–10, respectively; see Table ).…”

Section: Undergraduate Comments and Theme Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The reading comprehension test, Independent Assessment of Reading Proficiency (IARP), was locally developed. The IARP was shown to be representative of the type of standardized reading comprehension test seen in the SAT or ACT through external validation (Gorzycki et al., ).…”

Section: Purpose Of the Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This article is part of a larger undergraduate academic reading investigation (Gorzycki, Howard, Allen, Desa, & Rosegard, ; Howard, Gorzycki, Desa, & Allen, ). Student comments are analyzed in the context of the literature on undergraduate academic reading.…”

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confidence: 99%

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“Reading Is Important,” but “I Don't Read”: Undergraduates’ Experiences With Academic Reading

Gorzycki¹,

Desa²,

Howard³

et al. 2019

J Adolescent & Adult Lit

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Qualitative data analysis from open‐ended comments written by 206 undergraduates illustrates student attitudes, beliefs, and practices that reveal an academic reading paradox. Consistently, undergraduates report that reading is valuable, yet their noncompliance with reading assignments suggests otherwise. Undergraduates report that they achieve their academic goals with little reading and that they perceive reading as too voluminous and irrelevant to class outcomes. The data highlight a misalignment between conventional academic expectations that undergraduates will read in scholarly ways and their actual academic reading practice. Qualitative analysis illustrates that students do not experience academic reading as a venue for scholarly engagement in disciplinary discourse. Whereas the academic reading literature proposes that students develop along a continuum from novice to expert reader, findings suggest that the undergraduate experience of academic reading is not representative of that continuum.

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Section: Undergraduate Comments and Theme Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Purpose Of the Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

“Reading Is Important,” but “I Don't Read”: Undergraduates’ Experiences With Academic Reading

Gorzycki¹,

Desa²,

Howard³

et al. 2019

J Adolescent & Adult Lit

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Yang and Han (2009), Springer, Wilson, and Dole (2015), Zhang (2009), andZhong (2002) asserted that students who did not use critical thinking had weak comprehension skills, which resulted in inability to understand relationships among the units of the text, recognize contradictions, comparisons or analogies, or extract logical inferences. Gorzycki et al (2016) indicated that students who did not achieve reading proficiency were those who were unable to perform cognitive tasks related to interpreting various texts. Moreover, Tang (2016) pointed out that English reading activities that required students to merely memorize and recite information did not help students develop critical thinking skills.…”

Section: Barriers To the Efficacy Of Reading Proficiencymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Students' reading competence is also a significant indicator of language proficiency. However, research (Ahmadi, Ismail, & Abdullah, 2013;Ari, 2015;Bell, 2004;Dickens & Meisinger, 2016;Douglas et al, 2016;Gorzycki et al, 2016;Jiang, 2015;Kwon & Linderholm, 2015;Mishra, 2014;Schuster, 2012;Shih , 2015;Springer, Wilson, & Dole, 2015;Wilson-Fowler & Apel, 2015) indicated that college students had difficulties in reading comprehension, reading interpretation, reading speed, critical and inferential reading, and word recognition, all of which affected reading competence. These research studies also showed that students with inadequate reading skills had problems not only in achieving their academic objectives, but also in performing cognitive tasks in real life.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Linguistic Integrative Model for Enhancing College Students’ English Reading Competence

Madkour¹

2016

IJEL

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This quantitative correlational research focused on investigating the relationship between linguistic technology-based integrative teaching approaches and college students' reading competence. The study occurred in five phases. The first phase involved observing four reading classes to collect data on teaching methodologies. The second phase was based on identifying the problems that affect students' English reading performance. The researcher selected a random sample of 100 female freshmen students from the College of Languages and Translation at Al-Imam Mohamed Ibn Saud Islamic University (IMAMU Univ.), Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The participants responded to a Likert questionnaire regarding their reading problems and strategies. In the third phase, the participants took a reading comprehension exam to determine their exact reading levels. The preliminary data showed the presence of a high degree at the scale of difficulties that students faced in reading comprehension. Students had problems in loud and silent reading, reading speed, and critical and inferential reading, which reflected students' weak reading skills. The study also pointed to the ineffective traditional teaching strategies as the main cause of this problem. Traditional teaching strategies which depend on general lectures and explaining the mechanical structure of the reading passages did not help students use their cognitive abilities to improve their reading comprehension. The fourth phase of the present study required selecting an experimental group of 35 students from the same sample to be taught using the linguistic integrative model for five weeks. At the end of the fifth week, a reading comprehension exam was given to the group to determine the impact of the new teaching methodology on students' reading competence. The comprehension test was adopted from ACCUPLACER, an integrated computer-assessment designed to evaluate students' reading skills. The test is designed by Board College in USA, which is a specialized agency in college students' exams, and it offers diagnostics and intervention support to help students prepare for academic course work. The reading exam covers six skills, including: understanding the text's purpose and tone; identifying the central ideas; recognizing supporting details; understanding sentences and vocabulary relationships; distinguishing illustration, comparison and contrast, and cause and effect relationships; and understanding inferential meanings. The data analysis showed a significant difference in favor of students who used the linguistic integrative model, indicating the positive impact of technology-based teaching approaches on students' proficiency in reading. Based on the results of this study, the researcher made the following recommendations: integrate educational technology into teaching the reading courses at the college; provide professional programs for teachers to train them to use the linguistic integrative approaches; and provide linguistic laboratories that are equipped with modern techno...

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College Students' Conceptualizations of Academic Reading: What Metaphors Suggest About the Important Role of Purpose in College Reading and Learning

Theriault¹

2022

J Adolescent & Adult Lit

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An important part of college learning is the ability to comprehend complex texts. Research indicates that epistemic beliefs—views about what knowledge is like and how people come to know—may guide readers' goals and behaviors. Metaphor is a tool for uncovering individual's beliefs. This article reports on a study examining 90 beginning university students' conceptualizations—broad‐based understandings and views—of academic reading through collecting metaphors and explanations. Through metaphor analysis, collective patterns of three themes emerged: consumption, obligation, and destination. Threaded across themes was the notion of compliance. Implications center on how college faculty who teach beginning college students might support students' learning in college through (re)examining intentionality of reading in their courses, providing purposeful, specific assignments to accompany reading, and using metaphors to communicate the purposes of reading. Findings from this study, overlayed with previous research, present a need to emphasize the purpose of academic reading tasks in college reading and learning.

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An Exploration of Academic Reading Proficiency at the University Level: A Cross-Sectional Study of 848 Undergraduates

Cited by 28 publications

References 24 publications

“Reading Is Important,” but “I Don't Read”: Undergraduates’ Experiences With Academic Reading

“Reading Is Important,” but “I Don't Read”: Undergraduates’ Experiences With Academic Reading

A Linguistic Integrative Model for Enhancing College Students’ English Reading Competence

College Students' Conceptualizations of Academic Reading: What Metaphors Suggest About the Important Role of Purpose in College Reading and Learning

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