Assessments Of The Strategies Teachers Use To Motivate Students To Read Texts In English: The Case Of Grade 10 Students At Sire Secondary School.

Abstract

The main objective of this study was to assess the strategies teachers use to motivate students to read English texts in EFL classroom. It was also to investigate students’ English reading skills in grade 10 at Sire Secondary school. To achieve this, the researcher used descriptive research. The sample populations were selected from 500 grade 10 students. 20% of the students were selected in simple random sampling technique. Hence, 100 students were selected and six English teachers who teach English were also selected purposely. In order to gather information on the main objective, data collection instruments such as questionnaire, classroom observation, and focus group discussions were used. The data collected through the questionnaires were categorized, coded and analyzed according to quantitative statistics. The data gathered through open-ended questions, classroom observation and focus group discussion also coded and categorized thematically. Thus, the results depicted that inappropriate reading techniques and procedures were used in grade 10. Teachers were using the traditional way of teaching reading which was dominated by reading aloud and giving meanings of new words without the students’ prediction. Teachers also gave meanings of new words without guessing from the context. Teachers only focused on the active learners. There was no time given for silent reading in the strategies of group discussion, individual or pair works about the text. This studying paper provided about change in the practice of teaching and learning reading in grade 10. As a result, current strategies and procedures of teaching reading were not employed by the teachers properly. On the other hand, teachers tried to motivate students to read texts. Students also motivate to read texts in English as they responded. But the teachers concluded in the discussion that only a few students in the reading classroom practice the reading activity voluntarily. Most of the students in the classroom haven’t interested to practice the reading task. This showed that most of the students’ statuses were below grade10. Generally, the consequence of wrong reading practices and less motivated the students resulted in the weak performances of them in their reading skills. This leads us to conclude teachers, the government’s hierarchal structures on educational leaderships should motivate to read on more attention for education quality to the students’ reading achievements.