The effect and students perception of metacognitive strategies on their reading comprehension at vus english center m a

In order to contribute to the field of MS training, this paper looks into the effect of MS on students’ reading comprehension, by utilizing MS teaching model proposed by Education Endowm

THE EFFECT AND STUDENTS’ PERCEPTION OF METACOGNITIVE STRATEGIES ON THEIR READING COMPREHENSION AT VUS ENGLISH

PHAM VU PHI HO, ASSOC PROF

HO CHI MINH CITY, AUGUST 2022

First and foremost, I would like to show my deepest gratitude to my supervisor Pham

Vu Phi Ho, Assoc Prof for his valuable guidance, critical feedback and enormous

encouragement, without which my thesis would be far from completion

Secondly, I’m deeply grateful to all the professors of the Faculty of English Linguistics

& Literature at Ho Chi Minh City University of Social Sciences & Humanities for valuable knowledge, and advice during the years of studying

Thirdly, I would like to thank all the participants at VUS center for their engagement and beneficial information

Finally, millions of thanks to my colleges at VUS center and Dien Hong high school, friends from Ho Chi Minh City University of Social Sciences & Humanities, my beloved family who helped and encouraged me a lot when I was conducting the research

Ho Chi Minh City, July, 2022

To Minh Dao

TESOL, accept the requirements of the University relating to the retention and use of Master’s Theses deposited in the Library

In terms of these conditions, I agree that the original of my thesis deposited in the Library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the Library for the care, loan or reproduction of theses

Ho Chi Minh City, July, 2022

To Minh Dao

iv

ATTESTATION ii

RETENTION AND USE OF THE THESIS iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

LIST OF ABBREVIATION vii

LIST OF TABLES viii

LIST OF FIGURES ix

ABSTRACT x

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Background to the study 1

1.2 Statement of the problems 2

1.3 Aims of the study 3

1.4 Research questions and hypotheses 3

1.4.1 Research questions 3

1.4.2 Hypotheses 4

1.5 Significance of the study 4

1.6 Scope of the study 4

1.7 Outline of the thesis 5

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 7

2.1 Definition of key terms 7

2.1.1 Definition of reading comprehension 7

2.1.2 Reading comprehension types 7

2.2 Cognition and cognitive strategies 8

2.3 Metacognition and metacognitive strategies 9

2.3.1 Metacognition 9

2.3.2 Metacognitive strategies 11

2.4 Teaching metacognitive strategies 12

2.4.1 Metacognitive strategies for teaching 12

2.4.2 Think-aloud strategy 13

2.8.1 Research with training program 17

2.8.2 Research without training program 18

2.9 Synthesizing previous studies 20

2.10 Theoretical framework 21

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 23

3.1 Research design 23

3.2 Research site 23

3.3 Participants 24

3.4 Research instruments 24

3.4.1 Demographics survey 24

3.4.2 Pre-test and post-test 25

3.4.3 Interview questions 28

3.5 Teaching material and procedure 29

3.5.1 Textbook 29

3.5.2 Metacognitive strategies lesson plan for teaching reading comprehension 30

3.5.3 Teaching procedure for both experimental group and control group 33

3.6 Data collection procedure 35

3.7 Data analysis procedure 35

CHAPTER 4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 37

4.1 Analysis of the data 37

4.1.1 The demographic information 37

4.1.2 Reading comprehension scores 39

4.1.3 Literal comprehension and inferential comprehension 45

4.1.4 Students’ perception 54

4.2 Discussion of result 58

4.2.1 The improvement of students reading comprehension after MS training 58

4.2.2 The improvement of literal comprehension and inferential comprehension after MS training 59

4.2.3 Adjustment on each reading strategy time allocation 61

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5.3 Limitation of the study 66

5.4 Recommendation for further study 67

REFERENCES 68

APPENDICES 76

Appendix A Summary of MS Research with Training Program 76

Appendix B Summary of MS Research without Training Program 79

Appendix C Demographic Survey 82

Appendix D Lesson Plan for Control Group 84

Appendix E SIOP Lesson Plan for Experimental Group 88

Appendix F Pre-test for reading comprehension 93

Appendix G Post-test for reading comprehension 98

LIST OF ABBREVIATION

CS

MA MAI MARSI

MS EEF SIOP SORS CAIE MARSI EFL TESOL

Cognitive Strategies Metacognitive Awareness Metacognitive Awareness Inventory Metacognitive Awareness of Reading Strategy Inventory Metacognitive Strategies

Education Endowment Education Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol Survey of Reading Strategies

Cambridge Assessment International Education Metacognitive Awareness of Reading Comprehension Inventory English as Foreign Language

Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1 SIOP Lesson Plan 15

Table 2 Description of TOEIC pre-test 26

Table 3 Description of TOEIC post-test 27

Table 4 MS lesson with SIOP format 31

Table 5 Teaching timetable for experimental group and control group 34

Table 6 Demographic information of partipants 37

Table 7 Background experience of MS 38

Table 8 Distribution of pre-test of both groups 39

Table 9 The independent Samples T-Test of the pre-tests 41

Table 10 The independent Samples T-Test of the post-tests 42

Table 11 The paired Samples T-Test of experimental group 44

Table 12 The paired Samples T-Test of control group 44

Table 13 The paired Samples T-Test of control group for literal comprehension 46

Table 14 The paired Samples T-Test of exeperimental group for literal comprehension 46

Table 15 The paired Samples T-Test of control group for infernetial comprehension 47 Table 16 The paired Samples T-Test of control group for literal comprehension 48

Table 17 The Independent Samples T-Test of literal comprehension before training 49 Table 18 The Independent Samples T-Test of literal comprehension after training 50

Table 19 The Independent Samples T-Test of inferential comprehension before training 51

Table 20 The Independent Samples T-Test of inferential comprehension after training 52

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1 Components of Metacognition 9

Figure 2 Think Aloud Strategy teaching steps 14

Figure 3 Theoretical framework of the study 22

Figure 4 Histogram of the experimental group’s pre-test 40

Figure 5 Histogram of the control group’s pre-test 40

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ABSTRACT

More and more studies have been conducted to investigate the effect of metacognitive strategies (MS) on reading comprehension with positive results However, in Viet Nam, many researchers focused on exploring metacognitive awareness (MA), and little has been made with the application of MS This led to the need for more investigation on the effect of MS as well as learners’ perception of time allocation and difficulties during the learning process since the more we know about learners’ problems, the more effective lessons could be designed for their development Forty-nine students were recruited to be participants of the study with the employment of Quasi-experimental design Statistical analyses including Paired Samples T-test and Independent Samples T-test were utilized to assess if MS could increase learners’ reading comprehension The result correlated with previous study when the experimental group had significant higher performance on the reading test than the control group, in terms of both literal comprehension and inferential comprehension Moreover, time for practice and assessment was suggested to be extended and some difficulties hindering students’ learning were identified such as lack of cognition knowledge, regulation knowledge, and motivation

Key words: metacognitive strategies, reading comprehension

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

This chapter provides an overview view of the study by highlighting the importance of reading, especially reading comprehension, and its correlation with Moreover, aims and the reasons underline the importance of this study are also presented, followed by the research questions and scope of the study

1.1 Background to the study

Anderson (2002) stated that reading greatly contributes to the success of an English learner In particular, reading has been considered a fundamental skill to acquire a language since the more time language learners spend on reading, the more knowledge they get about how the language functions However, it is the complicated process of reading that makes many learners difficult to be proficient readers (Grabe, 2002) Othman et al (2014) emphasized the role of readers in reading process, in which they

do not only focus on the reading process, but they have to plan before reading and assess themselves at the end of the process According to Alshehri (2018), the complication

of reading process happens because of the attempt to get messages that writers imply

in the text Not every reader is good at reading comprehension To develop reading competences, learners need to comprehend the reading process It is not a simple process of using only knowledge of vocabulary and grammar to comprehend the text More than that, reading requires learners to use various skills and strategies from necessary ones which mainly focus on reading techniques such as skimming, scanning, inferences, etc to monitoring and regulating strategies, which are MS Moreover, reading comprehension achievement is in correlation with learners’ MS use Therefore, using MS to increase learners’ reading comprehension has become an interesting topic for many researchers in which they have been proved to bring significant influence on the process and outcome of students’ learning (Boekaerts & Niemivirta, 2000; Bolitho

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et al., 2003; Eilam & Aharon, 2003) Many studies on this topic have been conducted with different training methods In some training programs, MS have been incorporated directly in teaching process without another tool for either explicit instruction or explicit teaching procedure model (Do, M H & Nguyen, T P T, 2014; DeGennaro, 2018) On the other hand, Huynh, T H (2020) conducted the training program with Cognitive Academic Learning Approach model as a way to deliver explicit instruction and Fan (2009) employed SIOP lesson plan to teach think-aloud, summarization, and text structure strategies In order to contribute to the field of MS training, this paper looks into the effect of MS on students’ reading comprehension, by utilizing MS teaching model proposed by Education Endowment Foundation (EEF, 2019) and investigate learners’ perception of the application of MS in terms of time allocation and difficulties

1.2 Statement of the problems

MS have gained much interest from many researchers all over the world Several aspects have been investigated such as the effect of MS, learners’ awareness of MS, teacher perception of MS, etc In terms of investigating the effect of MS on reading comprehension, the positive interaction between MS and reading comprehension has been proved (Boekaerts & Niemivirta, 2000; Bolitho et al., 2003; DeGennaro, 2018; Eilam & Aharon, 2003; Fan, 2009) While some certain MS including think-aloud, reciprocal teaching, text-summarization, etc were assessed by many researchers, some other studies applied all the MS suggested by Israel (2007) and Phakiti (2006) Although various ways of applying MS into the training have been used, there is a need for more investigation on measuring the effects of MS on reading comprehension with the application of MS teaching model

In the context of Viet Nam, Huynh, T H (2020) stated that little research has been conducted to investigate the effect of MS on reading comprehension Many of them

focused on exploring learners’ MA rather than the application of MS into teaching reading (Do, M H & Phan, T L H (2021); Nguyen, T T T (2020); Nguyen, T M T

& Trinh, Q L (2011)) Moreover, Nguyen, T M T & Trinh, Q L (2011) emphasized the necessity of carrying out research into problems preventing students from using MS effectively However, these studies explored learners’ difficulties without MS training

It is noteworthy mentioning that the difficulty exploration would be more valuable if learners were in the progress of MS training Therefore, it is necessary to conduct more studies on implementing MS into teaching reading and investigating learners’ perception of MS such as difficulties and time allocation

1.3 Aims of the study

The aims of the study are to investigate the effect and students’ perception of MS on their reading comprehension at VUS English center In order to meet the aims, three objectives are clearly defined: (1) measuring the extent to which MS affect students reading comprehension through MS training, (2) measuring the extent to which MS affect each reading comprehension, (3) investigating learners’ perception of time allocation of each MS and difficulties using MS

1.4 Research questions and hypotheses

1.4.1 Research questions

To achieve the above aims, the study seeks to address the following research questions:

1 To what extent do metacognitive strategies affect students’ reading comprehension?

2 To what extent do metacognitive strategies affect different reading comprehension types?

3 What is students’ perception of the application of metacognitive reading strategies?

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1.4.2 Hypotheses

Some hypotheses were raised from the research questions:

1 There are differences in reading comprehension score between the control group and the experimental group

2 There are differences in each reading comprehension type score between the control group and the experimental group

1.5 Significance of the study

The effectiveness of MS on reading comprehension has been examined by many researchers Bringing more empirical evidence to this result, the research was conducted to assert the effectiveness of MS by implementing a theoretical model of MS teaching Theoretically, the effect of MS on each type of reading comprehension was investigated with an endevor to contribute to the field of metacognitive reading strategies research Practically, teachers could have more suitable teaching plan on how

MS are applied appropriately to each reading comprehension type questions The investigation of students’ perception of MS provides not only researchers with a larger picture of MS but also teachers with a deeper understanding of their students

1.6 Scope of the study

This study focuses on the effect of MS on reading comprehension of learners at intermediate level and their perception of these strategies at VUS center In particular, the study investigates the impact of MS on reading comprehension in general and four separated reading comprehension types In addition, students’ perception was explored

pre-on the subjects of learners’ opinipre-on of time allocatipre-on and their difficulties in applying

MS The participants consisted of 49 students for both control group and experimental group at VUS center- An Duong Vuong campus in district 5 The study lasted for 12

weeks including 8 weeks with intervention employed and 4 weeks to analyze, discuss information and collect data

1.7 Outline of the thesis

There are 5 chapters in the thesis:

Chapter one presents some background information of the study about the importance

of English teaching in general and MS in teaching reading comprehension in particular Also, this chapter includes research questions and significance of the study These parts highlights the issue of the study as well as reason for conducting this study Moreover, scope of the study was also be presented

Chapter two analyzes and synthesizes many studies in order to provide foundation knowledge and identifies the gap in research to develop the study The literature review begins with reading comprehension It is then followed by theories of metacognition and metacognitive strategies Finally, previous research on the relationship between metacognitive strategies and reading comprehension is compared and synthesized to find the gaps between the studies The theoretical framework comes the last to provide concepts, components and procedures how this study was carried out

Chapter three gives detail information of the research design, research site, participants, instruments, data collection procedure In particular, instrumentation is presented clearly with the attempt to prove the reliability and validity of them Data collection procedure is then listed step by step

Chapter four focuses on the finding of the data collected The data is interpreted based

on both qualitative and quantitative methods The statistics withdrawn after using SPSS software is described in a simple and rigorous way The answer and information from the interview are synthesized in thematic way

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Chapter five discusses the results of the data collected and compares these with the research questions and some previous studies to make conclusions Moreover, recommendations for further research are suggested with the hope to improve teaching and learning English in general and metacognitive strategies in particular Limitation is presented to have a objective view for the study

References and appendices are given at the end of the thesis

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter discusses some foundation knowledge and key terms with the purpose of getting an understanding of previous research in the field of MS’ impact on reading comprehension and students’ perception of MS application in learning

2.1 Definition of key terms

To give some background knowledge for the first and second research questions, reading comprehension definition and reading comprehension types are presented after reviewing some studies

2.1.1 Definition of reading comprehension

Many researchers have defined the term reading comprehension in different ways It is considered to be the process of establishing the understanding of the text by coordinating numerous complicated processes (Klingner, 2007) Snow (2002) described it as the action of deriving and creating meaning at the same time from the interaction and involvement with written material

2.1.2 Reading comprehension types

Richard and Schmidt (2002) stated four types of reading comprehension including literal comprehension, inferential comprehension, critical comprehension and appreciative comprehension

Learners can use information from the text to answer questions by recalling or identifying the content at the level of literal understanding Khand (2004) claimed that learners just need to remember information in the text to answer the questions This level could be stated to be a basic level when learners just need to read the text carefully

to find the information which is explicitly stated in the text In terms of the second

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reading comprehension type, readers interpret the meaning of the text, which is not stated, from some clues During the reading process, learners might have problems understanding the message that writer wants to deliver, they only comprehend what is explicitly stated in the text (Currie & Cain, 2015) Graves et al (2007) emphasized that

to comprehend the meaning readers have to connect different clues and information in the text According to Pressley (2000), inferential comprehension relates to not only the process of guessing the meaning from the words in the sentence but also the linking to prior knowledge so that readers could draw the meaning which is not stated in the text Richard and Schmidt (2002) identified the third type of comprehension that readers have good enough comprehension of ideas and information to critique them with sufficient supporting evidence However, according to Khand (2004), at this level, learners are able to understand the information, analyze them, integrate this information

to another one In terms of the last comprehension type, Richard and Schmidt (2002) stated readers can deduce the author's point of view, goal, tone, etc based on the indication of some clues in the text Khand (2004) shared the same definition that this level requires readers to understand the text and deduce the author’s point of view

However, comprehending a text or determining the message that writers intend to deliver requires readers to apply an active process of recognizing, interpreting, and perceiving written or printed materials (Khand, 2004) Reading comprehension necessitates not only the use of cognitive strategies but also strategies to monitor and regulate one’s cognition Therefore, it is vital to mention some basic notions of both cognition and metacognition

2.2 Cognition and cognitive strategies

EEF (2019) defined cognition as the action of obtaining knowledge, comprehending, and learning that occurs in mind First and foremost, CS are critical in the reading process, as it necessitates readers' use of basic methods to complete a task CS are ways

of thinking that help people learn new things to fulfill various tasks or goals by using some strategies which are at basic level They are direct strategies that help learners to cope with a task

2.3 Metacognition and metacognitive strategies

2.3.1 Metacognition

Metacognition has been explored by several researchers There are a wide range of definitions to clarify this term The most basic one is thinking about what someone is thinking (Gredler, 2008) According to Peirce (2003), metacognition is the combination

of elements including the understanding of learning tasks, requiring skills, knowledge, and ability to apply appropriate strategies to a certain situation effectively When individuals engage in the activity of identifying obstacles and try to monitor and regulate their behaviors, metacognition occurs (Pretorius & Lephalal, 2011)

According to Schraw (2001), metacognition generally consists of two components: metacognitive knowledge and metacognitive regulation The first one describes learners’ thinking process and the way they understand how to make the best improvement of learning On the other hand, the second one is about the process learners’ control and adjust their own learning The components of metacognition were summarized by Nguyen, T H (2016) into a diagram

Figure 1

Components of Metacognition

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Schraw (2001) further stated that declarative, procedural, and conditional knowledge are all included in knowledge of cognition Declarative knowledge involves the knowledge that helps learners understand things in general In particular, in reading, it

is about the knowledge of some specific strategies such as what strategy, and its purpose However, it is noteworthy to bear in mind some problems which may occur with declarative knowledge Providing those strategies serve various goals depending

on the situation, they offer learners a range of choices to select (Winnie & Azevado, 2014) Readers, on the other hand, may not be able to choose an appropriate strategy needed to accomplish the task as it is warned that this type of knowledge can be incorrect since they might not be able to choose the appropriate strategy or lack of encouragement to apply all the strategy steps (Afflerbach et al., 2008; Winnie & Azevado, 2014) Knowledge of how to accomplish things is referred to as procedural knowledge (Kuhn & Dean, 2004; Schraw et al., 2006) It can be simplified as how leaners know to do the task It is the way learners apply one by one all the steps of a cognitive strategy in attempt to finish the task Moreover, Mahdavi (2014) pointed out the difference between good readers and weak readers, in which the former has higher performance than the latter Knowing when and why to apply the other two categories

of information is conditional knowledge (Mahdavi, 2014; Winnie & Azevado, 2014)

At this level, they can identify which strategy is most effective to utilize for the task, and the reason for their choice comparing other strategies

In terms of regulation of cognition, it is described as learners’ ability to control their studying progress, which consists of three key parts: planning, monitoring, and evaluating Planning involves the ability to identify learning goals and how to select appropriate strategies to complete the task For example, thinking about the text’s topic, text features, studying illustrations before reading are considered to be planning strategies Monitoring refers to one's comprehension and tracking of their knowledge and strategies used to complete the task By asking questions, learners can get ideas, predictions, inferences During the reading process, confusion may appear (Tovani, 2000) such as learners’ inability to remember the text or lack of concentration This strategy helps learners to keep track of their work and manage the problems Evaluation requires learners to reflect their learning progress This is related to the way they measure what they have done and how they finished it These help learners look back

at their learning outcomes, draw conclusions and regulate their own learning However, Gredler (2008) claimed that there are 4 steps in regulation of cognition Leaners, first, start by evaluate themselves to identify their strong points and weak points so that they could select suitable solutions such as linking to background knowledge or using materials to do the task (Eker, 2014) After that, learners question themselves to monitor

if the learning goals are met Next, learners assess their own studying process and finally with self-reflection, they can equip themselves for future learning

2.3.2 Metacognitive strategies

Wang et al (2009) pointed out that MS brings many advantages When learners are conscious about their learning, they are more likely to monitor and develop their learning According to Boulware-Gooden et al (2007), to assist reading process and contribute to reading performance, learners could apply MS into the reading procedure Livingston (2003) stated that cognitive strategies are strategies that help learners to achieve their goals, MS help learners to manage their learning by planning, monitoring and evaluating

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Cohen (2003) claimed that there is a relationship between MS and reading comprehension It was mentioned that readers who have trouble understanding do not use self-monitoring procedures (McTavish, 2008) As a result, when readers fail to understand the text, they are unaware of and unable to use and adjust strategies to meet their learning goals (Dermitzaki et al., 2008) Those who are good reading performers tend to use these strategies, whereas poor readers do not apply these skills while reading More studies have been conducted to emphasize the positive correlation between these strategies and reading comprehension It is indicated that while CS develop learners’ reading comprehension in short-term result, MS enhance reading comprehension in long-term result (Cohen, 2003; Koda, 2005)

2.4 Teaching metacognitive strategies

2.4.1 Metacognitive strategies for teaching

MS have aroused interest in many researchers Different studies suggested different lists of MS in teaching However, they all clarified into three categories: planning, monitoring, evaluating, which are three main parts of regulation of cognition Regarding to planning, Israel (2007) and Phakiti (2006) advised readers to create a general view of the text before reading Readers can get the overview of the reading by finding text structure (Israel, 2007) and link to their own knowledge This match with one of the seven steps in the model of teaching MS proposed by EEF (2009) However,

in the situation of lacking background information, it is suggested for students to construct a schema to remember new things (Kenne & Zimmermann, 2007; Zimmermann & Hutchins, 2003, cited in DeGennaro, 2008) On the other hand, Phakiti (2006) suggested readers to set goals so that they can plan activities and strategies in order to achieve these goals EEF (2019) and Cambridge Assessment International

Education (CAIE, 2019) also emphasized that explicit goals should be presented to students in the MS teaching process

Israel (2007) introduced some monitoring strategies in which readers have to induce words’ meaning, ask themselves on their understanding of the material, summarize and draw out the main idea On the other hand, Phakiti (2006) focused more on the process

of monitoring that readers themselves verify their understanding and confusion, facilitate themselves by checking uncertain information and self-questioning Kenne and Zimmermann (2007)) also emphasized the benefits of questioning to check understanding, infer meaning in the reading, find answers for some questions Contributing to this field, EEF (2019) emphasized the effectiveness of teaching students how to monitor by explicit strategy instruction, which is not just telling but about the way teachers instigate activities to facilitate students’ learning Moreover, many students may struggle how to self-question or adjust the procedure on their own Then through modelling of learned strategy, students listen to what the teachers explain and how they demonstrate the thinking procedure step by step through think-aloud strategy

or metacognitive talk

In terms of evaluation, this stage happens after reading, when students evaluate the text and stand from the author’ s point of view to understand it Israel (2007) Phakiti (2006) mentioned the ability of students to estimate the level of difficult of the reading Sharing some similarity, in the model of MS teaching from EEF (2019), the last stage is structured reflection when learners evaluate their studying procedure and how to utilize these to future practice

2.4.2 Think-aloud strategy

According to Al-Qahtani (2020), among many MS teaching strategies, Think aloud is considered to be used at high level Think aloud strategy refers to the process of convey

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one’s thought out loud Sönmez & Sulak (2018) emphasized the advantages it brings consisting of helping poor readers increase their comprehension ability by focusing them on key information In particular, teacher’s responsibility is to lay students’ attention on their explanation During their careful listening, they can understand how strategies could be used and the process of comprehension Think aloud teaching steps proposed in Richards and Vacca (2011, cited in Al-Qahtani (2020)) study include 5 phases

2.5 SIOP lesson plan

In the study of using SIOP to develop reading comprehension skills of EFL learners conducted by Ebedy (2019), the result showed that the experimental group’s reading comprehension skills developed significantly after the training with SIOP lesson plan

by bringing essential scaffolding tools And it is concluded to be an effective instruction tool in foreign language classroom The research therefore suggested that the SIOP should be used by EFL teachers to help EFL students improve their reading comprehension skills Fan (2009) employed SIOP lesson plan in his study to teach some metacognitive reading strategies including think-aloud, summarization, text-structure

It was claimed to be a well-organized lesson plan which combines useful techniques and practical activities The implementation of Model of Metacognitive reading strategies and metacognitive teaching advice through SIOP lesson plan is an effective guiding tool to deliver the lesson more successfully since this model is not a step-by-step process, it is instead considered to be a guide for effective lesson planning and delivery (Kareva & Echevarria, 2013) Hanson et al (2006) provided a SIOP lesson plan outline with guidelines

Table 1

SIOP Lesson Plan Outline

Motivation Building background; links to background and to past learning Presentation Content and language objectives, comprehensible input, strategies,

interaction, feedback; modeling Practice Meaningful activities, interaction, strategies, practice/application

(guided and independent practice), feedback Assessment Review objectives and vocabulary, assess learning (individual, group,

written, oral) Extension Assign “big idea” questions that relate to the topic for homework

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2.6 Theoretical model of teaching metacognitive strategies

CAIE (2019) and EEF (2019) emphasized explicit strategy instruction, which is not just telling but about clear teaching procedure in facilitating students’ learning Therefore, the model proposed by EEF (2019) was integrated into the SIOP lesson plan with an attempt to help teachers design explicit activities Although many researchers suggested several MS for teachers to apply in the teaching process However, after reviewing these

MS, it is the teaching model proposed by EEF (2019) that covers most of MS and is well-organized to apply into teaching Therefore, the model of teaching MS by EEF (2019) was used through SIOP lesson plan and with some highlighted MS of some researchers In particular, Phakiti (2006), Israel (2007), and EEF (2019) suggested teachers to activate learners’ background knowledge which also fits the description of SIOP motivation Phakiti (2006) and EEF (2019) praised the actions of giving clear objectives so that students could plan actions to fulfill these goals EEF (2019) stated using think-aloud strategy to model new strategy During presentation section, clear content and language objectives are introduced Phakiti (2006) mentioned strategies of checking comprehension and re-checking confusion These strategies are steps in think-aloud strategy, in which teachers demonstrate how to verbalize the confusion and instruct learners to regulate the learning EEF (2019) noted the importance of scaffolding with guided practice and independent practice In the last stage, teachers encourage students to conduct reflection and evaluation against content and language objectives

2.7 Learner’s perception

Beside the positive correlation between MS and reading comprehension, current research into investigating learners’ perception of MS application was conducted The students encountered various difficulties when using the metacognitive method, in addition to the benefits that came from its adoption Trinh, Q L and Nguyen, T M T (2011) stated some difficulties hindering learners’ use of MS which include lack of

knowledge of cognition, regulation of cognition, and intrinsic motivation Politeknik and Sholikhah (2021) stated that the difficulties are mostly described as having to simplify the text's material, creating a mind map template, and working with limited time Additionally, it was suggested requesting additional time to complete the mandated task This could be justified since the acquisition of language knowledge involving MS use (Politeknik & Sholikhah, 2021)

2.8 The review of previous research

2.8.1 Research with training program

There have been many studies conducted to identify the influence of MS on reading skill in different contexts with the application of various strategies in teaching lesson Fan (2009) employed think-aloud, summarization and text-structure strategies to investigate the effectiveness of MS on reading comprehension of Taiwanese university learners as the researcher claimed that there was comparatively less study in Taiwan using these strategies The result underlined the effectiveness of these MS on reading comprehension Moreover, it also emphasized the increase in students’ interest and motivation after the training program However, the metacognitive awareness of reading strategy inventory (MARSI) showed little effect on the experimental group, proving to be an ineffective facilitator during the training

MS have been investigated by many researchers with a variety of participants’ background from university students to very young learners, one of which was conducted by DeGennaro (2018) The study aimed to investigate if MS increased reading comprehension in fifth grade students by using 7 MS for training The effectiveness of MS on reading comprehension of fifth grade students was emphasized The research also suggested that there should be more investigation on teachers’

by students such as planning, monitoring and evaluation At the end of the thesis, the writer suggested that more research should be conducted to measure the effect of MS

2.8.2 Research without training program

Although there are studies with MS training which include MS teaching practices, many studies have been conducted to measure the effectiveness of MS on reading comprehension only by investigating learners’ attitude through some questionnaires such as MARSI, SORS, MAI

With the idea that “one for all” approach could not bring positive result on every student’s reading comprehension The study carried out by Ronzano (2010) aimed to investigate how effective a certain MS currently used at that time was at improving secondary students' reading comprehension skills A poem with some questions related

to MS was delivered and the result was consistent with previous study that MS improved learners’ reading comprehension However, note-taking strategy was proved

to be irrelevant to learners’ success

Considering that research on MA in Viet Nam had been scarce, Do, M H and Phan, T

L H (2021) conducted a study about students’ MA In order to get data information to analyze, two questionnaires and an English test were delivered It is concluded that MS were utilized on a medium-regular basis, in which problem-solving strategies were used more than other types of strategies Moreover, the result correlated with previous studies that the MA of proficient readers was higher than that of weak readers

With an attempt to contribute to the investigation of MA of TESOL postgraduates, a study was carried out by Nguyen, T T T (2020) with the utilizing of 2 instruments –

MA questionnaire – survey of reading strategies (SORS) and a semi-structured interview The majority of the participants were favorable about the advantages of implementing metacognitive methods in their reading process, according to the findings On the other hand, they faced several problems using the strategies such as lack of cognitive strategies, time-consuming and challenging strategy selection Trinh, Q L and Nguyen, T M T (2011) also explored the problems that hindered students’ MS use by an interview Some factors such as lack of cognition knowledge, regulation of cognition, and motivation were presented The research showed some interesting result about MS use of learners in which the successful group indicated a stronger use of metacognitive techniques than their less successful peers in terms of global and supporting strategies

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Nguyen, C H and Phung, V T (2021) employed two instruments to investigate learners MA of reading strategies and their difficulties using MS Two questionnaires used were metacognitive awareness inventory (MAI) and MARSI, both of which were adapted to be more suitable for the study The research provided interesting information that learners’ way of using cognitive strategies during metacognition did not consistent with the revised version of Bloom’s taxonomy; in particular, the strategies used were not in the order from low-thinking order level to higher thinking level Although the pupils were aware of their metacognition, they excelled at conditional and procedural knowledge

2.9 Synthesizing previous studies

Many studies have been conducted using MS training program with different methods Some researchers applied MS directly to the teaching training program, some used specific tools to make the lesson deliver more effectively during the intervention In particular, DeGenero (2008) investigated eight MS and concluded that these strategies increased students’ reading comprehension Do, M H and Nguyen, T P T (2014) deployed 6 different to teach the experimental group However, Huynh (2020) used explicit MS instruction to teach 12 MS strategies which were combined from MS proposed by Phakiti (2006) and Israel (2007) Fan (2009) utilized think aloud, summarization and text structure strategies using SIOP lesson plan It is undeniable that there is a need for the utilization of a MS model in the field of MS training Therefore, this paper looked into the effect of MS on students’ reading comprehension, however,

by utilizing MS teaching model proposed by Education Endowment Foundation (EEF, 2019) with an endevor to give more empirical evidence for further standard MS application This study then proposed the first research question to measure the effect

of MS on reading comprehension when using a MS model and a well-organized lesson plan- SIOP

The finding from these studies only showed the positive effectiveness of MS in general, but have not identified how MS affect each type of reading comprehension so that researchers and teachers can have a more detailed view of each reading comprehension type There is a need to carry out a study with the investigation on the effect of MS on each type of reading comprehension This provides teachers a more detailed view on teaching various type of reading The second research question was created to fulfill this goal

Moreover, many of mentioned studies looked into the MA of students, in which MARSI, MAI, and SORS were the most common data collection instruments The majority of these studies drew to the finding that the more skillful readers were, the more MS were used However, though MS have positive interaction with reading comprehension, students still have problems while using these strategies Therefore, students' challenges with MS were also explored by conducting some interviews but the data collection was taken place without any MS training As a result, it led to a gap

in which students’ perception of difficulty should be investigated when learners are taught these strategies Only when learners try to use these strategies in their learning,

do they really know the problems they are facing Moreover, it is also suggested by DeGennaro (2018) that further research should be done to investigate the time allocation for each strategy so that teachers could make a more logical activity distribution time All of these led to the third research question to investigate learners’ perception in terms of allotted time for each strategy and difficulty when applying MS

2.10 Theoretical framework

After synthesizing previous studies, there was a need to apply a model of teaching MS

to contribute a standard of teaching MS The MS teaching model of EEF (2019) which was proposed by CAIE (2019) has been highly appreciated by many researchers in the field of metacognition The model aims to provide information about MS teaching steps

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with clear guidance Moreover, it covers many certain MS and is well-organized to apply into teaching, consisting of activating prior knowledge, explicit strategy instruction, modelling of learned strategies, memorization of strategy and guided practice The MS model selected were stated with explicit instruction- SIOP lesson plan (Hanson, S., & Filibert, C., 2006), modelling by think-aloud strategy Fan (2009) Moreover, reading comprehension types including literal comprehension and inferential comprehension (Richards and Schmidt, 2002) were also investigated under the training of MS The other two types of comprehension - critical comprehension and appreciative comprehension were excluded from the study due to time constraint In addition, students’ perception was a valuable source to investigate so that researchers and teachers can have a deeper look in the field of MS teaching The theoretical framework for the study was then presented

Figure 3

Theoretical framework of the study

Survey on students’ perception of the metacognitive strategies application

• Time adjustment opinion

• Difficulty

Reading comprehension:

• Literal comprehension

• Inferential comprehension (Richards and Schmidt, 2002)

A Model of Teaching Metacognitive strategies (EEF, 2019)

• Activating prior knowledge

• Explicit strategy instruction

• Modelling of learned strategy: Think-aloud (Fan, 2009)

• Memorization of strategy

• Guided practice

• Independent practice

SIOP Lesson Plan Outline

(Hanson, S., &

Filibert, C., 2006)

1 To what extent do metacognitive strategies affect students’ reading comprehension?

2 To what extent do metacognitive strategies affect different reading comprehension types?

3 What is students’ perception of the application of metacognitive reading strategies?

3.1 Research design

In order to answer the research questions in an accurate way, it is vital to employ an appropriate research design Among many research designs, this study utilized quasi-experimental design, in which an intervention was applied in the experimental group during the training with no random assignment In particular, the researcher utilized MS

in teaching the experimental group with convenience sampling

The data was collected, analyzed, interpreted, and synthesized In particular, in order to answer the first and the second questions, researcher collected data involving numbers and statistic from conducting pretest and posttest to investigate how MS affect reading comprehension On the other hand, an interview was conducted to get an insight into students’ perception of MS application, involving themes and meanings

3.2 Research site

The VUS foreign language center is a global standard English language training unit recognized by NEAS, an independent organization that manages the quality of

3.4 Research instruments

Many research instruments were utilized in order to collect data for analysis There was

a demographic survey, a pre-test, a post-test, a list of question for the interview

3.4.1 Demographics survey

The demographic survey was adapted from Fan (2009) with an attempt to get an overview of information about the participants In particular, learners’ gender, learning background, and their metacognitive reading experience prior to the training were investigated Some modification in terms of students’ MS questions were made due to the differences of research’s purpose The survey consisted of 6 questions The three first questions aimed to collect students’ personal information including name, age and gender The following two questions gathered information about language learning background The last question investigated students’ metacognitive reading experience before training The last one was created after synthesizing previous studies and the strategies in the questions were designed based on steps as well as MS used in the training The questionnaire was translated into Vietnamese so that the participants would feel more comfortable giving answers Moreover, before delivering the questionnaire, a short explanation of all the strategies were discussed to ascertain those learners were able to understand these options and only choose the strategies they usually used before The information was then translated into English and SPSS was utilized to analyze the data

3.4.2 Pre-test and post-test

The study aimed to investigate the effect of MS on reading comprehension In order to collect data for this purpose, a pre-test and a post-test were delivered to students The TOEIC tests were chosen for pre-test and post-test since TOEIC certificate is recognized by educational institutions and businesses around the world They have been used for over 30 years all over the world, and demand has recently increased considerably Both the pre-test and post-test were extracted from ETS TOEIC READING PRACTICE TEST 2, which was published in 2020 ETS stands for Educational Testing Service and is considered to be one of the largest private nonprofit educational testing and assessment organizations Therefore, the reliability and validity

of the tests can be ensured

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A TOEIC test includes 75 minutes for the Reading section There are three parts in a standard TOEIC reading test including incomplete sentences (part 5), text completion (part 6), reading comprehension (part 7)

Due to the research purpose, some reading comprehension texts in part 7 were extracted and combined to create the pre-test and the post-test It was inevitable that critical comprehension and appreciative comprehension were excluded from the text due to TOEIC test format and time constraint of the study

In particular, both the pre-test and the post-test included 20 multiple choice questions There were 7 literal reading comprehension questions and 13 inferential reading comprehension questions in each test The researcher identified the comprehension type

of each question based on the skill each question required Moreover, a consultant with

an expert in teaching reading was made to discuss to ascertain the reading comprehension types of the study

Table 2

Description of the TOEIC pre-test

Question

Reading comprehension type

Description

Reading text 1

Question 161 Question 162 Question 163

Inferential Inferential Literal

Infer main idea of the text Infer the information about Ms Walters Find explicitly stated answer in the text Reading

text 2

Question 164 Question 165 Question 166 Question 167

Literal Inferential Literal Inferential

Find explicitly stated answer in the text Infer Mr Kim’s job

Find explicitly stated answer in the text Infer information about the residents there

Reading text 3

Question 168 Question 169 Question 170 Question 171

Inferential Literal Literal Inferential

Infer main idea Find explicitly stated answer in the text Find explicitly stated answer in the text Infer the suitable position for the sentence Reading

text 4

Question 172 Question 173 Question 174 Question 175

Inferential Inferential Inferential Inferential

Infer Mr Li’ s job Infer the reason Infer what is likely to happen Infer the meaning

Reading text 5

Question 176 Question 177 Question 178 Question 179 Question 180

Inferential Inferential Literal Inferential Literal

Infer the purpose of the web page Infer the type of industry

Find explicitly stated answer in the text Infer information of the summer test Find explicitly stated answer in the text

Table 3

Description of the TOEIC post-test

Question

Reading comprehension type

Description

Reading text 1

Question 161 Question 162 Question 163

Inferential Inferential Literal

Infer information about Mr Deems Infer the reason

Find explicitly stated answer in the text Reading

text 2

Question 164

Question 165 Question 166 Question 167

Inferential

Literal Literal Inferential

Infer information about Lewis and Clark County

Find explicitly stated answer in the text Find explicitly stated answer in the text Infer information about the residents there

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Reading text 3

Question 168 Question 169 Question 170 Question 171

Inferential Literal Literal Inferential

Infer main idea Find explicitly stated answer in the text Find explicitly stated answer in the text Infer the suitable position for the sentence Reading

text 4

Question 172 Question 173 Question 174 Question 175

Inferential Inferential Inferential Inferential

Infer Mr Li’ s job Infer the reason Infer what is likely to happen Infer the meaning

Reading text 5

Question 176 Question 177 Question 178 Question 179 Question 180

Inferential Inferential Literal Inferential Literal

Infer the purpose of the web page Infer the type of industry

Find explicitly stated answer in the text Infer information of the summer test Find explicitly stated answer in the text

The interview questions were designed after reviewing studies related to MS and reading comprehension Nguyen, T M T and Trinh, Q L (2011) conducted an

interview using three questions focused on knowledge of cognition and regulation of cognition and lack of intrinsic motivation Nguyen, T T T (2020) conducted a semi-structured interview with a list of five prepared questions to collect data This study was designed with two main questions about learners’ perception of time allocation and difficulty while using MS

- What do you think about the time distribution for each MS?

- What difficulties do you have while using MS?

However, extra questions were asked to gather more information for the study Some questions were arisen during the interview and some were adapted from interview questions of Nguyen, T M T and Trinh, Q L (2011)

Anticipating that although both good readers and bad readers might have different difficulty when reading, weak ones seem to struggle more This study interviewed 8 students from the experimental group including 3 good readers and 5 weak readers, their reading level was identified based on the post-test scores The questions were asked in Vietnamese so that the participants would feel more comfortable giving answers The information was then translated into English and put into themes related

to the topics that can address the third research question

3.5 Teaching material and procedure

3.5.1 Textbook

The textbook used for both control group and experimental group was Solutions intermediate (Third edition) To provide an overview of the text book, some basic information was introduced Firstly, the textbook was published by a well-known institution in the field of English language – Oxford University Press with a regular update Secondly, the structure syllabus is logically organized with 8 sections in a unit, each of which focuses on a particular skill including A Vocabulary, B Grammar, C