Teaching Reading Comprehension Strategies to Iranian EFL Pre-University Students

The present study investigated the potential of implementing reading strategy instruction in raising learner readers' awareness of reading strategies,  extending the range of strategies they employed and enhancing their reading comprehension ability. To conduct the study, 90 female pre-university students majoring in Natural Sciences were selected based on a convenient sampling procedure. After the students' existing strategy awareness and use were determined, the researchers started to teach them reading comprehension strategies explicitely. During this period of instruction, the students' strategy use was improved and reviewed at regular intervals through review exercises and interviews. To collect the necessary data, two types of instruments were employed,  a reading comprehension test and two questionnaires. A group of 53 students (experimental) was taught to employ reading comprehension strategies in reading some English texts during a period of 15 sessions while the other group of 37 students (control) was taught reading comprehension traditionally. The findings of the study pointed to the problematic nature of reading strategy instruction. While strategy training appeared to raise students' awareness of reading strategies and could encourage  strategy use by some students, some strategies were found to be harder to be acquired. Moreover, the reading strategy instruction was not able to enhance the students' reading performance significantly based on the results of a reading comprehension test given to the participants at the end of the program.