Investigating the Effect of MReader Quizzes on Japanese University Students’ Attitudes Toward Reading in English

Authors

  • Daniel Hougham

Keywords:

extensive reading, MReader, assessment, EFL context, attitudes

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to investigate student attitudes towards extensive reading (ER) with MReader, an online quiz program designed to motivate, verify, and track students’ ER achievements. The participants were 61 first- and second-year Japanese university students enrolled in a basic compulsory English course where the Start with Simple Stories (SSS) and Sustained Silent Reading (SSR) approaches were implemented. The participants were placed into two groups: treatment (MReader) group and control group. A multi-item Likert questionnaire was used as a pretest-posttest to measure various components of L2 reading attitude. Although only minor differences among the groups in their mean differences were found, the results of this study suggest that the SSS/SSR approach to ER together with the use of MReader quizzes may lead to improved attitudes towards reading, increased Intellectual Value and decreased Anxiety in particular.

Downloads

Published

2020-06-28

Issue

Section

Extensive Reading World Congress Proceedings