Comments by Jo Mynard
I had a really interesting discussion with Esmaeil Momtaz during the poster session. Esmaeil is from Iran and doing his PhD at the University of Aberdeen. His study showed that generally students performed better on reading comprehension questions if the reading was done collaboratively. The collaborative approaches included activities such as students reading aloud to each other and discussing the text, or students choosing to translate the text into their mother tongue. Other students paraphrased or summarized the main ideas. Whatever the approach, it sounded like the students in the collaborative group had ownership over the activity and directed the task their way. A much more effective approach than simply reading an assigned text alone.
First of all, I really regret having missed the opportunity to take part in such a great event! Secondly, I do agree with dear Esmaeil (from whom I have learned a lot) that collaboration really works in reading comprehension classes. This is what I have personally experienced in my reading comprehension classes with EFL majors here in Iran. However, another approch to making learners more autonomous in FL/SL classes is to train them in the use of various learning strategies such as vocabulary, reading, listening, etc strategies, the very pivotal issue which is not practised much in some EFL/ESL situations including Iran. This is what my own researech and those of the others indicate.
Hassan Soodmand Afshar (Ph.D),
Head, English Department,
Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran.
Hamedan Marefat Language Institute
(a Cambridge Open Centre, IR056).