Abstract
<p class="Normal1">This paper reports on a needs analysis that sought to explore students’ reading challenges as an initial step in designing an appropriate reading intervention programme for first-year Sociology students. The aim of the paper is to suggest conditions for the production of an effective reading intervention programme by determining the needs of the students in the first-year Sociology class. A survey using an open-ended questionnaire was used to explore students’ reading challenges. The responses were analysed using content analysis. The analysis showed a variety of learner needs and revealed that most of the students have difficulty in reading their first-year Sociology texts. Comprehension was the main challenge, but other specific areas such as vocabulary, length of texts, language, and affective issues such as motivation and interest were also mentioned. The findings show that this cohort of first-year Sociology students had reading challenges that involve cognitive, language and affective issues. Based on the results of the needs analysis an intervention programme that addresses cognitive, language and affective issues is recommended for this cohort of students.</p>
Highlights
The importance of reading in academic literacy cannot be over emphasised
This paper reports on a needs analysis that sought to explore students’ reading challenges as an initial step in designing an appropriate reading intervention programme for first-year Sociology students
The findings show that this cohort of first-year Sociology students had reading challenges that involve cognitive, language and affective issues
Summary
The importance of reading in academic literacy cannot be over emphasised. The construct of academic literacy, as outlined by Cliff, Ramboa and Pearce (2007) and Weideman (2007), is mainly reading-oriented. In other words the ability to read successfully underlies academic literacy. In order to be academically literate, students should be able to make meaning from texts, extrapolate from texts, apply high level inferencing and distinguish between essential and nonessential information, among others. Students should be able to comprehend texts within certain domains (Klos, 2012; Ngaepe, 2012; Scholitz, 2012). Students’ ability to cope with course work and academic requirements within specific disciplines are highly dependent on their ability to read academic texts
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