A Review of Effective Reading Strategies to Teach Text Comprehension to Adult English Language Learners

Abstract

This paper reviews the reading strategies and their theoretical perspectives in reading comprehension inside/outside the classroom. Reading strategies aim to build vocabulary and help integrate the existing knowledge of the readers/learners with the new knowledge through analysis and critical reflection on textual form and content. The study covers four major types of strategies, namely basic differentiated strategies, metacognitive strategies, cognitive strategies, and socio-affective strategies, to highlight their pedagogical value. The study opens up the research area of how these strategies are viewed as significant, which strategies the teachers and the students neglect, and how these strategies are influenced by pedagogical instructions and assessment and shape the participatory and transformative teaching/learning. It is recommended that all these strategies should be given due attention as they collectively involve orthographic recognition and processing through cognitive patterns that engage memory and retention to integrate new knowledge with the previous for possible conceptual change.