THE EFFECTIVENESS OF USING JIGSAW STRATEGY IN COMPARISON TO TRADITIONAL LECTURING IN ENHANCING READING COMPREHENSION SKILLS OF SAUDI EFL LEARNERS

Abstract

This experimental study aims to investigate the effectiveness of using Jigsaw strategy in comparison to traditional lecturing in enhancing ICP EFL students’ reading comprehension skills. The experiment was conducted in an ICP EFL reading comprehension course, a five credit course, with five hours of instruction per week, over the first semester of 2021-2022 academic year. Forty ICP EFL students of Sciences and Arts College taking EFL reading comprehension course took part in this study, with 20 students in the experimental group and 20 in the control group. The experimental group received a Jigsaw strategy instruction, whereas the control group received a traditional lecturing instruction. The sole instrument used in this study was an identical pre-post EFL reading comprehension test. Both of the experimental and control groups were administered pre and post EFL reading comprehension tests. The pre- and post- scores from the EFL reading comprehension tests were calculated for descriptive statistics and compared using a t Test. The findings of the study indicated that there were statistically significant differences in favor of the effectiveness of using Jigsaw strategy instruction in enhancing ICP EFL students’ reading comprehension skills. The students’ scores in EFL reading comprehension were higher for the post-test than the pre-test after being subject to Jigsaw strategy instruction. Most literature published on using cooperative learning strategies in the Saudi higher education context did not focus on using Jigsaw strategy in teaching EFL reading comprehension for ICP EFL students. To the best of the researcher’s knowledge, this is the first paper to investigate the effectiveness of using Jigsaw strategy in teaching EFL reading comprehension for secondary school leavers without prior experience with cooperative learning strategies like ICP EFL students. In conclusion, EFL reading comprehension instructors are highly recommended to use Jigsaw strategy instruction in EFL reading comprehension courses.