“We help each other”: Collaborative exploration of reading by college students of English as a foreign language in China

Abstract

In this study, college English as a foreign language (EFL) learners in mainland China for the first time explored their reading process through collaborative retrospective miscue analysis (CRMA). In pairs, they interviewed each other about reading interests, beliefs, and strategies; read aloud and retold texts to each other; marked each other's miscues; and talked about how they made those miscues when they read. They read multiple genres of texts in class and discussed their miscues and readings. Through the retrospective conversations for 5 months, they shifted toward reading as meaning making and learned that everybody miscues and not all miscues are mistakes, they became more metacognitive about their reading process and uncovered and named reading strategies, and they learned English language through this language in a social context. Their native language contributed to their English language learning. The CRMA sessions provided an opportunity for Chinese EFL students to listen to each other, encourage exploratory talk, and take ownership of their learning through discovering their reading process with their peers. They valued their reading and themselves as readers through CRMA sessions.