Effects of a Computer-Assisted Concept Mapping Learning Strategy on EFL College Students' English Reading Comprehension.
by Pei-Lin Liu, Chiu-Jun Chen, Yu-Ju Chang. (2009)
Abstract
The purpose of this research is to study the effect of Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) concept mapping towards English Foreign Learners (EFL) English reading comprehension. One hundred and ninety-four new students of English course were divided into 2 groups; the low-level and high-level group according to their level of proficiency. The mapping reading concept was introduced to improve their reading ability. Throughout the analysis, it was found that the low-level group earns more benefit rather than the high-level group. It was indicated that CALL concept mapping learning strategy increase learners English usage in reading, strategies-listing, enforcing and reviewing.
Introduction
Concept mapping helps learners to organize the information using visual aids where all the information show relationship among each process. When a learner is processing information, concept mapping can trigger the brain assists the learner not only to establish an appropriate monitoring strategy but also to increase the use of retrieving and memorizing knowledge
In learning English language, reading is an important skill that promotes the acquisition of knowledge and exchange of information. In addition, there are some English instructors that still focus on correcting the learner’s grammar or increasing the learner’s vocabulary size. The instructors seldom teach learners how to use reading strategies effectively to improve their reading comprehension resulting into learners’ difficulty in comprehension.
In order to improve learners reading comprehension, several method and tools had been put under further consideration. Researchers have found that concept mapping reading strategies can enhance learners’ reading comprehension. A concept mapping reading strategy offers readers a more systematic and organized way to emphasize the main element of the message. However, few limitations are found for the concept maps using traditional paper–pencil methods. First, it may be too complicated to use conveniently and second, the instructors cannot conveniently provide immediate feedback to each learner.
Throughout the years, computer-assisted concept maps have offered solutions to the limitations of the traditional paper–pencil methods. It facilitate the modification, the computers record the processes in the database while learners construct the maps and the instructors can monitor the learners’ learning behaviors and further analyze the database. The combination of computer-assisted concept maps and multimedia system give a very strong impression of the article.
The purpose of this research was to investigate the effects of a computer-assisted concept mapping learning strategy on college learners’ English reading comprehension. The research questions were:
1. What was the influence of the computer-assisted concept mapping learning strategy on different learners’ English reading comprehension?
2. Did the computer-assisted concept mapping learning strategy affect learners’ use of other English reading strategies?
Research background
Concept mapping reading comprehension strategy
Back in 1972, Novak and Gowin did a research at Cornell University, which aimed to monitor and explore children’s scientific conceptual change processes. However, they faced a problem that the paper and pencil tests were unable to measure children’s understandings validly. From that, the experience prompted them to create a prototype of concept map based on David Ausubel's assimilation theory as an assessment tool that stressed the essential role of prior knowledge in being able to learn new concepts. This method allows children to explicitly express their degrees of understanding and track their conceptual changes over time.
Initially, learners need to confirm the concept of a topic, working from its characters to words, to sentences, and paragraphs, and to arrange the concepts around a main concept. Then learners must link and align the relationship of some concepts, and then comprehend the whole essay. Furthermore, when mapping, they organize the new message and after mapping, the learners can also review the relationships between concepts. Concept mapping enable learners to recall and organize the messages from essays. Other than that, it can also reduce the tendency of poor readers to forget the content they have read.
Various concept mapping strategies have been found and the strategy linked with the related points concept map is the most widely used. It takes one concept as the center, and related concepts and details emerge as the mapping develops from the central to the external. This kind of concept mapping can be classified in two categories: one is development from inner to outer; the other is development from upper to lower (Fig 1.)
Figure 1: Concept maps linking main concept to related nodes.
Two approaches to concept mapping are used in class: one is the “learner-constructed concept map”; the other one is the “expert-constructed concept map”. For the “learner-constructed concept map”, teachers ask learners to construct concept maps themselves after explaining and demonstrating concept mapping to them. The expert-constructed concept map is another method of teaching learning strategies. This concept map differs from the former learner-constructed concept map because it is developed by the instructor. Both of these maps depends on its usage and actual meaning of the message.
In the English reading field, concept mapping is beneficial for students in terms of reading comprehension, recalling and organization. Dyer (1985) studied the application of concept mapping in reading stories. The results showed that the two experimental groups which had assistance with concept maps in learning achieved better scores than the controlling group on a comprehension test.
Novak et al. (1983) indicated that all kinds of learners can obtain benefits by using concept mapping. Wu and Zeng (2003) and Seaman (1990) suggested that students with high proficiency had better ability in reading comprehension and concept mapping than students with low proficiency. However, research of Lipson (1995) and Guastello (2000) indicated that students with low proficiency benefited more from concept mapping strategies. Chiang and Guo (1997) also pointed out that for middle and lower-ability students, learning different concept mapping strategies was more helpful in organizing information and promoting comprehension than traditional reading strategies. Moreover, although the above-mentioned research indicated that concept mapping strategies are beneficial for all or specific levels of students, according to Chen (1998), the use of concept mapping did not have a positive influence on students’ reading comprehension and summarization ability. Thus, research results on the effects of concept mapping on reading ability in general and for learners of different proficiency levels still diverge.
Computer-assisted concept mapping
Positive effects in learning can be achieved actively by combining computer-assisted learning with concept mapping in a learning strategy leads learners to construct concept maps . This concept mapping is easily corrected, and it helps learners construct concept maps quickly. It also makes instructors and learners interactive as well (Anderson-Inman and Zeitz, 1993 and Novak and Gowin, 1984). In addition, computers can track and record learners’ concept-constructing processes, analyze their thinking patterns, and resolve test results (Foegen and Hargrave, 1999 and Shin et al., 2000).
Many kinds of computer-assisted concept mapping software, such as Inspiration, EDGE Diagrammer, SemNet, and IHMC CmapTool, have recently been made available. Learners can download them from the Internet. Shawn (2000) undertook a case study of college students with learning disabilities with respect to their use of a meta-cognitive strategy relating to concept mapping. In Shawn’s study, students who had been trained in the use of a concept mapping software program, Inspiration, were interviewed and observed in their use of the software. Data was collected with the intention of analyzing how, when, and why the students used Inspiration (and why not if they chose not to use it) and whether the students regarded the software as a valuable meta-cognitive learning strategy. The study provided evidence that students with learning disabilities benefited from using Inspiration. Inspiration was also utilized in the study of Plotnock (1997); thus, Inspiration was adopted as the concept mapping software program in this study.
Methodology
The participants were one hundred ninety-two freshmen who took Freshmen English in four classes whereby the experimental and control groups were instructed by the same teacher. There are five instruments used in this research. They are reading materials, reading tests, reading strategy application questionnaire, concept mapping reading strategy instruction and concept mapping software program. These instruments helped the researchers to measure the participants’ level of reading skills. The experiment lasted for ten weeks, and every class period was two hours a week. Before the experimental process was carried out, the subjects were given a pre ‘‘reading test” and completed a pre ‘‘reading strategy application questionnaire”. The researcher chose subjects from two classes as the experimental group (N = 94), and students from the other two classes as the control group (N = 98). Students whose scores were above the average grades in the English reading comprehension pre-test were defined as good readers, while the others were defined as poor readers (experimental groups M = 54.72; control group M = 56.54). The instructor introduced the idea of the concept map and the function of Inspiration software in the second and third week to the subjects in the experimental group. While the experimental group adopted the computer-assisted concept mapping reading strategy, the control group used the same articles as reading materials.
4. Results
4.1. The influence of computer-assisted concept mapping on learners’ English reading comprehension
The findings were based on four reading tests which were taken by the experimental and the control groups. The pre-test aimed to test the subjects’ reading ability before the treatment. The results of the t-test confirmed that there were no significant differences in the pre-test of the two groups (t = _.83, p = .41). In addition, the levels of difficulty for the four tests were similar, which increased the internal reliability of the tests. Thus, it was interesting to investigate further whether the use of the concept mapping strategy showed a positive effect in the scores of the following tests. The experimental group showed significant improvement from the pre-test (M = 54.72) to Test 3 (M = 62.75) (t = 3.89, p = .00). In contrast, the control group did not show significant improvement from the pre-test to Test 3.
Research question one asks if there is significant interaction between the use of computer-assisted concept mapping strategy and the students’ English reading abilities. The researchers used two-way ANOVA to analyse research question one. The independent variables are the computer-assisted concept mapping learning strategy and the students’ reading abilities while the dependent variables are three English reading tests. From the two-way ANOVA analysis, no significant difference was found between the scores of Test 1 and Test 2 (Test 1: p = .12; Test 2: p = .21). It was not until week ten that the experimental group outperformed the control group in Test 3. That is, the computer-assisted concept mapping reading training required time before the effect could be seen. For poor readers, use of the computer-assisted concept mapping reading strategy was associated with significant differences as shown on Test 2 and Test 3.
The results indicate that the concept mapping reading strategy had a more continuous effect on poor readers than on good readers. Although good readers in the experimental group performed better than poor readers on Test 1, there were few differences between good and poor readers’ performances in the experimental group on Test 2 and Test 3. That is, training in the computer-assisted concept mapping reading strategy helped decrease the differences among students. The improvement of poor readers was greater than the improvement of good readers. For the control groups, good readers outperformed poor readers on the pre-test and the latter three tests; significant difference remained between the good and poor readers.
The concept mapping reading strategy was more effective than the traditional reading teaching strategy to improve the reading comprehension of poor readers. However, for good readers, significant differences between control and experimental groups were not always found, and it seemed that the concept mapping reading strategy does not always contribute to enhancing the English reading abilities of good readers.
4.2. The influence of a computer-assisted concept mapping reading strategy on English reading strategy application
The emphasis of research question 2 is on the outcomes of students’ concept of mapping of English reading strategies by the used of experimental and control groups’ response on the pre and post reading strategy questionnaire. Researchers used independent sample t-test to examine the results of the pre-questionnaire and found out that no significant differences are shown between the two groups. On the other hand, the post-questionnaire came with significant differences between the two groups where the experimental group achieved higher score than the control group. Table 6 shows result of the independent t-test (post-test) of the experimental group and the control group. The scores of “listing”, “enforcing” and “reviewing” increased significantly in the experimental group. Learners were inclined to apply various reading approaches once they were taught in the computer-assisted concept mapping reading strategy teaching.
5. Conclusion
5.1. The computer-assisted concept mapping reading strategy has positive effects on learners’ reading ability
The concept mapping application of reading strategy had a direct influence on learners’ reading ability as conforms to the findings of some other scholars (Berkowitz, 1986, Bowman et al., 1998, Brookbank et al., 1999, Brown, 2001, Darch et al., 1986, Davis, 1994, Gordon and Rennie, 1987, Huang, 2000, Reutzel, 1985, Sinatra et al., 1984, Stephens, 2000 and Troyer, 1994). Learners can evaluate their own learning outcomes as they monitor their learning process by drawing the concept maps based on the mapping strategy. Moreover, the concept appears to enhance the learners’ confidence in learning English reading. This result concurs with the arguments of Huang (1995) and Mintzes, Wandersee, and Novak (1999). In a way, mapping concept helps students to examine the structure of an article by connecting the ideas in it. Moreover, it helps learners to build appropriate monitoring strategies and recall the content of an article due to lack of vocabularies. Furthermore, learners can review the content, and guess the meanings of vocabulary when they understand the article as a whole through concept mapping. According to Pressley (1998), English reading comprehension from learners can be categorised into two levels: vocabulary comprehension (the lower comprehension level because vocabulary comprehension requires that learners have a sufficient word bank to recognize a certain word) and content comprehension (higher comprehension level which emphasizes the understanding of sentences, paragraphs, and the whole article). Hence this research shows that a computer-assisted concept mapping reading strategy can assist learners to achieve English reading content comprehension successfully. Mapping strategy shows effective result to the poor readers compared to the traditional reading strategies. However, fluent readers show no continuous positive effect. This result corresponds to those reported for the research of Chiang and Guo, 1997 and Lipson, 1995, and Guastello (2000). The computer-assisted concept mapping on reading strategy developed poor readers ability and lessen the reading proficiency distance between them and the fluent readers. Some possible reasons for this effect are as follows: first, poor readers lack the capability to develop knowledge and seldom utilize learning strategies (Clark, 1985 and Lundberg, 1995); second, poor readers have weaker meta-cognitive capability and are unaware of the reading process (Wagner and Torgesen, 1987 and Zeng, 1999). The good readers, on the other hand, whether the learners employed concept mapping or traditional reading strategies, the results did not display any remarkable differences. The potential reason is that good readers already have their own effective learning strategies and knowledge structure. However, the researchers did find that good readers were able to draw the concept map quickly with complete structure, hierarchy and details. Therefore, if good readers can also attempt higher-level comprehension activity, such as writing, then concept mapping might have a superior learning effect for them.
5.2. Concept mapping can enhance the use of English reading strategies
“Reading strategy application” questionnaires were accomplished by the students before and after the computer-assisted concept mapping instruction. Comparison of the data specified that the students more effectively utilized such strategies as “listing”, “enforcing”, and “reviewing” after they received instruction in the computer-assisted concept mapping reading strategy. Concept mapping puts skill in illustrating to use, and transforms materials into a comprehensible and practical framework that enables the learners to save and retrieve information conveniently. Doing “listing” as a brief description of the article helps the learners understand how one part of the article is connected to the other parts. It helps the learners clarify the meaning and ideas within the article. In addition, application of the listing strategy can help learners to identify major and minor constructs, and to connect the related parts after finding them. On the other hand, concept mapping presents a visual representation of the learner’s cognitive structure, and therefore, can reveal the myth in the learner’s mind. It also helps learners through the use of “enforcing” and “reviewing” reading strategies to condense and summarize passages and restructure one-sided comprehension. In this way, students can gain more precise understanding of the author’s original meaning (Hidi & Anderson, 1986). As the analyzed data showed, the learners still have to employ reading strategies like “listing”, “strengthening”, and “review” when they continue with concept mapping for the article they are reading to increase the flexibility of their thinking so that they can draw the concept map systematically and structurally. To summarize, concept mapping is a useful English reading strategy which has positive effects on learners’ English reading comprehension and their application of reading strategies. The researchers found that both good readers and poor readers can search for and compare concepts, and they think that the texts, space location, and pictures of the concept map can be considered important sources for comprehension. Use of concept mapping gives students more confidence in their comprehension ability. From the variation in the students’ concept mapping, instructors can gain insights into students’ knowledge structure development. Instructors could use it in student counseling for greater understanding of their reading procedures. It is suggested that future research might discuss the process and development of students’ concept mapping, and its correlation with learners’ English reading comprehension.
Reflection:
The summary gives us an overview of teaching reading skill to the students. It also provides us with teaching materials such as software and more. Lesson plan shows the guidelines for teachers to have their systematic way in a teaching process. Without this assignment, we may not know how to construct our own teaching schedule. The allocated time provides clear instruction to conduct the teaching. It is like a time keeper for us to be punctual while doing the task.
Link:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360131509002218ENGLISH LESSON PLAN
LINK FOR LESSON PLAN
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