AN EXPLORATORY STUDY ON READING COMPREHENSION SKILLS OF URBAN AND RURAL PUPILS IN MALAYSIA

Abstract

This study was undertaken with three aims in mind: 1) to find out the relative levels of reading comprehension ability between urban and rural students; 2) to study the effects of pictorial and auditory support on reading comprehension am 3) to find out the influence of sex difference on reading comprehension. However, the main focus of the study was to find out the relative difference between the urban and rural pupils in their reading comprehension ability to find out the effects of modalities on comprehension. In Malaysian schools, both the urban and rural students are taught similarly using the same teaching techniques and textbooks regardless of the different socio-economic and environmental factors in operation. In this respect, the school curriculum is run on the basis of a common syllabus. Likewise, teachers are known to use texts which incorporated pictorial adjuncts without really knowing the true import of such aids for pedagogy or its effect on comprehension. It is also not unknown in Malaysian schools to find the practice of simultaneous reading and listening to a text read aloud without an indepth understanding of the processes involved or its effect on reading comprehension. The sample which consisted of one hm1dred and forty-three form two pupils, were from two urban schools and two rural schools which were selected randomly from one district. All the pupils in in the respective classes of the selected schools were included in the study. The main instruments used for data collection were a battery of reading comprehension. tests and a cloze test. The test battery incorporated three reading comprehension tests, all of which were developed in the pilot study. Two of the tests were given modality supports, i.e. the pictorial mode and auditory mode. The cloze test was intended as a parallel measure of language proficiency. Data collected were analysed for statistical significance using mainly the t-test and ANOVA. Significant differences between pairs of means were tested using the Scheffe test. Overall, the results of the study indicated that the urban and rural pupils had different levels of reading comprehension ability and English language proficiency. The modality supports on comprehension, i.e. the auditory support and the pictorial support, have failed to show that they were facilitative of comprehension. Sex differences in reading comprehension ability were significant.