Developing Speaking Ability Through Extensive Reading of Children's Literature

Abstract

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates the effects of extensive reading of children’s literature on L2 learners’ speaking ability. In the Korean educational sphere, college EFL learners often struggle, especially in speaking, even with more than 10 years of English education. One of the reasons for the lack of progress in their English abilities is that much of English education in Korea is designed to enhance test scores, since tests are used in schools for admissions and even in corporate environments for hiring and promotions. Schools and private academic institutes use textbooks, drills, and exercises to train the students to become capable test-takers. The result is that the students may score well on standardized tests, but they have very limited capability in situations that require pragmatic language proficiency. There is a need to re-examine the method of reading as one of the most effective ways of acquiring a language and enhancing language skills. Therefore, this research focuses on developing oral proficiency through extensive reading of materials appropriate to the readers’ input levels. Improving speaking ability generally requires an input-output interaction between the learner and a fluent speaker of the target language. It is a resource-heavy endeavor, especially since Korea is not an English-speaking country. On the other hand, reading can be a complete independent activity. The researcher wanted to find the relationship between reading, arguably one of the most cost-effective and efficient ways of acquiring a language, and speaking, one of the most difficult output tasks. Therefore, this research was designed to seek the effects of extensive reading of children’s literature on the participants’ reading abilities; the participants’ behaviors in planned and unplanned discourse communities as they respond to the extensive reading of children’s literature; and the influences of extensive reading of children’s literature on the participants’ speaking abilities in fluency, accuracy, and lexical complexity. Over six months, this study offered eight college-level participants with English reading materials consisting of children’s literature of elementary to high school levels. Furthermore, they were given a stress-free environment, in which the participants were allowed to read any book of their liking at their own pace without any negative pressure, such as those created by exams or grades. The participants read books and took part in discussions, which consisted of planned and unplanned discourses. The researcher recorded the data resulting from the participants’ reading and speaking to study the relationship and changes between their reading habits and speaking ability. Participants’ reading lists, reading journals and notes were collected, and discussions were recorded, transcribed, and processed to produce quantitative and qualitative data. The research was approached mainly from a qualitative perspective with quantitative support. The results indicate that extensive reading is an effective way to improve speaking proficiency, and the most important part of extensive reading is the selection of appropriate reading materials. Participants who saw the most positive change in speaking proficiency in all fluency, accuracy, and lexical complexity from extensive reading were those who read easier books while gradually increasing their book difficulty, regardless of amount of reading. Furthermore, an enjoyable reading experience and the formation of a community of readers helped with the participants’ morale, not just in reading, but also in the desire and the interest of learning English. The results of this study suggest that educators should seriously consider an extensive reading curriculum accompanied with appropriate-level reading materials. While this study introduced the possibility of the development of the participants’ speaking abilities, future research in this area might further contribute to various fields in second language acquisition.