engleski

Young FL Learners and Their Reading Awareness: A Follow-up Case Study with Twins

Children included in regular FL programmes learn how to use language and interact within new discourses of the classroom and content learned in a new language, taking on new identities at the same time. It can be said that, in their early primary school years, young FL learners are in the process of integrating into a new discourse community and developing a series of new identities. The development of literacy understanding and skills is an unavoidable part of the picture, so their early engagement with reading and writing is to be of crucial importance. As the title suggests, this paper deals with the first part of the above-stated equation (reading + writing = literacy) although the second one was also considered to some extent. Reading is here depicted as a dynamic meaning- focused interaction, and its acquisition (code breaking, comprehension ability, strategic component) is presented from a longitudinal, developmental perspective, showing the whole process as a complex dynamic system. The current study fits into the second stage of a larger-scale research on the reading behaviour of young Croatian EFL learners. The aim of this particular study was to investigate the development of reading ability in case of a pair of twins, eighth-graders, who had started learning English at the age of six/seven. It was especially focused on the participants’ comprehension awareness, and included several data collection sources, such as: EFL proficiency test (reading, listening, writing), gap-filling tasks, self- revelation reports, post-reading interviews, and researcher’s observation notes. The participants’ general school achievement and achievement in EFL in Grades 1-8 were also taken into account. The available data were interpreted with the use of mixed-method approach (quantitative analysis supplemented with qualitative descriptions). The obtained results indicated sophisticated similarities, as well as key differences between the twin participants. Both types of characteristics primarily revealed their awareness of (meta)comprehension ability inside and around the process of reading. The present case study may contribute to investigation into the field of SLA, especially its segment centred on reading, from a twin-based viewpoint that does not appear common within its research scope.

reading awareness, young learners, twin case study

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