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A Reading Profile of Singapore Primary 1 Students and Implications for Reading Pedagogy

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Quadrilingual Education in Singapore

Part of the book series: Education Innovation Series ((EDIN))

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Abstract

Reading plays an important role in providing a foundation for language proficiency and academic achievement. Thus it is imperative that, in schools, children are properly inducted into a reading process that develops them into proficient and critical readers. To attain this objective, however, schools require a comprehensive and effective reading instruction curriculum. Such a curriculum can be more effectively formulated if there are data portraying the reading and comprehension abilities of the students at entry level. In light of this need, this paper describes the reading profile of a group of students in Singapore at entry level of a primary school, Primary 1, detailing their decoding, retelling and comprehension abilities. In examining and discussing the scores, we examine the kind of pedagogy which is necessary for enhancing the reading abilities of these students. It is envisaged that the findings and pedagogical implications could have applicability in other contexts where school students are expected to communicate and learn through the medium of English even though they might have different home languages.

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Acknowledgements

This chapter refers to data from the research project “A Reading Intervention Model to Improve Reading Instruction in Primary Schools” (CRP 18/05 CS) funded by the Centre for Research in Pedagogy and Practice, National Institute of Education (NIE), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. The views expressed in this paper are the authors’ and do not necessarily represent the views of NIE. The authors wish to express their gratitude to the participating schools, teachers and students.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Independent Scholar, Singapore, Singapore

    Chitra Shegar

  2. English Language Institute of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    Christopher S. Ward

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  1. Chitra Shegar
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Correspondence to Chitra Shegar .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Nanyang Technological University, National Institute of Education, Singapore

    Rita Elaine Silver

  2. Crandall University, Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada

    Wendy D. Bokhorst-Heng

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Shegar, C., Ward, C.S. (2016). A Reading Profile of Singapore Primary 1 Students and Implications for Reading Pedagogy. In: Elaine Silver, R., Bokhorst-Heng, W. (eds) Quadrilingual Education in Singapore. Education Innovation Series. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-967-7_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-967-7_5

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  • Print ISBN: 978-981-287-965-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-981-287-967-7

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