Situational interest during individual reading and peer reading activities using PALS: its relationship to students’ reading skills and reading motivations

ABSTRACT

This study examines how students’ situational interest changes across different segments of peer reading activities and identifies the relationship with personal traits like the students reading skills and motivation. The authors measured their levels of situational interest, reading skills, and reading motivation, based on their participation in individual and peer reading using PALS. The result revealed that situational interest was rather stable across different segments during peer reading activities. However, the change in situational interest differed between less competent readers and more competent readers across different reading tasks. The less proficient readers showed a significant increase in situational interest before and after peer reading. Furthermore, situational interest during peer reading activities did not correlate with reading motivations, contrary to the result of the individual reading task. The findings suggest that peer reading may be more beneficial than individual reading when teaching learners with low reading skills or motivation.

KEYWORDS:

• Situational interest
• ✚PALS (Peer Assisted Learning Strategies)
• reading skills
• reading motivations

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Youngju Lee

Youngju Lee is an associate professor in the Department of Education at the Korea National University of Education in South Korea. She received her Ph.D. in Instructional Technology from University of Virginia. Her research interests include Technology Enhanced Learning, Peer interactions, e-Learning, and Learning Analytics.

Young Hoan Cho

Young Hoan Cho is currently an associate professor of educational technology at Seoul National University, South Korea. His research has focused on the design of meaningful learning with advanced technologies. Dr. Cho's research interests include problem-based learning, computer-supported collaborative learning, learning analytics, and online learning.

Taejung Park

Taejung Park is an assistant professor in the Department of Life-long Education & Counseling, College of Future Convergence, Pukyong National University, Busan, South Korea. She received  her Ph.D. in educational technology from Seoul National University. Her current research interests focus on designing instruction in the affective domain, e-Learning, remote learning, EduTech, and AI-based adaptive learning.

Jaeho Choi

Jaeho Choi is an associate professor of English education at Sangmyung University, Seoul, South Korea. He is teaching pre-service teachers of English education with the topics of language learning and technology integration in classrooms. His research interests include computer assisted language learning, online education, and motivation for language learning.