I. Title: Utilizing Higher- Order Thinking Skills to Improve the Reading
Comprehension of Grade Six Pupils of Lote Elementary School
II. Context and Rationale
The main essence of reading is comprehension- the ability to convert and
decipher written words, or the process of constructing meaning from text. If the
reader does not understand what he has read, it is not reading at all. Reading
without comprehension is pointless. But once he/she was able to understand it, he or
she will easily follow the development of word and later interpret the text.
As learning leaders, we believe that reading comprehension is crucial to the
development of all pupils’ reading skills, especially those who are in the sixth grade
who are exposed to more complex expository texts all subjects. Though only few of
our pupils are slow readers and are lacking fluency, a great number of grade six
pupils of Lote Elementary School experience difficulties in comprehending and
understanding the reading text. Through the teacher researcher’ observations and
pupils’ written responses on comprehension worksheets, evidence has been found
that the pupils struggled to derive meaning from the text they have read. This is also
manifested in the various assessment test given to them such as the Philippine
Informal Reading Inventory (Phil-IRI) Test and the District-Wide Oral Reading Test.
The researcher also believes that the pupils’ incapacity to comprehend expository
texts greatly affects their performance in the National Achievement Test for Grade
Six. And these facts caused the teacher-researcher’s great concern as educator.
In line with the above reality, it is imperative as a learning leader to take into
consideration the means to solve the problem and further improve the pupils’
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performance in reading comprehension. One that must be taken into account is the
strategy in teaching reading. Although it’s important to ask pupils questions about
what they read, doing so is not the same as teaching them how to comprehend what
they have read. Research supports the fact that varied reading strategies help
heighten pupils’ reading comprehension, vocabulary development, understanding of
grammar, and knowledge of the world. The teacher-researcher intended to improve
reading comprehension by using higher-order thinking skills such as predicting,
making connections, visualizing, inferring, questioning, and summarizing, which is
the most appropriate for the level of reading skills for grade six.
Reading strategies such as higher thinking techniques for questioning,
graphic organizers, and collaborative learning groups were found to increase pupils’
reading comprehension. Helping pupils improve their reading comprehension
beyond knowledge required an understanding of Bloom’s (1956, as cited in Wong &
Wong, 1998) higher thinking skills of comprehension and application, and strategies
to develop them. These skills have been classified into a hierarchy of educational
objectives from less to more complex: knowledge, comprehension, application,
analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Teachers are mandated to integrate and develop
the skills in order to direct pupils’ level of thinking in learning activities. According to
Bloom, the lowest thinking skill, knowledge, requires pupils to recognize and recall
information. For comprehension in learning, pupils can retell or translate what they
understand in their own words in written or oral form, put information in order,
compare and contrast it, and interpret it.
With this interest, the researcher decided to explore the effectiveness of
higher order thinking skills in developing the thinking skills for improved reading
comprehension of the Grade Six pupils of Lote Elementary School.
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III. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The findings of the study will rebound to the benefit of the school community
as pupils’ academic performance elevate as their reading comprehension improve
through the utilization of higher-order thinking skills. Moreover, the findings of this
research may prove useful to the following, to wit;
Pupils. Having a clearer view and firsthand experience on the use of higher
order thinking skills, this will further enhance pupil's comprehension level that will
elevate their school performance.
Teachers. This study may heighten their awareness in identifying the
problems encountered by the learners and recognize the learning tasks that are well
developed as well as the least. This may further be a motivating factor to adapt
measures and new strategies for the improvement of instructions in reading.
Parents. The result of this study will serve as bird's eye view of the parent to
know the needs of their children with regards to improving their reading
comprehension.
School Administrator and Supervisors. Results of this investigation may
encourage administrators and supervisors help their teachers upgrade their teaching
performance in improving reading comprehension through closer supervision and
faculty development and training programs
Department of Education Tupi 3 District. With the use of the results of the
study, any educational upliftment will benefit the municipality of Tupi as it may
improve the quality of working force of the municipality or the quality of life of their
respective constituents.
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Curriculum Planners. The findings of this study may assists the planners in
the proper selection of methods, techniques, and strategies that need to be
reinforced.
Community.The result of this study may benefit the community in as much
they know that the teachers of their children are equipped with the necessary tools
and competence in teaching them.
Researcher Himself. This may serve as inspiration in teaching his pupils
above and beyond his capacity.
Future Researcher. The information and insights that will be gained from this
study may serve as guide for other researcher in framing their conceptual framework
and design and at the same time encourage them to conduct lateral studies within
their area of preferences.
IV. RELATED LITERATURE
Comprehension, a complex cognitive process, is central to acquiring a new
linguistic system. Input must be decoded in some comprehensible fashion for second
language acquisition to occur. In the case of a foreign language reading
comprehension, the reader uses previous knowledge to construct and integrate
meaning from text. During reading, there is simultaneous cognitive processing
involving pattern recognition, letter identification, lexical access, concept activation,
syntactic analysis, propositional encoding, sentence comprehension, activation of
prior knowledge, information storage, and comprehension monitoring. According to
connectionist
models
(e.g.,
Koda,
in Diana Pulido and David Z. Hambrick)
the
2005,
2007;
Nassaji,
generic
knowledge
2002.
structures,
or
background knowledge, that are accessed during reading are largely determined by
the quality of the text base that the learner constructs. Text base quality is affected
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by the individual’s text processing efficiency (i.e., ability in lower-level processes,
such as word recognition and syntactic parsing) and working memory.
Gillet and Temple in Juniari (2003:9) stated that reading comprehension is a
search for meaning, actively using our word knowledge and the text to understand
new things we read. We need knowledge of the world to understand new things,
need to be familiar with various text structure encountered and need to be active in
seeking meaning to rise up from the passage.
Simanjutak (1998), as citied in Raharja (2004:9), agreed on reading as a
cognitive process of making interaction with print and monitoring comprehension to
establish meaning which involves the process of identification (the ability of the
reader to identify or determine what the text says) and the process of interpretation
(the readers’ activity to make sense or to draw out the meaning of the reading text
they read).
Reading comprehension is process of understanding written text or
information presented by the author and affected by many factors. Those are factors
within the readers, factor within the written message, and factors within the reading
environment (Pearson Johnson, in Gipe (1991:156).
Comprehension processes and second language acquisition processes,
although somewhat overlapping, are also distinct. For example, comprehension
involves constructing a mental representation from the propositional content for the
purpose of understanding the message. However, in order for a linguistic system to
be developed through comprehension activities, additional input processing must
occur. Such processing entails making form-meaning connections from the input, or
focusing attention on new forms and associating them with their functions or
referents.
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Strategies to develop comprehension and application in this study were
activating pupils’ background knowledge, having them make predictions, complete
graphic organizers, and answer questions. These strategies were suggested in the
literature and by knowledgeable others, and related to personal interest. Activating
background knowledge for learning involves helping English learners make
“connections between their own knowledge and experiences and the new
information being taught” (Rumelhart, 1994, as cited in Echevarría, Vogt, & Short,
2008, p. 23). These connections can be made with motivating and relevant
materials for pupils (Echevarría et al., 2008). Cummins (2009) affirms that activating
and building prior knowledge helps ESL (English as a Second Language) pupils
learn content, and suggests strategies such as brainstorming or discussion, using
both visuals and graphic organizers. Moreover, visuals in the form of pictorial
contextual organizers “depicting action from the beginning of the story” has
improved English pupils’ reading comprehension in French at the college level
(Omaggio, 1993, p. 144). In addition, combining visuals with questions has
facilitated comprehension for EFL college pupils in Brazil (Raglieber, Johnson, &
Yarbrough, 1988, as cited in Omaggio, 1993).
Questioning as a strategy can develop different levels of thinking skills for
deeper learning (Marzano, Pickering & Pollock, 2001) and help pupils to prepare for
reading and to understand while reading (Hendricks, et al., 1996). Questioning can
be facilitated with the Directed Reading-Thinking Activities Approach (DRTA)
described by Haggard (1985, as cited in Hendricks et al., 1996) whereby the
teacher reads a text with pupils, stops at intervals, and asks questions. Pupils
discuss their answers in a whole-class activity in order to have a better
understanding of what they are reading1 . A Question-Answer Relationship (QAR)
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technique proposed by Raphael (1984, as cited in Hendricks et al., 1996) has been
linked to improved pupils’ reading comprehension after reading (Sorrell, 1990, as
cited in Kelty, 1999; Spivey, 2000). Kelty (1999) explains four types of questions
that differ in how their answers are related to the material. ‘Right there’ or literal
questions have answers stated directly in the reading, and help pupils to focus on
knowledge
by
finding
and
recalling
information.
‘Think
and
search’
or
comprehension questions also have their answers in the text, but require inference
as pupils have to search for information in various parts of the reading and describe,
compare, organize and explain ideas. ‘Author and you’ and ‘on your own’ questions
require pupils to respond and look within themselves to find the answers. The
former relates pupils’ prior knowledge and inferences from the text, while the latter
is related to pupils’ life experiences. With these 1 DRTA is also known as shared
reading according to the Curriculum and Standards produced by the Department for
Education and Skills in the United Kingdom (2005). questions, pupils apply what
they read to their lives before and after reading.
Researchers have also found that graphic organizers help students store
information into long-term memory and give them a visual image of the story (Teele,
2004). The teacher researchers introduced and modeled a graphic organizer that
was used with each comprehension strategy. After each strategy was modeled and
practiced in a whole class setting, the students practiced in small groups and
independently. The teacher researchers modeled the use of journaling to record the
comprehension strategies that were used and how it helped give meaning to the text.
Research shows students improve comprehension when they analyze which
strategy they are using and how it helps bring meaning to the text. One tool to
accomplish this task is journal writing (Block, Gambrell, & Presseley, 2002).
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Following the teacher modeling, the students independently used the journal to
record the comprehensionstrategy they used, and how it helped give meaning to the
text. These interventions were implemented during the period of June 2019 through
March 2020.
V. RESEARCH QUESTIONS
The main problem of this study is to find out the significance of higher order
thinking skills to the comprehension level of the Grade six pupils of LES.
Specifically, the study sought to answer the following questions:
1. What is the level of comprehension of Grade Six pupils based on the Phil-IRI
result?
2. How can the quality of teaching and learning process of reading be improved
through Higher-Order Thinking Skills?
3. How is the pupils’ response in learning reading using Higher-Order Thinking
Skills activity?
4. What is the proposed intervention that could be developed to improve the
comprehension skills of grade six pupils?
VI. SCOPE AND LIMITATION
The general focus of the study was on improving reading comprehension
through the use of higher order thinking skills of the Grade Six pupils in Lote
Elementary School. The study covers the use of Phil-IRI assessment result of the
school year 2019- 2020. In the classroom the teacher-researcher also developed
and implemented the higher order thinking skills strategy among others through the
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think-aloud process and graphic organizers. This was followed using these
strategies through whole class, small group, and independent practice. Further
formative and summative data is collected as the strategy unfolds, and the analysis
of the data provides feedback about the effectiveness of the change in practice.
VII. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This chapter presents research design used, the subject of the study, the
data gathering instrument, data gathering procedure and statistical treatment data.
The respondents of the study were the grade six pupils from Lote Elementary
School during the S.Y. 2019 -2020.
Reading comprehension difficulties were documented through data obtained
from standardized tests, text- and teacher-made comprehension assessments, and
interviews/surveys. The teacher-researchers record their observations and findings,
draw conclusions that will shape future practice.
The Pre-test of the Phil-IRI will be used to measure the pupils’ word
recognition and comprehension level. To determine their progress, the Post-test to
be given on February 2020 will be utilized.
Lesson plans containing higher-order thinking skills activities were prepared
aimed to improve the reading comprehension skills of the grade six pupils enrolled
in the school.
VIII. FINDINGS
The Philippine Informal Reading Inventory was used to gauge the reading
level of the grade six population for the school year 2019- 2020
. It was administered at the second month start of the classes. The researcher has
found out that almost 70% of the grade six population are reading below average
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level. Only 3% are considered Independent or proficient. This is revealed in their
PHIL-IRI Oral Reading Pre-Test.
90%
77%
80%
68%
70%
72%
60%
50%
Male
40%
Female
29%
30%
21%
TOTAL
25%
20%
10%
3%
2%
3%
0%
FRUSTRATION
INSTRUCTIONAL
INDEPENDENT
Figure 1. The Reading Level of Grade Six Pupils of Lote Elementary School in the
PHIL-IRI Oral Reading Pre- Test
So as with the result of the PHIL_IRI Silent Reading Test which alarmed the
researcher. It revealed that almost 70% of the grade six are considered at risk when
it comes to their comprehension. 25% are under the Instructional Level and only
3% are considered as Independent readers.
90%
80%
70%
77%
68%
72%
60%
50%
Male
40%
Female
29%
30%
21%
TOTAL
25%
20%
10%
2%
3%
3%
0%
FRUSTRATION
INSTRUCTIONAL
INDEPENDENT
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Figure2. The Reading Level of Grade Six Pupils of Lote Elementary School in the
PHIL-IRI Silent Reading Pre- Test.
With the alarming result of the Phil-IRI Test, the researcher gathered the other
teachers who teach English subject in grade six. She explained the effectiveness of
the higher- order thinking skills in enhancing the reading comprehension of the
pupils. Tests were given to the grade six pupils to measure the effectiveness of the
reading skills. They used standardized lesson plans in English which utilized the
different higher- order thinking skill activities such as predicting, visualizing, using
graphic organizers, and summarizing. They gave pre- assessment Reading Tests
wherein pupils were not taught yet of the HOTS activities. The result, as seen on
Figure 3, showed that 35% of the pupils answered correctly in predicting outcomes.
Twenty-five percent of the respondents were able to answer correctly with the use
of graphic organizers. In visualizing, 48% of the grade six pupils showed positive
result. 28% and 46% of the pupils answered correctly in summarizing and selfquestioning skills respectively.
48%
46%
50%
40%
35%
28%
30%
23%
20%
10%
0%
PREDICTING
USE OF GRAPHIC
ORGANIZERS
VISUALIZING
SUMMARIZING
QUESTIONING
Figure 3. Percentage of the Correct Responses in the Reading Test Without the
Use of HOTS among Grade Six respondents
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The next figure shows the percentage of the correct responses in the
evaluation done by the teachers after being taught of the higher-order thinking skills
in Reading Comprehension. It revealed a great difference from the assessment
given to them. It shows that 68% of the respondents were able to answer the
predicting outcome items correctly. On the other hand, 77% were able to use
graphic organizers effectively. The use of visualization helped 83% of the pupils in
answering the questions correctly. Meanwhile, 71% were able to answer
summarizing sheets correctly. A total of 82% of the grade six pupils answered
questions in self- questioning techniques. This only proves the effectiveness of the
use of the higher- order thinking skills activities among the grade six pupils.
100%
80%
68%
77%
83%
82%
71%
60%
40%
20%
0%
PREDICTING
USE OF GRAPHIC
ORGANIZERS
VISUALIZING
SUMMARIZING
QUESTIONING
Figure 4. Percentage of the Correct Responses in the Reading Test With the Use
of HOTS among Grade Six respondents
The findings of this study revealed that the use of different higher order
thinking skill activities like making predictions, completing graphic organizers,
vusualizing, summarizing, and questioning led students to be motivated to read and
understand better. Implementing these reading skills is effective in improving the
reading comprehension.
IX. RECOMMENDATION
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“The goal of all readers should be to understand what they read” (Teele,
2004, p. 92). The teacher researcher recommends the
continuation of teacher
modeling, the use of the teacher think-aloud process and the higher- order thinking
skills activities such as predicting, summarizing, questioning, and use of graphic
organizers, and student practice of the reading comprehension strategies. It is also
the intention of the teacher researcher to share their research results and their
knowledge of the comprehension strategies with the administration and other
teachers in their school. At this note, the researcher also proposes a
comprehensive School Reading Program to be utilized to be of help to the pupils
who have difficulty in the reading comprehension process.
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