A Critical Evaluation of Reading Comprehension Questions in English for Academic Purposes Textbooks: Old Versus New Generation

Saidi, Mavadat; Nasiri, Soheila

doi:10.30465/crtls.2021.36167.2226

Document Type : Research

Authors

Mavadat Saidi ¹
Soheila Nasiri ²

¹ Assistant Professor of TEFL, Shahid Rajaee Teacher Training University, Tehran, Iran

² MA Student of TEFL, Shahid Rajaee Teacher Training University, Tehran, Iran

https://doi.org/10.30465/crtls.2021.36167.2226

Abstract

English for academic purposes materials primarily focus on developing and enhancing the university students’ reading skills. The current study aimed to evaluate and compare the reading comprehension questions in the old and new generations of EAP textbooks published by SAMT. To this end, the reading comprehension questions in ten EAP textbooks (five old and five new) were identified and categorized in light of Freeman’s (2014) taxonomy. The results indicated that almost half of the questions were related to the Content category in the old textbooks while the highest frequency in the new ones belonged to the Language questions. Moreover, Lexical and Implicit comprehension types were the most frequent questions in both old and new textbooks. With regard to the Affect category, the evaluation type was the most common one. The results of Chi-square tests also revealed a significant difference between old and new EAP textbooks in terms of the frequency of content and language questions while no significant difference was found considering the effect questions. The findings of the current study carry pedagogical implications for EAP course design and material development.

Keywords

Main Subjects

Foreign Languages

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A Critical Evaluation of Reading Comprehension Questions in English for Academic Purposes Textbooks: Old Versus New Generation

References

References

Volume 21, Issue 10 - Serial Number 98
December 2021
Pages 231-253

A Critical Evaluation of Reading Comprehension Questions in English for Academic Purposes Textbooks: Old Versus New Generation

References

References

Volume 21, Issue 10 - Serial Number 98December 2021Pages 231-253

Volume 21, Issue 10 - Serial Number 98
December 2021
Pages 231-253