Background of the study

Reading in English, in Brunei as elsewhere, is valued because it provides access to knowledge across the curriculum. The emphasis on reading in English in the Brunei education context begins early in pre-school education, at the same time as reading in Malay (Bahasa Melayu) and is continued to secondary school. We will look at the role and function of these two languages in Brunei, especially in education, in Chapter 2 (see section 2.5). Reading is an essential skill needed for English language as a subject (Curriculum Development Department, 1996; 2004; 2008) and it can be assumed that the same applies for the learning of content subjects such as Science, History and Geography. This study is conducted to investigate what actually happens in upper secondary classrooms in Brunei, both in language and non-language classes as far as reading (instruction) is concerned. It also looks at reading strategy use of students. Further elaboration of the educational system in Brunei and the languages of education are necessary to the background and context of this study and

therefore will be further outlined in Chapter Two.

The underlying aim of the Brunei education system is for students to be able to follow the school curriculum both in Malay (the national language) and English (the second language), using all four language skills (reading, writing, listening and speaking) (Rahmawati, 2001). Of these skills, I always perceive reading, especially in secondary education in the Brunei context, as an important and vital tool for

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students to succeed. This is mainly because, to be able to read in English is essential for Bruneian students in order to access information in their content subjects (e.g. Science, Geography and Mathematics). Personally, I believe that reading in English is further intensified in upper secondary level, not just for the English Language itself but especially for content subjects. This is because in content subjects, apart from reading comprehension, these subjects further required students to read and learn the content.

The English language syllabus (CDD 1996; 2004; 2008) for primary and secondary schools in Brunei indicates the importance of reading and it is my hypothesis that language teachers and teachers of other subjects need to work together to ensure that students are getting the assistance they need to improve their reading skills and to enable them to cope with their academic studies. The ability to read is a skill that all students must acquire in order to be successful in school. Reading skill is

considered important to learn from the text, especially for the content area subjects, because it makes available resources for higher –level processing (e.g., Perfetti, 1985). According to Grabe (1991), reading is an essential skill and probably the most

important skill for second language learners to master in academic contexts. Since reading comprehension has been distinctively important in first and second/foreign languages, reading strategies are of great interest in the field of reading research. In this study, I look at reading strategy use in both subjects’ areas to provide

information about what goes on in these two types of classes in order to contribute a better understanding on what happens in English Language classes and Content subject classes. The study will therefore describe the use of reading strategies for comprehension and for learning in the upper secondary classes in Brunei.

It seemed that many students when entering (upper) secondary education and eventually pre-university and university education were often underprepared for the reading demand placed on them (Dreyer & Nel, 2003 in Maritnez , 2008). Various studies have been conducted in Brunei secondary classes both in the English language and in various content subjects. A number of perceived problems, in

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relation to reading, were found in these studies which were also found in research elsewhere outside the local context. These include lack of language proficiency (e.g. Nicol, 2004; Yong 2003, Mohiddin, 2007, Norainie, 2008); vocabulary related problem (Hamidah, 2002; Sara, 2009), the unsuitability of the textbooks (Burns & Charleston, 1997; Yong, 2010; Norainie, 2008) and ‘poor’ reading skill (Nicol, 2004; Rosmawijah, 2009; Yahya & Noradinah, 2012). There were, however, other perceived factors in relation to reading found in the local studies such as motivation and interest (Sarifah, 2005) and also in relation to instruction (Nicol, 2004; Pieronek, 1997 & Rahmawati, 2001). These studies will be further looked at in Chapter 3.

As indicated earlier, reading is a tool for academic success. In the context of learning in the upper secondary education, students’ reading process is not only for the purpose of understanding texts literally but it is beyond that. Readers need to explicitly understand and analyse the content of the texts deeply (Yahya Othman, 2010). At the secondary level, there are certain students who are able to read fluently but do not understand the text they have read and the meaning it conveys. They usually will continue to read until the last sentence without understanding the text, even in Bahasa Melayu (Yahya & Noradinah, 2012). Because the content (academic) subjects requires a high degree of reading (and writing) ability that English Language learners might not have or fully acquired, as with the students in the local context, they then experience immense difficulties when reading their textbooks and in understanding the vocabulary unique to particular subjects.

There were quite a lot of studies on reading strategies, particularly for

comprehension done in the local context especially in the English Language classes. However, to date there was no study been conducted that specifically looked at reading strategy use of students in the content classes. This study will look at reading strategy use in two types of classes across the two types of schools by looking at reading strategies for comprehension as well as for learning. The perceived and actual reading strategies used and taught (the use of) in upper

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reading strategy were effectively used by the students across the two types of school and may also contribute to the reading in ESP/EAP especially as a pre-requisite preparation for the students to study in the higher education.

Asides from the language subjects, ‘Bahasa Melayu’ (i.e. Malay) and English Language), it is hypothesized that content subject teachers will not be teaching reading strategies to their students. A preliminary study which was carried out in Brunei in 2008, prior to the main study confirmed this prediction. The preliminary study found that little time was allocated to the teaching of reading strategies to students across the curriculum, particularly the content subjects. Often only basic reading strategies are conducted in classrooms especially when reading academic textbooks. These include note-taking, highlighting main points, explanation of vocabulary, questioning as well as activating previous knowledge. Moreover, the preliminary study also revealed that explicit reading strategies were often left to the English language teachers to teach. Content subject teaching is usually for imparting knowledge or content. The procedure of the preliminary study can be found in the methodology chapter (Chapter 4). Results from the preliminary study have further motivated me to explore the students’ reading strategy use across the curriculum, particularly in the ‘reading to learn’ (Chall, 1983; Grabe & Stoller 2002; 2011) setting in the Brunei upper secondary classrooms. The preliminary study which focused on teachers is used to establish the context of the main study, which will primarily look at students.

This study has two main objectives. The first is to investigate what reading strategies students use when reading their academic texts and subsequently which strategies they used they to cope with comprehension and vocabulary difficulties. The second is to describe the reading strategies the students from the two types of schools used for comprehension and for learning.

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