Reading Strategies in Teaching and Learning English as a Foreign Language: A Mixed-Method Study

Reading strategies are essential for teachers and students, especially in an EFL classroom. However, reading comprehension strategies and effective adoption of the strategies have been challenging for both teachers and students in Malaysia. This study aimed to identify the reading strategies used and not used by students and teachers when answering and teaching reading comprehension questions and explore the discord between the responses using an explanatory sequential mixed methods research design. The participants were 91 students and five teachers from a private university in Malaysia recruited using census sampling methods. A questionnaire consisting of literal, reorganization, and inferential reading comprehension questions was administered to the students, whereas interviews and observation were used to examine the strategies targeted by teachers based on Barrett’s reading taxonomy (1972). The findings revealed that EFL teachers used a vast repertoire of strategies in teaching reading, whereas students only used a small number of strategies when answering reading comprehension questions. This study underscores the importance of the accord between the strategies taught and those utilized by L2 readers. Students’ awareness plays a key role in filling in this gap.