THE READING COMPREHENSION PROCESS IN A FOREIGN LANGUAGE: A PROPOSAL TO EVALUATE READING STRATEGIES

Abstract

We understand that learning strategies in the reading comprehension process are not directly observed, but they may be detectable and measurable. The evaluation is a process that is being studied from new angles more consciously focused on the person who learns how to learn. To assess the use
of strategies during reading we have elaborated an instrument – a questionnaire aimed at evaluating the students’ own cognitive and affective procedures through the reading comprehension process in a foreign language. The process of the information includes a list of skills which contains not only decoding, but also applying and extending the interpretation of the written
text to other contexts, and the construction of new meaning and senses i. e. the creation of new texts. Therefore, after an exhaustive bibliographical review, four categories with their corresponding items were established: previous knowledge, translation level, interpretation level, and extrapolation level.
Finally, we set up the technical characteristics of the questionnaire through statistic methods such as: Alpha of Crombach to validate its reliability, the criterion of experts and factorial analysis which confirmed its validity to evaluate the use of reading strategies in the teaching learning process of a
foreign language.