Effectiveness of a Metacognitive Reading Strategies Program for Improving Low Achieving EFL Readers

As the training of language learners was a main concern of EFL teachers, this study aimed to assess the effectiveness of metacognitive reading strategies instruction (MRSI) on Taif University EFL students who achieved low results in reading. The final sample of this study was (21) female university students. The sample was divided into two groups; the experimental group, which consisted of (10) girls, and the control group, which consisted of (11) girls. By using the quasi experimental-research methodology, three research objectives were addressed in this study: (a) to examine whether there were significant differences between the experimental group and the control group on the employment of metacognitive reading strategies and reading comprehension post-tests): (b) to explore whether there were significant differences between the mean scores of preand post-tests on the English Language reading test: (c) to find out whether there were any significant differences between the mean scores of the post-test and the follow up of the use of metacognitive reading strategies and the English Language reading comprehension test given to the experimental group. Data from preand post-test measurements were used to investigate the impact the intervention had on EFL low achievers in reading. Statistical analyses of the data showed that there were statistically significant differences between the experimental group and the control group on the post-test reading comprehension test as well as the reading strategies questionnaire. These showed a significant improvement in the reading skill in the experimental group. They also revealed that there were statistically significant differences between the pre-test and post-test results for the experimental group on the reading comprehension test and the reading strategies. This showed that the experimental group improved in reading skills after the students participated in the program, as seen on the post-test. In the light of these results, the study provided a number of procedural recommendations that may contribute to raising the importance of metacognitive reading strategies training for the students with low achievement in reading.


The status quo of reading comprehension of non-specialist Saudi students
Although English language instruction has been required for intermediate and secondary school students for six years in Saudi Arabia, many university professors and educators have viewed that the English reading level of most college students is far from satisfactory, especially for students who are non-specialists of English.The test results of the midterm and final exams also showed that their reading comprehension is not acceptable.However, college students had much incentive to improve their English skills, as those students study 12 hours weekly.
Reading in a foreign language is very complex and many factors impact the foreign readers' reading processes and their comprehension of texts.These factors include their background knowledge, language proficiency in the L1 and L2, and metacognitive knowledge.Therefore, it takes time for language learners to achieve improvement in reading, especially for learners who learn English in foreign language environment.Since English is neither spoken at home nor in daily communications in Saudi Arabia, the only opportunities EFL students have to learn English occur in English classes.So, the average Saudi college students' reading ability in English usually lags far behind their first language reading competence.According to Eskey (2005), many EFL students may not need to speak English in their daily lives but they need to read it to access the richness of information in English.
Researchers in metacognition (Jacobs & Paris, 1987;Zhang & Seepho, 2012, 2013) have demonstrated that learners' knowledge about what constitutes learning coordinates and directs their thinking and behavior.Thus, if readers are aware of what is involved in the reading process and what is necessary to read effectively, then it is possible for them to take steps to meet the demands of a reading situation.On the other hand, if readers are not aware of, or have misconceptions about, the complexity of a reading task, then they cannot take appropriate action.Many approaches to the teaching of reading have called attention to the importance of EFL/ESL students acquiring metacognitive strategies for comprehension text.Teaching reading strategies has drawn considerable attention from many researchers (Kletzien, 1991;Pressley & Afflerbach, 1995).Successful L2 readers engage in a high level of metacognition, or monitoring of their own thinking, during the process of reading.For example, they make predictions, test hypotheses, and monitor their comprehension while extracting meaning from text.Less proficient L2 readers, however, tend to focus heavily on word recognition and word-for-word translation (Auerbach & Paxton, 1997;Rusciolelli, 1995).As a result, they may employ fewer higher-order thinking processes while reading and may tend to be less metacognitively aware (Rusciolelli, 1995).
Teaching students to read English is a major goal.Research has shown that skills in comprehension and strategies can be taught (Zarrillo, 2007), some students are successful in learning to read English, yet others remain at a low proficiency level throughout their school years.Many different activities are needed to enhance reading.However, poor readers are found not only among EFL learners but also among students reading in their native language (L1).Many adult readers in the United States, for example, have been diagnosed as failing to develop fifth grade level reading skills (Micklos, 1990).These students, often termed "low literate readers" (Gambrell & Heathington, 1981), have inspired extensive research investigating the reasons for their unsuccessful learning.

Low Reading Achievers
Literature describes low achievers as young people who have low reading levels (Gambrell & Heathington, 1981, Micklos, 1990;Hoskyn & Swanson, 2000, p. 102).They lack the defining attributes of the struggling reader-poor reading comprehension, study skills, word recognition, and reading fluency (R. Vacca & J. Vacca, 1999).In regards to the importance of reading skills on the other skills, studies show a relationship between amounts read and spelling performance (Stanovich & West 1989;Polak & Krashen, 1998) and a positive relationship between reading and writing ability (Lee & Krashen, 1997).Low achievers had a strong preference for alternative to reading materials, which has implications for the way schools structure reading for adolescents who are struggling readers (Gordon & Lu, 2008).
In fact, these EFL Saudi students lack proper metacognitive strategies to manage their own reading effectively.Students are uncertain of what metacognitive strategies are and how to use them (Wen, 2003).Poor readers, especially, do not know what methods are efficient for academic reading, nor do they know how to improve their reading ability (Young & Yoke, 2001).Markedly, in academic reading comprehension, if students lack metacognitive knowledge, they feel puzzled in adopting the appropriate reading methods and reading strategies (Shokrpour & Fotovatian, 2009).Many researchers have compared the performance of good and poor readers (Mokhtari & Reichard, 2002;Hsu, 2003;Almasi, 2003) indicating that good readers are more aware of monitoring their comprehension and are also more aware of their strategy use.Poor readers who enhance their awareness of the nature of reading will ultimately become better readers than those who do not (Kinnunen & Vauras, 1995).

Metacognitive Reading Strategies
Reading is a fundamental skill for learning a foreign language.It is the basis of instructions in all tasks of language learning such as using textbooks, writing tasks, revising and acquiring vocabulary, acquiring grammar, and using computer-assisted language learning programs (Mikulecky, 2008).Anderson (2003) considers reading as "an essential skill which is most important skill to master for most of the learners of English in order to ensure success in learning" (p.2).Regarding the importance of reading, many researchers recommended different strategies to improve reading comprehension (O'Malley & Chamot, 1990;Sheorey & Mokhtari , 2001;Winne & Nesbit, 2010;Zhang & Seepho, 2013) Metacognitive reading strategies indicate learners' knowledge and use of their own cognitive resources (Garner, 1987).Sheorey and Mokhtari (2001), who have conducted research on metacognitive awareness and the use of reading strategies among L2 readers, define metacognitive strategies for reading as "intentional, carefully planned techniques by which learners monitor or manage their reading" (p.436).McNeil (1987) and Al Faramawy and Radwan (2004, p. 203) suggested that metacognition in reading allows readers not only to employ particular strategies, but also to become aware of the importance of these strategies and evaluate them.
McNeil mentioned that "metacognition refers to one's awareness of what one's purposes for reading are, how to proceed in achieving these purposes, and how to regulate progress through self-checking of comprehension and self-test" (p.104).And he asserted that metacognitive processes refer to self-knowledge, task knowledge and self monitoring.While Zhang and Seepho (2013) asserted that metacognitive strategies in reading are those strategies designed to increase readers' knowledge of awareness and control, to improve their reading comprehension, and to evaluate whether their attempt at comprehension has been achieved.In addition, Sheorey and Mokhtari (2001) stated that "skilled readers are more able to reflect on and monitor their cognitive processes while reading" (p.445).
Both L1 and L2 researchers of reading skills emphasized that metacognitive strategies play a significant role in a reader's language learning.O' Malley and Chamot (1990) stressed that "students without metacognitive approaches are essentially learners without direction or opportunity to plan their learning, monitor their progress or review their accomplishments and future directions" (p.8).Sheorey and Mokhtari (2001) stated that "skilled readers are more able to reflect on and monitor their cognitive processes while reading" (p.445).Moreover, Zhang and Seepho (2012) pointed out that metacognitive strategies are important for successful second/foreign language readers.On the whole, much of the research into metacognition in L2 reading revealed that readers' metacognitive strategies are related positively to their success in their L2 reading comprehension and that language proficiency is connected to readers' development of metacognition (Taraban, Rynearson, & Kerr, 2000;Hong-Nam, Levell, & Maher, 2014).Hence, it is crucial for L2 readers to be aware of how they should employ reading strategies in planning, regulating and evaluating their own reading processes.

Studies on Metacognitive Strategies Training Reading
Muñiz-Swicegood (1994) explored the effects of metacognitive reading strategy training on bilingual Spanish students.The bilingual Spanish dominant students in this experimental study were taught to use metacognitive reading strategies while reading in Spanish.Post interview results of the Burke Reading Interview, translated into Spanish, showed increases in the frequency of Spanish reading strategies following metacognitive intervention.The study found that significant improvements in the types and frequency of metacognitive strategies that the children were using during their Spanish reading investigation were documented.Wenden (2001) has carried out metacognitive training with advanced students in Columbia University.In her experiment, she distributes handouts to students which are related to problem-solving reading strategies, and learning language attitudes.After 7 weeks of training, from the results in the questionnaire, most of the subjects thought the training was useless.Wenden explained that the pure metacognitive training has no ideal effectiveness, the subjects thought of it as extra thing in reading; they could not purposefully and actively apply the metacognitive strategies to their reading comprehension.Salataci and Akyel (2002) investigated the reading strategies of Turkish EFL students in Turkish and English and the possible effects of reading instruction on reading in Turkish and English.The participants consisted of 8 Turkish students enrolled in a pre-intermediate level class of a one-year intensive English course offered at a Turkish-medium technical university.The data came from think-aloud protocols, observation, a background questionnaire, a semi-structured interview and the reading component of the PET (the Preliminary English Test).The results indicated that strategy instruction had a positive effect on both Turkish and English reading strategies and reading comprehension in English.Moustfa (2004) conducted a study to discover the impact of the use of metacognitive reading strategies on motivation, which results in academic achievement.His study involved 208 secondary school students.He used three questionnaires to measure the metacognitive awareness of reading strategies, motivation and self-worth conception.The findings of his study showed that there was a positive relationship between academic achievement and metacognive awareness of reading strategies.His results also indicated that the most predictive variable of the scores of the academic achievement was metacognitive awareness of reading strategies.Meng (2004) reported a study of reading strategy training in an ongoing English classroom and investigated the effects of the training on students' reading ability by means of analyzing test results and the questionnaire.Results showed that strategy training was effective in enhancing EFL college students' overall reading proficiency and reading rate.The intervention had significant effect on the improvement of students' abilities to grasp main ideas and to make global and lexical inferences from both given passages and knowledge of the world; however , it had no obvious effect on the improvement of their ability to extract detailed information from the texts Karbalaei (2010) made a study to compare between the use of metacognitive reading strategies by EFL and ESL readers.His study involved 189 undergraduate students; among them 96 Iranians as EFL readers and 93 Indians as ESL readers.He used a 30-item questionnaire to measure metacognitive awareness of reading strategies inventory which explore three sets of metacognitive strategies: (1) generalized or global reading strategies, (2) problem-solving strategies, and (3) support reading strategies.The results of his study showed significant differences: Indian students reported using most types of strategies more often than did the Iranian students.He reported that Indians are more interested in using top-down strategies for better comprehension such as summarizing, paraphrasing, note-taking while Iranians are more focused on using bottom-up strategies such as using a dictionary to comprehend meaning.Karbalaee (2012) carried out a study on Iranian high school EFL 114 male and female students to examine the relationship between reading strategy use and reading achievement.The results revealed that the Iranian EFL high school students reported overall reading strategy use was found to be a predictor of reading comprehension test scores.

Problem Statement
English as a second/foreign language (ESL/EFL) reading research has focused attention on metacognitive strategy training to improve students' reading comprehension (Wenden, 2001;Al Faramawy, 2004;Karbalaei, 2010).However, the requisite research for such instruction is scarce since little research has been conducted regarding poor readers' concepts about ESL/EFL reading.Two studies have suggested that decoding-oriented concepts correlated with lower performances in reading English in L2 (Carrell, 1989;Devine, 1984).
Reading is an important skill and affects the other language skills, e.g. a student who is a low achiever in reading, is a weak one in understanding the reading text, has a lot of spelling mistakes, poor writing composition, and even his speaking skill can be negatively affected.Moreover, weakness in reading makes the situation difficult in the class, as the student needs to read in front of the class while in the other activities, he can hide himself.
From a personal point of view, which has developed out of our eight-year experience as teachers of EFL, EFL teachers' practices in Saudi universities are far from teaching reading skills and strategies.Rather, EFL teachers spend the time devoted for reading in practicing one skill, "silent reading", and tackling what they believe as comprehension questions".It is because of this huge gap between the world's rapid movement toward teaching reading skills and strategies and the reality of reading instruction in Saudi Arabia, the researchers thought of conducting a study to explore the use of reading strategies among low reading achievement Saudi EFL college learners and how these strategies can help them to increase their level in reading.
Regarding the relationship between the metacognitive reading strategies use and its effect on the readers' reading comprehension, there are few studies touching with the reading strategies of nonnative English speakers, especially for Saudi native speakers (Madkhali, 2005;Mushait, 2004;Al-Nujaidi, 2003;Al-Seweed, 2000).To the researchers' knowledge, most studies that have measured reading strategy use have utilized self-report questionnaires.However, a review of literature revealed that no experimental studies investigated the effectiveness of a program based on metacognitive reading strategies for improving reading achievement for EFL low achievers in reading in Saudi Arabia.Interventions for at-risk students can be expanded by various programs and best practices (Education & Urban Society, 2003).Determining effective instructional practices for low-achieving, at-risk students is necessary in order to meet the goals that have been set forth by the university.

Study Hypotheses
This study addressed the following hypotheses: 1) There would be significant differences between the experimental group scores and the control group scores on the post-test of metaconitive reading strategies questionnaire and the English Language reading comprehension test.
2) There would be significant differences between the mean scores of the pre-and post-test of metaconitive reading strategies and the English Language reading comprehension test for the experimental group.
3) There would be no significant differences between the mean scores of the post-test and follow up of Metacognitive reading strategies and the English Language reading comprehension test for the experimental group.

Purposes of the Study
The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of the metacognitive reading strategies on EFL low achievers in reading.It also aimed to fill the gap in the literature linking theories and practice in the field of college EFL low achievers in reading.

Significance of the Study
1) Making metacognitive reading strategies known to EFL students can help facilitate their positive English reading experience and gain control over their own learning.
2) By keeping reading strategy training, students are encouraged to think about which kinds of strategies they use more often and to perhaps consider adding new strategies or rarely used strategies to their repertoires as they become more aware of other ways to deal with a text.
3) Exploring the use of reading strategies among Saudi EFL learners will provide data that might help in suggesting implications for effective EFL instruction.
4) The results of this study can generate baseline information and provide insights to decision makers in Saudi higher education institutions and in Ministry of Education.
5) The results of this study can help Saudi college-level teachers and students to develop their awareness of effective reading strategies.
6) This study might provide useful information for other developing EFL/ESL studies that have a situation similar to the Saudi one.

Pilot Study Sample
Forty one female students were randomly drawn from the EFL preparatory non-English major students, second level (Science Stream), for the pilot study.They completed the metacognitive reading strategies questionnaire and the reading comprehension test.Their age ranged from 18-19, (M = 18.682,SD = 0.687).Then the data was analyzed to determine the reliability of the instruments.

Participants
One hundred thirty six females participated in this study.To determine who the low achievers in reading were, the researchers followed two steps: (1) according to the mean and Standard deviation in the pre-tests scores (M = 8.529, SD = 2.305), so the student who got less than the mean by one standard deviation was considered a low achiever in reading.According this procedure, the students who got six scores and less would be counted as low achievers.
(2) The student who scored on the midterm exam below the general average of the reading achievement, that is 3 out 5, was also considered a low achiever.The final sample was 21 students that were divided into two groups; experimental (10 females) and control (11 females).The average age of the students was (M = 18.714,SD = .462).Table 1 shows that there are no differences between the control and the experimental groups in the pre-tests in reading strategies, reading comprehension test and age.This means that both groups are homogenous.

Item Validity and Internal Consistency for Metacognitive Reading Strategies Questionnaire
The corrected item-total correlation ranged from 0.37 to 0.63 (p < 0.01), suggesting adequate item validity.The corrected item-Subscale 1 (Global reading strategies) correlation ranged from 0.33 to 0.59 (p < 0.01), for Subscale 2 (problem-solving strategies) the correlation ranged from 0.59 to 0.80 (p < 0.01), and for Subscale 3 (support reading strategies) the correlation ranged from 0.36 to 0.77 (p < 0.01), suggesting adequate item validity.

Psychometric Conditions of the Reading Comprehension Test in the Current Research
The test was prepared by the researchers.It consisted of two passages and 20 multiple choice questions.Each passage was followed by 10 questions.The total mark of the test was 20 (See Appendix C).

Item Validity and Internal Consistency for the Reading Comprehension Test
The Pearson Correlation between the reading test and the students' GPA (grade point Average) was 0.71, suggesting adequate validity.In addition, the discrimination index for each item indicates that the validity of each item is high.The internal consistency is high for the total test (α = 0.75).The suitable range for easiness index is from 0.15 to 0.85 (Alaam, 2011, p. 114).As shown in Table 2, all the questions are within this range.But based on the discrimination index, three items were omitted (items numbers 8, 17 & 18), as their discrimination indices were below 0.2.They were weak items (Alaam, 2011, p. 116).Thus the reading comprehension test became 17 items instead of 20.Seventeen points were devoted for the whole test, one mark for each correct answer and correspondingly a wrong answer got zero.Finally, the marks on the test were from 0 to 17.The students were given 30 minutes to complete the reading test.

Experimental Procedures of the Reading Strategies Program
The structured reading strategies training program included an experimental group of ten students.The program took place in the second semester of 2014.The training program consisted of 20 sessions, two sessions per week for 10 weeks.The two groups, the control and the experimental groups, were instructed by the same teacher.The control group practiced reading comprehension without using the strategy training program.Participants in the control group were not provided with any kind of pre-reading activities (e.g., reading strategies pre-teaching).
For the experimental group, the researcher started each session with some reading strategies, such as Global reading strategies, Problem-solving strategies and Support reading to make the students aware of how to read and to plan what they are going to do during the reading session.Before reading each day, the researcher chose some different reading strategies to discuss with the students before the program session to help them to understand the reading passage.The researcher asked the students to read the reading passage.Then students were given time to answer all reading comprehension questions.After that, the teacher gave them feedback on their tasks.Finally, the reading comprehension post-test was administered to both groups in the same manner as the pre-test.The program was evaluated through the pre-tests and the post-tests, through a comparison between the experimental group and the control group scores, and also through the follow up in developing the metacognitive reading strategies one month after concluding the program.This researcher concurs with Cooper and Kiger (2006), who said that reading intervention should give the students more instruction, not less instruction, for the program to work to the students' best interest.

Results
Table 3 As Table 3 shows, there are significant differences between the experimental group and the control group in metacognitive reading strategies and in reading comprehension post-tests which confirmed that the first hypothesis was correct.That is, the mean of the experimental group was higher than that of the control group in the reading strategies with a Z value = -2.362,p < 0.05).The researchers presume that the positive results of the experimental group are due to the effects of the program which includes a lot of reading activities that the students shared with each other and it was suitable to the students' level.In Table 5, the results showed that the differences between the ranks scores of the pre and post-tests of reading strategies subscales and the English Language reading test total score are in favor of the experimental group (Z (10) = -2.347,p < 0.05).These differences can be explained by the importance of the reading program and the importance of its training, as well as showing the importance of the teaching style and additional materials that the main researcher introduced during the program.Table 7 showed that there are no statistically significant differences between the mean scores of the first post-test and the second (follow up) post-test that was given about month after the first post-test on the reading strategies and the reading test.The results made it obvious that the effects of the reading strategies training program should continue and it should be of great value to future students.

Discussion
The main purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of a program based on metacognitive reading strategies to develop the reading skill of second level college students who have a low achievement in reading.
With regard to the first research hypothesis results, the results of the present study proved that there were statistically significant differences between the mean scores of the experimental group in each of the pre and post-test mean scores and the control group in favor of the experimental group.They confirmed the correction of the first hypothesis; the mean of the experimental group was higher than the control group.This result is consistent with the results of many studies (e.g., Auerbach & Paxton, 1997;Rusciolelli, 1995;Al Faramaway, 2004;Huang & Newbern, 2012) which confirmed that metacognition is critical to effective reading in an L2.
With regard to the second hypothesis was that there would be significant differences between the mean scores of the pre and post-test of metaconitive reading strategies and the English language reading comprehension test for the experimental group.This can be interpreted as the role of reading strategy's usefulness in helping readers achieve better comprehension when reading a passage, which is emphasized in the realm of EFL (Macaro, 2003;Pressley & Harris, 2006;Sinatra, Brown, & Reynolds, 2002,).The use of a reading strategy can help readers deal with the problems which arise while reading in a foreign language, and consequently, individuals' reading comprehension can be improved.The results of a number of experimental studies (e.g., Wenden, 2001;Cubukcu, 2008;Karbalaei, 2010;Huang & Newbern, 2012) have indicated significant gains in reading proficiency of adult ESL learners following metacognitive strategy training.Notably, in all of the aforementioned studies, the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group on objective assessments which measured reading proficiency gains.Moreover, Anderson (2003) asserted that reading develops gradually as the reader does not become fluent suddenly or immediately following a reading course.
With regard to the third hypothesis was that there would be no significant differences between the mean scores of the post-test and follow up of Metacognitive reading strategies and the English Language reading comprehension test for the experimental group.The data showed that the effects of the reading training program continued and had a great benefit to EFL students.This finding agrees with Shinn (1998), and Gordon and Lu (2008).This study can be seen as further evidence to the idea that learners should be provided with a training program to train them how to read and how to choose the best strategies to help their reading.Successful reading programs should provide activities that challenge the students (Meng, 2004;Zarillo, 2007).

Conclusion
In summary, this study was carried out in part because the researchers were unable to find studies which examine the effectiveness of metacognitive reading strategies on the low reading achievers by experiment, especially in Saudi Arabia.The results have implications for EFL teachers, which should motivate them to provide their learners with reading strategy training which can lead to better achievement in reading comprehension.Thus, if readers are aware of what is involved in the reading process and what is necessary to read effectively, then it is possible for them to take steps to meet the demands of the reading situation.The results of the current study have implications for language learners, encouraging them to become more conscious of their own strategy use.The questionnaire in Appendix A is composed of twenty items that are actually teaching strategies made into the form of questions for the students.These strategies can be used by the teacher to make their students aware that reading strategies are powerful reading tools.Finally, the researchers suggest that future research focus on the development of the effectiveness of metacognitive reading strategy programs for primary, middle and high school students.

Emma and the old house
Ever since Emma could remember, the old house next door had been empty.Panted peeled from it, and its front steps sagged.No car ever parked in its driveway.No family ever laughed inside.Emma's friends called the house spooky!Creepy!A wreck!But Emma didn't.She could see the house from her bedroom window.Every night before she went to bed looked at it.She saw moonlight shine on its dark windows, and she felt sorry about the old house.She wished there were something she could do."I wish someone would fix up that old house.I wish they would return it into the brightest, happiest house on the street!Emma climbed into bed and went to sleep.One morning Emma heard a rumbling noise.It was coming from the street.Emma slid out of bed and ran to her window.A large green truck rumbled past her house.It stopped next door.People wearing work clothes got out of the truck.They carried carpenters' tools.They climbed the old house's sagging steps and disappeared inside.
She heard the sound of a hammer.She heard the sound of a power saw.She heard an electric drill.What's going on?Thought Emma.Emma watched three people wearing white coveralls out of a van.They carried ladders and buckets of paint."Are you going to paint that house?" called Emma.Yes, we are going to turn this old house into the brightest, happiest house on the street.Emma remembered her wish and said sometimes wishes do come true!
2) Read the story and choose the correct answer.

20
When reading, I think about information in both English and Arabic.a. "Feeding the animals" b. "Work for animals lovers" c. "Going to the zoo" d. "The best animal" 2. The writer thinks that zookeepers are _____ .a. lazy b. weak c. mean d. hard-working 3.This story was written in order to _______.a. give directions b. list some rules c. teach about a place d. tell about a job 4. What is the first thing a zookeeper must do each day?a. feed the animals b. look at the animals c. clean the living area d. give medicine to sick animals 5. Why does the writer tell about the gorillas?a. to show the gorillas are dangerous b. to show the zookeepers are kind c. to show the zookeepers know the animals well d. to tell what gorillas eat.6.You can tell that a veterinarian is the zoo's ______ .a. owner b. keeper c. painter d. doctor 7.All animals need a lot of ________ .a. care b. cloths c. glasses d. hotels 8.The keeper sprays the area of the animals with a ____ .a. hose b. perfume c. cola d. tea 9. Animals need care _____ .a. all the time b.two days a week c. on holidays d. five days a week.
10. Emma wished that _______.a. the old house did not look scary b. her family could move c.her family could buy the house d. someone would fix up the old house 11.Why Emma feel sorry about the old house?a.It was creepy b.No one cared about it c.It was next door to her house d.Its windows were dark 12. Who were the people in coveralls?a. Thieves b.Painters c. Emma's friends d.The new owners

Table 1 .
The comparison between the experimental and the control groups in the study variables and age

Table 2 .
Easiness, variance and discrimination indices for reading comprehension test . The Differences between the experimental and control group on the metacognitive reading strategies and reading comprehension test on post-tests

Table 4 .
Means and standard deviation for the pre and post-tests of reading strategies and the English language reading comprehension test for the experimental group

Table 5 .
The differences between the ranks scores of the pre and post-tests of reading strategies and the English language reading comprehension test for the experimental group

Table 6 .
Means and standard deviation for the post-tests and follow up of reading strategies and the English language reading comprehension test for the experimental group

Table 7 .
The Differences between the ranks scores of the post-test and follow up of reading strategies and reading comprehension test