Exploring Assessment Strategies in Teaching Reading Among Pupils of Al-Joud International Kindergarten Towards a Development of Training Program

Abstract

This study focuses on exploring the variety of assessment strategies used to teach reading to students and the challenges faced by the teachers of Al-Joud International Kindergarten in implementing them. Most teachers in the school rely on traditional and bottom-up approaches such as phonics and decoding. However, this study highlights a critical gap in addressing higher-order thinking skills, skills under metacognition, which are vital for holistic reading development, as well as some barriers to implementing the strategies. Given that the school has a diverse student population, with students coming from different cultural backgrounds, the teaching process becomes difficult for the teachers because of the language barrier, time constraints, reading resources, and, most importantly, the student's language proficiency.

Additionally, this study highlighted the lack of professional development opportunities for teachers, particularly in the latest teaching strategies for reading that align with the top-down and metacognitive models of reading instruction. Moreover, the absence of this can lead to inconsistencies in teaching practices, which leads to a lack of organization in implementing assessment strategies in reading and insufficient support for diverse students.

This study used qualitative phenomenological research design, which recommends the development of a training program to provide a structured framework for reading instruction. Additionally, the study highlights the importance of this training program which includes the workshops and seminars to support teachers in delivering effective reading strategies in English instruction.