This qualitative study examines reading comprehension strategy use in English in upper secondary school (16-17 year old) one year after teachers participated in a professional development (TPD) course.

Prior research suggests there is a need to identify reading comprehension strategy use in English L2 in upper secondary school. The presentation argues that teachers need to have a dual focus in their reading comprehension instruction; how strategies enhance disciplinary literacy and how the teaching of such strategies pay attention to the purposes of strategy use in the lives of upper secondary readers. To identify this, this study addresses these issues through the research questions:

1. How do upper secondary teachers include reading comprehension strategies in their English L2 instruction?
2. To what extent and why do the students in general and vocational programmes use the strategies as tools to enhance their reading comprehension in English L2?

This study is informed by Vygotskian thinking on the importance of tools and social interaction in learning (Daniels, 2008; Edwards, 2015; Vygotsky, 1981) in which reading comprehension strategies are considered tools to be used to enhance text comprehension. Grabe (2009) argues that social factors “are multiplied for L2 readers who must sort through competing cultural and social influences emerging from both L1 and L2 contexts, as well as many competing influences in the dual-language mind of each individual L2 reader” (p. 152). Transparency in the nature and purposes of comprehension strategies as tools would therefore seem a worthwhile aim.

Vygotsky also distinguished between the technical and the psychological aspects of tools. The technical aspects refer to their potential as resources while the psychological aspects refer to how learners recognise and work with these possibilities. Reading comprehension strategies as tools have this dual function, but learners need help with both aspects. According to this analysis, it is not enough to focus only on the technical aspects of what the strategies are; learners need help in understanding how and why these tools are useful in both aspects (Grabe, 2009).

This way of teaching to promote learning is emphasised in the Vygotsky-based Quadrant model of a pedagogic sequence (Edwards, 2015), which aims to encourage students to engage with ideas in ways that reflect both technical and psychological aspects. The model illustrates how learners are first introduced to new concepts, or ways of working, and participate in learning situations through guided instruction. Then they move towards independent use, first through tightly structured tasks, and later through more open tasks. Finally, they display their knowledge in some form of summatively assessed task.

A similar process is illustrated in the Gradual release of responsibility model (Duke & Pearson, 2002), where the responsibility of strategy use transfers from the teacher to the student in five steps:  (1) naming and describing the strategy – why, when, and how it should be used; (2) modelling the strategy in action – either by teacher or student, or both; (3) using the strategy collaboratively – in a sort of group think-aloud; (4) guiding practice using the strategy with gradual release of responsibility; (5) using the strategy independently, with no teacher guidance, individually or in small student-led groups.

Instruction on reading comprehension has been influenced by understandings of the role of social interaction in learning (Grabe, 2009; RAND, 2002), where strategies are initially modelled by the teacher and gradually applied by the autonomous learner.

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