The effects of extensive, timed, and repeated oral reading on 101 lower-intermediate Japanese university L2 English learners' reading rates and comprehension were investigated over one academic year. The participants were divided into four quasiexperimental groups: (a) Group 1 did extensive, timed, and repeated oral reading with prosody and…

This paper examines learners' fluency development in L2 silent reading rate and comprehension. In both L1 and L2 readings, a positive relationship between readers' silent reading rate and comprehension has not been as firmly established as theories might propose. Based on Wallot et al. (2014), the paper indicates the need to look at readers'…

Twenty adult ESL students at a community college participated in a semester reading intervention. Participants received a modified extensive reading treatment, and some participants received an additional repeated reading direct instruction reading intervention. The author examined the impact of the reading interventions on ESL students' reading…

One of the challenges for the successful implementation of extensive reading (ER) programmes, especially in Asian contexts, stems from curricular factors where class time is often prioritised for tasks requiring the presence of a teacher. This paper investigates the role of extensive reading online (ERO), an alternative approach to traditional ER,…

This quasi-experimental study traces a 12-week reading fluency training program for elementary-level English as a foreign language (EFL) learners at a Japanese university (N = 56). More specifically, this study examined whether a teaching intervention combining (a) extensive reading and practicing, (b) timed reading, and (c) repeated oral reading…

In this article, a three-phase mixed-methods study was conducted to investigate timed reading effects on Chinese university students' English as a foreign language (EFL) reading rate. First, two equivalent reading rate tests were designed and validated with 30 participants. Second, 81 university students from two intact classes participated in the…

Two groups of English as a second language students engaged in a fourteen-week repeated reading (RR) treatment: (1) a 3x group (n = 16), which engaged in three readings per session, and (2) a 5x group (n = 15), which engaged in five readings per session. Reading rate and background knowledge were measured at five points to assess the effect of…

The present study investigates the effects of extensive reading on developing the language knowledge and reading abilities of high school learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) over the course of one school year. Participants were divided into control (n = 205) and experimental groups (n = 200), with the former receiving regular grammar…

Fluency development instruction lacks in reading in Japanese as a foreign language instruction. This study examined how 34 upper-intermediate level learners of Japanese responded when they first experienced pleasure reading and speed reading. The participants also engaged in intensive reading, the main component of which was translation. Survey…

The progression of silent reading rates and reading comprehension were examined among Japanese university students (N = 55) over one academic semester. Participants were divided into three quasi-experimental groups. The first group practiced a combination of timed reading and repeated oral reading with attention paid to chunking and prosody. The…

The Extensive Reading Foundation's bibliography now boasts over 530 articles with "Extensive Reading" in the title. About 35% of this rich and diverse body of papers were published in the past decade. A meta-review of this literature shows it is quite fragmented as evidenced by considerable variability in the conceptualization of…

This study investigated the relationships between lower-level processing and general reading comprehension among adult L2 (second-language) beginning learners of Chinese, in both target and non-target language learning environments. Lower-level processing in Chinese reading includes the factors of character-naming accuracy, character-naming speed,…

Thirteen English as a foreign language students read 26 passages during a 13-week period. Each passage was read five times, and students answered comprehension questions after the first and the fifth reading. Another 13 students read the same number of passages but without repetition and only answered the comprehension questions once. All students…

This paper reports on two projects which investigated graded readers (GRs) as meaningful input for learners of Japanese as a foreign language (JFL). Project One examined the intentions of six writers of Japanese GRs. A focus group interview demonstrated that the writers had a genuine communicative intent in the writing process. Project Two…

This study investigates the effect of timed reading (TR) and repeated oral reading (RR) on 35 adult students of English as a foreign language. Students in the TR (n =18) and RR (n =17) groups read 52 and 26 passages respectively over a 13-week period. Reading rates and comprehension levels were measured at three occasions: pre-intervention,…