The Effectiveness of Thinking Maps to Improve Reading Comprehension

Authors

Angela Michelle Neo, Nur Ehsan Mohd Said

Abstract

The Malaysian education system has taken into account the importance of developing thinking skills. The Thinking Maps program or known as i-THINK, which is introduced as part of the education’s huge transformational progress consisted of eight cognitive learning tools. Thinking maps are introduced to the learners as part of the teaching strategy intended to serve as a common visual language, so they will be able to gage specific cognitive thinking across all academic content areas. Since reading is an essential language skill that should be mastered by all learners, this study aims to investigate the effectiveness of using thinking maps to improve the learners’ reading comprehension. This quasi-experimental study was conducted in a sub-urban school in Kapit, Sarawak. 56 participants from Year 5 were involved in this study. The non-equivalent group design data were collected through pre-test and post-test and were analysed using t-test, the mean, standard deviation and effect size. Findings showed that the learners in the experimental group had outperformed the control in their reading comprehension test. Based on the results, using thinking maps in the teaching and learning process has facilitated the learners to comprehend their reading texts better and promoting Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS).

Keywords

Thinking Maps, i-THINK, reading comprehension, HOTS

The Effectiveness of Thinking Maps to Improve Reading Comprehension. Angela Michelle Neo, Nur Ehsan Mohd Said. 2019. IJIRCT, Volume 4, Issue 6. Pages 106-110. https://www.ijirct.org/viewPaper.php?paperId=IJIRCT1801020