GEPT Gains using Extra-Curricular English Reading

Abstract

This study investigated whether extracurricular English reading in the form of additive ER would influence student performance on the General English Proficiency Test (GEPT) in a one-year Freshman College English course. The participants were Taiwanese university learners of English (N = 240) from three consecutive academic years. Extracurricular graded readers and novels were integrated into the Freshman College English Course with little accountability, following the ER principles (Day &Bamford, 1998). Even though the pre-test and post-test results showed significant gains each year, an examination of the assigned readings, compared to what the literature has reported, showed the assigned additive reading materials were level appropriate but not satisfactory in terms of the amount of reading. Pedagogical implementations and limitations will be discussed.