The Role of Schema or Background Knowledge ActivationandGraphic Organizer on Increasing Iranian EFL Learners’ Reading Comprehension

Abstract

The purpose of current study is to use graphic organizers and schema or background activation knowledge to determine its effectiveness on increasing Iranian EFL learners’ reading comprehension. For doing this study, 63 female students learning English at intermediate level in Ganje Daneshpazhohan English institutes in Tehran, Iran, were randomly selected and were divided into three groups including graphic organizer, schema, and control group. First, all three groups were given a reading comprehension pretest. Then, the graphic organizer group were taught reading through the use of graphic organizer tasks while those in schema group were taught how to activate their background knowledge before reading. Regarding the control group, there was no treatment. Finally. the posttest took place in the following class meeting after the training. The results indicated that using graphic organizer and background knowledge activation strategy could play a significant role in developing the level of reading comprehension among Iranian EFL learners. Finally, graphic organizer was recognized to a more useful method for learning enhancing reading comprehension among Iranian EFL learners. Therefore, the interactive reading processing approach based on schema theory and graphic organizer seems to have better effects in English reading comprehension.