Conference Agenda

Reading is an essential skill for foreign and native speakers that enables their professional development (Wallace, 2006). This is in line with the submission of Habermas and Nielsen (1990), that reading ability is requisite to participate in and interpret the complex discussion of texts. Subsequently, developing students’ reading skills is essential for their future career success, as the modern job market and employers are looking for professionals who can read, understand, and interpret texts. Critical reading (CR) is the way students and teachers interact in the classroom to practice a higher form of comprehension. Combs (1992) emphasized that CR is an interactive process that uses multiple levels of thought simultaneously. In discussing and interpreting data, students practice critical thinking. This is also reinforced by Salisbury College (2008), which states that in reading comprehension, students not only absorb the knowledge of the passages they read, but also assess and evaluate the author’s arguments, tone, and bias.

According to some experts (Sweet, 1993; Wallace, 2003;) CR means the ability to read between the lines, i.e. to find the hidden meaning of texts and to read beyond the lines by using their analytical and evaluative skills that require higher order thinking. Arici (2012) refers to CR as “ideal reading” and states that it is the only way to help retain knowledge in the long term. Sweet (1993) and Wallace (2003) agree to some extent, referring to critical readers as "living readers" who can evaluate, question, interpret, recognize, and analyze evidence. As it helps students retain knowledge in the long term, it could even be useful in tests and exams. Although this is one of the skills that students need to acquire in this study, the compulsory and assessed internal and external examination tasks do not reflect the tasks that require critical thinking skills. However, the observational exams, i.e. the ungraded exams held to determine students' strengths and weaknesses, have tasks that require the use of critical thinking. The two aforementioned exams are common in High School Educational programs in Kazakhstan. Nonetheless, the structural difference in tasks puts additional pressure on teachers’ shoulders who struggle to juggle the preparations for two exams.

Nevertheless, Özdemir(2007) emphasizes that CR can be conducted by “intellectual students”, which could indicate that this could only be beneficial to students whose level of English proficiency is high.

Although it is not required in assessed examinations, the aim of this research is to develop student’s reading skills on expository texts through critical reading strategies so as to prepare them for further studies in higher institutions. According to Lwai (2007), expository texts are written to convey, describe, or explain non-fictional information. Ozensoy (2021) had previously studied the effect of cultivating critical reading skills on students' academic progress in social studies courses. He reported that there was a noticeable difference in learners’ academic achievement who trained CRS compared with another class who did not. The current study therefore aims to investigate the impact of some critical reading strategies on upper- intermediate students’ comprehension of expository texts. For quantitative analysis, pre and post-tests (derived from Critical reading test in English classes and from National exam tests in Kazakh) four science/industry and four nature related texts (ESL Brain, Critical Reading club) were covered during the study. Researchers conducted a survey and semi-structured interviews for qualitative analysis to study the learners’ perception according to the practiced strategies.

This study was carried out in one of the intellectual schools of Kazakhstan. The participants were tenth grade students of class A, experimental and F, control groups. The study lasted 10 weeks. After taking pretest, teachers presented

There is no doubt that the ability to read is a fundamental skill without which participation in today's society seems almost impossible. This is precisely why numerous studies point to the key role of reading skills acquired in primary school (Maitz et al., 2018) for later educational and career opportunities (Bachinger et al., 2021).Additionally, the results of the latest Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) show that the acquisition of the readingskill is often not crowned with success: In Austria, 20% of the primary school pupils read at literacy level 1 or below and are therefore at risk (Schmich et al., 2023). However, in order to show a long-term improvement in reading, preventative measures and consistent reading promotion based on evidence are required. This refers in empirical educational research to the proof and legitimization of the effectiveness of a specific measure. Moreover, according to the National Reading Panel (2000), reading fluency is one of the key factors in effective reading promotion. The development of this skill is generally regarded as a central task of German lessons. However, the results of more recent research (Michalak & Feigenspan, 2022) indicate that fluency and subject-related learning are closely linked. Accordingly, reading promotion and reading comprehension must be seen, conceived and implemented as a task for all subjects. It should not be the isolated focus of German lessons at primary school as a subject-specific vocabulary requires basic interpersonal communication skills. Thus, reading promotion measures are needed that focus on and support subject-specific reading in addition to general reading comprehension. For this reason, the FLEDI Project (Subject-integrated Reading Promotion in Mathematics, German and Subject teaching) focuses on promoting reading skills at primary school level.

The term subject-integrated reading promotion focuses on reading measures that are not detached from their problem contexts, but rather imply a mental networking of what has been read in subject lessons. In this context, non-fiction texts play a central role in subject lessons, as pupils use them to deal with certain topics and facts on the one hand and to learn new content on the other. Ultimately, it is always about a lesson design that is not primarily constituted by the subject areas, but is based on the promotion of reading, in which subject matter plays an essential role. In addition, non-fiction texts meet children's need to understand the world and, according to the Erfurt-study, are among the most popular types of text for primary school children of both genders (Richter, 2003).

Despite these studies, however, Križan (2014) criticizes the lack of reliable findings, particularly in German-speaking countries, as to which support approaches are fruitful under which conditions. The FLEDI-Project attempts to address this criticism from the third grade onwards by using a longitudinal design to investigate the development of reading fluency in reading comprehension, taking particular account of pupil-related background characteristics (special educational needs, family migration background, ethnicity). The aim is to find out whether the FLEDI-Reading intervention is particularly beneficial for a specific level group of children. The developments of four different level groups are considered separately. These levels result from the initial reading fluency skills. Based on the children's performance in the Salzburger Reading Screening 2-9 (SLS) at the first test time, they were divided into four level groups one based on the quartiles of the overall sample. Accordingly, the research question is: How do the basic reading skills and reading comprehension of pupils with different reading performance levels develop in the context of subject-integrated reading promotion?