Strategies for teaching reading comprehension

This research was done to find out how reading comprehension was taught at an Islamic boarding school in Pidie Jaya, the strategies that were used by the teachers for teaching reading comprehension, and the responses of the students towards the teaching-learning of reading comprehension. This study was conducted using an action research. The participants of this study were the teachers and their students. The instruments used were an interview guide and observation sheets to collect data. Based on the data collected, the researcher found several problems that needed to be solved, especially in the preparation of lesson plans even though the teachers at the school already had much knowledge of teaching. Based on these observations, the methods and strategies generally used by the English teachers at the school included individual learning, cooperative learning, using media, (games, pictures and picture series), and the grammar translation method. They modified the strategies used in teaching depending on the materials or the genre of the text. The choice of strategy was adapted by the teachers with the materials, the indicators and the purpose of learning based on the syllabus and curriculum. They chose the most appropriate strategy to help the students comprehend the text well. Their reasons for  using a particular strategy was to help the students to avoid difficulties in reading the text, especially comprehending the aspects of reading such as the main idea, making inferences, noting detailed information and references. The use of appropriate strategies to reach the purposes of learning was planned in the lesson plan.