Ninth grade pupils’ reading comprehension of English newspaper articles

Abstract

Abstract This essay compares ninth grade pupils’ reading comprehension of four British newspaper articles that differ in style, content and level of difficulty. It investigates gender differences in reading comprehension and the effects of interests and reading habits of newspapers and English texts on reading comprehension. The pupils have read the articles and then filled out questionnaires with questions on the content, their opinions of the articles and level of difficulty, and the meaning of some words from the articles. The results have been complemented by previous gender studies and reports on school results and pedagogic theories about teaching reading. The boys knew more of the words from the articles. The girls did not generally have better results than the boys which might have been expected due to previous research. A close connection between interests and reading comprehension was found in this study.