CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

Background of the Study

The different reasons for and timing of becoming multilingual result in varying degrees of
fluency, both for home and school languages. For the classroom, this means that teachers
are faced with and need to be aware of students' language proficiency in the home
language as well as the school language, and the effect this has on students' reading
comprehension skills. In essence, teaching reading comprehension to multilingual students
is no different from teaching monolingual students. However, there are several specific
aspects and challenges that teachers encounter in the multilingual classroom. In this
chapter, we first describe theories regarding reading comprehension and multilingualism,
and the impact of the first language (L1) on comprehension in the second language (L2). We
then turn to classroom practice, showing how theory can be put to use in the curriculum.

The role of language experience in bilingual children's reading development, and the
contexts in which these experiences occur, have been important considerations in recent
years. For example, variations in home language experiences, such as home L2 usage
(Mancilla-Martinez et al., 2020) and literacy practices at home (Peets et al., 2019), have
been demonstrated to predict bilingual children's RC in L2. Similarly, indirect associations
between home language environment and English RC were reported with morphological
awareness and vocabulary as modulators in bilingual children who speak English as their L2,
such that greater English use at home enhanced morphological awareness and vocabulary
knowledge in L2, leading to improved RC in L2 (Relyea et al., 2019). Furthermore, more
dynamic and contextualized bilingual experience (i.e., higher L2 usage and exposure across
the context of home and school) has been demonstrated to be positively associated with
children's executive functions including attention and monitoring (Oh et al., 2022).
Researchers have also advocated using approaches that go beyond the bilingual-
monolingual dichotomy by adopting multi-factorial, individual differences approaches
(Takahesu Tabori et al., 2018). Together, exploring how diverse language experience
manifests in component skills of reading will lead to a more nuanced understanding of
reading development in bilingual children.

Consequently, Uchikoshi and Maniates called for more empirical work on the quality of
program implementation "to understand the explanatory variables for academic success in
bilingual programs". Likewise, Valentino and Reardon underscored that research on various
bilingual instructional models has left unanswered the question of which components make
the programs work.
To achieve the effectiveness of reading comprehension of the learners there is an institution
that is mandated by the law of education and theories on how to achieve multilingual
reading comprehension, Understanding, and Participation are the keys to involving the
multilingual reading comprehension program of an institution.

This study of Multilingual Reading Comprehension of School Effectiveness has developed

independently. The multilingual/ success Paradigm was proposed by Carter and Chat Field,
who were among the first writers to link school success and bilingual education initiatives.
They posed a query on how bilingual education initiatives and the schools they were housed
in interacted. "The school does make the multilingual program effective; the program does
not make the school effective," they found. Although scholars on multilingual education
continue to assert that there is a dearth of evidence in this field, it appears that these
factors have not received enough attention. The program, as an essential component of
school activities, contributes to and mirrors the overall effectiveness.

Through this research, the researchers hope, that this Research explicitly addressing the
subtleties and difficulties related to reading comprehension among Grade 5 students in a
multilingual context is scarce, despite the increased emphasis on multilingual education.
There is a knowledge vacuum about how multilingualism especially affects reading
comprehension at the Grade 5 level because the majority of the work currently in
publication concentrates on general language learning or wide reading comprehension
skills. Examining the distinct elements and approaches that influence multilingual reading
comprehension in this particular age range might provide important information for
curriculum creation and teaching methods.

The primary goal of a research study on "Multilingual Reading Comprehension" might be to

learn more about how grade 5 student develop their skills of multilingual reading and to
improve their understanding of this process. Investigating elements like linguistic impacts,
cognitive functions, and language proficiency on reading comprehension in various
languages may be part of this. The objective can be to provide methods or resources that
support proficient multilingual reading comprehension, with possible uses in teaching,
language acquisition, and intercultural dialogue. By focusing on grade 5 learners, this study
seeks to gain insights into their skills, understanding, and knowledge that is related to
multilingual reading comprehension.

Statement of the problem

This study aims to determine the Multilingual Reading Comprehension of Grade 5 learners.

Specially, this study will seek answers to the following question:

1. What was the profile of the grade 5 learners-respondents in terms of:

• Age

2.What is the level of reading comprehension in English, Filipino, and bisaya when taken as a
whole or what grouped according to age and grade?

3. What is the level of multilingual reading comprehension according to the aformentioned

variable?

4. What recommendations can be proposed to improve multilingual reading comprehension

of grade 5 students?