OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING

INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

A Title Proposal Presented to the Faculty

of Father Saturnino Urios College of
Trento, Inc., Trento, Agusan del Sur

KAREEN JANE I. CANILLAS

Researcher
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

INTRODUCTION
Reading plays a vital role especially in education for it helps the students
become more adept in knowing the how-tos in their daily lives, for them to
be more socially conscious, to be wiser in decision-making and for them to
be able to share the knowledge they get out from reading. However,
reading sounds boring to some other students especially if they are given
long informative texts (e.g. news, essays) with unfamiliar words causing
them not to read the entire text and worst, cannot comprehend what the
text is all about. One of the reasons why they cannot fully understand the
text is the inability to understand what the word, phrase or sentence
means.
Some of the students, specifically those who have lower grades in
English, seek help from their classmates or even from a dictionary just to
understand the text and also to answer the comprehension questions given
by the teacher. They would rather read narrative texts such as stories 2

because they find these stories more enjoyable to read than essays.
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

INTRODUCTION
In Malaysia, a study was conducted about
reading difficulties of EFL students and the
findings reveal that the respondents are motivated
to learn as they are in dire need for
acquiring English. However, they face several
problems in the reading process, especially in
informational texts, such as ambiguous words,
unfamiliar vocabulary, and limited available time
to cognitively process the text (Qarqez, 2017). 3
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

INTRODUCTION
In the Philippines, particularly in Cabadbaran,
it was found out that both the interpretive and
critical levels of reading comprehension of the
Grade VII students are fair; thus, this imply that
English teachers should consider programs and
activities in school that develop students’ critical
and interpretive thinking, and conduct regular
evaluation to monitor their academic progress in
reading comprehensions (Paz, 2018). 4
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

INTRODUCTION

In Trento, Agusan del Sur, I observed that there are

some students in the Oral Communication class who
struggled in understanding informative texts causing
them not to also get the correct answers in the
comprehension questions that follow afterwards. I found
out that most of the students with difficulties in
understanding are those who have low scores in the
quizzes and exams and those who incurred a low grade
during the first term in the subject.
5
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

INTRODUCTION

I believe that this study should be

conducted as a means to know the
underlying problems of the inability of some
students to directly understand the
informative texts given to them. With this,
certain actions could be taken to address this
problem at hand. 6
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purpose of this phenomenological study is to explore
and describe the experiences of Grade 11 Senior High
School students in one of the schools in Trento, Agusan del
Sur in understanding informative texts.
At this stage of research, the struggles in understanding
informative texts will be known through exploring the lived
experiences of the students, their ways of coping with the
struggles they experienced and their insights and
aspirations with their experiences. 7
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

RESEARCH QUESTIONS
This study aims to know the struggles in understanding
informative texts of Grade 11 students in Trento, Agusan del
Sur. Specifically, it seeks to answer the following questions:
1. What are the lived experiences of senior high school students
in understanding informative texts?
2. How do they cope with their experiences in understanding
different informative texts?
3. What are the insights and aspirations of grade 11 students
with regards to their experiences in understanding informative 8

texts?
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

THEORETICAL LENS
This study is linked to the Schema Theory. Schema theory is
an explanation of how readers use prior knowledge to
comprehend and learn from text (Rumelhart, 1980). The
fundamental principle of the schema theory assumes that
written text does not carry meaning by itself. Rather, a text only
provides directions for readers as to how they should retrieve or
construct meaning from their own previously acquired
knowledge. In addition, comprehending a text is an interactive
process between the reader’s background knowledge and the
text. Efficient comprehension requires the ability to relate the
textual material to one's own knowledge. 9
 OVERCOMING STRUGGLES IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATIVE TEXTS: A
PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY

THEORETICAL LENS
This is also supported by Vygotsky’s Constructivism
Theory (1978) wherein it argues that humans generate
knowledge and meaning from an interaction between their
experiences and their ideas. It is based on the premise that
learners construct their own perspective of the world through
individual experiences and schema, and this enables them to
solve problems in ambiguous situations.
These theories are relevant to the study because they give
explanations as to why some students have difficulties in
reading, especially in understanding informative texts. It could
be understood that the comprehension of a text requires the
ability of a person to relate to his or her own knowledge.
10