The effect of using a webquest model to develop critical reading performance among general secondary stage students in Egypt

الملخص EN

This study aimed at investigating the effect of using a WebQuest Model (WM) on General Secondary Stage students' critical reading performance.

The participants were first year General Secondary Stage students at Asmaa' Bint Abi Bakr General Secondary School for Girls in Suez Governorate in Egypt.

Twenty four first year General Secondary Stage students participated in each of the experimental and control groups.

Both groups were pre-tested by using the Critical Reading Performance Test (CRT) for equivalence in their critical reading performance.

The researcher trained the experimental group on using the WM to develop their critical reading performance.

The experiment was conducted at the very beginning of the second term of the school year 2008-2009.

The experimental group and the control group were post-tested by using the CRT.

Differences between the mean scores of the pre- and post- CRT was calculated by using the t-test.

Results showed that statistically significant differences were found between the mean scores of the experimental group and the control group on the post- CRT in favor of the experimental group.

Results also revealed that there were statistically significant differences in the mean scores of the experimental group between the pre- and post- CRT in favor of the post- CRT.

Results indicated the effectiveness of using the WebQuest in developing General Secondary Stage students' critical reading performance.

It is recommended that curriculum designers, teacher-trainers and textbook writers have to focus on providing strategies based on using the WebQuest in teaching all language skills to General Secondary Stage students.

Suggestions include investigating the effect of using the WebQuest on General Secondary Stage students' writing performance and writing apprehension.