HOW CAN I IMPROVE THE READING SKILLS OF

GRADE 7 STUDENTS THROUGH SPEAK UP?

(SHARING PROACTIVE EVENTS AND KNOWLEDGE
FOR UNDERSTANDING AND PROGRESS)

PSYCHOLOGY AND EDUCATION: A MULTIDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL

2023
Volume: 8
Pages: 371-374
Document ID: 2023PEMJ657
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.7857977
Manuscript Accepted: 2023-21-4
Psych Educ, 2023, 8: 371-374, Document ID:2023 PEMJ657, doi:10.5281/zenodo.7857977, ISSN 2822-4353
Research Article

How Can I Improve the Reading Skills of Grade 7 Students Through SPEAK UP?
(Sharing Proactive Events and Knowledge for Understanding and Progress)
Rodel R. Sienes*, Aimee Amor C. Porto
For affiliations and correspondence, see the last page.
Abstract
Reading becomes a rampant problem to every school nowadays. This study aims to improve the
reading skills of grade 7 students of Soong National High School through SPEAK UP. The study
employed action research design, in which quasi- experimental was also applied to determine if there
is a significant effect on the intervention program. The study administered a pre-test to 2 sections in
Grade 7. Classes were split into two as experimental group (1 class, 15 students) and a control group
(1 class, 15 students), according to pre-test results. Only the experimental group was involved in
SPEAK UP for 4 weeks. There are series of activity that every learners need to undergo. Participants
were carefully observed during the intervention program. There is a showed evidences of learning
improvements by the participants. Moreover, the result of this showed that SPEAK UP innovation
strategy has a positive effect on the educational value of teaching and learning especially in English
classes. This research entitled “How can I improve the reading skills of Grade 7 students through
SPEAK UP? (Sharing Proactive events and knowledge for Understanding and Progress), prepared
and submitted by Aimee Amor C. Porto and Rodel R. Sienes, is hereby recommended for approval.

Keywords: senior high school, reading skills, SPEAK UP, program intervention

Introduction Foundation, 2023) incantation or speaking aloud helps

As the coronavirus pandemic shuttered the schools,
education has been tough and challenging to the
teachers. It has been observed that student’s reading
skills is immensely a constant battle in our school.
Students at junior high school level are expected to
read and comprehend. However, we cannot the fact
that our students struggle vastly with reading. Our
concern now is how to engaged the students into a
more fun and enjoyable learning journey that in the
long run they still remember and acknowledge the
skills they just have acquired.
In relation to education, we teachers were demanded to
be innovative and creative in teaching and learning. In
fact, English lessons especially reading skills are very
low mastered by our students today. With this we are
challenged and opted to make reading interesting to
them. In my class, I really observed that most of my
students when being called to read an English text they
are in fear of reading, especially reading aloud certain
words or sentences. Moreover, student become so
starkly when they read in front of their classmates.
He/she is not confident and did not want to read. This
kind of stigma must be cut off. This condition made
the students feel insecure in learning and tend to drop
off their participation and engagement to learn. With
this issues and concerns. We teachers innovate
something new and introduce to our students a new
way to improve reading skills which is through
SPEAK UP. According to (George Lucas Educational
students improve their reading skills. Moreover,
students get motivated to come to school for they are
given special or extra support to learn reading in a
more engaging way. This activity will help boost their
confidence and increase their level of engagement in
school or class activities.
Research Questions
This study aimed to find out the answer of the
following research questions:
1. How does the SPEAK UP help improve the reading
skills of grade 7 students?
2. Will there be a significant difference between the
traditional way of improving student’s reading skills
(done under control group) and the SPEAK UP
innovative strategy (experimental group)?
Innovation
The SPEAK UP strategy is a proposed innovation to
be utilized as an experimental approach for learners in
enhancing their ability to improve reading skills while
reading aloud for grade 7 learners. Through the use of
statistical treatment the researchers will determine if
there is a significant difference between traditional
way in teaching reading skills and through SPEAK UP
strategy. Moreover, the researchers will be able to find
out the conclusions and recommendations in

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Psych Educ, 2023, 8: 371-374, Document ID:2023 PEMJ657, doi:10.5281/zenodo.7857977, ISSN 2822-4353
Research Article
improving the aforesaid innovation.
The proposed intervention and strategy would be
defined by IPO. During input, the researchers will
apply the SPEAK UP strategy to the grade 7 students.
In the process, students will be carefully observed.
Participants will undergo two successions of activity
where they cannot proceed to other phase if they
cannot successfully finish the task given to them.
Finally, the output will be determined from the results,
conclusions and recommendations of the researchers.
On the other hand, the researchers will add some
improvisations if there is a need to improve the
aforesaid strategy.
Methodology
Participants and/or other Sources of Data and
Information
The study will utilize a quasi-experimental method to
determine the effectiveness of SPEAK UP innovation
in improving the reading skills of grade 7 students of
Soong National High School. The study will carry out
2 sections of Grade 7 enrolled this school year 2021-
2022. The respondents consist of 30 Grade 7 students
drawn from 2 sections. The 2 sections were drawn
purposively. The first section will serve as the
experimental group, where the SPEAK UP is
introduced and the other section will be the control
group. To gather the necessary data and information
the researcher will choose specific competency in
English 7 to test the effectiveness of SPEAK UP in
improving reading. The grades and the performance of
both sections will be evaluated if there is a difference
between the 2 groups. In addition, students were given
pre-test after which they were subjected to treatment
which lasted for about a month. The lesson was taught
for four weeks. Afterward, a post-test was given.
Moreover, mean and standard deviation were tested
using t-test and analysis of co-variance (ANOVA).
Data Gathering Methods
The researcher will make self – made assessments in
assessing students’ enhancements and enrichments in
their confidence of reading skills while speaking it
aloud. The self – made assessment tools will be for
two – fold justifications: one is for the T-Test of
Independent Means for experimental and control
group, and the other one is for the T – Test of
Dependent Means for pre – test and post – test.
Data Analysis Plan
Sienes & Porto
As the basis for interpretation, the following statistical
analyses will be utilized as follow:
1. The mean and standard deviation of academic
scores of pre – test and post-test of the learners in
before and after the implementations of SPEAK UP.
2. The Cronbach’s Alpha for Pilot Test will be used to
determine if there is a reliable or valid internal
consistency in the test questionnaires.
3. The Pearson R will be utilized to determine if there
is a significant relationship between the pre – test and
post – test scores on the pupils before and after the
SPEAK UP implementations.
4. The T – Test of Dependent Means/Paired T – Test
will be utilized if there is a significant difference
between the pre – test and post test scores.
The T-Test of Independent Means/Unequal Variance
will be utilized if there is a significant difference
between the experimental and control group.
Ethical Considerations
The confidentiality of the primary and secondary data
of the students – respondents will be religiously kept
by the researcher in response of the Data Privacy Act.
There will be no side comments when it comes of the
responses of the participants held from the survey
proper. The School – Based Management will also be
informed regarding the said study.
Results and Discussion
Thissection presents the result of the study and the
discussion of the findings about the SPEAK UP
strategy conducted by the researchers. Moreover, this
section would also determine on how SPEAK UP
strategy help improves the reading skills of grade 7
students of Soong National High School.
Sharing Proactive Events and Knowledge for
Understanding and Progess (S.P.E.A.K. U.P.)
One of the objectives of this study is to improve the
reading skills of grade 7 students through SPEAK UP.
As for the data, there are 72 grade 7 students enrolled
in this school year 2021-2022. On the note, only 30
students were selected to undergo the SPEAK UP. The
selection of 30 students is based on the scores of their
pre-test. With the intervention program of SPEAK UP
strategy it is found out that there is a remarkable
progress among the students who were part of the
study.
According to (Brown, 2004) reading skills consist of
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Research Article
micro skills and these are the 3Rs. First, recognizing a
main of word and able to interpret the word in order;
second, recognizing grammatical words such as noun,
verb and etc. and the last one is recognizing a
particular meaning express in different grammatical
forms. Thus, these skills are also focused by SPEAK
UP strategy which greatly helps to improve the reading
skills of grade 7 students. Moreover, reading aloud
plays a significant part in project SPEAK UP where
students must able to correctly spell and pronounce the
word. This also corroborated by the study of (Richard,
2002) which stated that having students read silently
and aloud will help them send a strong message. He
added that, to do these materials being used should be
interesting to the students so that they achieve the
message of the texts in a high level of engagement.
Comparison of Conttrol Group and Experimental
Group
There are two groups that are involved in the study.
The traditional way of improving student’s reading
skills (done under control group) and the SPEAK UP
innovative strategy (experimental group). The graph
below shows the pre-test and post-test for control
group.
Based on the graph and the figures above, there is a
difference of +0.96 percent which means there is a
little progress on the students reading skills under the
traditional way of teaching reading.
The graph below shows the pre-test and post-test for
experimental group.
Based on the mean and standard deviation of pre – test
and post – test of both control and experimental group,
they gained remarkable increase, however, when it
comes to the results of T – Test of Dependent Means
for pre – test and post-test, there were no significant
Sienes & Porto
differences of pre – tests and post tests for both control
and experimental groups, causing each test to accept
the null hypothesis. Thus, there were no remarkable
improvements of reading ability while doing the read
aloud as far as the SPEAK UP innovation is
concerned.
Though there were increases in the means and standard
deviations of the pre – tests and post – tests on both
control and experimental groups of junior high school
learners who experienced the SPEAK UP innovation,
there were no significant improvements in their
reading skills or remarkable enhancements in their
reading aloud as far as the innovation was concerned
on how to implement it throughout the school setting,
so also to the comparison was neglected between
control and experimental groups since there were still
no remarkable advantages of doing the SPEAK UP
strategy.
Conclusion
The findings of this study will be disseminated,
presented and utilized. Dissemination and utilization
will be done first in the researcher’s school where the
researches are assigned through School-Based in-
Service Training (INSET), then, in the whole district
or even in the entire Division, if given a chance.
References
Brown, H. (2004). Pearson Education. Retrieved from Language
Assessment: Principles and Classroom Practices.
Chang, Y., Chen, C. et.al., Enhancing English – Learning
Performance through a Simulation Classroom for EFL Students
Using Augmented Reality – Junior High School Case Study,
November 2020
Christie, L. Listyani, Teachers’ Strategy to Improve Students’ Self –
Confidence in Speaking, Register Journal, 2018
Chang, Y., Chen, C. et.al., Enhancing English – Learning
Performance through a Simulation Classroom for EFL Students
Using Augmented Reality – Junior High School Case Study,
November 2020
Dewi, R., Kultsum, U., et.al., Using Communicative Games in
Improving Students’ Speaking Skills, Canadian Center of Science
and Education, Volume 10, Number 1, 2017
George Lucas Educational Foundation. (2023). edutopia. Retrieved
from https://www.edutopia.org/:
https://www.edutopia.org/article/improving-reading- skills-through-
speaking
Minero,E. (2019). Elementary Reading Strategies That Really Work.
George Lucas Educational Foundation
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Research Article

Pack, S. (2021). Enduring Practices in Remote Teaching. George Affiliations and Corresponding Information
Lucas Educational Foundation.

Richard, J. &. (2002). Cambridge University Press. Retrieved from Rodel R. Sienes
Methodology in Language Teaching: An Anthology of Current
Soong National High School,
Practice/.
Department of Education - Philippines
Turner, F. D. (2010). Evaluating the Effectiveness of Fluency-
Oriented Reading Instruction with Increasing Black and Latino Aimee Amor C. Porto
Reading Fluency, As Compared to Asian and White Second-Grade Soong National High School,
Students' Reading Fluency Department of Education - Philippines

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