Master Thesis

This phenomenological inquiry intended to find answers to the central question "What was the essence of the lived experiences of learners with reading difficulties?" Specifically, it sought answers to the following corollary questions. 1.How did the learners describe their lived experiences in school? 2.What themes emerged from the testimonies shared by the co-researchers? 3.Based on the findings and reflections drawn, what appropriate intervention framework can be designed? This phenomenological study shows that most learners with reading difficulties felt sad in their learning experiences in school for many reasons and in many different circumstances. Most of them had very few friends and experienced bullying in school. One of the co-researchers was even called as "moron" and resulted to a shattered self-confidence. However, there were learners with reading difficulties who were still happy because they felt the compassion of their teachers and classmates and at times were actively participating in the classroom activities. The co-researchers had their own most liked and most disliked subjects. Many of them disliked the subject English because they found it very difficult and they could not read yet. There were some co-researchers who could not read even a simple word in English. Meanwhile, in reading Tagalog words, most of the co-researchers were able to read it independently. However, among the three grade six co-researchers, there was one of them who could not read both English and Tagalog words. This led to the favoritism of subject other than reading. Seven of the co-researchers were able to read aloud in front of their classmates and teachers. Unfortunately, they were not able to do the reading task properly. It resulted to a not so good experience. Most of them were teased and became the object of fun in the classroom. They were emotionally hurt, three of them cried in front of their classmates and teachers. That experience led the co-researchers to develop inferiority complex and self-pity. From the lived experiences shared by the co-researchers who had experienced reading difficulties, six themes emerged which were (1) Impact of Lingering Past Negative Experiences, (2) Non-Realization of the Significance of Reading, (3) Perceptive Difficulty in English, (4) Emotional Disturbance, (5) Introversion, and (6) Willingness to Learn to Read in English. The Collaborative Intervention Framework was designed for teachers and parents who intend to provide a wide array of reading interventions appropriate for learners with reading difficulties. Most of the interventions described in this material were chosen based on the needs of learners with reading difficulties on the result of this study. The activities include phonemic awareness, letter-sound correspondences, acquisition of basic sight words, phrase and sentence reading, and listening while reading. All the interventions presented here are research-based. At some points, the researcher attempted to restructure the reading strategy from the cited research articles with some modifications. However, the author opted to make interventions more relevant and pupil-friendly.