Developing Literacy Skill through Direct and Explicit
Comprehension Strategy Instruction (DECSI)
An Action Research
Elih Sutisna Yanto and Hilmansyah Saefullah
English Education Program, Singaperbangsa University of Karawang, H. S. Ronggo Waluyo St, Karawang, Indonesia
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Keywords: Direct and Explicit Comprehension Strategy Instruction (DECSI), English literature, engaging.
Abstract: This study reports the findings of action research on the development of students’ literacy skill particularly
through Direct and Explicit Comprehension Strategy Insctruction (DECSI) in English literature class of the
English Education Program Department in Indonesia. Drawing on data of students’ reflective journals,
observation and interview, empirical findings showed that the students engaged actively in text identifying,
word defining, class presentation, vocabulary enforcement and reflection through Direct and Explicit
Comprehension Strategy Instruction (DECSI). Empirical data also revealed that through role scaffolding by
teachers and peer support, the student participants engaged in the discovery of English literature vocabulary
by documenting unfamiliar or interesting words from their English literature readings and by exploring
different meanings of vocabulary using electronic dictionaries, corpus software called BNC and
skell.sketchengine.co.uk. The other research findings showed that student teachers had enhanced of being
autonomous learners. The findings suggest that DECSI can be a catalyst for engaging students in post-
reading tasks such as writing a summary of the English literature text and promoting language awareness
and improving comprehension as well.
1 INTRODUCTION
Teachers often consider that literature is unsuitable
for the language classroom. This view reflects how
the study of language and the study of literature are
separated, which refers to as a border dispute over
territory between linguists and literary critics. This
divergence has resulted in the teaching of the two
subjects as ‘disconnected pedagogic practices’ and
has, consequently, led to the limited role of literature
in the language classroom
.
However, the awkward fact that many learners
want and love literary texts was probably the first
driving force which brought literary texts back in the
language classrooms.
In recent research studies, teaching literature has
promoted language learning, cultural awareness,
students’ awareness of a different usage of language,
and has enriched new vocabulary and imaginative
expression (Krsteva and Kukubajska, 2013;
Nasirahmadi, 2014; Tevdovska, 2016). The
importance of literary texts (i.e., short stories) as
sources of teaching and learning materials for EFL
contexts has been recommended by professionals
and intellectuals as the literary texts reveal
comprehensive language use in authentic contexts
(Pathan, 2013).
Traditionally, the teaching of literature has been
a teacher-dominated process, allowing for limited
opportunity for students to do their own ideas
creatively and feelings towards a literary text. This
conventional teaching activity of reading
comprehension on literary text does not afford
students the opportunity to share what they have
read and what language resources they have learned
from literary reading texts. In short, such process of
literary text reading activities does not create a
supportive environment where students engage in
interactive reading tasks and collaborative learning
community of reading as a social practice (Widodo,
2014).
In contrast, a student-centered approach
encourages learners to develop their own opinions,
feelings and responses to a literary text. It is then
predicted that learners will be able to apply these
proficiencies to further reading of texts for their own
110
Yanto, E. and Saefullah, H.
Developing Literacy Skill through Direct and Explicit Comprehension Strategy Instruction (DECSI) - An Action Research.
DOI: 10.5220/0007162901100115
In Proceedings of the Tenth Conference on Applied Linguistics and the Second English Language Teaching and Technology Conference in collaboration with the First International Conference
on Language, Literature, Culture, and Education (CONAPLIN and ICOLLITE 2017) - Literacy, Culture, and Technology in Language Pedagogy and Use, pages 110-115
ISBN: 978-989-758-332-2
Copyright © 2018 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved

benefit. For this reason, Direct and Explicit
Comprehension Strategy Instruction (DECSI) is
suggested in engaging literary texts through the
discovery of English literature meaning.
This present study was inspired by the study of
Haggard (1982), Martin (2002) and Widodo (2015).
The implementation of DECSI has been well
understood in the ESL context but the
implementation of this instructional method in the
literary class of EFL context remains under-
explored. To fill this gap, the present study adopts
DECSI. Two research questions guide this study:
1. In what ways do students engage in Direct,
Explicit Comprehension Strategy Instruction
(DECSI)?
2. What are students’ reactions to these activities?
2 LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Defining and conceptualizing
literacy
Literacy is now commonly defined as being able to
read and write, including ‘skills enabling access to
knowledge and information’ (UNESCO, 2005b).
Literacy is not only the decoding and encoding of a
written script; it is also a socioculturally embedded
practice, dependent on understandings of the
language, culture, and other texts (those that are
similar and those that are different).
Comprehensively literacy is a construction and
reconstruction of knowledge, attitude, value, skill
and experience. Language itself is a key aspect of
students’ culture. Through language, students can
gain access to the literary heritage of humanity and
develop their appreciation of the richness and
breadth of world’s literary heritage.
2.2 Direct, Explicit Comprehension
Strategy Instruction (DECSI)
Literature explains that the explicit-implicit
dichotomy is applied to three different concepts–
learning, knowledge, and memory–and it is only
very rarely explained how these are interconnected.
Further, Dörnyei (2009) adds that explicit
knowledge is acquired through explicit learning and
is stored in explicit memory; and implicit knowledge
is acquired through implicit learning and is stored in
implicit memory.
In this research, comprehension strategies refer
to routines and procedures that readers use to help
them make sense of texts. These strategies include,
but are not limited to, summarizing, asking and
answering questions, paraphrasing, finding the main
idea, text identifying, word defining, and vocabulary
enforcement. An important part of comprehension
strategy instruction is the active participation of
students in the comprehension process. In addition,
explicit instruction involves providing a sufficient
amount of support, or scaffolding, to students as
they learn the strategies to ensure success.
3 RESEARCH METHOD
The research was undertaken at a university in
Indonesia. The twenty-six student teachers were the
second year from English language education major.
To address the two research questions, the nature of
the present study employed an action research. Two
strategies were implemented in this present study:
Vocabulary self-collection and learning logs:
reading, grammar, and vocabulary. The reading log
focused on how much time student teachers read and
how much information they learned. The grammar
log was used to record grammatical resources that
the student teachers learned. The vocabulary log was
employed to record all the lexical items that the
student teachers learned or found useful.
4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
The data collected from the students’ interviews and
reflective journals were analysed using Braun and
Clarke’s (2006) thematic analysis. Driven by the
thematic analysis to the students’ interviews and
reflective journals, four central finding themes were
identified revealing that DECSI with learning logs
helped the students be autonomous learners, develop
vocabulary, promote language awareness, and
improve comprehension. These were clearly
portrayed in one of the students’ reflective journals
asserting:
“By learning logs we were encouraged to fill up
the format with some unfamiliar words taken
from the short story we read to find out their
meanings, summarize the story, and analyze the
grammatical structures, so that the learning logs
helped me comprehend the content of the story”
(Haris).
As can be inferred from the student’s response
above, the learning logs encouraged the student to
actively and independently learn new words from
Developing Literacy Skill through Direct and Explicit Comprehension Strategy Instruction (DECSI) - An Action Research
111

the text he read. The learning logs also provided the
student to activate his language awareness by
analyzing the structure of the sentences from the
story, and hence he comprehended the story well.
The following discussions reveal the four central
finding themes elicited from the students’ responses
in their interviews and reflective journals.
4.1 Being autonomous learners
The students’ responses to the use of learning logs
while reading a short story revealed that the learning
logs facilitated them to be active and independent in
comprehending a short story. The following
excerpts, taken from the students’ interviews and
reflective journals, demonstrate the students’
autonomy in learning.
Table 1: Students’ responses reflecting autonomous
learning.
Students Res
p
onses
Budi Learning logs were quite beneficial for me
because ...hmmm the activities in the
learning logs encouraged me to input some
unfamiliar words into the learning logs
format ...hmmm and analyse the
grammatical structures which made me
actively read and comprehend the story.
Dita Ya, hmmm by using learning log I could
be more active to find out every word I
wasn't familiar with, then I searched for
their meanings and I input the words into
the learning logs.
Fajar I think some advantages were that we
could understand some unfamiliar words
by finding out their meanings and
synonyms. We could learn how to
summarize the story and learn to analyse
the grammar of our favourite sentences
taken from the short stor
y
.
Rani Besides reading activity, we were also
encouraged to find out some unfamiliar
words, our favourite sentences and so on.
From those activities I could understand
the stor
y
well.
The students’ responses on the use of learning
logs in reading a short story revealed that the
learning logs provided the students with some
activities that enabled them to actively and
independently learn new words and comprehend the
story well. The students actively and independently
utilized the learning logs to record unfamiliar words,
to look for their meanings and synonyms from their
dictionaries, to summarize the story, to record some
favorite sentences from the text, and even to analyse
their grammatical structures. The various activities
that the students employed with the learning logs
promoted autonomous learning for them. It can be
inferred that they became autonomous learners
during accomplishing the activities in the learning
logs.
The benefit LL is also informed in previous
research by Widodo (2015:167) as “the students
were engaged in the act of reading as meaning
making process (ideational meaning, interpersonal
meaning, and textual meaning)”. The ideational
meaning in this reading a short story deals with how
a literary text is used to represent student teachers’
experience in order to organize, understand, and
express their perceptions of the literary texts. The
interpersonal meaning focuses on how elements of
the literary text create patterns of interaction and
evaluation: the type of interaction taking place and
the way writers take a position in their message
within the literary text. Additionally, the textual
meaning refers to with the literary works to create a
connected and coherent discourse (Halliday 1975;
Christie & Unsworth, 2000; Bloor & Bloor, 1995).
4.2 Developing vocabulary
All of the students shared the similar opinions that
the activities in the learning logs assisted them to
develop their vocabulary. The following excerpts
highlighted the students’ responses on how the
students could develop their vocabulary in using the
learning logs.
Table 2: Students’ responses reflecting vocabulary
development.
Students Responses
Dewi I got some new vocabularies after I filled
up the learning logs while reading
“Teenage Wastelan
d
”
Angga I could find out the meanings and
synonyms in every new word I found in the
short story. It helped me the process to add
new words for me.
Robi I think some advantages of learning log
were that I could understand some
unfamiliar words by finding out their
meanin
g
s and s
y
non
y
ms...
Siska In learning log I learned to understand new
vocabularies by looking for their meanings
and synonyms.
As can be inferred from the students’ responses,
the learning logs assisted them to obtain some new
vocabularies during their reading. In the learning
logs activity dealing with selecting some important
CONAPLIN and ICOLLITE 2017 - Tenth Conference on Applied Linguistics and the Second English Language Teaching and Technology
Conference in collaboration with the First International Conference on Language, Literature, Culture, and Education
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unfamiliar words, the students were encouraged to
find out the meanings and the synonyms of the
selected unfamiliar words they needed to understand
from reading a short story. The students most
importantly acquired some new vocabularies from
their attempts to find out the synonyms of the
selected unfamiliar words facilitated by the learning
logs. These indicate that through LL ‘student
teachers increased their reading ability, developed
positive attitudes toward reading, had increased
motivation to read, and made gains in various aspect
of proficiency in English, including vocabulary and
writing’ (Day & Bamford, 1998, p. 33). Therefore, it
can be inferred that learning logs are really helpful
tools for developing vocabulary.
4.3 Promoting language awareness
Besides identifying important unfamiliar words to
find out their meanings and synonyms, in one of the
learning logs activities the students were encouraged
to identify the word class and the grammar of the
sentences from the story they read. These activities
for the students were considered to help them
comprehend the text well during their reading of a
short story. The following students’ responses reveal
the evidence.
Table 3: Students’ responses reflecting language
awareness.
Students Responses
Cepi Hmm ... learning logs helped me know
more deeply about the function of words in
the sentences and the structure of the
sentences.
Risa I think some advantages (of learning logs)
were ... and learning to analyze the
grammar used in the selected sentences
from the stor
y
.
Asep The advantages I got in using learning logs
were adding more vocabularies, sharpening
my grammar ability, and being able to
understand well the function of words in
the sentences.
Widia By learning logs I could know the
meanings of the unfamiliar words from the
story, then I could understand the grammar
use. Besides that, I also learned to analyze
the structure of the sentences and the
tenses. I could also train my thoroughness
to comprehend the story.
The students’ responses depict how the learning
logs have facilitated the students in promoting
language awareness. Based on the responses, in the
learning log activities the students were encouraged
to identify the function of words in the sentences and
to analyze the structure of the sentences taken from
the text they read. These activities indirectly
activated their knowledge about language that they
already had in their minds in order to gain
knowledge and information from the text they read.
Therefore, the language awareness activities can be
valuable experience for the students in promoting
their literacy skills.
4.4 Improving comprehension
The main point of being literate as proposed by
UNESCO is that we are able to access knowledge
and information to the text we read (UNESCO,
2005b). During reading a short story, the students
were facilitated by the learning logs in order to gain
meaningful access to the content of the story. After
using the learning logs, the students shared the
similar opinions that the tools assisted them in
improving their comprehension on the text they
read. The following responses show the evidence.
Table 4: Students’ responses reflecting comprehension
improvement.
Students Responses
Andika ...we were encouraged to select unfamiliar
words, our most favourite sentences, and
so on. From those activities in the learning
logs I could easily comprehend the short
stor
y
"Teena
g
e Wasteland"
Gita Learning logs helped me learn the
vocabularies and the structure of the
sentences from the short story "Teenage
Wasteland" which could gradually help me
com
p
rehend the content of the stor
y
.
Mila In the learning logs activities I analysed
the unfamiliar words and sentences. It
really helped me to comprehend the short
stor
y
"Teena
g
e Wasteland" easil
y
.
Nuri In the learning logs, for the unfamiliar
words I had to find out their meanings and
synonyms, so that I could understand the
meanings of the sentences from the story.
It helped me more understand and
comprehend the plot and the content of the
stor
y
.
Based on the students’ responses, all of the
students agreed that the learning logs provided them
some activities to improve their comprehension on
the plot and the content of the story they read.
Selecting some important unfamiliar vocabularies to
find out their meanings and synonyms, summarizing
the story, selecting most favourite sentences, and
analyzing the structure of the sentences were
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available in the learning logs which gradually
enabled the students to comprehend the story better.
Therefore, meaningful access to knowledge and
information occured when the students utilized the
learning logs during their reading to a short story.
5 CONCLUSION
Three important instructional implications can be
highlighted from the findings of the research. First,
Direct and explicit comprehension strategy
instruction (DECSI) can be implemented into
literary extensive reading program that focuses on
(1) linguistic aspects: a variety of styles, registers,
and language learning materials; with this in mind,
such exposure to authentic materials will improve
language acquisition through literary texts; (2)
methodological aspect: great interaction
opportunities in a language class internalizing the
lexico-grammatical repertoires or resources from
context, and (3) motivational aspect: stimulation to
express student teachers’ opinions dealt with the
topics and the characters in the literary texts to their
own life. The findings suggest that the use DECSI
(i.e., learning logs vocabulary self-collection
strategy) engage student teachers in reading literary
texts as meaning making and learning autonomy that
expand their reading ability and lexico-grammatical
repertoires. In addition teachers can use a variety of
literary texts so that student teachers can discuss
different dimensions of the texts, such as cultural
knowledge or cultural issues in terms of the history,
people’s customs and traditions, student teachers’
personal responses, their personal satisfaction or
engagement to the literary texts they read focusing
beyond the lexico-grammatical resources.
The present study has revealed how DECSI were
employed in a literary extensive program. We
acknowledge that a more complete picture of the use
of DECSI in both extensive and intensive reading
programs could be provided in future studies. For
example, an experiment study may be conducted to
look at the effect of DECSI on student teachers’
reading fluency and achievement. A qualitative case
study may also be undertaken to investigate different
types of teacher scaffolding and peer support in
learning logs-based literary texts in EFL/EAL
extensive and intensive reading programs. These
future research agendas focus on documenting more
empirical evidence regarding the implementation of
DECSI beyond short story texts.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
We would like to thank all of learners who have
participated in our study. We wish to extend our
sincere thanks to anonymous reviewers for their
useful comments on this manuscript. All lack of
clarity and any omissions remain entirely our
responsibility
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