Computer-produced comics as a means of summarising academic readings in EAP programs
Steve Engler
International Christian University
Christopher Hoskins
International Christian University
Sylvan Payne
International Christian University, Japan
PP: 19 - 33
Abstract
Students entering academic bridge programs for foreign languages face multiple reading challenges. For one, they have to wade through academic material that is far more dense and sophisticated than they are accustomed to. Faced with such material, students often cannot distinguish the main ideas from supporting, or even superfluous information. This can result in frustration and lack of motivation.
This article reports on two separate pilot projects involving the use of the software application Comic Life to supplement assigned academic readings. In the first project, half of the subjects were given a teacher-generated summary of a reading in comic format. All the subjects were then given a quiz over the assigned reading and the means were compared to determine if the comic helped comprehension. In addition, the subjects were given a questionnaire in order to determine their perceptions of the comic. In the second pilot project, students developed their own comic summary of a given academic reading.
Teacher observation, peer comments, and a questionnaire were used to evaluate this project. The results for both projects were highly positive in regard to both comprehension and evaluations.
Keywords
Comic Life, academic reading, foreign language learning
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