Advisers

Genalyn Masanay Lago

Discipline

Education

Abstract

This phenomenological study explores the lived experiences of non-proficient readers at Jose Maria Panganiban Senior High School in Quezon City, Philippines, focusing on their emotional, cognitive, social, and situational challenges in comprehending texts. Using hermeneutic phenomenology with methodological triangulation, including semi-structured interviews, observations, and document analysis, the research purposively samples five Grade 11 and 12 students identified via Division Reading Assessment Tool (DRAT) results as less proficient or non-proficient readers. Analysis using the Modified Van Kaam Method revealed ten (10) interconnected themes: Emotional Barriers in Reading, Inadequate Foundational Skills, Cognitive Processing Challenges, Social Comparison and Self-Esteem, Emotional Variability and Burnout, Personal Circumstances Affecting Learning, Self-Acceptance Versus Discouragement, Small Successes as Motivation, Performance Anxiety in New Settings, and Processing Limitations. Each of the themes had subthemes that further described the participants' experiences, such as anxiety caused by reading tasks, lack of early literacy exposure, slow text processing speed, feeling inferior to schoolmates, academic exhaustion, family-related stressors, realization of one's own pacing, small successes leading to confidence, fear of public reading, and struggle with grasping high-level vocabulary. Each of the themes had subthemes that further described the participants' experiences, such as anxiety caused by reading tasks, lack of early literacy exposure, slow text processing speed, feeling inferior to schoolmates, academic exhaustion, family-related stressors, realization of one's own pacing, small successes leading to confidence, fear of public reading, and struggle with grasping high-level vocabulary. In summary, the study found that non-proficient readers experienced a variety of emotional, cognitive, social, and situational problems. The study recommended supportive classroom environments, paced reading tasks, individualized motivation strategies, and teacher training in phenomenological insights to foster resilience and literacy equity.

Keywords

coping strategies, motivation, non-proficient readers, reading difficulties, emotional barriers, cognitive processing, hermeneutic phenomenology.