Implementing a reading programme for college students has always been a challenge as getting students motivated to read requires consideration from many aspects. This collaborative project investigates the similarities and differences of the reading habit between 18-19 year old urban college students from intact classes in Indonesia and Malaysia. Two same multiple-choice questionnaires, one for Indonesia and the other for Malaysia, were created on google forms and sent to 30 college students in Indonesia and Malaysia respectively. The responses from the 13 questions in the questionnaire are used to compare the reading habit and motivating factors to read for these 60 students. The insight gained can assist course coordinators to organise, implement and monitor reading programmes more effectively.

It is understood that extensive reading can be an effective way to expose students to texts that reflect cultural practices and perspectives. This presentation reports an experience using Xreading materials to teach western society and culture that integrated some components of extensive reading. Fifty-five sophomore students from the English Literature program at Universitas Negeri Surabaya were assigned to read a selection of fifteen graded readers that address various topics on Early American history and multiculturalism in America. The students were given the freedom to select the texts to read and were asked to comment on the readability of the texts based on vocabulary and familiarity with the topic. They were also encouraged to make connections with the texts through online forums. Student responses revealed that the selected texts were relatively at their reading level. The simple language and new vocabulary provided a challenge that did not hinder understanding and helped maintain students’ interest. Students’ familiarity with the topic was also addressed in that they could see the connection between the texts on American history. In addition, familiarity with British history also made it possible for students to build a connection to the texts on Early American history. The personal connection was also built through online forums where students responded to each other’s comments.

Extensive reading (ER) has been well-documented as a robust tool for developing EFL students’ L2 skills. For a large portion of its existence, ER research and approaches have relied heavily on paper-based materials. However, appropriate paper-based graded readers for students are often limited at Japanese universities. Thus, this research project aimed at supplying 50 Japanese EFL students with access to a digital library, allowing them to use any device for reading eBooks that aligned with their reading interests and abilities. Through a mixed-methods approach, the participants of this study were surveyed about their attitudes toward graded readers via an online extensive reading digital library utilizing a modified version of Yamashita’s (2007) Reading Attitudes Survey and an open-ended questionnaire in order to get a better understanding of how cognitive, affective, and behavioral factors play a role in extensive reading mediated by technology.

Learning reading is sometimes a scourge for students from Gen-Z, especially in the post-covid-19 situation where the learning process is still limited. This presentation examines students' preferences and reflections on reading courses. A survey-questionnaire and interviews were conducted using a sequential explanatory design. 99 respondents Indonesian students participated in this study. This study revealed five findings regarding students' preferences toward their reading activities which cover reading book genres and resources that they prefer. Moreover, reflections covering students' reading awareness and their expectations of reading courses are elaborated in this presentation. This study's findings offer recommendations for teachers in organizing reading courses, demonstrating that learning to read entails not only theoretically learning several reading strategies, but also practicing them to improve their ability to fully understand the context of reading pleasantly and realizing that learning reading is more than just reading and answering reading questions.

Students’ engagement in reading combines students’ motivation, effort, emotion, and ability to gain flow in reading. It is the key to help students love reading and gain their students' academic achievement. This qualitative study aims to identify the types of engagement that the students experienced in extensive reading and factors that make students engaged in reading English materials in a EFL context. This study was held in English Department at one of universities in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. As data collection techniques, reflection and interview were conducted to six students who enrolled a class that was implemented extensive reading. The students’ reflective essays were used as the main data to explore engagement that the students experienced in reading. In order to further the exploration, important statements appearing in the essay were confirmed and explained by the students through one on one interview. From the data, it was revealed that students experienced behavioural and emotional engagement when reading English books. Behavioural engagement was shown from students’ attempts to make time to read and finish their chosen books while the emotional engagement was identified from students’ positive feeling in reading that they wrote in the reflective essay. Furthermore, factors that made students more engaged in reading their books are their motivation, relevant reading materials, and influences from peers and teachers. Pedagogical implications and limitations are also discussed.

The presenter has been conducting standalone Japanese ER courses in a U.S. university for the past nine years. In addition to in-class individual reading activities and book chats, the presenter incorporates semester-final projects in order to connect input to output. The projects and presentations also provide opportunities for learners to share their outcomes with their classmates. As ER itself is learner-initiated, the instructor tries to let learners control their own learning, including project presentations; therefore, topics and formats are completely free. Learners have created variety of unique products, including picture books, online games, and songs, to name a few. Many of the works reflect sentence patterns and writing styles that learners have naturally acquired through their individual reading. The presenter will showcase students’ products and examine how their ER experience influenced their works. Furthermore, the instructor’s role in cultivating creativity and autonomy will be discussed.

Extensive reading (ER) is promoted in the first-year university EFL communication course by integrating ER interactional activities while adopting an English for Specific Purposes (ESP) textbook. ER is activated in class through three ER interactive activities: (1 ) doing the sustained silent reading (SSR) with graded readers, (2) using a "learners' newsletter," a compilation of class affective states showing communicative success and challenges in ER speaking activities, and (3) doing "timed writing" to prepare learners mentally for the ER interactive task. The weekly logs and final interview revealed that interactive engagement increased when ER interactive communication activities were implemented consistently and supplemented with interactional strategies as scaffolders. Similarly, the language learning strategy shifted from translating to using simple words and gestures, thus changing views on learning English communicatively. This presentation discusses classroom practices of integrating ER interactive activities based on graded readers in the EFL communication course.

The necessity of Extensive reading crept on the façade of Mach Kiem Hung Secondary School, in District 5 Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. This aimed to first elucidate the theory and principles underlying Vietnamese teachers extensive reading beliefs. Deep-rooted principles will be discussed in light of practical classroom and contextual consideration on the parts of the students of Mach Kiem Hung Secondary School. Secondly, a critical summary of current research on extensive reading that has been conducted in English as a Second Language and English as Foreign Language contexts and has been tested for the school year 2022. This research sheds light on the importance to the immeasurable benefits of extensive reading in improving many aspects of L2 learners’ language proficiency as well as encouraging the great implementation of extensive reading in educational institutions in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Vietnamese teachers will also become acquainted with future directions in the practice of implementing extensive reading programs such as how to make use of online resources, and available books at the library and be potentially equipped on making use of the internet to assess students 'potential And progress in reading extensively. Thirdly, the presentation provides directions for steps that can be used by future public school teachers on how to conduct extensive reading with Vietnamese students which the presenter believes might fill in the gap in knowledge for extensive reading. The research was conducted using Google forms and Google classroom to evaluate the difficulties met with extensive reading. Thus, it gives light on the joyfulness of extensive reading on the part of the students and leads to the analysis of the importance of extensive reading.

The present study explores Japanese EFL language learners’ preferences for extensive reading books—graded readers or non-graded readers— in the period of more than two years. Many researchers insist that graded readers (GR) play an important role when institutions implement an extensive reading program. However, in the Japanese context, some language learners have negative impressions toward GR for various reasons. GR sometimes prevent them from reading extensively. For instance, high schools in Japan use too advanced GR as a reading assignment during long vacations and students tend to have an unsuccessful reading experience due to finding numerous unknown words. As a result, they often end up having negative images toward GR. This qualitative research explores how GR and non-GR books influence Japanese EFL language learners reading motivation based on interviews to those who have practiced extensive reading more than two years. The results suggested both GR and non-GR are necessary even in the beginning of their learning stage.

This study explores the two language learning communities of adult language learners engaging in extensive reading in Japan: at a local library and through an online language learners' community. This qualitative study examines how a local library and an online learners’ community can support adult learners to practice extensive reading in English continuously. The data collected includes semi-structured interviews with three participants from each group who practiced extensive reading for a year, observation notes, and their reading logs. The major findings of the study suggested extensive reading helped the learners connect to each other through sharing what, how much, and how they read even though there was a gap in English proficiency among the participants in both communities. In addition, extensive reading seemed to have helped them to continue learn English using other language learning methods as well. The study suggested extensive reading could play important roles to help lifelong learning in Japan.

Situated in a post-secondary EFL classroom, this qualitative study explores two first-year non-English department students’ reading motivation sources. The students did extensive reading that was embedded in an English class and used the Xreading platform to provide reading materials and record the students’ reading. Data was collected from students’ reading record in Xreading and interviews with the students. From the data analysis, it was evident that students developed a book selection strategy that potentially improved their internal reading motivation. The students also benefited from the reading target set by the teacher and the self-monitoring of their reading progress in Xreading. The reading target was able to motivate the students externally. This study concluded that freedom of book selection and reading target served as a source in motivating students to read. More pedagogical implications will also be discussed.

This presentation will talk about a new global project called, ‘Reading Across the Sky’. What began as a meeting between students and teachers from two countries rapidly spread to other parts of the globe. This is why we begin each meeting by looking at a map of the world so that the students realize that they are talking to their peers across the sky. At the time of writing, the last meeting involved students from ten countries. During the first meeting students listened to a pre-prepared story while in the most recent event it was the students themselves who proposed their own stories. Until now we have relied on simple word of mouth to expand the group, and this has been very effective. However, now we are thinking that participating in conferences would prove to be an excellent way of connecting with other like-minded teachers. The aim would be not only to expand our Across the Sky group, but also to create a template that other teachers can follow if they wish to create their own global read aloud project.

This study explores how foreign language enjoyment (FLE), foreign language classroom anxiety (FLCA), and L2 grit influence reading achievement in extensive reading (ER) programs. Underpinned by theories of Positive Psychology, the study investigates how these affective and personality factors impact reading amount, reading fluency, and reading comprehension. The study involved 49 university EFL learners who completed a questionnaire and participated in a six-week ER program on Xreading.com. The findings suggest that FLCA predicted reading amount, while FLE predicted reading fluency. However, FLE, FLCA, and grit did not significantly affect reading comprehension. The study provides valuable insights into the relationship between affective factors and reading achievement and offers theoretical and practical implications for ER teaching and research.

This presentation will highlight the features on Extensive Reading Central. Extensive Reading Central (www.er-central.com) is a free website for students and teachers that has thousands of texts at 20 different levels. Students can choose texts from the Reading Library or Listening Library as well as do Speed Reading. After sign-up, students take a placement test which suggests a level for them to select texts at. Students have the option of taking a quiz if they wish. Teachers can create an Institution account, classes and and bulk-register their students. This allows the teachers to track what the students have read and monitor their progress and then download these data is they wish, Students can also look up any unknown word and save them to their private learning environment. ERC works best on the browsers in tablets and computers. ERCentral also has a support area which contains many resources and advice for teachers.

In this presentation, the researchers will describe the results of a study aimed at investigating whether and how foreign language (FL) reading anxiety could be mitigated through extensive reading (ER) among Japanese college EFL students. FL reading anxiety decreased significantly according to the results of FLRAS (Foreign Language Reading Anxiety Scale), which were conducted before and after the ER activities were introduced. In the researchers’ previous study, in which questionnaires were conducted with students in pre-intermediate course, significant differences were observed only in the items related to negative affective factors such as “fear” or “worries”. However, in this study with students in upper-intermediate course, significant differences were also observed in the items related to the positive affective factors such as “pleasure” or “enjoyment”. This could suggest that the aspects of reading anxiety ER could mitigate may differ depending on the factors such as students’ learning experiences or proficiency levels.

The present study explored students’ attitudes towards the Extensive Reading activities in General English courses among non - English majors in Vinh Long province, Vietnam. The method employed was conducted quantitatively by questionnaire. The results revealed that the students had a positive attitude toward reading graded readers and gained more self-confidence in their English communication. These students also showed good performances in the final examination. Moreover, students could be aware of how to choose appropriate books to read and how to use information, vocabulary, and model sentences. They also kept doing the reading process after finishing the English courses. However, some students found difficulties with graded readers without a teacher’s supervision and follow-up activities. The study ended with discussions, pedagogical implication, and research limitations.

To many scholars (e.g., Hu & Nation, 2000), extensive reading (ER) helps readers develop robust vocabulary, acquire a strong writing and grammar foundation, and build key connections with academic disciplines such as the sciences, goals that numerous international students hope to achieve in intensive English programs (IEPs). To foster learner autonomy and reflective practice, effective L2 reading instruction must rely on metacognition, or thinking about thinking (Chick, 2013). Many college instructors, however, continue to deviate from the true essence of ER by overemphasizing quizzes, teacher-selected books, and detailed reading logs (Bentahar & Cranker, 2021). These practices both contradict the essence of ER and seem to deprive L2 readers of key opportunities for integrating speaking and thinking into the ER experience. In this session, the presenter will share proven classroom-based ER activities that 1) build upon IEP students’ preferences and 2) cement the reading-speaking-thinking connection in the language classroom.

This is a meeting for anyone involved, or anyone who wants to become involved, in journals and newsletters about Extensive Reading. Reviewers, editors, copy editors, layout editors, and website managers. We will also discuss the Proceedings for the Extensive Reading World Congress.