Fostering Guessing From Context: Digital Book Reading, Strategy Training, and Contextual Clue Training
Guessing from context is a widely accepted and favored strategy when learners encounter unknown words. Training can improve the process, but it is unclear which method may facilitate a more successful rate of guesses. In this study, three training methods for guessing from context were explored: Digital Book reading (DBR), strategy training (ST), and contextual clue training (CC). The participants were 99 first-grade students at a national university who received one of the trainings for 30 minutes a week over five weeks using Zoom. The students in the DBR group used Xreading to read books online, while ST and CC students answered ten guessing questions in breakout rooms. Their guessing ability was measured before and after the training using the Guessing from Context Test, which analyzed three dimensions of guessing: part of speech identification, contextual clue discovery, and meaning inference. The results showed that each guessing skill can be trained through instructions, but no clear evidence was found to determine the most effective method. Further analysis will be conducted based on the questionnaire results collected at the end of the survey.