Investigating the Importance of Cooperative Learning Strategies to Improve EFL Learners' Reading Comprehension Skill The case study of second-year EFL students at Mohamed Khider

Abstract

Reading comprehension is one of the crucial skills for EFL learners; hence, teachers are required to provide methods to encourage them to develop their level. To achieve this goal, they try to create a suitable environment in the classroom and organize it through cooperative learning techniques. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the importance of cooperative learning strategies to improve EFL learners’ reading comprehension skills. It is addressed to the second-year students of the Language and English Literature department at Mohamed Kheider University of Biskra. While descriptive research was an appropriate method to validate our research hypotheses, we opted for a mixed-methods approach to collect and analyze data: a questionnaire was distributed to 45 second-year students from different groups, and an interview was administered to five EFL teachers who have taught the first and second years of the reading comprehension course. Overall, the results obtained from the data gathered proved that cooperative learning is effective and stimulating method to increase the level of students' reading comprehension and is a helpful strategy to enhance their proficiency.