The Role of Using English Newspapers in Enhancing Pre-intermediate Level Learners' Reading Comprehension Skills

Several newspaper based reading comprehension sessions for pre-intermediate learners were conducted at the foreign languages center at Arab International University. Using newspapers was a first in remedial English courses at the FLC. The learners were excited to explore newspapers with their different sections. They were required to apply their reading comprehension skills while attempting to read a newspaper article: skimming, scanning and summarizing. The learners ability to cut through the challenging task was measured by a written assessment as they were required to present a summary of the main ideas of a chosen article in addition to expressing their own personal opinion. The learners were judged according to four points: the linguistic structure, dependence on the original text, the number of ideas presented, and expressing their personal opinion. Finally, the learners' feedback on the current experience was collected via a questionnaire.