IRANIAN EFL TEACHERSʹʹ ATTITUDES TOWARD READING STRATEGIES IN PRIVATE CENTERS AND STATE SCHOOLS

This study investigated Iranian EFL (English as a foreign language) teachers’ attitudes toward reading strategies in private centers and state schools. Further, a comparison was made between EFL teachers in these two educational settings so as to explore whether they utilize different reading strategies equally. To this end, an attitude questionnaire was distributed among 40 Iranian EFL teachers with dissimilar academic degrees and from different age groups and also with different lengths of teaching experience in their career. The data gathered then were fed into the SPSS software for analysis. The results showed that all the participants supported the importance of applying both cognitive and metacognitive reading strategies. Further, no significant difference was found in participants’ degree of using these strategies in state schools and private centers. Finally, with respect to the findings of the present study which once more highlights the vital role of tending to applying strategies in optimal reading comprehension, EFL teachers who do not pay sufficient attention to the inclusion of strategies in teaching reading are strongly recommended to make it an indispensible part of their instructing reading skill.