The Effect of Different In-Text Glosses on Iranian High School EFL Learner's Reading Comprehension

This study sought to investigate how different types of in-text glosses (i.e. synonym, translation, and definition glosses) affect reading comprehension of Iranian high school students. For this purpose, seventy-eight students from a high school in Isfahan were randomly chosen to serve as the participants of the study. They were then randomly divided into four groups –three experimental groups and one control group. To ascertain the homogeneity of the groups in terms of reading comprehension ability, a general reading comprehension test was administered prior to the administration of the actual tests of gloss type. No meaningful difference was spotted between them. The participants subsequently sat for the tests of gloss type, the results of which made it possible to reach the following different types of glosses brought about considerable changes in the students’ reading comprehension scores. More precisely, the students in synonym gloss group outperformed, although not significantly, those in translation gloss group who, in turn, substantially surpassed those in definition gloss group. Unsurprisingly, these three experimental groups had a better than did the control group, i.e. the no-gloss group