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To understand the impact of teachers’ academic qualifications on students’ reading performance, a regression analysis was also applied. A student, who was taught by a senior
high school graduate teacher, provided an expected increase of about 7 words per minute in the ORF and 8.60 increase of correct answers in the reading comprehension. A similar
impact was also identified from teachers who were university graduates.
Table 4.30: Oral Reading Fluency and Reading Comprehension: Impact of Teachers’ Characteristic
4.8 The Impact of School and Classroom Characteristics on EGRA
Results
The impact of school and classroom characteristics on the EGRA score was also examined using a regression model. There were six factors of a school’s characteristics that had a
significant impact on the ORF score and reading comprehension, namely: school status public or private school, school accreditation, library ownership, reading corner availability, as well
as availability of electricity and clean water resources. These factors had a relatively similar impact on the EGRA scores. Attending a public school provided an expected increase of about
2 words per minute in the ORF. In addition, students from a higher level of school accreditation had the opportunity to increase their ORF score to about 4-5 words per minute.
Meanwhile, the availability of a library and reading corner improved students reading performance to about 3 words per minute in the ORF, and about a 4-5 increase in correct
answers was found in the reading comprehension. Finally, the school’s infrastructure such as electricity and clean
water also played a significant role in improving students’ reading performance.
SSME Category
Indicator ORF
Wordsminute Reading
Comprehension Correct
Teacher Teacher’s academic
qualification Junior high school
- -
Senior high school SMASPGSPGA
7.03 8.60
Diploma 1,2,3 3.05
2.60 Bachelor ref
6.75 8.90
Constant 4.09
7.80 ref : signifies the reference group
: indicates statistical significance at the .05 level
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Table 4.31: Oral Reading Fluency and Reading Comprehension: Impact of a School’s Characteristics
This baseline study also revealed that various classroom factors had a significant impact on the EGRA results. There were three factors that significantly contributed to the ORF scores
and reading comprehension results, namely: seating arrangement, availability of other books in the classroom in which the students had access to read or borrow them, and students
works displayed on the walls. From these three factors, book availability had the largest impact on the ORF scores and reading comprehension. It provided an expected increase of about 10
words per minute in the ORF and an increase of about 13 correct answers in the reading comprehension. From this finding, it could be seen that providing reading books for children
to read in a classroom was important.
Table 4.32: Oral Reading Fluency and Reading Comprehension: Impact of Classroom Characteristics
SSME Category
Indicator ORF
Wordsminute Reading
Comprehension Correct
School School status
Public 1.77
3.80 Private
- -
School accreditation Not accredited ref
- -
A 1.13
3.60 B
4.47 5.70
C 3.69
4.60 There was a school library
Yes 2.86
4.20 No
- -
The school had a source of electricity
No ref -
- Yes, but not functioning today
2.67 4.90
Yes, and functioning today 2.11
4.30 School had clean water
source Yes
3.67 5.60
No -
- There was a reading
corner where students could borrow and read
books Yes
3.39 5.30
No -
- Constant
1.69 1.60
ref : signifies the reference group : indicates statistical significance at the .05 level
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4.9 The Overall Impact of SSME Dimensions on EGRA Results
This baseline study analyzed the aggregate impact of all dimensions of SSME, namely students, parents, teachers, head teachers, as well as school and classroom characteristics on the EGRA
results. All of the variables that had a significant impact on the ORF score and reading comprehension were simultaneously integrated into a model. The results are presented in
Table 4.33. From the overall model, it could be concluded that there were 12 factors that contributed significantly to the ORF and reading comprehe
nsion, namely: district, student’s grade, student’s language, mother’s literacy, parents’ income, parents’ education, teacher’s
academic qualifications, seating arrangement, reading book availability, school type public vs. private and its accreditation, and library availability. These factors provided an expected
increase of more than 5 words per minute in the ORF and more than a 5 increase of correct answers in the reading comprehension.
SSME Category
Indicator ORF
Wordsminute Reading
Comprehension Correct
Classroom How the students were
seated Students seated classically ref
- -
Students seated in small groups 1.94
1.30 Students seated in pairs
0.46 3.00
Students seated in U formation 6.22
10.90 Others
-2.48 -3.70
Booksbooklets other than textbooks were available and
accessible not locked away for children to read
None ref -
- 1
– 9 1.48
2.50 10
– 19 8.59
11.10 20
– 39 8.72
15.00 More than 40
9.96 12.90
Students’ work was displayed on the walls
Yes 3.64
6.20 No
- -
Constant 6.05
9.30 ref : signifies the reference group
: indicates statistical significance at the .05 level
