A validation of the 'Naqra u Nifhem' Reading Comprehension Test (TL1)

Abstract

This dissertation deals primarily with children's reading literacy achievements in Year levels 2, 4 and 6 of local primary schools, with the subtleties of two perspectives of literacy: reading comprehension and single word reading. This study serves to validate the 'Naqra u Nifhem' Reading Comprehension Test (TL1) against the one other widely used literacy test in Maltese, the Maltese Word-Reading Test (Bartolo, 1988). A comparative analysis between these two standardised measures of assessment was carried out with the intent of validating the 'Naqra u Nifhem' (TL1). Following this first step of validation, the two tests were then correlated to a measure of children's achievement in their respective Maltese Annual Examinations for Years 4 and 6. The research approach adopted in this dissertation constitutes a bibliographic search of relevant literature and a quantitative research design which required the conduction of standardised tests exclusively, with a sample size of around six hundred participants from the three local sectors. The findings of this research study provide evidence that the 'Naqra u Nifhem' (TL1) correlates with the Annual and Benchmark Examinations and that it does not discriminate against pupils of any gender or coming from any of the three school sectors. These results attest to the concurrent validity of the 'Naqra u Nifhem' (TL1) as it can now be considered a valid and an internally reliable assessment measure of Maltese reading literacy. In light of this validation, some recommendations for further research are also presented in this dissertation.