The level of English comprehension at year 4 in a state and a church school class

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the level of competence in English comprehension at year 4 level. The study was carried out with thirty-eight year 4 children in a girls' Church school and in a State school. The main objective was to determine the level of comprehension skills of the sample. The study was carried out between April 2007 and June 2007. A structured interview was administered to the sample to provide information about their level of competence. The Sentence Comprehension Test (SCT) was conducted to assess their ability to understand various language forms. The results indicated that home background of the sample influenced proficiency in the language, Maltese interfered with English competence, and most of the sample from the Church school used correct syntax while most children from the State school used fragmented syntax structures which resulted in frequent code-switching.