Gladly Reading: Using Witte’s Literary Competency Levels in the English Language Classroom to Promote Autonomy, Motivation and Competency; exploratory research in VWO4

Abstract

This Master thesis is an attempt to translate Witte’s literary competency level to the EFL classroom, in order to promote autonomy, motivation and competency. First, the problematic state of English literature teaching in The Netherlands is explored, followed by a discussion of Witte’s competency levels as a possible solution to these problems. Exploratory research was carried out to figure out whether the competency levels could be transferred to the English language classroom; a lesson series was developed according to Witte’s methods, where students had to work with his literary competency levels and were asked to read a book and make exercises. During the process, students were told to reflect on their progress. The competency levels were indeed transferable, though from the results of the research it is not unilaterally clear that the students’ sense of competency has increased greatly. Possible reasons for this are the limited length of the study, and the transparency of the learning process for students, making them more insecure about potential progress. Recommendations are given for further research, but the author is cautiously optimistic about the general results, since motivation and autonomy were generally perceived by students to be much greater than in their previous experience. Therefore it is recommended that a catalogue of English books, in accordance with Witte’s levels of competency and like that on the Lezen voor de Lijst website, is made to complement the Dutch and German one already available.