Enhancing Poetry Comprehension through the Reading Power Program: Students’ Perceptions and Learning Outcomes

Abstract

This study examined students’ perceptions of the Reading Power Program (RPP) and its effectiveness in enhancing poetry comprehension in English II among Grade X D students at Tang Central School. A mixed-methods explanatory sequential design was used. Quantitative data were collected from 31 students through a pretest, posttest, and structured perception survey, while qualitative data were gathered through semi-structured interviews. The intervention used the five RPP reading powers: Connect, Question, Visualize, Infer, and Transform. The poem “A Red Palm” by Gary Soto was used as the main instructional text. The findings showed an increase in students’ mean score from the pretest (M = 15.5, SD = 2.00) to the posttest (M = 17.8, SD = 1.33). A paired samples t-test indicated a statistically significant improvement, t(30) = 5.55, p < .001, with a large effect size (Cohen’s d = 0.997). Survey and interview findings further showed that students perceived RPP as engaging, helpful, and useful for understanding difficult poetic ideas. Although constrained by a small sample, single class and brief intervention duration, the study suggests that RPP implementation was associated with active reading, deeper interpretation, increased confidence, and improved poetry comprehension.