Task formats to assess reading comprehension: A study on secondary school Turkish textbooks and Turkish teachers' preferences

The aim of this study is to comparatively examine the frequency and distribution of task types used to assess reading comprehension skills in Turkish language textbooks. Additionally, it seeks to identify the distribution of task types preferred by Turkish language teachers during the instructional process and to compare these findings. The study, which employs document analysis and a descriptive research design, includes as its sample four Turkish textbooks used at the fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth grade levels, and as participants, 347 Turkish language teachers. Data were collected using a questionnaire designed to identify task types used to evaluate reading comprehension. The data were analyzed based on content analysis principles and categorized under nineteen theoretical categories. The data were then processed using a statistical software program for further analysis. According to the findings, the most frequently used task types in reading comprehension activities across the four textbooks were open-ended and short-answer questions, while tasks such as inferential operations, eliminating unnecessary words, textual gap-filling, error detection, and visual creation instructions were not included. Results from the z-test indicated significant differences among the textbooks in terms of the proportions of task types such as gap-filling, C-test, short-answer questions, information transfer, multiple-choice items, matching, and two-component items. The survey also revealed that the most preferred task types by Turkish language teachers during instruction were, in descending order: open-ended questions, writing appropriate titles for paragraphs, multiplechoice items, information transfer, short-answer questions, summarization, and matching tasks. Keywords: Reading comprehension, task format, assessment and evaluation