Reading comprehension problems among Ontario Francophone students in initial teacher training

To understand a textual document, whatever the medium used, it is not enough to know how to decode a series of words; it is still necessary to correctly grasp the general meaning of the document. The act of reading encompasses two components: word recognition and comprehension. In a minority francophone context, especially for students in initial teacher training, reading and correctly understanding the meaning of texts in French can be a difficult task. Yet, these future teachers will have to assess their students’ French reading comprehension when they are in French schools in Ontario. The objective of this article is to determine the degree of reading comprehension shown by students in initial teacher education in minority Francophone communities in Ontario by testing a reading comprehension diagnostic tool. Preliminary results show that these students have more difficulty with issues related to reading-related integration processes and macroprocesses. This article will also discuss the average obtained by all participants for the five texts read, questions that received the fewest correct answers according to category and the limitations of the study.