ASEAN LITERATURE: A READING COMPREHENSION WORKBOOK FOR GRADE 8 STUDENTS

This study entitled "ASEAN Literature: A Reading Comprehension Workbook for Grade 8 Students" used a Research and Development method adopted from Borg and Gall (1983). It identified the least difficult to the most difficult reading comprehension skills of Grade 8 students of General Santos City National High School, S.Y. 2020-2021 as based on the DEpEd K to 12 Curriculum Guide 2016. It developed a workbook using Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) literary texts to help improve the students reading comprehension skills. The researchers used the ranking tool that was adopted from Balitaan (2020) to identify the least to the most difficult skills in reading comprehension. The respondents were the seven (7) Grade 8 teachers. The result showed that the least difficult skill is "Determine tone, mood, technique, and purpose of the author" (68.15%); the less difficult is "Express appreciation for sensory image used" (65.71%); the more difficult skills are "Explain the literary devices used, Identify the distinguishing features of notable poems, short stories, dramas, and novels contributed by Southeast Asian writers, and Explain figurative language used" (60.00%); and the most difficult skill is Explain how selection may be influenced by culture, history, environment, or other factors (54.29%). Furthermore, the reading comprehension workbook was validated by the three (3) M.A validators using the evaluation tool adapted from Robles (2017) in terms of Acceptability, Appropriateness, Relevance, and Usability by three MA validators. The result showed that the ASEAN Literature: A Reading Comprehension Workbook for Grade 8 students has a "Very High Extent" validity.