Student perceptions of an online extensive reading platform

Extensive reading (ER) has been shown to have a number of positive effects for learning a foreign language. Improvements in vocabulary size, reading fluency and comprehension, and grammatical accuracy are just some of the outcomes of extensive reading programs. Since 2011, extensive reading at Sojo University has been carried out through the use of graded readers, typically in the form of physical books made available to students either in class or through the Self-Access Learning Center (SALC). Recently, the popularity of reading texts in digital format has increased with the universal ownership of portable devices such as smartphones, tablets, and lightweight laptops. In April 2018, all second-year students at Sojo University were required to purchase a subscription to the Xreading website (www.xreading.com), which offers hundreds of graded readers in digital format. This study examines student perceptions of this platform. A total of 730 second-year students participated in the study, and the results appear to indicate that students feel extensive reading in general is a worthwhile activity to help them improve their English, but that the digital format provided by Xreading is not necessarily an improvement over physical books