“We are
not trying to put something in his head,
but
instead we are trying to get him to take it in himself.”
(Nuttall)
Aims: (1) to
help learners to independence
in their private reading.
(2) to
achieve functional literacy i.e.
to show our learners that being literate is part of day-to-day life
in a personal and social sense.
- KNOWLEDGE OF READING
1. Definition: (a) the process by which an actual
reader and writer engage in a discourse in a context where the onus
is on the reader to approximate to the intended meanings of the
writer. (b) what the reader does in order to integrate the text into
their real world and make sense of it within their own knowledge,
interests and needs.
2. Applying L1 higher-order strategies knowledge to the
new language involves admitting and encouraging risk-taking
strategies as READING IS COMMUNICATION.
3. COMPREHENSION =
what the reader does in order to integrate the text into their real
world and make sense of it within their own knowledge, interests and
needs.
3. The TOP-DOWN model of Reading trying to show the
psycholinguistic processes involved in reading and the complex
relationships between Reader and Text as a backward and forward
process that may require many reversals and revisions before the
final message is extracted and committed to the long-term memory.
writer
text
initial
text interim text (task environment: reader’s
purpose)
graphological
processing
linguistic
processing(reader’s short-term memory)
semantic processing
draft text final text
knowledge of topic and world
knowledge of text plans
knowledge of writer
Stanovich(1980)
proposes an interactive-compensatory model:
readers process texts by utilizing information provided
simultaneously from several different sources and that they can
compensate for deficiencies at one level by drawing on knowledge at
other (either higher or lower) levels(i.e. phonological, lexical,
syntactic, semantic and discoursal knowledge).
- KNOWLEDGE ABOUT TEACHING READING
1. The
nature of Reading Difficulties
1.1 Decoding
stage: greater or less depending on the
degree of correspondence between L1 and L2.
1.2 Encoding
stage: relate to: text, topic, purpose.
2. What
can be taught?
2.1 SKILLS:
lower-order approaches i.e. enable readers to use the strategies.
2.2
STRATEGIES: higher-order approaches: give the reader independence.
Examples of
Skills and Strategies: Word-attack/ use of grammatical context/
understanding significance of cohesion devicescontext-deduction
strategy;
Distinguishing
main ideas from supporting detail, identifying topic sentences
skimming
3. How can
Reading be taught?
NB. As
Reading is communication
the Reading lesson must be very active and
full of discussion and cooperation through
a wide variety and grading of:
3.1 texts
(authentic whenever possible)
3.2 topics
3.2 tasks
4.
Training/helping Ss with Prediction
= giving a ‘springboard’ to their understanding (in point of
content, direction of story, mood, vocabulary, grammar)
5.
Comprehension and Prediction Ideas
6. Qualities
of the reading class: interactive, stimulating, challenging,
providing a sense of security we all need before we will take risks.
Some
Truisms:
- A person learns to read by reading
- Teaching Reading Skills can mean teaching deliberate attack strategies.
- Reading is much more than decoding a text, figuring out a message. It is interacting with a text, synthesizing ideas, drawing conclusions, forming new ideas.
Process
Skills List
Observing:
recognizing, identifying, listening, isolating, and discriminating.
Predicting:
anticipating, choosing, supplying, broadening, focusing, judging,
assessing, and surveying.
Classifying:
listing, sorting, distinguishing, naming, labelling, arranging,
organizing.
Inferring:
applying, associating, connecting, linking, matching, weighing,
discarding, rearranging.
Analyzing:
questioning, considering, inquiring, pondering, exploring, parsing,
reassembling, and criticizing.
Communicating:
demonstrating, following directions, explaining, pronouncing,
discussing.
Interpretation:
decoding, relating, drawing conclusions, generalizing, specifying,
organizing, cataloguing.
- CLASSROOM OBSERVATION: READING
1. What do
you think were the objectives of the reading lesson i.e. what reading
sub-skills
were being developed/practised?
2. How was
the reading lesson set up? Which of the following types of activity
were
present
and what did they consist of?
a)
pre-reading task(s)
b)
while-reading task(s)
c)
post-listening task(s)
3. How did
the teacher deal with any learner difficulties in understanding the
text?
(e.g. give
explanation, tell them to use dictionaries, etc.)
4. Do you
think all the learners achieved what they were required to do with
the text?
If so,
why? If not, why not?
5. What in
your opinion, were
a) the
good features of the lesson?
b) the
weak features of the lesson?
Post-lesson
reflection
Was this
reading lesson different from the way you approach reading in your
own classes?
If so, what
were the differences?
- Reflection as Exercise:
- Make a list of prediction ideas that may give students a ‘springboard’ to their understanding of a text.
- State the main difference between the following strategies of ensuring comprehension:
Ordering
a sequence of pictures vs. reordering events
Mapping
it out vs. completing a document
Matching
vs. summarizing
- Throughout most teaching materials reading is viewed as a process involving three stages. Mention the stages and the corresponding reading strategies to be employed.
- How do you explain the two-fold role of the reading skill (integrating and integrated) in the process of teaching?
- Devise your own list of criteria for selecting text-types for both intensive and extensive reading.
- Look at Unit 1 Lesson 2 from Perspectives on English to find an illustration of how students are expected to access textual meaning, Starting from literal meaning (ex.II.2; Ex.III.1a; ex.III.1b; ex.III.1c; ex.III.1d) through type of text (ex.III.2a) to text assessment/ evaluation (ex.III.2b; ex.IV.1; ex.IV.2a; ex.IV.2b; ex.IV.2c; ex.IV.2d; ex.IV.3, students are put in charge of their own building sense out of the text. Reflect upon your own training for becoming the competent readers you are. Any differences/similarities?
- Go through the series Pathway to English (5-8) and devise a list with exercises dealing with direct reference or understanding literal meaning of the text.
- Go through the series Pathway to English (9-12) and devise a list with exercises dealing with indirect reference/ meta-content information from a text.
- Choose a lesson from any textbook in use and devise a possible scenario for giving students practice in intensive reading. Mention level, age, and number of students.
- Mention all the books you have read this month.