FINAL ASSIGNMENT ELT METHODOLOGY

NAME : Erson Efendi

NPM : A1B007019
AN EFFECTIVE WAY TO TEACHING READING AT SENIOR
HIGH SCHOOL
Background
Reading is the fundamental skill upon which all formal education
depends. Research now shows that a child who doesnt learn the reading basics
early is unlikely to learn them at all. Any child who doesnt learn to read early
and well will not easily master other skills and knowledge, and is unlikely to ever
flourish in school or in life.
Low reading achievement, more than any other factor, is the root cause of
chronically low-performing schools, which harm students and contribute to the
loss of public confidence in our school system. When many children dont learn
to read, the public schools cannot and will not be regarded as successfuland
efforts to dismantle them will proceed.
Like many other fields of knowledge, reading has undergone a tremendous
change during the last three decades. !his change is the fruit of innovative
theories of reading, which have come as a reaction against the views that claimed
that reading is a passive skill wherein readers do no more than assigning sounds
to letters and reinforcing grammatical structures. !he innovative theories say that
reading is an interactive process of communication between the writers
represented by the te"t and the reader with his prior knowledge. #n fact, the writer
encodes his message in the te"t$ the reader decodes this same te"t to get that.
%ur role, as teachers, is to provide the learners with the strategies that would
allow them to become efficient readers, to use &oodman's words, (readers who
rely on strategies that yield the most reliable predictions with minimum use of the
available information). #t is worth mentioning that the innovative models of
reading aim at making reading in the classroom similar to reading in real life.
When reading in the native language or in a second or foreign language in real
FINAL ASSIGNMENT ELT METHODOLOGY
life, we have a certain reason why we do so. We read things that interest us, not
for practicing a given structural item. %ur aims in reading usually go beyond mere
understanding. We may wish to understand something in order to learn from it
*studying+, find out how to act *instructions, directions+, or for many other
purposes.
The purpoe o! "h# ar"#c$e
!he purposes of this article were to provide the teacher about the aspects of
reading skill and strategies should be noticed by them before they are being
teaching reading skills to their students in the classroom.
E$e%en" o! Co%prehen#on
Reading means reading and understanding. !he purpose of reading is to
connect the ideas on the page to what you already know. #f you don't know
anything about a sub,ect, then pouring words of te"t into your mind is like
pouring water into your hand. -ou don't retain much.
.lements of understanding/
Analysis/ the result of this process is the perception of the meaning of a
sentence.
#nference-making/ it is the process of making best guess about what the
speaker meant, apart from what he said e"plicitly.
.vent-connection/ we attempt to find out if the new input we have received
fits with any beliefs, contradictory facts, or other information that will help to
e"plain or connect together the new event of which we have ,ust been
informed.
0rediction and generation/ to postulate a set of possible plan.
&oal tracking/ to try to figure out, why someone wants to do something.
!hematic relationships/ to know about the te"t topic before hand.
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1eliefs/ these beliefs are very much a part of how we understand and thus of
how we read.
Accessing and utili2ing raw facts/ simple facts about the world, without that it
would be hard to understand a te"t or story.
Read#ng Sk#$$
A teacher should select activities suitable for promoting reading as a skill in
its own right, and which involve various different sub- skills. We need to isolate
them and understand each one. !he following are some of the main reading skills
re3uired by the pupil/
Word recognition
4peed-reading
4kimming
4canning
0rediction and generation
4ummari2ing
Anticipation
#nference
Analysis
Fac"or H#nder#ng Read#ng Co%prehen#on
Reading comprehension fails for a number of reasons. 4tudents should attempt to
identify the causes of lack of comprehension and then identify appropriate reading
strategies to compensate for the deficits. !he following are the main factors that
reduce the reading rate/
Limited perceptual span
4low perceptual reaction time
5ocali2ation
6aulty eye movement
Regression * habitual 7 habits of
concentration +
6aulty attention and
concentration habits
4uppressing reading rate
Lack of practice
Lack of interest
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0oor evaluation of important and
less important parts
reasonable Wholesome
remembering rather than
selective remembering
4ome factors are related to the readers habits while others are te"t related. !he
following tables show which factors are te"t-related and which are reader-related.
&' Reader(re$a"ed !ac"or
&ood or mature readers 1ad or immature readers
1efore
reading
activate prior knowledge
understand task and set
purpose
choose appropriate
strategies
start reading
without
preparation
read without
knowing why
read without
considering how to
approach the
material
8uring
reading
focus attention
anticipate and predict
use fi"-up strategies when
lack of understanding
occurs
use conte"tual analysis to
understand new terns
use te"t structure to assist
comprehension
organi2e and integrate new
information
easily distracted
read to get done
does not know
what to do when
lack of
understanding
occurs
do not recogni2e
important le"ical
items
do not see any
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organi2ation
do not reali2e they
do not understand
After
reading
reflect on what was read
feel success is a result of
effort
summari2e ma,or ideas
seek additional information
from other 4ources
stop reading and
thinking
feel success is a
result of luck
)' Te*"(re$a"ed !ac"or
.fficient #nefficient
language 9omprehensible to the learners. !oo difficult for learners'
level.
9ontent Accessible, learners know
enough about it to apply prior
knowledge
!oo difficult, too far
removed from the learners'
knowledge and e"perience.
#ncomprehensible
vocabulary
!he reader takes it in his stride,
guessing from conte"t, ignores
and manages without, uses
dictionary only when these
strategies are insufficient.
9annot tolerate them, looks
up everyone in a dictionary,
discouraged from trying to
understand the te"t as a
whole.
T+pe o! Read#ng
Learners should be e"posed to the different types of reading. %ur aim is to create
readers so as to enable them to read in real life. We should provide our learners with a
variety of different te"ts and reading tasks and encourage them e"plicitly to use
different strategies.
4ituation !e"t !ype Reading !ype
#nstructions #nstruction 6ocus on main verbs
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Letter :arrative - informative 4emi-close reading
Advertisement 8escriptive Reading for gist
:ewspaper :arrative - e"position 4kim-scan
!imetable table !arget info- scan
;enu list 4kim- scan
#nvitation 4emi-table 4can
Report ."position 4can- evaluate
<eadlines Label #nterpret
!5 guide 4emi-table 4kim - scan
:otice #nstruction 4can - identify main points
Road names signs 4kim to check
!he most helpful thing we can do to improve learners' reading comprehension and
speed is to provide them with the opportunities to do as much *successful+ reading as
possible, including a varied diet of types of reading and 3uestions$ slow, fast,
skimming, scanning, inference, generation, analysis, and evaluation. !he aim is to
encourage automati2ation of recognition of common words or word-combinations,
this being in general the crucial contributory factor to reading comprehension and
speed.
In"ruc"#ona$ Techn#,ue
&etting learners to understand a simple te"t is only the beginning. Reading skills
need to be fostered so that learners can cope with more and more sophisticated te"ts
and tasks, and deal with them efficiently, 3uickly, appropriately and skillfully. #t is
our duty as teachers to provide appropriate teaching techni3ues, which may enable
our learners to gain these skills and use them efficiently as re3uired. #n this part, we
will tackle some of innovative teaching techni3ues that would be helpful in teaching
reading elements to our learners in schools.
&enerally, teachers introduce the topic of the te"t before hand and ask some
general 3uestions to arouse learners' interest. Learners read the 3uestions and then the
te"t to answer them. =nknown vocabulary is pre-taught before reading takes place.
Reading comprehension is not concerned only with teaching vocabulary items in
isolation or answering 3uestions for the sake of answering. Learners should learn
FINAL ASSIGNMENT ELT METHODOLOGY
vocabulary, add to their background knowledge of the topic tackled and learn to
think, to infer, to predict and to analy2e.
8ifferent techni3ues should be used by teachers to deal with reading te"ts, to
ensure the element of interest and motivation, and encourage learners to use different
strategies and skills, is webbing. !his techni3ue involves learners own perspectives in
creating interactions that gradually clarify targeted vocabulary may be a way to
combine direct teaching and incidental learning in one e"ercise.
!eachers can use learners personal e"periences to develop vocabulary through
informal activities such as brainstorming a list of words associated with a familiar
word, pooling their knowledge of a pertinent vocabulary item, etc. !his could be done
at the beginning of a reading lesson, where the teacher shows learners the title and
asks them to give the words that might appear in the te"t. !he title should help them
guess what the te"t will be about. After the words are written on the board, learners
split the words into groups, according to their connotation$ i.e. funny or sad,
associated with kindness or violence etc...
After that they are re3uested to compose their own stories based on the title given by
the teacher and the vocabulary list from the board. Later the te"t is read.
Conc$u#on
6rom a teacher's point of view the issue in the classroom usually revolves around
how to improve the learner's reading comprehension, whether it is in content area or
in the language arts. #t appears that different tasks should be used in a reading class to
enhance the skills and sub-skills which learners need ac3uire to be able to understand.
!he lack of motivation in learners during a reading lesson may be due, to a
reasonable e"tent, to the monotonous way in which teachers deal with reading te"ts.
!his generally consists of reading and carrying out the workbook tasks or answering
Wh- and true of false 3uestions. !hese tasks may neither develop the reading ability
of the learners nor prepare them to become independent readers. %n the contrary, they
may make them believe that the ultimate ob,ective of reading is answering 3uestions
and getting good marks in tests. All these things re3uire more preparation on the part
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of the teacher. We should stop hiding behind the unwillingness and the weakness of
the pupils because we are responsible to a certain degree for the reluctance of our
learners and their being at loss.
!aking all the material that has been presented in this workshop into
consideration$ we would come to an agreement that there is a ceiling below which
language deficiencies hinder understanding. We would also agree that a reader whose
general knowledge repertoire is too low, or whose culture is very different from that
underlying the te"t would face great problems in understanding them. !his implies
that we should aim at making our learners gain a good linguistic repertoire. We
should encourage them to seek general information if we really want to form efficient
readers.
References
;c>eachie, W. ?. *@AAA+ Teaching tips: Strategies, research and theory for college
and ni!ersity teachers, 1oston/ <oughton ;ifflin.
Wilhite, 4. *@ABC+. 0repassage 3uestions/ !he influence of structural importance.
"ornal of Edcational Psychology, DE*F+, FCG-FGG.
&raves, ;. 6., ?uel, 9., H &raves 1. 1. *@AAD+. Teaching reading in the t#enty$first
centry% 1oston/ Allyn H 1acon.
9arver, R. 0., H Leibert, R. .. *@AAE+. !he effect of reading library books at different
levels of difficulty upon gain in reading ability. &eading &esearch
'arterly, CI, FJ-GB.
&ersten, R., 6uchs, L. 4., Williams, ?. 0., H 1aker, 4. *FII@+. !eaching reading
comprehension strategies to students with learning disabilities/ A review of research.
&e!ie# of Edcational &esearch, 71*F+, FDA-CFI.
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