British Council Teaching English: How and Why of Graded Readers
•Download as PPTX, PDF•
1 like•819 views
Online talk given for British Council. There is a recording of the talk here: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/victoria-boobyer-a-why-how-graded-readers
Recommended
More Related Content
What's hot
What's hot (20)
Similar to British Council Teaching English: How and Why of Graded Readers
Similar to British Council Teaching English: How and Why of Graded Readers (20)
More from Victoria Boobyer
More from Victoria Boobyer (11)
Recently uploaded
Recently uploaded (20)
British Council Teaching English: How and Why of Graded Readers
- 1. A how and why of graded readers Victoria Boobyer
- 2. Contents • Definitions (Graded readers, Extensive & Expansive Reading) • Theory - Extensive Reading (ER) • Practice - Extensive Reading (ER) • Theory - Expansive Reading • Practice - Expansive Reading • Further Reading / Information
- 3. Graded Reading What’s graded? Vocabulary, grammar complexity, number of words. What is not graded? Theme. i.e. You can have graded readers for CEFR A2 level with adult themes.
- 4. Extensive Reading “Extensive reading in a foreign language asks learners to read a lot of easy, interesting books.” www.ERFoundation.org
- 5. Expansive Reading “…a reading text becomes a springboard to improve language skills and to explore historical background, cultural connections and other topics suggested by the text.” Black Cat Guide to Graded Readers Updated edition http://www.blackcat-cideb.com/2-english-catalogue
- 6. Extensive Reading? “Perhaps the most important principle of ER is that that the students read for overall understanding and pleasure.” … https://theotherthingsmatter.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/met-jan15-keegan_stein.pdf Phil Keegan in Keegan, P and Stein, K ‘Extensive Reading in Theory and in Practice” Modern English Teacher, 2015 Vol 24, i. p52
- 7. https://theotherthingsmatter.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/met-jan15-keegan_stein.pdf “However, I feel strongly that follow-up tasks and extensio n activities have considerable value, as long as they do n ot in any way resemble an exam.” Phil Keegan in Keegan, P and Stein, K ‘Extensive Reading in Theory and in Practice” Modern English Teacher, 2015 Vol 24, i. p52 Extensive Reading?
- 8. https://theotherthingsmatter.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/met-jan15-keegan_stein.pdf “…tests and comprehension questions have no place on an ER programme, but … extension activities, especiall y creative ones, most definitely do.” Kevin Stein in Keegan, P and Stein, K ‘Extensive Reading in Theory and in Practice” Modern English Teacher, 2015 Vol 24, i. p52 Extensive Reading?
- 11. Why?
- 13. Now, imagine doing that and picking up a dictionary once or twice in the middle to look up words that you don’t know the meaning of.
- 15. “What is interesting is that our participants felt that reading helped their oral / aural language proficiency. Books like [these] contain a great deal of colloquial language that learners with mostly formal language instruction experience have missed.” Cho, K and Krashen,S Cho, K.-S., & Krashen, S. D. (1994). Acquisition of vocabulary from the Sweet Valley Kids series: Adult ESL acquisition. Journal of Reading, 37(8), 662-667.
- 16. “So I believe that ER impacts writing, listening and speaking because students know more vocabulary. The second possible factor is the increase in positive affect. Students develop positive attitudes toward and increased motivation for learning the L2.” Day, R The Benefits of Extensive Reading (ER): Prof Richard R Day http://goo.gl/7tjHPz
- 17. Practical ER ideas for language organizations and teachers
- 19. Practical ER ideas for language organizations and teachers A Community of Readers. McCollister, M 2014 The Round
- 20. Expansive Reading “…a reading text becomes a springboard to improve language skills and to explore historical background, cultural connections and other topics suggested by the text.” Black Cat Guide to Graded Readers Updated edition http://www.blackcat-cideb.com/2-english-catalogue
- 23. Different types of writing Genre - newspaper report, leaflet, summary, diary, letter, screenplay, text messages, cartoon (reduced / augmented) Style - sensationalist, modern, informal, formal Transvocalisation - first person to third person etc. Characters - change to modern celebrities, classmates Plot - change the ending, add a twist
- 24. • SMS
- 25. • Comic strip Background image: Sherlock Holmes Stories. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Black Cat 2013
- 26. Different types of speaking TV / radio drama Talk show TV / Radio advert for the book / film Phone conversation between characters
- 27. Different types of speaking News report
- 28. Different types of speaking • Potential to integrate technology. Student within a book. Background image: The Enormous Turnip. Hobart, R Black Cat 2013
- 31. Reading Circles: Geoffrey Chaucer: Canterbury Tales Read Chaucer and Chaucer’s world together. Develop interest. Read ‘Prologue’ together Discuss and assign stories and roles Read and prepare for homework Group discussion and presentation
- 32. Teacher resources on publisher websites http://goo.gl/B4p0Xq http://goo.gl/498rMy http://goo.gl/5bqbtGb
- 33. Further reading: • Bringing extensive reading to the classroom: A practical guide to introducing extensive reading and its benefits to the learner. Day R et al. 2010 Oxford • Extensive Reading in the Second Language Classroom. Day R and Bamford, J 1998 CUP • Extensive reading in theory and in practice Keegan P and Stein K Modern English Teacher 2015 Vol 24,1. pp52-52 • A Community of Readers. McCollister M 2014 The Round • Black cat CIDEB • Oxford OUP • Richmond • www.ERFoundation.org http://goo.gl/B4p0Xq http://goo.gl/498rMy http://goo.gl/5bqbtGb
Editor's Notes
- Thanks for coming along and thanks to Paul Braddock for inviting me. To make it more interactive, I’ll talk and sometimes ask for responses in the text chat box. Time for questions at the end… hopefully as we go along some of you can answer each other’s questions as we al have different experiences of working with graded readers. I’ll be posting links in the chat box along the way and you can always contact me as well… my email at the end. I’ve written one graded reader, written activities for others. Worked with graded readers as a teacher and AM.
- Briefly, this is how I’ve set out the webinar today… You’ll see immediately that based on this the title is wrong and it should be ‘a why and how of graded readers’ rather than ‘how and why’. This is because ‘How’ we use them depends on ‘why’ we are using them…what are we trying to achieve by having our students reading these books.
- First definition… ‘Graded reading’ … and graded readers. Different genres… different types of fiction, classic fiction abridged, factual books, (graded magazines, online reading)…paper based and digital. The focus here is graded readers
- This next bit (definition of extensive reading) has caused me a lot of grief…not only for these talks but also as a teacher. We briefly glance at ER in CELTA level courses and quickly glance again at diploma level. Left with some vague idea that it’s reading a whole book for enjoyment rather than, as Jeremy Harmer and Scott Thornbury both advocate, ‘exploiting’ the reading text for language input. Or, as my students and I used to call it “doing a reading to death” in class. But what, exactly is ER? simple but each of these elements is vital. a lot=Reinforce language gains. easy=focus of meaning, rather than decoding = fluent reader. enjoyable=want to read a lot more. Things that break this cycle…i.e. think going to have exam questions on it…or even write review etc. might change how you read. Take away enjoyment.
- Probably a lot more familiar to many of us… we ‘do’ a book in class. Have speaking or writing activities based on chapter one. Draw on themes of book. Examine characters. CLIL, ICT etc. integration. Oxford bookworms …Reading circles…to some extent though the focus remains more on the book…using for speaking and writing production… rather than picking up a book, reading it and then picking up another one. Trouble (as always with definitions)… Chatting with Marcos Benevides about this… the term ‘expansive’ is interesting. We find that the term is a little too close too extensive and also implies that the opposite in ‘narrow’ – which isn’t the case. The idea is that the book is a ‘springboard’ in class to something else. Maybe other reading, maybe a focus on different skills. After some discussion Marcos came up with what we think is a better term… Expanded Reading. “It encapsulates the idea of a broader focus beyond reading.” We’re going to keep saying it in the hope that it will become the more-commonly used term. On the whole, that seems fairly clear…but not at all..
- Yes… this is similar to ERF definition earlier …of a lot of easy for enjoyment. but Phil continues to say
- …
- and his co-author Kevin Stein also writes… Now… I would argue that this means it’s not ER… extension activities (no matter how fun and creative) are going to stop the reading of the graded reader being reading for pleasure. Maybe not as quick as trying to focus on what might be useful in the task that follows, maybe added anxiety that might miss something. I’d say this isn’t extensive reading… Why is this important? Because as soon as you add this activity that ‘breaks’ the enjoyment, slows the reading or makes it a chore (no matter how fun or creative the activity is) then it’s not going to be extensive reading … Richard Day would say it’s no longer read, read and read. NOW VERY IMPORTANT here to say that I’m an advocate of both uses and those activities are pedagogically sound…useful and it’s a great way of drawing skills together but if you confuse the two… you’ll end up with something that isn’t Extensive reading.
- Why else is this important? Graded readers are written for different purposes. If you want to use graded readers in class for expansive reading… that is links to culture, exam-type activities etc.. then more likely to use something like black cat readers with lots of tasks integrated. They have a mountain of support on their website too with activities etc.. With other graded readers like the Richmond Mazes on the left, the authors and editorial team made a conscious decision NOT to have tasks integrated within the books. The stories are for reading pleasure. These have business English language embedded within them as they’re set in a variety of business environments but the idea is that you read them again and again with different outcomes and earn rewards etc. as you go. These choose-your-own-adventure books are perfect example of graded readers for pleasure …they’re easy and exciting. The Atama-ii books are another example. But not have to be choose your own adventure…just enjoyable graded reader and LOTS of really exceptionally well-written books in variety of genres.
- So… moving on to look at ER in more detail. The basic principles are set out in this document which is on the ERFoundation website.
- When you read them, you can see how it differs from the expansive ‘springboard’ reading. If they don’t like a book… put it back and start another. Just as we would in L1. If we focus on the material having to be easy and enjoyable… this is necessary for reading to be fast.
- As it’s a cycle…you can see that you need all the elements to be in place for it to work and if add tasks and creative activities throughout the story then jeopardise the whole cycle. Why have an ER programme? Apart from helping to embed past language gains through repeated exposure to known vocabulary and grammar structures – start to build greater bank of what language goes with what.
- 1994 Journal of reading. Kyung-Sook Cho Stephen Krashen. 4 participants showed Vocabulary increased but also oO speaking and listening improved to. Other studies show writing improved.
- How other skills improve? Prof Richard R Day - SLA and ESL lecturer
- So, we’re convinced… we’d like to create an ER program in our institution. What next? HOW do we do it? Advice: …read and research first. What do you want for your institution? If you have a clear idea, it’s more likely to work.
- What to read? How students choose books to read independently. …Go to ERFoundation website and look at their toolkit... Lots of advice and resources… …get a catalogue of graded readers from the publishers, get any information you can. Ask for deals. Often say class sets are cheaper but what if you buy ‘a variety pack’ of ten or more? …read the books yourself, so that (a) lead by example and (b) if a student asks you whether you would recommend it or just wants to chat about it, then you have answers.
- -Look at Michael McCollister’s Community of Readers (series of interviews with ER scholars and practitioners). Read Bringing extensive reading to the classroom: A practical guide to introducing extensive reading and its benefits to the learner. Day et al. As I said before…if you know why you’re doing it…more likely to know how to do it. …talk to others. Ask about in groups in social media, try to find an institution like your own. …Marcos Benevides… ask students to donate books when they’ve finished with them. In UK, maybe when returning home don’t want to take books or (hopefully) they’ve moved on to different levels. …very different in an institution in UK (where average student stay is about 3 weeks) to an institution in Korea or Japan with long semesters of settled students. We may read about these grand programs and they seem to have little relevance to our situations… but Encourage to read one book in that time? Make sure mention properly in the student’s induction, not just drift by library door. While there are other out of hours activities going on, at some time have a student-run book club…where can read and chat about books if want.
- If we want to integrate graded readers into class… can still have silent reading time in class. Not necessarily read at home, productive skills in class…
- Transposition - synonyms, sentence structure, embellishment, characters (people) How can we use graded readers in this way? Well, firstly we can see what materials are already in the book or accompany it? Then one of the most popular ways of using graded readers ‘as a springboard’ in classrooms. Can anyone read and guess what Mr Peacham was describing in 1577?
- In this type of activity the focal skill may change from reading to something else (writing or speaking) but it may return to reading later and if this type of task is done in the middle of a reading…it’s important not to lose sight of the reading and return enthusiastically to it.
- We can change the reading into… different types of writing by altering… -Remember the aim. Why are you doing this? Not just to make the reading fun! Making students more aware of language differences in specific genres in L2 that might not be there in L1, for example. Catherine Walter and Michael Swan dealing with specific linguistic features than make reading hard to decode… Transvocalisation…more obvious grammar Characters… all sorts of descriptive language Plot… storytelling / narrative writing skills
- Who’s David? This is a higher level story taken from David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. Great for checking relationship, comprehension, This might be at any stage…e.g. have a text message to recap on previously-read chapter:
- have pictures and add cartoon text to predict what’s going to happen.
- AGAIN, remember the aim… functional language in a casual phone conversation, expressing opinions in a talk show. Genre analysis for adverts. Hopefully the students are invested in the characters by now… get some real interesting discussions when Peter Pan is confronted by Wendy Darling’s father!
- News report with ‘bystanders’ people who found body etc. TV drama of whole book condensed Phone conversation. Information gaps. Delivering a news report about something that’s just happened. What do they think is going to happen next? Making predictions, hedging. Genre analysis.
- WITH marvels of technology can put a student (in form of a Tellagami character) in the book (by using picture of a book) and have the student describe what they can see, read what’s on the page and talk about how they feel. (Great exam practice for talking about feeling in … situation). Notice how I got The enormous turnip in there! Permission from Black Cat to use images from books like this.
- Built-in activities… speaking exam activity in the Frankenstein book… add to it by recording. Recording is great for pron work as the rehearsing stage becomes vital
- Can build webquests around the book/ author etc. before or after reading the story. I’ve used this one about the story behind the writing of Frankenstein as a pre-reading activity.
- Taken from Oxford Bookworms Reading Circles idea…Each student has a role (e.g. summarizer, word collector, culture collector) reads the stories and then regroup to share their insights…and in a book such as Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales it could work like this…
- There are hundreds more activities like this… a good place to start is publisher’s website…
- Nearly all the publishers have teacher or teacher and student resources. Downloadable PDF worksheets etc.. Black Cat has resources such as a guide for teaching with books, IWB, quizzes etc. Worth checking them out.