Reading comprehension activity for advanced esl students.

1. READING COMPREHENSION. ADVANCED LEVEL. FIRST YEAR
Learning to Multitask: Simultaneous Reading and Writing
Classic attentional training study hints at our considerable potential to multitask.
The mind has a remarkable ability to focus attention on just one voice from a chorus. But what
about spreading our attention across different types of tasks? A classic 1976 study which
taught two people to read and write at the same time hints at our considerable potential to
multitask.
Professor Elizabeth Spelke and colleagues at Cornell University wanted to know whether we
can really divide our conscious attention between two demanding tasks, like reading and
writing. To find out they recruited two participants willing to put in 29 hours of practice over a
6 week period: Diane and John were their volunteers (Spelke, Hirst & Neisser, 1976).
Before the training Diane and John's normal reading and comprehension rates were measured,
so it could be compared with post-training. Then Spelke and colleagues set about their three-
phase training regime.
Phase 1: Simultaneous reading and writing.
The first step was to get Diane and John reading and writing at the same time. To do this they
read short stories by authors like Katherine Mansfield at the same time as writing down a list
of words being dictated to them. Afterwards the experimenters checked their story
comprehension and memory for the list of words. This procedure was continued throughout
all three phases of the study.
Naturally when Diane and John first tried to multitask their reading speed, comprehension and
memory all deteriorated. But surprisingly, after six weeks, they could read just as fast and with
the same level of comprehension whether or not they were also taking dictation at the same
time. They also often recognised more than two-thirds of the dictated words.
There is a problem with this study so far though: it's possible that Diane and John weren't
really multitasking but had just learnt to take dictation automatically and unconsciously.
Spelke and colleagues knew they had to push Diane and John harder.
Phase 2: Detecting structured sub-lists
Over the next few weeks Spelke and colleagues tested Diane and John's higher-level
awareness of the dictated lists. Instead of dictating relatively unrelated words, patterns were
now surreptitiously inserted into the lists, sometimes whole sentences.
Mª Jesús García San Martín. Adapted from http://www.spring.org.uk/2009/03/learning-to- 1
multitask-simultaneous-reading-and-writing.php

2. READING COMPREHENSION. ADVANCED LEVEL. FIRST YEAR
Without forewarning Diane and John found these difficult to spot, but once told to search for
the patterns they started noticing rhymes, categories of words and even sentences. Although
still missing a few, they did spot many of the patterns the experimenters hid in the sub-lists.
Remember that this is all at the same time as reading an unrelated story at their normal speed
and level of comprehension. In this second phase the participants' multitasking is even more
impressive and it's harder to argue that the dictation has become automatic and unconscious
because Diane and John could spot many of the patterns.
Phase 3: Reading while categorising words
In the third and final phase Diane and John were asked to just write down the category to
which the words belonged rather than the words themselves. Again, their reading speed
initially dropped when they were given this new task, but soon, with practice, it was back up to
its original level.
After the 16 weeks of the study it seemed that both Diane and John could categorise lists of
words and write down the name of the category at the same time as reading, and
understanding, a sophisticated and completely unrelated short story.
Not only that but their reading speed and comprehension of the short story was unaffected
compared with their pre-training tests. Quite an impressive feat of attention!
What does this mean?
Not everyone accepts that what Diane and John were doing was really multitasking. Here are
some of the objections:
• One of the tasks became automatic and therefore unconscious.
• Similarly, people have complained the tasks weren't hard enough: reading and writing
are already highly practised skills.
• Diane and John were learning to switch their attention from one task to the other very
quickly, not focus on both at the same time.
• Two people is a very small sample size!
These are all good points, but ultimately there's still an impressive human performance here
that requires explanation. Whether or not Diane and John were really multitasking, the
research certainly implies that we can train our attention to carry out two sophisticated tasks
which require conscious deliberation at the same time.
This is more than just simultaneously talking and driving, or patting the head while rubbing the
stomach: both reading and writing involve relatively deep processing of similar types of
linguistic information. Spelke and colleagues were clearly very impressed with Diane and
Mª Jesús García San Martín. Adapted from http://www.spring.org.uk/2009/03/learning-to- 2
multitask-simultaneous-reading-and-writing.php

3. READING COMPREHENSION. ADVANCED LEVEL. FIRST YEAR
John's new abilities and they suggest there may be no limits to training human attention,
perhaps even no limits to our general cognitive capacity. All we need is some creativity along
with plenty of time and practice.
Comprehension questions
1. The experiment consisted of testing
a. Conscientious attention
b. The level of conscience while sleeping
c. Conscious attention while awake
2. The research took almost
a. A month
b. two months
c. a year
3. The beginning of the study was
a. successful
b. spoiled
c. a failure
4. At the end of the first stage the volunteers could remember … dictated words
a. All the
b. Most
c. Less than half of the
5. Was the first stage enough for the researchers?
a. No, the evidence was not crystal clear
b. No, the volunteers had been pushed too far
c. No, the dictation was clearly too easy
6. In the second stage, the volunteers could write down dictated sentences at the same
time as they read a
a. related novel
b. totally different short story
c. topic-based rhyme
7. After the third phase the volunteers’ level of reading and understanding was
a. Compared to the tests carried out before stage one
b. Affected by the categories they had to read and write
c. Notoriously deteriorated because of multi-tasking
8. The three-stage experiment …
a. Is widely recognized as multitasking
b. Isn’t accepted as multitasking at all
c. Is somehow rejected as full multitasking
9. A test sample should …
a. consist of two thousand people
b. cover over three tasks
c. engage a larger group of individuals
Mª Jesús García San Martín. Adapted from http://www.spring.org.uk/2009/03/learning-to- 3
multitask-simultaneous-reading-and-writing.php

4. READING COMPREHENSION. ADVANCED LEVEL. FIRST YEAR
10. One conclusion drawn from the research clearly suggests that human
a. conscious attention is limited
b. attention can be trained
c. innate abilities are reading and writing
Mª Jesús García San Martín. Adapted from http://www.spring.org.uk/2009/03/learning-to- 4
multitask-simultaneous-reading-and-writing.php