Reading in Another Language

1. READING
CHAPTER 9

2. •Reading is anything but passive as well. There
are of course , similarities between reading and
non interactive listening ( that is , listening to a
monologue, news broadcast, lecture, etc. Both
involve processing ideas generated by others that
are transmitted through language.

3. READING IN ANOTHER LANGUAGE
• Unlike speaking , reading is not something
that every individual learns to do. An
enormous amount of time, money, and effort is
to spent teaching reading in elementary and
secondary schools around the world.

4. READING PURPOSES AND STRATEGIES
•Take a few minutes to reflect on all of
the reading that you have done in last
of twenty- four hours.

5. MY 24- HOUR LIST OF READING TASKS
• London, San Francisco Sydney newspapers on the
world Wide Web.
• Countless e-mail messages.
• The South China Morning Post newspaper.
• A memo from a staff member.
• Several poems from a newly published collection by a
colleague.
• A Brazilian visa application form.
• Several academic texts.

6. •Pages proofs of a forthcoming listening text.
•The University bulletin for senior staff.
•A past issue of TESOL Matters.
•The telephone directory.
•The label on a bottle of wine.
•The final chapter of a novel.

7. SEVEN MAIN PURPOSE FOR READING
1. To obtain information for some purpose or because we are curious
about some topics.
2. To obtain instructions on how to perform some task for our work or
daily life.
3. To act in a play , play a game , do a puzzle.
4. To keep in touch with friends by correspondence or to understand
business letters.
5. To know when or where something will take place or what is available
.
6. To know what is happening or has happened . ( as reported in
newspapers, magazines, reports.
7.For enjoyment or excitement.

8. DIFFERENT TYPES OF READING THAT EXISTS.
•Receptive reading
•Reflective reading
•Skim reading
•Scanning

9. BOTTOM- UP AND TOP- DOWN APPROACHES
•The bottom- up approach views reading as a
process of decoding written symbols into their
aural equivalents in a linear fashion.
•The top-down approach is that learning to read
and reading fluently must necessarily involve
the same process.

10. SCHEMA THEORY
According to schema theory, the process of
interpretation is guided by the principle that
every input is mapped against some existing
schema and that all aspects of that schema
must be compatible with the input
information.

11. This principle results in two basic modes of information
processing, called bottom-up and top-down processing
Bottom-up processing is evoked by the incoming data; the
features of the data enter the system through the best
fitting, bottom-up schemata.
Schemata are hierarchically organized , from the most
general at the top to the most specific at the bottom.
Bottom-up processing is therefore called data driven.

12. Top-down processing, on the other hand, occurs as
the
system makes general predictions based on higher
level, general schemata and then searches the input
for
information to fit into these partially satisfied,
higher order schemata.
Top-down processing is , therefore, called
conceptually- driven.

13. THE TRANSFER HYPHOTHESIS
A reasonable working hypothesis in the area of
reading comprehension is that good readers in a first
language will be able to transfer their skills to the
second language. However ,it has been found at L1
reading proficiency.
Limited linguistic proficiency would appear to “short
circuit” the transfer of reading skills from one language
to another (Cziko 1978; Clarke, 1979).

14. CROSS-CULTURAL ASPECTS OF READING
COMPREHENSION
One line of research of particular interest to second language
teachers is that into the affect of background knowledge,
particularly cultural knowledge, on comprehension.
One of the best known studies is that by Steffensen (1981) who
compared the comprehension of readers from two different
cultural backgrounds, one group from North America, and one
group from India. She looked at the ability of her subjects to
recover meaning from two text , one describing a North American
wedding, and one describing an Indian wedding.

15. Richards concluded that the following principles capture
the essence of effective instruction
1. Instructional objectives are used to guide and organize
the lesson.
2. The teacher has the comprehensive theory of the nature of
reading in second language, and refers to this in planning his
teaching.
3. Class time is used for learning.
4. Instructional activities have a teaching rather than a testing
focus.

16. 5. Lessons have a clear structure.
6. A variety of different reading activities are used
during each lesson.
7.Classroom activities give students opportunities
to get feedback on their reading performance.
8. Instructional activities relate to real-world
reading purposes.
9. Instruction is learner-focused.

17. Task Types
 The “good "reader task
• DART(Directed related activities related to text) model
 Developed by Davies and Green in reaction to traditional
reading exercises, such as multiple choice, that, they argue,
are extremely limited in their potential as learning activities.
 Davies argues for tasks that are characterized by the
following features:

18. • The Good Reading task:
 Typically makes use of authentic and challenging texts;
 Provides students with a rhetorical or topical framework for
processing and analyzing the text;
 Frequently involves an oral reading of the text by the teacher or as
student followed by silent reading and rereading of the text;
 Involves students interacting with the text and with other;
 Involves students in direct analysis of the text instead of indirect
question answering;
 Frequently involves the transfer of information from text to a
visual or diagrammatic presentation.

19. Through active reading tasks incorporating these features:
Students make their hypothesis explicit;
Hypothesis are evaluated by other students and checked against the
text;
There is discussion about alternatives interpretations;
Students ask questions about what they do not know instead of
answering question to which they know the answers or which may be
seen as irrelevant
If necessary, the teacher can adopt a role of informant rather than
inquisitor;
Students learn to be critical in their reading of a text.

20. • These principles were used in the development of their DART model as an
alternative to the traditional approach to reading comprehension.
• Within this model, there two different task types
1. Reconstruction Activities- require the reader to reconstruct a text.
Ex. Using text modified by teacher
Pupil Task: Pupils complete text or diagram, reconstructing meaning.
2. Analysis Activities- requires the reader to transform the information in the
text in same way.
Ex. Using straight text
Pupil Task: Pupils locate and categorize text information by marking and
labeling. Use marked text as basis for summary (diagrammatic or note form).

21. Strategies-Based Approaches to Reading Tasks
One of the most comprehensive typologies of reading strategies is that
developed by teachers in the ELTU at Chinese University. They note that
by choosing the best strategies for different texts and purposes, it is
possible for second languages readers to significantly increase both their
reading speed and their comprehension.
A typology of reading strategies
*Having a purpose * Clustering
*Previewing * Avoiding bad habits
*Skimming * Predicting
*Scanning * Reading actively

22. Designing Reading Courses
Steps in the Design Process
1. Decide Overall purpose
The purpose of your program, and the relationship of the reading
component to the other skills that you might be wanting to teach will
determine the overall goals and objectives of your course.
2. Identify Text and Task
Tasks can be either target(relating to the kinds of things learners might
want to do outside the classroom), or pedagogical.
Target reading tasks might include following a set of instruction for
assembling a piece of furniture, reading a recipe, or reading the warranty
for an electrical appliance to determine whether still valid.

23. Pedagogical tasks might include reordering a set of scrambled
sentences for a coherent paragraph, underlining the topic sentence in a
text, comparing the ordering of information in a newspaper article
about an incident with that in a radio repost of the same incident.
3. Identify Linguistic Elements
These can be grammatical, lexical and discourse.
Example when designing language courses, have a syllabus checklists
to guide in making decisions about which linguistic items to teach and
when and then make a selections from these.
4. Sequence and Integrate Texts and Tasks
In sequencing and integrating tasks, a number of possibilities suggest
themselves. In the planning framework, several options are suggested.

24. These include following the sequence in which texts would be dealt with in a
real-world situation.
Ordering the texts in terms of their difficulty
Beginning with texts most critical to students needs, and then introducing less
critical texts.
Sequencing texts in terms of strategies
5. Link Reading to Other Languages Skills
 The final step in the design process is to link reading and other language
skills.
Hood suggest linking reading to other kinds of language interactions that
mirror sequence in daily life.
Example, we might interact in the following ways when dealing with a matter
of health (illness, injury, or any general check-up)