Let's learn some tricks

1. READING COMPREHENSION IN
A FOREIGN LANGUAGE

2. GET STARTED!
1. What is Reading Comprehension?
2. What are Macro and Micro Skills?
3. What different types of text are there?

3. What is reading?
● Reading is a guessing game
● Reading is an active process
● Reading capitalizes on the reader’s prior
strengths, past experiences and knowledge
Goodman (1971)

5. What are Macro and Micro
● Macroskills focus on the global understanding of a
particular text.
● Microskills deal with local or phrase-by phrase
understanding.

7. What different types of text are there?
● Narrative texts are expressions of event-based
experiences. imaginary, factual or a combination of both.
They may include fairy stories, mysteries, science fiction,
romances, horror stories, adventure stories, fables, myths
and legends, historical narratives, ballads, slice of life,
personal experience.
● Expository texts are mainly informational, convey
content, and pretend to induce new insights on a given
topic. Ex.: essays of different types.

8. SO…
… WHAT MAKES A
‘SUCCESSFUL’ READER?

9. TIPS
Successful readers…
● Use existing knowledge (background) to make
sense of new information.
● Predict and check their predictions when reading.
● Identify the type of reading they are doing.
● Pay attention to supporting cues (visual, for example).
● Highlight ‘key’ words. (Benjamin Franklin said so!)
● Monitor their effectiveness/comprehension.
● And… use ‘fix-up’ strategies when meaning breaks
down! (Re-reading, making connections, reflecting in
writing, etc.)

10. SOURCES
•Alderson J. C. (2000). Assessing Reading. Cambridge Language
Assessment Series. Cambridge: CUP.
•Bloom B.S. (1956). “Taxonomy of Educational Objectives”.
Handbook I: Cognitive Domain. New York: David McKay Co.
•Goodman K. (1971). “Reading: A Psycholinguistic guessing
game”. In Journal of the Reading Specialist. Vol 4, pp 126-135.
•Koda K. (2004). Insights into Second Language Reading. A
Cross Linguistic Approach. Cambridge Applied Linguistics.
Cambridge: CUP.
Further reading:
http://www.slideshare.net/pilgrimlibrary/reading-
comprehension-strategies-9749454?qid=46fd85dd-6844-4c30-
bd8b-ab18690bd5c6&v=default&b=&from_search=2

11. THANK YOU!