2. Third :Teaching Reading

3. Reading: Current research generally views reading as an interactive, sociocognitive process, involving a text, a reader, and a social context within which the activity of reading takes place.

4. In reading, “an individual constructs meaning through a transaction with written text that has been created by symbols that represent language. The transaction involves the reader’s acting on or interpreting the text. And the interpretation is influenced by the reader’s past experiences, language background, and cultural framework, as well as the reader’s purpose for reading”.

5. Within the complex process of reading, six general component skills and knowledge areas have been identified: 1-Automatic recognition skills --- a virtually unconscious ability, ideally requiring little mental processing to recognize text, especially for word identification. 2-Vocabulary and structural knowledge --- a sound understanding of language structure and a large recognition vocabulary.

6. 3- Formal discourse structure knowledge ---- an understanding of how texts are organized and how information is put together into various genres of text ( e.g., a report, a letter; a narrative) 4- Content/ world background knowledge ----- prior knowledge of text-related information and a shared understanding of the cultural information involved in text

7. 5- Synthesis and evaluation skills/ strategies -- the ability to read and compare information from multiple sources, to think critically about what one reads, and to decide what information is relevant or useful for one’s purpose 6-Metacognitive knowledge and skills monitoring ------ an awareness of one’s mental processes and the ability to reflect on what one is doing and the strategies one is employing while reading

8. Reading as a Process Reading is an interactive process that goes on between the reader and the text, resulting in comprehension. The text presents letters, words, sentences, and paragraphs that encode meaning. The reader uses knowledge, skills, and strategies to determine what that meaning is.

9. Reader knowledge, skills, and strategies include:  Linguistic competence: the ability to recognize the elements of the writing system; knowledge of vocabulary; knowledge of how words are structured into sentences.  Discourse competence: knowledge of discourse markers and how they connect parts of the text one another.

10.  Sociolinguistic competence: knowledge about different types of texts and their usual structure and content.  Strategic competence: the ability to use top-down strategies, as well as knowledge of the language (a bottom-up strategy).

11. Comprehension Is an interaction between reader and text by which meaning is created. Comprehension requires readers to use their prior knowledge and experiences to create new knowledge. We distinguish between reading comprehension as a process versus a product. A product approach to comprehension requires readers to read for the purpose of answering questions when they finish. A process approach, involves the following assumptions:

12.  Comprehension requires an interaction between the reader’s prior knowledge and the text.  Readers start with their schemata, a conceptual system for understanding something and integrate the text into it.  Using elaboration and the author’s framework, readers deeply process the text.  Reader’s perspectives influence what is remembered.

13. As students read and interact with the text they create their own understanding of the text. Students’ unique understanding of the text is expressed in their retellings, which provide a more accurate assessment of their reading comprehension. Four assumptions underlying the process approach are as follows:

14. 1)What pupils already know affects what they will learn from reading. 2)Both concept-driven and data-driven processes are necessary in comprehending text. 3)The deeper a person processes text, the more he/she will remember and understand it. 4)The context in which reading occurs influence what will be recalled.

15. Objectives of Teaching Reading 1.To orientate students with the proper coordination of eye movements in reading. 2.To familiarize students with teaching methods of reading a foreign language. 3.To instruct students to read in word groups with special emphasis on their stress and intonation. 4.To familiarize students with the necessary skills for effective reading.

16. 5.To encourage students to adopt the proper habits of fluent and rapid reading. 6.To involve students in various classroom activities on reading. 7.To enable students to understand the meanings from printed or written material. 8.To enable students to read English material fluently. 9.To acquaint students with the conventional presentation of English phonemes in graphic form.

17. Some Comprehension Processes 1-Learning from context A useful aid in identifying words is the context in which they appear. Context is associated with meaning and it is meaning as well as visual elements that aid readers in recognizing words. Using contextual clues is one of the strategies students can use for recognizing unfamiliar words.

18. The strategy presupposes two things; firstly that the learners are able to follow the ideas in the text they are reading, that is they have sufficient command of vocabulary, grammar and reading skills in order to achieve basic comprehension of the text, and secondly that the learners bring some relevant background knowledge to the text. This strategy consists of five steps:

19. 1)Finding the part of speech of the unknown word. 2)Looking at the immediate context of the unknown word and simplifying this context if necessary. 3)Looking at the wider context of the unknown word. This means looking at the relationship between the clause containing the unknown word and surrounding of unknown word. 4)Guessing the meaning of unknown word. 5)Checking that the guess is correct.

20. Context has many dimensions: The situation in which reading occurs is context. The reader as a person with prior experiences constitutes context. So, too, does the purpose of reading. The schema for the work as a whole-exposition, narration-is a contextual variable to that will influence the meaning the reader gives to words. Narrower contexts for determining word meaning are paragraphs and adjacent sentences.

21.  Schemata (the plural of schema) are the fundamental elements upon which all information processing depends, and in this sense we call them “building blocks of cognition”. As such, they are used in the process of “interpreting sensory data, in retrieving information from memory, in recognizing actions, in determining goals and subgoals, in allocating resources, and generally, in guiding the flow of processing in the system. Schemata are “packets” or “units of knowledge” that represent our beliefs about “ objects, situations, events, sequences of events, actions and sequences of actions”.

22. Inferring Another process that readers must learn to use as a part of becoming effective comprehension is that of inferring. In inferring readers use the details provided by the author plus their own prior experiences to determine information that is not stated by the author.

23. Main idea: Determining the main idea of paragraph and longer text is another process students must be taught as a part of teaching them how to comprehend. Main idea refers to the central thought or idea that is presented in a paragraph or longer text. The main idea is not always directly stated. Many times it is necessary for the reader to infer the main idea by using the relevant details in a paragraph to determine the central thought.

24. Skimming: Before actually reading a text, efficient readers quickly look over a text for the main idea or for a specific piece of information.

25. Scanning: Is to locate a particular piece of information. To scan-scanning requires careful reading and is often a form of focused re-reading. The steps involved in scanning are the following:

26. A.Decide exactly what information you are looking for, and think about the form it may take. B.Next decide where you had to look to find the information you want. C.Move your eyes as quickly as possible down the page until you find the information you need, read it carefully. D.When you find what you need, do not read further.

27. Predicting – Guessing – anticipating: These three processes describe what good readers do as their eyes quickly go down a page of print, picking up meaning in bunches.

28. On other word level the reader guesses the meaning of unfamiliar words by using the context. On the syntactic level, he/she uses what he/she knows about the form of language to extract meaning without actually reading all the words. The idea of a dialogue between author and reader is part of the process of predicting and anticipating. The reader tends to anticipate the author’s words before he/she encounters them on the page.

29. Reading comprehension skills:  There are some levels of comprehension. A- Literal comprehension. Includes levels like recognition of details, recognition of main ideas, recognition of a sequence, recognition of comparison and recall of all these elements.

30. B-Reorganization: Includes levels like analysis, classification, outlining, summarizing, and synthesizing the ideas involved.

31. C- Inferential comprehension: Includes levels like inferring, supporting details, inferring main ideas, inferring sequences, inferring comparison, inferring cause and effect relationship.

32. D- Evaluation: Includes levels like judgment of reality and fantasy, judgment of fact and opinion, judgment of adequacy and validity.

33. E- Appreciation: Includes levels like emotional response to the context, identification with characters and events, reaction to the use of language and imagery.

34. F- Literal level: Readers understand what the author says; read the lines. G- Applied level: Deals with questions as (so what ) reader is involved in creating new insights about the material.

35. H- Interpretive level: Readers read between the lines, make inferences, and allow conclusions. To interpret demands to recognize the relationships that exist among main ideas.

36. Procedures in Teaching Reading A.The Teacher introduces new words in the reading passage. The meanings of new vocabulary can be shown through the use of context, picture, drawing, objects, mime, synonyms, and antonyms. 1.Preparation

37. C. The teacher should provide his students with practices after the introduction of new vocabulary and structure in order to enhance and reinforce them. B. The teacher can use various techniques to present the new grammatical patterns such as rules, drawings, pictures, realia, diagrams, demonstrations, and tables.

38. 2. Comprehension questions: A.A language teacher reads the comprehension questions about the passage aloud to his class. B.He explains or translates them to stimulate students’ understanding.

39. 3. Silent Reading: A.The language teacher asks the entire class to read the passage silently. He may emphasize that students should move their eyes very rapidly from left to right without looking back to the preceding words. He may instruct them to make no lip movement, no muttering, or murmuring. Fewer pauses may also be of great concern in silent reading.

40. B.Students should try to find the appropriate answers of the comprehension questions while reading. C.A language teacher should monitor his class to ensure that all his class keeps reading. He should give academic help to those who have difficulty in understanding or pronouncing some words without interrupting others.

41. :Renewing Students’ Answers A.A language teacher should encourage his students to give the appropriate answers to the questions about the contents of the passage. B.He can give them clues to the answers such as the number of a reading line, the number of words which form the right answer. C.He asks them to write or copy the answers in their notebooks. He may go around in the class making sure that they write the answer carefully.

42. Oral Reading: The teacher may go through the following activities:  He reads the passage aloud as a model and lets his students listen to it carefully.  He reads phrases or sentences of the passage aloud and lets his students repeat after him.  Each students reads a line or two aloud and others listen to him attentively..

43. Types of Reading A. Silent Reading  Characteristics of Silent Reading A.Eye movement : The student should move his eyes very rapidly from left to right without looking back at the previous words. B.Complete silence: He should make no lip movement. He should produce no oral words, no muttering or murmuring.

44. C.Accurate eye fixations: He should make fewer pauses than he does while reading orally. He should make, say, two fixations per line. D.Speed: He should increase the rate of his reading. Quick reading results in better understanding of his printed material. Both speed and comprehension should be emphasized in silent reading.

45.  Techniques in Teaching Silent Reading A.Give a short and easy but interesting passage to your students. They should be familiar with topic. B.Ask students to read it silently but rapidly without moving their lips or pronouncing its words. C.Set the time for the reading passage. D.Formulate some comprehension questions in the reading passage.

46. B. Oral Reading  Characteristics of Oral Reading A.Pronunciation: The teacher should give adequate and clear pronunciation to each word. B.Rational reading: He should read it with reasonable speed. C.Pauses: He should make proper pauses and correct stops to help learners understand the reading passage. Unnecessary pauses create confusion in grasping the meaning of the passage.

47. D.Tone: He should give the accurate tones of a falling or a rising voice. E.Stress: He should produce a word or a syllable with louder and longer duration using more air from the lung than the surrounding words or syllables. Wrong stress can mislead the listeners.

48.  Techniques in Teaching Oral Reading A.A language teacher should give constant practice in vocabulary recognition of the reading passage. He can use flash cards of a word or phrase, eye movement devices, and minimal pair exercises. He should also stress the use of other visual discrimination exercises and auditory discrimination drills to enhance reading.

49. B.He should ask his students to use their fingers or their pens from the top to the bottom of the printed page at the left end of line while reading. C.He should ask the students to look up while reading aloud. A student is asked not to read from the book. He should read to his teacher and classmates. He must look up during the reading of the whole sentence. He must not just look for a second and then look down again. This technique is very useful because the sentence that is read is held in the mind for a few minutes. There is an effort to memorize and remember it instead of only sounding out the print.

50. Rapid Reading Techniques 1. skimming Skimming is a type of rapid reading technique. The purpose of this technique is to read rapidly. It is widely used to gain quick information from a text or article by passing over it swiftly and skippingly. A person skim-reads to grasp quickly the main idea from a passage. He /She may also skim-read to test and assess materials for skipping or selecting.

51. In these cases he/she may want to have a general overview of the reading material and need not read it precisely and thoroughly. Skimming is an economical and time saving technique. There are four types of skimming:  Skimming main ideas.  Skimming for revising a textbook.  Skimming a newspaper.  Skimming a magazine or journal.

52. 2. Scanning Scanning is a type of speed-reading technique. The purpose of this technique is to examine closely and rapidly a piece of printed or written material. It is used when the reader wants to locate a particular piece of information or fact without necessarily understanding the whole of a passage or script.

53. The reader, for example, may scan- read a chapter of a book as rapidly as possible in order to find out information about a particular date, name, figure, or amount. Scanning comparatively is easier than skimming because the reader knows ahead of time what he wants to find.