Introduction
What is reading? Reading is about understanding written texts. It is a complex activity that involves both perception and thought. Reading consists of two related processes: word recognition and comprehension. Word recognition refers to the process of perceiving how written symbols correspond to one’s spoken language. Comprehension is the process of making sense of words, sentences and connected text. Readers typically make use of background knowledge, vocabulary, grammatical knowledge, experience with text and other strategies to help them understand written text.
Researchs and classroom practices support the use of a balanced approach in teaching reading comprehension. Because reading comprehension depends on efficient word recognition and comprehension, instruction should develop reading skills and strategies, as well as build on learners’ knowledge through the use of authentic texts.
The theme of the research work consists in the new way of looking at the problem of teaching reading. Since teaching reading comprehension was always underestimated in teaching English as a second language, nonetheless it plays a great role in second language acquisition.
The aim is to analyze the existent problems in teaching reading comprehension and find the ways out of this problem by suggesting a series of exercises that can be useful in classroom activities.
Thus, according to the set aim we are to solve the following tasks:
- to determine the aim and nature of teaching reading comprehension;
- to open the essence of
- to describe the reading skills and teaching technics;
- to describe different approaches to teaching reading;
- to work out new technologies in teaching reading;
The scientific novelty: few would dispute the claim that comprehension is necessary in order for language acquisition to occur. In order to communicate effectively, learners must understand what is being said. To function successfully with a target language, learners depend upon their ability to comprehend the spoken and written word. Empirical studies have identified a positive relationship between listening ability and language acquisition as well as between reading ability and language acquisition.
The theoretical and practical value of the research work consist in the material that was used during the investigation work which may be used in further researches and be helpful in lectures on methodology of the English language as well as to teachers and students in their practical lessons.
Material under analysis is the literature on the theme of the work.
teaching reading exercise
1. The General Characteristics of Teaching Reading Comprehension
Traditionally, the purpose of learning to read in a language has been to have access to the literature written in that language. In language instruction, reading materials have traditionally been chosen from literary texts that represent «higher» forms of culture.
This approach assumes that students learn to read a language by studying its vocabulary, grammar, and sentence structure, not by actually reading it. In this approach, lower level learners read only sentences and paragraphs generated by textbook writers and instructors. The reading of authentic materials is limited to the works of great authors and reserved for upper level students who have developed the language skills needed to read them.
The communicative approach to language teaching has given instructors a different understanding of the role of reading in the language classroom and the types of texts that can be used in instruction. When the goal of instruction is communicative competence, everyday materials such as train schedules, newspaper articles, and travel and tourism Web sites become appropriate classroom materials, because reading them is one way communicative competence is developed. Instruction in reading and reading practice thus become essential parts of language teaching at every level.
Reading is an activity with a purpose. A person may read in order to gain information or verify existing knowledge, or in order to critique a writer's ideas or writing style. A person may also read for enjoyment, or to enhance knowledge of the language being read. The purpose(s) for reading guide the reader's selection of texts.
The purpose for reading also determines the appropriate approach to reading comprehension. A person who needs to know whether she can afford to eat at a particular restaurant needs to comprehend the pricing information provided on the menu, but does not need to recognize the name of every appetizer listed. A person reading poetry for enjoyment needs to recognize the words the poet uses and the ways they are put together, but does not need to identify main idea and supporting details. However, a person using a scientific article to support an opinion needs to know the vocabulary that is used, understand the facts and cause-effect sequences that are presented, and recognize ideas that are presented as hypotheses and givens.
Reading research shows that good readers
· Read extensively
· Integrate information in the text with existing knowledge
· Have a flexible reading style, depending on what they are reading
· Are motivated
· Rely on different skills interacting: perceptual processing, phonemic processing, recall
· Read for a purpose; reading serves a function
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.
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 to one another
· 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)
The purpose(s) for reading and the type of text determine the specific knowledge, skills, and strategies that readers need to apply to achieve comprehension. Reading comprehension is thus much more than decoding. Reading comprehension results when the reader knows which skills and strategies are appropriate for the type of text, and understands how to apply them to accomplish the reading purpose.
Instructors want to produce students who, even if they do not have complete control of the grammar or an extensive lexicon, can fend for themselves in communication situations. In the case of reading, this means producing students who can use reading strategies to maximize their comprehension of text, identify relevant and non-relevant information, and tolerate less than word-by-word comprehension.
To accomplish this goal, instructors focus on the process of reading rather than on its product.
· They develop students' awareness of the reading process and reading strategies by asking students to think and talk about how they read in their native language.
· They allow students to practice the full repertoire of reading strategies by using authentic reading tasks. They encourage students to read to learn (and have an authentic purpose for reading) by giving students some choice of reading material.
· When working with reading tasks in class, they show students the strategies that will work best for the reading purpose and the type of text. They explain how and why students should use the strategies.
· They have students practice reading strategies in class and ask them to practice outside of class in their reading assignments. They encourage students to be conscious of what they're doing while they complete reading assignments.
· They encourage students to evaluate their comprehension and self-report their use of strategies. They build comprehension checks into in-class and out-of-class reading assignments, and periodically review how and when to use particular strategies.
· They encourage the development of reading skills and the use of reading strategies by using the target language to convey instructions and course-related information in written form: office hours, homework assignments, test content.
· They do not assume that students will transfer strategy use from one task to another. They explicitly mention how a particular strategy can be used in a different type of reading task or with another skill.
By raising students' awareness of reading as a skill that requires active engagement, and by explicitly teaching reading strategies, instructors help their students develop both the ability and the confidence to handle communication situations they may encounter beyond the classroom. In this way they give their students the foundation for communicative competence in the new language.
Instruction in reading comprehension strategies is not an add-on, but rather an integral part of the use of reading activities in the language classroom. Instructors can help their students become effective readers by teaching them how to use strategies before, during, and after reading.
Before reading: Plan for the reading task
· Set a purpose or decide in advance what to read for
· Decide if more linguistic or background knowledge is needed
· Determine whether to enter the text from the top down (attend to the overall meaning) or from the bottom up (focus on the words and phrases)
During and after reading: Monitor comprehension
· Verify predictions and check for inaccurate guesses
· Decide what is and is not important to understand
· Reread to check comprehension
· Ask for help
After reading: Evaluate comprehension and strategy use
· Evaluate comprehension in a particular task or area
· Evaluate overall progress in reading and in particular types of reading tasks
· Decide if the strategies used were appropriate for the purpose and for the task
· Modify strategies if necessary
For students to develop communicative competence in reading, classroom and homework reading activities must resemble (or be) real-life reading tasks that involve meaningful communication. They must therefore be authentic in three ways.
1. The reading material must be authentic: It must be the kind of material that students will need and want to be able to read when traveling, studying abroad, or using the language in other contexts outside the classroom.
When selecting texts for student assignments, remember that the difficulty of a reading text is less a function of the language, and more a function of the conceptual difficulty and the task(s) that students are expected to complete. Simplifying a text by changing the language often removes natural redundancy and makes the organization somewhat difficult for students to predict. This actually makes a text more difficult to read than if the original were used.
Rather than simplifying a text by changing its language, make it more approachable by eliciting students' existing knowledge in pre-reading discussion, reviewing new vocabulary before reading, and asking students to perform tasks that are within their competence, such as skimming to get the main idea or scanning for specific information, before they begin intensive reading.
2. The reading purpose must be authentic: Students must be reading for reasons that make sense and have relevance to them. «Because the teacher assigned it» is not an authentic reason for reading a text.
To identify relevant reading purposes, ask students how they plan to use the language they are learning and what topics they are interested in reading and learning about. Give them opportunities to choose their reading assignments, and encourage them to use the library, the Internet, and foreign language newsstands and bookstores to find other things they would like to read.
3. The reading approach must be authentic: Students should read the text in a way that matches the reading purpose, the type of text, and the way people normally read. This means that reading aloud will take place only in situations where it would take place outside the classroom, such as reading for pleasure. The majority of students' reading should be done silently.
Students do not learn to read by reading aloud. A person who reads aloud and comprehends the meaning of the text is coordinating word recognition with comprehension and speaking and pronunciation ability in highly complex ways. Students whose language skills are limited are not able to process at this level, and end up having to drop one or more of the elements. Usually the dropped element is comprehension, and reading aloud becomes word calling: simply pronouncing a series of words without regard for the meaning they carry individually and together. Word calling is not productive for the student who is doing it, and it is boring for other students to listen to.
· There are two ways to use reading aloud productively in the language classroom. Read aloud to your students as they follow along silently. You have the ability to use inflection and tone to help them hear what the text is saying. Following along as you read will help students move from word-by-word reading to reading in phrases and thought units, as they do in their first language.
· Use the «read and look up» technique. With this technique, a student reads a phrase or sentence silently as many times as necessary, then looks up (away from the text) and tells you what the phrase or sentence says. This encourages students to read for ideas, rather than for word recognition.
1.3 Reading Comprehension Strategies
Reading comprehension is defined as the level of understanding of a passage or text. Reading at the rate of 200 to 220 words per minute is considered as a normal speed of reading. For normal reading rates 75% is an acceptable level of comprehension. That means if a student can understand the meaning of at least 75% of the total text given then it is regarded as acceptable limits for reading comprehension.
Reading is an active process that require an interplay between various types of knowledge.
According to Canale and Swain’s model of communicative competence, listeners and readers draw upon four types of competencies as they attempt to comprehend an oral or written message.
1. grammatical competence: knowledge of morphology, syntax, vocabulary, and mechanics;
2. sociolinguistic competence: knowing what is expected socially and culturally by native speakers of the target language;
3. discourse competence: the ability to use cohesive devices such as pronouns, conjunctions, and transitional phrases to link meaning across sentences, as well as the ability to recognize how coherence is used to maintain the message’s input;
4. strategic competence: the ability to use a number of guessing strategies to compensate for missing knowledge.
Readers rely upon the types of knowledge described above as they perform a variety of tasks in the comprehension process.
Various methods are used to improve Reading comprehension that include Training the ability to self assess comprehension, actively test comprehension using a set of questions, and by improving metacognition. Practice plays more pivotal part in development and honing the skills of reading comprehension. Self assessment with help of elaborative interrogation and summarizing helps.
Effective reading comprehension is the culmination of mastering vocabulary, phonics, fluency, and reading comprehension skills. Person having good comprehension skills is considered as active reader, with an ability to interact with the words by understanding its complete meaning and the concept behind it. Thus skill of reading comprehension distinguishes an active reader from a passive reader who just read the text without getting its meaning.
Reading comprehension teaching aims at-
1. To let better grasping of the context, sequence and the characters narrated in text.
2. Certain parts of the text can confuse readers. Reading comprehension skills works on this aspect to get the clear idea of the meaning of the text.
3. Helps to create the questionnaire based on the text about its theme or idea. It often helps in better understanding of the said paragraph.
4. It helps to link the event of narration with our previous experiences and predict the next probable event in the course based on the information given in the narration.