Developing receptive skills: Reading

Reasons for reading

• Reading – a genuinely complex skill, useful as
a source for both vocabulary expansion AND
grammar awareness – through ´grammar in
context´ ; when chosen properly, in enhances
speaking, too, and creative thinking of the
learners (Richterová , 2015).
• Reading has positive effect on spelling,
writing, punctuation. Reading stimulates
language acquisition. (Harmer, 2007)
• Motivation/reason –
• to be able to read for our careers,
• for study purposes, pleasure;
• good texts introduce interesting topics and
encourage the students to discuss them
(Harmer, 2007, 99).
• Reading – difference between reading to
oneself and reading aloud; reading to oneself -
another receptive skill;
• similar procedures can be used to help the
learners as with listening (the task → feedback
circle and other recommendations -
adaptable)
• Obvious difference – people read at different
speed + in different ways (x the recording) →
individual learners control their speed and
what they are looking at; (Scrivener, 2011)
• extensive reading (reading for pleasure –
joyful reading)
• intensive reading (detail focus – reading texts
used mainly in classroom)
(Harmer, 2007, 99)
• Ideally – we would like the learners to read
authentic texts (those which are not written
especially for language learners), but to
balance the level of the students with the
requirement – simplified graded readers are
used, providing the comprehensible input.
(Harmer, 2007, 100)
 Difficulties when reading in a foreign
language:
• We may not know enough vocabulary;
• We may need the dictionary all the time;
• It´s very slow; it takes a long time to get through
a few sentences;
• We sometimes get to the stage where we
understand all the individual words, but the
whole text eludes us – makes us feel confused;
• As it is slow, the pleasure or interest in the
subject matter may soon get lost;
• Advice – we should raise the learners´
awareness of the fact that it´s not always
essential to understand every word – so,
practising some reading techniques may be
useful.
(Scrivener, 2011)
 Reading skills
• 1. Reading for detail
• (´intensive reading´) reading texts closely and
carefully with the intention of gaining an
understanding for as much detail as possible;
• The students answer comprehension questions
(e.g. Why did the three men go into the office?);
a stop/start reading – going back over
paragraphs/small pieces of text; trying to get
correct interpretation of the words used; aim –
being able to read fast and fluently; (Scrivener,
2011)
• Skimming and scanning
• Activities designed save time/increase reading
speed – variations of the two strategies:
• 2. Skimming = reading quickly to get the gist
of a passage (key topics, main ideas, overall
theme, basic structure (possible question a
school – Is this passage about a school trip or
a family holiday? – find the answer quickly,
not reading every word, ´speed reading´
through some ´portions´ of the text);
• 3. Scanning = moving eyes quickly over the
text to locate a specific piece of information (a
name, address, size, date, number, price, etc.)
without reading the whole text; commonly –
searching for information in a leaflet or
directory; (Scrivener, 2011)

• Both skimming and scanning – top-down skills;

 Reading principles (by Harmer):

• Encourage the learners to read as often and

much as possible;
• Students need to be engaged with what they
are reading;
• Encourage the learners to respond to the
content of a text (and explore their feelings
about it), not just concentrate on its
construction;
• Prediction is a major factor in reading;
• Match the task to the topic when using
intensive reading texts (once the text chosen –
the tasks to be invented – e.g. questions and
activities during and after reading, useful
study exploitation, etc.); mind the level of
challenge;
• Good teachers exploit reading texts to the full
! (sentences, words, ideas, descriptions,
integrating the reading texts interesting lesson
sequences, using a range of activities to bring
the text to life); (Harmer, 2007, p. 102)
• Selecting an appropriate reading task (real-life
purposes recommended by CLT); Choosing useful
activities – examples of reading tasks: (by Scrivener):
• Put these illustrations of the text in the right
order;
• Put these cut-up paragraphs in the correct order;
• Find words in the text that mean the same as the
words on the list;
• Read the text and find the mistakes in this
illustration (or draw your own);
• Read the text and make a list of particular
items (i.e. advantages and disadvantages);
• Give a headline to each section of the article
(or match given headlines with the sections)
• Find appropriate places in the text to reinsert
some sentences which have previously been
separated from the text;
• Write a reply;
• Look at the title and the illustrations (but not
the text). Predict which of the following words
you will find in the text;
• Solve the problem;
• Discuss (or write) the missing last paragraph of
the text;
• Make notes under the following headings …
• Before you read the text, make notes about
what you already know about the subject;
• Act out the dialogue, story, episode, etc.
• Put this list of events in the correct order;
• (Scrivener, 2011)
 Reading techniques by Penny Ur
• Pre-questions (a general question - asking the learners
to find out a piece of information central to the
understanding of the text)
• Do-it-yourself questions (learners compose and answer
their own questions)
• Provide a title (learners suggest a title - if none was
given originally - or an alternative, if there was)
• Summarize (learners summarize the content in a
sentence or two - this may also be done in MT)
• Continue (the text is a story; learners suggest what
might happen next)
• Preface (learners suggest what might have happened
before)
• Gapped text (towards the end of the text, four or five
gaps are left that can only be filled in if the text has been
understood; this is different from the conventional cloze
test which tests grammatical and lexical accuracy)
• Mistakes in the text (the text has, towards the end,
occasional mistakes - e.g. wrong words, intrusive words,
omissions; learners are told in advance how many
mistakes to look for)
• Comparison (there are two texts on a similar topic;
learners note points of similarity or difference)
• Responding (the text is a letter or a provocative article;
learners discuss how they would respond, or write an
answer)
• Re-presentation of content (the text gives
information or tells a story; learners re-present
its content through a different graphic medium,
e.g.
• a drawing that illustrates the text,
• colouring,
• marking a map,
• lists of events or items described in the text,
• a diagram indicating relationships between
items, characters or events)
(Ur, 2007, 146)
Extensive reading – encouraging learners to
read extensively
• Extensive reading has a great impact on
language learning (picking up vocabulary,
grammar, increasing overall knowledge and
linguistic confidence);
• Condition – the material is self-chosen,
relevant, interesting;
• Providing a library of readers (books/readers –
(un)abridged versions, magazines,
newspapers, leaflets);
• Choice - advise the learners on how to choose
suitable reading material and the ways to read
them without forcing them;
• Feedback - learners should have an
opportunity to give feedback on what they
have read; Create a book-club environment
(talking about favourite books, sharing, writing
recommendations);
• Time - allow sections of classroom time purely
for the pupils to read; ´It is a good idea to
leave a ten-minute reading period at various
times during a course just to get students
comfortable with the activity. It is vitally
important that when we do this, we should be
reading ourselves in order to underline the
attractiveness of the activity´
• (Harmer, 2007, 110).
 Reading aloud round the class

• Possible problems: different speeds, boredom,

some may have read the text, wrong
pronunciation – embarrassment, nervousness
– missing the story, not being able to follow
the story, preference for individual reading,
long waiting to have a go, ´wrong´ voices of
the characters, the language seeming useless
for everyday communication);
• Some alternatives to try:
• the teacher reads;
• one reads the narrative, the others the characters,
• the teachers provides a summary of a part of the
text,
• the learners do the same with other parts,
• the students read to each other in small groups
and discuss,
• the learners read silently and act it out without
previous discussion,
• the learners silently speed-read a chapter and
then report back or discuss;
Extensive reading activities – further ideas:

• Don´t always start at the beginning!

• Use a key section of the story as a dictation;
• Create a situation separate from the story – allow
the learners to improvise and imagine the
characters in different, e.g. real life situations;
• The learners draw pictures of the scene, then
discuss the differences;
• Making up an interview with the characters;
• Keeping a character´s diary;
• Mapping the story (chapter);
• Review the book for a TV programme. Meet
the author. Discuss, argue.
• Would it be a good film?
• Choose a page or paragraph from the next
chapter in the book and blank out some
words. The learners are going to guess what is
going to happen next by trying to find the
missing words, etc.
• (Scrivener, 2011, 263 - 270)
• Resources:
• Scrivener, J. (2011): Learning teaching.
Macmillan.
• Ur, P. (1996). A Course in Language Teaching.
Cambridge: CUP.
• Harmer, J. (2002). The Practice of English
Language Teaching. Harlow: Longman.