This time, we are going to focus on how to change the focus of reading through listening and speaking. According to the document you received in your personal e-mail, post your comments and reactions about the reading. Also, provide examples in which you share with us the way you can implement this in your classes (or let us know if you have already implemented)
Hello Professor and partners. From my personal experience as Conversational English teacher I do not enhance a lot of reading in my classes due to the fact that they are conversational ones. But, it caught my attention that the author from the article mentioned that it is important to present to our students new texts structures that extend the limits of conventional texts as they are emerging in electronic communications. I realized that I use some of those “unconventional texts” in my classes. For example, when we studied the topic of social networks in class, I asked my students to write a blog about “the use of social networks at the workplace”. Although most of the teenagers do not like to read, they took the time to read each of the blogs from their partners and write a reply about their opinion. When I checked all their comments, I can say that they enjoyed reading the blogs. I think that we have to deal with their “prior knowledge” and the best way to do it is when talking or reading about current topics such as media.
ResponderEliminarThat is an interesting point that you mention Melissa. Now a days not only in Costa Rica but worldwide students do not appreciate reading. The youth even dislike reading text messages, I notice "dey rite 2 weird n texts" LOL BRB. They don't like the thought of reading. In my classes I really enjoy and value short stories. Stories that are not extremely long however they can obtain a meaningful learning experience from it. In my oral communication II class we are currently reading Oxford "Great Crimes" in my labratory class for oral communication II we are reading "Far from Home" and in my oral communication IV course we are reading Academic Encounters Intermediate Edition. These provide short texts that they can reflect upon and hopefully see the beauty in reading.
EliminarI forgot to mention that I really enjoy these short texts because you can get so much out of it...for example grammar, punctuation, vocabulary. If you read aloud you can hone your listening skills and practice pronunciation.
EliminarHey Girls,
EliminarI agree with Jennifer about the short readings. I believe in using these little books, from the Oxford's reading series: bookworms, and I have brought in several childrens stories. Have you ever used The true Story of the three little pigs? Oh, it is great. And since its a twist to the story Ss really enjoy it.
We need to find ways to make the reading texts meaningful to them and teach them the grammar and punctuation, etc through them.
I want to read with my Intermediate I students (ESP course) Frankstein, do you know if there is a short story for it?
Thanks
Hola Meli,
Eliminarpodras enviarnos tu correo? Grx Laura, Mitzy, Ma Fer!
Melissa
EliminarGood point, and that lets us know that reading can ba an active skills and not totally passive as people use to think about.
Laura, I asked my students to read Frankenstein last quarter, by the chance. I have an adaptation of the book that you can borrow if you are interested. =)
I agree!!! That's right.
EliminarIn my case, "use knowledge of text structures" was impressive.
There are many structures of a wide variety of texts.
In these days, many new forms of texts are constantly emerging in electronic communications like blogs, wikis, online chat, sms messages and so on.
So teachers should use authentic texts that are used in the world outside of school.
YES YES YES :)
EliminarIn my case, as in Melissa's, my courses involve more speaking and writing, and not a lot of reading. However at the beginning of each chapter in my Oral communication course there is a reading related to the main topic of the chapter. Interestingly enough, before the reading there is a picture related to it and which is to be discussed. There is also a list of vocabulary words that are set in sentences to infer the meaning. This I find very helpful because when I ask them to read out loud, they already know the meaning and the pronunciation of the words, which of course helps them understand better. So we can see that the strategies discussed in the book can also be applied for older students by twisting them a little. Also I try to discuss the general topic of each chapter before we start and at the end I also ask for them to summarize the ideas that were presented,
ResponderEliminarin fact, these are exam questions. Regarding the visualization strategy, I can't ask my students to do the kind of exercise explained in the article, but maybe I can find a short video related to each or the readings.
Exactly, those small readings at the beginning of each chapter allows to wake up the student's schema. That is totally meaningful in an active learning process: that kind of process we pretend.
EliminarHi Dayanira. It is important to mention that videos, websites, podcasts and billboard advertisements are also multimodal texts that can be read and analysed so I do share Mills' point of view when saying that there is an increasing need to incorporate those.
EliminarIt's impressive. At the end you ask for them to summarize
Eliminarit. it's very important to summarize for reading comprehension.Reading is related with watching and listening and speaking .Right?
Hello guys,
EliminarI am very familiar with Deyanira’s point, I remember my classes at the university in which we always commented the reading related about the topic of the unit. I believe those are very useful for students to share and learn new knowledge by activating prior knowledge, making inferences,
Generating and answering questions, and retelling and summarizing. Those strategies help students emerge in the new topic and eliminate possible gaps of knowledge at early stages of the new lesson.
hello everyone. I truly love teaching reading. i loved the article's idea of the hot seat and visualization ideas. I can share with you that I have tried to involve my students in the reading befor we read. I printed out dozens of birds and pasted them around the class to simulate being atta ked by birds, I have had a ball of different colors an dressed a student as the red masque , we have created things out of clay, and written our own big books. , and after it all...my students read! birds by hitchcock, poe, my left foot and my sixth graders read their original big book stories to little kinder kids. :) all th time immersed in language and a big smile on their faces.
ResponderEliminarthe article is quite interesting of ourse and I agree with deyanira that we , with adults, need to spice up our texts and make them interesting for them. metacognitive! that is the word i love from it all. when we starr moving neurons in our brains we come alive...so do our classes.
and, ideas for digital readings: how about a wiki, or some e books?
bb!
As you, i believe that metacognitive is the key word, since students learning process become more sufficient and they have a notable increase on their skills and abilities, and get to remember more information since they are working in a more active way in all aspects.
EliminarOf course it is necesary that the teacher should stick during the whole process, and analyze the response of its students.
Hi Ylenia. I have also used some audio books to teach pronunciation. For example, I downloaded all the Easop's Fables from an audio book. You can ask the students to hear the story and analyze the phonemes and intonation. Besides, you can discuss with your students the moral of the fable which is something I really like about teaching with fables.
EliminarEvery year I have 5th graders coming to my class with their own creations to read to my little kids. They bring puppets, and pictures and candies too!! We spend a nice time together, kids love it
EliminarHey. It sounds so interesting!!! When I become a teacher in Korea, I want to use your methods. Kids will like that!!Clearly!!! Also, we can use all of things like wiki,blogs,online chat!!
EliminarHi guys,
EliminarI must say I just loved and enjoyed those activities Laura described before. As a student I would have loved for my teachers to put that amount of effort and enthusiasm in my classes. I think we all agree on the found love for the word metacognitive which I think involves our duty as teachers- the great possibility of developing minds!
Jason, could you please get in contact with Jennifer or me.
ResponderEliminarA very intresting article thta showed how many activties can be performe by listening and speaking to imptove other skills,and how the author emphasize the social and culture interaction, and knowledge.
ResponderEliminarMelissa stated that normally don't like to read which is true because most of the time they're not intrested in the topic and the activties performed are common activities that maintain them passive and don't reinforce other areas. As i stated before student's needs and interest are essential.
Reading is a challenge. Since it is considered a passive skill, it is common to associate it as a boring and isolated activity. As teachers, we have the chance to change that concept and make it more active.
EliminarWe always have a subject we love more than the other. I think I can do with grammar...he he he. I love reading like I said so that is what makes me come alive, and create more games and activities. I believe, like you said, that to teach reading is a challenge, and maybe more so to others because it is not their strength. The challenge is also to become teachers that help Ss learn by themselves, independed learners!
EliminarGood night!
I've seen through personal experience that you can also BECOME a reader with the right book, and this can be achieved at any age. It's just a matter of getting to know your taste. My daughter didn´t like to read very much when she was in school, but one day a friend lent he a book and she has never stopped reading ever since. The problem was that the books she had to read at school were not appealing for her.
EliminarWe can also help our students become readers if we guide them and suggest titles until we find something that they trully love, and then they will continue on their own.
In my opinion, reading has helped me to be more aware of what is happening around the world, has made me a person more criticism. At the same time it has left me create a very interesting environment, magic, where the only one who makes the rules I am. This try to share it with my students, and the truth have done me very well.
EliminarI think an aspect that is important but not mentioned in the text was the use of context clues. Students often become stuck or frustrated when they do not understand a word. However they forget to use the clues around the word to guide them to understand the meaning. It is important students get into the habit of doing a little investigation when doing a reading. And the word that they don't know the meaning of will stick with them because they made an extra effort to find the meaning of the word. They won't forget it so easily
ResponderEliminarhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcsUfYBHhm4
ResponderEliminarLink to the story, 'as told by A. Wolf" ;)
Something else that is not mentioned in the article, and which I find essential, is the need to read the article, story, poem, etc. more than once. Students often just don't get that the first reading is not enough to understand the content and the vocabulary. Even we as teacher need to read any material we are going to use at least twice. Now as students, we can also see the need for this repeated task.
ResponderEliminarDeyanira
EliminarWhat you mention is totally right; reading twice let us internalize ideas better. I always say that when you read a book more than once you get details you didn´t see the first time. It provides more security, actually.
HiDeyanira, I totally agree with you,I have to read twice to understand what i'm reading even in spanish or with daily notes e-mails etc. When you read twice you can get something else from the reading, you can get a better understanding and many ideas come to your mind.
EliminarAlso I think that poetry and poems play an important part in this process. We are developing many skills through poetry.
Hey,
EliminarI think it is appropriate to have, just like in listening, a pre reading, while reading, and post reading strategy. Students need to know vocab before they come in contact with the text, need guidance as they read to clarify, and they need to put it all together.
We all need to develop many reading strategies and put them into practice constantly. Its not the same to read a newspaper article, poem, haiku, or a data chart report. We need different strategies to understand the information presented. And we need to be aware of WHAT we are reading so we can know what we are doing with it.
:)
I think that the previous activities before reading the whole text is what help to understand the text faster, for example the activity of visualizing given in the article to get a better idea of what the are going to read and search about that topic, as well as making a quick reading to identify vocabulary and unknown language, in that way they can overcome the idea that reading is annoying and boring.
EliminarHi everyone!! I learned a new word today “metacognition”, I liked it. I think it´s what we do every day in our classes with our students. I enjoyed this reading , is useful because it has many good ideas and also because for a moment I thought I was one of those students in those classes. I had some flashbacks, I really enjoyed reading when I was in high school because it was very concrete, real and meaningful to me. I really had a wonderful time with books and reading.
ResponderEliminarOne strategy that little ones have enjoyed is the one that involves "telling tales" and making predictions just showing the front cover of a book or an illustration, they really loved it, everybody wants to participate and give their opinions so they are focusing in the reading and paying lots of attention.
“Character Hot Seat” looks like a nice activity for inferential thinking, also there is a game that is similar to this activity, you write the names of the characters on a paper, sts will take one paper without looking at it and they put it on their forehead, then they start asking questions to their classmates, trying to guess who they are?
I will try with my kids, pick a plot!!! We are developing lots of skills with this kind of activities!!!
In my personal experience and as I told you my sts are starting their reading and writing process, every day we have “reading circles”. Reading circles are small groups of reading, we have books for everybody. The whole class is divided into 3 groups depending on their reading level. Students are so excited with their books. Stories are very short, we work on fluency, reading comprenhension, punctuation and intonation, once is all ready finished they take the book to their house to read it with their family!!! This is their first experience with books. I have to be honest some kids are excited about reading and they wait for this time of the day, but others don´t . Since this is their first experience or contact with reading it has to be meaningful and enjoyable,and we have to train them to get used to books and reading but in a creative way.
Hell. It's Jenny .I'm late.I was busy this week and am sick ㅠㅠ
ResponderEliminarIt's just my individual opinion. I think Reading is related with speaking and listening. Also, Writing,Reading,Speaking,Listening. All oh these things are related with.
So, if learners are devoted themselves into main part of language,listening,speaking,reading and writing, they'll be able to achieve good fruits in learning English.
Reading after listening is a good way to make sure how much learners can remember what they heard. While researching about reading after listening, I found that there was something more than what we heard.
Thinking about what we are hearing is necessary to read well.
This article was very interesting!!! When I become a teacher, I want to refer this article!!!!
Hello guys,
EliminarI think what Jenny mentioned it is definitely true. All skills (Writing, Reading, Speaking, and Listening) are related and that relationship is something we need to take advantage as teachers. The endless possibilities that a text can offer is sometimes underestimated by students an even by teachers! As Jenny described, we can reinforce students´ understanding about a topic and also teach them how to do research and find valuable texts and sources. Especially for learners, reading is a great habit to become acquainted with a foreign language syntaxes, grammar, structure, vocabulary, etc… and also with the culture it represents.
Hello Jenny. This idea of mixing skills seems very well. In my experience, I've done many times and actually helps the student to be more attentive, also to be able to acquire a second language in a way more quick and efficient. Besides that creates an environment more enjoyable, as students see progress in a short time.
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ResponderEliminarHello guys,
ResponderEliminarIn my case I agree with Melissa, I haven’t had the chance to implement a lot of Readings in the classroom due to the fact that I have taught conversational courses in the past. However, I consider it is crucial to utilize Readings to help students develop vocabulary among other skills, and especially useful to use those “real texts” that students encounter in everyday life like blogs, advertisements, etc. First of all, I would be careful about the chosen material or text, and then I will try to make students apply some corrections skills- in case those blogs- for example- some present various problems about coherence. In that case, students can correct those and meanwhile they will be analyzing the text by using the repertoire of strategies like Use Knowledge of Text Structures, Activate Prior Knowledge, Make Inferences, etc.
Hi Mtizy, Reading provides much help to students in order to get more vocabulary, to have a more broad criteria about things. The idea of introducing it in your classes will help to exploit ideas, activities with students.
EliminarDefinitely, reading plays a super role in our lives. Reading helps us to learn about different cultures, as well as to be able to give us a vision more extensive in the world in which we live. In my case the reading plays a very important role in my classes. I like that the student knows that it is what is happening around. In addition, reading gives the student the ability to express themselves better, points of view more specific and to participate actively within the topics developed in the class. So reading is and will be a very important tool in my classes.
ResponderEliminar