knowledge to guess what the text is about. Lastly, in interactive reading, readers try to combine the bottom-up and top-down processing. Readers not only identify
and decode the language feature of the text but also use their background knowledge and experience to comprehend the text.
e. Micro and Macro Skills in Reading Comprehension
Brown 2004: 187-188 notes that reading comprehension consists of two big
elements, micro and macro skills. The micro skills are presented below.
a discriminating among the distinctive graphemes and orthographic patterns of
English. b
retaining chunks of language of different lengths in short-term memory. c
prosses writing at an efficient rate of speed to suit the purpose. d
recognizing a core of words, and interpret word order patterns and their significance.
e recognizing grammatical word classes nouns, verbs, etc., systems e.g.,
tense, agreement, pluralization patterns, rules, and elliptical forms. f
recognizing that a particular meaning may be expressed in different grammatical forms.
g recognizing cohesive devices in written discourse and their role in signaling
the relationship between and among clauses. Meanwhile the macro skills include these following skills.
a recognizing the rhetorical forms of written discourse and their significance for
interpretation. b
recognizing the communicative functions of written texts, according to form and purpose.
c inferring context that is not explicit by using background knowledge.
d distinguishing between literal and implied meanings.
e detecting culturally specific references and interpret them in a context of the
appropriate cultural schemata. f
developing and using a battery of reading strategies, such as scanning and skimming, detecting discourse markers, guessing the meaning of words from
context, and activating schemata for the interpretation of texts.
f. Teaching Reading Comprehension
Teaching reading comprehension is essential because reading is the most important activity in any language class. Besides it becomes a medium to get
information, it is also a mean for expanding students’ background knowledge about language Rivers, 1981. The stages of teaching reading according to Brown 2001
and Vaughn Bos 2009 can be summarized as follows: 1
Before reading In this stage, the teacher should introduce the topic of the text that the students
will read in order to act ivate students’ background knowledge. The teacher
should also introduce strategies in reading such as skimming, scanning, predicting, activating scemata, and the other strategies that can heko students
comprehend the text. The use of prompts such as visuals, realia, photos,etc is recommended Gower et al., 1995.
2 Whilst reading
In this stage, the teacher monitors students’ comprehension by encouraging them to self-questions.
