Reading Teaching Reading Comprehension

1 Context Clues The use of context clues to help recognize words that are familiar in speech but not in print. Context clues also key the meaning of an unfamiliar word by directly defining the word, providing an appositive, or comparing or contrasting the word with a known word. 2 Structure Clues Structural analysis as a word recognizing skill, can also be used as an aid in discovering meanings of unknown words. Knowing meanings of common affixes and combining them with meanings of familiar root words can help the learners determine the meanings of many new words. 3 Analogies and Word Lines Analogies compare two similar relationships and thereby bolster word knowledge. Educators may teach analogies by displaying examples of categories, relationships, and analogies, asking and guiding questions about the examples, allowing students to discuss the questions and applying the ideas that emerge. Whereas, the use of word lines is to show the relationships among words, just as they use number lines for numbers. 4 Dictionary Use The dictionary is an excellent source to use in discovering meanings of unfamiliar words, particulary for determining the appropriate meanings of words that have multiple definitions or specific, technical definitions. b Sentences The students may find complicated sentences that are difficult to understand, so they need to know ways to attack them, or derive their meaning. Reseach has shown that systematic instruction in sentence comprehension increases reading comprehension. The students will understand the material better when the syntax is like their oral language patterns. c Paragraphs Paragraphs are groups of sentences that serve a particular within a whole selection or passage. They may be organized around a main idea or topic. Understand the paragraphs’ functions, the paragraphs’ general organization, and the paragraphs’ relationships between the sentences in a paragraph is important to reading comprehension. d Whole Selections The understanding of the whole selections depends upon understanding the smaller units Burns, 1984. 3 Levels of Comprehension Burns 1984: 177 states that it is possible to understand materials on a number of different levels. In fact, the students need to achieve higher levels of reading comprehension to become informed and effective citizens. According to Burns 1984, there are four levels of reading comprehension. a Literal reading comprehension At this level, the reader is simply “reading the lines.” Literal comprehension is to take ideas and detail notes that are directly stated. The task of the reader is to locate and identify information that is explicitly stated by the author. b Interpretative reading comprehension At the inferential level, the reader is “reading between the lines.” The reader takes the information gained at the literal levels and draws conclusions, makes inferences, and predicts outcomes based on the explicit information supplied by the author. In other words, in this level, the learner is expected to discover conclusion from what is written and find main ideas and cause and effect relationship when the factors are not stated. c Critical reading comprehension Critical reading is to read for information. At this level, the reader may apply external information such as background experience, cultural values and personal values. The reader’s major task at this level is to pass a personal judgement on the text and to form and express an opinion. In order to do this, the reader must attend to the meanings both stated and implied by the author as well as all the information gained at the “Literal” and “Inferential” levels. Therefore, the reader must attend to both denotative and connotative meaning in order to critically evaluate a text. d Creative reading comprehension Creative reading is to read beyond the lines. It enables the reader to use the printed matter to solve problems, make judgements regarding the actions of characters, and draw a conclusion about what they would have done.

5. Theory of Teaching Writing

Robert Nancy 1985: 3 states that writing is a way of thinking as well as a means of communication, and one of the things it can be used to think about is yourself. Every act of communication involves sender who initiates a message and a receiver who interprets it, a writer explaining communication and a reader deciphering symbols on a page. But the elements that make up the situation in which communication takes place can be specified even further. All writing situations, for example, may be described by a simple diagram: topic writer text reader form of writing Figure 4: The Writing Situation The central level of the diagram writer → text → reader describes the basic process of written communication. The writer produces a written message that is transmitted to the reader. The readers read it, interpret it, and understand it, thus completing the process. In order for this to happen, however, the writer and reader must share two kinds of knowledge, indicated on the diagram by the upper and lower terms topic and form of writing Robert Nancy, 1985: 6. Raimes 1983 explains the reasons to include writing as a part of second language syllabus. Writing helps our students learn. First, writing reinforces the grammatical structures, idioms, and vocabulary that we have been teaching our students. Second, when our students write, they also have a chance to be adventurous with the language, to go beyond what they have just learned to say, to take a risk. Third, when they write, they necessarily become very involved with the new language; the effort to express ideas and constant use of eye, hand, and brain is a unique way to reinforce learning.

6. The Integrated Teaching Reading and Writing

Obviously, when the students read, they interact with the finished product. Reading can do far more in the teaching of writing than simply provide subject matter for discussion and for composition topics. When our students read, they engage actively with the new language and culture. Reading is the only activity that gives them access to unlimited amounts of the language. The more our students read, the more they become familiar with the vocabulary, idiom, sentence, patterns, organizational flow, and cultural assumptions of native speakers of the language Raimes, 1983: 50. A short story, a newspaper column, an advertisement, a letter, a magazine article, or a piece of student writing can work as a picture to provide shared content in the classroom. Readings can also, like pictures, be used to create an information gap that leads to communicative activities: if the students work with a variety of readings at the same time, then they will be dealing with different content, and anything they write to each other will thus be authentic communication, conveying new and real information Raimes, 1983: 50. The activities we can ask students to do in the classroom to tie their reading in with their writing fall into two broad categories: they can work either with the text or from the text. Students work with the text when they copy and when they examine the writer’s choices of specific linguistic and logical features, such as cohesive links, punctuation, grammar, sentence arrangement, and organization. They work from the text when they use it to create a text of their own, that is, when they summarize, complete, speculate, or react Raimes, 1983: 51. In teaching the integrated reading and writing, the teacher can create many teaching strategies which enhance the students in learning reading and writing skills. These following strategies are some strategies for teaching integrated reading and writing: 1 Asking Questions to Clarify According to Chamot, et al. 1986: 26, in their book The Learning Strategies Handbook states that asking questions to clarify means clarifying involves your asking for explanation, verification, rephrasing, or examples. a. Conducting this strategy, we usually use question words such as: b. Where…? c. Who…?