three sequences in teaching reading: before reading, while reading, and after reading.
1 Before reading
In this stage, the teacher needs to spend some time to introduce a topic of a text, and let the students to understand the topic given.
The teacher can apply skimming, scanning, predicting, and activating schemata to stimulate students’ knowledge and skills.
2 While reading
In this stage, the teacher should be able to give the students a sense that they have a purpose in reading a particular text. So that, the
students will understand that they read a text not merely because the teacher orders them to do so.
3 After reading
In the final stage, the teacher can provide some activities appropriate for post-reading. Comprehension questions can be
given to check students’ understanding of the text. Additionally, activities can be in the form of vocabulary study, identifying the
author’s purpose, discussing the author’s line of reasoning, examining grammatical structures, or steering students toward a
follow-up writing exercise.
f. Strategies in Reading Comprehension
As reading comprehension is one of main goals in ESL reading teaching-learning, both a teacher and a reader needs to know strategies that
can facilitate a student in comprehending text and is potential in improving his or her reading comprehension. Janzen in Richards and Renandya 2002: 287
suggests reading strategy as plans for solving problems encountered in constructing meaning.
There are ten reading strategies proposed by Brown 2001: 306-310, as follows:
1 Identifying the purpose in reading.
2 Using graphemic rules and pattern to aid in bottom-up decoding
especially for beginning level learners. 3
Using efficient silent reading techniques for relatively rapid comprehension for intermediate to advanced levels
4 Skimming the text for main ideas.
5 Scanning the text for specific information.
6 Using semantic mapping or clustering
7 Guessing when you are not certain.
8 Analyzing vocabulary.
9 Distinguishing between literal and implied meanings.
10 Capitalizing on discourse makers to process relationships.
Those are some strategies that can be applied for a student in order to overcome difficulties in reading comprehension. The teacher and the reader
can select the most suitable strategy based on each student’s ability to be applied in reading activity.
g. Principles in Reading Comprehension
There are some principles that should be taken into account by teachers when they want to teach reading comprehension to the students. The
principles are essential for teachers to guide the course of teaching and to meet the goals of teaching. Nunan 2003 mentions some principles for teaching
reading, as follows:
1 Exploit the reader’s background knowledge
A reader’s background knowledge can influence reading comprehension Carrell, 1983; Carrell and Connor, 1991 in Nunan,
2003. Background knowledge comprises all of the experiences that a reader brings to a text. Reading comprehension can be enhanced
through activation of background knowledge such as by setting goals, asking questions, making predictions, teaching text structures, and so
on. 2
Build a strong vocabulary base. Vocabulary is considered essential as it influences successful reading.
Nunan 2003 suggests that basic vocabulary should be taught explicitly and L2 readers should be taught to effectively guess meaning
based on context of less frequent vocabulary. 3
Teach for comprehension. Monitoring comprehension is important to successful reading Nunan,
2003. Mostly in reading instruction, teachers emphasize in testing reading comprehension, instead of teaching how to comprehend.
4 Work on increasing reading rate.
Teachers must work to develop fluent readers. Many second language learners in reading classroom show that they can read, but much of
their reading is not fluent. Teachers need to find a balance between assisting students to improve their reading rate and developing reading
comprehension skills.
5 Teach reading strategies.
Students need to learn how to use a range of reading strategies that match their reading goals. Teaching them how to do this should be a
major consideration in reading instruction Anderson, 1991; Chamot and O’Malley, 1994 in Nunan, 2003. Nunan 2003 adds that a good
technique to make students aware to the strategies they used is to get them to verbalize or talk about their thought processes as they read.
6 Encourage readers to transform strategies into skills.
“As learners consciously learn and practice specific reading strategies, the strategies move from conscious to unconscious; from strategy to
skill” Nunan, 2003. In this case, teachers need to make students familiar with reading strategy. As using the strategy becomes
automatic, so the learner moves from using conscious strategy to unconscious skill.
7 Build assessment and evaluation into your teaching.
It is required for teachers to assess development in reading skills from both formal and informal perspectives. Teachers can involve
qualitative and quantitative assessment activities in reading classroom Nunan, 2003.
8 Strive for continuous improvement as a reading teacher.
A good reading teacher actively teaches the students what to do. Teachers should consider themselves as facilitators, and help each
reader to discover what works best. Nunan, 2003.
In the end, basing on the teaching reading principles will help teachers find a way to conduct effective reading instruction. The teachers can select
what principles work best for the students, and even they can integrate some key principles in order to achieve the success of teaching reading.
h. Assessing Reading Comprehension
