Definition of Reading Skills for Reading Comprehension

8

CHAPTER II REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

In this chapter, the writer describes theoretical description underlying the research, rationale, and hypothesis.

A. Reading

1. Definition of Reading

Reading is the most important activity in the language class. It is not only as the source of information but also as a means of extending knowledge of the language. William 1984: 2 says reading has received increasing attention in recent year. There are many definitions of reading, William 1996: 2 defines reading as a process whereby one looks and understands what has been written. It is meant that reading is process of obtaining meaning from written text. According to Adams 1990: 1974 reading is acquisition of the multiple acts, skills, and knowledge that enable individuals to comprehend the meaning of text. Nunan 1989: 32 states that reading is a process of decoding written symbol, working from smaller units individual letter to larger ones words, clauses and sentences. In other word, it is process of understanding the meaning of written forms. Other definition come from Schoenbach, et al. http:www.nwp.orgcspublicdownloadnwp_file380WhatisReadinge 9 xcerpt.pdf?x-r=pcfile_d reading is a simple process of decoding figure out how to pronounce each word in a text and then comprehends the meaning of the words. It is said by Silberstain 1994: 12 that reading is a complex information processing skill in which the reader interact s with text in order to create meaningful discourse. According to Richards 1997: 15 reading is what occurs when people look at a text and select message of the written symbols in that text.

2. Skills for Reading Comprehension

According to Brown 2004: 187-188 there are two skills in reading, micr o- and macr o-skills. a. Micr o-skills 1 Discriminating among the distinctive graphemes and orthographic patterns of English. 2 Retaining chunks of language of different lengths in short -term memory. 3 Processing writing at an efficient rate of speed to suit the purpose. 4 Recognizing a core of words, and interpret word order patterns and their significance. 5 Recognizing grammatical word classes noun, verbs, etc. systems tense, agreement, and pluralisation patterns, rules, and elliptical forms. 10 6 Recognizing that a particular meaning may be expressed in different grammatical forms. 7 Recognizing cohesive devices in written discourse and their role in signalling the relationship between and among clauses. b. Macr o-skills 1 Recognizing the rhetorical forms of written discourse and their significance for interpretation. 2 Recognizing the communicative functions of written texts, according to form and purpose. 3 Inferring context that is not explicit by using background knowledge 4 From events, ideas, etc. infer links, and connections between events, deduce causes and effects, and detect such relations as main idea, supporting idea, new information, given information, generalization, and exemplification. 5 Distinguishing between literal and implied meaning. 6 Detecting culturally specific references and interpret them in a context of the appropriate cultural schemata. 7 Developing and using a battery of reading strategies, such as scanning and skimming, detecting discourse markers, guessing the meaning from context, and activating schemata for the interpretation of texts. 11 Davis in Charles 2000: 9 defines eight skills in reading, they are: 1 Recalling word meanings 2 Drawing inferences about the meaning of a word from context 3 Finding answer to questions answered explicitly or in paraphrase 4 Weaving together ideas in the content 5 Drawing inferences from the content 6 Recognizing a writer’s purpose, attitude, tone and mood 7 Identifying a writer’s technique 8 Following the structure of a passage M unby in Charles 2000: 10 distinguishes the following reading ―micro-skills‖: 1 Recognizing the script of a language 2 Deducing the meaning and use of unfamiliar lexical items 3 Understanding explicitly stated information 4 Understanding information when is not explicitly stated 5 Understanding conceptual meaning 6 Understanding the communicative value of sentences 7 Understanding relations within sentence 8 Understanding relations between parts of the text through lexical cohesion devices 9 Understanding cohesion between parts of the text through grammatical cohesion devices 12 10 Interpreting by going outside it 11 Recognizing indicators in discourse 12 Identifying the main point or important information in discourse 13 Distinguishing the main point from supporting details 14 Extracting salient details to summarize the text, an idea 15 Extracting relevant points from a text selectively 16 Using basic reference skills 17 Skimming 18 Scanning to locate specifically required information 19 Transcoding information to diagrammatic display In general there are two kinds of reading skill Tarigan, 1990: 11- 12 as follows: a. Mechanical skill, ketr ampilan yang ber sifat mekanis, yaitu: 1 Pengenalan bentuk hur uf 2 Pengenalan unsur -unsur Linguistics fonem, fr ase, kata, kalimat,dll 3 Pengenalan hubungan ejaan dan bunyi 4 Kecapatan membaca ber tar af lambat b. Compr ehension skill, keter ampilan yang ber sifat pemahaman 1 Memahami leksikal seder hana leksikal, gr amatikal, r etor ika l 13 2 Memahami signifikansi atau makna maksud dan tujuan pengar ang, r eaksi pembaca, dll 3 Evaluasi atau penilaian isi, bentuk 4 Kecepatan membaca yang flexible, mudah disesuaikan dengan keadaan. According to Anderson in Aebersold and Field 1997: 16 the followings are skills for reading: a. Recognizing word quickly b. Using text features subheadings, transitions, etc. c. Using title s to infer what information might follow d. Using word knowledge e. Analyzing unfamiliar words f. Identifying the grammatical functions of words g. Reading for meaning, concentrating on constructing meaning h. Guessing about the meaning of the text i. Evaluating guesses and trying guesses if necessary j. M onitoring comprehension k. Keeping the purpose for reading the text in mind l. Adjusting strategies to the purpose for reading m. Identifying or inferring main ideas n. Understanding the relationships between the parts of text o. Distinguishing main ideas and minor ideas 14 p. Tolerating ambiguity in a text q. Paraphrasing r. Using context to build meaning and aid comprehension s. Continuing reading even when unsuccessful, at least for a while.

3. Reading Purposes