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Mitchell 1982: 2-3 as the writer cited from Inocentia’s thesis 2005: 18, argues that it is likely that different people read in different ways. Thus, the strategy depends on
the response they make to the text. As Gibson and Levin 1975: 438 state that:
“A skilled reader is very selective. Sometimes he skims, sometimes he skips and sometimes he concentrates. He plans his strategy, suiting
it to his interests, to the materials and to his purpose, which may be entertainment, searching the wants for job, reading someone else’s
text while typing it, cramming for a quiz, completing a Double- Crostic, to name but few of a million or so possibilities”.
The meaning of all theories is that readers can use whatever strategy in reading based on the time given. The reader may place their strategies in semantic
related to the meaning of word or syntactic related to the meaning of sentences, and when necessary the reader should emphasize their visual or auditory strategies.
As a consequence, the reader will read more slowly when the text is difficult to understand and is not highly predictable; they tend to use graphic information thus. In
addition, based on Mitchell, out of the models above he argues that it is likely that different people read in the different ways, the strategy depends on the response they
make to the text.
d. Teaching Reading Skills
According to Pearson and Fielding’s generative learning quoted by Urquhart and Weir 1998: 83, there are three phases in teaching reading, including pre
reading planning, while reading monitoring and post reading evaluating. The
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writer combines the phases with the basic principles adapted from Anderson in Nunan’s book A Practice English Language Teaching 2003: 74-77. Each phase
will be further explained in line with its basic principles, as follows:
1 Pre reading activities Pre reading activities are important as they prepare students to read a
selection of material. The basic principles for pre reading activities are:
Activate background knowledge
Reading is a process in which readers actively search for and construct meaning by relating what they are reading to their background knowledge Bonnie
and Jean, 2002: 83. Therefore, a reader’s background knowledge can influence reading comprehension since it includes all experiences a reader brings to the text:
life experiences, educational experiences, knowledge of how text can be organized rhetorically, knowledge of how one’s first language works, knowledge of how a
second language works and the cultural background and knowledge Correll, 1983 Correll and Conor, 1991 as the writer cited from Maran 2005: 20. Moreover, Bill
Preston 2003, x says that having students share their personal experiences before they read serves several functions: it pools group knowledge, generates useful
language for discussing the piece and prepares students to make personal connections with the reading.
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Build a vocabulary base
According to Anderson 1991, as cited by Nunan 2003: 74, basic vocabulary should be explicitly taught and second language readers should be taught
to use context to effectively guess the meaning of less frequently used vocabulary. Thus, there are three questions to enhance vocabulary instruction: what vocabulary
do the students need to know? How will they learn this vocabulary? How can a teacher best see what the students need to know and what they now know?
Set purposes and direction for teaching
Setting purposes for reading will help the students focus their attention on what to look as for they read and help them to connect their background knowledge
with new information. This can be done by asking questions about the texts, questions to which they would like to find answers in the text, and by making
predictions Bonnie and Jean, 2002: 85.
2 While-reading activities While-reading activities should facilitate or enhance the students’ reading
comprehension. The basic principles are: Teach for comprehension
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According to Beck et al. 1997, as cited by Bonnie and Jean 2002: 1991, one of the techniques to monitor comprehension is by questioning the author. This is
because the students will engage in meaningful cognitive and metacognitive interaction with the texts and assist them in the process of constructing meaning
from texts. The questions may include the following: What does the author try to say here? What is the author’s message? What is the author talking about? Does the
author explain it clearly?
Teach reading strategies Strategies refer to the tools for active, self directed involvement that is
necessary for developing communicative ability Oxford, 1996 as the writer cited from Maran 2005: 22. According to the National Reading Panel, as cited by Bonnie
and Jean 2002: 71, strategies may include retelling drawing inferences, getting the main idea, summarizing, visualizing and many other strategies. Since there is no
single set of processing strategies, Neil Anderson 1991 as cited by Nunan 2003: 76 says that the students need to learn how to use a range of reading strategies that
match with their purposes of reading. Encourage students to transform strategies into skills
According to Kawai, Oxford and Iran Nejad 2000, as cited by Nunan 2003: 77, an important distinction can be made between strategies and skills. As
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learners consciously learn and practice specific reading strategies, the strategies move from conscious to unconscious; from strategies to skills.
3 Post reading activities According to Bonnie and Jean 2002: 87, post reading activities should help
students do something with what they have just read in order to tighten the connection between their background knowledge and information in the text. The
teacher needs to encourage them to think creatively and critically about what they have read and to apply and extend their new learning. The activities include further
questioning, discussion, drama, writing music, application and outreach in the real word.
e. Conclusion
