Submitted on 23 January, 2009 - 19:15
Author Unknown
Taken from http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk
Readers use a number of skills when reading, and their understanding of the
context will depend on their expertise in these areas:
Predictive skills –
for example, predicting the content of an article or from a headline or
introduction.
Scanning -
We often read for specific information. For example, we look in a newspaper to
find a specific information.
Skimming.
This is where we read for the gist of a text, we don’t focus on every single
word but are just trying to get a general understanding of the content.
Detailed information. Sometimes we read in order to understand
everything in detail. Here we need to read in a concentrated manner to gain full
benefit.
Deduction from context.
Sometimes we need to be able to understand the meaning of individual words from
the context.
Problems with reading
Sentence length, word length and a number of unfamiliar words can present
problems to learners of English.
Fortunately, there are ways of dealing with language difficulty.
Pre-teaching vocabulary –
One way of helping students is to teach the difficult words, before doing a
reading activity.
Careful selection of texts –
If the teacher is careful he can choose a variety of authentic texts.
Topics
The topic of the text can also help to motivate the students. If the topic is
not interesting it is will not engage the students with material.
Create interest
If the teacher can get the students motivated and engaged in the tasks, there is
a much greater possibility that they will read with real enthusiasm.