UNIT 5- LANGUAGE ACROSS THE CURRICULUM-Developing Proficiency in Written Comprehension and Production - Part 3-BEd notes
Prepared by
Sabarish P
Contents
- Techniques of reading based on nature of content-factual, literary, scientific , expository, narrative and the like
- Techniques for improved reading comprehension-skimming and scanning
Techniques of reading based on nature of content – factual
School children are constantly bombarded with new knowledge in multiple topic areas in which they may or may not be interested. Additionally, they are expected to both learn and demonstrate the mastery of this knowledge on a weekly basis. Thus, an effective and efficient memory is critical for school success.
Students who have difficulty with working memory often forget what they are doing while doing it.
Such students will look like they have difficulty with reading comprehension. Students do understand facts, but the comprehension problem is due to a failure of the memory system rather than the language system.
Students who have deficits in the storage and retrieval of information from long-term memory may study for tests, but not be able to recall the information they studied when taking the tests.
Students frequently have difficulty recalling specific factual information such as dates or rules of grammar. They have a poor memory of material they earlier in the school year or last year.
The following ten general strategies are offered to help students develop a more efficient and effective memory in order to recall the factual information.
Give directions in multiple formats.
Teach students to over-learn material.
Teach students to use visual images and other memory.
Give teacher-prepared handouts prior to class lectures.
Teach students to be active readers.
Write down steps in maths.
Provide retrieval practice for students.
Help students develop cues when storing information.
Prime the memory prior to teaching/learning.
Review material before going to sleep.
Techniques of reading based on nature of content – literary
Reading a work of literature means understanding what the author has written and evaluating the success of the work as a whole. The following six steps helps a student to achieve the purpose:
Figurative language : Along with reading, expressive language such as similes, metaphors, and personification should be noted and the reasons behind their usage need to be identified in order to understand the author’s viewpoint.
Structure : Many times an author opts to tell a story out of chronological sequence, perhaps with flashbacks or integrated tales. The purpose of the nonlinear structure is for the reader to understand, in retrospect, how prior events led to the present state of situations. Thus, students need to undertstand this structure.
Influence : For every writer, some other author’s work appeals to him or her on some level, whether it is in the lessons learned, the style used, or the conclusions reached. The influence need to be discovered by students in order to understand the author’s perception.
Archetypes : Students’ critical reading should also include an awareness of archetypes. Like influences, archetypes are things patterned after an original, and many are so common that students often don’t need extensive knowledge of the original to appreciate the meaning or intent. Archetypes often fall into one of two categories: character archetypes and situational archetypes.
Symbolism : A symbol typically encompasses both a literal meaning and a figurative meaning. Unlike a metaphor, a symbol is not necessarily a statement: a single word can evoke meaning and become a symbol. Being aware of common symbols in novels will increase students’ ability to read a work critically. The more symbols a student is able to identify, the richer his/her critical interpretation will be.
Reading and rereading : A student needs to resist the impulse to assess a work after a he/she has first read it, even if he/she has diligently completed the first five steps.
Techniques of reading based on nature of content – scientific
Reading a scientific article is a complex task and the worst way to approach this task is to treat it like the reading of a textbook—reading from title to literature cited, digesting every word along the way without any reflection or criticism.
Rather, a student should begin by skimming the article to identify its structure and features. As he/she reads, the author’s main points need to be looked for. Questions should be generated before, during, and after reading.
Inferences based on experiences and knowledge need to be drawn.
To really improve understanding and recall, a student should take notes as he/she reads.
The following steps helps students to read scientific literature more efficiently:
Article must be skimmed and its structure need to identified.
The main points need to be distinguished.
Questions should be generated and students should be aware of their understanding.
Inferences should be drawn by students.
Students must take down notes as they read.
Techniques of reading based on nature of content – expository
Expository texts have their own unique structures that are different from those of narrative text, and most students, regardless of their reading ability, struggle at times with expository text.
Skilled readers use different strategies to comprehend expository text.
Students must have a good understanding of how strategies work and when to use them.
Students receive many opportunities to practice a comprehension strategy, with teacher guidance and using many texts, until they have a good understanding of how to use and apply the strategy.
Research has shown that comprehension is enhanced when readers activate prior knowledge or make connections to background knowledge.
Initial questioning by the teacher can quickly establish if students have the knowledge base to do this.
Activating relevant background knowledge helps readers make connections between what they know and what they are reading.
Encouraging the reader to generate and answer questions before and during reading aids comprehension.
Text structure awareness, or the ability to analyse text in terms of its structure, is a mental awareness of how writers organise information.
Exposition has many types of structures, and some are complex. The use of design sketches to capture the structure helps hugely in terms of comprehension.
Teachers need to teach each type of expository text structure, so students can internalise all of the structures.
Creating a mental image of the text being read (or being able to visualise how texts are structured) enhances comprehension.
Knowing how to summarise the main ideas has a positive impact on comprehension.
Techniques of reading based on nature of content – narrative and the like
Students need to learn the purposes and methods of narration in order to understand the narrative framework and to eliminate frustration when they read.
When students know the narrative elements, they can more easily follow the story line and make successful predictions about what is to occur. In addition, understanding these elements develops higher-level thinking skills.
Narrative text includes any type of writing that relates a series of events and includes both fiction (novels, short stories, poems) and nonfiction (memoirs, biographies, news stories).
Both forms tell stories that use imaginative language and express emotion, often through the use of imagery, metaphors, and symbols.
Students need to know how narrative texts work and how to read them, because stories are used for many important purposes.
The purpose of narrative text is to entertain, to gain and hold a reader's interest; however, writers of memoirs and novels often relate complex stories that examine universal ideas, events, and issues. In addition, speakers, advertisers, and politicians use stories to persuade us to accept or reject an idea.
In effect, students need to learn the purposes and methods of narration in order to understand the narrative framework and to eliminate frustration when they read.
When students know the narrative elements, they can more easily follow the story line and make successful predictions about what is to occur.
In addition, understanding these elements develops higher-level thinking skills. For example, the complications in a plot are related to cause and effect, and awareness of character's motives can lead to analysis.
All in all, the narrative form is unique, because authors relate ideas they want to express about how people behave and what they believe. These ideas, or themes, generally relate to universal truths and make connections to the reader's experiences.
Scaffolding strategies for narrative text
Teachers can use the following techniques of Focus Strategy to introduce the narrative form.
Focus: Themes
Ask students to do pre-writing about a theme.
Ask small groups to make posters related to a theme or themes.
Focus: Conflict
Ask students to identify modern values and record their answers.
Have the class identify the values that are evident in the narrative.
In small groups, have students determine how the characters' values cause conflict.
Create a series of questions, each starting with the word suppose, that relate to a character's conflicts and complications.
Focus: Features
Ask students to copy lines from the narrative that relate to the conflict or characters; break the lines into three parts, and write each part on a different color index card. Mix the cards together, and then ask students to work together to find complete lines. Then have them read the line aloud and make a prediction.
Ask students to make predictions about the title and/or illustrations in the text.
Focus: Characterisation
Utilise the AWAIT strategy. To teach the methods of indirect characterisation, have each student create an image of a character. Each image should include the following details:
Appearance: What does the character look like? Wear?
Words: Create a line of dialogue that the character would say.
Actions: Make the character do something (e.g., run, hit a ball).
Interactions with other characters: Write a sentence that creates a conflict between the character and someone else.
Thoughts: Create a thought bubble; record the character's thoughts in the bubble. In addition, have each student write a one-line assertion stating what the character is like.
Students can easily remember indirect characterisation by learning the acronym AWAIT.
Focus: Setting
Use the graphic organiser in the figure below to teach the functions of the setting. Ask students to create an example for each function.
Techniques for improved reading comprehension-skimming and scanning
Skimming and scanning is that type of reading in which the reader locates and deals with only those parts of the content that serves their purposes.
Skimming and scanning are alike in that the reader alternates in the following ways:
Scanning: In scanning, the reader has a specific question in their mind or information that is needed. The reader goes to the content and searches through it until the information is found.
Skimming: In skimming, the reader passes quickly through an article or chapter to get a general impression of the whole. A person might previewskim before reading material more carefully. This type of skimming, called surveying by many people is often used in studying and in reference work. A general impression is sufficient. The reader does not feel the need to read the material previously read, going back over material to study for a test or to prepare a report.
Skimming and scanning are two specific speed-reading techniques, which enables a reader to cover a vast amount of material very rapidly. These techniques are similar in process but different in purpose.
Scanning and skimming are both reading techniques used to find information quickly.
Skimming is a method of rapidly moving the eyes over text with the purpose of getting only the main ideas and a general overview of the content.
Given a new passage, a reader might quickly read over every few lines to ascertain the essence of the piece. This is called skimming.
Scanning rapidly covers a great deal of material in order to locate a specific fact or piece of information.
If the reader knows exactly what she is looking for, she might scan the page for that specific word or phrase.
Prepared by
Sabarish P
