Reading and Listening Skills PDF

Session 5: Receptive Competences Reading, Listening and Viewing 1. Communication as a Process: The 4 Skills 1.1. Process of Reading Basic Information − while reading, we decode letters, words, sentences, and other language features in the text (bottom-up processing) − meaningful senten...

Session 5: Receptive Competences Reading, Listening and Viewing 1. Communication as a Process: The 4 Skills 1.1. Process of Reading Basic Information − while reading, we decode letters, words, sentences, and other language features in the text (bottom-up processing) − meaningful sentences → we can read them more quickly and we memorise them more easily than single letters or words − skilled readers can construct meaning without considering every single letter but rather the unit − context knowledge makes understanding a text easier − general world knowledge can be applied more easily − we combine information from the text and previous knowledge in order to understand the text (top-down processing) Different Types of Knowledge Working Together − linguistic/systemic knowledge: dealing with language itself o syntactic knowledge: the position of words within a sentence gives a hint as to what type of word it might be (e.g. verb or noun) o morphological knowledge: affixation (prefixation and suffixation) o semantic knowledge: knowledge of the co-text − schematic knowledge: enabling a reader to work with the language of the text in order to interpret its meaning o general world knowledge and/or sociocultural knowledge o topic knowledge o genre knowledge Common Ways of Reading and Reading Strategies silent reading to understand the meaning of the text most frequent way of reading in everyday life a student reading out an unknown text frequently done in FLC but often underestimated in its difficulties − focusing on the grapheme-phoneme relation the student may not get the meaning − it requires anticipatory decoding of meaning and text structure to adapt intonation and body language the teacher reading out a text good way of demonstrating how to read out in terms of pronunciation, fluency, nonverbal signs corresponding to what is read as well as the relevance of the structure of the text (dialogue, poetry, manual) for how it is read out a student reading out a familiar text − often used to prove the student’s reading skill − to promote the understanding of a text or as a way of pointing out text passages when discussing a text − depends on the context of the task if it can be considered didactically useful skimming going over a text, looking for its general meaning or central information scanning going over a text, looking for specific information holisitic reading − reading a text in its entirety, notwithstanding some unknown words or structures − should be trained in order to avoid the impression that texts are only read in order to introduce vocabulary or grammar, instead encouraging them to read despite words they do not know intensive reading reading very closely for every detail reading along − helps to get an impression of how you spell what is being read out − this way of reading is not much used in everyday life proof reading advanced way of reading as it requires a distanced review of your own writing error spotting reading for the mistakes of others fast reading useful way of reading, required and to be trained when, e.g., reading subtitles extensive reading to show how much the students can already read in a foreign language literary reading aesthetic reading, comprising more than just the lines of the text (the structure of the text, the readers, their interpretation, the author, the context of its production and reception…) 1.2. Process of Listening Real-Life Listening − conversations/discussions − instructions  − loudspeaker announcements − radio news/podcasts/audiobooks − music − telephone chat − voice messages − lesson/lecture − watching television/films/audiovisual texts − story-telling Listening Situations − listening to public announcements (information, instructions, warnings) − listening to media (radio, TV, internet/youtube, cinema, computer games) − listening as a member of a live audience (public meetings, public lectures, entertainments, concerts, theatre) − listening to other speakers in conversations and discussions Listening Goals − for main information (gist) − for specific information − for detailed understanding − for implications − for pleasure → learners need specific listening tasks → learners need to know about the purpose of their listening (focus on relevant content) → listening should be taught, not mainly tested How should we teach Reading and Listening in class? − make reading and listening a habit: encourage extensive reading and listening which will lead to recognising bigger chunks (also from the context) − give students reading time in class (to lower anxiety) − students should also be able to choose the text they would like to read or listen to (address their interests, give them a wider range of texts, including picture books/comics/podcasts…) − teach linguistic aspects (syntax, grammar, vocabulary) − teach genre knowledge and provide your learners with different texts − select texts suitable for the learners, linguistically and in terms of topic and world knowledge so they can relate to the topic − provide background knowledge and activate schematic knowledge (see above) that is already there (pre- reading/listening activities) − develop strategies (to infer meaning from context, to use helps such as dictionaries or keeping a vocab book) and reading/listening strategies specifically  − promote positive reading − link literature with audio books and movies − post-reading/listening activities (process-oriented way of teaching) → personal reactions to a text, critical reading/listening − different interpretations should be possible 1.3. Reading and Listening as Interactive Processes Bottom-Up Processing − data-driven − process of decoding letters, words and other language features in a text Top-Down Processing − knowledge-driven − application of prior knowledge when trying to understand a text o cognitive schemata: knowledge about how things normally are, e.g. school life, families, hobbies o social scripts: mental structures about conventionalised routine situations and the associated forms of behaviour they require 1.4. Designing Reading and Listening Tasks Strategy − first: aim o What do I want my students to do? o Which aims do I want them to achieve? o Which aspects of reading do I want to foster? − then: select a reading strategy − also important o pre-reading tasks: preparing the reading process o while-reading tasks: accompanying the reading process o post-reading tasks: evaluating the reading process Structuring and Planning Reading How can we support students? − teach and develop strategies o to prepare reception (reading instructions carefully) o to facilitate reception process (asking questions to the text) o to process what was received (taking notes in view of guiding questions) o to compensate lack of understanding (eliciting meaning from context)  o to improve memory (processing notes to cluster) o to prepare language production/speaking (developing a structure) Bottom-Up Processing Tasks − tasks for extracting general, specific or detailed information − employing reading strategies explicitly o deciphering the meaning of unknown words from context o focus on individual lexical items to reconstruct a text, e.g. for its sequence of events − visually capturing text elements, e.g. the time and place − encouraging word recognition through ‘flash exercises’ − segmenting a sentence into units of meaning − examples o task ideas for skimming ▪ based on a quick look at the text, decide on the text genre ▪ make a list of keywords that reappear in the text without reading the text in detail ▪ after skimming the text, students choose an option out of four that summarises the text best o task ideas for scanning ▪ letter box: find as many words as you can that are related to the topic summer ▪ read a text about last weekend’s soccer games and find the result of Tottenham Hotspur against Manchester United ▪ read the text about the latest blizzard in Canada and find out whether Winnipeg was hit as well ▪ read a number of recipes and find the one that uses beef and eggplants Top-Down Processing Tasks − activating prior knowledge (world/situation/genre/topic) before reading/listening to a text − formulate one’s own questions about a text based on title, topic, images, headlines or captions (staged process: image first → speculating on the title, title → speculating on key topics…) − reconstructing what a text could be about by giving key terms or expressions from the text − silent viewing of a film clip (sound off): speculate on the mood, emotions and setting Interactive Processing: Reciprocal Reading − questioning: read the passage aloud to the members of your group, ask questions about unclear parts, puzzling information or anything that could be misunderstood − summarising: briefly summarise the content of the passage which has just been read aloud, try using your own words − clarifying: ask the members of your group to explain what certain words/chunks mean or how they are pronounced correctly − predicting: make predictions, imagine how the story could continue − the process is repeated with each following paragraph and the next person