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THE ESSENTIAL WAYS OF TEACHING READING Egamberdieva S.Ya.
Egamberdieva Sevara Yakubjanovna - Teacher, DEPARTMENT OF METHODOLOGY OF TEACHING ENGLISH LANGUAGE, ENGLISH LANGUAGES FACULTY 3, UZBEKISTAN STATE WORLD LANGUAGES UNIVERSITY, TASHKENT, REPUBLIC OF UZBEKISTAN
Abstract: the reason for reading depends very much on the purpose for reading. Reading can have three main purposes, for survival, for learning or for pleasure. Reading for survival is considered to be in response to our environment, to find out information and can include street signs, advertising, and timetables. It depends very much on the day-to-day needs of the reader and often involves an immediate response to a situation. Keywords: reading, Top-Down or Bottom-Up approach, cognitive constructs, fluency.
Hudson and et all define reading as "...an enjoyable, intense, private activity, from which much pleasure can be derived, and in which one can become, totally absorbed [2]." Reading means different things to different people, for some it is recognizing written words, while for others it is an opportunity to teach pronunciation and practice speaking. However reading always has a purpose. It is something that we do every day, it is an integral part of our daily lives, taken very much for granted and generally assumed to be something that everyone can do.
In contrast reading for learning is considered to be the type of reading done in the classroom and is goal orientated. While reading for pleasure is something that does not have to be done. For Dowhower [1] the central ideas behind reading are:
- the idea of meaning;
- the transfer of meaning from one mind to another;
- the transfer of a message from writer to reader;
- how we get meaning by reading;
- how the reader, the writer and the text all contribute to the process.
Readers' process texts in two ways Top-Down or Bottom-Up. Bottom-up processing is when the reader builds up meaning by reading word for word, letter for letter, carefully scrutinizing both vocabulary and syntax. This is often associated with poor or slow readers, but can sometimes occur when the readers own schema knowledge is inadequate. Top-Down processing is the opposite, where a global meaning of the text is obtained, through "clues" in the text and the reader's good schema knowledge. This is often associated with a good reader, who does not read word for word but quickly and efficiently. The most comprehensive description of the reading process is interactive models, ".in which every component in the reading process can interact with any other component.» [2], combining elements of both bottom-up and top down models. Reading is considered to be an interactive process (a conversation between writer/reader, even though the writer is not present) and for it to occur both processes are necessary, top-down to predict the meaning and bottom-up to check it. The two are therefore complementary ways of processing a text.
Our knowledge and experiences of the world around us also influence how a text is read or processed; this is known as schema theory. It operates actively and constructively, with our knowledge of the world being a continuous process that upon receiving new information interprets it on the basis of what is already known. Good readers have an idea of what is normal (linguistically and conceptually) and of how the world works, therefore when reading they make use of existing schemata and then modify them with any new information.
They also have expectations or make predictions before reading that are reinforced, challenged or modified after reading. Schemata have also been described as ".cognitive
constructs which allow for the organization of information in the long term memory..." [2]. Often a writer will presume that the target reader has the relevant schemata to read the text and will therefore leave certain facts out or unstated (presuppositions) but this creates problems when the writer and reader do not share the same relevant schema.
Fluency in any activity is achieved largely through practice - the actor rehearses the athlete talks about repetitious training drills, "the musician spends time daily practicing pieces that will eventually performed, and the novice driver spends as much time on the road as possible. Often, that practice involves the repetition of a particular line, skill, movement, or composition many times. So too, in reading fluency is achieved through practice - wide reading for some readers, repeated practice of particular pieces for others. Accomplished readers are often able to achieve and maintain their fluency through wide and independent reading. Even young successful readers can move toward higher levels of fluency through independent reading as found in sustained silent reading and its various permutations.
However for many young and struggling readers at all ages, repeated readings seems to be an essential method for achieving fluency. Such an accomplishment is to be expected. However, he also found that when students moved to new passages, their initial readings of those new pieces were read with higher levels of fluency and comprehension than the initial readings of the previous passage, even though the new passage was as difficult as or more challenging than the previous piece.
Since Dowhower work, other studies have demonstrated the value of repeated readings as an instructional tool for reading fluency and, because reading fluency is related to text understanding, to reading comprehension [1, 2]. Independent repeated readings might work for readers who are already sufficiently accomplished readers that they are able to evaluate and monitor their own reading. However, for most younger and struggling readers repeated readings need to be under the guidance of a teacher or coach.
References
1. Dowhower S., 1989. Repeated reading: Research into practice. The Reading Teacher.
2. Hudson R.F., Lane H.B. & Pullen P.C., 2005. Reading Fluency Assessment and Instruction: What, Why, and How? The Reading Teacher.
