This article focuses on the use of written texts in the classroom. It suggests ten different uses, gives one or more examples of activity types for each use, and indicates some follow-up reading which goes into more depth.
1. Use: For general reading comprehension practice
Example Activity: The activities in the standard sequence of pre-reading warm-up, gist reading activities followed by reading for detailed information serve this purpose.
Recommended
reading: Willis, D. Reading for
information…
2. Use: After general comprehension work has been done on the text, it can be used for language focus
Example Activities: a) If the text contains several examples of a new structure, these can be isolated and guided discovery activities can be used to help the Ls work out the rules of form and use; b) Short texts create learning affordances and can be “mined” for any interesting items that they contain. Eg: if there are a number of verbs/adjectives plus prepositions in the text, they can be given a new copy of the text with the prepositions gapped and asked to complete it before checking with the original; or the T. might focus on a word from a specific lexical field (eg sad from the field of emotions) and ask the learners to brainstorm all the other words they can think of in that field
Recommended
reading: Willis, D. Form, Focus and Recycling
3. Use: To teach specific reading subskills
Example Activity: Eg to develop the Ls’ ability to infer words from co-text, a number of unknown but inferable words in the text can be highlighted or listed on the board and Ls can be asked to look for and discuss in pairs the clues in the text which indicate what the words must mean.
Recommended
reading: Banfield, S. Reading Skills
Swift, S. Inferring Unknown Words from Context Part One and Part Two
4. Use: To stimulate discussion
Example Activities: a) Personalisation activities (ie discussion of the L’s own experience of or opinions on the topic) can be used after comprehension work on the text to engage the learner in the lesson and transfer the language items focused on from receptive understanding to productive use; b) Jigsaw reading activities can be used. eg each L in a group of three has the description of a different holiday resort. After reading, they discuss what they found out in order to decide where they would like to spend a holiday together.
Recommended
reading: Swift,
S. Jigsaw
Reading/Listening Activities
5. Use: To provide models and analyse features of specific genres that the Ss need to write.
Example Activities: After reading for general comprehension, Ls’ can be asked to “notice” a specific feature of the genre – eg a) the use of ellipsis in customer reviews on websites such as Tripadvisor. Practice can then be given in identifying and using ellipsis, before they are asked to write their own review for the website; b) Ls who need to write expository essays for exams such as IELTS can focus on features such as paragraph organisation. They can be given the individual sentence of the paragraph in scrambled order and asked to reconstruct it and justify their order based on features such as content (eg the use of an initial topic sentence) and the logical coherence of the ideas, possibly signalled by connective expressions.
Recommended
viewing: British Council Reading and Writing
Genres
6. Use: To develop text mediation skills
Example Activities: a) Some Ls need to translate or interpret texts for others – eg Ls studying to become professional translators, PAs working for a boss who does not speak English. They may therefore need to develop the ability to translate both L1 to L2 and vice versa accurately and appropriately; b) others may not need to translate but still have to convey the content of a text (in either L1 or L2) to others – eg EAP Ls need to be able to summarise ideas found in their reading and cite the sources conventionally, both in writing and in speech during tutorials etc. Jigsaw reading activities can be used here : each L in a group reads a different article on the same topic (possibly in English but also in their L1). They then discuss the articles to find out what each said – whether they had the same or different information/opinions etc. Finally, they write a short essay discussing the topic and combining the information.
Recommended
reading: Chiappini
and Mansur Mediating a Text
7. Use: To recycle and consolidate language items
Example
Activity: In
lessons following the initial use of a text, the same text (or a section of it)
can be reused in a different activity to give distributed practice (Stevick) of
the items that were originally focused on. Eg: a) paragraph for the text can be used for some sort of dictation
activity – possibly dictogloss or a “running” dictation; b) a gapped version of the text can be given to check the Ls’
ability to remember collocations, use the correct verb forms or whatever.
Recommended
reading: Willis, D. Techniques for
priming and recycling
8. Use: To encourage extensive reading for pleasure which will also provide “roughly tuned input” (Krashen) and aid acquisition.
Example
Activity: If the school has a collection of graded
readers, these can be used as a class library. Each week, learners can be asked to spend
10-15 minutes selecting one that looks interesting and to start reading it –
finishing the book at home as part of their homework
Recommended
reading: Nation and Waring on Extensive Reading and Graded Readers / Day and Bamford on Extensive Reading
9. Use: To practise reading aloud
Example
Activity: Although
many Ls do not need to read aloud, others do – eg 121 Ls I have taught in the
past included politicians who needed to read speeches aloud during EU meetings;
primary school teachers who had to teach English and needed to read stories to
their pupils; a grandmother whose grandchild was being brought up in the US and
wanted to be able to talk to, play with and read stories to him. Reading aloud
is a skill that needs to be taught by using activities such as identifying sense
groups, listen and repeat, and shadow reading
Recommended
reading: Swift, S. Reading Aloud
10. Use: To
teach/practise dictionary skills
Example Activity: If a text contains unknown words which are not inferable from context, or are pronounced in ways which do not correspond “obviously” to the written form. these can be highlighted/listed on the board and the Ls can use dictionaries to check eg meaning (possibly from multiple possible meanings) and pronunciation.
Recommended
reading: Hayton, T. Using Dictionaries
