bEGAE 182- READING AND WRITING SKILLS- BLOCK 03

INTRODUCTION

Block three emphasizes the two basic skills of communication such as reading and writing. These two skills are known as secondary skills. Because these two skills follow the other two skills, listening and speaking or these are the two skills we learn second after listening and speaking. Listening and speaking are known as primary skills as we acquire first in our life. This block consists of four units such as.

UNIT NUMBER	UNIT NAMES
UNIT 01	The Reading Skill
UNIT 02	Vocabulary Development
UNIT 03	The Writing Skill: Some Basic Guidelines
UNIT 04	The Language of Formal Letters

UNIT 01: THE READING SKILLS

Reading is one of the important skills in any language. This is an important activity in our daily life and it is a skill that has to be developed in students earlier from school. We read different materials for different purposes. This skill helps us to enhance our knowledge in different fields.

UNIT 01 discusses the following topics

Reasons for Reading
The Reading Process
Strategies Used by Good Readers
Characteristics of Reading
Levels of Meaning
Reading Problems

REASONS FOR READING

There is a variety of reasons behind reading material.
Some of you read for the sake of having facts, ideas, information, and enjoyment
Some of us read for the sake of language learning.

The following are the reasons for reading in our daily life.

For getting or acquiring knowledge or information.
- Everyone has a purpose behind the reading. Sometimes we have to get knowledge to sort out a problem, and sometimes to find out an answer to the question. Sometimes reading can be based on the curiosity of knowing about something
Need of instruction
- The need for instruction is another reason for reading.
- We need instructions in order to perform some tasks in our workplace or in our daily life.
- For example:- whenever we make a model airplane, or if we have to fill out any forms, we have to read instructions in order to complete it.
To understand official correspondence and friends’ messages is another reason for reading. Official correspondence means an official form of communication. Usually, letters are written between different offices, govt departments, autonomous bodies, and semi-govt bodies to communicate with each other..
We read in order to understand timetables, programs, announcements, notices, and menus. We also read to understand advertisements as well.
We read if we want to know what is happening or has happened (newspapers, magazines, reports)
Another reason for reading is the excitement and enjoyment. We read a wide variety of short stories, novels, songs, and poems in order to get aesthetic pleasure or happiness, or excitement.

the reading process

Reading is a process of constructing meaning from written texts.
In considering the reading process, we have to distinguish reading activities into two;
- Reading for meaning or silent reading and reading aloud.

reading process is a two separate activities

Reading for meaning/silent reading	Reading aloud
Silent reading is a process where we look at the text and understand it.	Reading aloud is a process where we have to, look at the text, understand it and we have to say it.
It is less difficult than reading aloud. because readers have to give attention only to reading and understanding	It is a much more difficult activity than reading silently because our attention has to give to both reading and speaking
It enables us to have an immediate comprehension and understanding	Reading aloud is another language more difficult.
Silent reading consumes less time. readers can cover many paragraphs within a limited time than the loud reading	It consumes more time than silent reading
It helps us to improve reading comprehension.	loud reading helps us to teach pronunciation and encourage
In silent reading, there are not many roles for expressions	It helps us speak with suitable expressions.
It enables us to read with comprehension and understanding	It enables us to speak with feeling and emotion
Reading in silence is all about reading for meaning and understanding	Reading aloud is not just to understand a text but to convey the information to someone else who has no access

COMMUNICATION PROCESS

We have already covered the communication process in the first unit of Block 01. Click here to access it

STRATEGIES USED BY THE GOOD READERS

Interacting with the text is the first strategy adopted by good listeners. Good readers always connect what he already knows and what is in the text.
Good readers always have an expectation about the reading. When they read any piece of writing like a novel, poem, or any other piece of prose or poetry they have a preconceived idea of what can expect from them, And they try to fulfill their expectation.
They create meaning or construct meaning out of what they already know and what they read.
Good readers use schemata.
- Schemata is prior knowledge about a topic.
- Good readers always use prior knowledge of the topic and relate it with new reading material.
- Schemata is a piece of generalized knowledge about a topic, object, or event.
- Knowledge about a language system also comes under the schemata
- An important function of the schemata is to help the readers to reach or find out the meaning.

Schema Theory

Shema theory says that a reader constructs or creates meaning by looking at the relationship between the prior experience and a text.
A reader always combines his experiences in life, language, and literature with the elements of text like vocabulary, ideas, syntax, and semantics and generates or creates meaning.
Schema theory says that readers use schemata by relating them with the text and create meaning.

CHARACTERISTICS OF READING

Following are the characteristics of reading.

Reading is purposeful: there will be a reason or purpose behind a reading. we read either for pleasure or entertainment or for information. The purpose of the reading varies based on the material we read. This means the purpose of reading a novel may change when we read a textbook.
Reading is selective: Reading is a selective process. Sometimes readers have to read selectively and ignore some irrelevant parts. We never read each and everything on the pages. We skim and skip based on the relevance and importance of the content. Especially, whenever readers want to get a wholist idea about a text, they never go through each and every paragraph, instead, concentrate only on important ideas and skip all less impotent ones.
Variations in the reading speed: Variations in reading speed are another characteristic of reading. the speed of reading varies based on content and purpose for example we may read a short story or a novel more faster than we read a text or a study material.
Reading is silent: Reading can be a silent process. Whenever readers have to understand the meaning of material it is better to adopt the method of silent reading
Reading involves a complex cognitive process: Cognitive process means mental process. Reading is not merely an act of pronouncing words on the page, there is a mental process behind the reading. Readers make inferences and assumptions based on what they read. That is why reading is called “a psycholinguistic guessing game”.
Effective reading also involves the chunking of information. this means the reading process forms different groups of information and it leads to the formation of different schemas.
Reading is based on comprehension: Understanding meaning is an integral part of reading. If we understand more we read more.

LEVELS OF MEANING

Considering the reading process, expert readers deal with the four levels of meaning:
- 1. The literal meaning
- 2. The interpretive meaning
- 3. The critical meaning
- 4. The creative meaning
Literal meaning
- literal meaning means word meaning which is directly stated in a text.
- literal meaning usually can be in the form of information.
- every reader can understand the information directly without much effort.
- that information can be facts and details, sequences of events, main ideas and generalizations, causes and effects.
- The readers need not have to dig too deeply to get at it.

Interpretive meaning
- Interpretive meaning is another level of meaning which can find out only through interpretation.
- To read at the interpretive level, readers have to read ‘between the lines.
- because ideas and information are not directly stated there in the text.
- and readers have to make inferences or assumptions about many factors like time relationships – the year, time of day, and season; geographical relationships; cause-and-effect relationships; the ages, feelings, and familial relationships of characters if it is not stated directly.
- In an interpretive text, writers do not always state facts directly, readers have to interpret in order to get meaning.
- Writers usually express interpretive meaning the through literary allusions, idiomatic expressions, and figures of speech

Critical meaning
- Critical meaning is another level of meaning where readers have to make critical analyses or judgments in order to get meaning.
- In other words, it is a type of meaning which is originated from the judgment.
- Critical reading requires making judgments on the reliability and accuracy of the facts presented in the text.
- Critical readers do not make any judgment without reason or evidence.

Creative meaning
- Creative meaning is another level of meaning which can be reached only through creative reading.
- Only creative readers can reach creative meaning.
- Creative reading calls for the generation of new ideas, insights, information, applications, and approaches.
- In order to get creative meaning readers to have imagination and free thinking.
- Apart from that readers have to think in different directions on the same topic

READING PROBLEMS

The following are the mistakes or errors usually committed by readers.

Miscues and decoding errors

Miscues and decoding errors
- Miscues are the errors or mistakes that are committed by the readers when they read.
- The student repeats a word or portion of the text which is not appropriate to the context.
- Instead of reading the word in the text, a child substitutes a word that may or may not make sense in the passage.
The errors can be insertion, omission, reptation, or substitution.
- Insertion (add): the student adds a new word to the sentence while reading out loud, which is not appropriate in the sentence
- Omission (exclude): The student will omit a word while reading out loud. This often changes the meaning of the sentence.
- Repetition: The student will repeat a particular word or even a portion of the text which is appropriate to the sentence and passage
- Substitution: The student may substitute a different word with another one in the text. It adversely affects the meaning.

Through the oral reading of a student, a teacher can identify and interpret a child’s miscues or decoding errors.
A teacher should analyze a student’s miscues.
The following are the areas where teachers have to give more attention:
- First, the Teacher has to check if there is an error in the sounds produced by the students.
  - It means the teacher has to check for the mispronunciation of the words.
  - For example, the child may say rid/for ride and fum/for fume.
- The second one, the teacher has to check whether all syntactic information is correct or not.
  - Syntactic means related rules and grammar. Here the teacher has to correct the grammatical structure of the sentence if there are any errors.
- Third one teacher has to correct the errors related to semantic information.
  - The word semantic means, related to the meaning of a word. Students may make many mistakes related to word meaning.

Faulty reading habits

There are some reading habits that we acquired from our mother Tongue. Those reading habits may transfer when we learn a second language like English. Those such reading habits slow down our reading process.

Subvocalization: Subvocalisation is one of the faulty habits among the readers. Subvocalisation refers to the forming of sound when we read any text. Subvocalisation or loude reading can be helpfull during the initial stages of language leaning. But later it slow down our reading process. In other words subvolisation our loud reading more slower than the silent reading. Becuse our eyes move faster than tongue.
Finger-pointing is another faulty habit among readers. Like subvocalization, finger-pointing also slows down the reading process. Usually, children use the technique to concentrate only on the reading words. But it affects the reading process.
Regressions: Regression is another habit that slows down our reading habit. The regressive eye movement is the eye movement, backward to check previous words instead of moving steadily forward. Sometimes, even a skilled reader may have to return to earlier parts of a text to connect with the previous sentence. But the frequent practice of regressions may cause slow reading.