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Date Posted: 13:44:25 10/16/04 Sat
Author: Verônica
Subject: Re: Task 3
In reply to: Ângela Vitorino 's message, "Re: Task 3" on 17:40:06 10/12/04 Tue


TEACHING READING SKILLS


Mickuleck B.S., in the first parts of his book “A Short Course in teaching reading”, defines reading and explains the reading process, its skills and how to teach them. According to Mickuleck, reading is an active skill, which involves processing ideas, transmitted through language. While reading, a reader interacts with the text, using two processes to comprehend the written language. One process occurs when the reader uses his background knowledge related to the content (top-down) and the other one is when the written symbols are decoded and the writer recognizes words, phrases and sentences (bottom-up). Inside the bottom-up process, working with the specific skill of cohesion devices, students should be encouraged by teachers to recognize and use , through exercises, the function words, which comprise the pronouns, referents and other lexical equivalents.

The author shows the relevant role of the function words in improving vocabulary as a part of accurate reading. Serving as cohesion devices, function words makes the text a whole unit, as he well defines, “signalizing the relationships between concepts and ideas”. Mickuleck relates and gives sample exercises about some function words, such as pronouns, synonyms, hyponyms and summary words.

Among these cohesion devices, pronouns are the most used ones. A lot of students of second language are confused with them, because of their double levels of meaning, i.e., the “local” and “text-level”. Teachers should go beyond their grammatical nature, teaching the pronouns inside a “meaningful context”. The author remarks that, although the small size of pronouns, they have a important role in reading, because they refer to some words mentioned before and sometimes are used “instead of nouns”. His first example is very simple , showing the noun as a “referent” and how the underlined < what is underlined? >pronouns take the place of the noun “Mary Simmms”.
“Mary Simms lives in New York City. She has an apartment near Central Park.
She thinks the jogging is good for her. So she jogs three times a week.”

The next category mentioned by Mickuleck is the synonyms . Students should be directed to recognize their function in a text, noticing when two words or phrases have the same meaning and, after that, arranging the passages of the text. According to the author, writers name one thing with different words, in order avoiding repetition and trying “to make their writing interesting and enjoyable to read.” Good examples of synonyms are showed in a text about “natural resources”, by Amy L. Sonka, like this one < I think that you can't use this kind of sentence in your composition> “What about the forests in your country ?Is the published information on the preservation of the forest areas reliable? Can we trust the information we read?” Note that the word “reliable” and “can we trust the information” have the same meaning.

Considered as another kind of synonyms, hyponyms are defined by the author as words that “name members of the same category but at different levels of specificity”. They are in a chain, where the first one is the most specific and the following are becoming more general. Students can have a better understanding of the text if they know hyponyms and their patterns. Referring to the group Mickuleck chooses, as an example, it is clear that each hyponym is becoming more general : “The Rolling Stones – Rock music groups – Rock music – Popular music – music.

After recognizing the hyponyms, students can realize in a better way the summary words, in which the collective nouns and generalizing words are included. Sometimes only one word or phrase refer to the “whole collection of ideas or examples”, says the author. His examples are very good, and the first one illustrates well this category . In the group “Sports” , considered as a “summary word”, the kinds of sports, like “baseball “, “basketball” , “football”, “swimming” and “tennis” are considered members of the same group.

Summarizing, the author considers the function words ,as cohesive devices, of great importance in the effectiveness of reading process, remarking their role as a helper to improve vocabulary , besides the fact that they can give the text a unit. He gives the teachers good examples to direct the students in recognizing the cohesive devices and put them in practice.

Angela,

I could not find your thesis statment. I think that you should make it clear.

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  • Re: Task 3 -- Deborah, 14:30:39 10/18/04 Mon
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