My favourite reading strategy

Reading in a foreign language lesson is very important, so I use different sources such texts from the student book, articles from the Internet or the Graded Reader texts. The topics of the texts I use depend on the contents we are working in the Learning Situation but I try to adapt to interests and necessities of my students. If the are motivated, the learning process is better. My favourite strategy of reading is “Top Down” approach, I firmly believe that when students are able to predict the content of the text, the reading process becomes easier for them. However, if necessary, we can use other strategies in order to get the best results. In the following lines, I would like to describe the steps I follow in my reading lessons: First of all, I start with pre- reading activities such as watching videos related to the topic of the text. Then, they discus the video; in this way, we can encourage students to use vocabulary and structures that will appear in the text. Then, I give the text to my students, they skim the text and they try to predict the content. After that, they read aloud and they check what have they guessed correctly about the text. Later, they individually answer some comprehension questions. We check the answers and comment on them. Finally, they have to sum up the text in a few words or even when they are at low levels, make up a new title to show they have understood the text. As a post- reading activity, I use gamification in my classroom. Sometimes, I divide the class in groups and each group is given a task where they have to look for something in the text. Other times I use digital games such us Kahoot to review the contents we have worked on during the different lessons. Reading activities need to be prepared beforehand; for example organising the groups, to select the most suitable videos and questions, however it is worth it because through a text we can learn vocabulary and grammar, as well as gain knowledge about other subjects and topics.

READING HABITS

When I look at the different pictures about reading habits, I realise that our reading habits have changed significantly during the last decades. Nowadays, with the use of the internet and the social media, we read a wide variety of texts such as blogs, online articles or posts written by people who are not always writers. Therefore, I believe that not all texts are based on scientific evidence. It is ironic that, although we now have access to a wider variety of texts than in the past, statistics show that young people do not read too much. Taking into account my experience as a reader, I do not read so many paper books as I did in the past. If I read for pleasure, I normally choose printed books, but If I read for professional purposes, I choose a wide variety of text formats. On the other hand, in my first language I usually read novels or short stories in paper format during my free time. In English, I usually read texts on digital devices in order to have a quicker access to information and to apply it in my lessons. Finally, as teachers, I would like to point out that the most important challenge is to motivate our students to read, and reading in a foreign language is even more difficult to achieve successfully.