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.